Take Five, the Dave Brubeck Quartet

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I can’t watch standard def video stretched out to wide screen (or HD squashed down to 4:3). It makes me bananas.

When I am king, this will be stopped.

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During my time at the University of Oregon the different saxophonists almost literally took on the personas of specific artists–the “Paul Desmond guy” was quite good, as was the “Stan Getz guy”. The video made me reminisce a touch :slight_smile:

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One of the slinkiest tunes ever, to be sure. Although this version is a tad fast.
Dave Brubeck and Foreigner?

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Some friends made a pretty great track with the help of a Take Five sample–giving credit, of course (@ 2:52)

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in the 70s, when i and a friend of mine were young sax players for our high school band, the two of us vied to see who could play the sax part the most “impressively.” by which i mean the most ridiculously. i learned harmonic fingerings so i could play it an octave above standard while he could play it in double time, so i moved the key up a half step every 8 bars until i reached an octave higher. 40 year later i regret nothing but know that the pace and the key desmond set were perfection. restraint is not usually a strength of the young.

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A couple of days ago I enjoyed a guy blowin’ this tune on his Andean panflute in downtown L.A. Made me smile.

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In Santa Barbara, where Brubeck visited from time to time (I am not sure if he lived there), they put out pianos on First Thursday’s and randomly through the year. Walking down the street one can hear paid musicians as well as people that randomly decide to play. Not far from museum of art I heard a fantastic little jazz piece being played on the piano. An elderly man plaid the piano, changing rhythms quickly, yet never really speeding through any portion of what he was playing. The guy looked like Dave Brubeck, who I had seen earlier at a performance at the lobero. I listened for as long as I could, but I wanted to make another performance. In 2012 I he died, and I have always wondered if indeed that was a very elderly David Brubeck, who for a time, aged backwards while he played.

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That’s the thing. Music makes you young again. I happened past an old gent playing a piano in a public forum in London today - in a hospital, there for exactly this - and he was playing with pleasure and vigour.

He seemed to like that the young ladies admired him. Heavens knows why.

I’m not a young lady.

And Take Five - that’s going in my time capsule.

As a kid, I was always a little happy when there would be ‘Technical Difficulties’ on the local CBC TV station because they would almost always play Take Five while the issue was being resolved.

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I lke the tempo in this version, and when Joe Morello puts his sticks down at the beginning of his solo.

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My favorite cover version, too bad I can’t find a example of it done live

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Even that feels slightly rushed. @Israel_B’s below sounds lazy. The mashup version was taken from the ‘Time Out’ ‘mono & stereo’ cd.
Edit to add;
Just came across this little weird curiosity.
Dave Brubeck & Al Jarreau.

Absolutely love Take Five but for me it’s not the sax or piano rag that swings but Joe Morello’s percussion. His 5/4 solo is sublime.

EDIT: Since the posted video is without the solo here it is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tTyTc6FjjU

I am not as well up on all of these songs as I should be. I wish there was a title card for each piece.

Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog do a cover of Take Five as well, which is quite nice.

ha, you remind me of me :slight_smile:
some day i’ll pick up the horn again, and not be quite so frantic about everything.

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Just curious how long “Art Pepper” guy lasted…

These days I’m happy if I can put in 10 minutes just blowing overtones.

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