Jazz

[Dennis Perrin/Nancy Bauer]

>If you think that Parker was "conventional" in his arrangements, it is 
>because he and the other bebop pioneers created modern jazz arrangement. The 
>strings was a Norman Granz thing. Parker is alawys worth listening to in any 
>circumstances, but for the motherlode you have to listen to the Savoy and 
>Dial recordings, not the Verve recordingsa; and among the Verve recordings, 
>listyen to, e.g., Now's the Time or Swedish Schnapps. Coltrane is wonderful, 
>and became great with the Quartet, but there's no comparison in terms of 
>musical power, fertility, inventiveness, richness, and, truth be told, sheer 
>virtuosity. Parker sounds "conventional" becomes his innovations became 
>jazz. Bird lives. --jks

Don't get me wrong: I think Bird was fantastic, and yes, he was superior to
Coltrane in terms of "sheer virtuosity." Also, be-bop is perhaps my favorite
jazz form. So major props to Birdman (and his early partner Diz). I guess
what I meant by "conventional" arrangements is that Bird, for all his skill,
stayed pretty much inside the form that he helped to establish. Of course he
died young, so who knows what he would have done in the 1960s. But Coltrane,
first with the Quartet, then after, incorporated various pieces of world
music in his arrangements, bits from the Arab and Indian experience, and so
on. As he prolonged his compositions, he also stripped away the traditional
sax notes common to modern jazz and unveiled truly raw, piercing sounds. In
the end, though, it is useless to compare Bird and Coltrane. Both were
giants, and each offered a unique sound. 

DP