Watch this video clip and listen to the magic music of Arne Jansen and his trio performing a tune called Release. While in our last post with the Arne Jansen Trio the song they performed was a uniformly quiet piece called On the Shore, this composition passes through different moods, from quiet long electric guitar notes while the drummer is playing the cymbals with mallets to parts where the drums become much louder and hammering while the guitar player plays faster runs on his instruments too. Let’s not forget Eva Kruse on the double bass, unfortunately the sound quality of this recording doesn’t allow to hear her clearly (At least not with the poor speakers built into my laptop).
This kind of music reminds me the records that used to appear on the ECM label during the 1970s and 80s, with artists like Jan Gabarek or Terje Rypdal, to mention just two of a long list who all compared a certain sound on these records. Sounds like open spaces.
I cannot avoid to mention that Eric Schaefer recently performed a very convincing concert in Mexico City as the drummer of the Carsten Daerr Trio. Look out for this young german drum talent, we’re sure that he soon will participate in more interesting projects.
The Arne Jansen Trio with Eric Schaefer and Eva Kruse Performing Release
The Fly Trio Performing a Tune Called Child’s Play
Watch this video with the Fly Trio. This trio counts with Jeff Ballard on drums, Mark Turner on tenor saxophone and Chris Lightcap on accoustic bass. The song is a composition by drummer Jeff Ballard, however, some people think it is kind of a remake of Billie’s Bounce, the famous song by the legendary alto saxophone giant Charlie Parker.
The composition might be influenced by Charlie Parker’s original melody, but the drummer’s introduction is very original: Jeff Ballard playing the drumset with his bare hands. Later he plays with one bare hand and one stick and finally plays the conventional two drum stick style.
This kind of trios require excellent musicians, there are only three instruments in charge of the interpretation. In this case it is especially heavy work for the bass and tenor saxophone players since the band does not include an instrument like the piano or the guitar which can play simultaneously sounding chords. Here the bass player has to perform bass lines that fill the space.
Avishai Cohen Trio Performing Emotional Storm Live on Stage
In this video you can see and listen to the Avishai Cohen Trio featuring Avishai Cohen on the accoustic bass, Mark Giuliana on drums and Shai Maestro on the piano. Avishai Cohen is a recognized jazz bass player who has performed with such great jazz legends as Chick Corea and many others. In this video the band plays a mainly quiet piece which nevertheless is full of energy. Notice the perfect synchronization between the musicians. It is always rewarding to see how the musicians communicate on their field of expertise and what beautiful results they can achieve. Words won’t be enough to fully describe the beauty of the music, or maybe they would do just that: describe the music, but never sound like the music itself. Once again we find out that music is a communication channel of its own, independent from the spoken languages.
The Arne Jansen Trio Performing On the Shore
In this video clip you can see and listen to the Arne Jansen Trio performing the tune On the Shore live on stage. Arne Jansen plays the electric guitar, Eva Kruse is playing the double bass and Eric Schaefer is performing on drums. The song is in a quiet mood with an melancholic feel. Just as the title says, it could be a day on the shore, have the ocean in front of you, get calm with the huge amount of water and the endless rolling waves, maybe some birds flying in the air, a boat or two passing by, just a day On the Shore.
It is remarkable how these great musicians can play such a quiet piece, most listeners won’t appreciate their skills, everybody is expecting them to show what they can do.
However, musicality or musical talent certainly doesn’t have much to do with virtuousity, virtuousity sometimes even kills musicality just because the musician has to perform extra fast runs on his instruments, play them smoothly and don’t make any ‘mistakes’, don’t leave out notes, play wrong notes or anything that could be interpreted as evidence of his lack of talent. Many times, these fast parts don’t sound like music and the performers seem to be like secretaries who can type real fast, regardless of the content they are writing.
Philly Joe Jones Performing a Drum Solo
In this video you can see and listen to a drum solo performed by one of the early jazz drummers named Philly Joe Jones. The occasion this solo was played was on a concert of the Miles Davis Group. Philly Joe Jones has also played with the Sun Ra Orchestra.
Terence Higgins with the Dirty Dozen Brass Band Jamming in the Studio
Watch this video clip with funky drummer Terence Higgins jamming with the Dirty Dozen Brass Band live in the studio. The Dirty Dozen Brass Band usually plays as a marching band but on this video clip you can observe the guys together with a studio drummer and an electric guitar player. The sound quality is not the best since the camera is shooting from behind the drummer so that the sound track also has a relatively high volume for the drum set, which isn’t necessarily bad. As a matter of fact, Terence Higgins plays a really funky rhythm, I couldn’t stay calm when I listened to the recording.
We also recommend you to look for more videos of the Dirty Dozen Brass Band on youtube, there are about forty clips with different performances of this excellent brass band. In the future we will post some more footage of the Dirty Dozen Brass Band here on the Music Video Guide, putting more attention to the band while in the present clip we were so fascinated by the drummer’s funky groove that we had no other choice than to share this video clip with our blog readers. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did, it’s always better to see and hear new things, don’t you think so?
The Elvin Jones Trio Performing A Night in Tunesia – Jazz Standard by Dizzy Gillespie
Elvin Jones is one of the most significant jazz drummers of all times. He became famous while playing with the John Coltrane Quartet and in some occasions he has played duets with John Coltrane, for example on the album Interstellar Space which is an entire album dedicated to this saxophone-drums duet.
In the video clip featured here, Elvin Jones is playing with a guitar player and a hammond organ player: Bireli Lagrene and Joey Defrancesco. This is a relatively unusual combination of musical instruments.
The song they perform is the well known jazz standard tune A Night in Tunesia which was originally recorded by Dizzy Gillespie and his orchestra.
This recording of the song lasts about nine minutes and of course there is enough space for soloing on all instruments. Watch how Elvin Jones beats the drums, there are very few drummers out there who play with this energy and feeling.
Trumpet Player Dizzy Gillespie Performing A Night in Tunesia in a Show from 1958
This is a video clip showing the great jazz trumpet player Dizzy Gillespie performing the song A Night in Tunesia. The drummer on this recording is Kenny Clarke.
The song earned this title after Earl Hines suggested it to Dizzy because the melody sounded exotic and because of World War II battles, Tunisia was a well-known city in the news at the time.
Dizzy Gillespie plays a trumpet with a special form which was custom-made for him because he liked the sound he perceived when playing it. There are many legends and stories about the rare form of Dizzy’s trumpet among which the story that relates it to an accidental footstep of a guy on a birthday party seems to be one of the most believeable ones.
However, the form of Dizzy’s trumpet is not the most important thing when the conversation goes about jazz musicians and trumpet players. Nobody can have doubts about the excellent skills Dizzy shows on the trumpet. I think he is the world’s best trumpet player ever, even though I know that it is difficult to ‘proove’ this but after all it’s just a matter of taste. Some people might like Miles Davis better and still others mention Arturo Sandoval or Rafael Méndez. I would say that all of these guys are fabulous trumpet players but I like Dizzy Gillespie the best. Listen to his improvisation! You decide for yourself.
Ionisation by Edgar Varese Performed by the Ensemble InterContemporain
Watch this video with Pierre Boulez conducting the Ensembe InterContemporain for a performance of Edgar Varese’s (1883 – 1965) composition Ionisation. The music involves many percussion instruments and some rare music instruments like the siren and the lion’s roar which you can listen to as a solo instrument at 1:15 of the video clip and as part of the orchestra at 3:08. This particular version of the instrument is suspended and the performer pulls down from beneath on a string attached to the middle of the drum head.
Not only did Varese experiment with new instruments but also integrated electronic resources into his compositions, for example on the 1958 World Fair when he wrote his Poème électronique as part of the pavilion Philips had commissioned to Le Corbusier. The piece was presented over 400 speakers located in a series of rooms, with the effect that the visitors could listen to the changing sound as they moved through the rooms. This and other experiments with electronic resources gained him the nickname “Father of Electronic Music” (which is a little bit exaggerated considering composers like Karlheiz Stockhausen and many others who actually used electronically produced and synthesized sounds in their compositions) while Henry Miller described him as “The stratospheric Colossus of Sound”. However, ther can’t be no doubt about the quality of the compositions of Edgar Varese.
Some people say that this particular recording is performed much to fast, but as far as the composer is concerned he wrote no number for beats per minute, instead he left the space empty on the sheet music.
Edgar Varese was also one of the most important influences for modern music composer and rock guitar player Frank Zappa, check out the music by this legendary musician and you will clearly hear the influence of the french composer in Frank’s music.
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