| Product Summary | | Label: Universal Music Group | | UPC: 00044006779126 | | Release Date: 5/13/2003 | | Buy.com Sku: 60601567 | | Item#: M6NJLP | Format:  CD |
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(P) 2003 WATT Works Inc./ECM Records GmbH
(C) 2003 WATT Works Inc./ECM Records GmbH
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| | Album Notes and Credits |
Notes & Personnel Info |  | Personnel: Carla Bley (conductor, piano); Wolfgang Pusching (alto saxophone, flute); Andy Sheppard, Craig Handy (tenor saxophone); Gary Smulyan (baritone saxophone); Lew Soloff (trumpet); Jim Pugh (trombone); Karen Mantler (glockenspiel, organ); Steve Swallow (bass); Billy Drummond (drums); | | Don Alias (percussion). | | Recorded at Avatar Studios, New York, New York on October 7 & 8, 2002. | | LOOKING FOR AMERICA was nominated for the 2004 Grammy Award for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album. | | With an unlikely amalgam of influences including Eric Dolphy, Thelonious Monk, Oliver Nelson, Charles Ives, and Woodstock-fatback-groove, Carla Bley's musical palette is a quirky and uncompromising one. A maverick in the American tradition by any standard, Bley began writing crystalline melodies for her first husband, pianist Paul Bley, in the early 1960s. She made a name for herself writing for other musicians, winning many awards along the way from institutions like Down Beat and Jazz Times. | | If you enjoy your patriotism, not to mention your jazz, with an impish twist, her 2003 installment, LOOKING FOR AMERICA, might be the ticket. Clocking in at nearly 22-minutes, her version of the National Anthem, loosely based on "The Star Spangled Banner," might be the most original version of the piece since Jimi Hendrix's notorious performance in '69. As their titles imply, "Fast Lane" and "Tijuana Traffic" come replete with pulsing car-horn harmonies. The writing for the brass and winds throughout is done with bright, bold colors and tight, interlocking rhythms. The proceedings are capped off with a slaphappy "Old MacDonald." |
Producer: Steve Swallow |
Engineer: Tom Mark |
Musical Guests | | Craig Handy | | Wolfgang Puschnig | | Lew Soloff | | Steve Swallow | | Billy Drummond |
| | Artist Overview | | Something of a first lady of the avant-garde, pianist/composer/arranger Carla Bley began writing jazz charts for top-name players in the late 1950s. In the mid '60s she helped found the Jazz Composers' Orchestra, which marked her first forays into a more complex free-jazz realm. Her long-form piece ESCALATOR OVER THE HILL, written in 1968, stands as a distinct stylistic signpost of the era. Bley would go on to work with a host of free-jazz icons--including Pharaoh Sanders, Steve Lacy, and Peter Brotzmann, among others--and continued to compose challenging genre-bending works into the 21st century. |
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| | Technical Info | | Release Date : 05/13/2003 | | Original Release Date : 2003 | | Catalog ID : 0000195 | | Label : ECM/WATT | | Number of Discs : 1 | | Studio/Live : Studio | | Mono/Stereo : Stereo | | SPAR Code : n/a | | UPC : 00044006779126 |
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| | Professional Reviews | | Mojo (Publisher)
(10/03, p.112)
- 3 stars out of 5 - "...Much of this meditation on Bley's homeland is affectionate and funky..." |
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