[78-L] Bird with Stringency

[Eric Goldberg]

My friend Dave Uchitel played viola for a couple of years on the Bird with Strings club engagements in NYC. He never understood jazz at all, in fact he said of Bird "I hear he was great but he never played the same way twice" I guess all those winters with the Metropolitan Opera were the standard. Repetition (no pun intended) of repertoire was not an issue.


I once asked him if Bird had borrowed any money from him and he told me "30 dollars."
"Did you get it back??"
"Yes." I had to explain how rare that was. 

Eric




On Wednesday, January 8, 2014 12:57 PM, Joe Scott <joenscott at mail.com> wrote:
 
One factor I guess is that there were a lot more standards than there were bop standards. If you went to see Bird and he played a familiar bop tune such as "Ornithology" you could enjoy (a) a direct association with bop ("our music") as such, (b) recognition of the familiar, and (c) improvisations you'd never heard before. A more "mainstream"-associated performer could provide (b) and (c) on _any_ standard, with many more tunes to choose from without repetition over the years, and wasn't expected to do (a).
Joseph Scott
----- Original Message -----
From: Joe Scott
Sent: 01/08/14 10:38 AM
To: 78-L Mail List
Subject: Re: [78-L] Bird with Stringency

In the '50s the audience for bebop had shrunk and if you were famous to that audience as a bebop-as-such musician, the people who did show up to the little club tended to want to hear the tunes they associated with you (how avant-garde of them). It was different for musicians less closely associated with bebop, such as Oscar Peterson. Joseph Scott ----- Original Message ----- From: Julian Vein Sent: 01/06/14 09:22 AM To: 78-L Mail List Subject: [78-L] Bird with Stringency Charlie Parker recorded some 14 titles for the "Charlie Parker with Strings" sessions, but most of his live recordings consist of just the same four songs. This must've had a stultifying effect on Bird's string players. This got me thinking about the size of jazz musicians' repertoires. Working from those who left a large body of live recordings, I have noted the following: Large: Chet Baker, Dave Brubeck. Small: Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis, John Coltrane. The second group seem to
 stick to their comfort zon
es, and appear unwilling to step outside it. I exclude big bands and singers because there are certain constrictions on what they can practically perform. Julian Vein _______________________________________________ 78-L mailing list 78-L at klickitat.78online.com http://klickitat.78online.com/mailman/listinfo/78-l _______________________________________________ 78-L mailing list 78-L at klickitat.78online.com http://klickitat.78online.com/mailman/listinfo/78-l
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