Tallinn Jazz Festival 1967

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The Jazz Festival in Tallinn 1967 was a jazz festival in the Soviet-Estonian Tallinn from May 11th to 14th, 1967. At that time the city belonged to the Soviet Union. “The 1967 festival became the high point of jazz life in Estonia so far.” Several groups from abroad performed at the festival, including the Charles Lloyd Quartet, which played avant-garde jazz and at the time raised hopes that the Soviet Union would open up to Western influences, which was stopped soon after by the Soviet side, which saw this opening as a threat. Modern jazz in the Soviet Union then went underground again.

history

The Kalevi spordihall , inaugurated in 1962, is the venue for the jazz festival

From the mid-1960s, there was an upsurge in jazz festivals in the Soviet Union, except in Tallinn in Leningrad, Moscow and elsewhere. There had been a major jazz festival in Tallinn as early as 1966 and before that, since the loosening of the Soviet regulations after the 1957 World Youth Festival. Uno Naissoo was the initiator of the Tallinn Jazz Festival. This "jazz festival attracted every year many groups and listeners from the Soviet Union to Estonia, and Tallinn was known among musicians as jazz capital of the Soviet Union." As early as 1966 played two bands from abroad, the Helsinki Quartet and the trio of Jan Johansson from Stockholm.

The 1967 festival was "an international event" with five foreign groups - including the quartet by Zbigniew Namysłowski with Adam Makowicz from Poland, from Sweden the septet by Arne Domnerus and the Kurt Järnberg Quintet (from Gävle ), from Finland Erik Lindström (* 1922) and the Heikki Laurila Trio from Helsinki and, as a highlight from the USA, Charles Lloyd's quartet.

Almost every known musician of the Soviet jazz musicians was there, except for Roman Kunsman and Gennadi Golstein . 175 musicians (28 bands) from all over the Soviet Union performed, including Vaqif Mustafazadə , Wladimir Wittich (Vittikh), the pianist Anatoli Kroll with his Tula Quartet, and the Azerbaijani pianist Rafiq Babajew (1937-1994). Wittich and Babajew were already represented at the 1966 festival. Babayev was very successful with his mixture of jazz and Azerbaijani folklore ( mugham ), while pianist Wittich from the Novosibirsk jazz avant-garde was a fan of the Third Stream , which met with more resistance in the Soviet Union.

Heinrich Schultz

The Soviet pianist Vyacheslav Ganelin (who was studying in Vilnius at the time) came from the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic with his trio. The then 16-year-old pianist Tõnu Naissoo from Tallinn also took part with his trio. There was also a vocal ensemble under Heinrich Zarch in the style of the Swingle Singers .

The festival made it possible for foreign observers to convince themselves of the high standard of Soviet jazz musicians. Of particular importance was the proximity to Leningrad with its jazz scene (there was also the only conservatory in the Soviet Union where jazz was taught).

There was also a jazz parade led by the Leningrad Dixieland Band. The festival was featured on radio and television, Reuters, CBS and BBC. Estonian television recorded all concerts. There were parties and balls (shortly before that there was an international dance festival in Tallinn, from which there were also visitors). There were jam sessions and discussions. The festival seemed like a liberation for many Soviet musicians and left a lasting impact.

Performance by the Charles Lloyd Quartet

On the Estonian side, the cultural commissioner for Tallinn, Heinrich Schultz , a Baltic German who fought in the Red Army in World War II, was involved in the invitation from Lloyd and his band . After the festival he was relieved of his job as cultural representative. In the run-up, tour manager George Avakian had to overcome considerable problems with official bodies in order to make Lloyd's appearance possible. The group “did not have an invitation approved by the higher party authorities, was not part of the announced program and waited for days to be able to perform. When the situation threatened to grow into an international scandal due to the pressure of the many foreign journalists, the local Central Committee of the Communist Party grudgingly approved a fifteen-minute performance for the quartet. "The quartet's performance was so enthusiastically welcomed by the audience that Lloyd" forty minutes to the delight of the audience long ”played. Lloyd described his appearance on Down Beat with the words: “I played my experience from Memphis up to then ... There was so much stress leading up to it that it exploded” (“Musically I lived through my experiences from Memphis up to today .. . So much tension built up that it exploded ”). The performance was followed by a standing ovation from the audience of over 8 minutes. The Soviet officials covered the drums to prevent encores and interrupted the festival for half an hour.

The concert made the front page of The New York Times and made it into Time Magazine . The quartet then performed in Moscow and Leningrad. While the director refused to perform at the House of Culture of the Food Industry in Leningrad (Pravda Street) for fear of reprisals (although they could still play in a local jazz café late in the evening) they were able to play in the Molodeschnoe Café in Moscow and then on Jam sessions and parties with Russian jazz musicians. They were at the height of their success at the time, touring East Asia and Europe on behalf of the State Department. In 2013 Charles Lloyd received an award from the Estonian side for his groundbreaking appearance in Tallinn in 1967 on the Jazzkaar .

Recordings

For the festival in 1967 a record was also released in the Soviet Union (without Lloyd) by Melodia. Lloyd's appearance with his quartet (Charles Lloyd, tenor saxophone, flute, Keith Jarrett , piano, Jack DeJohnette , drums, Ron McClure , bass) on May 14th at the Kalevi spordihall in Tallinn also appeared as Charles Lloyd in the Soviet Union ( Atlantic Records 1967).

effect

The events of the festival as a symbol of the brief thaw in the 1960s in the Soviet Union were described by the Russian writer Vasily Pavlovich Aksjonow . Because the stormy success of Lloyd's Quartet and the opening up to foreign influence disrupted the Soviet authorities, “the consequence ... was not long in coming. The festival was banned from above - forever, as it seemed at the time. "

An international jazz festival ( Jazzkaar ) was not held again until 1990 in Tallinn .

Discography

  • Melodija D 020843-44:
    • Vladimir Vittikh Combo Piece from Children's Album ( Igor Shirokov (flugelhorn), Peter Panov (fl) Vladimir Zakharovich (ts), Vladimir Vittikh (p), Valeri Dvornikov (b), Sergey Belichenko (dr))
    • Zbigniew Namysłowski Quartet Summertime (Zbigniew Namyslowski (as), Adam Makowicz (p), Roman Dyląg (b), Czesław Bartkowski (dr))
    • Erik Lindstrom Quintet: Improvisation on a Finnish Folktune (Pekka Poyry (as), Matti Konttinen (p), Heiki Caurila (el-g), Erik Lindstrom (b), Matti Koskiala (d))
    • Vladimir Zakharov Quintet Oleo (Vladimir Zakharov (as), Vadim Horowitz (p), Victor Ivanov (g), Oleg Kichigin (b), Alexander Tsigalnitsky (dr))
    • Rafik Babayev Quartet The Mountaineer's Song (Rafik Babayev (p), Yuri Sardarov (g), Albert Hodja-Bagirov (b), Arkadi Dadashian (dr))
    • Arne Domnerus The midnight sun will never set
    • Anatoli Kroll Quintet Locomotion (from a three-part suite) (Alexander Pishchikov (ts), Anatoli Kroll (p), Sergej Martynov (b), Yuri Gendbachyov (d))
    • Wagif Mustafa-Zade Tallinn W Maje (Tallinn in May) (Wagif Mustafa-Zade (p) Andrei Geworgjan (b) Felix Schabsis (dr))
  • Melodija D020845-46
    • KM Quartet The song (Vladimir Sermakashev (ts) Vagif Sadykhov (p), Andrej Yegorov (b), Vladimir Amatuni (dr))
    • Kurt Jarnberg Quintet Calmness (Kurt Jarnberg (tp, tb), Roland Keijser (ts), Thomas Jutterstrom (p), Kurt Anderson (b), Leif "Gus" Dahlberg (dr))
    • Zvjozdovka Quartet Khorovod (Gunnar Rosenberg (tp), Uldis Stabulnieks (p), Valdis Eglitis (b), Dzintar Bekeris (dr))
    • Tonu Naissoo Super -C- Super-Ut (Tonu Naissoo (p), Yuri Plisnik (b), Eyno Tandre (dr))
  • Charles Lloyd Quintet: Days and Nights Waiting , Sweet Georgia Bright , Love Song to a Baby , Tribal Dance (Melodija 02084-4, all also on Atlantic), with Keith Jarrett , Ron McClure , Jack DeJohnette

literature

  • S. Frederick Starr : Red & Hot - The Fate of Jazz in the Soviet Union 1917–1991 . Limelight Editions 2004, Hannibal 1990, especially p. 232ff
  • HP Hofmann: Tallinn 1967 . In: Melodie und Rhythmus , June / July 1967, pp. 7-10
  • Lisa Davenport: Jazz Diplomacy. Promoting America in the Cold War Era . University Press of Mississippi, 2009
  • Charles Lloyd Set for Soviet Jazz Festival . In: Down Beat , April 20, 1967, p. 13
  • Ira Gitler Charles Lloyd in Russia: Ovations and Frustrations . In: Down Beat , July 13, 1967, p. 15
  • Jazz Forum , 1967, English edition
  • Soviets invite 1st Yank Jazz Crew . In: Variety , March 8, 1967
  • Penny von Eschen: Satchmo blows up the world. Jazz Ambassadors play the cold war . Harvard University Press, 2004 (on the Soviet tours of American jazz musicians)
  • Valter Ojakäär : Sirp yes saksofon . Ilo, Tallinn 2008 (sickle and saxophone, Estonian)

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Walter Ojakäär Jazz in Estonia. Hopes and realities. In: Wolfram Knauer : Europe's Jazz . Hofheim 1993, pp. 95-105, here p. 104.
  2. ^ Frederick Starr Red and Hot , p. 232
  3. ^ Walter Ojakäär Jazz in Estonia. Hopes and realities. , here p. 103.
  4. ↑ Anatoli Kroll , with Alexander Pishikov , tenor saxophone, Sergei Martynov, bass, Yury Genbachev, drums
  5. ↑ Jazz Dünyasi, An Eternal Moment
  6. ↑ Tom Lord in his jazz discography only records one recording session from the 1967 Festival
  7. ^ Jazz in Lithuania
  8. ↑ Tonu Naissoo
  9. ^ Photo in Frederick Starr Red and Hot , Hannibal 1990
  10. ↑ Fredrick Starr, Red and Hot , p. 233
  11. ↑ In Eesti Kroonika, No. 21, 1990, he remembers the jazz festival.
  12. ↑ On the tours of international jazz stars such as Goodman and Ellington, the Soviet authorities always paid attention to restricting contacts outside the concerts, and access to the concerts was otherwise closely monitored and controlled. Occasionally - like Benny Goodman's performance in Moscow in 1962 - there were jam sessions with Russian musicians afterwards, but this remained the exception. After Goodman, there was no great jazz musician on tour in Moscow for a long time (only Earl Hines in 1966 ) - Nikita Khrushchev's negative attitude towards jazz still had an effect . Frederick Starr Red and Hot , p. 232
  13. ↑ On Lloyd's appearance in Jazzkaar 1997
  14. ↑ Frederick Starr Red and Hot , p. 233
  15. ↑ His album Forest Flow from the Monterey Jazz Festival 1966 sold millions, he performed at the Antibes, Montreux and Molde festivals in 1967 and he was voted jazz musician of the year in the Down Beat readers' poll.
  16. ↑ Jazzkaar 2013 ( Memento of the original from December 3, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.jazzkaar.ee
  17. ↑ Discogs
  18. ↑ with the titles Days and Nights Waiting (by Jarrett), Sweet Georgia Bright (almost 18 minutes), Love Song to a Baby , Tribal Dance
  19. ^ Review by Scott Yanow
  20. ↑ Vasily Aksenov In search of melancholy baby , Random House 1977
  21. ↑ Discogs . English translations are given