Jazz

Herbie Mann Impressions of the Middle East (1967) [Jazz,Oriental][mp3 320][h33t][schon55]

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Herbie Mann - Impressions of the Middle East
Year: 1967
Label: Atlantic
Style: Jazz, Oriental
Total time: 44:25
Bitrate: 320 kbps

This album marks one of the rare occasions when a major jazz musicians has turned his attention to the musical traditions of the Middle East. Herbie Mann has recorded the ”pleasant sound” which is in the grain of the whole region. Exuberance is Mann’s mood. He blows his flute to lifting rhythms, capturing the joys and the flamboyance of the Middle Eastern soul. Turkish Coffee, a Mann original, displays how wonderfully suitable is jazz for evocation of exotic themes. The performance has the makings of an authentic fasil, a suite or fugue with an intriguing interplay between the ensemble and occasional instrumental solos and cadenzas.

With Incense, another Mann contribution, mysticism, which is deeply ingrained in the culture of Islam, comes alive in a mond of happiness. It is a paean to the epicurean whose soul, in the words of the 20th century Turkish neo-classical poet Yahya Kemal Beyath, "Iike an incense-burner, fumes a myriad years." Arif Mardin's Odalisque portrays a concubine in all her vivacity and spleen. The authentic rhythmic structure employed by the composer seems to reproduce the deft voluptuous movements of a lovely girl who sings a song as if to prove the words of Sadi, the great 13th century Persian poet, that "a sweet voice is more delicious than a beautiful face." Do Wah Diddy Diddy, the hit tune of a few years ago, can best be defined as Near Eastern rock 'n' roll. The popular tune by Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich is graced here by Arif Mardin's lilting arrangement and a rousing, riproaring performance by Herbie Mann and his group.

Uskudar is a joyful new version of a perennial Turkish favorite which requires no introduction to non-Turkish audiences. The lyrics of the original song which bears the longer title of Usküdara Gider iken (On The Way To Scutari) tell the story of a tender love affair in a romantic section of Istanbul: On a rainy day, a girl wistfully dreams of her government clerk who is dressed in his Sunday best-frock coat und striped pants which used to be so popular in the latter part of the 19th century. Herbie Mann captures all the local color of the melody and of the original lyrics. With the aid of the authentic instruments, he turns Uskudar into a genuine Turkish delight. The Oud And The Pussycat is Mann’s playful reading of the lighter side of Middle Eastern music. It is as captivating as a Tom and Jerry cartoon. The minor blues melody forms a flighty arabesque which works itself into the senses in delicious tones.

As summer came to a close in 1914, the German battle cruiser Goeben frantically sailed through the Mediterranean and the Aegean seas, trailed by British destroyers, and made its full-steam entry into Istanbul to join the Turkish navy. Turkey found herself thrust into the First World War-and Goeben soon became Yavuz. This massive armored battleship with its graceful guns and Boaring masts immediately fired the Turkish imagination. The people took a popular folk tune, which had originated on the Black Sea coast, and wrote new lyrics to it in praise of Yavuz which remained for fifty years the uncontested queen of the Turkish navy until it was scrapped in the mid-sixties. The tune will outlive the legend of the glorious ship, for it is one of the most captivating Turkish tunes of all time. Yavuz, which is often used for the traditional convulsive hara, danced to the accompaniment of kemence (a hemispherical viol), becomes reflective and sonorous here with Arif Mardin's arrangement in 6/8 time. The dance finds itself transformed into poetry.

Dance Of The Semites features a question-and-answer theme laced with oud fills. Herbie Mann's original melody seems to re-unite the whose Semitic race in one happy mood. In Eli Eli we find a different orchestral set-up: A string ensemble conducted by Torrie Zito provides a lavish background for Herbie Mann's wailings of lament, which is the essence of this beautiful medieval Hebraic chant. Herbie Mann's impressions are jazz distillations of a time-honored musical heritage His phrasing, although it bears Mann's unmistakable jazz imprint, succeeds in staying in the mainstream of tradition. His flute rejoices in the delights of the Middle East and its music. Mann translates these into his fluent jazz idiom. He does this without falling into banality or bathos, without becoming abstract or academic. He exudes the buoyancy of the Middle Eastern soul interfused with the zest of his jazz. What results is the profile of a joyous Middle Eastern Mann. ~ From the Original Liner Notes by Talat. S. Halman

Personnel:
Herbie Mann (Flute)
Reggie Workman (Double Bass) - 1-8
Hachig Thomas Kazarian (Clarinet and Percussion) - 4-8
Carlos "Potato" Valdes (Congas) - 1-4,6
Bruno Carr (Drums) - 1-8
Jimmy Owens (Flugelhorn and Trumpet) - 4,5,7,8
Chick Ganimian (Oud) - 1-8
Geraldine Swee (Percussion) - 1-3
Moulay Hafid (Percussion) - 4-8
Joe Orange (Trombone) - 4,6
Julian Priester (Trombone) - 4,6
Roy Ayers (Vibraphone) - 1-3
Mohamed Elakkad (Zither) - 4-8
Richard Davis (Double Bass) - 9
Gloria Agostino (Harp) - 9

Mann - Impressions of the Middle East Tracks:
01 Turkish Coffee (Herbie Mann) 5:01
02 Incense (Herbie Mann) 7:19
03 Odalisque (Arif Mardin) 7:43
04 Do Wah Diddy Diddy (Jeff Barry/Ellie Greenwich) 2:38
05 Uskudar (Traditional) 3:38
06 The Oud and the Pussycat (Herbie Mann) 5:04
07 Yavuz (Traditional) 4:37
08 Dance of the Semites (Herbie Mann) 4:29
09 Eli Eli (Traditional) 3:56

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