• Favorite ECM Recordings w/ Guitarists?

    From matthew.wj@gmail.com@21:1/5 to danstearns on Tue Apr 21 08:09:59 2020
    On Monday, March 2, 2009 at 5:48:55 PM UTC-6, danstearns wrote:
    ECM has introduced, established, supported, and broke an astonishing
    array of unique instrumentalists over the years, not to mention
    photographers like Franco Fontana by way of their cover art and design layout. However, they were not without detractors or controversy.
    Manfred Eicher, who founded ECM records and thoroughly applied his
    personal vision to the whole style and sound of the label, did so to
    such a degree that you really had to be either sympathetic to his
    aesthetic, or you had to take that as part and parcel of that ECM
    sound while listening past that on to whatever ECM recordings of
    theirs you were interested in hearing solely for the musicians it
    featured. Interestingly, Eicher was a huge Bergman fan, and there is a
    bit of an apt comparison there..... at least in as much as that both
    Eicher and Bergman had a singular vision colored by an strong
    aesthetic and always did things their way despite having an
    astonishing strong host of willing artists with which to work with.
    Okay, enough contemplating the aesthetics of ECM and its impact as an artistic entity--how about just trying to list the amazing guitarists
    that made their rep, or at least part of it, on ECM recordings?

    Terje Rypdal------>
    To my mind he's perhaps the quintessential ECM guitarist. Terje was
    kind of northern Europe's jazz/fusion Siamese step-cousin to non-jazz guitarists like Jeff Beck, Dick Dale, or even pink floyd's david gilmore---maybe it's the strat, or the abandon and perceived slop that results in that.... or perhaps the overall emotive impact? Anyway, he
    had a gazillion goosepimply moments on ECM, and i have a couple dozen personal desert island favorites. Okay, to start with, every last bit
    of After the Rain, all the solos on Water Stories (maybe his best
    stint as a guest soloist ever), the early, intensely Eurocentric take
    on Miles' Bitches Brew on the self-titled 1971 recording, Terje Rypdal--especially the opening and last tracks, "Keep it like That
    Tight" and "Tough Enough" ,a few of the strings and tight fusion
    arrangements on If mountain Could sing, the power trio and even (gasp)
    Van Halenisims on the first Chaser's CD, a few of the lovely, lushly orchestral bits on Lux Aeterna, especially the title cut of the final movement, lux Aeterna, and, well, on and on it would go if it weren't
    for the fact that i have probably forgotten a few and a bunch of
    others have great, stunning cuts here and there, like the title cut on Skywards for example. But i also intentionally didn't include a few of
    the other often-mentioned recordings like the vitous /DeJohnette
    recording "To be continued" or the other Bjornstad’ non-Water stories recordings, and the David Darling duets. Great, great players on there one-and-all of course, and Rypdal is always at the very least worthy
    of a listen as a guitarist, but none of these are near the level of
    the recordings i singled out,IMpO. Btw, i had the opportunity to study with/play for David Darling when i a teenager, and he was a great enthusiastic guy who gave me a lot of positive encouragement and
    advice. But i'll never forget one day when he took me aside and told
    me that he thought Terje Rypdal was the best guitarist in the world,
    "better than Van Halen" i think he said, and that he was unknown only
    because he was a European and not an American .This was probably 81 or
    82 after EVH had pretty thoroughly broke on the scene and was already considered to be a serious bad-ass rock guitar guy....and while i
    surely had a more pronounced liking for Rypdal myself, i honestly
    think David didn't realize that EVH had probably already at that point influenced Rydal himself to a certain degree here and
    there..........an amazing thing really for an already established, world-class artist late in their professional career. Like Miles, who
    clearly understood the implications and potential resources of Jimi
    Hendrix, this, as much as anything else, underscores the non-orthodox, unselfishly creative mindset of someone like a Terje rypdal----and
    hats off to that, no?

    Ralph Towner------>
    If it Rypdal isn't the guy, then Ralph Towner definitely is! I was
    fortunate enough to attend a master class with Towner and Abercrombie
    when they were touring their great Saragossa Sea recording, and Towner
    shared a lot of beautiful information complete with playing
    examples----like when you set a thing properly in motion, it's still
    there in the listener's mind even if you drop it entirely and move on
    to another different, though related idea.The trick is to truly set it
    into motion, a thing that might require less repetition than you'd
    think, too. Ok,True story: i bought my first Oregon record ,Distant
    Hills, with money from my paper route on summer day by riding my
    10speed to the neighboring town of Westboro, Massachusettts and
    picking it out of the record bin at the now defunct Caldor's
    department store. On the way home i pulled off into a sizzling,
    stereophonic bug humming field and stared at the back of the album
    cover for a long time wondering what the hell a classical guitar,
    oboe, upright bass, and sitar /tabla could possibly sound like together......man, was i on my way or what? Towner's an amazing guy on
    the nylon string....a kind of like Bill Evans meets leo Brower,but for
    me it was always his 12-string that stood WAY out in contrast to what
    others were doing in that context . Not a lot of guys made this
    instrument theirs....i saw Coryell two or three times dueting with
    polish violinist Michael Urbaniak, and in this setting he almost
    exclusively played the 12-string.However ,he was more of less playing
    what he always played acoustically, only faster than you'd expect
    circular picking on a 12-string. Other players, especially Robbie
    Basho who comes right to mind, and Leo Kottke added some other, non- sixstring personality and dimension to it. But man, Towner really took
    it out there into Towner-land........and hey, if if you don't believe
    me, just look no further than Ralph Towner with Glen Moore Trios/Solos record.Anyone familiar with this recording?it's no doubt a kind of an
    ECM throwaway in the great pantheon of accepted classics, but
    interestingly enough I think Towner has some of his best solo 12-
    string playing (and i've heard a pile too) on this record....so, if
    you can, check out the cuts 1 X 12 and 3 X 12---amazing stuff.

    Bill Frisell------>
    Okay, if the quintessential ECM guitarist isn't Rypdal or Towner, then
    it's certainly frisell. I mean what can you say at this
    point......he's recorded with everybody and everybody else’s uncle...
    he always sounds great despite having been on ten trillion recordings
    in a zillion diametrically opposed settings, and next to Metheny he's definitely the most universally influential ECM guitarist. I was lucky
    enough to open for him and Tim Berne at the WCUW JazzFest in the
    Worcester, Massachusetts Science Center's Planetarium while they were supporting their record Theoretically .And man was it great to sit a
    few inches from the bespectacled Frisell and his SG as he bent the
    neck and challenged the truss rod to deny him his microtonal, lonely
    whistle sonorities.

    Pat Metheny------>
    Well if the quintessential ECM guitarist isn't Rypdal or towner or
    Frisell, then there might be space for an argument that it's Metheny. Probably not, but without a doubt he's their most influential
    recording artist. Listening back, it's amazing, considering his pre-
    Bright Sized Life output that BSL just screamed, quintessential genius
    in his debut recording......and it's still my favorite Pat Metheny
    record by far, even after all these years. Just an aside in all this,
    as I really don't have a vested opinion not being devoted big fan or a devoted not-fan. I rather tend to see Metheny in the context of the
    great ECM guitar pantheon, and perhaps even more so, the great jazz
    guitar pantheon, both of which I see him in as an honorary member in
    that given milieu doing his thing. Oddly enough, Metheny wasn't always
    a well-respected jazz guitarist, as i'm old enough to remember that
    Metheny was, at least initially, heavily slagged by many of his jazz contemporaries as a kind of bubblegum jazz musician---more of less ala
    Kenny G today....funny how times have and have not changed, no? BTW, i
    saw Miles Davis With Mike Stern on guitar OPEN for Pat metheny in a
    free concert on the Boston commons,and i shudder to think of what
    Miles had to say during negations for that tour! Anyway, Stern was
    great that night, but Metheny really upped the anti as i saw it back
    then, and he and his band turned in a remarkable performance that
    really stood above.

    Egberto Gismonti------>
    A real marvel, and perhaps the most underrated/underappreciated member
    of the great ECM guitar pantheon.

    David Torn------>
    Man-o-man,ohhhhh-man. check the first everyman band record.check it,
    check it,check it, just check it....... because it's the portrait of a classic in repose. In much the same way that Coryell and McLaughlin
    had brought the dynamic of Hendrix and '60s psychedelia to jazz guitar
    before him, it's my contention that David Torn brought a Phillip K.
    Dick-like futuristic dynamic to jazz where EddieVan Halen is re-
    envisioned as Ornette Coleman and heavy metal adds something beyond
    the electro magnetic fence to what's already there as jazz
    guitar....well Torn did just that with his playing on the first
    Everyman Band record. But unlike Coryell and McLaughlin's pioneering
    work, which had many guitarist following in their footsteps, I can't
    think of hardly anyone who really followed up Torn's example--not even
    Torn himself! (Actually, Torn's playing on Jan Garbarek's It's OK To
    Listen To The Gray Voice is a nice bit of middle ground between the
    more oblique, exotic loop-based mature sound that he's best known for
    today and this singular sort of early heavy metal-jazz/rock-fusion
    sound.) Many players might mention Holdsworth as the first example of
    this sort, as he influenced Van Halen and clearly Torn as well in his
    early Everyman Band period, and all that is true enough and Holdsworth
    stands way apart from most all other players in terms of the degree to
    which he was able to assimilated a classic Coltrane-like dedication
    and compass to improvisation. But there's a stylistic aggressiveness
    and attitude on the first eponymous Everyman Band recording that
    really separates Torn's playing from anything else at the time and
    most things that came after as far as fusion guitar goes. Just
    remember you heard it here first.....because i think this record is a
    future fusion guitar benchmark that jut has to wait it's time.

    Steve Tibbetts------->
    The Minnesota native was already a well-respected underground legend
    for his independently released solo recordings before he signed on to
    ECM. And hey, anybody remotely jazz-related who says something to the
    effect of "who would you rather listen too ,Motorhead or Earl Klugh?”
    is pretty cool in my book---especially if they make a music like
    Tibbetts did. Anyway, i saw tibbets live at the WAG a few times, and
    man was he great. For a duo they had an absolutely HUGE and BEAUTIFUL
    sound with percussionist Marc Anderson alternating between a plethora
    of hand percussion, steel drums, and a modified trap kit really being
    every bit as amazing as Tibbetts. Also, Tibbetts occasionally got a
    massively garish, distorted tone by using an obscure effect called a compander--->I.e. an expander/ compressor which enables the signal to
    open up into a huge and aggressive attack arcs depending upon the pick attack. FWiW, one of my personal big time hero/ motivators was another Minnesota guy Sigurd Olson. I know he was a controversial figure
    locally as he was hung in effigy outside the courthouse by a group of
    local good ole boys over the boundary waters canoe area wilderness
    act. Well good for him, and god (or whatever) bless him and his
    snowshoes and canoes--and for what it's worth, it was his early, quasi- spiritual /religious experiences out-of-doors as described by David
    backe in his Wilderness Theology that drew me to him as an oddly
    simpatico personage.

    John Abercrombie------>
    Kind of the great utility guy, or seventh player award guy of the
    classic ECM guitar stable. Abercrombie always took an equal-
    opportunity approach to either the world fusion of a Nana Vasconcelo
    or Conlon Walcott, or the meanish John McLaughlin-esqe fusion of a
    Timeless or the first Gateway recording or the classic jazz-rock of Liberman's great 1973 ECM recording, Lookout Farm .Abercombie never
    had a singular, defining style per se, but almost always sounded good
    and special and really adapted well to the various ECM projects and personalities he collaborated on. And, for what it's worth, he was
    also much more of an orthodox jazz guitarist than any other big-time
    ECM guitarists aside from Methany and Frisell.

    Bill Connors------->
    Another ECM chameleon type guy who stood somewhat outside of the
    excepted pantheon of individualistic, stylized ECM guitarists. I
    always liked his early RTF McLaughlin-esque guitar, and especially his
    later vibes, flute/sax and acoustic guitar trio recordings with Tom
    Van Der Geld a lot, despite the fact that there really wasn't any comparatively obvious originality in his approach given the overall
    context of most of the other players mentioned here.

    Am I forgetting anybody? Well, of course I am, as there were a ton of
    other relevant guitarists who recorded under the ECM banner,
    especially later, like Raoul Bjorkenheim, Jacob Young and Eivind
    Aarset. But as a label with a guitar-roster ranging from the Music Impovisation Company's Derek Bailey to the Tonight Show's Kevin
    Eubanks to Whitesnake's Steve Vai, it's hard not to leave somebody
    deserving a mention out,such as some of the more obscure figures like
    Steve Eliovson, Hajo Webern,Ulich Ingenbold , and Om's Christy Doran,
    et al.

    I just came across this thread. I am an ECM megafan and a guitarist—so this is excellent. I always appreciated the wild diversity of its catalog in the first decade or two. It's too bad ECM didn't maintain its adventurousness—seems like it began sort
    of repeating itself. Only signing artists and releasing albums similar to its back-catalog. But maybe I haven't delved deep enough.

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