THE DYING ART

Prime time

2009-08-15T09:43:00.011-04:00

By the end of the 1950's and the beginning of the 1960's Blue Note was starting to make money and four-colour started to appear on the cover of some releases.

However, Reid Miles' continued artistic genius lay in hiring the up-and-coming pop artist Andy Warhol to create some covers that became pivotal, both as jazz album covers and works of art in their own right.

Needless to say Miles' hand was all over the art direction of these brilliant covers, for the likes of Kenny Burrell's 1958 double set, 'Blue Lights' and Johnny Griffin's 'The Congregation from 1957.

Reid Miles' design moved seamlessly from allowing Francis Wolff''s brilliant photography speak to the viewer, to a totally hands-on typographic approach.

From the amazing and legendary John Coltrane's 1957 'Blue Train' cover image — a candid study of a thoughtful Coltrane, to a full-on piece of art using type as his medium, as in Newark-born organist Larry Young's amazing 1965 album, 'Unity'.

The works...

2009-07-03T15:37:00.023-04:00

Throughout the latter half of the 1950's and into the 1960's Miles was as prolific and demanding in his designs as Alfred Lion was with his musicians. His art swung from graphics, to typography, to illustration and back again. Most likely it wasn't coincidence that some of his most distinctive work would find its way onto what have become all-time jazz classics.

Examples would include Cannonball Adderley's 'Something Else' [from 1958], Hank Mobley's 'Soul Station' [1960] and Kenny Burrell's 'Midnight Blue' [1963] being but three of his masterpieces. Miles shows off his type and graphics style on Adderley and Burrell's albums yet used some of Francis Wolff's fine photography to turn the magnificent Soul Station into a classic both musically and artistically.

Budgets being what they were for the small independent Blue Note label, Miles turned to the simple but effective method of adding a colour wash to a black & white image. It was of course helped by the brilliant composition and cropping created by Wolff in the camera and Miles on the drawing board [that's right, there were no Mac computers and Adobe InDesign then].

In essence, most of the 1950's Blue Note covers were printed in only two colours for reasons of cost, with only the occasional use of a third or daringly [and mostly in the 1960's], full colour.

In fact all three of the albums shown here are not only classics of classic jazz, they are also some of the most accessible jazz albums too, despite or perhaps because of containing some of the greatest musicians of any genre, which includes of course: Miles Davis, Cannonball Adderley, Art Blakey and Kenny Burrell.

I would also like to point out for those interested — if you don't already have them of course — all the albums featured here are still available, still vibrant and dynamic, and still some of

the best music, from the most talented

musicians you will hear anywhere.

Check out iTunes. Almost all of these are $9.99 or less... or Amazon if you crave hard copy, actual CDs.

Either way, a bargain for the gift of great music.

The theory of a 'blue note'.

2009-06-20T09:23:00.006-04:00

To talk about Reid Miles is to talk about New York's very own Blue Note record label. The label formed by Berlin schoolboy friends, Alfred Lion and Francis Wolff, and financed by Max Margulis, a musician, writer, teacher and communist intellectual.

From these strange beginnings in 1939, began a love affair with the vibrant world of Jazz in New York City.

Blue Note was a success pretty much from the initial recordings of Albert Ammons and Meade Lux Lewis, but it wasn't until 1956 and the inspired hiring of Reid Miles did the label find its graphical identity.

Although Miles didn't have a 'house style' or house typeface, his three most distinct design genres were identifiable almost instantaneously to designers and music lovers. From typography, to illustrations and of course his minimalist use of colour with photography. He set the bar extremely high.

At the same time, despite being only casually interested in jazz [much preferring classical music], his covers would instinctively tell the viewer [and listener] what was inside. He just knew how to design the cover that described the content perfectly.

Co-founder, Francis Wolff was also a photographer who took countless rolls of pictures of the artists — Reid Miles had complete access to this amazing raw material. And in the course of the next several years, he [along with several other brilliant designers of the period] completely revolutionised album art, type and the use of commercial photography.

*A blue note is a lowered third, seventh or fifth degree of the diatonic music scale.

Much more to come....

The treats to come

2009-06-19T13:00:00.008-04:00

It was in the 1950's, pretty much at the dawn of the 'album' concept [of presenting music to listeners] that happenstance played a part in producing arguably, one of the greatest and most-emulated album designers of all time. That designer was Reid Miles, a graduate of The Chicago School of Art.

There are many others though which stand closer scrutiny of their work, such as David Stone Martin, Jim Flora, Robert Crumb and many more in the United States, and in more recent times, Vaughn Oliver, Malcolm Garrett and Peter Saville from the UK.

All this and much more to come in future installments. Plus images of the great covers in question, the plagiarists, the copyists and even the owners and producers who made all of this possible.

It doesn't matter whether you're 16 or 76... who doesn't have a memory that includes the soundtrack of that special moment in all our lives?

All this to come. I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I will.

2009-06-16T08:58:00.012-04:00

When the vinyl album was eclipsed by the CD back in 1982*, an amazingly prolific and creative canvas for artists, illustrators, cartoonists and graphic designers was all but eclipsed too.

That was a sad moment, if only we knew it at the time.

Sad because since the inception of the Long Playing record [the 'L.P.' as it became known], the sleeve was there to explain and even enhance the contents. It was there to describe visually what you were about to enjoy [or not] aurally. And there are many books that celebrate the best album design of all time. A totally subjective topic if ever there was.

It's true to say that album art did indeed become an artform. And that is the topic of this occasional blog. It is to celebrate the amazing art and the amazing artists — both graphic and fine — that have graced the covers of Long Playing records. That artificial construct [the technology of the 1950's limited a vinyl record to 40-45 minutes of playing time at 33 rpm], and so the album was born. And along with it some seriously brilliant graphic art and illustration and fine art that can arguably stand with some of the great pieces of art around the world.

I hope to show some of these pieces here.

So if you enjoy music and the whole 'package' that goes with it, I dare say you will enjoy [and maybe even discover something new] in my posts. We're talking about a completely subjective field here, so please if you disagree, or can point me to other pieces I might not be aware of, then I'd love to hear from you.

In the meantime keep watching — an opening salvo will follow pretty soon.

*Billy Joel's '52nd St.', was the first ever CD — released in Japan on October 1st, 1982.