Play "Love Me Or Leave Me" by the great Bud PowellLast night, I was reading — and getting close to the end of — Woody Allen's autobiography, and I came across this:
Play "The Blood-stained Banner," play "Murder Most Foul"
I never thought having biological children was doing them any favor, bringing kids into this world. Sophocles said to never have been born may be the greatest boon of all. Of course I’m not sure he would’ve said that if he ever heard Bud Powell play “Polka Dots and Moonbeams.” Soon-Yi and I chose adoption to try and make life better for a couple of orphans already marooned on this orbiting psychiatric ward....And then on the last page of the book, summing up, he says "If I could trade my talent for any other person’s, living or dead, who would it be? No contest—Bud Powell."
Here's "Polka Dots and Moonbeams":
If you're wondering what the lyrics are, Frank Sinatra will sing them for you, here.
A country dance was being held in a garden
I felt a bump and heard an "Oh, beg your pardon"
Suddenly I saw polka dots and moonbeams
All around a pug-nosed dream...
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53 comments:
Jazz is like baseball. Either you just get its greatness or you don't. I don't get this.
Woody Allen and Robert Crumb both played the clarinet...after leaving high school!
Monk's tribute
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuHjgKQDofs
Isn't woody allen a pretty good jazz clarinetist?
John Henry
Somebody please tell Woody that his jazz fetish makes him even creepier and less likable ...
Maybe 20 years ago James Lileks posted an mp3 of Bud Powell playing Celia. I listen to it a lot. Over the years I've picked up a couple of Bud Powell collections, but I don't listen to them much. "Celia" is all the Bud Powell I need, I guess.
The "is it fair to bring kids into this crazy world" shtick is tres tired. Two months ago, there was never a better time in history to be having children. Even today, in the midst of a global pandemic, there are very few periods in history that were better than now.
Worrying about "this crazy world" is a luxury we have precisely because the world is so extraordinarily not crazy.
“on this orbiting psychiatric ward....”
Does he really believe this? Or is this a joke?
I don’t like his shtick any more. “Annie Hall” was his only good movie.
I think I'm biased against the Bud Powell jazz piano version.
Too much like those Vince Guaraldi piano interludes during the Peanuts cartoons when Charlie Brown is wallowing in self-pity and depression.
Always brought me down as a kid, and still conjures those emotions to this day.
Sinatra's vocal version added melody, depth and sentimentality.
Someone introduced me to the music of Eric Dolphy, John Coltrane and Albert Ayler in 1972 (all of them, sadly, already dead by then) and the fetish has never left me since.
"Isn't woody allen a pretty good jazz clarinetist?"
He plays with a group and they get attention because of him, but he does not say he's any good.
"I practice every day and with such dedication that to make sure I get it in I’ve practiced on freezing beaches, in churches while my film crew lit, in hotel rooms after work, at midnight, getting into bed and pulling the quilts over my head so as not to wake the other guests. Yet listen to the music as I have, read the stimulating tales of the musicians’ lives, and blow, blow, blow with different mouthpieces and reeds, always searching for that combination that will make me sound better, I still stink. I remain like a weekend tennis player among Federer and Nadal. Sorry to say, I just don’t have it: the ear, the tone, the rhythm, the feeling. And yet I’ve played publicly in clubs and on concert stages, in opera houses all over Europe, in packed auditoriums in the U.S. I’ve played in parades in New Orleans and bars there, at the Jazz Heritage festival and at Preservation Hall, and all because I can cash in on my movie career. Years ago, Dotson Rader, a witty man, asked me over dinner, “Have you no shame?”"
Allen, Woody. Apropos of Nothing . Arcade. Kindle Edition.
(Woody's) "...jazz fetish makes him even creepier and less likable..."
Why?
I've played clarinet for over fifty years, and studied with some really good teachers. I'm no jazz player, but can pretend to be one for short periods if the money is right.
His self evaluation is pretty much on target. If you don't want to listen, leave. As with his writing, it's not about you. It's about Woody. Imagine an alternate world where he was a great musician who made lousy movies for his own amusement.
"Someone introduced me to the music of Eric Dolphy, John Coltrane and Albert Ayler in 1972 (all of them, sadly, already dead by then) and the fetish has never left me since."
Of those three, Dolphy is my favorite, (though they're all great). There's something about Dolphy's tone (even on bass clarinet!) that sounds to me like he soaked his reeds in lemon juice!
"I don't think I knew the name Bud Powell until last week"
Wow. Interesting.
Do you sometimes get the feeling that declaring a passion for this or that jazz musician is a convenient pose? If so, does the pose-passion differ from declared passions for, oh, Dylan or Picasso or Bergman? I'd say yes and yes.
Mezzrow, you've named yourself after another white licorice stick player whose talent was apparently never equal to his efforts (or self-advertisements). I read REALLY THE BLUES a couple of years ago and found it very entertaining.
Jazz is a bag of tricks. A larger bag of tricks than most genres, it uses far more scales lending it an air of sophistication, I guess, Rock music uses maybe three scales heavily, but at the end of the day, Jazz is still a genre, which is a limited bag of tricks that gives it coherence. I do appreciate that the guy spent a lot of time in front of the piano mastering his craft though, but there has to be more to whatever Dylan and Allen see in this. If Allen really wanted to get good at Jazz, he needed to make it his life. You can’t practice twenty minutes a day then compare yourself to people who have devoted their life to it.
Maybe Dylan knows that his I IV V based bag of tricks is far more limited than that of Jazz. The more sophisticated your musical listening skills, which Dylan has in spades, I am betting, the more tricks it takes to overwhelm your analytical mind and take you to the land where music is intended to take you. That’s “tim in vermont’s” hypothesis about Jazz, anyway. <<-- Read that in a Forest Gump voice if you want.
“on this orbiting psychiatric ward....”
"Does he really believe this? Or is this a joke?"
Why are you baffled? This is not an uncommon view of the world, currently or historically.
You can listen to the posted recording of Bud Powell that you posted, followed by Frank Sinatra's vocals, then go listen to and view this: Today's sounds.
The music of my times- 60s-80's was good. But I always believed the music of my folks times was the best. Todays music and movies are generally, for shit. It's a barren time, creatively. Everyone trying so hard to sound the same, dance the same. Class and sophistication replaced by classLESS and in-your-face attitudes (for what reason, no one is sure.) And it's no surprise that the movies reflect the same vacuous style. Hollywood and the music industry are one and the same, with the same owners or different divisions of the same companies. They are all one giant piece of white bread. Flavorless, tasteless, but bought up by everyone without a need for flavor or taste.
Years ago I ran a nightclub/restaurant in Detroit. We were mostly top 40 dance bands. But one night a week we brought in a big band featuring JC Heard, formerly a drummer with some of the greats, from Count Basie to Duke Ellington, Dizzie Gillespie, Benny Carter and others. The greats. JC was old by this time. He brought in a Big Band comprised of some of his peers- older greats who had played with some of the best, along with younger players learning their licks from the veterans. The rest of the week we were hip and hot. But on Big Band night, the place was hopping. The younger people (me and my peers) would stand back and watch as older folks took over the dance floor, lindy-hopping and such until the younger crowd started wanting to join in. The room would pulse with great music, laughter, fun, and a feel of sohpistication from another time. It was great.
Then the rest of the week it was back to top 40 crap. Yeah it was busy, but it had such a different lesser feel to it. Fake. Not real.
Hmmm. That bit about biological children is interesting considering who his biological son is supposed to be. Supposed to be because of Frank Sinatra. I feel like that bit is a kind of acknowledgment that he has no biological children...
Althouse
I don't think I knew the name Bud Powell until last week...
Conclusion: in her nearly 7 decades of life on this earth, Althouse has paid little to no attention to jazz. Bud Powell is one of the greats in jazz piano.
I wonder how aware Althouse is of Western Swing, a genre that combines folk,blues, pop, and jazz. Here Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys perform Who Walks In.
Lurker21
Somebody please tell Woody that his jazz fetish makes him even creepier and less likable.
Like Robert Cook, I ask "Why?"
Woody Allen is a fairly competent clarinetist, but he knows his limits. Like another commenter stated, you can't spend 20 minutes a day on something that others spend a whole life on and expect to be as good as they are.
Powell is Oscar Peterson lite.
Widmerpool, In Walked Bud is one of my favorite Monk tunes.
Why?
As one famous jazzman said, "If you have to ask, you'll never know."
If you're a jazz fan, you may have a different opinion, but it you're not, Woody's jazz fetish probably isn't endearing - just more empty poser chatter from somebody you don't want to hear from anyway.
Sebastian
Do you sometimes get the feeling that declaring a passion for this or that jazz musician is a convenient pose?...yes
In the case of Woody Allen, while his clarinet playing is not up to the level of a professional jazz player, he is quite aware of jazz and who plays jazz.
I'll definitely read Woody's autobiography, but all these extracts lower my already low opinion of him. He writes like a pretentious College sophomore. But I suppose if I'd shacked up with a Hollywood actress, had a kid out of wedlock, boinked and married her Korean adopted daughter, and been in psychoanalysis for 30 years, I might label the world a "psychiatric ward" too.
"Years ago I ran a nightclub/restaurant in Detroit. We were mostly top 40 dance bands. But one night a week we brought in a big band featuring JC Heard, formerly a drummer with some of the greats, from Count Basie to Duke Ellington, Dizzie Gillespie, Benny Carter and others. The greats. JC was old by this time. He brought in a Big Band comprised of some of his peers- older greats who had played with some of the best, along with younger players learning their licks from the veterans. The rest of the week we were hip and hot. But on Big Band night, the place was hopping. The younger people (me and my peers) would stand back and watch as older folks took over the dance floor, lindy-hopping and such until the younger crowd started wanting to join in. The room would pulse with great music, laughter, fun, and a feel of sohpistication from another time. It was great."
Throughout the 60s, when I was listening to what was new music then and is now just the music I've listened to all my life, my father endlessly tried to get me to join him in the belief that the era of the big bands was the greatest. He even believed that the big bands would come back. Rock and roll would play out as a fad and what was truly wonderful would have to return. My music, the music of the 60s, did live on and on and the big bands never came back. I'm not saying that's a good thing, and I would be happy now to listen to all those records my father wanted to play for me back then.
Listening to them with him is something that has not been possible for more than 30 years, but I did do a "Records from my father" series of posts on this blog.
Bud Powell is good. You have to remember that Woody is so old he's "Pre-Rock & Roll". To a teenage Woody, Bebop was "cutting edge" the dangerous "Bad boy music" of the late 40s and early 50s. Today, its old fogey music.
Maybe one reason Woody cannot improve is that the music he hears and imprints on himself day after day is the music HE plays as he practices. There's a paradox in practicing. You're hearing yourself setting a bad example.
Beautiful melody, literate lyric, almost anybody can sing it.
“There were questions in the eyes of other dancers as we floated over the floor
“There were questions but my heart knew all the answers, and perhaps a few things more.”
"I would be happy now to listen to all those records my father wanted to play for me back then."
Go to You Tube, search for big bands especially those your father liked, create a play list of the ones you like - voila endless joy.
"The Double Exaltation of Bud Powell" feels like the name of a painting done in a religious-iconic style.
There are cherubs over the piano.
I am Laslo.
There's a paradox in practicing. You're hearing yourself setting a bad example.
I don't think it works. You're listening to other things, too, and hearin your mistakes as mistakes and trying to get better. But a point comes where you're about as good as you can get. In my late forties I took some guitar lessons with the (much younger) Irish guitarist John Doyle, and somewhere around the third lesson he told me, "Now don't get discouraged. I've been playing for 15 years and I was no good at all for the first couple years." I told him I'd been playing for about 30 years. He stared at me and then burst out laughing. "You're FOOKIN' with me!" I assured him I was not. He said, "Well, That's the saddest thing I ever heard. Let's get a drink."
"This is not an uncommon view of the world, currently or historically.”
Especially among people who seldom leave NYC.
I'm almost a complete musical illiterate, yet even I can tell the difference between Woody Allen playing a Jazz song and a good professional playing the same one.
Allen is good clarinet player for a Movie star.
The Sinatra recording? One of his first with Tommy Dorsey. Still a little bit in the style of Jack Leonard. More, much much more to come.
Big Band music was good in its time. But even by the 50s it was played out. Miles Davis thought Jazz was pretty much over by the mid-60s and moved on. For a music genre to produce great music, the young musicians need to be interested in it. Almost all great music is produced by men under 40. But they aren't interested in Jazz or Big Band. If you want to look at from a race angle, most of the America's popular music for over 100 years follows the same pattern. The blacks invent it and play it, then the white musicians copy and add something, and then its on to the next invention. Ragtime-Jazz-Big Band-Bebop-R&B-Rock-n-Roll-etc.
Genre: TV/movie actors who aren't half bad as musicians:
Hugh Laurie: piano (jazz and blues)
I like Louis Armstrong and particularly his Verve recordings with Ella Fitzgerald. I'm pretty sure that music will endure. The Powell recording sounded more selective in its appeal.
Is it fair to bring up kids in the crazy world of Woody Allen and Soon-Yi?
Is it fair to bring up children in the crazy world of Woody Allen and Soon-Yi?
'My music, the music of the 60s, did live on and on" That's because you are still juveniles.
OK, I guess. "Sunshine of Your Love" it ain't.
From the Powell Wikipedia page:
Bill Evans, who described Powell as his single greatest influence, paid the pianist a tribute in 1979: "If I had to choose one single musician for his artistic integrity, for the incomparable originality of his creation and the grandeur of his work, it would be Bud Powell. He was in a class by himself"
Personally, I don't want to get into an argument with Bill Evans about great jazz pianists.
“Now in a cottage filled with lilacs and laughter, I’ll know the meaning of the words ever after
And I’ll always see polka dots and moonbeams, when I kiss the pug nosed dream”
I could probably listen to it if it were more in tune...
Great tune. I've loved it forever.
Any music that was great in its time is still great--you just have to hear it.
I have picked up, at estate sales, for less than $10.00 American, total, three Big Band anthology discs and one of Louie Armstrong doing all WC Handy songs with a small group, with Velma Middleton singing.
Anyone who can listen to the great Big Bands going full tilt without pleasure is missing out.
Narr
I pity the fool
Thanks for reminding me what a depressingly miserable human being Woody Allen is.
Someone should tell him that, as long as you manage to avoid people like Woody Allen, the world is full of wonder, mystery, and beauty, the moreso the closer attention you pay to it.
Of course, this is hard to notice when your head is up your ass, which is a good description of Woody Allen's self-induced predicament.
You must expect to live a long time, Professor, if you have time to read this kind of tripe.
And RIP Bud Powell, whose work I am not familiar with. But from what others have said he made a more positive contribution in his lifetime than Woody Allen has.
Agree with you 100%, Narr. The big bands from the classic era ('30--50s) could really cook. The musicianship and scoring was great. Real pros, unlike today's "samplers" and "lip sync-ers".
I have some Frank Sinatra records with Count Basie's band. Some things are just perfect for what they are.
Jazz is a bag of tricks. A larger bag of tricks than most genres, it uses far more scales lending it an air of sophistication, I guess, Rock music uses maybe three scales heavily, but at the end of the day, Jazz is still a genre, which is a limited bag of tricks that gives it coherence.
If you're thinking in terms of scales, you don't get it. And you'll never get a player like Powell, or Parker, or Gillespie or Dolphy.
Jazz isn't scales. It's time, and it's CHORD TONES on strong beats, and leading tones into those chord tones, and it's space. At least in Bud's time, which was the bebop era. The scales are incidental, and if you think you can get at it thinking in terms of scales and not chord tones, it will hold you back.
Jeff: John Doyle is a great master. :-)
Althouse
My music, the music of the 60s, did live on and on and the big bands never came back. I'm not saying that's a good thing, and I would be happy now to listen to all those records my father wanted to play for me back then.
Beginning circa 2000-2002 I purchased a number of CD box sets. including old jazz at $1-$3 per CD. While they are neither as numerous nor as cheap as they used to be, Half Price Books still sells a fair amount jazz CDs, including box sets. There is a Half Price Books store in Madison, temporarily closed, but their website is still open.
IF you want to explore big band music, it is available.
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