Oboe in Improvised and New Music

[Michael Ward]

I've been listening and enjoying the playing of Yusef Lateef , Marshall Allen and Paul McCandless for a long time also recently Heinz Holliger on ECM New Series. I've also read about Charles Pillow but haven't managed to hear anything. Can anyone recommend some CD's featuring the oboe in an improvised or contemporary setting .
Thankyou

[gege]

michael, i can recommend a record, but i assume you will know it: its india on the "coltrane live at the village vanguard", with garvin bushell playing the introduction of india on the oboe, coltrane following on the soprano...
gege

[Michael Ward]

gege I do have the box set but I'd forgotten about Garvin's wonderful double reed playing, thankyou. India is fantastic. I've been listening a lot recently to Heinz Holliger on ECM Lauds and Lamentations which though not improvised is amazing oboe and english horn playing.

[gege]

hallo michael,

i admire holligers oboe playing very much, for me he has a unique style of classical oboe playing, with a big colourful sound and a superb controll over his instruments (e.g. he is able to play pianissimo in the deepest register almost like a clarinet). i like the oboe very much (my father was a good amateur player on the oboe and i grew up with this sound), but after becoming acquainted holliger, i stopped listening to other oboists (except lothar koch, who was solo oboist of the berlin philharmonics in the seventies, he had a total different concept of playing, with a slim, flexible sound and a vocal approach). i own a lot of holligers records, on most of them he plays barock music, bach, vivaldi, marcello, albinoni etc. or mozart, haydn. only two of his records i know are with music of the 20th century: benjamin britten and antal dorati (who studied composition by bartok), great recordings. I dont know the ECM recordings you mentioned. In the last years Holliger didnt play to much but works as composer an conductor.
years ago I was lucky to hear and see him playing live, great experience. his appearence on stage was impressive. but one could see, that he had to work hard to get this amazing sound out of this tiny instrument. he played the solo suite from J.S. Bach (orig. for flute) with circular breathing, and i was not able to hear a loss of sound quality when he changed the air stream. he also played a solo piece, a own composition, but i dont remember its title. I will never forget this "experience".

[Michael Ward]

gege thankyou for sharing those experiences. I do not play the oboe but would really like to begin studying and am investigating the huge options available. It's certainly a beautiful instrument.

[lowguy]

Hello Michael ! How are you ?

Some oboe references in jazz :
-G.Bushell with Coltrane, yes (Live Village Vangard), who play too contrabassoon on Spiritual ; beautifull recordings !
-Caris Visentin on some Dave Liebman's recordings (she's Dave's wife), on english horn and oboe ;
-Charles Pillow as a leader : look on Towerrecords.com ;
-Tom Christensen / Charles Pillow Quartet : two excellent musicians (both : sopranino / soprano / tenor / englhorn / oboe / cl / bcl), but the music is not fantastic I think... One is a Naxos Jazz, the other one I don't know ;
-Yussef Lateef on many recordings plays oboe (Impulse, Blue Note and others) ;
-Paul McCandless (ob / englhorn / sino / sno / bcl) in Oregon and some other groups ;
-Ken McIntyre : a fun CD on Streeplchase where he plays AS, bcl, ob, bassoon and flute, and some others with Cecil Taylor ;
-West Coast's GREAT tenor and oboist Bob Cooper ; there is a quintet rec. with Bud Shank : oboe (Bob Cooper) and flutes (Bud) w/ rythm section ;
-Marshall Allen with Sun Ra Arkestra ;
-french Jean-Luc Fillon, easy to find on Amazon I think ; he's not a saxophonist but a "real" jazz oboe play, like Mike Rabinowitz for bassoon.

Don't forget the Gil Evans scores (around 1955 / 1970) with great doublers like Bob Tricario and many oboe / englhorn parts ; and Charles Pillow with Maria Schneider.

and... I love Heinz Holliger, I sometimes meet him in Lyon and he's not only an incredible oboist and a beautifull composer, but too a fantastic GUY.

I sometimes play english horn but I really would like to find a cheap oboe...

[lowguy]

Hi,
I forgot for "jazz" oboe :
-a guy in the Bix Beiderbecke / Frankie Trumbauser's orchestra, in the 30's, played oboe, as and cl ;
-John Purcell ;
-Odean pope (with Max Roach sometimes, in his own recordings often) ;
-Joe Farrell ;
-Ralph Towner said me he recorded on oboe, but no idea about the period and the label (ECM ?) ;
-south french Daniel Beaussier (known as Carla Bley's big-band member) ;
-Vinny Golia is not only an EXTRAORDINARY virtuoso from soprillo to tubax, piccolo to octobass flute, Ab to contrabass clarinet : he's too a good english horn player and a good bassonist
.......

[Michael Ward]

Olivier nice to hear from you and thanks for the extensive list. Hope you're good. I just got my new Bassflute from Eva Kingma and got to play a contrabass with some heads that Vinnie Golia had returned after choosing one, the contra was wonderful.

[Tim Price]

Garvin Bushell- that made my day. Look for his book " Jazz From The Begginning", great read.

[Tenki]

:? jazz......oboe......brain cannot compute........
Seriously though, i play the oboe, and it would be kind of cool to hear a stereotypically stuffy oboe player loosen up and play some swing!
(i do realize that this post is late and adds nothing to the topic whatsoever, but forgive me it's late and i'm bored XP

[Michael Ward]

Tenki check out Yusef Lateef on Cannonball's "Nippon Soul" playing " Brother John". Yusef's tribute to Trane is great jazz oboe.