Gain Access Lee Konitz : Conversazioni Sullarte Dellimprovvisatore Depicted By Andy Hamilton Compiled As Softcover

of the book is made up of interviews with Konitz from the last several years, which I can't say enough good things about.
He's very honest and humble, while speaking thoughtfully and eloquently about some very difficult subject matter improvisation.
The rest of the book is interviews with musicians associated with him in some way, These are also very informative, Great anecdotes, too. Andy Hamilton's book is an extraordinary tale about the life and insights of the great jazz artist Lee Konitz.
The QampA form proves very effective for allowing the viewpoints of the great artist to translate to the reader with little or no distortion.
The chronological structure of the conversation and the interviews with fellow musicians creates a wellfunctioning flow that makes the book a joy to read.


Lee talkes about his approach to music, a direction that was reinforced under the influence of jazz pianist and inventor Lennie Tristano who became a dominant influence on the many people who studied with him.


Tristano is often mentioned by Lee throughout, and the influence is evidently still strong in theyears old Lee.
He is a unique character in the Tristano universe in that he left the circle but took many of the core elements with him and expanded the arena in which the teachings could be applied.
The Tristano world represents an idealistic approach that resulted in innovative and extraordinary music, and on the other hand there was certain cultlike elements in the way Tristano exerted his influence.
Lee took the purist element with him, without restricting himself to a purist setting of how the band was expected to function.


The game is true improvisation, which Lee believes is possible, and has nothing to do with elegantly phrasing together rehearsed licks and patterns, which is a common approach.
Instead the focus is on the spontaneous creation of melody and conversation between the musicians, whether the structure of the music is a Broadway standard, or completely free.


Lee is extraordinarily honest and he exposes his deepest thoughts on the subjects being discussed.
Being a highly admired musician, he still questions his approach, like when after witnessing an audience immediate positive response to a young jazz musicians who used all the "tricks" that Lee works so hard to avoid.


The late Lee Konitz music is very fascinating in that standards are almost always used as the foundation for improvisation, but in such a loose way that it is not recognized by the listener unless they are dedicated student of the music.
In this way a new "Leean" piece of music is created on the fly,

Lees has cultivated the art of improvisation to an extraordinary degree which is fortunately well documented in his large production of albums.
A remarkable book about a remarkable musician and human being, who possessed a subtle, intelligent feeling to the music.


"That's my way of preparation to not be prepared, And that takes a lot of preparation!"
Lee Konitz The recent death of Lee Konitz, one of the jazz musicians I most admired, prompted me to write a review of Hamilton's book.
I read this when it came out and frequently pull it off the shelf to reread sections.


Konitz was one of the most uncompromising of improvisers he once said that if he heard himself playing something he

had already played, he would take the horn out of his mouth.
He comes across as totally honest in these interviews, sometimes brutally so, His remarks about Anthony Braxton were tough for me to read, But while he is rough on some of his fellow musicians, he doesn't spare himself or make any attempt to hide his flaws, musical or personal.
This fan, at least, came away admiring Konitz even more after reading the book,
Fantastic read, but at some point I got annoyed with the frequency of commentary from other musicians, it started to feel like you would only get small amounts of Lee before an interruption, like the book was almost half notLee.
But still totally worth it Lee Konitz, considerato il più famoso interprete dello stile cool sul sassofono contralto, ha forgiato un sound unico tra i musicisti della sua generazione, riuscendo a percorrere una strada indipendente e alternativa rispetto a quella di Charlie Parker, il più influente sassofonista della storia del jazz.
La sua carriera comincia nell'orchestra di Claude Thornhill verso la fine degli anni Quaranta, quando entra in contatto con Miles Davis e Gil Evans, con i quali parteciperà poi alle storiche incisioni di Birth of the Cool.
Grande importanza nella sua fase formativa la ricopre anche Lennie Tristano, musicista con cui intrattiene un complesso rapporto e con il quale inciderà alcuni memorabili dischi: attraverso la scuola di Tristano incontra il tenorsassofonista Warne Marsh, che diventerà una sorta di suo alter ego musicale.
L'ingaggio con Stan Kenton lo porterà quindi al centro della scena del jazz mondiale, segnando l'inizio della sua maturità artistica.
Andy Hamilton traccia in questo volume la storia umana e professionale di Konitz, e ne discute le idee mettendo a fuoco alcuni temi chiave: dal valore della melodia alla forma "tema con variazioni", dalle qualità del timbro al sound come cifra stilistica, fino a toccare il cuore delle sue convinzioni in merito alla dialettica fra composizione e improvvisazione.


“Meticulously researched, detailed and documented, this long awaited overview justly establishes Konitz as one of the most consistently brilliant, adventurous and original improvisers in the jazz traditiona genius as rare as Bird himself.
”
John Zorn

“Hamiltons work may well mark the inception of a format new to writing on Western music, one which avoids both the selfaggrandizing of autobiography and the stylized subjectification of biography.
”
The Wire

Crafted out of numerous interviews between the author and his subject, the book offers a unique look at the story of Lee Konitzs life and music, detailing Konitzs own insights into his musical education and his experiences with such figures as Miles Davis, Stan Kenton, Warne Marsh, Lennie Tristano, Charles Mingus, Bud Powell, and Bill Evans.
Thoroughly enjoyed the book. The book is essentially interviews with Konitz and
with his many colleagues through the years, He can be very upfront in his comments “Anthony Braxton”, My take away is he is a true improviser, never into showboating as he says and even in jazz music there are very few pure improvisers who stay away from prepared phrases and licks.
A melancholy read for sure as Lee recently passed as a victim of Covid, Been listening to my Konitz, Warne Marsh and Lennie Tristano with greater appreciation, Andy Hamilton teaches Philosophy, and also History and Aesthetics of Jazz, at Durham University, UK, He was also until recently Adjunct Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Western Australia, Perth, and has taught music aesthetics at Hong Kong University.
He specialises in aesthetics, political philosophy, philosophy of mind, J, S. Mill and Wittgenstein, and has published Aesthetics and Music Continuum,, Lee Konitz: Conversations on the Improvisers Art University of Michigan Press,, The Self In Question: Memory, the Body and Self Consciousness Palgrave,, and Scrutons Aesthetics, edited with Nick Zangwill Palgrave,.
The Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Wittgenstein and On Certainty will appear in, an Andy Hamilton teaches Philosophy, and also History and Aesthetics of Jazz, at Durham University, UK.
He was also until recently Adjunct Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Western Australia, Perth, and has taught music aesthetics at Hong Kong University.
He specialises in aesthetics, political philosophy, philosophy of mind, J, S. Mill and Wittgenstein, and has published Aesthetics and Music Continuum,, Lee Konitz: Conversations on the Improviser's Art University of Michigan Press,, The Self In Question: Memory, the Body and Self Consciousness Palgrave,, and Scruton's Aesthetics, edited with Nick Zangwill Palgrave,.
The Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Wittgenstein and "On Certainty" will appear in, and The Aesthetics of Rhythm, edited with Max Paddison, is forthcoming with Oxford University Press.
At the moment he is working on monographs on The Autonomy of Art, and on books of conversations with cellist Frances Marie Uitti, and improvising pianist Steve Beresford.
He is a long standing contributor to "The Wire", "Jazz " and "International Piano" magazines, interviewing and writing features on jazz and classical musicians and composers such as Ornette Coleman, Sonny Rollins, Elliott Carter, Kaija Saariaho and Christian Wolff.
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