© - Steven A. Cerra, copyright protected; all
rights reserved.
It is amazing to
consider the fact that pianist-composer-arranger, Dave Brubeck, spent over 60 years on the road until his retirement from what his wife Iola
Brubeck referenced in a message to the Jazz writer and blogger Doug Ramsey as -
“The Gigs.”
Can you imagine -
sixty years on the road?
I was reflecting
on this incredible achievement with a pianist friend recently and his initial
reaction was – “Just think about all those cruddy pianos he had to play on
before he became famous.” Derelict pianos were a fact-of-life in most Jazz
joints for many years.
One of Dave ’s earliest albums for Columbia Records was
Jazz
Impressions of the U.S.A. [CL 984]. It was recorded in 1956 and 1957
when Dave ’s quartet had been traveling regularly for
about 5 years.
One can only
wonder at what such a diary of musical impressions might sound like if another
55-years of traveling was added to it!
At the time of its
issuance, Dave wrote the following introductory
paragraphs for the albums liner notes:
“A music notebook
is as important to the traveling musician, as a sketch pad is to the artist.
When lulled by the sounds of travel, the drone of the plane, the rumble of the
bus, the clack of the rails, or even the hiss of the radiator in a strange
hotel room, themes suddenly spring into consciousness. If a sketchbook is
handy, the elusive idea is captured to be developed, arranged or changed.
"Jazz Impressions" is a group of compositions created in just such a
manner, from notebook scribblings made while on tour. It was recorded on three
different dates, in three different cities (New York Hollywood Oakland
As many popular
songs have been transformed by jazz into almost different tunes — different in
emotional content, rhythmic conception, and melodic development — so these
sketches by the Quartet vary according to the mood of the group and the
individual interpretations of the soloist. The themes themselves, which are but
the skeletal framework for improvisation, occasionally use musical devices
which are typical of certain regions in the United States
Although these
pieces have their moments of humor, at no time do we attempt to satirize the indigenous
music which served as inspiration for these impressions. Much of the folk music
of America
The opening track
on the Jazz Impressions of the U.S.A. LP
is entitled Ode to a Cowboy.
The following
anecdote about Dave ’s formative years prior to becoming a
professional musician may have had something to do with the manner in which
this Jazz impression was formed.
“Dave was a working cowboy by the rime he was
thirteen. "My dad," he said, "was a cattleman and a top rodeo
roper, maybe the top in California
"My dad
covered the western states, buying cattle for a big company called the Moffet
Meat Company," Dave said. "And like myself, he was always on the road. He wanted
to settle down. So the company gave him a 45,000-acre ranch to manage, if you
can imagine how large that is. In some places it was twenty-five miles across.
He moved there and took me and my mother when I was twelve.
The ranch was in
Ione about 115 miles east of San Francisco Sierra Nevada ’s.” [Gene Lees , The
Man on the Buffalo
Also in his notes
to the album, Dave wrote:
“Ode to a Cowboy is an example of group
creation, after the theme has been presented and the idea discussed. Paul
Desmond's alto becomes the plaintive voice of a singing cowboy, and Norman
Bates' bass, his guitar accompaniment. The tango rhythm was Norman
The tune has
always been one of my favorites; maybe someone will
one day write a tune entitled Ode to a
Jazz Musician and dedicate it to Dave ?
