Wallering on the Artnicity
“The more one judges, the less one loves.”― Honoré de Balzac
For me, it is time to talk about Art Tatum.
No, it is not his birthday…that is in October. There is no bio-pic coming out about him, no honors being bestowed upon him…it is all about my process of coming to terms…and shrinking the footprint of…a record collection that got to wild and hairy over the years. On one of the latest rainy weekend days in the bay area, I was thumbing through the Jazz section of the collection. I came upon over a half dozen Art Tatum records that I have been carrying with me for decades now. In fact, when we last moved, I downsized my Art Tatum collection somewhat haphazardly, not thinking I needed over a dozen records of an artist that I never really think about throwing on the turntable. I kept the ones with the best covers…the ones that included sidemen who I loved…the ones that SEEMED like the ones I should keep. No real science or logic.
Art Tatum is considered to be one of the biggest geniuses to ever play the piano. He was a wizard with the keys…how he moved his hands…how he evolved the instrument away from the stride piano stylings that were popular as he came up in the business. His technical abilities…his abilities as a showman…remind me of what Glenn Gould did for Classical music. Audiences marveled at the complexes voices both of his hands projected simultaneously, harmonizing, improvising, almost inventing a new type of audio string theory. His was a new sound..a whole new genre of piano playing. He listened to classical composers like Ravel and Debussy and infused them into his vision of Jazz, while also taking from Fats Waller and others who came (right) before him. And he influenced future influencers like Charlie Parker, who incorporated Tatum tactics when hitting his solos as well as (Ulf take note) Jerry Garcia. By the time he died at the early age of 47 in 1956, he had recorded a huge body of work and created the treasured legacy that is still felt today.
Tatum was a giant (I empirically get it): so why don’t I ever listen to Art Tatum?
For years, I have seen cool looking Art Tatum records at garage sales or record stores, brought them home, thrown them on, and soon after lost the plot. There is something about his style…his vibe…that to my ear sounds more studied and less…groovy? Beat-ific? Dare I say….enjoyable?? And for years I have ended each listen thinking if I go back to the records later…if I find the right person to lead me through his greatest moments…if I give space to have that epiphanic Art Tatum moment, that I will be enlightened and finally understand a world that to me is a total mystery.
In a moment of pseudo-crisis, I went to social media and wrote:
OK...HELP ME HERE. I want to love ART TATUM but I DONT. SO MANY PEOPLE see him as a MAJOR INFLUENCE. What am I missing? Looking for Art Tatum appreciation.
To my surprise, a huge conversation evolved. One theme of the conversation centered around the idea that some majorly influential musicians are not the easiest to listen to. People sited Charlie Parker (I disagree), Bob Dylan (I disagree), Sarah Vaughn (don’t agree or disagree). Jazz guitar legend John Schott commented: “I too have big Tatum issues. He's a tricky one - always wonderful, but rarely do I want to listen to more than 3 or 4 sides in a row. Clearly very Influential, obviously innovative, clearly amazing, a class act, but... it's sort of the same story over and over again.” Another friend said, “I find Tatum’s playing bombastic, over adorned, relentlessly show off-y.” Another added, “Apparently no studio recording really does him full justice. That’s one thing I’ve always heard.” Many commenters gave me the support to decide to end my quest of finding my way into Tatumland: it is okay to just not appreciate an artist: “maybe it is ok if you don’t like him.”
Star Jazz producer Matt Pierson commented that Tatum has “Incredible feel, approaches the piano like a symphony orchestra, can play things on the instrument that nobody else ever has, or likely ever will. And he linked to a fantastic video of Tatum playing, making me think that maybe to appreciate the pianist, you had to be there when he was on stage showing off his stuff. A friend directed me to a pretty awesome documentary made on Tatum a year back, again allowing the listener to also see Tatum in glorious action.
As far as suggested listening, many pointed me to his solo records, of which I have many. Matt Pierson also recommended the recordings he did with the Ben Webster Quartet. And finally, someone brought up the record God Is In The House (a comment by Fats Waller when Tatum entered into a club): a group of field-ish recordings rather done by Jerry Newman (and others) on a portal disc cutter at night clubs like Mintons, after hours, which captured the feel that his studio records did not (you can read more about Jerry Newman’s recordings on John Schott’s website).
I spent the next few days carefully listening to all the suggestions. Tons of solo stuff. The Ben Webster recordings, which are great…but celebrate the greatness of Ben Webster, who I can listen to all the time, more than Tatum (I do like some of the more laid back Tatum presented here). I listened to a whole lot of recordings he did with different combos. And finally, I threw on God Is In The House, which to me is the greatest group of recordings I have ever heard of Tatum…one I could easily go back to…that brings Tatum out of my head, and into my heart and soul…there is soul there that is missing from many of the recordings I have heard. But at the end of the day, for me the jury is still out as far as listening to Art Tatum records like I listen to Fats Waller or Charlie Parker or Ben Webster records. Maybe I slim down the collection a little…add God Is In The House…and wait for another rainy day to dive back in. Or maybe—judging vs loving..just maybe, it is time to come to the realization that Art Tatum might never be a go-to when I am throwing a platter on. Maybe…
What do YOU think about Art Tatum?
THANK YOU CARY BAKER FOR REMINDING ME THAT TODAY IS THE BIRTHDAY OF TWO MUSIC GIANTS: Pete Townshend and Joey Ramone. My kids and I first saw The Who together 8 years ago tonight!
US Supreme Court Rules Against Warhol Foundation in Closely Watched Copyright Case
“The US Supreme Court ruled against the Andy Warhol foundation in the closely-watched copyright infringement lawsuit filed against the photographer Lynn Goldsmith, a decision that could set a precedent for cases involving the fair use doctrine. The Justices ruled 7 to 2 in Goldsmith’s favor, in the decision released Thursday. Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in the majority opinion that the photographer’s ‘original works, like those of other photographers, are entitled to copyright protection, even against famous artists.’”
“Rushdie, speaking to 700 guests at the American Museum of Natural History, said PEN America and its mission to protect free expression was never “more important” in a time of book bans and censorship and issued a call to action: ‘Terrorism must not terrorize us. Violence must not deter us. La lutte continue. La lutta continua. The struggle goes on.’”
Daveed Diggs and Ethan Hawke Just Want You to Feel Something
Hawke (this is great): “I’ve spent the last nine months working on a movie exploring the life and work of Flannery O’Connor, who is this Southern gothic writer. One of the things that’s interesting about her artistic life is she didn’t have any meaningful success until after she was dead. She was always writing for herself, or a tiny fraction of the population that read the Partisan Review. She had this line where she said, ‘Well, I’d rather have one reader in 100 years than 100,000 today.’ It’s a very interesting thing to think about when you make things. Are you making them for yourself? Are you making them for other people? I always feel like Bob Dylan’s being true to himself and millions of people happen to care. Spike Lee seems to always be working for himself and some of the movies hit big and some of them don’t, but you can tell they all kind of mean the same. It’s coming from the same creative force. When you make music, do you think about who you’re singing for?”
Library of Congress Magazine May June 2023
The new Library of Congress magazine is now available. Free. And it is a sweet one:
LGBTQ+ at the Library: Collections chronicle a story of pain, joy and perseverance. Also, a new collection sheds light on the life and work of a nurse who cared for the Lincoln family and attendance sheets record the Hollywood stars who took classes at the Actors Studio.
The Book of a Thousand Eyes [A dream, still clinging like light to the dark, rounding]
By Lyn Hejinian
A dream, still clinging like light to the dark, rounding
The gap left by things which have already happened
Leaving nothing in their place, may have nothing to do
But that. Dreams are like ghosts achieving ghosts' perennial goal
Of revoking the sensation of repose. It's terrible
To think we write these things for them, to tell them
Of our life—that is, our whole life. Along comes a dream
Of a machine. Why? What is being sold there? How is the product
emitted?
It must have been sparked by a noise, the way the very word "spark"
emits a brief picture. Is it original? Inevitable?
We seem to sleep so as to draw the picture
Of events that have already happened so we can picture
Them. A dream for example of a procession to an execution site.
How many strangers could circle the space while speaking of nostalgia
And of wolves in the hills? We find them
Thinking of nothing instead—there's no one to impersonate, nothing
To foresee. It's logical that prophesies would be emitted
Through the gaps left by previous things, or by the dead
Refusing conversation and contemplating beauty instead.
But isn't that the problem with beauty—that it's apt in retrospect
To seem preordained? The dawn birds are trilling
A new day—it has the psychical quality of "pastness" and they are trailing
It. The day breaks in an imperfectly continuous course
Of life. Sleep is immediate and memory nothing.
