Rock Evolution – The History of Rock ’n’ Roll - Pop pre-1960 (pg 38)

[threespires]

A pleasure.

I'm getting immense pleasure from both firing up my Dad's old vinyl/ likes and playing other people's choices.

At the back of my big bad book of vinyl is a "might need that album if I find it" page. It's been peppered with albums from this thread. Luckily I'm in Chichester this weekend, home to four record shops, two of which have a fair bit of jazz in them.

Tally ho!!

Happy hunting, let us all know if you bag something cool.

 

[threespires]

Can we add Desafinda by Joao Gilberto? Bossa Nova was big in the 1960's so good to see an early example

Absolutely, to your point when we get to the 60's there's rich pickings on the Bossa nova front, including the track me and MrsSpires danced to at our wedding :-)

 

[threespires]

OK, we are all muppets - does anyone want to rectify our collective omission of one of the most beloved jazz musicians who is often not thought of as a jazz musician because his beautiful rich voice tends to transcend genres?

(I don't mean Sinatra who I'm hoping we can save to a later playlist which will be much harder to fill).

 

[mrbelfry]

Absolutely, to your point when we get to the 60's there's rich pickings on the Bossa nova front, including the track me and MrsSpires danced to at our wedding :-)

Girl from Ipponeeeeeeeema?

 

[threespires]

Girl from Ipponeeeeeeeema?

Haha.

I've just noticed you've relocated Ipanema across the pacific ocean! :-)

 

[Saddleworth2]

Could easily fill a playlists full of these wonderful standards. Strange Fruit, God Bless The Child, Someone to Watch Over Me, What A Wonderful World, The Very Thought of You, Let's Do it the list just goes on and one covering the whole spectrum of human experience and emotion.




It's a cliché, but the way I look at it the voice is the greatest instrument of all, it's certainly the most complex and the most expressive IMO. I was going to be deliberately fatuous and say the 'correct' instrument order is Voice, Bass (acoustic & electric), Single Reeds, Hollow-Bodied Guitars and then everything else after them, but instrument wars is for another thread!! More seriously, I do agree that most of the great vocal performances are in the context of great arrangements and accompanists

And yet the human voice is the greatest instrument.

 

[threespires]

And yet the human voice is the greatest instrument.

Absolutely no argument from me on that.

 

[Saddleworth2]

I don't know if it was a TV impressionist or someone who cemented the vision of Laine scatting away in the public mind but I think it does her a disservice. I was thinking about this when @mancity111 mentioned her and her hubby, though we have never produced anyone quite as iconic as the four you mention, Laine is the best of British in many ways and was very versatile and worked on her craft throughout her career.

I'm sure I read somewhere that Ella Fitzgerald had a soft spot for her which seems a pretty good reference to me. I was going to suggest her version of Stormy Weather precisely because it's very 'unshowy' and laid back compared to more iconic versions. Quite different I think to the way lots of people think of her.

I really cant think of a british female jazz singer that I like. In fact I can't think of one that would challenge the Americans in a top 20 of all time. Even Diana Krall is Canadian. Elkie Brooks more recognised as a rock singer but she fronted a jazz band I'm sure. Norah Jones?

 

[Saddleworth2]

It’s OK. It doesn’t stop me in my tracks in a way that makes me think it’s better than 100 other singers. That’s not putting her voice down, or your love of it, it’s just not a thing that grabs my attention as much as the sound of a guitar or a Hammond B-3 or a mandolin.

She and other great singers make me physically melt.
I'm a puddle.

 

[threespires]

I really cant think of a british female jazz singer that I like. In fact I can't think of one that would challenge the Americans in a top 20 of all time. Even Diana Krall is Canadian. Elkie Brooks more recognised as a rock singer but she fronted a jazz band I'm sure. Norah Jones?

Jones is American. There's a couple of emerging brit singers who I really like but they have a long way to go. Krall sometimes gets dismissed as pizza express jazz but I think she's excellent.

But we shouldn't be surprised, for all that it's been adopted around the world, fundamentally Jazz belongs to America.