| Paul Bley | |
|---|---|
 Paul Bley recording solo piano in 2006 |
|
| Background information | |
| Birth name | Paul Bley |
| Born | November 10, 1932 |
| Origin | Montreal, Canada |
| Genres | Free jazz Avant-garde jazz Post bop |
| Instruments | Piano |
| Associated acts | Charlie Parker, Lester Young, Charles Mingus, Sonny Rollins, Ornette Coleman, Jimmy Giuffre, Steve Swallow, Chet Baker, Gary Peacock, Paul Motian, Annette Peacock, Charlie Haden, John Scofield, Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen, Bill Frisell, John Abercrombie, Michael Urbaniak, Pat Metheny, Jaco Pastorius |
| Notable instruments | |
| piano, Moog synthesizer, ARP synthesizer, Fender Rhodes | |
Paul Bley, CM (born November 10, 1932) is a pianist known for his contributions to the free jazz movement of the 1960s as well as his innovations and influence on trio playing.
Contents |
Biography [link]
Paul Bley was born in Montreal, Canada, his parents were Betty Marcovitch, an immigrant from Romania, and Joe Bley, owner of an embroidery factory.[1][2] Bley has been a long-time resident of the United States. His music characteristically features strong senses both of melodic voicing and space.
In the 1950s he founded the Jazz Workshop in Montreal, performing and recording there with Charlie Parker. He also performed with Lester Young and Ben Webster at that time.
In 1953 he conducted for Charles Mingus on the Charles Mingus and his Orchestra album and the same year Mingus produced the Introducing Paul Bley album with Mingus and Art Blakey. In 1960 Bley recorded on piano with the Charles Mingus Group.
In 1958, he hired Don Cherry, Ornette Coleman, Charlie Haden and Billy Higgins to play at the Hillcrest Club in California.
In the early 1960s he was part of the Jimmy Giuffre 3, a clarinet, piano and bass trio with bassist Steve Swallow. The quiet understatement of this music makes it possible to overlook its degree of innovation. As well as a repertoire introducing compositions by his ex-wife Carla Bley, the group's music moved towards free improvisation based on close empathy.
During the same period Bley was touring and recording with Sonny Rollins, which culminated with the RCA Victor album, Sonny Meets Hawk! with Coleman Hawkins.
In 1964 Bley was instrumental in the formation of the Jazz Composers Guild - a co-operative organisation which brought together many free jazz musicians in New York: Roswell Rudd, Cecil Taylor, Archie Shepp, his ex-wife Carla Bley, Michael Mantler, Sun Ra, among others. The guild organized weekly concerts and created a forum for the "jazz revolution" of 1964.[3]
Bley had long been interested in expanding the palette of his music using unconventional sounds (such as playing directly on the piano-strings). It was therefore consistent that he took an interest in new electronic possibilities appearing in the late 1960s. He pioneered the use of Moog synthesizers, performing with them before a live audience for the first time at Philharmonic Hall in New York City on Dec. 26, 1969.[4]
This led into a period of the "Bley-Peacock Synthesizer Show", a group where he worked with songwriter Annette Peacock.
Subsequently Bley returned to a predominant focus on the piano itself.
During the 1970s, Bley, in partnership with videographer Carol Goss, was responsible for an important multi-media initiative, Improvising Artists which issued LPs and videos documenting the solo piano recordings by Sun Ra and other works of free jazz with Jimmy Giuffre, Lee Konitz, Gary Peacock, Lester Bowie, John Gilmore, Jaco Pastorius, Pat Metheny, Steve Lacy and others.
Bley and Goss are credited in a Billboard Magazine cover story with the first "music video" as a result of the recorded and live performance collaborations they produced with jazz musicians and video artists.
Bley was featured in the 1981 documentary film Imagine the Sound, in which he performs and discusses the history of his music.
Bley has continued to tour internationally and record prodigiously, with well over a hundred CDs released. In 1999 his autobiography, Stopping Time: Paul Bley and the Transformation of Jazz was published. In 2003 Time Will Tell: Conversations with Paul Bley was published. And in 2004 Paul Bley: la logica del caso (Paul Bley: The Logic of Chance) was published in Italian. In 2008, he was made a Member of the Order of Canada.[5]
Discography [link]
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This section requires expansion. |
As leader [link]
- 1971: The Fabulous Paul Bley Quintet (Live recording from Hillcrest Club, Los Angeles 1958)
- 1972: Improvisie
- 1970: Paul Bley with Gary Peacock
- 1971: Ballads
- 1972: Open, to Love
- 1986: Fragments
- 1987: The Paul Bley Quartet
- 1991: In the Evenings Out There
- 1994: Time Will Tell (with Evan Parker and Barre Phillips)
- 1999: Not Two, Not One (with Gary Peacock and Paul Motian)
- 2000: Sankt Gerold (with Evan Parker and Barre Phillips)
- 2007: Solo in Mondsee
- 1970: Dual Unity (with Annette Peacock, Han Bennink, Mario Pavone, Laurence Cook)[6]
- 1975: Copenhagen and Haarlem (Live recordings 1965 and 1966)
- Improvising Artists (Bley's own label)
- 1974: Jaco
- 1975: Quiet Song
- 1975: Alone, Again
- 1975: Turning Point (with John Gilmore, Gary Peacock, Paul Motian), orig. Savoy mono recordings, March 9, 1964
- 1976: Virtuosi
- 1977: Japan Suite
- 1977: Coleman Classics Vol. 1 (Four more tracks of the Hillcrest Club recording from 1958)
- 1977: Axis
- 1978: IAI Festival
- 1987: Solo
- 1991: A Musing (with Jon Ballantyne)
- 1993: Sweet Time
- 1993: Double Time
- 1993: Know Time
- 1994: Outside in
- 1996: Touche (with Kenny Wheeler)
- 2001: Basics
- 2004: Nothing to Declare
- 2008: About Time
- 1994: Synth Thesis
- 1994: What If (with Bruce Ditmas as leader, John Abercrombie, Sam Rivers, Dominic Richards)
- 1996: Music for the Millennium (with Ralph Simon as leader, Gary Peacock, Julian Priester)
- 1983: Tango Palace
- 1983: Sonor
- 1985: Hot (with John Scofield)
- 1987: Notes (with Paul Motian)
- 1988: Live at Sweet Basil (with John Abercrombie)
- 1990: Memoirs (with Charlie Haden and Paul Motian)
- 1992: Mindset (with Gary Peacock)
- 1994: Chaos
- 1972: Solo Piano
- 1973: Paul Bley/NHØP (with Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen)
- 1985: Questions
- 1985: My Standard
- 1986: Live & Live Again
- 1987: Indian Summer
- 1988: Solo Piano
- 1988: The Nearness of You
- 1989: Rejoicing
- 1989: Bebopbebopbebopbebop
- 1991: Plays Carla Bley
- 1992: Caravan Suite
- 1992: At Copenhagen Jazz House
- 1993: If We May
- 1994: Speachless
- 1995: Reality Check
- 1998: Notes on Ornette
- Other labels
- 1953: Introducing Paul Bley (Debut)
- 1962: Footloose! (Savoy)
- 1964: Barrage (with Marshall Allen, Dewey Johnson, Eddie Gomez, Milford Graves), ESP
- 1965: Closer (with Barry Altschul, Steve Swallow), ESP
- 1965: Touching (Fontana)
- 1965: Blood (Fontana)
- 1968: Mr. Joy (Limelight Records)
- 1973: Scorpio (with David Holland, Barry Altschul), Milestone
- 1983: Tears, Owl Records
- 1990: Partners (with Gary Peacock), Owl
- 1993: Homage to Carla, Owl
As sideman [link]
With Jimmy Giuffre
- Thesis (1961)
- Free Fall (1962)
- Fusion (1962) all rereleased on ECM
- Emphasis & Flight 1961
- The Life of a Trio 2 volumes
- Fly Away Little Bird
- Conversations with a Goose, Owl Records
With Sonny Rollins
- Tokyo 1963 (Rare Live Recordings, 1963)
With Marion Brown
- Sweet Earth Flying (Impulse!, 1974)
With Charlie Haden
With John Surman
- 1991: Adventure Playground (ECM)
References [link]
- ^ Paul Bley with David Lee (January 1999). Stopping Time: Paul Bley and the Transformation of Jazz. Véhicule Press. p. 10. ISBN 1-55065-111-0.
- ^ Bley Paul biography www.jazz.com
- ^ Paul Bley with David Lee: Stopping Time. Paul Bley and the Transformation of Jazz. Vehicule Press 1999.
- ^ Stopping Time
- ^ "Governor General Announces New Appointments to the Order of Canada". https://www.gg.ca/media/doc.asp?lang=e&DocID=5447.
- ^ Allmusic review
External links [link]
https://wn.com/Paul_Bley
Paul Bley (album)
Paul Bley is the second album by Canadian jazz pianist Paul Bley featuring tracks recorded in 1954 and released on the EmArcy label.
Reception
Allmusic awarded the album 4 stars stating "Pick a personality trait of the Paul Bley style and chances are it won't be found anywhere here, as lovely a piano trio jazz record as this is... For the most part the tone of the pianist remains almost frigid in its consistency; volume level rarely varies and the direction of the improvisations is solidly mainstream... The obvious problem with someone like Bley or Jimi Hendrix is that once they developed their totally unique musical personality, their earlier work starts to sound a little boring".The Penguin Guide to Jazz said "At this stage of his career, he's a very orthodox bopper, aware of the blues but certainly not restricted by them, possibly exploring aspects of Tristano's evolution as well, and certainly listening to classical pianists for technique and harmonic ideas".
Track listing
Just Us
Just Us may refer to:
Just Us (JYJ album)
Just Us is the third studio album (second Korean) of South Korean band JYJ. The album was released digitally on July 29, 2014 and physically on August 1, 2014, by C-JeS Entertainment. The band reached an "all kill" status by placing first on Melon, MNet, Genie, Olleh, Naver, and Cyworld music charts an hour after the album release, with their title song, "Back Seat". American singer Chris Brown also produced a song for the album.
Track listing
Music videos
Release history
Chart positions
Weekly album charts
Sales
References
Just Us (Roy Haynes album)
Just Us is an album recorded by American drummer Roy Haynes's Trio in 1960 for the New Jazz label.
Reception
Allmusic awarded the album 3 stars stating "Haynes' concise drum solos always hold one's interest, and even though this tasteful date is far from definitive, the music is enjoyable".
Track listing
Personnel
References
Podcasts:
Paul Bley
ALBUMS
- Play Blue. Oslo Concert released: 2014
- Live In New York City, 16 June 1974 released: 2011
- The Montreal Tapes released: 2009
- About Time released: 2008
- Open, to Love released: 2008
- Solo in Mondsee released: 2007
- In the North released: 2003
- One Year After released: 2002
- Sankt Gerold Variations released: 2000
- Notes on Ornette released: 1998
- Jazz'n (E)Motion released: 1998
- Mindset released: 1997
- Carla released: 1996
- Introducing Paul Bley released: 1996
- Time Will Tell released: 1995
- At Copenhagen Jazz House released: 1994
- Sweet Time released: 1994
- Double Time released: 1994
- Synth Thesis released: 1994
- Diane released: 1994
- Jaco released: 1994
- In the Evenings Out There released: 1993
- Memoirs released: 1992
- Japan Suite released: 1992
- Annette released: 1992
- Footloose! released: 1992
- Barrage released: 1992
- Blues for Red released: 1991
- The Life of a Trio: Saturday released: 1990
- Bebopbebopbebopbebop released: 1989
- Notes released: 1988
- My Standard released: 1987
- Turns released: 1987
- Fragments released: 1986
- Quiet Song released: 1975
- Paul Bley & Scorpio released: 1973
- Open, to Love released: 1973
- Ballads released: 1971
- Improvisie released: 1971
- Paul Bley with Gary Peacock released: 1970
- Partners released:
- Homage To Carla Bley released:
- Fly Away Little Bird released:
-
by Gerald Levert
-
by Roger Miret And The Disasters
-
by Boot Camp Clik
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by Maze
-
by Only Crime
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by Roger Miret & The Disasters
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by Lovedrug
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by Donnie Klang
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by Alabama
Just Us
by: Gerald LevertGirl, I hate to call you up on your job
But I had to let you know that this bullshit got to stop
You're my woman now and you're full grown
Got a baby in my hand and your mama on the phone
Hit me with the boo-boo all on my ear
Talkin' 'bout the business over here
You better check 'cause you know that I fear
She don't know me that well, I don't care
Just us, just you and me
That's how it's supposed to be
All your friends and your family
I ain't gonna let them worry me
Just us, just you and me
That's how it's supposed to be
All your friends and your family
I ain't gonna let them worry me
And girl it reach a point about four five time
Tryin' to tell me I'll take care of this baby boy of mine
Talk about did you feed him? Yeah, he should take a nap
Better step to your girlfriend before the trick he slap
Hit me with the boo-boo all on my ear
Talkin' 'bout the business over here
You better check 'cause you know that I fear
She don't me that well, I don't care
Just us, just you and me
That's how it's supposed to be
All your friends and your family
I ain't gonna let them worry me
Just us, just you and me
That's how it's supposed to be
All your friends and your family
I ain't gonna let them worry me
[Incomprehensible]
Like he mean he will
So he don't like the way I treat you
Tell him go to hell
He told a friend of mine
That he gon' whip my ass
Till you let your brother know
I say he know what I'll do, yeah
Hit me with the boo-boo all on my ear
Talkin' 'bout the business over here
You better check him 'cause you know that I fear
You don't know me that well, I don't care
Just us, just you and me
That's how it's supposed to be
All your friends and your family
I ain't gonna let them worry me
Just us, just you and me
That's how it's supposed to be
All your friends and your family
I ain't gonna let them worry me
'Cause I love you
I love you, I love you
I love you, yeah
Take your meals on time
Make your baby's mind
Give you my last dime
I'm yours and you're mine
Just you and me
Just us, just you and me
That's how it's supposed to be
All your friends and your family
I ain't gonna let them worry me
Just us, just you and me
That's how it's supposed to be
All your friends and your family
I ain't gonna let them worry me
Love you, love you
Love you, love you
Love you, love you
Love you, love you
Just us, just you and me
That's how it's supposed to be
All your friends and your family
I ain't gonna let them worry me
Just us, just you and me
That's how it's supposed to be
All your friends and your family