Stan Kenton Art: I've never encountered a stronger personality.
Gil Evans Art: His writing for Miles on Miles Ahead to me was the most perfect thing I've ever heard done for a soloist with a band. Gil's understanding of Miles was perfect. I'd love to have the opportunity of doing an album with Gil with the same writing approach.
Miles Davis Art: His development has been phenomenal. ...His warmth, choice of notes, and beautiful simplicity have touched my very soul.
Zoot Sims Art: He's the most natural, swinging musician I've ever heard. I think I could achieve complete satisfaction playing with him in a small group. Add Miles for the third horn and going to work each night would be the ultimate.
John Coltrane Art: I thought it just helped my growth as a musician, going through the Coltrane thing, If I had stayed playing like him, then it would have been bad. It was just like you go to school, and take a certain course, for a year or a couple of years. Your technique, your facility becomes that much greater; it helps your approach you can do so many more things. and incorporate them into the way you feel about music, your own feelings about your style. In the long run, it gave me a different dimension, and it just broadened the whole thing.
Art Pepper: The Art History Project Unreleased Art, Vol IV CD One: Pure Art; CD Two: Hard Art; CD Three: Consummate Art
Two-thirds of the music here has never been released before. The program begins in 1950 (Art Pepper with Stan Kenton) and concludes with tracks from a previously unreleased New York gig, featuring Stanley Cowell, George Mraz, and Ben Riley, played just a couple of months before Pepper's June 1982 death, at age 56.
Disc 1. Pure Art is a story told by the young fellow who placed second only to Charlie Parker in the Down Beat polls, and who, by his own account, "musically, at least, had the world by the tail." That "at least" is typical Art Pepper. Nothing was ever was quite perfect enough. Nothing was ever quite right. He began to use drugs during this period, in an effort to escape the universal lack that prodded and plagued him. This disc is mostly "West Coast Jazz" with all its contrapuntal cleverness and loveliness -- though Art always gave it his own bright little edge of adrenaline so it never was lightweight. Many of the tunes are his originals. Sidemen here include Warne Marsh, Jack Sheldon, and Shorty Rogers "This music is sublime and really timeless," says Laurie.
Disc 2. Hard Art consists of mostly unreleased material from a rehearsal recorded at Contemporary Studios in 1964 a few weeks after Art's first release from San Quentin. It reveals his love for Coltrane and for the new sound of jazz. Art's songs still swing and have moments of lyricism, but he uses the license given him by freer musical conventions to express the grief, anger, and alienation he felt in the midst of serving what seemed like an only-occasionally-interrupted life sentence -- doing time in jails and prisons just for using drugs.
Disc 3. Consummate Art is just that. This is a narrative of reconciliation. In this music, most of which has never been released, Art embraces his past and his pain in music that is delicate, lively, and touching, and, at the same time, free: It rages and celebrates. The edge of desperation is still there, but Art has found a way to use it. He is again at the top of the jazz polls, respected and even adored, playing all over the world. He is "a knowing athlete, trained and poised" (Gary Giddins, Village Voice), who brought from deep inside the beauty of his own passion angst and glee and connected so unerringly with ours. He was "an architect of emotion" (John Litweiler, Chicago Sun-Times) who "played with controlled intensity, clean articulation, and a command of his instrument that make his virtuosity seem almost casual and easy" (John S. Wilson, New York Times)
Art Pepper: Unreleased Art, Volume III, The Croydon Concert (Live At the Fairfield Hall, Croydon, England)
Recorded live on May 14, 1981 with Milcho Leviev on piano, Bob Magnusson on upright bass, Carl Burnett on drums.
Track Listing: 1 Blues for Blanche 2 Talk, Band Intro 3 Ophelia 4 Mambo De La Pinta 5 Patricia 6 Cherokee 7 Goodbye 8 Yours Is My Heart Alone 9 Dedicated 10 Make a List (Make a Wish)
Art Pepper: Unreleased Art, Volume II, The Last Concert (Live At the Kool Jazz Festival, Kennedy Center, Washington D.C.)
Recorded live on May 30, 1982 with Roger Kellaway, David Williams & Carl Burnett.
The preview track in the MySpace MP3 player above is Art's solo on "Mambo Koyama" and has been graciously provided to this site by Laurie Pepper.
Track Listing: Landscape; Ophelia; Mambo Koyama; Over The Rainbow; When You're Smiling
Laurie Pepper has granted an exclusive download for Art's MySpace friends- so fans, collectors and completists gather round... It's Art Pepper live in January 1979 performing a stunning version of his original composition ballad, "Lost Life", at Douglas's Beach House in Half Moon Bay, California. This track was only available for a short time on an obscure Japanese LP in the early 80's and hasn't been in-print for 20 plus years!
(many thanks to Laurie for this gift. For further information, please visit her site at StraightLife.org)
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FROM ART PEPPER'S MEMOIR, "STRAIGHT LIFE":
I remember one time when I was playing at the Blackhawk in San Francisco. I forget the date, but Sonny Stitt... came in and wanted to jam with me. We both play alto, which is... it really makes it a contest. But Sonny is one of those guys, that's the thing with him. It's a communion. It'a a battle. It's an ego trip. It's a testing ground. And that's the beautiful part of it. It's like two guys that play great pool wanting to play pool together or two great football teams or two maginificent basketball teams, and just the joy of playing with someone great...
I said "what do you want to play?" Sonny says "Let's play 'Cherokee.'" That's a song jazz musicians used to play. The bridge, which is the middle part, has all kinds of chord changes in it. It's very difficult. If some kid came around, and he wanted to play, you'd say "Let's play 'Cherokee'" and you'd count it off real fast. I said "Well, beat it off." He went "one-two, one-two;" he was flying. We played the head, the melody and then he took the first solo. He played, I don't know, about forty choruses. He played for an hour maybe, did everything that could be done on a saxophone, everything you could play, as much as Charlie Parker could've played if he'd been there. Then he stopped. And he looked at me. Gave me one of those looks, "All right, suckah, your turn." And it's my job, it's my gig.
I was strung out. I was hooked. I was drunk. I was having a hassle with my wife, Diane, who'd threatened to kill herself in our hotel room next door. I had marks on my arm. I thought there were narcs in the club, and I all of a sudden realized that it was me. He'd done all those things and now I had to put up or shut up or get off or forget it or quit or kill myself or do something.
I forgot everything, and everything came out. I played way over my head. I played completely different than he did. I searched and found my own way, and what I said reached the people. I played myself, and I knew I was right, and the people loved it, and they felt it. I blew and blew and when I finally finished I was shaking all over; my heart was pounding; I was soaked in sweat, and the people were screaming, the people were clapping... and I looked at Sonny, but I just kind of nodded, and he went "All right. And that was it. That's what it's all about.
I want to be more than just a "jazz player" playing. I want to make people forget the categories and hear what's really happening. I want to make them feel the joy or sadness. I want to make them open up and listen. That's what I've always wanted.
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Hello! Georges Crébassa Project musique, formes, mouvements, couleurs... pour visionner le diaporama du précédent spectacle Arts Mêlés allez sur notre site www.georgescrebassa.com et accédez à la rubrique photo.......
Art Pepper was one of the greatest musicians ever;he was real and that reality permeated his music !His legacy lives on and I am very grateful for all the inspiration I have had listening to him !Love and Light Brother !James.
Ciao,Art Thank you for the add and the friendship. you are very good, I like your stupendous music a lot, compliments ..really. you are one of my prefeitis, I feel great admiration for you, you are a great really... you are writing important pages in the history of the music jazz talk to you soon, and all of my best wishes to always listen to your good music. all the best.. from italy..and good week neal
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