CD Review

I've had a chance to live with the newly released "Thelonius Monk Quartet with John Coltrane at Carnegie Hall" CD and I hear new things everytime I listen. This is a previously unknown recording that was discovered in the Carnegie Hall archives with the label T.Monk 1957. It was originally intened for broadcast so the quality is better than your average live recording. This performance comes off an extended house gig at The Five Spot (There is a live recording from one of these gigs but the quality is ...well...crap).

This is a true classic, must-have masterpiece. It shows these fantastic players at the peak of there powers and, despite some peoples' thoughts about later Coltrane or Monk, is very musically accessable. In 1957 Coltrane was becoming the Coltrane that made him a legend( and Monk was no slouch either).

The complete quartet includes the much under rated Shadow Wilson on drums. Shadow has that classic late fifties New York sound that at first listen sounds awkward...then confident ...then brilliant (listen to Epistrophy!). Ahmed Abdul-Malik anchors the whole thing so solidly on bass that the other players are free to relax and create.

In a five star rating system, I'll give this the full *****

This is an EMI / Blue Note recording 35174

p.s. Appearing on the same bill that November 29th night in 1957

Miss Billie Holliday !
Dizzy Gillespie !!
Ray Charles !!!
Chet Baker with Zoot Sims quartet !!!!
Sonny Rollins !!!!!
Ticket prices were $2.00 - $ 3.95!!!!!!

So I've decided to buy a Digidesigns MBox to do some home recording for my next CD. I'm strongly considering doing all the recording and playing myself...I'm sure that I'll be rethinking that idea as I struggle to play the ideas in my head. I'm going to do as much I can until I run into a talent wall. I have some very eclectic ideas for this new project and it won't necesarily fit into any commercial genre...or maybe it will....I don't know yet. I'm getting more and more dissillusioned with restrictive music genres and get really exited when I hear bands like the WhiteStripes bending classification. And while I truly appreciate the old jazz standards and listen and try to learn from the best, I get the feeling that a lot of musicians out there get stuck before they start....trying to copy... to immitate their idols who were innovators. In the jazz genre there are a few musicians doing new interesting things and then there are thousands who are just redoing the old stuff over and over and over.... I was one of those musicians. I'm not really happy with my first CD. It's OK but really nothing more than an indication of how musically naive I was when I recorded it.

So the new CD will have smatterings of everything I have learned from a lot of genres...I like jazz, classical, blues, bluegrass, folk, etc and I'm not going to let myself be restricted...just going to make music I like. My goal is to make a CD that I will be able to listen to myself for years and still enjoy it.

This is our cat Luigi. He's far less innocent than he looks.

I decided to allow ads on this blog. I don't have any control over what ads appear, but, I'll keep an eye on them and be sure that there is nothing offensive advertized.

Hello! This is my new blog. I've created this instead of my old website www.colindarling.ca . I'll be posting my general activities including my latest music endeavors here as often as I can. My new Cd will be recorded (hopefully) this coming March and will be mostly original material. My first CD of jazz standards is still available at www.cdbaby.com/colindarling .

Stay tuned for more!