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The Score: Rebirth of the Cool - Seattle Jazz Composers Ensemble Pays Tribute to Miles Davis

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By Christopher DeLaurenti

Was any other revolution in jazz so suave? When Miles Davis led a two-week stand at New York's fabled Royal Roost in 1948, the music—composed and arranged for a nonet by Gil Evans, John Lewis (later of the Modern Jazz Quartet), Gerry Mulligan, and others—changed jazz forever.

Revolution was already in the air: The sped-up, serpentine lines of bebop stymied mainstream musicians rooted in swing. Other contemporary experiments, notably the forays into unscored, chartless, freely improvised music fathered by Lennie Tristano as well as Stan Kenton's swaggering Innovations Orchestra, stunned and baffled listeners. But those brave ventures were short-lived.

Davis and his collaborators paved a middle path, smoothing the frantic, swerving angles and daredevil contortions of bebop with tubas and French horns. Solos glided instead of galloped; uptempo numbers never boiled over into frenetic jamming. Sly arrangements radiated a cool, relaxed sophistication, proving that a small group could stay nimble while sounding as orchestral as a big band.

With a short-term record contract to fulfill, Davis and his nonet recorded for Capitol Records, which astutely released the resulting sessions as 78 rpm singles, an EP, and later as an LP, Birth of the Cool. Mulligan moved to California, and the Capitol disc went everywhere, diffusing the Cool vibe into what was dubbed “West Coast Jazz" and then into movie and TV scores.

Although many of the Cool tunes—such as “Boplicity," “Jeru," and “Israel"—are standards, the arrangements are seldom played as originally scored. Reviving the music is a natural step for Seattle trumpeter Jason Parker, a co-instigator of tribute nights devoted to the music of Charles Mingus and Art Blakey. For this “Birth of the Cool" (Fri Aug 21, Lucid Lounge, 5241 University Wy, 9:30 pm, free), Parker plays in the Seattle Jazz Composers' Ensemble, which includes Reptet's Nelson Bell (an elated Parker told me “I found a tuba player!"), alto saxophonist Cynthia Mullis, Cara Sawyer on French horn, and codirector/bassist Nate Omdal, who painstakingly converted the music into individual parts for the band.

“We're playing the pieces as arranged," says Omdal, who expresses amazement at the original scores, published in 2002 after a half-century of tempting (and thwarting) transcribers. “You hear incredible pairings of baritone sax, tuba, and bass," he adds. He also notes that time—and affection for certain improvised sections—has blurred the line between composition and improvisation. “There are some little segues, improvised by Miles and others, that we're keeping. They feel inseparable from the music." True to the Cool spirit of exploration, the band play new tunes composed for the ensemble by Omdal, Jim Knodle, Bell, Michael Catts, SJCE codirector Michael Owcharuk, and Portland composer Andrew Oliver.

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