Myron -
I'm with you. Bill Evans was a brilliant artist.
Jazz is an acquired taste. I'm talking about real jazz here, not the kind of pre-digested pablum served up by people like Kenny G.
I was fortunate enough to work in a real jazz club in New York for a couple of years. I moved to New York in 1978 from Berkeley, CA. I had been working at the Mabuhay Gardens, a punk club in San Francisco, for a year and a half prior to that.
Suddenly I found myself immersed in a musical idiom that was completely antithetical to punk. Nightly, I heard three sets performed by people like George Coleman, Philly Joe Jones, Pharoah Sanders, Billy Higgins, etc. Most readers of this thread probably won't know any of those names, but let me assure you, they are among the finest musicians who have ever walked the earth.
I got a great education in jazz at the Tin Palace, and I will always be grateful for that. It was the kind of place where people came to listen, not to talk over background music. We had a policy of never running the blenders during bass solos, which should give you some idea.
I really miss hearing that kind of incredible stuff night after night. I came to love jazz, and the older I get, the more I appreciate it. At it's best, it is a truly unique and beautiful art form.
The superb musicians I listened to over that time have spoiled me rotten. When jazz is played by mediocre musicians, it bores me, and I can understand why some people have never, and will never, really tune in to it.
- Allen |
