A bunch of famous people have been dying lately. One not-so famous person who passed recently is George Russell, and I think he deserves a note or ten thousand in tribute. Songblague will do its humble part.Sadly under-praised, Russell was one of jazz's great innovators, working up an approach to improvisation based on scales, rather than chords, and getting all crazy with the Lydian mode, which I admittedly don't understand as well as I'd like to. Anyway, he made a bunch of awesome records in that great early-to-mid '60s period, when jazz was discovering all kinds of cool things about itself, before getting carried away by its excesses. This cut's got energy with brains to match.
The George Russell Septet - The Stratus Seekers
(Aww man, I just read that Rashied Ali and Les Paul kicked off as well. What is going on here?!)
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