As I chose today’s Sunday Big Note Listening Session, I was struck at how, over time, the details of many of these concerts and broadcasts are either lost or omitted by successive trader, poster, torrenter. Venue. Date. Location. Line-up. Important details. Indeed, most of the live music I have collected throughout the years has lacked some, if not all, of these details. Almost as important a hunt than that of the music, itself, are the details behind each concert. So was the hunt for the details behind today’s Sunday Big Note.
When I first found today’s show, the only details available were that the show was a Jean-Luc Ponty broadcast from “Hamburg in 1976”. That was it. Music without details, to me, is akin to viewing a square inch of a Picasso and being expected to appreciate the whole. I hunted for the facts to add flesh to the show (so to speak), give it back it’s history. And quite a history, indeed.
Enjoy today’s Sunday Big Note featuring the Jean-Luc Ponty Group performing at the NDR Jazzworkshop, Funkhaus des NDR, Studio 10, in Hamburg, Germany on September 17, 1976 (it’s quite interesting to note how Allan Zavod had an earlier connection to FZ before actually becoming a member of his band):
Is Once Enough
[audio:SBN_20110109_01 Is Once Enough.mp3]
Polyfolk Dance
[audio:SBN_20110109_02 Polyfolk Dance.mp3]
Lost Forest
[audio:SBN_20110109_03 Lost Forest.mp3]
Aurora
[audio:SBN_20110109_04 Aurora.mp3]
Renaissance
[audio:SBN_20110109_05 Renaissance.mp3]
Question with No Answers
[audio:SBN_20110109_06 Question With No Answers.mp3]
Passenger of the Dark
[audio:SBN_20110109_07 Passenger of the Dark.mp3]
Bowing-Bowing
[audio:SBN_20110109_08 Bowing-Bowing.mp3]
Tarantula
[audio:SBN_20110109_09 Tarantula.mp3]
Wandering on the Milky Way
[audio:SBN_20110109_10 Wandering on the Milky Way.mp3]
Fight for Life
[audio:SBN_20110109_11 Fight for Life.mp3]
Lineup:
Jean-Luc Ponty – violins
Darryl Stuermer – guitar
Tom Fowler – bass
Mark Craney (1952-2005) – drums
Allan Zavod – keyboard
cool – having seen/heard this line-up and material in Chgo. (small venue, actually Evanston, IL for those completists in the audience {but no name, date or time} – the best) that year, I’m looking fwd. to listening when I get a chance. Thanks.
The venue was Amazing Grace, probably not in 1976, probably not this same line-up, maybe even different material. The picture gets murky. It was a great show, as was this one presented here.
04/11/76 – Evanston, IL “Amazing Grace” (1 CD FM A-)
from http://www.test4echo.net/Fusion.htm
I love most of FZs musicians, but it’s not too often that I’m equally impressed by their afterzappa life.
BUT listenning to Tom Fowler here proves me that he’s a REAL GUY.
Tom Fowler rulez.
[quote post=”4528″]Tom Fowler rulez.[/quote]
Was thinking the very same thing Balint. He really sounds great on these cuts.
[quote comment=”21623″][quote post=”4528″]Tom Fowler rulez.[/quote]
Was thinking the very same thing Balint. He really sounds great on these cuts.[/quote]
ditto that!
Daryl Stuermer ended up touring with Genesis and Phil Collin’s solo bands. So did Chester Thompson (drums.)
[quote comment=”21603″]I love most of FZs musicians, but it’s not too often that I’m equally impressed by their afterzappa life.
BUT listenning to Tom Fowler here proves me that he’s a REAL GUY.
Tom Fowler rulez.[/quote]
In the entirety of my live music collection, Balint, I cannot recall Tom Fowler – or, indeed, any of the Fowler Brothers – ever really having an off night musically. Whenever I see the Fowler name, it tells me I’m going to have very happy ears…
Tom Fowler’s comment:
“I went with Jean-Luc Ponty (after ‘Bongo Fury’) which was a big mistake. His music was pretty fun, but it was unbelievably loud, way too loud. After a gig, I’d go back to my hotel room and it would still be loud. My ears would ring all night. It was painful and it was a drag and he paid us nothing and politically it sucked. It was a real drag. But some of the guys in the band were OK.
Allan Zavod was in the band. He was hysterical. He’d play a chord, then twirl round and try to hit the same chord again. He never did. He always missed it, but it was pure comedy. It wasn’t totally bad but it ended bad and I have a bad feeling about it.”