Wednesday, February 18, 2015

Coltrane on the recorder

I can't even fathom how long it must have taken to get this right.



Maybe Steve Bates can tell us.

2 comments:

  1. Looking at the man who did it, I'd have to guess that it took about 30 years. :-) First, he had to acquire that level of technical proficiency...

    Seriously, the tradition of playing jazz... real jazz... on recorder began, to my uncertain knowledge, in 1962 when (in)famous recorder soloist Bernard Krainis of NYC commissioned jazzer Bob Dorough to write a blues work for recorder quartet and percussion (instrumentation was ATTB plus assorted hand percussion). The work was released on Krainis's "Sweet Pipes" album as "Eons Ago Blue" and is regrettably NOT the same work of that name which appears in a YouTube video, though the concept is the same... early instruments, modern music.

    I have a vinyl copy of "Sweet Pipes" somewhere in the house, GK where, on a somewhat battered phonodisc that I somehow acquired in my high school days. As it is not available on a digital medium, I can't easily pop it in the drive and put it up for you. Maybe some ambitious young recorder group will record a nice digital track for us...

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  2. Very nicely done, Mark! Thanks for pointing me to your performance!

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