Carla Bley
A highly regarded pianist, composer, and arranger, Carla Bley has been at the forefront of avant-garde jazz and modern creative music since the '60s. She initially emerged as a composer, working closely with her first husband, pianist Paul Bley, as well as progressive artists like George Russell and Jimmy Giuffre. She is a founder of the Jazz Composers' Orchestra and her long-form jazz opera Escalator Over the Hill stands as a distinct stylistic signpost of the era. Bley has worked with a host of free-jazz icons -- including Pharaoh Sanders, Steve Lacy, and Peter Brotzmann, among others -- and continued to compose challenging genre-bending works into the 21st century. Along with her many large ensemble works, she has regularly collaborated in a trio with her partner bassist Steve Swallow and saxophonist Andy Sheppard, issuing albums like 2013's Trios, 2016's Andando el Tiempo, and 2020's Life Goes On. Born Carla Borg in 1938 in Oakland, California, Bley learned the fundamentals of music as a child from her father, a church musician. Thereafter, she was mostly self-taught. She moved to New York around 1955, where she worked as a cigarette girl and occasional pianist. She married pianist Paul Bley, for whom she began to write tunes (she also wrote for George Russell and Jimmy Giuffre). In 1964, with her second husband, trumpeter Michael Mantler, Bley formed the Jazz Composer's Guild Orchestra, which a year later became known simply as the Jazz Composer's Orchestra. Two years later, Bley helped found the Jazz Composer's Orchestra Association, a nonprofit organization designed to present, distribute, and produce unconventional forms of jazz. In 1967, vibraphonist Gary Burton's quartet recorded Bley's cycle of tunes A Genuine Tong Funeral, which brought her to the attention of the general public for the first time. Bley composed and arranged music in 1969 for Charlie Haden's Liberation Music Orchestra. In 1971, she completed the work that cemented her reputation, the jazz opera Escalator Over the Hill. In the '70s and '80s, Bley continued to run the JCOA and compose and record for her own Watt label. The JCOA essentially folded in the late '80s, but Bley's creative life continued mostly unabated. For much of the past two decades, she's maintained a midsized big band with fairly stable personnel to tour and record. She's also worked a great deal with the bassist Steve Swallow, in duo and in ensembles of varying size. Bley wrote the music for the soundtrack to the 1985 film Mortelle Randone. She also contributed new compositions to the Liberation Music Orchestra's second incarnation in 1983. All through the '80s, '90s, and into the new millennium, Bley continued releasing albums through ECM, ranging from duets with bassist Steve Swallow to the Very Big Carla Bley Band. She issued a third duets album with Steve Swallow, Are We There Yet?, in 2000; Looking for America in 2003; The Lost Chords Find Paolo Fresu in 2007; and the big-band album Appearing Nightly in 2008. Bley returned in 2013 with Trios, featuring Swallow and saxophonist Andy Sheppard; the album marked the very first time that the pianist recorded for ECM proper instead of WATT, which had been her home for over 40 years. Her next ECM effort, 2016's Andando el Tiempo, also showcased her trio with Swallow and Sheppard, as did 2020's Life Goes On.© Chris Kelsey /TiVo Read more
A highly regarded pianist, composer, and arranger, Carla Bley has been at the forefront of avant-garde jazz and modern creative music since the '60s. She initially emerged as a composer, working closely with her first husband, pianist Paul Bley, as well as progressive artists like George Russell and Jimmy Giuffre. She is a founder of the Jazz Composers' Orchestra and her long-form jazz opera Escalator Over the Hill stands as a distinct stylistic signpost of the era. Bley has worked with a host of free-jazz icons -- including Pharaoh Sanders, Steve Lacy, and Peter Brotzmann, among others -- and continued to compose challenging genre-bending works into the 21st century. Along with her many large ensemble works, she has regularly collaborated in a trio with her partner bassist Steve Swallow and saxophonist Andy Sheppard, issuing albums like 2013's Trios, 2016's Andando el Tiempo, and 2020's Life Goes On.
Born Carla Borg in 1938 in Oakland, California, Bley learned the fundamentals of music as a child from her father, a church musician. Thereafter, she was mostly self-taught. She moved to New York around 1955, where she worked as a cigarette girl and occasional pianist. She married pianist Paul Bley, for whom she began to write tunes (she also wrote for George Russell and Jimmy Giuffre). In 1964, with her second husband, trumpeter Michael Mantler, Bley formed the Jazz Composer's Guild Orchestra, which a year later became known simply as the Jazz Composer's Orchestra. Two years later, Bley helped found the Jazz Composer's Orchestra Association, a nonprofit organization designed to present, distribute, and produce unconventional forms of jazz.
In 1967, vibraphonist Gary Burton's quartet recorded Bley's cycle of tunes A Genuine Tong Funeral, which brought her to the attention of the general public for the first time. Bley composed and arranged music in 1969 for Charlie Haden's Liberation Music Orchestra. In 1971, she completed the work that cemented her reputation, the jazz opera Escalator Over the Hill. In the '70s and '80s, Bley continued to run the JCOA and compose and record for her own Watt label. The JCOA essentially folded in the late '80s, but Bley's creative life continued mostly unabated. For much of the past two decades, she's maintained a midsized big band with fairly stable personnel to tour and record. She's also worked a great deal with the bassist Steve Swallow, in duo and in ensembles of varying size.
Bley wrote the music for the soundtrack to the 1985 film Mortelle Randone. She also contributed new compositions to the Liberation Music Orchestra's second incarnation in 1983. All through the '80s, '90s, and into the new millennium, Bley continued releasing albums through ECM, ranging from duets with bassist Steve Swallow to the Very Big Carla Bley Band. She issued a third duets album with Steve Swallow, Are We There Yet?, in 2000; Looking for America in 2003; The Lost Chords Find Paolo Fresu in 2007; and the big-band album Appearing Nightly in 2008.
Bley returned in 2013 with Trios, featuring Swallow and saxophonist Andy Sheppard; the album marked the very first time that the pianist recorded for ECM proper instead of WATT, which had been her home for over 40 years. Her next ECM effort, 2016's Andando el Tiempo, also showcased her trio with Swallow and Sheppard, as did 2020's Life Goes On.
© Chris Kelsey /TiVo
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Life Goes On
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by ECM on Feb 14, 2020
Choc de ClassicaA sage piano stylist audibly influenced by Basie and Monk among others, Carla Bley has over the past 60 years also become one of jazz's preeminent com ...
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Andando El Tiempo
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by ECM on May 6, 2016
4 étoiles Classica24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
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The Lost Chords Find Paolo Fresu
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by Watt on Oct 26, 2007
Composer and pianist Carla Bley has been very consistent, if not exactly prolific, for most of her 40 years in jazz. When she and bassist/life partner ...
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Big Band Theory
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by Watt on Oct 1, 1993
Carla Bley's 1993 recording Big Band Theory features her 18-piece orchestra playing three rather moody and atmospheric originals, plus a straightforwa ...
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Life Goes On
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by ECM on Feb 14, 2020
A sage piano stylist audibly influenced by Basie and Monk among others, Carla Bley has over the past 60 years also become one of jazz's preeminent com ...
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Are We There Yet? (Live)
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by Watt on Jun 21, 1999
Carla Bley and Steve Swallow's third outing as a duo captures them live on their 1998 European tour sounding fabulous. Three of the seven tunes are by ...
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Carla's Christmas Carols
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by ECM on Nov 3, 2009
Carla Bley and Christmas carols? You bet. She loves them and has incorporated them into her live sets for decades now. On this WATT release, recorded ...
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Escalator Over The Hill - A Chronotransduction By Carla Bley And Paul Haines
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by ECM on Jan 1, 1971
At the time, this was probably the longest jazz-generated work in existence (its length has since been exceeded by recent pieces like Wynton Marsalis' ...
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Dinner Music
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by Watt on Sep 1, 1977
First excursion on a funky trail, executed immaculately. Near essential. © Michael G. Nastos /TiVo ...
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Fleur Carnivore
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by Watt on Nov 1, 1988
On Fleur Carnivore, pianist Carla Bley deftly integrates her beautiful melodies into five complex, yet effortless sounding pieces. Taken from 1988 liv ...
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Fancy Chamber Music
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by Watt on Jun 22, 1998
Always the iconoclast, here pianist Bley applies her keen musical skill on baroque and chamber styles with tongue firmly in cheek and a fine string se ...
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Songs With Legs (Live)
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by Watt on Jan 1, 1995
On many of her recordings, Carla Bley could hardly be accused of hogging the spotlight as a soloist; emphasizing her talents as a bandleader, composer ...
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Tropic Appetites
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by Watt on Jan 1, 1974
Following their superb "chronotransduction," Escalator Over the Hill, composer Carla Bley and poet Paul Haines once again teamed up for Tropic Appetit ...
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The Lost Chords (Live)
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by Watt on Jun 7, 2004
The Lost Chords are Carla Bley (piano), Andy Sheppard (saxophones), Steve Swallow (electric bass), and Billy Drummond (drums). This self-titled album ...
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More Jazzvisits
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by Stunt Records on Aug 22, 2006
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Heavy Heart
Carla Bley
Jazz - Released by Watt on Mar 1, 1984
In a fanciful press release for this record, Carla Bley wrote that she wanted to make a record that would "put people in a mellow, sensual mood" as op ...
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo