Although he certainly applied new twists and turns to jazz, no one took Jelly Roll Morton seriously when he claimed to have invented it. That was almost fifty years ago, when swing was all the rage and the top bandleaders were given movie star treatment by their fans and the press. Reduced to playing for the noisy patrons of a rather unglamorous Washington, D.C. bar, Morton knew that many of the musical devices that threw jitterbugs into a frenzy on the dance floor had been pioneered by him in the twenties.

Today, "jazz" is a much brooder term, often applied to sounds that bear little or no relationship to the music of Morton and his contemporaries. But bebop’s place in jazz has never been questioned- well, at least not in the post 35 or 40 years.

There are no individual claims on the invention of bop, as we now call it. like the jazz idioms that preceded it, the bop style come about through the creative efforts of many, although this time there exists a better record of how it all come about, and this collection contains performances by some of the most important early contributors- indeed, by some of the very musicians who shaped the concept. Think of this as a trip through the evolution of bop, from its very early phase, when its voice occasionally rose from within a swing context, to the time it come into full bloom at places like Birdland.

In terms of jazz, bop and the "cool" West Coast sound that derived from it may well be the lost stylistic developments of any consequence. In the more than four decades since bop emerged, we have seen several attempts at taking jazz in a new direction, but none has really been successful- at least not artistically-nor hove these new paths led to the musicality and substance that is evidenced here. It is a measure of bop’s enduring quality that so many of today’s finest young musicians are devoted to its furtherance. Whether they will be able to contribute to its evolution remains to be seen.

EPISTROPHY. It became known under its boppish name when Thelonious Monk made it his theme, but "Epistrophy" was originally called "Fly Right" and that sounds a lot more like a swing title. This 1942 recording splendidly illustrates the stylistic amalgam that was heard during the transitional period, when a young generation of musicians took swing music down a more adventurous lane, and found some of their seasoned colleagues following behind. An Ellington sideman for more than a decade, Cootie Williams had both feet planted firmly in the land of swing. But he was not locked into the past, and while this version of one of the earliest bop tunes favors the big band sound of the pre-war era, the "raw sound" as bop was sometimes called, comes through here and there, especially in Ken Kersey’s piano solo and in a trumpet passage by Joe Guy, a Minton’s regular who is credited as co-composer along with Williams, Kenny Clarke, and Thelonious Monk.

GOOD BAIT. When Dizzy Gillespie first arrived on the national jazz scene with Cab Calloway’s orchestra in the late thirties, his style was difficult to distinguish from that of Roy Eldridge, but he would occasionally take his horn into the realm of what Calloway not so affectionately called "jiu-jitsu" music. By the end of the forties, Gillespie’s style was distinctly his own, and his name had become synonymous with bebop. This 1945 recording of a Tadd Dameron/Count Basie tune, "Good Bait" stems from a milestone Gillespie session, his first as a leader. His own solo clearly demonstrates the frantic style that made those with closed ears cry "foul" while the line of disciples formed on the left. The side also contains a typical statement from the slippery trombone of Trummy Young, an authoritative bass passage by Oscar Pettiford, and an earful of delicious notes from saxophonist Don Byas, another swing giant who fancied the new sound.

KEEN AND PEACHY. Bandleader Woody Herman has always been a talent scout of sorts, and he seems to have had a particularly sharp ear for extraordinary saxophone players. "Keen and Peachy" a 1947 Shorty Rogers- Ralph Burns collaboration based on the standard "Fine and Dandy," features solos by Serge Chaloff, Stan Getz and Zoot Sims, all of whom mode their mark in the bop idiom. Ralph Burns’ harmonic explorations gave the Herman Herd its fine coloring in the mid-forties, when it stampeded into jazz history. Big band bop has always tended to have more in common with swing than does the more intimate variety, but this fast-paced re-dress of an old tune is unmistakably post-war fare.

DISC JOCKEY JUMP. By 1947 bop was clearly the musical language of the day, and even the most popular of all swing drummers, Gene Krupa, hod to give his band a healthy dash of the new ingredient. On "Disc Jockey Jump" we hear clearly that Krupa’s own drumming stayed deeply ensconced in the swing mold, but the Gerry Mulligan tune and the record’s solos- most notably those by Charlie Kennedy on alto and Don Fagerquist on trumpet- were right up to date. Krupa remembered Mulligan from those days as "a kind of temperamental guy who wanted to expound a lot of his own ideas. "This one" he said of "Disc Jockey Jump," "was good musically and commercially."

LEMON DROP. Remarkably, Krupa takes a back seat to bongo drummer Romon Rivera on this 1949 recording of George Wallington’s ultra-boppish "Lemon Drop." This kind of commercial treatment- we might call it Bebop- helped veterans like Krupa capture the pre-rock youth market, and there the topping is trombonist Frank Rosolino’s scat vocal. Further mileage was had by turning this number into a film short, the kind of thing we now call a "video."

DONNA LEE. With Claude Thornhill and Gil Evans, big band bop reached new heights. This 1947 Evans arrangement of "Donna Lee"- a Charlie Parker composition, based on the chord structure of "Back Home Again In Indiana"-heralds the coming of "cool" jazz. Thirty years ago, cool was a new, and in short order over-used, term for anything that seemed terribly up-to-dote, but it would also be applied to a slightly frosty type of modern jazz that seemed to thrive particularly well on the West Coast. Gil Evans would moke his ultimate cool statements with Miles Davis two years later, but the ingredients are much in evidence on the Thornhill sides. That aloof alto saxophone belongs to lee Konitz, who had just turned twenty.

YARDBIRD SUITE. Konitz shines on this Gil Evans treatment of a famous Charlie Parker line. His tone had yet to mature, but if ever there was an intriguing promise of things to come, this was it. Of course the promise was fulfilled and Konitz has carved for himself a rather large niche in jazz history, but Claude Thornhill, from whose orchestra so many jazz stars, and indeed, a new sound, emerged, only worked occasionally during the lost years of his life. He died in 1965.

GODCHILD. Bassist Chubby Jackson worked with Charlie Barnet before becoming one of the driving forces behind the first Woody Herman Herd. This 1949 big band-his first such venture- did not last out the year, and left only four commercially recorded sides in its wake. "Godchild" another composition by pianist George Wallington, features a bop scat vocal by drummer Tiny Kohn, who also wrote the arrangement. To hear Kahn sing is to understand why he also took up an instrument, but his style typifies the musician-vocal of the day. The band, a driving one that deserved a longer life, had a number of fine young bopsters on board, including altoist Frankie Socolow, vibist Teddy Charles, and bassist Curly Russell. Jackson, whose verbal encouragements can be heard when things heat up, puts his bass aside to take on the role of conductor.

ELEVATION. In his hometown of Philadelphia, Elliot Lawrence used to lead the children’s band on the WCAU Horn and Hardart Radio Hour, which was produced by his father, Stanley Brazo. When he was twenty, he took over the radio station’s house band, whose arranger was a young man named Gerry Mulligan. Lawrence himself did not make any conspicuous contribution to bop, but the association with Mulligan elevated his band beyond the dance floor. This 1949 Mulligan arrangement of a tune composed with Lawrence contains many of the hot elements of swing, and is a far cry from the so-called "Birth of the Cool" sessions he recorded with Miles Davis just three months earlier. "Elevation" is quite reminiscent of earlier Woody Herman charts, complete with tight, fiery ensembles and solos by Phil Urso, Vince Forrest, Joe Techner, Lawrence, and drummer Howie Mann riding high on the crests of brass waves.

DOUBLE DATE. Assembling winners of Metronome magazine’s annual reader’s poll for on all-star recording session was a tradition that began during the Swing Era. By the late forties, the once-so-torrid studio event had begun to reflect the new music. The 1949 Metronome All-Stars included Dizzy Gillespie and trombonist Kai Winding, but the dominant sound is that of pianist Lennie Tristano who, with his disciples, lee Konitz, Warne Marsh and Billy Bauer, had captured the imagination of critics and fans with some extraordinary explorations of harmonics. That distinct Tristano sound comes through on Pete Rugolo’s "Double Date" which also features Konitz and Bauer. Stan Getz and Serge Chaloff are also present, and the clarinetist is Buddy DeFranco, who was one of the few musicians to apply that popular instrument of the Swing Era to bop music. The rhythm section is completed by Eddie Safronski and Max Roach. The pace is brisk and, of course, everybody gets a solo.

NO FIGS. Tristano’s often complex, introspective, linear style really comes to the fore on "No Figs" which, like "Donna Lee" is based on the "Back Home Again In Indiana" chordal progression. The title is a typical bit of Tristano humor, alluding to the fact that dyed-in-the-wool jazz traditionalists were called "moldy figs." Tristano’s music had both a bop and a swing base, but it really was a few steps beyond both, and while his music may not sound so radical as w~e listen to it almost forty years later, we must marvel at how current it still sounds. Although it is from the some session that produced "Double Date" Dizzy Gillespie is not heard on this version of "No Figs."

D0N’T BLAME ME. The music of Miles Davis has gone through several changes since 1949, when this ballad was recorded at the Paris International Jazz Festival. Davis belongs to the second generation of bop musicians, but he went his own way after making some classic recordings in the bop genre. Following a highly productive period of collaboration with Gil Evans, Davis entered the Electronic Age and never come back. It is hard to think of Davis’ highly-synthesized fusion music as representing a progressive step when one hears the brooding beauty of his horn delivering "Don’t Blame Me." The saxophonist is James Moody, who in later years has been closely associated with Dizzy Gillespie, and the drummer is Kenny Clarke. Pianist/composer Tadd Dameron, the co-leader of the quintet, come to modern jazz with extensive experience an the swing scene. Following the trip to France with Miles Davis, he went to work as an arranger for bandleader Ted Heath in England. Technically, the recording quality of this Davis/Dameron performance leaves much to be desired, but the music compensates us well.

ORNITHOLOGY. When Charlie Parker and trumpeter Benny Harris took the so-called national anthem of bop, "How High the Moon" and turned it into "Ornithology" they created one of the classic bop vehicles. No one could play this tune better than Parker himself, and he is in exquisite form on this 1950 aircheck from New York’s Birdland. Of course, he has great help from trumpeter Fats Navarro, pianist Bud Powell, and two of bop’s finest rhythm men, Curly Russell and Art Blakey. This spirited performance represents bebop taken to the max.

‘ROUND MIDNIGHT. From the very beginning, the bop style embraced ballads, but the movement also created a few of its own, and none is more popular than Thelonius Monk’s "’Round Midnight." Here, from a 1951 Birdland broadcast, the beauty of this tune- which seems to be wholly original- is fully brought to the fore and superbly enhanced by Gillespie and Parker, with Bud Powell, Tommy Potter and Roy Haynes comprising the stellar rhythm section. It is hard for today’s young jazz fan to imagine the luxury of having regular live broadcasts by groups of this high caliber, and- primitive though they may seem by today’s technical standards- we are all fortunate that many such moments were captured for posterity.

Chris Albertson Contributing Editor to Stereo Review