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Gil Evans
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Ian Ernest Gilmore Green (or Gilmore Ian Rodrigo Green) was born May 13, 1912, in Toronto, Canada, the son of Margaret Julia MacChonechy and a father he never knew. He took the name of his stepfather, and thus became Gil Evans. His stepfather was a miner, whereas his mother took care of the children of rich families, and prepared meals for campsites. Moving wherever work would take them, they went from one North-American mining site to the next, including Saskatchewan, British Columbia, and such Northwestern U.S. states as Idaho, Montana, and Washington. Their child was put in boarding houses, moving from one family to the next, until they finally settled permanently in California, around 1922. Gil went to school in Berkeley, and there, his real musical training began. The father of one of his friends was a jazz fanatic and initiated him to this music. In 1927, he took the two teenagers to see Duke Ellington at the Orpheum theater in San Francisco.
It was a revelation for Gil Evans, who decided to devote his life to this music. That same year, he bought his first record, "No One Else But You," by Louis Armstrong and Earl Hines. At the same time, he started transcribing, from the recordings, the music of such great jazz arrangers as Red Nichols, Duke Ellington, and Don Redman. In 1933, he put together his first group in Stockton, which had six musicians at first, but grew to nine in 1934. The group played arrangements by Don Redman, Fletcher Henderson, and Duke Ellington, all transcribed from the recordings. In 1935, the orchestra was on the same bill at the Palomar Ballroom as the triumphant Benny Goodman, then was hired to play at the Rendez-Vous Ballroom in Balboa Beach, in southern California, where it remained until 1938. Gil Evans was in charge of writing and conducting, and, from time to time, Stan Kenton held the piano chair.
In 1938, Alex Holden, who worked for MCA at that time, offered Gil Evans' orchestra a chance to accompany singer Skinnay Ennis. Gil accepted, keeping his position as arranger. Ennis found work for the group in comedian Bob Hope's well-known radio show for NBC in Hollywood. The manager then called up another arranger to work with the group, Claude Thornhill, who scored a big hit in 1937 with his arrangement of "Loch Lomond" for singer Maxine Sullivan. He and Gil Evans became colleagues and friends, but the two arrangers decided to quit this particular job in 1941. Thornhill had already put together his own orchestra in New York in 1939. This group had begun touring, and found itself, in the summer of 1940, at the Rendez-Vous ballroom in Balboa Beach. In 1941, Thornhill decided to move back to New York, and on March 20, the orchestra began a three-month residency at the Glen Island Casino. Gil Evans joined him as arranger alongside Bill Borden, and on November 17, for the first time in his career, one of his arrangements was recorded. Unfortunately, the U.S. had also gone to war during this time, and the barrage of draft orders compelled Thornhill to disband his orchestra.
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The Gil Evans Orchestra: Live At Fabrik
![Read "Live At Fabrik" reviewed by Ian Patterson](jpg/0dfb38202a721bf676e90172c4c72f31.jpg)
by Ian Patterson
By the time Gil Evans led the Gil Evans Orchestra at the Hamburg Jazz Festival in 1986, it had been holding down the Monday night slot at Sweet Basil for the previous three years. The majority of the GEO's regular musicians were with him for this performance at Fabrik, a 19th century machine-parts factory converted into a glass-roofed cultural centre in 1971. Not for nothing does the sixteen-piece ensemble sound so organically attunedto the charts and to each otheron this ...
read moreBig Bands of the 1950s (1950 - 1957)
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by Russell Perry
Woody Herman disbanded the Second Herd in 1949 and, while Stan Kenton and Duke Ellington managed to keep a big band on the road through the 1950s, Count Basie disbanded his band at the start of the decade but assembled a new one in a few years. Generally this was a tough period for large ensembles. This, however, didn't dampen the urge for musicians and composers to hear music in large forms and find ways to make it real. In ...
read moreGil Evans: Old Bottle New Wine
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by Patrick Burnette
Arranger / pianist Gil Evans did not record extensively as a leader, and he only released a few albums in the classic" mode established by his collaborations with Miles Davis. New Bottle Old Wine (originally released on Pacific Jazz in 1958) is perhaps the best regardeddue to the vibrant presence of Julian “Cannonball" Adderley as the featured soloist, and the killer line-up of tunes from jazz's past, which Evans transformed into modern, third-stream-leaning music with all the wit of his ...
read moreGil Evans: The Gil Evans Orchestra Plays the Music of Jimi Hendrix
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by Sacha O'Grady
Out of all the myriad of tribute albums dedicated to Jimi Hendrix, this would have to be the most authentic and genuine. Evans and Hendrix had spoken on numerous occasions about working together, Jimi having even asked the legendary jazz arranger to teach him how to read and write music, thus liberating the guitarist from the burden of having to record everything on tape. But their friendship might never have happened were it not for producer Alan Douglas, who had ...
read moreGil Evans: The Complete Pacific Jazz Sessions
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by Hrayr Attarian
How do you summarize the history of jazz on a couple records? Ask Gil Evans. His two records New Bottle Old Wine (1958) and Great Jazz Standards (1959), originally released on World Pacific, have been reissued on one CD entitled The Complete Pacific Jazz Sessions. Each of the fifteen tracks is a chapter in the music's history from the start to the years when these recordings were made. From Jelly Roll Morton and W.C. Handy to Monk and Charlie Parker, ...
read moreGil Evans: The Complete Pacific Jazz Sessions
![Read "The Complete Pacific Jazz Sessions" reviewed by Greg Camphire](jpg/gevans2006.jpg)
by Greg Camphire
While perhaps best remembered for his landmark Miles Davis collaborations, arranger/bandleader/pianist Gil Evans' work with his own ensembles is notable in its own right. This reissue of The Complete Pacific Jazz Sessions combines two crucial Evans albums from 1958 and 1959: New Bottle, Old Wine and Great Jazz Standards. The fifteen overall performances capture Evans' expansive harmonic palette, painted by an all-star ensemble of colorists, offering an advanced reinterpretation of the great jazz tradition that still shines with a modern ...
read moreGil Evans: The Complete Pacific Jazz Sessions
![Read "The Complete Pacific Jazz Sessions" reviewed by Norman Weinstein](jpg/gevans2006.jpg)
by Norman Weinstein
"Complete" in this case refers to two LPs worth of primo early Gil Evans.The first LP on this disc answers the question of what would have happened if Evans had written a concerto for anyone other than Miles Davis. New Bottle, Old Wine" is a version of the Miles Ahead" concerto concept for Cannonball Adderley. And while the adventurous arrangements of King Porter Stomp" and Lester Leaps In" exercise Cannonball's skills to the max, this is an attractively happy entertainment, ...
read moreSteve McQuarry's Mandala Nonet And Orchestra To Perform The Music Of Gil Evans, Sept 30, At SFJAZZ Center's Miner Auditorium
![Steve McQuarry's Mandala Nonet And Orchestra To Perform The Music Of Gil Evans, Sept 30, At SFJAZZ Center's Miner Auditorium](jpg/stevemcquarry100.jpg)
Source:
Terri Hinte Publicity
Oakland-based keyboardist-composer Steve McQuarry has long been in love with the unique music of Gil Evans, the late, largely-self-taught Toronto-born composer, arranger, and keyboardist best remembered for his numerous collaborations with Miles Davis. “The whole way he thought about orchestrating using instruments and also pushing those instruments in different ranges is really fascinating,” McQuarry says of Evans. “I remember talking with Maria Schneider about this. She said he would write the trombone parts really high and things like that, which ...
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See What People Are Saying About The Gil Evans Project's Lines Of Color
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Brian Camelio
The Gil Evans Project's new live album, Lines of Color has won Jazz Magazine's CHOC award and been receiving reviews from jazz publications around the world. See what people are saying about Lines of Color". The gorgeous lilt of Evans' still startling original arrangements for horns is preserved, not in the aspic of academia but in the living, breathing performances of a group of New York’s finest musicians such as Evans might have selected himself." —Cormac Larkin, THE IRISH TIMES ...
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Gil Evans Project Live Album, Lines Of Color, Now Available For Download
![Gil Evans Project Live Album, Lines Of Color, Now Available For Download](jpg/9af969a6e5b71bac75ce4a955d116868.jpg)
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Prawit Austin Siriwat
The Gil Evans Project's live album, Lines of Color, is now available for download from the ArtistShare site and available for pre-order on iTunes. The band was nominated for three Grammy awards in 2013, and their first album, Centennial, won Gil a Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Arrangement. The ensemble also won two JJA Jazz Awards, record of the year and Large Ensemble of the Year. This new live recording took place May 13-18th, 2014, for the Gil Evans Project’s ...
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Gil Evans: Jamaica Jazz
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
One of the least-known Gil Evans albums and among his most interesting is Jamaica Jazz. Produced by Creed Taylor when he was at ABC Paramount, Jamaica Jazz was recorded in November and December 1957between Evans' Gil Evans and Ten (Prestige) and New Bottle, Old Wine (World Pacific). Evans wrote the arrangements for The Don Elliott Octet, with Candido Camero on conga. The East Coast personnel was exceptional and experimental... The November session: Don Elliott (tp,mellophone,vib) Frank Rehak (tb) Jimmy Buffington, ...
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Composer/Producer/Conductor Ryan Truesdell’s Groundbreaking Project "Centennial: Newly Discovered Works Of Gil Evans" Nominated For Grammy Awards In Three Categories
![Composer/Producer/Conductor Ryan Truesdell’s Groundbreaking Project "Centennial: Newly Discovered Works Of Gil Evans" Nominated For Grammy Awards In Three Categories](jpg/9af969a6e5b71bac75ce4a955d116868.jpg)
Source:
Braithwaite & Katz Communications
CD also earned one of France’s highest honors: LES COUPS DE COEUR from the Académie Charles Cros Renowned composer/producer/conductor RYAN TRUESDELL’s highly acclaimed CD CENTENNIAL: Newly Discovered Works of Gil Evans (ArtistShare) has earned three nominations in the 55th annual GRAMMY Awards. CENTENNIAL has been nominated in the categories of Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album, Best Instrumental Arrangement (How About You) and Best Arrangement Featuring a Vocalist (Look To the Rainbow featuring Luciana Souza). I share these nominations with everyone ...
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Putting Gil Evans in His Place
![Putting Gil Evans in His Place](jpg/04259eeec8107cf6a3bacbdcd59d19d2.jpg)
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Gil Evans was a slow arranger. He tended to agonize over chartsat times missing deadlines as he pushed to make bigger impressionistic statements, set off more romantic contrasts or simply wound up entangled in revisions. In some cases, his focus on the music overshadowed the need to keep an eye on the clock. Hal McKusick's and Creed Taylor's separate experiences with Evans are cases in point. But Evans' tortured experiments produced magnificent results, and what wasn't recorded over the years ...
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Gil Evans at 100
![Gil Evans at 100](jpg/04259eeec8107cf6a3bacbdcd59d19d2.jpg)
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Rifftides by Doug Ramsey
Gil Evans, who enriched the art and craft of jazz arranging, was born 100 years ago today. National Public Radio this morning ended one of its hours on Weekend Edition Sunday with a remembrance of Evans and his work. To listen to it, go here and click on “Listen Now.” Here are three pieces arranged by Evans for an all star orchestra featuring Miles Davis on a 1959 Robert Herridge CBS-TV special. They are from the 1957 Davis album Miles ...
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Producer/Conductor Ryan Truesdell Releases "Centennial: Newly Discovered Works Of Gil Evans" May 17-20 At Jazz Standard
![Producer/Conductor Ryan Truesdell Releases "Centennial: Newly Discovered Works Of Gil Evans" May 17-20 At Jazz Standard](jpg/9af969a6e5b71bac75ce4a955d116868.jpg)
Source:
Braithwaite & Katz Communications
Join producer/conductor Ryan Truesdell as he celebrates the release of his debut CD CENTENNIAL: Newly Discovered Works of Gil Evans at the Jazz Standard, 116 E. 27th Street, NYC for four nights: Thursday, May 17 – Sunday, May 20. Sets at 7:30 and 9:30 every night, with an 11:30 set on Friday and Saturday. Tickets are $25 Thursday and Sunday, $30 Friday and Saturday. Call 212-576-2232. Joining conductor Truesdell for this performance are some 30 top musicians including Lewis Nash, ...
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Gil Evans/Laurent Cugny Big Band Lumiere
![Gil Evans/Laurent Cugny Big Band Lumiere](jpg/04259eeec8107cf6a3bacbdcd59d19d2.jpg)
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Sound Insights by Doug Payne
Shortly after graduating college in 1987, I ventured to New York City with the naïve hope of finding a job. It was a miserable time and a memorably awful experience. My hope was to land a job in advertising. I ended up with a film pass for a great foreign film from a prestigious film distributor based in NYC that couldn't hire me and an interview for a position selling ad space for some TV or radio station, knowing full ...
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