Happy Would-Be 100th Birthday, Dave Brubeck!
The Song of the Day is:
The Dave Brubeck Quartet – “Blue Rondo à la Turk”
From the album Time Out (1959)
Today we celebrate jazz pianist and band leader Dave Brubeck on what would have been his 100th birthday. Ultimately, he gave a good run at the centennial, but died in 2012 at age 91, one day before his 92nd birthday. He lead a long life though, with a recording career that lasted from the 1940’s to 2007. He was a pivotal figure in jazz who helped moved trends away from the bebop jazz of the forties to the cool jazz that dominated the fifties. He was a major jazz star in the fifties, though despite his great talent, he felt that other musicians (like his hero Duke Ellington) were given less accolades than he due to the color of his skin. One of Brubeck’s more popular albums in his prime was Dave Digs Disney, in which he performed classic songs from movies from the Walt Disney studio. In doing so, he made “Someday My Prince Will Come” into a jazz standard (which was later performed by Miles Davis and is one of my favorite standards). “Blue Rondo á la Turk” is from Brubeck’s most famous album, in fact one of the whole genre of jazz’s most famous albums, Time Out. “Take Five” from this album is really the centerpiece, and one of the most recognizable jazz pieces world wide (and yes, I have featured it). While Brubeck and “Take Five” are intrinsically tied together, it was actually saxophonist Paul Desmond who wrote that song. In terms of recognizability, “Blue Rondo á la Turk”, which was written by Brubeck is a close second. This piece is famous for its time signature in 9/8, which is uncommon in the west, but is regularly used in Turkish music. Brubeck was on a state sponsored trip to the country when he became enamored with the time signature. “Rondo” actually had additive rhythm that is in 4/4 against the 9/8 rhythm, its a bit trick for me to explain, so I am linking a graphic to help with the concept. This albums artwork was created by artist S. Neil Fujita, and it is strikingly similar to Charles Mingus’s Mingus Ah Um album artwork which he the same year. The musicians who join Brubeck on piano are Paul Desmond on alto sax , Joe Morello on drums and Eugene Wright on bass. Wright, who is now 97 and is African-American, thus making the classic quartet a rare mixed racial band in the fifties, is the only surviving member of the quartet. Coincidently, Keith Emerson, who was featured in yesterday’s “song of the day” with Emerson, Lake and Palmer, would often play “Rondo” with ELP and his previous band The Nice. Prior to his passing, Brubeck was awarded the National Medal for the Arts, the Grammy Lifetime Achievement and the Kennedy Center Honors.
If you enjoy the blog, please consider helping me pay the dues paypal.me/MichaelSliwa.
Thanks!
Hear Today, Grown Tomorrow 