I had no idea that Clark Terry and Wayne Shorter had ever played together. I had even less of an idea that Clark sat in with Wayne's quartet at Newport. In 1986. Or that video of this encounter exists. And is on YouTube.
Internets, sometimes you bring me down, but how can I stay mad?
Remember, this is the kind of playing that led former (thank the FSM) New York Times jazz critic Peter Watrous to observe that "[Shorter's] work on soprano saxophone leads directly to Kenny G." Yeah. That's it. Totally.
(Thanks to Rick Perlstein for bringing this to my attention. Buy his book, fercrissakes.)
Watrous' claim may be one of the most acute cases of Fusion Derangement Syndrome I've yet seen.
Posted by: Auguste | 07 July 2009 at 01:23 AM
"fuuuuuck yeah."
:-)
Posted by: Matt Rubin | 07 July 2009 at 01:52 AM
I've known people that have been hospitalized for FDS. They used to work for these things called Newspapers. You know, the things that are black, white and read all over? Bit'o'nostalgia on the video to hear the synth patches through the wall of sound from Wayne and Clark. Clark, as observed on many, many occasions, is such the story teller in his solos. They're plot thickened with melodic lines that lead to logical conclusions but yet leave the listener wanting more, almost as if held in suspense...same goes for Wayne. To see them together is truly a treat.
Posted by: Cicily Janus | 07 July 2009 at 03:23 AM
Kenny G...hrumph... I was thinking about Mingus talking about Terry in "An Open Letter to the Avant-garde," he basically says Terry is already a free player.
I don't if it was that terrible review in the Gazette, but I can't help but notice that 2/3 of the rhythm section are mulleted ...Did the mullet disappear from jazz around the same time Budweiser stopped sponsoring jazz festivals?
Kidding aside, thanks for posting, great clip.
Posted by: Charles | 07 July 2009 at 11:56 AM
Oh wow. Great band. I saw them the same year at The Pier, w/o Terry of course. Jaco Pastorius was in the audience, acting like a maniac.
I saw Clark Terry about three years ago at the Vanguard. He could barely move, his alto player Dave Glasser had to call the tunes. But Terry still played one of the best solos I've ever heard. I was feeling tired and burnt, and he washed all that completely away with his first phrase. Can't remember what tune it was.
Posted by: David Adler | 07 July 2009 at 12:13 PM
Critics like Mr. Watrous keep trying to flush Mr. Shorter's 80s output down the memory hole-Michelle Mercer's excellent biography, "Footprints", provides some illumination on this subject-but albums like "Atlantis" are too great to leave buried beneath the dust of ages. Keep fighting the good fight!
Posted by: Vikram Devasthali | 07 July 2009 at 05:20 PM
Like a lot of writers in a lot of times, Watrous was just taking the dominant esthetic of his time too seriously. And he got a little lost. He started off as part of the backlash against Wynton Marsalis (whom he called Branford's "reactionary little brother" in the Village Voice) but after he moved to the NYT, he became part of the... uh... lash. If it was acoustic and a bit mopey, it was genius; if anyone had plugged in their instrument to a wall socket, it was trouble. So Watrous called Marlon Jordan's debut "a nearly perfect album" even though Jordan could barely play, because Marlon was from New Orleans and Branford was on the record. Similarly, those bass guitars proved Shorter was the devil. If Watrous had started writing in 1964 he'd be an Archie Shepp fan. If he'd started in 1997 he'd be all about the Bad Plus. Your moment determines your outlook unless you're very careful.
Posted by: Paul Wells | 20 July 2009 at 11:05 AM