Evans in England: Live at Ronnie Scott's
| Evans in England: Live at Ronnie Scott's | ||||
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| Live album by Bill Evans | ||||
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| Label (s) | Resonance Records | |||
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2 LP, 2-CD, download |
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Title (number) |
18th |
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Evans in England: Live at Ronnie Scott’s is a jazz album by Bill Evans , which was recorded in December 1969 at Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club in London and released on April 13, 2019 on Resonance Records . It is the label's fourth production with previously unreleased material by the pianist, from which Live at Art D'Lugoff's Top of the Gate (2012), Some Other Time: The Lost Session from the Black Forest (2016) and Another Time: The Hilversum Concert (2017) are available.
background
The production Evans in England documents on two LPs or CDs a concert recording from 1969, when the Bill Evans Trio toured Europe several times with bassist Eddie Gomez and drummer Marty Morell , initially with performances a. a. in Hilversum on March 26, 1969, in Pescare on July 18, then in late autumn of the year beginning at the Jazzhus Montmartre in Copenhagen on November 24, documented on the Milestone album Jazzhouse . After a concert in Amsterdam on November 28, 1969, a guest performance of several days at the London club Ronnie Scott's followed in December 1969. The recording contains both Bill Evans' earliest recording of "The Two Lonely People" and "Sugar Plum" as well as an interpretation by Miles Davis ' " So What " (recorded with Evans for the first time in 1959 for the Davis album Kind of Blue ) and two of the pianist's own compositions, "Re: Person I Knew" and "Waltz for Debby". The CD version also contains jazz standards such as “What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life”, “Come Rain or Come Shine”, “My Foolish Heart” and “Who Can I Turn To (When Nobody Needs Me)”. The booklet contains liner notes by producer Zev Feldman and music journalist Marc Myers ; also interviews with Gomez, Morell and the filmmaker Leon Terjanian , who made the label aware of the private audio documents.
The Resonance album is not to be confused with another Bill Evans album, Complete Live at Ronnie Scott's 1980 (Gambit Records).
Track list
- Bill Evans: Evans in England (Resonance Records HLP9037)
- Disc 1
- Our Love Is Here to Stay ( George & Ira Gershwin ) 4:44
- Sugar Plum (B. Evans, John Court) 9:44
- Stella by Starlight ( Ned Washington , Victor Young ) 6:23
- My Foolish Heart (Ned Washington, Victor Young) 4:41
- Waltz for Debby (Evans) 7:59
- 'Round Midnight (Hanighan, Williams, Monk) 6:37
- The Two Lonely People (Evans) 8:07
- Who Can I Turn To (When Nobody Needs Me) ( Leslie Bricusse , Anthony Newley ) 7:20
- Disc 2
- Elsa ( Earl Zindars ) 7:16
- What Are You Doing for the Rest of Your Life? (Alan Bergman, Marilyn Bergman, Michel Legrand ) 5:50
- Turn Out the Stars (Evans) 5:20
- Re: Person I Knew (Evans) 8:51
- Goodbye (Gordon Jenkins) 2:39
- Come Rain or Come Shine 5:11
- Very Early (Evans) 5:03
- So What (Miles Davis) 9:35
- Midnight Mood ( Joe Zawinul , Ben Raleigh ) 5:07
- Polka Dots and Moonbeams ( Johnny Burke , Jimmy Van Heusen ) 4:15
reception
Pianist Liam Noble wrote in an essay in London Jazz News about his difficult relationship with Bill Evans: “I am not an unconditional supporter of Bill Evans. For me he is like Mozart - he created masterpieces, but contrary to popular belief, not always. He defined a sort of melancholy lyric poetry that can be painfully beautiful, but occasionally switches to something that is a little too sweet for this listener's taste. He swings like crazy, but sometimes he lacks the risk that defines improvisation. Anyone who has ever studied jazz keyboard harmonies has likely started out with a system that is almost entirely derived from Evans' approach, particularly with regards to the left hand and its integration with the right melody lines above, thereby increasing the movement of the bass The fact that this method is sometimes referred to as a stopping method for large improvisation is due in part to opposition to this educational franchise and possibly to the musical reputation of the man himself. For a while it had become fashionable to say that one was not influenced by it, “and yet that influence was inevitable because it defined the mainstream that one had to work through before it could finally escape it. It was as much fun to play as he was, it was always an almost deafening pleasure to track down those harmonies, the neat fit between the hands. "
With Eddie Gomez and Marty Morrell, Bill Evans found a rhythm section again , Noble said, “that questioned, provoked, nudged and scribbled his best plans. In this relaxed environment, they definitely sounded like they were enjoying it ”. Noble cites the opening title “Our Love Is Here to Stay” as an example: “After a typical head arrangement, the bass solo with the virtuosity of a wind instrument and a melodic invention that surpasses many, tears directly into the sequence. But when Evans picks up the final phrase of the bass solo and plays along with it, Gomez and Morrell can have their fun shutting down his accents and challenging each phrase before they all lift off to an aggressively swinging second chorus . Moments like this illustrate how Evans could sometimes explode from his shell and breath fire. He was perhaps one of the most widely imitated musicians on this planet, but at this rate and with these musicians no one else can touch him. "
"Come Rain Or Come Shine" offers, as author, an interesting comparison with the iconic version of Portrait in Jazz nine years earlier; In contrast to the timid earlier version, the trio is here “at full throttle”, Evans plays the same coda as in the version of Portrait , “but rattles through like a contractual obligation, perhaps a reference to fans who want to hear this chorus , but the feeling of discovery is gone. Renewing past fame was a common strategy for Thelonious Monk and Miles Davis as well, “but there is a slight world fatigue here. What, on the other hand, may be spurred on by the Miles Davis versions starring Tony Williams creates a cruel walking groove that echoes some of the more impressionistic pieces in this set like "Sugar Plum", "The Two Lonely People" and "Elsa", where he gives the impression that he is going to the beach, [...] And yet on another ballad, "What Are You Doing for the Rest of Your Life?", This magical silence appears again discovering that permeated his early work, as if discovering the melody for the first time, and trying to figure out what reaction the idea will have, according to Noble.
"Fans will love this set, and when it takes off, this music has an aggressive effervescence that elevates it from being simply beautiful to being classic." Monk, Miles Davis, Derek Bailey and Bill Evans. All these people are practically gods, or author continues. But their weaknesses make the great moments of their music heroic, often it is precisely this quality that is lacking in the music, which is less pronounced. If you listen to Bill Evans again on these recordings, “It's the humanity of his sound, not the excellence of his playing, that stays with me. The courage to fail, or to run out, or simply to repeat the early successes and trust that something special will eventually happen. As if looking back on a teenage obsession with a newfound predilection made possible by the passage of time, I hear it differently now. Where did I just ask myself, "How do you do this?" Now I love the fragility of everything. It is the risk of failure that the music is somehow successful, and it is what makes this gig for me that is now a record that is so remarkable. I wish I had been there."
Marc Myers praised in Jazzwax : "I think you will find that Evans is the best live recording of this trio in England and is generally easily in the top five by Evans." For the writer, only Sunday at the Village gets it Vanguard / Waltz for Debbie from 1961 and Bill Evans in Town Hall from 1966. Music is said to be alive in London; "We're lucky that such artistic grace emerged and that Resonance producers Zev Feldman and George Klabin had the wisdom and will to play the music."
Web links
- Discographic information from Resonance Records
- Entry of the album Evans in England on Allmusic (English). Retrieved March 29, 2019.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Tom Lord: Jazz Discography (online)
- ↑ Joe Marchese: Love Is Here to Stay: Resonance Premieres Unheard Bill Evans, Wes Montgomery on CD and Vinyl. The Second Disc, March 12, 2007, accessed March 21, 2019 .
- ^ A b c d Liam Noble: Bill Evans: Evans in England. London Jazz News, April 1, 2019, accessed April 3, 2019 .
- ^ Marc Myers: Evans in England. Jazzwax, April 23, 2019, accessed on April 23, 2019 .