In „Music For Black Pigeons“ saxophonist Lee Konitz plays an important role. As I told earlier here Jakob Bro was keen to play with older musicians as Jon Christensen, Palle Mikkelborg and Konitz. All three are embodiments of the history of jazz. Konitz (1927-2020) had a long long career and played with Charlie Parker and Lennie Tristano in his early years. Trumpeter Kenny Wheeler (1930-2014) was another candidate. I wrote about Wheeler’s involvement and the role Konitz got in Bro’s music. You can read it HERE. There you can also find music of Wheeler with Bro.
There is a lot of material with Lee Konitz on Youtube and there is this wonderful album „ANGEL SONG“ (1997) on ECM with Kenny Wheeler, Konitz, Bill Frisell and Dave Holland. Wheeler and Konitz are unique voices you must have heard in your life.
Lee Konitz has his very own funny manners as you can see in „Music For Black Pigeons“. Here is an early hilarious example of that when Konitz played in a show dedicated to the music of Charlie Parker
I saw Konitz, who lived in Cologne for quite some time, live several times. The most magical was a concert I saw in Bucharest, the evening of July 5, 2015, that took place on an open air stage on a midtown square in Bucharest:
a huge crowd lost in a leap of time listens to his music in full devotion. Time seemed to have been turned back for a while. A glow of sound arises from a nostalgic aura seizing the square’s listeners, a rare sensation. LEE KONITZ is playing … , a totally immersing experience, unforgettable.
It actually had started messy with some coordination problems between the musicians, Thomas Rückert, Jeremy Stratton, George Schuller and then all of a sudden it turned …
to read HERE
