Jazz

[Ed Jewett]

Ooooh, I wish we could get together for dinner et al and trade favorites.

I've been listening to jazz on and off for years and consider myself still in elementary school. And I can't play a lick on any instrument except the ones of the "air" variety. On my wish list is a CD or two from Mapleshade Audio, and I have about 12 hours or so of the stuff stocked on my iPod. I was at a Borders music and books outlet browsing the jazz section some years ago and a younger black woman came up and asked me what kind of jazz I liked and I froze like a deer in the headlights and mumbled some nothing.

But the list includes:

• any version of "Summertime" or :God Bless the Child" I can find;
  
• a lot of Dave Brubeck (early, mid and late);
  
• some Ahmad Jamal and Keith Jarrett (especially "The Moth and the Flame" and the Koln concert;
  
• a smattering of Miles (especially "Kind of Blue" and "Sketches of Spain");
  
• a tiny bit of Coltrane ("May Favorite Things" is in my top five);
  
• Cannonball Adderley Quintet's "Autumn Leaves" is exquisite; and
  
• a little Freddie Hubbard (his "All Blues" along with the original is a nice brunch in itself);
  
• several versions of "'Round Midnight";
  
• three of "My Funny Valentine";
  
• six of "Take Five";
  

et alia.

If anyone knows of a recording (an Ampex tape recorder was there jus oiff-stage, going round and round) of a live extended version of "Koto Song" (Brubeck et al) with Bobby Millitello chanting across the mouthpiece of the flute (seen live by me at the Harvard Saunders Theatre, thought by Pierre Sprey to be the best place to record jazz in the world), there is a serious reward offered.

My theme? Probably the three versions of Brubeck's "Forty Days".