Straight Life: The Story of Art Pepper - A Gripping Tale of Jazz and Heroin

A visceral reading experience:

 

Straight Life: The Story of Art Pepper  is easily in the top 2 or 3 jazz books I have ever read.  It reads as much more than a jazz book, it's a whirlwind of hard living, trials, and tribulations about the jazz saxophonist (1925-1982).

The author of the book Laurie Pepper, the third wife and widow of Art has managed to create a book so compelling and "real", that I couldn't keep from running it over and over in my mind after reading it. Rarely have I been affected like this from a film, piece of music, or a book. Hard to believe this book hasn't been brought to the big screen by now?

The best way to describe Straight Life: The Story of Art Pepper is to think in terms of it being a heroin junkie's journal, who happens to be one the greatest alto saxophonists in jazz history. You will learn that the music he made, was the only outlet he really had to express his inner pain. I like how Art is just a man in this book, warts and all, it's all there for us to see. A tortured soul, complex, but simple in many ways.

Art Pepper's 1981 Lost Strings Classic Winter Moon

If anyone told you they hate strings albums, I bet they never heard this absolute masterpiece of the style.

Some how, not an ounce of pretense. Art Pepper experienced a career renaissance in the 1970's, he never played better in my opinion than he did during this stint.

Winter Moon was recorded in September of 1980, less than 2 years before Art's death at the age of 56.

Ironically the one format Art always dreamed of playing, strings, was one of his last, and as it turns out, pound for pound one of the best of his career.  The thing about Winter Moon other than Art's shimmering alto is indeed the perfect use of strings, subtle, yet there, but never in the way. That is a big deal for an album like this.

 The strings complement and perhaps enhance, but never feel like the star of the show, that mantle belongs to Art, he is the show here. Art even plays a  number, "Blues in the Night" on clarinet that just delight the ears.

Guess who's one of the arrangers on Winter Moon? Ever heard of Bill Holman? The same Bill Holman that wrote and arranged some of the best loved Stan Kenton charts, and albums like the killer Contemporary Concepts.

 A confident in his abilities kind of guy is Holman, and why not, he sure did a great job here.

When I think about this gorgeous record I think about the best of Miles Davis, yeah, it's that good, really has this Kind of Blue vibe. It's not a clone of that album, but the mood is similar.

Art gets  has fine support from pianist Stanley Cowell, Howard Roberts on guitar, and Cecil McBee on bass.

My favorite track on the record is "The Prisoner" which was the theme for the motion picture The Eyes of Laura Mars in 1978, Art nails it here. 

The strings are more upfront than usual, but never over done, just a dark and brooding mood, but not hopeless if that makes sense. I like the tasteful Spanish sounding guitar intro here from Robert's as well.

The title track is also very good, but honestly the whole album from start to finish has a suite like quality to it.

I have a hard time listening to individual tracks, I feel like I need the whole thing to really appreciate it. I suggest you do it this way too, and get the entire album and not just a few tracks.

Also, it's worth noting, all of the Galaxy records stuff that was released in the mid to late 70's and early 80's of Art's is as good, if not better than the 50's stuff, I'm not kidding about that.

It is high time the jazz community understood how classic his later period music was, let alone the mainstream music press.

Art Pepper was and is a giant in jazz, I cherish all of his music. I don't think he ever made a bad record, when you think about his much rough drug addicted life and how many lost years he had, that is either a miracle or a shame, probably both.