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Such a Great Sweetness (on Wayne Shorter)

1 Laurent Cugny Sorbonne University - Faculty of Letters Institute for Research in Musicology (IReMus, UMR 8223) International Research Center on Jazz and Audiotactile Music (CRIJMA)

Les Cahiers du jazz, new series

, p. 10-23.

Such a great sweetness (on Wayne Shorter)

Wayne Shorter was born on August 25, 1933 in Newark, New Jersey. He is therefore of the generation immediately following that of Miles Davis and John Coltrane, both born in

1926. These two names are not mentioned at random, since they are the

Major personalities?

—

With Art Blakey

—

Thanks to whom and by whom Wayne Shorter will reveal himself (we

Will come back). He first played with Horace Silver while he was still in the army and then, in 1958,

With Nat Phipps and Maynard Ferguson, with whom he meets Josef Zawinul. In 1959, he entered the

JAZZ MESSENGERS

By Art Blakey, a formation of which he quickly became musical director. He remained there until 1964, when he eventually gave in to Miles' insistent invitation

Davis to enter his orchestra

E (and therefore to leave Blakey's). He will stay there until

1970. But Wayne Shorter simultaneously began his leadership career with a first recording under his name in 1959. Throughout the 1960s, he carried out this activity head-on with his status as a sideman, successively with Art Blakey and Miles Davis. In this respect, it represents a kind of bridge between two eras of the jazzman profession:

The old one where we learn it by staying sideman for a long time with the elders, and the most

Modern where you can

Assert himself from the outset as a leader (Keith Jarrett provides a

Example) [FOOTNOTE 1: We will notice an interesting parallel with cinema, including in dates. This year 1959 when Shorter enters Art Blakey and begins his first album as a leader is also that of the emergence of the New Wave in French cinema. The proponents of it (Jean-Luc Godard, François Truffaut, Éric Rohmer, Claude Chabrol, Jacques Rivette), accompanied their criticism of what was then called "French Quality" (Marcel Carné, Claude Autant Lara, René Clément...) of the statement that he It was possible to pass immediately to the staging by sparing the long years of learning as an assistant.]

Wayne Shorter, as we said, will therefore reveal himself in the shadow of three ministering figures: Art Blakey, Miles Davis and John Coltrane. Art Blakey undoubtedly illustrates the figure of the father. His fourteen-year-old eldest, he welcomes the novice to his table and offers his benevolent protection in him confiding even the keys to the house. In contact with him, Shorter immerses himself in a tradition of Jazz, via Bebop in one of its advanced versions, hard bop. At the same time, he can develop his talents as a composer, arranger and ultimately as a conductor, although he does not have all the prerogatives. With Miles Davis, things are more complex. Blakey was happy to be able, in confidence, to rely on his recruit to ensure the game in compositions and arrangements that did not particularly interest him, to instill the mind and keep the rhythmic part of the lion. But there is no questioning about a firmly established idiom (even recently) as a landmark. Blakey fixes the frames, those of hard bop then in full vitality, and young people only have to fill it, as they please as long as they do not make the revolution. At Miles Davis in 1964, it is quite different enter a trumpet player in a period of transition, even crisis, aesthetics. He too has

Affirmed as a master of hard bop (and cool) in the late 1950s, but he very quickly, unlike Blakey, felt cramped in these ca

Dres. He responded with the modal flashes of 1958-1959, heard in the albums "Milestones" and "Kind of Blue". But there is a historical misunderstanding here, in my opinion. We usually date the true birth of modal jazz, after the beginnings of

Milestones

, at the registration of

"Kind of Blue" and it still seems justified. [FOOTNOTE 2: Although the expression "modal jazz" and the reality of the concept of modality in this aesthetic are at my opinion is widely discussed, but that's another debate.] But we often forget that, if John Coltrane has embarked well on this path in a clear and irreversible way, it is not at all the same for Miles Davis, who somehow made a rear machine almost immediately this recorded disc. If we look at the period 1960–1964 of the trumpeter, he is clearly more related to previous jazz (rather cool trend) than nascent aesthetics. Certainly, Miles Davis still plays "So What" on stage but, in addition to doing it in a less wild way than Coltrane in its endless versions of "Impressions," this remains the exception in a repertoire where we hear much more often "Stella by Starlight," "If I Were a Bell," and "I Fall in Love Too Easily." A convincing illustration of this phenomenon can be heard in the recording of the "Stockholm Concert" of March 22, 1960, one of the very last performances of the group with John Coltrane. We hear—for example in "On Green Dolphin Street"—the ditch, the chasm, which now separates Coltrane from Davis. Davis delivers a perfect solo of conciseness and elegance, as we are used to expecting from the aesthete trumpeter, while Coltrane crushes the material into a logorrhea whose obsessive and almost autistic character is highlighted by the complete discrepancy with the rhythm section formed by Wynton Kelly, Paul Chambers and Jimmy Cobb. Coltrane is already projecting himself into another music, while Miles Davis would like to escape from it, is always caught in the one before. This was no longer the case in 1963. He is ready to change his aesthetics, he has the intuition of solutions—different from those offered by free jazz, which do not suit him—but he does not know exactly how or with whom to implement them. The certainty of the viability of this mutation is brought to him by his new rhythm section, the first time he plays with people younger than him composed of Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony Williams, but he still lacks the saxophonist (and incidentally one more composer). He has known for a while now that it should be Wayne Shorter, but Shorter doesn't want to leave Art Blakey. The saxophonist finally decides in 1964, Miles Davis's "second quintet" is then constituted. The situation is completely new for Wayne Shorter, as well as for the other three sidemen, than the one met when he entered the JAZZ MESSENGERS. Indeed, if the leader's charisma is so strong, the musical frameworks are not only not fixed, but need to be transformed, without this leader holding the keys to this change. Wayne Shorter and his companions must no longer only bring compositions and help arrange them, but produce new ways of playing. The limits were set by Blakey to stay inside. The same at Miles Davis must be exceeded. We know the result: it is a major evolution of the language that the group will produce, through the action of each of its members.

For some ten years as a sideman, Wayne Shorter employs them in the most active way possible. Not only does he assert his language as a saxophonist, but he experiences at Art Blakey his qualities as a composer-stranger in a certain setting, then those explored with Miles Davis. Before seeing the interactions of this period with his as a leader, we must say a word about his third guardian shadow, that of John Coltrane. This one-

This, as has been said, is Shorter's eldest of SepT years. He was already on his way to becoming a reference saxophonist in 1955 when he entered Miles Davis' quintet. And he's going

Assert himself as such more and more, first as master of hard bop, alongside Sonny

Rollins, then as a pioneer

Modal jazz, before becoming the flagship of free jazz, and finally as an essential milestone in the history of jazz or even universal music, quite simply. We understand that it is difficult, bad luck or historical chance, to arrive in the wake of a

Such a strength of music, on the same instrument, a problem encountered many times in

The history of jazz, for example, by trumpeterists in Armstrong's time, or shortly before, by alto saxophonists hatched in the shadow of Charlie Parker

(The whites

In particular, Lee Konitz, Art Pepper, Paul Desmond...). Among the two terms of the alternative

Left to the epigones, the first is to stick to the model and not to have much other

Choice than to approach at the shortest possible distance

The but always respectable,

Knowing that it will never be completely satisfied. We know that, in the case of John Coltrane, legions have embarked on this path, until today, not that these

Soldiers are imitating wheels, to which they have often been too complacently reduced,

But certainly because the alternative to this solution was not visible (or audible), as the attraction force of the major star was strong. The other term was to find, as much as it

Is possible, another way. That's what Wayne Shorter did. Not that he couldn't

Play as well as Coltrane on this field, but because his musical temperament

Offered other perspectives, certainly more in line with his personality p

Rofonde.

However, by presenting the case as being limited to two solutions, the problem is reduced. Indeed, an alternative already existed through the representatives of the cool. Although they slightly chronologically preceded the arrival of Coltran

E on the front stage, the cool tenors

—

And whites

—

Stan Getz, Jimmy Giuffre, Zoot Sims, placed themselves in continuity

By Lester Young, while Coltrane resumed with others, Sonny Rollins in particular, in

Further fortifying it, Coleman Hawkins' tradition, in a well-known alternative between "big sound" and its hushed, hard and cool, expressionism and impressionism, sun and moon, etc. However, as early as 1954, cool jazz was, if not losing momentum, at least in a state of relative disg

Grate with observers who would like to see a certain vitality consubstantial to the

Jazz meet and renew itself. Lucien Malson wrote in 1961: "In 1954, jazz was released

A crisis of languor. In the years when tendanc ruled

Are cool, we

Conceive, without optimism or pessimism, "the miracle of an unpredictable explosion". Neither the perpetuation of the "rhythm and blues" aesthetic indeed, nor even the revival of excitatory virtue due to the Afro contribution

-Cuban could not be enough to reopen the destiny of Negro-American music"

3

. After Clifford Brown, Art Blakey, Horace Silver, John Coltrane will meet this expectation by proposing fully innovative solutions leading to

Incandescence the life forces at the origin of some

Eternal values of jazz. What then can be done for a Wayne Shorter attending this irresistible ascent? To try

To transcend the work of

Brothers

, extend Stan Getz, sublimate Jimmy Giuffre?

Certainly not, and it is not only his skin color that prevents him from doing so. The pe

Shorter's Blue Note period as a leader in the 1960s, is clearly in continuity with hard bop and not with cool. But we hear something else in this music, and not just harmonic and compositional innovations. This different perfume is nestled

In sound, in intention, more negro than cool, softer also than Coltranian fury, for sure, but also as the tradition of hard bop. A different sweetness, a crack, a humanity, which are the marks, not of a new style necessarily, but of a person, of an entirely original musical personality. Can

-Be in those 1960s,

Was not

-We are not quite inclined, or ready, to hear this sweetness, Coltranian rage (or Mingusian or colemanie

Nne) sticking better to the violence of the time, violence of the

Repression against blacks in the United States and the response of anti-

Segregationists, violence of the wars of decolonization, violence of the ideological "great stories" of this

Time. Wayne Shorter appears as an island of aerial poetry

Who will no longer be heard by the white, non-violent, hippie answer, who preferred to see Charles Lloyd as his emissary in jazz. Too soft for some, too black for others. We can then situate his link with John Coltrane. As we know, around 1956-1957, the two

Men became friends and exchanged musical ideas and work sessions. This collaboration even spread to the stage. In September 1959, Co

Ltrane is at Birdland with Freddie Hubbard, Wayne Shorter, Tommy Flanagan, Cedar Walton, Ahmed Abdul-Malik, George Tucker and Elvin Jones, and he plays some of his recent compositions including

Giant Steps

,

Moment's Notice

And

Naima

.

4

Wayne Shorter talks about these evenings as follows: "We had rehearsed [at Coltrane], and that same evening we were playing. Cannonball and his brother Nat were on the same program. Cannonball and Trane were then working with Miles, but they had a break in their schedule and they separated to form separate orchestras. Elvin Jones was on drums that night.

It was historic

everyone realized it it.

we ignited the place. Ten years later when I went to California

, people were still talking about it, "we heard about it here, this memorable Monday at Birdland". This was the time when Trane began to play all the new material he had written.

It was a new wave.

5

For the first part of his career, Shorter will be compared to Coltrane,

Generally to be told that it is not as good. Today we can discuss the

Comparative grandeur of these two musicians. It is certain that Coltrane is at the top of the jazz pantheon. For Shor

Ter, it is still too early to say. But finally, it is still not a giant and a dwarf. I really believe that this period, after the

Cool vapors (some will say cuteness) and at the time of the explosions of the

New Thing

And from

S political, social and ideological violence of the 1960s was not willing to

Hear all the depth of the shorter poetics in gestation at that time. But it would still be simplistic to think that the relationship was in a united sense

That, Shorter inspired

De Coltrane without ever being able to compete with him on his field of virtuosity and flamboyance. It would be to remember only the Coltrane of

Giant Steps

, from

Impressions

And

Of a

Expression

, and forget that of

Naima

, "Ballads" and "Love Supreme". John Coltrane, who is said to be the sweetest of men, knew how to turn into the most violent

Musicians but also the most tender. And who knows if he hasn't heard this at Wayne?

Shorter during their joint working sessions in the late 1950s? It is certain that Wayne Shorter had to train at Art Blakey, to look at Miles Davis, and probably to grow, not against John Coltrane himself-

Even, but in the yardstick what he

Represented. A standard of virtuosity, ability to work, self-respect and

Music, musical requirement and rigor. And also an image of what the time wanted to hear.

Wayne Shorter, therefore, did not wait long to record as a leader, while

Continuing his activities as a sideman. Curiously enough, the hinges of his first period respond in both parts of his activity. He recorded his first album "Introducing Wayne Shorter

» the same year he entered the

JAZZ MESSENGERS.

When he doesn't

In 1964 from the Blakey Art group to Miles Davis, it changed label from Vee Jay to Blue Note, and it's not just a change of record label

When he left the trumpeter in 1970, he would do the same to enter Davis' label precisely, Columbia. Can-

We really talk about a "period" about his recordings on the label

Vee Jay? Maybe not. There are only three albums under his name: "Introducing Wayne Shorter" (November 9 and 10, 1959), "Second Genesis" (October 11, 1960) and "Wayning Moments

" (1962). To which should be added "

The Young Lions" collective album recorded on April 25, 1960. Production is therefore relatively sparse compared to what will happen at Blue Note.

But we must not forget that he was then musical director

Of

JAZZ MESSENGERS

That he provides abundantly in compositions and arrangements. He gives

Therefore a significant part of its production that

—

Truism

—

He can't keep for himself.

And all the more so since he evolves, at Art Blakey, in a setting that is close to the one he

Seeks to create in its own recordings. The dilemma will not be the same for Miles Davis, who practices, in co-creation with his sidemen, largely experimental music, different from what Shorter then wants to do in the albums under his name. It can, in its davisian period of the second half of the 1960s, satisfy two aesthetic slopes

Much more separated than they are, in the first

Half of the decade, between the

Art Blakey group and those he edits for his recordings for Vee Jay. In those

Here, he always keeps,

Via

The musicians he surrounds himself with, a link with the Blakey Art group.

In the first opus "Introducing Wayne Shorter", he uses his trumpeter buddy from the

MESSENGERS

, Lee Morgan, but surrounds himself with the rhythm of Miles Davis' then group,

Composed of Wynton Kelly, Paul Chambers and Jimmy Cobb. In "Second Genesis", he will

Until you take Blakey

Himself on drums, and on the piano a future member of the

MESSENGERS

, Cedar Walton. The time of the transition between the

JAZZ MESSENGERS

And Miles Davis' quintet

Is that of intense personal production

no less than seven albums in 1964 and 1965: "Night Dreamer", "Juju", "Speak No Evil", "The Soothsayer", "The Collector", "Ecetera", "The All Seing Eye". Many people see this as the great period of Wayne Shorter's discography. Without denying the very high technical and aesthetic quality of

This production, however, we can think that it is also there between the two chairs represented by the respective orchestras of these employers, stylistically speaking. Aesthetics

Of the first series of his albums Blue Note is clearly on the side of hard bop, so more

Close to Blakey, but harmony and form are already anticipating on Davis' quintet. In my opinion, this is the rhythm section that links these discs to the hard bop. Shorter doesn't try anything about it

The renewal of the function

Rhythmic training that we will hear at Miles Davis with

Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony Williams (and whom Hancock saw in 1963 in "Inventions and Dimensions"). It will always be the same with his subsequent production, which became scarce with only two albums under his name throughout the period 1965-1968 of the second Davis quintet: "

Adam's Apple

In 1966 and "Schizophrenia" in 1967. Shorter's saxophone playing will be profoundly modified by this mutation of the rhythmic section

In the second quintet. The best illustration can be there

Hear in my opinion in the "Complete Live at Plugged Nickel" box set recorded in

December 1965 and published only in 1995 by Columbia. This publication also has

Totally renewed

E the perception we had until then of the quintet. Indeed, the

Available discography of the group came entirely from studio recordings. There is

Did have the recording of Antibes in July 1963, but it was rather the prehistoir

E of the group with a Hancock - Carter - Williams trio just arrived and a George Coleman who still held the position of saxophonist. However, as we know, the behavior of davisian orchestras is often, if not always, very different on stage and in the studio. We don't

Therefore had only the studio side of the second quintet until the publication of the box in 1995. The dimension of experimentation in group play was only imperfectly

Documented by studio recordings only. In public, Wayne Shorter and Herbie

Hancock deliver truly staggering solo performances, at a level that Miles Davis

Him-

Even is in my opinion far from reaching, not only because he was affected by

Health problems at the time of

This recording, but also probably because it was

A little behind the level reached by his sidemen in this compartment of the game

6

. In more

Solos sometimes reaching four to five minutes, Shorter rises to a level of abstraction that is not intended

Nd neither in the studio albums of the quintet nor in the albums under his name for Blue Note.

1968 finally saw Miles Davis' quintet gradually disintegrate

And the music of the trumpeter turn into depth. It is gradually tinted

Electricity, so-called binary rhythms, and abandons the canon of the quintet (sometimes increased

In sextette), bebop combo model, which Davis has always practiced. Wayne Shorter is the only member of the second quintet to accompany this mutation until

U at the end. This is where he will experiment (and adopt) the soprano saxophone. The often evanescent atmosphere of

Sessions of that time is well suited to Shorter who will give some of his most beautiful soprano solos (on

Sanctaury

Or

Early Minor

For example). On March 17, 1970, he played for the last time alongside his mentor. In this intermediate period of Miles Davis' discography, he found Joe Zawinul, himself starting from Cannonball Adderley's group, who represented for Zawinul a bit the same as Blakey's quintet for Shorter. He was a very influential member,

In particular by the compositions he brought and the sound of the electric piano

7

That there is

Introduced. Obviously, the two musicians (Zawinul and Shorter) are in sympathy with the landscape that Miles Davis is clearing with them. They decide

—

During the sessions of "In a Silent Way" and then "bitches Brew" in 1969

—

To explore a personal path through a new group

WEATHER REPORT

Was finally born in 1971 with Miroslav Vitous (also visiting Miles Davis) and Alphonse Mouzon. The two musicians will jointly feed the group with compositions and create together a sound at

Electricity base.

There is clearly a first period

WEATHER REPORT

With the three initial opus, "Weather Report" (1971), "I Sing the Body Electric" (1972) and "Sweetnighter" (1973)

8

. The overall sound is very rough, rough. Obviously, this is a sign of

E

At the time, under joint influence can

-Be free jazz and davisian experiences, the

Trumpeter increasingly hardening the sound, of his stage group first, as early as 1969, with

Chick Corea, Dave Holland and Jack DeJohnette, and more and more

Up to the two-guitar group of

"Agharta" (1975); a little later in the studio from "Jack Johnson"

(1970) until the 1974 sessions. This same roughness found in the group

LIFETIME

By Tony Williams with John McLaughlin and Larry Young, the first

MAHAVISHNU ORCHESTRA

By McLaughlin or, to a lesser extent, in Herbie's sextette

PAGE 7

Hancock of the Warner years. Although he doesn't have a regular band, the last three albums

That Wayne Shorter recorded for Blue Note, "Super Nova" in 1969, "Moto Grosso Feio" and "Ossey of Iska

In 1970, could be similar to this idea of sound, but in acoustic versions, in the same way, in a way that the group

CIRCLE

Where you hear

Chick Corea and Dave Holland next to it

Anthony Braxton and Barry Altschul, in an aesthetic closer to free. If we wanted to find an exception, it might be

-Be on the side of the first versions of the

RETURN TO FOREVER

By Chick Corea.

The album "

Mysterious Traveller" (1974) marks a turning point in the sound of

WEATHER REPORT.

This is played a lot on keyboards. It can be said schematically that synthesizers take precedence over the electric piano. This Fender Rhodes piano, which Miles Davis had introduced to these groups in 1968, Zawinul was, along with Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock, one of the first specialists. He quickly sought to dirty the

Sound by adding effects such as distortion and the wha pedal

-Wha. He already uses in the first three albums of

WEATHER REPORT

Synthesizers, but rather in this

Same optics of a rough sound. This design is abandoned with "

Mysterious Traveller

". Zawinul uses a new generation of synthesizers, and a turn

In the design of their sound

9

. In the same idea, the acoustic piano is back but

With a very long reverberation, which will also be applied to Shorter's soprano. A question then arises, that of the respective influence of the two co

-Leaders on the music of

WEATHER REPORT

. The two men, obviously, have a very strong bond, but their personalities are quite opposite. Zawinul is a force of nature, a

Beating, while Shorter is a rather withdrawn personality. Whatever we have pe

U

Information on the operation of the orchestra, everything suggests that Zawinul took charge of the practical operation of the orchestra, as evidenced in part by the

Cover credits

10

. He also forges the sound

Via

The choices of electronic sounds. Obviously, Shorter brings a certain spirit, a soul, the poetry of his own. On the composition side, the respective contributions have always been balanced. Jaco Pastorius is coming

Then, in 1976 until 1982. Also!

E a powerful, extroverted personality, who has a

Very strong influence on the orchestra, so much so that it can be estimated that it co

-Directs for a period of time. With whom? Zawinul, undoubtedly. We imagine Shorter in a corner of the studio, looking at sto

The two wisp. Finally, it should be noted that Zawinul has never

Wanted to play again with a saxophonist since the end of

WEATHER REPORT

, believing that none

Could take over from Wayne Shorter. No doubt he could find "assistant-producers" or "co-producers", but a soul, it is very difficult, in terms of music, to do without it

PAGE 8

During the first years of

WEATHER REPORT

, Shorter does not record outside this group, with the notable exception of "

Native Dancer", magnificent album, recorded on September 12, 1974

—

In one day, as in the good old days before technology -

Where he invites Milton Nascimento. Precisely at the time when, with "Mysterious Traveller",

WEATHER REPORT

Initiates a technological and aesthetic shift, Shorter delivers a digest

Wonderful acoustics and electric, jazz and song, North and South America with the presence of the Brazilian singer, sophistication and child's play, quiet self-affirmation and altr erasure

Uiste. Almost ideal cocktail with which the saxophonist seems to take up the now distended thread of his personal production. But this

Will ultimately only be an isolated terminal, can

—

To be the swan song of a certain aesthetic

Shorterienne started with the 1964 Blue Note albums. Then comes this evening of June 29, 1976 where the

Newport Jazz Festival

By George Wein one evening -

Tribute to Herbie Hancock, entitled "

Retrospective of The Music of Herbie Hancock

" during the

Aquel the pianist is already turning on a not so long career. In addition to his group of the moment,

HEADHUNTERS, i

L

Reforms for a concert his sextette of the years 1969

—

1973, recorded at the time on

Warner, and Miles Davis' second quintet, without Davis, replaced by Freddie Hubbard

11

.

The recording of this evening is published as an album entitled "

V.S.O.P. ". The reformed quintet with Hubbard will then decide to extend this renaissance through two tours of

He summer, in 1977 and 1979, which achieved great success, especially in Japan, and hence

Will release four albums all recorded in public, "The Quintet" and "Tempest in the Colosseum" in 1977, "Live under the Sky" and Five Stars" in 1979. It seems to me that

This was a more important phenomenon than was noted at the time. The emergence of this "new" group marks three dates in my opinion. Of a certain

Way, jazz-

Rock died tonight in 1976. Indeed, it is the signal of a return to acoustics

That the creators of jazz-

Rock from the davisian workshop will all practice, with the notable exception precisely of Joe Zawinul. Chick Corea, after the experience of

CIRCLE

, had

Engaged in the different versions of

RETURN TO FOREVER

, re-recorded in trio with

Miroslav Vitous and Roy Haynes. John McLaughlin begins the experience of

SHAKTI

. With Tony Williams, Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter who are part of

V.S.O.P.

In 1977, all the electricians of Davis returned to the candle, except Zawinul, who will never give in to these sirens. In addition, there may be a form of

Star-system

Jazz whose avatars are well known today. We form a group more or less circumstance with the stars of jazz, and we scour the

S summer festivals. Norman Granz had somehow inaugurated the

Formula with

Jazz at the Philarmonic

, but at that time, the tradition of the

Jam session

Still alive gave a probably different meaning to these meetings. Conrad Silvert, in the cover note of "The Quintet" may unintentionally give the key to this system by validating it once and for all: "Masters in music remain masters, as long as

Motivation and development come from within

". The blank cheque is thus issued. If

The argument is not clear enough, Ron Carter completes

"For some members of

V.S.O.P.,

Replaying this music requires some changes from a physical point of view -

Herbie only uses the acoustic piano, and

Tony plays the cymbals differently from

PAGE 9

To his own orchestra

—

But it is not a change from an emotional point of view.

Simply because, if some of the forms we play go back to a dozen

Years, this does not mean that they are not contemporary

12

". So it's enough to

Make small changes and let motivation come from within, and masters can play what they want when they want, timelessly. Of which act.

Finally, the birth of

V.S.O.P.

And its success may also give the signal for this

That will later be called the neo

-Traditionalism (or even neo-conservatism). Wynton Marsalis appeared on the stage shortly after (in 1982 he recorded his first record under his name, precisely produced by Hancock). He too will make his debut at Art Blakey and will play in 1981 with Herbie Hancock and Tony Williams music rooted in that of the Miles Davis of the second quintet.

V.S.O.P.

Is perhaps

Thus be the first "reformation" in the history of

U jazz.

Certainly, Count Basie reassembled his phalanx in the 1950s, but he had dissolved it only for economic reasons, and there was no idea in him to

Revive an era, but rather continue an accidental journey

Interrupted. For the first time, in 1976, the history of jazz began to contemplate itself

-Even, probably a symptom of its completion.

I already hear the cries that inevitably trigger any evocation of the "end of history". I am

S the first not to admit this thesis, and as far as jazz is concerned,

Convinced that it has been as lively for the last thirty years as it was during the

Sixty-

The first ten of its existence. This does not prevent us from being able to estimate that a

Don't

Capital caesura occurred in the mid-sixties

—

Ten, where we can reasonably see a change in the nature of jazz history, which would justify this "end of history" formula by specifying its meaning.

On the discussion list

Jazz-Research

13

, Philippe Baudoin asked the following question in a very interesting way: what do you think are the historical albums of the 1980s and 1990s?

? This question is accompanied by a very precise definition of what it

Heard p

Ar "historical". Briefly, these are not necessarily the "best" albums of a musician or an era, but those that change the way we play and mark

The spirits. "Kind of Blue" was in this sense a historical album, "Atomic Basie", "Getz/Gilberto" and "A Love Supreme" as well. This issue sparked a lively debate,

Hence it appears precisely that no album imposes itself in a way, if not unanimous, at least relatively consensual. How can we not see this as a sign, among

Others, confirming what any observer of recent jazz knows well: it is very difficult, in jazz

Of the last thirty years to identify masters and undeniable works, to define

Dominant styles, to simply understand jazz. And even to determine what

Is and what is not (or more). In any case, it is incomparably more difficult than in previous periods. Until 1975, the linear description of styles -

To

Incomplete and partial it may be -

E

St relatively relevant, the election of masters is the subject of consensus, even during their lifetime (and, could

-We add from the beginning of their

Career). A certain reading of jazz history, relatively easy and accepted, works

De facto

Corr

Etement before 1975 and badly or not at all after. It's in this sense that we could talk about the end of history on that date, it's

-To-

Say the end of a certain way of seeing history. The question obviously becomes

it is

—

There is a quality change

Structural if

In musical evolution itself, or the obsolescence of a way of seeing history. It is not here, of course, that this issue will be discussed, while still betting on the fact that it is probably a bit of both.

Finally, we will notice, on this subject of

V.S.O.P.

That the existence of the group lodges

Exactly in the withdrawal period of Miles Davis who almost completely deserted the

PAGE 10

Scenes and studios between the end of 1975 and the beginning of 1981

14

. It seems obvious that Davis, even in pa

Regained possession of his physical means, would never have agreed to reform

His second quintet so shortly after its dissolution, and probably never

15

. The last

Music he had produced at the time -

As we hear it, for example, on the album "

Agharta » recorded in public in February 1975

—

Was probably the most radical in the sense of the

Violence of sound and a kind of self-destruction of one's own trumpet game, grandiose death work that we were tempted to put in parallel with

Physical decay and

Suffering that the trumpeter endured at that time. One could then assume that

Musicians of the second quintet and public, frightened by this Davisian descent into hell, would have taken refuge, warmed up, in an image

Of what the guide had been, the musicians taking for alibi from their nostalgic return the imposed absence of the master then unable to play

All music, and the public reassuring themselves in a reminiscent image of the same absent master and his now past splendor.

During all this time, the adventure

WEATHER REPORT

Continues, which allows Wayne Shorter to mix the two regimes, electric with

WEATHER REPORT

And acoustic with

V.S.O.P.

. The situation is similar for Herbie Hancock and Tony Williams, while Chick Corea and John McLaughlin tend to alternate formations in turn

Acoustic or electric, a regime that Hancock will also adopt after

V.S.O.P.

. During the first half of the 1980s, Shorter devoted himself entirely to

WEATHER REPORT

—

But probably invests less in it. But the group is starting to decline -

Maybe precisely for this reason

—

To finish his race in 1985 in a curious somewhat deserted album, "This Is This" with an equally enigmatic title. That same year, Wayne Shorter produced his first album under his name since "Native Dancer" in 1974: "Atlantis", which will be followed by "Phantom Navigator" in 1986 and "Joy Rider" in 1988. The design remains resolutely electric, with very heavy rhythmic sections, at all

Meaning of the word. One might think that from this point on, Shorter will refocus on his concerns as an arranger. Indeed, in

WEATHER REPORT

, he shared this prerogative with Joe Zawinul (and Jaco Pasto

Rius for a while), and was done at times too

Dispossess. Maybe sucked up

He to completely reclaim this field that he has always loved, alongside those of instrumentalist and composer. Its design is increasingly

More orchestral, but he still hesitated in the late 1980s to take the step of the great

Orchestral format that obviously attracts him. The big band format is certainly outdated and the symphony orchestra is too exogenous. There are still the synthesizers (we are at the end of

Them

"Reign" and before sampling). They offer a substitute for broad orchestral format, and above all

Their sound is still suitable for Wayne Shorter's rhythmic designs who remains attached to

The "fusion" side. However, the twilight of this style has already been announced. Miles Davis is also there, in versions, it must be admitted, more and more watered down, and Joe Zawinul has rather gone to the neighboring but still divergent countries of a certain "world jazz" that finds the

African continent by other shores. This refocusing on the arrangement will continue in a curious way. At the end of the decade, Wayne Shorter signed for the Elektra label and announced an orchestral project that he

Constantly retreats to finally never realize it and leave this label for Verve without having published anything on Elektra. "High Life" was then released in 1994 on the new label. We can

Think that it is the result of research conducted in this silent interval. “High Life"

PAGE 11

Is in a vein close to previous opus but now seems totally anachronistic, a turning wind having meanwhile swept away the jazz-rock galaxy. We still hear very beautiful things, both instrumentally and compositionally.

Some arrangement ideas are also worthy of interest, but the sound and options

Rhythms are now fully offset. Is Wayne Shorter aware of this distortion? Always is

Except for the duet with Herbie Hancock in 1997 ("

1+1"),

He was silent again until 2002 when he released his first album of his new

Group with which he met a great success on stage, a resolutely acoustic group with Danilo Perez (p), John Pattitucci (b) and Brian Blade (dm). He finds there a functioning that owes something to the second quintet, but also perhaps to the

WEATHER REPORT

First period. No more doubt in any case for the sound: the design and sound are acoustic, homeopathic serenity and calm found after decades (more than two since

V.S.O.P.

, and almost three since the Blue Note groups) for treatment with

Electroshocks. The concert audience is all the more enthusiastic as they seem reassured, the nightmare of lead rhythms having finally moved away. The Wayne Shorter he finds is consistent with the idea of a human, humanist jazz, perfectly embodied by this so sweet

Musician, long haunted by his electric phantasmagoria who, since the great hours of

WEATHER REPORT

, ballasted it as diver soles rather than the

Propel into the ethers where he hovers with so much grace. The music is probably no more

Creative, but it soothed, recomposed, ecological. And also, incidentally, she is beautiful.

This is what the album "

Footprints Live » published in 2002, restoring

The atmosphere of the quartet concerts. Then came "

Alegria

"And the orchestral arrangement, the writing, taken out through the door returns through the window. Then

? History not finished?

Ah, I forgot

Joni Mitchell! Long episodic companionship, light, apparently happy, jazz or not jazz, major or minor. The notes issued one by one. A very special specialty with one master among the masters: Wayne Shorter.

Laurent Cugny

NOTES