People forget. They forget what the saxophone was before jazz adopted it and gave it a sound. Certainly, whoever write this Wikipedia article must have been living under a rock. Here’s a quote from the first paragraph:
“The saxophone is used in a wide range of musical styles including classical music (such as concert bands, chamber music, solo repertoire, and occasionally orchestras), military bands, marching bands, jazz (such as big bands and jazz combos), and contemporary music.”
Jazz comes in a lowly fourth place here, but Art Pepper reminds us that in the real world, jazz transformed the saxophone. Going from something that sounded loud in a marching band and an awkward guest in a small selection of orchestral music, it became, in the hands of African American musicians, an extension of the human voice. The voice, with its accents, its turns of phrase, its whispering sweetness and angular rage, joy and sorrow. Jazz did that. And there is no one who makes you feel that line, that direct transmission from the gut to the horn, more than Art Pepper. We now live in a world where lived experience is often superseded by manufactured self-image, but back then, Pepper blew the truth, his truth at least, straight into the instrument.
And his truth was pretty ugly at times. Born into a violent and alcoholic family, addiction came easy and early. In and out of prison from a young age, he often looked like he was going to make it big, but time and time again his drug habit cut high hopes short. He died young, just under a year after these recordings were made, aged 56. That’s the basic outline, but Laurie Pepper’s pithy and incisive sleeve notes on Art’s life on and off the bandstand are worth the price of these discs alone. They serve as a kind of lyrical complement to the music, reminding us where, if we were wondering, sounds like this came from. She also pulls no punches about the complexities of race relations between musicians at the time.
The music is a sprawling 8 hours and 22 minutes, seven sets recorded over three nights at the Maiden Voyage in Los Angeles, and it’s nothing short of miraculous. Pepper’s sound and concept are so deeply engrained that everything he plays sounds good to me. There are some fast tempos that get the better of him, like “Donna Lee” (his own notes on one version, included on the sleeve, state, simply: “Terrible”), but even here there are also flashes of razor sharp swing, spitting out the accents between swallowed phrases. For me he embodies the wayward spirit of Charlie Parker more than almost any other musician, which is strange considering the dreaded “west coast” tag that dogged him his whole life. And on “Straight Life”, his original based on “After You’ve Gone” and named after his gruelling autobiography, it’s clear that fast tempos are no problem: he doesn’t so much float on it so much as dig a new groove in it. But it’s the ballads and blues, the
“What’s New?” swoops and dives at the chords, waves of erratic energy reminiscent of Bud Powell at his most tortured, and the duet with pianist George Cables, “But Beautiful” is almost animalistic in its sonic distortions. You’ll wonder how he gets those notes to bend like that. Pepper also famously embraced the new. The influence of Pepper’s younger bandmates can be felt on “Landscape”, and it’s a particular joy to hear George Cables stretch out here…but then a surprising coda veers into free jazz territory with a healthy shot of the blues, and the circle is closed again.
The gospel groove of “Thank You Blues” sees Pepper darting in and out of the time, wrenching his sound into guttural noise before spinning off like a loose catherine wheel. George Cables provides the perfect foil, a quiet intensity building to a tour de force of in-and-out rhythms. David Williams bows a solo with the space and grace that makes it more than a novelty, with a sound like an ocean liner’s horn. Carl Burnett is solid but flexible, holding everything together without feeling remotely boxed in. “Arthur’s Blues” is another epic exploration of the form, Pepper’s solo literally bubbling like a saucepan about to boil over.
It’s all in a day’s work for these musicians, but there are many such details that loom large in these performances, and tuning into them is the key to appreciating this music. This is a band on fire, and in Pepper’s case, he’d long burnt the candle at both ends and was running on fumes. This is the sound of music made at the very edge of life, and the sheer heat this band generates it is all the more extraordinary for it.
6 responses
Nice review Liam, Pepper was a one-off, an incredible emotive musician
this review is much appreciated, beautiful, and so true, especially about the saxophone, how it can speak, spit, mutter, and sing!
I have been playing this on WTJU 91.1 FM Charlottesville, VA. Thanks for sharing this with us.
Man, Liam, you write with such insight. I’m always inspired to check out, or re-check-out, the music. You know your stuff.
Excellent review.
I’ve just listened to the first set so nothing to add to your thoughtful comments. You do not mention Art’s ballad work, however, which I found to be especially poignant.