Kenny Clarke Plays Andre Hodeir

 

Blue Serge

Kenny Clarke Plays Andre Hodeir

A collection of modern jazz arrangements by the celebrated French author and composer

The Kenny Clarke Sextet

Epic LN 3376

1956

'Round Midnight and When Lights Are Low - Kenny Clarke, drums; Roger Guéruin, trumpet; Billy Buyers, Nat Peck, trombones; René Urteger, piano; Pierre Michelot, bass

On A Riff - Martial Solal, piano replaces Urtreger

Cadenze, Blue Serge, Bemsha Swing, The Squirrel and Swing Spring - Kenny Clarke, drums; Roger Guérin, trumpet; Billy Byers, trombone; Martial Solal, piano; Armand Migiani, baritone sax; Jean Warland, bass

Oblique, Tahiti, Jeru and Eronel - Robert Gunsmith, alto sax, replaces Guérin

Kenny Clarke and Jean Warland appear by courtesy of Jacques Hélian; Billy Byers and Roger Guérin by courtesy of Versailles Records; René Urtreger by courtesy of Barclay Records and Martial Solal by courtesy of Vogue Records

From the back cover: Until the last few years, that stowaway aboard jazz called the arranger had limited his activities to the big band. In recent years, however, his attention has turned to smaller and small jazz groups, down to quartets consisting, in addition to drums and bass, of piano and vibraphone or of saxophone and trumpet. In this way there gradually emerged, alongside purely different from the one that had produced some of jazz's most deservedly famous works, from the Hot Five recordings on 1926 to Parker's unforgettable ones in 1947.

What we have attempted here is a step forward in this new approach to small-group jazz. The most important thing, we believe, is to re-examine the problems presented by the soloist himself and by his relations with the other musicians as well as to give concrete expression in actual pieces to the enlarged forms that might result from this re-examination. Was it possible for new ways of combining sounds to give birth to a new kind of musical sensitivity? The listener will be the judge of that.

In the small group as we see it, the soloist (in this case almost invariably the piano) should be, as it were, propelled toward his solo by the arrangement. We try to surround him, before he takes off, with a musical background sufficiently dense to constitute a challenge that he must at any price respond to when the band finally leaves him on his own. In this respect, it seems that the challenge has been met, since Martial Solal has never played better; in fact, he proves himself here to be one of today's greatest jazz pianists.

For the drums and bass, the problem was different. It was not a question of freeing them but of leaving them space in the arrangement so that they could become more integral part of the piece than they usually are.

Finally, throughout one whole group of arrangements, we have experimented more completely than ever before with writing out solos and duets in a style of free improvisation. We shall refer to this as "written improvisation."

The compositions included in this group of arrangements are Gerry Mulligan's Jeru, Milt Jackson's Tahiti, Benny Carter's When Lights Are Low and Thelonius Monk's Round Midnight. – Notes by André Hodeir

Bemsha Swing - Denzil Best and Thelonisu Monk

Oblique - André Hodeir

Blue Serge - Duke Ellington

Swing Spring - Miles Davis

On A Riff - André Hodeir

Jeru - Gerry Mulligan

The Squirrel - Todd Dameron

Eronel - Thelonius Monk

'Round Midnight - Thelonius Monk

When Lights Are Low - Benny Carter

Cadenze - André Hodeir

Tahiti - Milt Jackson