Al DiMeola

We should change the name of this forum to fusionarchives.com. I had a lot of musician friends I was playing in jazz groups who like the fusion jazz fusion jazz style of the seventies but when it came to bands like Gentle Giant, Tull, Yes, Rush, Genesis, ELP etc. they were never interested. I guess progressive rock, with exceptions of course, is more a listener`s style of music.

Artists like Al DiMeola, Coryell, Ponty, UZEB, McLaughlin and the like as far as I`m concerned are jazz players and I`ve never seen any of the being categorized otherwise in music stores, encyclopedias etc.

Vibrationbaby wrote: We should change the name of this forum to fusionarchives.com. I had a lot of musician friends I was playing in jazz groups who like the fusion jazz fusion jazz style of the seventies but when it came to bands like Gentle Giant, Tull, Yes, Rush, Genesis, ELP etc. they were never interested. I guess progressive rock, with exceptions of course, is more a listener`s style of music. Artists like Al DiMeola, Coryell, Ponty, UZEB, McLaughlin and the like as far as I`m concerned are jazz players and I`ve never seen any of the being categorized otherwise in music stores, encyclopedias etc.

Not suprising VB since those bands are mainly composition bands and your friends sound like they like a loose structure with improv so it is no suprise that Genesis would sound as boring to them as mozart did. And when did anyone who likes prog agree on everything?  I think fusion is that fusing jazz and rock.  I don't think that the progressive movement was/is limited to classical structures and devices only.  Just because some took it in other directions or actually moved jazz closer to rock in no means lesssons their contribution to the genre. They are lumped together with jazz artists because I think it was the way their record companies marketed them.  As for my memory all the same people who saw ELP, Genesis etc also saw Weather Report and Return to Forever.

I think that nobody really knows what a guitar album is until they listen Friday Night in San Francisco featuring Al DiMeola, John McLaughlin and Paco de Lucía.

When I listened this album for the first time I was learning guitar, but threw away the poor instrument after playing  Mediterranean Sundance/Rio Ancho in my turntable, a track where the three play together, knew that was impossible for me to reach that level.

Don't care if it's prog' flamenco, fusion or whatever, it's a fu**ing mastepiece.

Iván

JCProg wrote: lucas wrote: Fusion can be regarded as a subgenre of prog rock. Lost Tribe's cd's have some rap on them, so I guess fusion can also be regarded as a subgenre of rap.

Strange as it may seem Jazz Fusion is a sub division of jazz - Brian Glasser, the Joe Zawinul biographer  (i.e. In A Silent Way), said it all to my mind: 'the last great movement in jazz was jazz rock fusion'.

By employing rock with their jazz,  Lifetime, Soft Machine, MO, RTF and a little later Weather Report (mustn't forget Tasavallan Presidentti also in the ealry 70's), we prog fans who were also into jazz, readily accepted their music as progressive rock as well as jazz rock. Keith Emerson infusion of jazz into Nice's repertoise from 68 onwards (both in  musical style and the session musicians employed on record), helped lay the foundations to this acceptance. The recent TV documentary Jazz Britannia, dealt pretty thoroughly with the subject in the second programme, citing for instance the early 60's  bands of Georgie Fame and Graham Bond as 'jazz rock'.

Jazz (as Wynton Marsalis will reluctantly accept) is a great borrower and stealer of other forms of music - so is prog.

We get a similar debate wrt to prog folk and straight folk. It could be argued  Bob Dylan should be included under the heading  'prog rock', because he fused folk with blues or rock or country........

goose wrote: lucas wrote: Fusion can be regarded as a subgenre of prog rock. Only when it's progressive, surely? You might as well say that metal is a subgenre of prog rock, since some metal bands are progressive.

Fusion IS a sub-genre as well. Look at the birth of Jazz-Rock. Many of the players came up through the English Prog scene and evolved.

Even though I've never thought of Al DiMeola as prog, I have no hardlined reason to dismiss him either. For those who remember, I didn't push for Holdsworth's inclusion and you'll be hard pressed to find a bigger fan than I.  

danbo wrote: goose wrote: lucas wrote: Fusion can be regarded as a subgenre of prog rock. Only when it's progressive, surely? You might as well say that metal is a subgenre of prog rock, since some metal bands are progressive. We do. It's called Prog-Metal. There are a few hundred of those bands it seems.   Fusion IS a sub-genre as well. Look at the birth of Jazz-Rock. Many of the players came up through the English Prog scene and evolved. Even though I've never thought of Al DiMeola as prog, I have no hardlined reason to dismiss him either. For those who remember, I didn't push for Holdsworth's inclusion and you'll be hard pressed to find a bigger fan than I.

Holdsworth on his own is more jazz than rock or prog rock however his work with Caravan and UK no one disputes his inclusion.  Although different music styles I find the same thing happened to Kerry Livgren.  His solo stuff tends to be more rock  so he is not included (mainly because he ends up doing allmost all of his own instrumentation) but both of his bands are included here  Protokaw and Kansas.  It happens.

Garion81 wrote: Holdsworth on his own is more jazz than rock or prog rock however his work with Caravan and UK no one disputes his inclusion.

And I thought I had most Holdsworth records - which one with Caravan????