Funk in France: From Paris to Antibes (1969-1970)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Funk in France: From Paris to Antibes (1969-1970)
Live album by Grant Green

Publication
(s)

2018

Label (s) Resonance Records

Format (s)

2 CD, 3 LP

Genre (s)

Jazz , fusion

running time

1:58:13

occupation

production

Andre Francis, Zev Feldman, Pascal Rozat, Zak Shelby-Szyszko

chronology
The Holy Barbarian, St. Louis, 1959
(2012) 		Funk in France: From Paris to Antibes (1969-1970) Slick! - Live at Oil Can Harry’s
(2018)

Funk in France: From Paris to Antibes (1969-1970) is a jazz album by Grant Green , recorded in France 1969-70 and released on May 25, 2018 on Resonance Records . The album was created in collaboration with the Institut national de l'audiovisuel (INA). Funk in France was released as a 180-gram vinyl and a 2-CD edition. "Both appearances show Green's early shift to a heavier and more funky sound in the early 1970s."

background

The recordings were made in different line-ups at concerts by the guitarist in France, most of the tracks were recorded in trio in Studio 104 of the Maison de la Radio , the seat of the ORTF (the French organization for radio and television) on October 26, 1969 in Paris . Grant Green played there with Larry Ridley and Don Lamond , supplemented by guitarist Barney Kessel on "I Wish You Love" . The second part of Funk in France combines four tracks from two appearances on July 18 and 20, 1970 at the Antibes Jazz Festival. The ORTF studio session was recorded for a radio broadcast and produced by producer André Francis .

Since the two concerts were separated by a few months, they are quite different in their execution. Organist Clarence Palmer, Claude Bartee on tenor saxophone and Billy Wilson on drums joined the Antibes performance . Bartee had previously played with Grant Green in New York and would then work for him for several years.

The liner notes are from Michael Cuscuna, Pascal Rozat and Zev Feldman.

Track list

  • Grant Green: Funk in France: From Paris to Antibes (1969-1970) (Resonance Records - HCD-2033)
CD 1
  1. I Don't Want Nobody to Give Me Nothing (Open Up The Door I'll Get It Myself) 4:34
  2. Oleo 4:24
  3. How Insensitive (Insensatez) 7:18
  4. Untitled Blues 8:09
  5. Sonnymoon For Two 7:00
  6. I Wish You Love 7:06
  7. Upshot 18:02
CD 2
  1. Hurt Sun Bath 2:35 pm
  2. Upshot 19:46
  3. Hi-Heel Sneakers 27:13

reception

Richard Brody ( The New Yorker ) counts Grant Green's album (together with his Slick! - Live at Oil Can Harry’s ) one of the best archive releases in the field of jazz of 2018. He also wrote: "I had long dreamed of that rediscovered live recordings of guitarist Grant Green would appear; the dream came true this year: with two album releases by Resonance Records, 'Funk in France: From Paris to Antibes (1969–1970)' and 'Slick! - Live at Oil Can Harry's', three concert tours were presented that give rare insights into Green's art. ”Self-taught by listening to records (especially by Charlie Parker ), Green played long,“ horn-like solo lines of subtle boldness ” , “Where the harmonies seemed to float with a flowing effect, which made him equally at home with funky rhythm and blues. Green's two new concert albums feature a 1969 trio recapturing their abundantly recorded style as instant classicism, and a 1970 electric quartet reflecting popular styles to which Green responds with renewed warmth and energy. Green died of a heart attack in 1979 at the age of forty-three and did not see these syntheses blossom and expand, nor to carry them on himself. "

Stephen Thomas Erlewine awarded the album four (out of 5) stars in Allmusic and wrote: “At the Paris concert, Green advances the funky pop-jazz hybrid that he would make his specialty in the early 1970s, but himself not yet fully committed to it. Green doesn't hide his loyalty to funk by opening the process with a percolating version of James Brown's "I Don't Want Nobody To Give Me Nothing," a version that does not act as K as a harbinger of what came later. Apart from a loosely lyrical "Untitled Blues", Green and Company are in relatively uncomplicated bop territory and play two Sonny Rollins songs and the standard "I Wish You Love" together with Antonio Carlos Jobim's "How Insensitive". It's a lively set but unobtrusive compared to the Antibes recordings. By working with an organist and saxophonist, Green can get involved in R&B. The quartet learns hard and spends almost 20 minutes on the original "Upshot". Then Tommy Tucker's dance hit 'Hi-Heel Sneakers' extended to almost half an hour. Here Green plays the hard jazz funk with which he is on Alive! Debuted the landmark Blue Note LP, which he would record just a month later, and while broadcasting appearances in France are neither pop-oriented nor grueling. The material there also has its charm. Green has found his style and he's free to jam as long as he wants. The results are not only fascinating, they are danceable. "

Andrew Cartmel said in LOndon Jazz News that the rediscovery of Grant Green is well underway, thanks to his music, which is adopted and re-used first by acid jazz performers , then hip-hop artists and fans of funk music. More importantly, the true stature of his recordings, such as the 1963 classic Idle Moments, is increasingly recognized by Blue Note . And now Resonance Records is continuing this by uncovering classic long-lost recordings by Grant Green. “The Paris set opens with a title that almost uses up the word count for this review: I don't want no one to give me anything (open the door I get myself). The fact that this is a James Brown track clearly shows that Grant Green intends to make funk "innuendo". It's dark, nervous, and searching while Green plays percussively. Larry Ridley's bass writhes and squirms like it does an ivy on a branch. Sonny Rollins' melody 'Oleo' is delivered in a trendy, open and airy rendition, with Green creating colors and highlights as if he were shearing glittering fragments from a block of ice. "

Portrait of Barney Kessel on stage with an archtop electric guitar

The set really starts to boil with Tom Jobim's 'Insensatez', introduced by the excited stopwatch ticking of Don Lamond's drums, which is then played under and then woven into Ridley's bass. Green's exploration of the song is echoing and (appropriately enough) resonant. The relaxed and funky 'Untitled Blues' is followed by another highlight, Charles Trenet's 'I Wish You Love', for which Barney Kessel joins the trio. The dueling guitars are an opportunity for sharply tailored playing that paradoxically produces a fat, warm sound, with a great feel for relaxed timing that plays elastically behind the beat so that the listener can just let go of the day's worries. The guitarists explored the melody almost pianistically, giving it an unexpected stature and depth, according to Andrew Cartmel.

The recordings from the Paris radio studio also benefited from brevity - all Antibes routes are extensive training, says Carmel. On the other hand, the presence of Claude Bartee on the tenor saxophone in Antibes adds an extra dimension. Funk in France is an extremely lavish offer for every Grant Green lover or lover of jazz guitar , the author sums up.

Reinhard Köchl said in Jazz thing that anyone who assumed Nile Rodgers was the inventor of the funk guitar was obviously not familiar with Grant Green. This is not the first knowledge gap that could be closed thanks to the “music archeology” of Resonance Records. "At the latest after enjoying the previously unpublished France recordings of the wonderful man from St. Louis, who is always a bit in the shade, everyone knows that he must be considered the true forefather of funky patterns on six strings." The recordings from the ORTF Studios in Paris and the Antibes Jazz Festival documented “the amazing development of a guitarist who had found his true destiny on the home stretch of his career. The ultra-long versions of his classic "Upshot" from Antibes alone offer a fireworks display of fast, pearly solos on a seething foundation. Everything that Green's bands unpacked back then was virtuoso and danceable. Sublime coolness. "

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Grant Green: Two pearls from the great guitarist at we Got Music
  2. ↑ a b > Review of the album Funk in France: From Paris to Antibes (1969-1970) by Stephen Thomas Erlewine on Allmusic (English). Retrieved March 21, 2019.
  3. ↑ Hionweise at Discogs
  4. ^ A b c Andrew Cartmel: LP REVIEW: Grant Green - Funk in France, From Paris to Antibes (1969-1970). Lomndon Jazz News, April 18, 2018, accessed March 21, 2019 .
  5. ↑ Richard Brody: The Best Archival Jazz Releases of 2018. The New Yorker, December 27, 2018, accessed March 17, 2018 .
  6. ↑ Reinhard Köchl: Grant Green: Funk In France: From Paris To Antibes . In: Jazz thing. July 23, 2018, accessed March 21, 2019 .