
Dave Brubeck
David Warren "Dave" Brubeck (December 6, 1920 – December 5, 2012) was an American jazz pianist and composer, considered to be one of the foremost exponents of progressive jazz. He wrote a number of jazz standards, including "In Your Own Sweet Way" and "The Duke". Brubeck's style ranged from refined to bombastic, reflecting his mother's attempts at classical training and his improvisational skills. His music is known for employing unusual time signatures, and superimposing contrasting rhythms, meters, and tonalities.
His long-time musical partner, alto saxophonist Paul Desmond, wrote the saxophone melody for the Dave Brubeck Quartet's best remembered piece, "Take Five",[1] which is in 5/4 time and has endured as a jazz classic on one of the top-selling jazz albums, Time Out.[2] Brubeck experimented with time signatures throughout his career, recording "Pick Up Sticks" in 6/4, "Unsquare Dance" in 7/4, "World's Fair" in 13/4, and "Blue Rondo à la Turk" in 9/8. He was also a respected composer of orchestral and sacred music, and wrote soundtracks for television such as Mr. Broadway and the animated mini-series This Is America, Charlie Brown.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Brubeck
Take Five
Won't you stop and take
A little time out with me
Just take five
Stop your busy day
And take the time out
To see if I'm alive
Though I'm going out of my way
Just so I can pass by each day
Not a single word do we say
It's a pantomime and not a play
Still, I know our eyes often meet
I feel tingles down to my feet
When you smile, that's much too discreet
Sends me on my way
Wouldn't it be better
Not to be so polite
You could offer a light
Start a little conversation now
It's alright, just take five
Just take five
Though I'm going out of my way
Just so I can pass by each day
Not a single word do we say
It's a pantomime and not a play
Still, I know our eyes often meet
I feel tingles down to my feet
When you smile, that's much too discreet
Sends me on my way
Wouldn't it be better
Not to be so polite
You could offer a light
Start a little conversation now
It's alright, just take five
Just take five
--song written by Paul Desmond
Just take five. Kick off yer shoes.
Grab a babe or better yet a babe-&-a-half, a good pinot noir (has there ever been a bad one?) &
maybe take down a slim volume of poetry that really moves, like jazz itself, like sorta maybe Kerouac's Mexico City Blues:
Chorus 113
Got up and dressed up
and went out & got laid
Then died and got buried
in a coffin in the grave,
Man–
Yet everything is perfect,
Because it is empty,
Because it is perfect
with emptiness,
Because it’s not even happening.
Everything
Is Ignorant of its own emptiness–
Anger
Doesn’t like to be reminded of fits–
You start with the Teaching
Inscrutable of the Diamond
And end with it, your goal
is your startingplace,
No race has run, no walk
of prophetic toenails
Across Arabies of hot
meaning–you just
numbly don’t get there
And learn to play the lute...
Or a sweet piece on a blue guitar.
R.I.P. Dave. IOW--Let it rip!
Bon voyage & thx.
"Take Five" is a jazz piece written by Paul Desmond and performed by The Dave Brubeck Quartet on their 1959 album Time Out. Recorded at Columbia's 30th Street Studios in New York City on June 25, July 1, and August 18, 1959,[1] this piece became one of the group's best-known records. It is famous for its distinctive catchy saxophone melody; imaginative, jolting drum solo; and use of the unusual quintuple (5/4) time, from which its name is derived.[2] The song was first played to a live audience by The Dave Brubeck Quartet at the Village Gate nightclub in New York City in 1959.
The inspiration for this style of music came during a US State Departmentsponsored tour of Eurasia and Brubeck observed in Turkey a group of street musicians performing a traditional Turkish folk song that was played in 9/8 time, a rare meter for Western music. After learning about the form from native symphony musicians, Brubeck was inspired to create an album that deviated from the usual 4/4 time of Jazz and experimented in the more exotic such styles he experienced abroad.[3]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Take_Five
Dave Brubeck - Take Five