“Accent on Youth,” by Ted Bryan

July 26th, 2007

Accent on Youth

by

Ted Bryan

___________________________

Ted Bryan is a seventeen-year-old Portland, Oregon resident who was co-winner of the 2006 Accent on Youth Essay Contest, as judged by jazz critic Gary Giddins, vocalist Dee Dee Bridgewater, and the publisher of Jerry Jazz Musician. His passion for jazz is the focus of the column.

This is Ted’s debut column, originally published July 5, 2006

*

Listen to Dinah Washington sing Accent On Youth

Out From In


__________________________________________

Second paragraph, book four, of his Vanity of Dulouz:
An Adventurous Education, 1935-46, Jack Kerouac poses the artist’s
existential quandary: “Did I come into this world thru the womb of my mother
the earth just so I could talk and write like everybody else?”

This month I am going to begin a two-part series, comparing
and contrasting two jazzmen who worked to stretch the boundaries of the medium,
who contributed greatly to free jazz (the next step after bebop), and who
often straddled the fence between music and noise: Eric Dolphy and Roland
Kirk.

     Both played more than one instrument, Dolphy using Bb
bass clarinet, alto saxophone, and flute; Kirk playing tenor sax, manzello,
stritch, black mystery pipes, flute, nose flute, siren, piccolo, harmonium,
et cetera, et cetera. Where they differ is that Dolphy only played one instrument
at a time; Kirk reportedly had a dream where he saw himself playing three
horns at once, and so he took to it, coupling simultaneous multi-horn playing
with his talent for circular breathing. If the real purpose of jazz is to
capture the emotions of people and set them into musical form, then I postulate
that, beginning with Charlie Parker in the fifties, there came a realization
of the need for noise in jazz due to increased unrest in the United States.
Are we to think it mere coincidence that free jazz and civil rights came
along largely during the same time period? I should hope not. What Kirk and
Dolphy were a central part of was trying to help jazz be more than it had
been before. The music of these two men is music to clear your head, to blow
out control sinuses, and to shake some liberation into the forefront of the
consciousness. It’s also music to just have a good time with, to help you
into whatever frenzy you like, to help you breathe. So that is what their
music does — now on to what it is.

     I was in the car recently with my mom, and we were listening
to Dolphy’s Last Date, which was recorded 27 days before his June
29, 1964 death. The track playing was “The Madrig Speaks, The Panther Walks ,”
and as we listened, my mom (a musician herself) commented on Eric’s tone
being round and dark. I interjected a few observations of my own: weird and
mournful. Although mournful may not have been the “right” adjective (as in,
maybe not a correct judge of intent, at least maybe not on “Madrig”), it
seemed to fit its purpose at the time. Of his alto sax playing, my mom said,
“It’s almost like he’s playing a completely different instrument.” She added
that his tone sort of blends in with the background, and that at times it
doesn’t define itself. I suggested that sometimes when he plays his low notes
they aren’t even there. (And by that I meant to describe a sound utilized
by both Dolphy and Kirk: the interrupted note. These guys will often launch
a breath out of their bells and make it sound like a car engine starting
— the note breaks up and is sort of discontinuous in the air. You can hear
it on the beginning of Kirk’s “Rip, Rig And Panic .”)

     Dolphy’s ability to make his horns sound like a completely
different instrument, and to walk the line between definite/indefinite sound,
adds to the distinction of his voice. That he was unafraid to blow jokes
or noise on the road to new discoveries and frontiers shows what a damn bold
and funny guy he was. For instance, listen to his use of repetition of four-five
notes in a little swinging riff on the album Out There. On the first
track, the same riff is returned to — the foundation for short bursts of
playing, again and again, effectively serving as a reference point and creating
an entity of sound (the entire solo) that can be divided into two parts.
Imagine the surprise when, coming to the end of the album, you hear the riff
again, although less overt, in the solo on “Feathers “! That’s funny, but
it’s also genius.

     If you were going to compare Kirk’s sound to the comic
book art of S. Clay Wilson (which I have heard described as being something
akin to “graphic agoraphobia”), you’d have to say Dolphy sounded like B.
Kriegstein. Specifically, I’m thinking of Kriegstein in the one story he
drew for MAD, a parody of “From Here To Eternity”. In the story,
Kriegstein accentuates the curves and lines of the human form. He caricatures
the protagonist’s slouch at almost a perfect 180 degrees; the fingers jut
out looking like they’re too long to handle anything…the effect is extremely
comical, but Kriegstein’s style allows for an encompassing sense of what’s
natural. The characters are ridiculously shaped, but you can imagine looking
up from the page and seeing one of them walk by. I’m not sure how he does
it (and from what I’ve seen of his other work, the MAD article is
fairly unique). So, while Kirk deals with blobs, layers of sound, Dolphy
is capable of much more angular material; unnatural to the sensitive ear
and unexpected qua jazz (or any music, really), but actually commonplace
to the denizens of any bustling avenue or boulevard. Anyone who has ever
taken a good long look at a lonely wall, or watched a clay chip off the handle
on a mug of bitter, cold coffee; anyone who has ever felt his own heart weaving
a web to trap him while garbage men banged the cans in the street can and
ultimately will empathize with this music.

     His first offering as a leader, Outward Bound,
shows him in a fairly standard bop quintet format, with Freddie Hubbard on
trumpet, George Tucker on bass, Jaki Byard (who worked with Kirk and Charles
Mingus) on piano, and Roy Haynes on drums. The playing is inventive and
energetic, but the album isn’t as much of a statement as his next album,
Out There, which features George Duvivier on bass, Ron Carter on cello,
and Roy Haynes, again, on drums. Out There is my favorite Dolphy album,
but it’s also the one I have owned the longest, so it could just be the one
I am most comfortable with. It is Dolphy’s final studio album, Out To
Lunch
(a very “out” guy!) that delivers the angles I speak of. Out
To Lunch
showcases the phenomenal Richard Davis (who played on Van Morrison’s
Astral Weeks) on bass, Freddie Hubbard, Bobbie Hutcherson on vibraphone,
and young Tony Williams on drums. It contains many moments of great beauty,
but on some songs it’s like the beauty has fallen down a broken staircase,
hitting each step as she came down. Out To Lunch is incredibly structured,
as is most of Dolphy’s material, it is the actual sounds made that often
confuse people into thinking it’s “free” jazz.

     Art without conflict would be incredibly boring, and
Dolphy knew that, so he utilized dissonance when creating his melodies, and
the effect is great. The soloing is unpredictable, and some of it is so damn
squawky you wonder what he is doing to that poor goose. But even in him moments
of frenzied playing, Dolphy soothes. Kirk can often sound like a conjurer
of demons, creating these fantastic scenes of turmoil with his horns, but
Dolphy sounds like he is sublimating his thoughts and demons, expelling them
through the music in a terse way, exorcizing them through the music instead
of creating a lot of “hoo hah!” to yell and shout at. Maybe he was shy, certainly
not as magniloquent as Kirk, but he was incredibly courageous, and the world
of music — and the world in which we live — would be a lot better place
if we all followed his example.

______________________________

Share this:

Comment on this article:

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Site Archive

Your Support is Appreciated

Jerry Jazz Musician has been commercial-free since its inception in 1999. Your generous donation helps it remain that way. Thanks very much for your kind consideration.

Publisher’s Notes

Creatives – “This is our time!“…A Letter from the Publisher...A call to action to take on political turmoil through the use of our creativity as a way to help our fellow citizens “pierce the mundane to find the marvelous.”

In This Issue

Announcing the book publication of Kinds of Cool: An Interactive Collection of Jazz Poetry...The first Jerry Jazz Musician poetry anthology published in book form includes 90 poems by 47 poets from all over the world, and features the brilliant artwork of Marsha Hammel and a foreword by Jack Kerouac’s musical collaborator David Amram. The collection is “interactive” (and quite unique) because it invites readers – through the use of QR codes printed on many of the book’s pages – to link to selected readings by the poets themselves, as well as to historic audio and video recordings (via YouTube) relevant to many of the poems, offering a holistic experience with the culture of jazz.

Interview

photo Louis Armstrong House Museum
Interview with Ricky Riccardi, author of Stomp Off, Let’s Go: The Early Years of Louis Armstrong...The author discusses the third volume of his trilogy, which includes the formation of the Armstrong-led ensembles known as the Hot Five and Hot Seven that modernized music, the way artists play it, and how audiences interact with it and respond to it.

The Sunday Poem

photo of Billy Wilder via Wikimedia Commons


“You Know by the Laughter,” by Joan E. Bauer


The Sunday Poem is published weekly, and strives to include the poet reading their work....

Joan E. Bauer reads her poem at its conclusion


Click here to read previous editions of The Sunday Poem

Short Fiction

Short Fiction Contest-winning story #68 — “Saharan Blues on the Seine,” by Aishatu Ado...Aminata, a displaced Malian living in Paris, is haunted by vivid memories of her homeland. Through a supernatural encounter with her grandmother, she realizes that preserving her musical heritage through performance is an act of resistance that can transform her grief into art rather than running from it.

Feature

“What one song best represents your expectations for 2025?” Readers respond...When asked to name the song that best represents their expectations for 2025, respondents often cited songs of protest and of the civil rights era, but so were songs of optimism and appreciation, including Bob Thiele and George David Weiss’ composition “What a Wonderful World,” made famous by Louis Armstrong, who first performed it live in 1959. The result is a fascinating and extensive outlook on the upcoming year.

Poetry

Sax in a Blue Suit by Samuel Dixon
21 jazz poems on the 21st of March, 2025...An ongoing series designed to share the quality of jazz poetry continuously submitted to Jerry Jazz Musician by poets sharing their relationship to the music, and with the musicians who perform it.

Interview

photo by Brian McMillen
Interview with Phillip Freeman, author of In the Brewing Luminous: The Life and Music of Cecil Taylor...The author discusses Cecil Taylor – the most eminent free jazz musician of his era, whose music marked the farthest boundary of avant-garde jazz.

Feature

photo of Rudy Van Gelder via Blue Note Records
“Rudy Van Gelder: Jazz Music’s Recording Angel” – by Joel Lewis...For over 60 years, the legendary recording engineer Rudy Van Gelder devoted himself to the language of sound. And although he recorded everything from glee clubs to classical music, he was best known for recording jazz – specifically the musicians associated with Blue Note and Prestige records. Joel Lewis writes about his impact on the sound of jazz, and what has become of his Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey studio.

Poetry

Elizabeth Hudy (based on photo by Gary Pepper)/CC BY-ND 2.0
“It’s Always April in Paris” – a poem (for April) by Jerrice J. Baptiste...Jerrice J. Baptiste’s 12-month 2025 calendar of jazz poetry winds through the year with her poetic grace while inviting us to wander through music by the likes of Hoagy Carmichael, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Sarah Vaughan, Melody Gardot and Nina Simone. She welcomes April with a poem welcoming the promise of Spring, a time that “breaks icy borders to free wild rivers.”

Playlist

“Sextets: The Joy of Six” – a playlist by Bob Hecht...The cover of the 1960 debut album by the Jazztet, co-founded by the trumpeter Art Farmer and the tenor saxophonist Benny Golson, and which always featured a trombonist and a piano-bass-drums rhythm section. Golson wrote much of the music, but “Hi-Fly” – a tune featured on Bob Hecht’s two-hour playlist devoted to sextets – was written by pianist Randy Weston, and appears on the 1960 album Big City Sounds.

Interview

Interview with Jonathon Grasse: author of Jazz Revolutionary: The Life and Music of Eric Dolphy....The multi-instrumentalist Eric Dolphy was a pioneer of avant-garde technique. His life cut short in 1964 at the age of 36, his brilliant career touched fellow musical artists, critics, and fans through his innovative work as a composer, sideman and bandleader. Jonathon Grasse’s Jazz Revolutionary is a significant exploration of Dolphy’s historic recorded works, and reminds readers of the complexity of his biography along the way. Grasse discusses his book in a December, 2024 interview.

Feature

Dmitry Rozhkov, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
“Thoughts on Matthew Shipp’s Improvisational Style” – an essay by Jim Feast..Short of all the musicians being mind readers, what accounts for free jazz musicians’ – in this instance those playing with the pianist Matthew Shipp – incredible ability for mutual attunement as they play?

Art

Photo of Joe Lovano by Giovanni Piesco
The Photographs of Giovanni Piesco: Joe Lovano...Beginning in 1990, the noted photographer Giovanni Piesco began taking backstage photographs of many of the great musicians who played in Amsterdam’s Bimhuis, that city’s main jazz venue which is considered one of the finest in the world. Jerry Jazz Musician will occasionally publish portraits of jazz musicians that Giovanni has taken over the years. This edition features 1999 photographs of the saxophonist Joe Lovano.

Feature

Excerpts from David Rife’s Jazz Fiction: Take Two – Vol. 11: “Chick” and “Hen” Lit...A substantial number of novels and stories with jazz music as a component of the story have been published over the years, and the scholar David J. Rife has written short essay/reviews of them. In this 11th edition, Rife writes about the “chicks” (energetic women, attractive, and open to experience) and “hens” (older women who have either buried or lost a loved one, and who seem content with their lives) who are at the center of stories with jazz within its theme.

Interview

photo by Carl Van Vechten, Library of Congress
A Black History Month Profile: The legendary author Richard Wright...In a 2002 Jerry Jazz Musician interview, Richard Wright biographer Hazel Rowley discusses the life and times of legendary author Richard Wright, whose work included the novels Native Son andBlack Boy

Feature

On the Turntable — The “Best Of the ‘Best Of’” in 2024 jazz recordings...Our annual year-end compilation of jazz albums oft mentioned by a wide range of critics as being the best of 2024

In Memoriam

photo via Pexels.com
“Departures to the Final Arms Hotel in 2024” – poetic tributes, by Terrance Underwood...2024 produced its share of losses of legendary jazz musicians. Terrance Underwood pays poetic homage to a handful who have touched his life, imagining their admittance to the Final Arms Hotel, a destination he introduces in his prelude.

Community

Stewart Butterfield, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Community Bookshelf #4...“Community Bookshelf” is a twice-yearly space where writers who have been published on Jerry Jazz Musician can share news about their recently authored books and/or recordings. This edition includes information about books published within the last six months or so (September, 2024 – March, 2025)

Feature

Trading Fours, with Douglas Cole, No. 23: “The Wave”...In this edition of an occasional series of the writer’s poetic interpretations of jazz recordings and film, Douglas’ poem is written partly as a reference to the Antonio Carlos Jobin song “Wave,” but mostly to get in the famed Japanese artist Hokusai’s idea of the wave as being a huge, threatening thing. (The poem initially sprang from listening to Cal Tjader’s “Along Came Mary”).

Interview

Interview with James Kaplan, author of 3 Shades of Blue: Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Bill Evans and the Lost Empire of Cool...The esteemed writer tells a vibrant story about the jazz world before, during, and after the 1959 recording of Kind of Blue, and how the album’s three genius musicians came together, played together, and grew together (and often apart) throughout the experience.

Feature

photo of Lester Young by William Gottlieb/Library of Congress
Jazz History Quiz #179...Throughout his career, this saxophonist was known as the “Vice Prez” because he sounded so similar to “Prez,” Lester Young (pictured). Who was he?

Community

Nominations for the Pushcart Prize XLIX...Announcing the six writers nominated for the Pushcart Prize v. XLIX, whose work was published in Jerry Jazz Musician during 2024.

Publisher’s Notes

photo by Rhonda Dorsett
On turning 70, and contemplating the future of Jerry Jazz Musician...

Feature

“Are Jazz-Hop Instrumentals Jazz?” – an observation (and playlist) by Anthony David Vernon...Google “what is jazz-hop?” and the AI overview describes it is “a subgenre of hip-hop that combines jazz and hip-hop music. It developed in the late 1980s and early 1990s.” In Mr. Vernon’s observation, he makes the case that it is also a subgenre of jazz.

Community

Notes on Bob Hecht’s book, Stolen Moments: A Photographer’s Personal Journey...Some thoughts on a new book of photography by frequent Jerry Jazz Musician contributing writer Bob Hecht

Art

“The Jazz Dive” – the art of Allen Mezquida...The artist's work is inspired by the counterculture music from the 1950s and 60s, resulting in art “that resonates with both eyes and ears.” It is unique and creative and worth a look…

True Jazz Stories

Columbia Records; via Wikimedia Commons
“An Evening with Michael Bloomfield” – a true blues story by David Eugene Everard...The author recounts his experience meeting and interviewing the great blues guitarist Mike Bloomfield in 1974…

Short Fiction

photo via PxHere
“The Magic” – a story by Mark Bruce...Most bands know how to make music. They learn to play together so that it sounds good and maybe even get some gigs. Most bands know that you have your chord progressions and your 4/4 beat and your verses and bridges. Some bands even have a guy (or a woman, like Chrissy Hynde) who writes songs. So what gives some bands the leg up into the Top 40?

Contributing Writers

Click the image to view the writers, poets and artists whose work has been published on Jerry Jazz Musician, and find links to their work

Coming Soon

An interview with Sascha Feinstein, author of Writing Jazz: Conversations with Critics and Biographers;, Also, a new Jazz History Quiz, and lots of short fiction; poetry; photography; interviews; playlists; and much more in the works...

Interview Archive

Ella Fitzgerald/IISG, CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons
Click to view the complete 25-year archive of Jerry Jazz Musician interviews, including those recently published with Judith Tick on Ella Fitzgerald (pictured),; Laura Flam and Emily Sieu Liebowitz on the Girl Groups of the 60's; Tad Richards on Small Group Swing; Stephanie Stein Crease on Chick Webb; Brent Hayes Edwards on Henry Threadgill; Richard Koloda on Albert Ayler; Glenn Mott on Stanley Crouch; Richard Carlin and Ken Bloom on Eubie Blake; Richard Brent Turner on jazz and Islam; Alyn Shipton on the art of jazz; Shawn Levy on the original queens of standup comedy; Travis Atria on the expatriate trumpeter Arthur Briggs; Kitt Shapiro on her life with her mother, Eartha Kitt; Will Friedwald on Nat King Cole; Wayne Enstice on the drummer Dottie Dodgion; the drummer Joe La Barbera on Bill Evans; Philip Clark on Dave Brubeck; Nicholas Buccola on James Baldwin and William F. Buckley; Ricky Riccardi on Louis Armstrong; Dan Morgenstern and Christian Sands on Erroll Garner; Maria Golia on Ornette Coleman.