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The first group to consciously and unabashedly play
"chamber jazz" was the Modern Jazz Quartet.
The Modern Jazz Quartet was born in 1952,
an offshoot of Dizzy Gillespie's rhythm section,
although it stabilized in the classic
line-up only in 1955: pianist John Lewis (1920), the musical director,
vibraphonist Milt Jackson (1923),
bassist Percy Heath (1923),
and Connie Kay (1927), the last to join, replacing veteran drummer Kenny Clarke (1914).
They debuted with
two 10" albums, Modern Jazz Quartet with Milt Jackson (june 1953) and
Modern Jazz Quartet Volume 2 (october 1953),
later summarized in 1956 as the LP Django. It already contained
some elegant Lewis compositions at the border between jazz and baroque music,
such as Vendome (first recorded in december 1952),
La Ronde (ditto), based on Dizzy Gillespie's Two Bass Hit and later (1955) turned into a nine-minute four-movement suite,
and Delaunay's Dilemma (june 1953),
as well as Lewis' seven-minute tribute to Django Reinhardt, Django (december 1954), reminiscent of New Orleans' funeral parades,
and Lewis' ballad Milano (december 1954).
The plan was to architect pieces that used improvisation only to the extent
that the composition required it (not for a mere display of virtuoso style),
and to target the audience of the concert hall, not the night clubs.
The Kay era opened with the 12" LP Concorde (july 1955), containing
Lewis' fugue Concorde, Jackson's seven-minute Ralph's New Blues,
an eight-minute Gershwin Medley,
and a lengthy cover of Sigmund Romberg's Softly As in a Morning Sunrise.
For Fontessa (january 1956) Lewis composed another fugue, Versailles, and
the baroque, eleven-minute suite Fontessa,
the peak of his "neoclassical" manner.
At Music Inn (august 1956), a collaboration with Jimmy Giuffre, contained another Lewis fugue, A Fugue for Music Inn, as well as the bluesy
Two Degrees East Three Degrees West.
The dynamics of these pieces was often due to the dialogue between the
complementary voices of Lewis and Jackson: Lewis' piano was austere and
rational, while Jackson's vibes were wild and rustic; Lewis' phrasing was
rooted in blues music, while Jackson's phrasing was rooted in gospel music.
Lewis also scored movie soundtracks: No Sun in Venice (april 1957),
that debuted the funeral music of Cortege and the fugue Three Windows;
Odds Against Tomorrow (july 1959), with Skatin' in Central Park and
Odds Against Tomorrow;
Under the Jasmine Tree, originally composed for a documentary and inspired by Moroccan music.
The Modern Jazz Quartet's
Third Stream Music bridged the format of jazz and of chamber music
via Lewis' ten-minute Exposure (january 1960) with a classical chamber ensemble
and Schuller's eleven-minute Conversation (september 1959).
But his interest was clearly to reach beyond jazz and towards European music:
the seven-movement ballet suite The Comedy (january 1962), either inspired or mocking renaissance music,
the ballet suite Original Sin (march 1961),
the 14-minute three-movement suite Three Little Feelings, first performed in 1957 by an orchestra and recorded by the quartet on Under the Jasmine Tree (december 1967), and the orchestral requiem In Memoriam (november 1973).
He composed most of the music for The Jazztet And John Lewis (january 1961).
Kenny Clarke died in 1985.
Connie Kay died in 1994.
Milt Jackson died in 1999.
John Lewis died in 2001.
Percy Heath died in 2005.
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