The Prisoner by Lawrence, Desautels
from ART: (music mentioned in) Why I Stuck with a Junkie Jazzman (11 Tracks) by Art Pepper
about
Recorded At Fantasy Studios, Berkeley, CA, 1980 (The Winter Moon session) with Stanley Cowell, Howard Roberts, Cecil McBee, Carl Burnett plus strings
lyrics
From the Memoir:
I spat into his ear, “It stinks! It’s weak. It’s terrible. You’ve gotta give it more.”
He groaned to me about the stupid, useless chart, saying that
he’d done the best he could. But he went in for one last try.
A jazz soloist, especially a guy like Art, is, first of all,
a listener. Ask any band he ever played with. His art is to work
“in concert” with the arrangement and the other players, and
to comment on and build on what the music’s saying, creating
something new and individual, yet still harmonious. He must
complete the piece. And good musicians, playing with him, live,
would be inspired by him, by what he was creating, and rise to
the occasion. But in this case, and despite the live setting, the
musicians couldn’t follow him. The chart they had to play was
written: set and static.
Who knows what mental trick Art used to wrench himself
away from an improvising jazzman’s lifelong understanding and
to rise above it? But he did it. He dragged himself out of the
quicksand of that chart, ignoring it, at last, relying just on what
he heard inside. It sounded as if he was ripping his own guts out
in the studio. He was magnificent, and when he heard the take he
knew it. He loved it. And I still love to listen to it.
A friend recently talked about good black gospel
churches, how they sometimes have nurses, even ambulances
there for people who, through the preaching and singing, are
kayoed by the Spirit. Art could blast you just that way, and he
does it for a while, if you’re at all susceptible, when he plays
“The Prisoner” on Winter Moon.
I spat into his ear, “It stinks! It’s weak. It’s terrible. You’ve gotta give it more.”
He groaned to me about the stupid, useless chart, saying that
he’d done the best he could. But he went in for one last try.
A jazz soloist, especially a guy like Art, is, first of all,
a listener. Ask any band he ever played with. His art is to work
“in concert” with the arrangement and the other players, and
to comment on and build on what the music’s saying, creating
something new and individual, yet still harmonious. He must
complete the piece. And good musicians, playing with him, live,
would be inspired by him, by what he was creating, and rise to
the occasion. But in this case, and despite the live setting, the
musicians couldn’t follow him. The chart they had to play was
written: set and static.
Who knows what mental trick Art used to wrench himself
away from an improvising jazzman’s lifelong understanding and
to rise above it? But he did it. He dragged himself out of the
quicksand of that chart, ignoring it, at last, relying just on what
he heard inside. It sounded as if he was ripping his own guts out
in the studio. He was magnificent, and when he heard the take he
knew it. He loved it. And I still love to listen to it.
A friend recently talked about good black gospel
churches, how they sometimes have nurses, even ambulances
there for people who, through the preaching and singing, are
kayoed by the Spirit. Art could blast you just that way, and he
does it for a while, if you’re at all susceptible, when he plays
“The Prisoner” on Winter Moon.
credits
from ART: (music mentioned in) Why I Stuck with a Junkie Jazzman (11 Tracks),
released May 27, 2014
license
all rights reserved
tags
about
Art Pepper Los Angeles, California
Born in 1925 in Gardena, CA, and raised in San Pedro, CA. Incredible life can't be summarized here! Read all about it in STRAIGHT LIFE at Amazon. Read what it was like being married to him in ART: Why I Stuck with a Junkie Jazzman. Amazon ditto.
discography
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Dec 2023 -
Feb 2022 -
Oct 2023 -
Jan 2021
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