Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Backing a winner

Over on the mothership, this from May1366:
Not so much a supergroup
but the most incredible jazz academy

Rock, blues, country, hip hop... all have seen their share of both supergroups and 'academy' groups (members apprentice under a guru then get famous on their own).
Comment as you please. Examples (good and bad) and finely crafted essays (good and bad but heartfelt) welcome.

11 comments:

tincanman said...

As an example of an 'academy' guru I was thinking like John Mayall.

tincanman said...

Ooops, that's wrong since I clearly couldn't know how John Mayall thinks.

treefrogdemon said...

Folk guru: Ashley Hutchings, in at the start of Fairport Convention, left to form Steeleye Span, formed the Albion Band in its many metamorphoses, also with Morris On!, The Bunch, the Etchingham Steam Band (with Shirley Collins), the Lark Rise Band...oh, look him up in Wikipedia!

Abahachi said...

Not sure it counts as an academy, but during my mid-80s rock phase it did at time feel as if 75% of active musicians of a certain age had been in Deep Purple or one of its spin-off groups. But John Mayall is a much better suggestion.

goneforeign said...

Also not sure about an academy or even what the question is but I've long been tempted to do a post on Norman Granz, Many of the names that made history in jazz signed with one of his labels, including Cannonball Adderley, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Louie Bellson, Ray Brown, Benny Carter, Buck Clayton, Paulinho Da Costa, Buddy DeFranco, Roy Eldridge, Duke Ellington, Herb Ellis, Tal Farlow, Stan Getz, Dizzy Gillespie, Lionel Hampton, Bill Harris, Coleman Hawkins, Johnny Hodges, Billie Holiday, Milt Jackson, Illinois Jacquet, Hank Jones, Barney Kessel, Gene Krupa, Howard McGhee, Thelonious Monk, Bill Evans, Gerry Mulligan, Anita O'Day, Kenny Kersey, Charlie Parker, Joe Pass, Oscar Peterson, Flip Phillips, Bud Powell, Buddy Rich, Charlie Shavers, Sonny Stitt, Slim Gaillard, Art Tatum, Ben Webster and Lester Young.

goneforeign said...

When someone recently said they'd like to hear more sax I was tempted to post just one cut from the Norman Granz Jam Session from 1952, it would probably have been 'Funky Blues': the artists are: Charlie Parker, Johnny Hodges, Benny Carter, altos, Ben Webster and Flip Phillips , tenors, Oscar Peterson Barney Kessell, Ray Brown and J.C.Heard.
It's 13 min 26 seconds.

Luke-sensei said...

post it GF, post it!!

steenbeck said...

Sorry, yesterday was crazy, but I did have some thoughts.. One of the things I love most about hip hop is it's collaborative nature. And sometimes it does take a guru/apprentice form. The examples are endless. I love the track Respiration, which combines skills of Talib Kweli, Mos Def, COmmon, and Hi Tek.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiNwTL0HQRI

Anything by The Dungeon Family is worth listening to...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEwSJM3hQh0

There's the Gravediggaz, I feel like I want to listen to more of their stuff, but they're a little dark for me. I like this one a lot, though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnMKJBlcw-Q

Buddy combines a lot of brilliant talent.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F69dt5clGPo

I'm curious about the Hieroglyphics, but I don't know that much about them...yet.

Here's Scenario by ATCQ. They're all perfect on it, and it features Busta Rhymes, so that counts, sorta..

As I said, I could go on and on and on...
I'll be back...

steenbeck said...

Um, ITS collaborative nature, and here's scenario...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFZLq6R-ZtM

May1366 said...

Loads of these in jazz - my comment tin quotes was about Billy Eckstine's Big Band but there's also Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers - best part of half a century of quintets (mainly) from which graduates included Wayne Shorter, Clifford Brown, Benny Golson, Freddie Hubbard, Dexter Gordon, Horace Silver, Wynton Kelly, Bobby Timmons, Curly Russell, Lou Donaldson, Kenny Dorham, Hank Mobley, Donald Byrd, Keith Jarrett, Gary Bartz, Jackie McLean, John Gilmore, Lee Morgan, Chuck Mangione, Robin and Kevin Eubanks and Wynton and Branford Marsalis, and that's not even a comprehensive list. Then you've got two British (London, even) collectives: Loose Tubes, from which Django Bates, Iain Ballamy, Ashley Slater and the Arguelles brothers, among others, went on to notable careers; and the Jazz Warriors, the all-black collective which included all of these:
Orphy Robinson, Courtney Pine, Tony Remy, Cleveland Watkiss, Steve Williamson, Gary Crosby, Julian Joseph, Gail Thompson, Harold Beckett, Cheryl Alleyne, Claude Deppa, Dennis Rollins, and Mark Mondesir.

Away from jazz obscurantism, how about the teen swingbeat vocal group New Edition, of Candygirl fame? Bobby Brown, Ralph Tresvant, Johnny Gill, Bel Biv DeVoe - yeah, not what you'd call lasting fame but they all had careers in their adult years (and Bobby had a very adult career).

Shoegazer said...

Courtney Pine started out playing reggae with Clint Eastwood & General Saint.