Last night, as I was trying to decide whether I REALLY wanted my next Daily Devotional Reading pick to be Jazz: Its Evolution and Essence by André Hodeir *, I pulled Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool (2019) up on Netflix and had some drinks. It was an interesting documentary, to be sure. While I was repulsed by Miles' treatment of women and the way he sometimes vulgarly dismissed people who came to him, I was fascinated by his development as a musician--from child prodigy to unrelenting innovator. It's a documentary well worth seeing. One of the things which most interested me was a bit about the album Ascenseur pour l'échafaud, a soundtrack for a movie by Louis Malle. Here's how Wikipedia summed up the composition and recording of this album:
"On December 4, [Miles Davis] brought his four sidemen to the recording studio without having had them prepare anything. Davis only gave the musicians a few rudimentary harmonic sequences he had assembled in his hotel room, and, once the plot was explained, the band improvised without any precomposed theme, while edited loops of the musically relevant film sequences were projected in the background."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ascenseur_pour_l%27échafaud_(soundtrack)
Well. That's kind of ballsy, isn't it? ** The original album release was only 25:38, but a later (much later--like 30 years-ish later) was 71:18, and includes alternate takes in addition to the original album.
So I wanted to check this music out.
And fortunately for me, hoopla was there for me.
Their version was The Big One:
Original Album Side One:2 L'assassinat de Carala - BOF "Ascenseur pour l'échafaud" 2:10
3 Sur l'autoroute - BOF "Ascenseur pour l'échafaud" 2:18
4 Julien dans l'ascenseur - BOF "Ascenseur pour l'échafaud" 2:10
5 Florence sur les Champs-Élysées - BOF "Ascenseur pour l'échafaud" 2:52
Original Album Side Two:
7 Évasion de Julien - BOF "Ascenseur pour l'échafaud" 0:53
8 Visite du vigile - BOF "Ascenseur pour l'échafaud" 2:03
9 Au bar du Petit Bac - BOF "Ascenseur pour l'échafaud" 2:52
10 Chez le photographe du motel - BOF "Ascenseur pour l'échafaud" 3:51
The Extra Stuff:
12 Nuit sur les Champs-Élysées - Take 2 5:23
13 Nuit sur les Champs-Élysées - Take 3 2:53
14 Nuit sur les Champs-Élysées - Take 4 3:01
15 Assassinat - Take 1 2:04
16 Assassinat - Take 2 2:12
17 Assassinat - Take 3 2:11
18 Dîner au motel - Take 2 3:57
19 Final - Take 1 3:06
20 Final - Take 2 3:01
21 Final - Take 3 4:06
22 L'interrogatoire de Julien 5:16
23 Évasion de Julien - Take 2 1:58
24 Le petit bal - Take 1 2:41
25 Le petit bal - Take 2 2:55
26 Séquence voiture - Take 1 2:58
27 Séquence voiture - Take 2 2:18
It's a beautiful and intense album...and it's pretty hard to believe that it's not the product of long hours of composition & planning & recording & producing. But it was actually recorded in two days--December 4 and 5, 1957--and though I don't know how long they took to do the mixing and producing, since the film was released 29 January 1958, I'm guessing that it wasn't a whole heckuva lot of time.
Anyway...first impression (of the original album tracks only): I liked this music a lot. The only complaint I have at this point is that several of the tracks fade out abruptly, and I assume that that's because whoever did the final editing just chopped the song off where s/he wanted it to end. I suppose that was necessary given the parameters of recording here, and it's not a big deal, but it's a little distracting. Before I listen to the "extra" tracks, I'm going to give the original album another spin and compare the endings of the official tracks to those of the corresponding extras and see what I can see. Or hear what I can hear.
BTW, I also just found out that the movie is available (1) at my local library and (2) on HBO Max, so I think I'll get on to that in a moment.
* For one thing, because with all of this terrible stuff going on in Ukraine, I thought it might be more appropriate to read A History of Ukraine. But as I thought about it--and as I watched the news and a documentary entitled Ukraine on Fire--I decided that (1) that was just me thinking I could inform myself when the truth is that all I can do is try to winnow the bullshit & (2) I am fast approaching my psychic limit on this stuff, and that if I overload my nervous system I will end up not keeping up with what is happening now. So I went for the Jazz.
** I feel compelled to note that Neil Young took this one step farther when he recorded his soundtrack for Dead Man, going into the studio with his guitar and improvising the music as he watched the film.
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