![]() And we can swing in 4, 3, 5, 7, 9, or anything. With Time Out, it’s as if Dave Brubeck were announcing, “Ladies and gentlemen, there is only one rule in jazz. The album was a gauntlet slammed into the ground of jazz. These are beats you can’t dance to and can’t sing to, or so we’d think. “Blue Rondo à la Turk” in a crazily sliced 9/8 was born there, and so was Brubeck’s lasting popularity. On tour, he heard local musicians playing odd rhythms and decided right there that he’d make a jazz album employing unusual time signatures. It’s found in avant-garde music or in folk traditions tucked away in Hungary, India. “Take Five” added one little beat to the normal 4/4 pulse and made it 5/4, an unheard-of time signature for jazz. People like to look at faces, especially of celebrities, but there were no photos of the popular musicians greeting the public, just egg shapes and abutting slaps of color.īut the biggest risk, of course, was the music. No comforting “standards” were on it to reassure buyers wary of new music.įor another, the cover art was a contemporary, abstract painting. For one thing, it was a jazz album with nothing but original pieces. It broke many conventions in achieving that. Led by the hit single “Take Five,” written by alto saxophonist Paul Desmond, Time Out was the first jazz album to sell a million copies. Brubeck’s face had been on the cover of Time magazine in 1954, Jailhouse Rock came out in 1957, and it would still be two years before the Quartet had its incandescent burst into the stratosphere-and into jazz history-with the release of Time Out. The Dave Brubeck Quartet was already one of the hottest ensembles in jazz in the ’50s, playing hundreds of concerts, and releasing multiple LPs, every year. Hollywood knows a good stereotype when it sees one, hick or slick, and “Brubeck” meant cerebral, cool, West Coast. Rather than revealing his ignorance, he barks crudely at her and stalks out. Elvis’s increasing discomfort wells up when the hostess asks his opinion. They toss around lingo like “dissonance” and “atonality,” and the names of some musicians, including that of Dave Brubeck. He’s dragged to a swanky party, where he’s wedged between society snobs who try to look intellectual and hip by discussing modern music. In Jailhouse Rock, Elvis plays an ex-con rube hoping to make it in the music business. This belongs in even the most rudimentary jazz collection.(Originally published in 2015). ![]() Countless other musicians built on its pioneering experiments, yet it’s amazingly accessible for all its advanced thinking, a rare feat in any art form. It doesn’t just sound sophisticated - it really is sophisticated music, which lends itself to cerebral appreciation, yet never stops swinging. Some have come to disdain Time Out as it’s become increasingly synonymous with upscale coffeehouse ambience, but as someone once said of Shakespeare, it’s really very good in spite of the people who like it. The other selections are richly melodic as well, and even when the meters are even, the group sets up shifting polyrhythmic counterpoints that nod to African and Eastern musics. Brubeck’s classic “Blue Rondo à la Turk” blends jazz with classical form and Turkish folk rhythms, while “Take Five,” despite its overexposure, really is a masterpiece listen to how well Desmond’s solo phrasing fits the 5/4 meter, and how much Joe Morello’s drum solo bends time without getting lost. That’s a testament to Brubeck and Desmond’s abilities as composers, because Time Out is full of challenges both subtle and overt - it’s just that they’re not jarring. Buoyed by a hit single in altoist Paul Desmond’s ubiquitous “Take Five,” Time Out became an unexpectedly huge success, and still ranks as one of the most popular jazz albums ever. But for once, public taste was more advanced than that of the critics. It was a risky move - Brubeck’s record company wasn’t keen on releasing such an arty project, and many critics initially roasted him for tampering with jazz’s rhythmic foundation. Dave Brubeck’s defining masterpiece, Time Out is one of the most rhythmically innovative albums in jazz history, the first to consciously explore time signatures outside of the standard 4/4 beat or 3/4 waltz time.
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