Five-Star Collection... Charles Bell

Charles Bell

The Charles Bell Contemporary Jazz Quartet

In recent months the phrase "Third Stream" has been coined to describe an intellectualized form of jazz which springs as much from classical training as from the traditions of popular dance music. John Lewis' Modern Jazz Quartet has made an enormous commercial success in combining severe formal discipline with free-swinging improvisation.

Charles Bell takes his jazz very seriously, as listeners will find out from this extraordinary long-playing record. He is of the firm belief that there can be a legitimate fusion between jazz and the most serious approach to classical music. As a pupil of Nicholai Lopatnikoff, he was first immersed in the Romantic composers, but his interest soon branched out to the early composers of church music as well as the most contemporary writers. As an undergraduate at the Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh, he was first known for his works for chamber orchestra and string quartet, and his present jazz group was formed in 1958 when it made its debut at the "Copa Club". (...)

There are more than a few parallels between Charles Bell and the previously mentioned John Lewis. Both are essentially serious composers, although Bell makes less use of improvisation than does Lewis. Both are dedicated, abstemious souls who are striving to raise the level of public taste as well as to entertain. Even the musical balance of the group is not dissimilar. In the CJQ, the guitar replaces the vibes, but in the drummer, Allen Blairman, there is a real counterpart to the ebullient Milt Jackson of the MJQ. However, there is one significant difference between the two groups: Bell is far less blues-oriented than is John Lewis, and he approaches music even more from the classical side than does the more experienced Lewis.

In the few months that have passed since the award-winning at Georgetown University, the Contemporary Jazz Quartet has had a successful engagement at New York's "Birdland" and worked around Pittsburgh. The CJQ deserves the much broader audience that only records can bring.

*John Hammond (from the liner notes)*

One of the most fascinating things about writing of jazz and jazzmen is the similarity that exists between that specialized branch of journalism and general-assignment reporting of everything under the sun. The similarity is evident in that the unexpected and the new are constant factors and hence constant challenges to the writer.

Bell and company are something new under the jazz sun. This is their first recording (so far as can be ascertained), and their treatment of theme, variation, and rhythmic pulse is, as well, something different. They are not alone in their experimental probings, heaven knows, for the continuous seeking of fresh avenues of expression within the jazz context seems to be synonymous with the music itself.

Bell, an undergraduate of the Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh, Pa., has written works for chamber orchestra and string quartet. He formed this group in 1958 and made a large critical impression with it in 1960 at Georgetown University Intercollegiate Jazz Festival, at which it was judged the winner by a panel consisting of Dave Brubeck, Paul Desmond, Jack Pleis, and John Hammond. Hammond contributed the liner commentary for this set.

He is constrained to draw parallels between the CJQ and the MJQ. Personally, I'm more inclined to feel a parallel between Bell's combo and the Lennie Tristano-Billy Bauer-Lee Konitz group of the late 1940s. Certainly, the cerebral rather than the emotional dominates Bell's music, much of which shares more in common with contemporary "classical" concepts than it does with what we have become accustomed to regard as jazz.

Most reminiscent of the Tristano approach is Happy Funky, which is devoted mostly to piano and guitar having some fun with a boppish line that is actually a departure in thematic concept from the balance of the album.

The set is rich in professional competency — all know their axes and exploit their potentialities to the limit. Bell is classically trained; Smith is a guitarist of considerable technical prowess; Traficante is an adequate time bassist and a soloist whose abilities are well displayed in the opening Festival; Blairman is an excellent drummer, equipped with the taste and intelligence to participate integrally in the complex and constantly altering figurations that stamp the group with its mark of individuality.

If one were to tie down a single characteristic or trademark of this group, it would have to be the singular contrapuntal interplay between piano and guitar. Their relationship — the sensitive and lightning-like rapport between them — is basic to the quartet's music. It is futile to single out any one example of this twin-thinking; the set is replete with it. This is not to understate the drummer's role. Blairman is accenting the developing lines with subtlety and imagination when he is not laying down firm time on the top cymbal or hi-hat.

As to the individual tracks, The Gospel is not according to Ray Charles, Bobby Timmons, or Les McCann; it's a delicate mood piece at the outset that evolves into blues-flavored jazz improvisation, grooving along at medium tempo. Blairman erupts with very fast-tempoed cymbal work, an interlude of passion before piano and guitar return to re-establish the opening mood of contemplation.

Neither is The Last Sermon fashionable funk. It begins with more contemplation, even introspection, until it is suddenly transformed into uninhibited up-tempo cooking.

Study No. 2 is mainly dialog between piano and guitar, while Variation 3 is taken fast and jazz-spirited with individual contributions tossed back and forth while the drummer is ever aware of meter, pulse, and changing ideas.

Perhaps this group will not catch on with the fashionably hip; perhaps it is too experimental for the Cannonball Adderley fans. I don't think so for one reason—Bell's music avoids the coldness that condemned the offerings of Tristano. It's intellectual, but it's got heart.

*John A. Tynan (Down Beat, June 22, 1961 [5 stars])*

Side 1

1 - Latin Festival

2 - The Gospel

3 - Stage 13

Side 2

4 - The Last Sermon

5 - Counterpoint Study #2

6 - Variation 3

7 - Happy Funky

(All compositions by Charles Bell)

Charles Bell (piano), Bill Smith (guitar), Frank Traficante (bass), Allen Blairman (drums).

Recorded in New York City, July 8, 1960