Sunday Music Muse Day - Father's Day - Mike Melito, Bill Frisell, Miles Davis, and Weather Report

The Sunday Music Muse Day find us celebrating Father's Day with a nice array of music.  First up.  Local Rochester drummer Mike Melito New Connection CD.  Mike's a friend, and I enjoy seeing him play quite often.  I hope to see him at the upcoming jam sessions at the Xerox Rochester International Jazz Festival.   His latest is a very solid, swinging collection of tunes. Mike you'll be happy to know I even paid full price at the Bop Shop Records (they asked that be sure to mention them).  Mike's music was the great way to start Father's Day. 

Next is another interesting Bill Frisell CD.  Disfarmer is concept CD inspired by a photographer of stark Americana, black and white photos of every day farm folk of the middle west.  This is a amazing CD, the music caught to ear of my visiting mother-in-Law and the connection to the photographer intrigued her as she used to work as museum archivist. Well worth listening to.

Next, I continue my exploration of Miles Davis music with the CD, A Tribute to Jack Johnson.  This a actually a soundtrack to the 1970 film documentary about Jack Johnson, the first Black heavy weight boxing champion around the early 1900s. The play and film The Great White Hope is about his life.  I already have this on LP, but picked this up for the convenience of having it on CD. (I might start considering selling the LPs, soon)  Also, Jack Johnson's story brings to mind the great Muhammad Ali, who passed away recently.  Again, the music is solidly in the Bitches' Brew era, performed by the usual suspects.  I just can't get enough of it.

This last selection is a gold mine, and in a way an extension of the Mile Davis selection. Of course, Weather Report founders, Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter, left Miles to form Weather Report and the rest, as they say, is history.  Weather Report has to be my favorite post-Miles jazz fusion band (even without a guitarist) bar none. Quoting from wikipedia "Forecast: Tomorrow is a 3-CD/1-DVD career-spanning compilation of recordings of Weather Report. The 37 tracks are presented chronologically, beginning with three tracks pre–Weather Report, from ensemble duties with Miles Davis (both Zawinul and Shorter), Cannonball Adderley (Zawinul), and from a Shorter solo album. In addition to one unreleased track, the set closes with DJ Logic's remix of a Weather Report track.
The 4th disc in the package is a 2-hour DVD of a concert in Offenbach am Main, on September 29, 1978 for the German TV program Rockpalast. The boxed set includes a 100-page book with notes on the set by compiler Bob Belden, a long essay on the band by Hal Miller, and a reminiscence of the 1978 concert by drummer Peter Erskine ."

This was a really nice surprise to find.  I'm really going to enjoy this.  Hope you enjoyed your Father's day.