Jazz Casual DVD (Count Basie, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie)
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Count Basie, John ColtraneDVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono; English (Dubbed), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono
Format: Black & White, Dolby, DVD-Video, Live, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 90 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2000-08-22
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Rhino / Wea
Movie Reviews of Jazz Casual DVD (Count Basie, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie)
Movie Review: John Coltrane's Performance
Summary: 5 Stars
Afro Blue: It may be one of my favourite tunes of Coltrane, but here Coltrane seems just a little uninspired. A couple of times his soprano rises above the low-set mike and the sound drops out. McCoy Tyner is more worthy of attention, with a fine piano solo. Oh yes, and why is Coltrane holding a cigarette at the beginning of the performance?? He pauses, takes a puff, and grinds it out with his shoe - all in mid-performance! I think this may be Coltrane's sense of humour - he knew the cameras would be on him and wanted to do something weird. I couldn't imagine even trying to play an instrument with a cigarette in one hand.
Also, watch out for Ralph Gleason's condescending attitude - his peering down at Tyner's piano with smug curiosity when he does a fantastic solo, and actually laughing when Coltrane's solo reaches its peak. And don't even mention the insipid speech (jazz musicians like poets in a supermarket???)
Alabama: Get the disc if only for this. This is the only recorded performance of Alabama that is complete. The version on disc was sadly incomplete thanks to a screw-up in the recording studio! The style is sombre and quiet, a good contrast to the screeching of Afro Blue. I like Elvin Jones' drumming here. Look out for Alice Coltrane sitting in the background here.
Impressions: The other two numbers are pretty short, seemingly to make room for a truly inspired performance of Impressions that lasts fourteen minutes and is the meat of the program. Coltrane states the theme, then leaves the stage for McCoy Tyner's amanzing solo, which is truly one of his best. Then Tyner himself drops out, and Jimmy Garrison takes over. To me, the Garrison solo is the highlight here. As amazing as the Coltrane and Tyner solos are, Garrison's strumming is truly unbelieveable. I usually don't like Garrison's solos on disc, but this one is great. Seeing Garrison's intense concentration may help, of course. You can see why people say puddles of sweat were left on the stage when the Classic Quartet had been on. Also, you can finally see why there's usually an annoying buzzing during Garrison's solos - it's his humming!
Then Coltrane comes back on with a screeching, energetic solo that is another highlight. But just as he approaches the end - a dull sounding announcer gives us the name of the TV channel - and the performance is CUT OFF!!! ARRRGH! I hate that - if only the programmers had the decency to keep the end of the performance in...
As it is, this Coltrane disc is truly worth getting - I'd be interested in the Sonny Rollins one too.
Summary of Jazz Casual DVD (Count Basie, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie)
Count BasieA telling moment in this terrific Jazz Casual program occurs very early on, when host Ralph J. Gleason asks Count Basie the name of the first piece that the pianist-bandleader and his small group played. "I don't know," says Basie with a laugh. He's not being flip. "I Don't Know," as it eventually became known, is, like most of the other music Basie and company play here, nothing more or less than a blues jam, improvised on the spot. The "casual" label has never been more appropriate, as this 1968 performance finds Basie at his most relaxed. He smokes a lot. He talks a lot: about the influence of Duke Ellington and such legendary pianists as Fats Waller, Pete Johnson, and Meade Lux Lewis; about the genesis of "One O'Clock Jump," the Basie band's signature tune; and about his own playing style, which he self-effacingly calls "dated." And, best of all, he plays a lot, accompanied by the superb rhythm section of Sonny Payne on drums, Norman Keenan on bass, and the redoubtable Freddie Green on guitar. "I never get tired of playing the blues," Basie tells Gleason, and in the hands of these pros, you'll never get tired of listening to it. Basie's blues are inimitable: effortlessly swinging, completely cool, at once laconic and driving, danceable, humorous, just unmistakably right, with the rhythm players always on the beat and Basie himself the master of what not to play. This is great stuff, and highly recommended. --Sam Graham
Dizzy Gillespie
John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie--trumpeter, bandleader, entertainer--was 43 and still at the peak of his powers when he appeared with his quintet on Ralph J. Gleason's performance-interview TV program, Jazz Casual, in early 1961. And while his style had become somewhat cooler since the days when he and Charlie Parker led jazz's bebop revolution, this four-song set is as identifiably Dizzy as his trademark up-tilted horn and ballooning cheeks. The tunes, from Benny Golson's mid-tempo "Blues After Dark" to Dizzy's own "Lorraine" (with an exotic, sinuous melody reminiscent of his more famous "Night in Tunisia"), are invariably swinging, with fine solo turns by Gillespie, saxophonist-flutist Leo Wright, and a pianist named Lalo Schifrin. That's the same Lalo Schifrin who within a few short years would achieve pop music immortality by composing the Mission: Impossible theme. --Sam Graham
John Coltrane
It might not seem like much: 30 minutes, three tunes, four musicians on a bare- bones soundstage. But this is John Coltrane, and any opportunity to see the legendary saxophonist at work is something to be savored. That's especially true with this January 1964 television performance. Some five years after his membership in Miles Davis's immortal Kind of Blue group, he was well past playing the usual standards and ballads; at the same time, he had yet to explore the outer reaches of the avant-garde. Joined here by pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Jimmy Garrison, and drummer Elvin Jones--the classic Coltrane quartet, and undoubtedly one of the most important and influential groups in jazz history--he works his way through three numbers that were familiar components of the Coltrane repertoire: Mongo Santamaria's "Afro Blue," which finds Trane on soprano sax and features a typically dynamic Tyner solo; "Alabama," a Coltrane original with a brooding, droning intro and conclusion sandwiched around the middle section's slow, swinging groove; and "Impressions," the modal touchstone, which at nearly 14 minutes long gives all four musicians plenty of room to stretch out.
Playing the tenor horn here, Coltrane is typically restless and searching, volcanic and commanding. It's not necessarily pretty, especially when he is backed only by Jones's angry, explosive polyrhythms, but the power is undeniable. The fact that Coltrane says nothing (all other Jazz Casual guests were interviewed by host Ralph J. Gleason) is immaterial; what could he say with his voice that he hadn't already said with his horn? --Sam Graham
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