My Own Biggest Fan

I’ve always thought I should know and appreciate more about jazz and classical music. Well, not ALWAYS. For awhile I derided jazz pretty badly. Mostly because I didn’t understand it. I wouldn’t say I understand it much more than I did back then (not as long ago as I’d like to admit) but now I am at least open to learning about it. So far my endeavours to understand it have been only very slightly successful. Probably because I most of my experience with both jazz and classical has been mostly reading about them, watching documentaries about them and not actually LISTENING to the music.

Today I went to the record store and I bought three jazz records. All of these records are by artists I have a very vague understanding of. Mostly they were chose because of name recognition, and how cohesive a package the cover made it look like. I didn’t want “greatest hits” packages or some other cash-in title, of which it seems there are many.

I normally do a little bit of research about an album before I write about it here but I’ve decided instead to write this post in a way that displays my ignorance of the subject matter. After I write a very uninformed piece about my meandering thoughts on these albums, I’ll go off and read up about where they fit into the artist’s careers and jazz as a whole.

The Cat by Jimmy Smith

I was first introduced to Jimmy Smith through Sideshow Sid’s CJSW show The Musiquarium, which uses the track Walk on the Wild Side as it’s theme song. It’s a kick ass song that has always been something I thought that a burlesque dancer could light a stage on fire to. (Get on that, Garter Girls.)

I found myself a copy of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf somewhere along the line, I think even before I put two and two together that this album was by the same guy. I don’t listen to it very often because it looks like someone used the record as a doormat before I got it. Too scratched to enjoy. But the couple of times I did listen, it exhibited the same grand virtuosity that is evident in Wild Side.

I think The Cat is a pretty excellent album. I feel like I’m not the one to proclaim anything about it, but like Virginia Wolf, it has all of the things I’ve liked about Jimmy from the beginning. The fingerwork that seems to be beyond human capacity and songs that are just incredibly funky.

In a Silent Way by Miles Davis.

I’ve watched a little over half of Ken Burns’ 19 hour Jazz documentary. (Despite this fact I still cannot speak intelligently on the subject.) I think they were just about to get to Miles when I believe I got distracted by The Wire.

I once briefly owned a Miles Davis CD, Panthalassa, that was “remixed” by Bill Laswell. When I bought it I was expecting something like Laswell’s dub experiments, using Davis’s material as a jumping-off point. Instead I got a straight-up jazz album only mildly remixed, and I don’t really understand what the point of it was even now. It had the entirety of In a Silent Way mixed down to a 15 minute selection as it’s opening track. I remembered having heard most of the album as I was listening to it, so I guess it gave me a good base to rest my opinions on.

Have Trumpet, Will Excite by Dizzy Gillespie

Of the three artists, Dizzy is probably the one I should know the most about due to his stature as a historical figure and also because of how much time was devoted to him in the Ken Burns documentary. At least I think so, it’s been awhile. Funny thing is, I think he’s the one I’ve heard the least amount of music from.

It’s my understanding that he’s of a certain era of musician that came directly from the Big Band era. Musicians like Davis and Smith were not, (I don’t think) of the generation that started off playing big band jazz and then branched out from that. Where as Dizzy was. (If I’m wrong about this, it will be unnecessary to correct me as I’ll be reading about all three of these guys on Wikipedia pretty soon.) As such, his music reminds me a little of that era and sounds a little more dated than the others. Not that Jimmy Smith doesn’t sound firmly of the 60s, but Dizzy sounds older, 40s or 50s. I enjoyed Have Trumpet, but it wasn’t my favourite of the bunch. Of course, it was the last of three albums and I might have not as into it as I could have been, so I’ll reserve my judgement.

All three of these albums will receive multiple listenings from me, I’m positive of that. Especially the I a Silent Way. I already feel like it has subtleties that will reveal themselves as I grow as a jazz listener. It’s my hope that next time I choose an album it will be based on more than just the cover design and I also hope I’ll soon be able to write about a jazz album in reference to more than just my own ignorance. I’m sure you’ll be grateful for that, as I doubt this was all that interesting of a read as it could have been.