CDOTD 5/17/2024

 Jimmy Giuffre 3: Jimmy Giuffre 3, 1961 (ECM) (disc one, Fusion)

Purchased used years ago, I don't remember where. 

Today is my wedding anniversary, #38. That has nothing to do with my listening choice today. My father told me when he entered the chapel, all the weird looking people were sitting on one side, the normal people on the other, and he knew which side he was supposed to sit on.

My choice has more to do with having gotten a COVID booster yesterday, and I ache all over. Didn't feel like a day for metal, industrial, or even Stockhausen. While there's an intensity to this group, it is quiet nonetheless.

I never really modeled my playing on anyone in particular. There have been important performances and recordings, but I never listened to anyone and thought, "I want to sound like him". That said, I love Jimmy Giuffre's clarinet playing and I'm certain some of it has rubbed off on me. I find it very interesting that, even though he was historically primarily a tenor saxophonist, he devoted himself strictly to the clarinet for a number of years. 

The three in this case was rounded out by Paul Bley on piano, Steve Swallow on upright bass. The program mostly Jimmy's works, with two by Carla Bley. Giuffre's compositions sound quasi-tonal, sort of cool and intellectual, but retain a vague feeling of the blues. The lack of drums gives the group a lack of push and drive, and places much more of the emphasis on the harmonies. The music floats but never becomes completely unmoored. Perhaps the description of highly focused is better than intense.

There's a story that this group played the Crawford Grill in the Hill District in Pittsburgh. This was the club that saw performances from John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Charles Mingus, and many other legendary musicians in the late 50s-mid 60s. It would have been somewhere approximately at the time of this album. The band played one set and the owner told them afterwards, that's okay, you're done. 

The tale points out the tension of this music (or any, really) as art vs. entertainment. The two aren't necessarily mutually incompatible, more of a sliding scale or pie graph. Even that's too simple; Duke Ellington could be said to have been an entertainer in some ways, but there's no question as to his artistry. 

Jimmy deserves more love and credit, he's one of the greats.