Why Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring,” Now 100 Years Old, Fascinates Jazz Musicians
May 29 marked the centennial of the 1913 premiere of Igor Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring (Le Sacre du Printemps) — one of the unquestioned landmarks of modern music. (Listen to this NPR feature on the impact of Stravinsky’s premiere, both on the 1913 audience on Paris and on composers, dancers and audiences ever since.)
After a century, Stravinsky’s score still fascinates, invigorates and jars listeners. It’s no wonder that jazz musicians are strongly drawn to the rhythmic, tonal and harmonic invention of Stravinsky’s masterpiece. NPR’s Patrick Jarrenwattananon takes a closer look at the love that generations of jazz musicians, from Charlie Parker, Coltrane and Miles Davis to the Bad Plus, have harbored for Stravinsky’s music.
-Nick Moy
(Photo: Dancers in folkloric costume from The Rite of Spring in 1913. Keystone-France/Getty Images)
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Wayne Shorter Talks Saxophone and Saxophonists
This 1992 interview of Wayne Shorter by fellow saxophonist Mel Martin is wonderfully in-depth and revealing. Wayne talks about horns, meeting John Coltrane and Lester Young, joining Blakey and Miles and other early career highlights.
-Michael Cuscuna
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Sun Ship: The Complete Sessions: John Coltrane’s Musical Documentary
An in-depth look at this new release in The New Yorker…“The album Sun Ship captures that vast musical and moral change; the complete session documents it in action, like a sonic documentary film. It’s a treasure, a joy, and a revelation.”
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Sun Ship: The Complete Sessions: John Coltrane’s Musical Documentary
Jimmy Garrison, After John Coltrane
Wow, a nice nod to Jimmy Garrison by Doug Ramsey, on what would have been his 79th birthday, plus a posted 1968 video of the Elvin Jones trio with Joe Farrell and Garrison. I had no idea there was any footage on this trio. A lovely discovery. I only worked with Jimmy Garrison once on an Archie Shepp album about a year before he died. For such a large talent on his instrument, he was modest and kind person.
-Michael Cuscuna
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Read MoreJohn Coltrane: Giant Steps
Wow, this is a riveting transcription of Coltrane’s “Giant Steps” that unfolds as the music is being played. It reminds me how miserably I failed at being able to sight read and how thoroughly amazed I am at what Coltrane played and at how someone could commit it to musical notation in less than ten years of time! Have fun, watch this and be amazed.
-Michael Cuscuna
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Saving the John Coltrane House in Philadelphia
This is a very cool article about Coltrane’s house in North Philly, where he lived from 1952 to ’58 when he moved to New York City. It’s gratifying to see the street named in his honor and the house declared a landmark. I lived in Philly from 1966 to ’70 and these photos remind me of what a three-story city Philadelphia was. I’m sure that’s no longer the case.
-Michael Cuscuna
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Kenny Garrett Blows Them Away on emGiant Steps/em
Doug Ramsey recounts a tale of awe on watching this video clip of Kenny Garrett’s blistering solo on the John Coltrane classic Giant Steps. It’s the kind of story you would have expected to hear about Coltrane himself. Anyone who would play Giant Steps in public, at this tempo, naturally invites such comparison. Looks like Kenny Garrett can take it.
-Nick Moy
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Read MoreSaxophone Summit: Brecker, Lovano and Liebman Play Coltrane
Everyone is on fire in this 1999 webcast of three contemporary tenor saxophonists re-igniting John Coltrane’s Locomotion. The rhythm section, Phil Markowitz, Rufus Reid and in particular, Billy Hart, nearly set off Birdland’s sprinkler system, too. Many thanks to the Jazz Video Guy, Bret Primack.
-Nick Moy
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John Coltrane’s Neighborhood: Philadelphia as Post-War Jazz Capital
All About Jazz is hosting a series of articles about the Philadelphia where John Coltrane spent his formative years. And not just Coltrane: the Heath Brothers, McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Smith, Philly Joe Jones, Benny Golson, Lee Morgan and Reggie Workman, among many others. In this article, Rob Armstrong revisits the Philadelphia local culture that, as Odean Pope asserts, harbored the most important US jazz scene between World War II and the mid 1960s.
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The Early Years of Jimmy Heath
We’ve been relating in the Gazette the resurgent interest in John Coltrane’s formative years in Philadelphia. Another distnguished musical citizen of that City was saxoophonist and composer Jimmy Heath. In this 2009 JazzWax interview, Marc Myers adroitly elicits Jimmy Heath’s impressions of the jazz world in the late 1940s — especially his first foray into Dizzy Gillespie’s world, from the eyes of youth — albeit highly talented youth.
-Nick Moy
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