Gary Giddins

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I'm mostly a lurker, never started a thread. But the greatest living jazz critic is leaving the Village Voice after thirty years, and I just think it's a sad, sad day.

http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0351/giddins.php

― Not That Chuck, Tuesday, 16 December 2003 16:14 (twenty-two years ago)

i have my qualms about giddins but this is indeed a sad day. that music section is sinking into precisely what i imagine whatever the suits that decided to ruin the voice this year want.

― cinniblount (James Blount), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 16:18 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, I wouldn't say Giddins is my favorite or anything but I always read and enjoy his articles when I come across them, that's too bad. Maybe he'll change the trend of jazz crit books being boring crap, though (judging from the few I've read).

― Jordan (Jordan), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 16:24 (twenty-two years ago)

i'm still quite curious about his bing bio

― cinniblount (James Blount), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 16:27 (twenty-two years ago)

i quite enjoyed his book. i guess i shouldn't have expected some scathing indictment of corporate dumbsizing in this final essay, but it seemed oddly muted.

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 16:28 (twenty-two years ago)

he made the point for those who'd see it

― cinniblount (James Blount), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 16:29 (twenty-two years ago)

I would love to have bios of some of the musicians he mentioned in that article...Booker Ervin, Charlie Rouse, etc.. Someone should get Max Roach's memoirs on paper soon, he's nearly 80.

― Jordan (Jordan), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 16:32 (twenty-two years ago)

haha - back when i was a jazzbo (ie. when i was also a cineaste)(ie. 'adolescence') i used to always 'rant' about how underrated rouse was.

― cinniblount (James Blount), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 16:38 (twenty-two years ago)

my dad used to drag me to see george coleman all thru the 80's and he would always go on about how underrated he was. no wonder my dad is such a giddins fan. he will be sad. i am sad too. i like institutions when they are good institutions(see:hentoff).

― scott seward, Tuesday, 16 December 2003 16:48 (twenty-two years ago)

Haha. They are underrated though! :> Rouse is taken for granted because he's just the guy in Monk's band who always sounds good, and George Coleman because he's not Wayne Shorter. And I don't think he was necessarily right for the Miles Quintet, but he plays some beautiful stuff on Four + More that makes me glad he was there.

― Jordan (Jordan), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 16:51 (twenty-two years ago)

i really need to hear Andrew Hill's "Passing Ships". i will have to go buy a copy.

― scott seward, Tuesday, 16 December 2003 17:45 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't get the Shorter love. He was fine with Blakey and great with Miles, but everything he's done since, including Weather Report and even his contributions to some of the electric Miles records, has been mediocre at best and shit at worst.

I've been listening to the Columbia Monk albums quite a bit the past few months, and yeah, Rouse was the fucking man.

Giddins: nice guy, great writer. Even when I didn't give a crap about his chosen subject, he always had something to say that wound up interesting me.

― Phil Freeman (Phil Freeman), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 19:15 (twenty-two years ago)

another hat's-off. I should also mention that a friend got me the complete tracklist for GG's Jazz Map (http://www.villagevoice.com/print/issues/0223/giddins.php) on six audio CDs and/or one MP3 disc. if anyone is interested in a trade, holler.

― M Matos (M Matos), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 19:19 (twenty-two years ago)

He was fine with Blakey and great with Miles

That's enough to make a name right there...I feel you, but I would have to argue that some of his solo albums are as classic as anything (Speak No Evil!!), and that his current quartet with Brian Blade, Patitucci, and Danilo definitely has their own thing.

― Jordan (Jordan), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 19:36 (twenty-two years ago)

Actually, he works in early Weather Report too. His playing on the first s/t and Body Electric is heading towards the all-smooth-all-the-time realm, but those records are pretty out in general. He just lends them a spooky quality. I think Wayne Shorter's peak with Miles was his playing on the It's About That Time (3/70) set. I don't think I've ever heard him more aggressive and just going for everything than there.

I can vouch for the coolness of Giddins' jazz map, which Matos already sent me in a trade.

― dleone (dleone), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 19:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, Shorter's run of Blue Note albs are prob. the most consistent series of recs the label ever released: Shorter gets big props as a composer (and albs like 'Speak No Evil' and 'Juju' and 'Night Dreamer' and 'Adam's Apple' and 'The All-Seeing Eye' and 'Super Nova' (w/ Mclaughlin and Sharrock) are indeed stuffed fulla great tunes), but I think that this sometimes obscures the insane greatness of his tenor playing, so full of mystery and atmos and unexpected twists and turns and little asides and smears - listen to the Plugged Nickel box set and hear the way he's constantly thinking on his feet, re-inventing and responding, avoiding cliche and the expected.

Agreed, tho', that his soprano playing is far less interesting and affecting, and that there was indeed a terrible quality dip in the 70s (I'm not totally thrilled by the current quartet either - Shorter, understandably, just doesn't have the stamina/power/range that he had in the sixties.)

George Coleman is great on 'Maiden Voyage'; I always think of Charlie Rouse as the non-freaky free Jimmy Lyons (or vice versa).

Meltzer had some nasty things to say abt Giddens in 'Whore', but GG's contributions to that wretched Ken Burns series were pretty smart, I thought. His crit-write doesn't get much of an airing here in the UK.

― Andrew L (Andrew L), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 19:58 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't hate Shorter, but he's way, way overrated.

― Phil Freeman (Phil Freeman), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 20:14 (twenty-two years ago)

awww, this sucks. giddins was the most readable critic at the voice, which sounds like a backhanded compliment i guess but actually i really like him. i hope whatever he produces from here on out is as good as his bing bio, which was really good.

― amateur!st (amateurist), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 20:31 (twenty-two years ago)

does the bing bio focus on the music (which i'm really really interested in) or in the man and dark side thereof (which i've had my fill of really)?

― cinniblount (James Blount), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 20:33 (twenty-two years ago)

blount: both, actually. more of the former than i had expected.

also, hear hear:

Occasionally, exhausted, I'd rankle and hand in "Twelve Albums With Strange Covers" or "Five Bands I Heard Last Week," though rarely more than once a year, not including holiday wrap-ups. Essays require deep immersion, the inhalation of an artist's life and work.

― amateur!st (amateurist), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 20:34 (twenty-two years ago)

i really need to hear Andrew Hill's "Passing Ships". i will have to go buy a copy.

Yes, it's really freaking great. It's hard to believe it was never released.

I pull out GG's Visions of Jazz fairly often, it always gives me a slightly different perspective, an angle I hadn't thought of.

― scott m (mcd), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 21:19 (twenty-two years ago)

Um, Shorter is on a roll lately--both last year's live album and this year's Alegria excellent, in very different ways.

― bugged out, Tuesday, 16 December 2003 21:23 (twenty-two years ago)

I haven't really gotten into Shorter yet. He's decent on the Miles records (though I can't say I listen to Miles often), but whenever I listen to his BN albums (I have Juju, Speak No Evil, and The All Seeing Eye), I always wonder why I'm not just listening to Coltrane.

Shorter seems to get plenty of attention, particularly since so many current older jazz fans got there moustaches all twitchy over Weather Report back in college.

Underrated? Henry Threadgill, Sabir Mateen, Arthur Blythe, SAM RIVERS...

― usual channels, Wednesday, 17 December 2003 03:44 (twenty-two years ago)

i've enjoyed various parts of two books of his collected writings that were published in the last twenty years.

i know he's championed some conservative stuff too, but i'm thankful that he informed me in however big and small ways about the edges as well as some of the smooths of jazz. thanks for allowing me to get to "loft-period" David Murray, for instance.

i especially like the written-on-the-spot style, the "wow, what was that !", backed up with a for-me usually thoroughly educative read -- and for his collecting his un-revised impressions in those books so handy for those for whom the Village Voice ain't.

i also really respect his acceptance and appreciation of the role of humility in a critic, almost at times taking that to the point where his modest observations underate his legit. "long view" understanding of jazz during those times when jazz changed in so many interesting ways.

― george gosset (gegoss), Friday, 19 December 2003 07:28 (twenty-two years ago)

i didn't read him ALL the time, figuring he was there for ever and i could pick and choose, but, uh, fuck eh? disappointed.

― gaz (gaz), Friday, 19 December 2003 07:51 (twenty-two years ago)

his bing book is good

― mark s (mark s), Friday, 19 December 2003 12:04 (twenty-two years ago)

three years pass...

I'm stuck with these damned smooth jazz records, so I'm reading Giddins' Weather Bird to get a more reasonable perspective on 80s+ stuff. It's great so far and eminently readable.

― Hoosteen (Hoosteen), Tuesday, 9 January 2007 03:28 (nineteen years ago)

this summer I read huge chunks of Weather Bird and Natural Selection and was kind of blown away by how great his writing is. I always liked him but it was like discovering him for the first time.

― Make a Beck Song #1 (M Matos), Tuesday, 9 January 2007 03:33 (nineteen years ago)

That Gary Giddins Reviews Classic DVDs And Other Stuff Too book that came out last year was good too, whatever it was actually called. Or maybe that was Natural Selection?

― The Redd And The Blecch (Ken L), Tuesday, 9 January 2007 05:14 (nineteen years ago)

Excellent int w/ Giddins abt Cecil Taylor:

http://www.jerryjazzmusician.com/mainHTML.cfm?page=giddins-taylor.html

― Ward Fowler (Ward Fowler), Tuesday, 9 January 2007 09:40 (nineteen years ago)

"Visions of Jazz" is also a great book that I often dive into, both for work and for pleasure.

― A Radio Picture (Rrrickey), Tuesday, 9 January 2007 13:30 (nineteen years ago)

respect GG but don't enjoy. liked his short book on Satchmo, tho.

― m coleman (lovebug starski), Tuesday, 9 January 2007 13:39 (nineteen years ago)

Giddins is my favorite critic. So smart, so knowledgable, and he writes perfect prose. Terrific stuff on film and books in his latest anthology. Also an excellent essay on Dylan as a vocal stylist.

― Jody Rosen (Jody_Rosen), Tuesday, 9 January 2007 15:24 (nineteen years ago)

Cool,I'll have to read that. Come to think of it, he put Love & Theft in his Top Ten. (He'd mentioned getting creeped out by Hoagy Carmichael's voice, said it made him think about how nostalgia can go moseyin' in the wrong direction, blood on the Klansheet, etc, despite loving Hoagy's songs. So was wondering how this might apply to other professional old white down homey guys.Including those who crib from Confederate poets, but I guess this essay was written before Modern Times.)

― don (dow), Wednesday, 10 January 2007 04:15 (nineteen years ago)

Haha, the funny thing is that this book has totally propelled me back into Louis Armstrong's catalog vs. more recent jazz. For years when I heard the Hot Fives & Sevens all I could think of was this:

http://www.aana.com/75th/images/timeline/steamboat_willie_sm.jpg

― Hoosteen (Hoosteen), Thursday, 11 January 2007 00:56 (nineteen years ago)

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