Parker’s Revolutionary Council

Press, Volume CV, Issue 31029, 7 April 1966, Page 10

Parker’s Revolutionary Council

The forces of reaction dispersed, all bastions breached, the revolutionary council in session—this is the significance of the music on two new MGM LPs, Historical Masterpieces Vols. One and Two (mono MC-6205-6, both 12in, available separately, 39s 6d each).

Eleven years after his death the shadow of Parker the great alto saxophonist, still lies heavily across modern jazz. He made his first record in 1941 at the age of 21; eight years later he had seen accomplished a revolution that changed the course of jazz history. With a handful of others, none of whom had his overwhelming combination of genius, arrogance, wit, curiosity and revolutionary fervour, Parker created the music known as “bebop”—and in doing so realigned and expanded the basis of jazz improvisation and gave it a new emotional and intellectual depth. These recordings come from 1948, 1949 and 1950. They are rare—possibly the first—examples of Parker in his natural setting, performing before audiences in New York night clubs. They are imperfect; they

are not. so much masterpieces as post-mortem examinations of masterpieces. The recording quality is atrocious, Parker’s intonation is inexact, his phrases frequently trail off in mid-flight or leap precipitately between registers; but the essential Parker has been captured—the postrevolutionary Parker, with the impatience of his youth diminished but not discarded. Definitive recordings of most of the 17 numbers on the two volumes had been made in the studio before 1948: and on some tracks (“Ko Ko.” “Out Of Nowhere,” “Groovin’ High” and “Cool Blues”) Parker is content merely to re-examine old revelations. But on others he leaps impetuously into unknown territory. “Rifftide” (called “Street Beat” here) takes Parker deep into the blues; “Round Midnight,” Thelonious Monk’s beautiful ballad, becomes a cry of anguish; “White Christmas” is gentle, but tangy, satire. The men who accompany Parker are not much less illustrious. They include Miles Davis, the trumpeter who is today one of the dominant influences in jazz; the late Fats Navarro, who may have become the greatest trumpeter in the history of jazz if he had lived past the age of 26; and Bud Powell, the brilliant but erratic pianist. Powell i's heard at his best and worst on these sides — fumbling and incompetent on “Round Midnight,” but incis-

ive and inquisitive on "Street Beat,” “Ornithology” and “Perdido.”

Navarro, too, is superb on “Street Beal,” ’ dancing from chorus to chorus while Powell niggles at the edges of his solo. Meanwhile the rhythm section, led by Roy Haynes’s drums, dispenses total swing. NO SWING

Junior Mance’s Straight Ahead (Capitol mono T 2218 12in, 355) uses a similar format; but Mance plays the piano and the orchestra led by Bob Bain, is all brass.

As on an earlier ManceBain collaboration on Capitol the tracks are too short for Mance to get into much in the way of improvisation. The longest of the lltracks runs for four minutes and 52 seconds and the average is about two and a half minutes; so the buyer gets short ration well as bounce, no swing.