Q: The Dave Brubeck Quartet visited the Middle East, India, and Eastern Europe in 1958 as part of a tour sponsored by the US State Department. Paul Desmond, the Dave Brubeck Quartet’s alto saxophonist, had written “Take Five” in order to showcase Joe Morello’s drum solo - although in the event, a shorter version was released as a single with only a very brief drum solo (it had to be under three minutes in order to receive radio airplay).Ī conversation with Louiz Banks, widely regarded as the Godfather of Jazz in India, clears it all. Joe impressed by hand technique, odd meters (5, 7, 11). More from Desmond’s diary: “Another session with Indian musicians at All India Radio – pretty much a mutual admiration society for rhythm men. Either way, it is certain that the complexity of Indian rhythms played a major role in Morello’s playing of the Take Five groove, one of the most addictive and best-known drum patterns ever to be recorded. Some say Indian jazz drummer Leslie Godinho introduced him to the rhythm, others identify mridangam (a double-sided Indian hand drum) maestro Palani Subramania Pillai as the one who did the trick. Various accounts tell different stories about the origin of Take Five, but they all point to (the band) Joe Morello’s musical experiences in India. Ironically, Columbia Records only allowed the album to be released under the assumption that the quartet would go back to recording jazz standards for subsequent projects.Īn extract from "The Music Aficionado" on the creation of “Time Out” first published in 2019 states A slow-burner at first but two years after the album’s release it spawned a hit single: Take Five. The ambassadors included Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie - and pianist Dave Brubeck, who was inspired to explore non-western rhythms which resulted in Timeout. In 1956 the US State Department launched the “Jazz Ambassadors” program, which aimed to promote American culture abroad (and allay concerns about racial tensions in the US) by sending musicians around the world. Written by legendary saxophonist, Paul Desmond the song came from the album Time Out and is the first jazz LP to sell one million copies and inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. The name 'Take Five' is derived from its unusual quintuple-time signature. It is found at the beginning of pieces, positioned after the key signature. Recognised by its distinctive catchy saxophone melody imaginative, jolting drum solo and use of the unusual quintuple (5/4) time signature, the jazz standard ‘Take Five’ by the Dave Brubeck Quartet was not the first jazz composition that used the quintuple meter but it was one of the first in the United States to achieve mainstream significance in 1961.įrom left: Dave Brubeck, Paul Desmond, Joe Morello, and Gene Wright.Ī time signature is a sign, found in the form of a numerical fraction, of which the numerator represents the number of beats per measure and the denominator stands for the type of note value that equals one beat.
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