Charlie Parker with Strings

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Charlie Parker with Strings
Charlie Parker's studio album

Publication
(s)

1995

Label (s) Mercury , Clef , Verve Records

Format (s)

LP, compact disc

Genre (s)

jazz

Title (number)

24 (CD Verve Reissue)

running time

76:18 (CD Verve Reissue)

occupation
  • further strings and woodwinds

production

Norman Granz

Studio (s)

Reeves Sound Studios, New York City

chronology
- Charlie Parker with Strings Bird and Diz

Charlie Parker with Strings is a jazz album by Charlie Bird Parker . The compact disc released in January 1995 is based on the two 10-inch long-playing records Bird with Strings (Vol. 1/2), which were recorded on November 30, 1949 and July 5, 1950 by Mercury Records in New York City and released in 1950 .

Charlie Parker's string sessions

Norman Granz brought Parker, who had been under contract with Mercury Records since 1949, already at the end of 1947 for the recording of the piece "Repetition" with a string formation under the direction of Neal Hefti , when recordings for the record project The Jazz Scene were made. Parker's attempts came at a time when jazz no longer saw itself as the center of popular music. The spontaneous guest appearance at the Hefti Session in 1947 was the trigger for Parker, which led him to prepare a concept for the integration of strings over the next two years. The sessions of November 1949 and July 1950 also realized “Norman Granz's idea of finding new timbres and new statements by combining bebop jazz and classical string sound.” Parker was chosen for the recordings in the context of a ten-piece string ensemble and brought to a jazz rhythm section that nearly matched his regular bebop quintet; instead of Thelonious Monk (as in Bird and Diz ) or Al Haig (in Bird at St. Nick’s , 1950), Stan Freeman and Bernie Leighton, who remained largely unknown, were the pianists.

With the string recordings of well-known jazz standards such as Summertime , Out of Nowhere , Laura , I'll Remember April or They Can't Take That Away from Me , a long-cherished wish for the saxophonist came true. The arrangements for the July session were made by the orchestra leader Joe Lipman, while the November session, which also used the oboe ( Mitch Miller ) and French horn , was Jimmy Carroll. The recordings became Parker's most successful records during his lifetime and led to a live performance with string accompaniment in August and September 1950 at the Apollo Theater and Carnegie Hall and in 1952 to further sessions with strings, in which trumpeters Al Porcino and Bernie Privin also took part .

Charlie Parker with Tommy Potter, Miles Davis, Max Roach around 1947.
Photograph by William P. Gottlieb .

Appreciation

Parker researcher Phil Schaap sees Miles Davis ' departure from the Parker Quintet in December 1948 as a turning point in Parker's musical career; With the fusion of classical and jazz music, he had given a formula that was later repeated by many jazz musicians in order to express a more relaxed, pop-oriented side of their work and to increase the awareness of their music. Schaap sees the album as "a door opener that allows improvising musicians to this day to search for a lush background structure" and recalls similarly oriented projects by Stan Getz ( Focus , 1961), Johnny Hodges , Chet Baker , Harry Carney , Clifford Brown ( Clifford Brown with Strings , 1955), Billie Holiday ( Lady in Satin , 1958) and Wynton Marsalis .

Parker's string recordings have been highly controversial among jazz audiences since they were first published; this controversy also reflects the divergent assessment of the album by the critics; while Allmusic gave the album the highest rating and the "collection (as) lush, poetic, romantic as hell and the perfect antidote for someone who is oversaturated with records with undisciplined blowing", Richard Cook and Brian Morton described it with only three Stars and did away with the legend of "Parker's (alleged) impatience with the smooth setting ". However, the authors found his solo construction in "Stella By Starlight" to be masterful. Brian Priestley particularly highlights Parker's solo in Just Friends ; otherwise he often tries to play too straight . In 1988 the recordings were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame .

Edition history

Under the production of Norman Granz, the material from the first session was released on November 30, 1949 on the 10-inch LP Charlie Parker With Strings ( Mercury MG-35010 ); all six songs were standard material from the Great American Songbook . The success of the first album led to another session on July 5, 1950, the pieces of which appeared on Charlie Parker With Strings (Vol. 2) (Mercury MGC-109), then another eight standards. The album was released on Granz ' Clef Records (MGC 675) in the form of a 12-inch LP, and later also on Verve (MGV 8004) under the title The Genius Of Charlie Parker, # 2 - April In Paris . After various other editions in LP form, Verve Records edited these fourteen pieces on a compact disc in 1995 , supplemented by ten additional pieces such as the aforementioned Hefti session from 1947, five pieces from a live recording from Carnegie Hall on September 17, 1950 ; four from another studio session in January 1952 and finally a piece from an earlier concert at Carnegie Hall in December 1947.

Pieces from the original albums and cast

1995 CD release and cast

All other pieces as stated above.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Cook / Morton, p. 1019.
  2. ↑ a b c Phil Schaap about Charlie Parker with Strings in an interview with Marc Myers in Jazzwax 2010
  3. ↑ a b Peter Niklas Wilson , Ulfert Goeman: Charlie Parker - His life, his music, his records. Oreos (Collection Jazz), Schaftlach 1988, ISBN 3-923657-12-9 , p. 135.
  4. ↑ and further: “the perfect antidote to a surfeit of jazz records featuring undisciplined blowing. There's a lot of jazz, but there's only one bird ”.
  5. ↑ Carr, Pristley, Fairweather: Rough Guide . P. 492 f.
  6. ^ Clef 600 series. Jazzdisco.org