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10* THE INSTRUMENTS, THE SOUNDS, THE PERFORMERS
James Moody (Dizzy Gillespie, 1947); Amett Cobb (Lionel Hampton, 1942-7).
A final word should be reserved for a group of tenor saxophonists who, even by the standards of the last group mentioned, must be considered extremists. So anxious are they to impress naive audiences with the excitement allegedly inherent in their work that as each solo progresses, and as tide music becomes less and less coherent, they indulge in such physical by-play as the removal of jacket, shirt and other accouterments, and have no objection to playing the last couple of choruses lying flat on their backs on the floor. This phenomenon is mentioned only because it has been the last resort, in a desperate search for economic success, of several potentially good jazzmen, and because, incredibly, a small segment of the public equates these performances with jazz. That we can safely afford to disregard the members of this lunatic fringe element should become clear on inspection of the long roster of names in the preceding pages. More than any other horn in jazz, the tenor saxophone has produced an unending array of musicians of elegance and distinction. |
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