Celebrating Bird: The Triumph of Charlie Parker
by Gary Giddins
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DVD details
Actor: Charlie Parker, Frank MorganDirector: Gary Giddins
DVD: Region Code 0
Audio: English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo; English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo
Format: Black & White, Color, DVD, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 59 minutes
DVD Release Date: 1999-01-19
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Geneon [Pioneer]
DVD Reviews of Celebrating Bird: The Triumph of Charlie Parker
DVD Review: Hmmm...
Summary: 3 Stars
This DVD has no special features; no Charlie Parker discography or interview, which are common features on musical documentary and/or concert DVD's nowadays, but since it didn't read anywhere that it would feature anything special I guess I shouldn't be disappointed.
I'm not a Parker junkie although I have studied his music, but this documentary didn't teach me anything new. They went through everything you've seen and heard on jazz-history TV-programs, so there weren't any surprises, but there were a couple of highlights - the TV appearance he made with Dizzy Gillespie playing Hot House for instance (the only song performed from beginning to end on this disc, btw.)
The content of this documentary could have been more insightful musically (and longer, as it runs a bit under an hour.) It was made in 1987 - 4 years prior to Miles Davis' death. It would have been interesting to hear what he, for instance, would have had to say about his collaboration with Bird, but Miles' name is mentioned here only once in haste.
Something that bothered me about the people who were interviewed were the extreme close-up shots - it would have been nice to see the camera man find the zoom OUT button.
Well, anywhooo... it's nice for refreshing your musical history memory enough not to forget that Bird lived and made a difference.
I'd rate the quality of sound and picture 4/5. Acceptable but not much more at almost full price...
Description of Celebrating Bird: The Triumph of Charlie Parker
Celebrating Bird is a revealing look at an enigmatic yet endlessly appealing man, who soared to the heights of creative freedom but couldn't beat a lifelong addiction to heroin. It includes a TV appearance with Dizzy Gillespie and rare footage with jazz greats including Billy Eckstine, Count Basie, Art Tatum, Thelonious Monk, Louis Armstrong, Kenny Clarke and Lucky Thompson, Lester Young, among others. This exciting soundtrack contains many of Parker's finest recordings including: Ballade, Yardbird Suite, Relaxin' At Camarillo, Just Friends, Koko, Confirmation, Au Privave, Kim, and Bloomdido.This 1987 film represents the first substantial documentary devoted to virtuoso saxophonist and bebop icon Charlie Parker, whose wildly inventive style and hip charisma made him a legend well before his untimely death at 34. Parker's huge, ultimately self-destructive appetites and sad demise long ago confirmed him as a poster boy for the doomed romanticism associated with the jazz life, and arguably apotheosized in a number of the bop era's most brilliant players, but while the film doesn't ignore Parker's life as a long-term heroin addict, the portrait hews more closely to exploring his creative genesis.
Through film clips, stills, and interviews with family members, musical peers, and writers, we follow Parker from his native Kansas City, Kansas, through his apprenticeship with band leaders Jay McShann and Bennie Moten, and on to New York. There, Parker would step forward as a de facto co-architect (with erstwhile partner Dizzy Gillespie, among others) of bebop, the small-group style that hot-wired swing rhythms and pop melodies with breakneck tempi, inventive harmonies, and extended improvisations, leaving behind the terra firma of swing for the high wire of a musician's music that mainstream listeners initially found daunting to follow.
Liberally scored with Parker's best-known performances, Celebrating Bird represents one of the most literate jazz documentaries extant, thanks to writer and codirector Gary Giddins, one of America's most thoughtful jazz writers, and Toby Byron, the producer behind the Masters of American Music series including The Story of Jazz. Engaging interviews with McShann, Gillespie, drummer Roy Haynes, veteran jazz writer Leonard Feather, first wife Rebecca Parker Davis, and final companion Chan Parker provide a balance of musical analysis and personal insight. For Bird's fans, this is a treat; for newly converted listeners, the story represents a keystone to the history of the music's crucial transition from swing to bop and beyond. --Sam Sutherland
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