''Bop for Kerouac'' is a 1981 studio album by Mark Murphy. ''Bop for Kerouac'' is the 18th recorded album by American jazz vocalist Mark Murphy. It was released by

Muse In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, the Muses (, ) were the Artistic inspiration, inspirational goddesses of literature, science, and the arts. They were considered the source of the knowledge embodied in the poetry, lyric p ...

in the United States in 1981 when Murphy was 49 years old. The release is a tribute to

Beat Beat, beats, or beating may refer to: Common uses * Assault, inflicting physical harm or unwanted physical contact * Battery (crime), a criminal offense involving unlawful physical contact * Battery (tort), a civil wrong in common law of inte ...

writer

Jack Kerouac Jean-Louis Lebris de Kérouac (; March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969), known as Jack Kerouac, was an American novelist and poet who, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, was a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Of French-Canadian ...

and

bebop Bebop or bop is a style of jazz developed in the early to mid-1940s in the United States. The style features compositions characterized by a fast tempo (usually exceeding 200 bpm), complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes and numerou ...

. Murphy reads excerpts from two of Kerouac's works, ''

The Subterraneans ''The Subterraneans'' is a 1958 novella by the Beat Generation author Jack Kerouac. It is a semi-fictional account of his short romance with Alene Lee (1931–1991), an African-American woman, in Greenwich Village, New York. It was the first w ...

'' in "

Parker's Mood "Parker's Mood" is a piece of music originally performed by Charlie Parker as an improvised blues in 1948. Vocalese lyrics were later written and recorded by King Pleasure and Eddie Jefferson. Original recording Alto saxophonist Charlie Parker reco ...

" (track 3) and ''

On the Road ''On the Road'' is a 1957 novel by American writer Jack Kerouac, based on the travels of Kerouac and his friends across the United States. It is considered a defining work of the postwar Beat and Counterculture generations, with its protagoni ...

'' in "Ballad of the Sad Young Men" (track 8). Mark Murphy recorded ''Bop for Kerouac'' in six hours on March 12, 1981, with producer and arranger

Bill Mays William Allen Mays (born February 5, 1944), known professionally as Bill Mays, is an American jazz pianist from Sacramento, California. Biography Mays came from a musical family and at the age of 15 became interested in jazz at an Earl Hines ...

and saxophonist Richie Cole. The album reflects Murphy's interest in the hip

Beat Generation The Beat Generation was a literary subculture movement started by a group of authors whose work explored and influenced American culture and politics in the post-World War II era. The bulk of their work was published and popularized by members o ...

, Jack Kerouac, bebop,

vocalese Vocalese is a style of jazz singing in which words are added to an instrumental soloist's improvisation. Definition Vocalese uses recognizable lyrics that are sung to pre-existing instrumental solos, as opposed to scat singing, which uses nonsen ...

, mixing storytelling with music, ballads, and using the voice as a musical instrument for improvisation. Lyrical themes include isolation, loneliness, and bebop's masters. It includes quotes from Kerouac both on the album sleeve and in the tunes themselves. It was followed by a sequel, ''Kerouac Then and Now'', released in 1989. Both albums were met with critical acclaim. Murphy was at his peak. As was typical with his Muse releases, he was paid a flat fee upfront and received no royalties.

Background

In his book, ''This is Hip: The Life of Mark Murphy,'' author Peter Jones writes that "With ''Bop for Kerouac'', Mark Murphy showed that it was possible to be nostalgic for something that was far from mom and apple pie. In his celebration of the most liberal writer America has ever produced, Murphy offered an alternative vision of both the Fifties and the present". Murphy had recorded bop and vocalese (words added to an instrumental soloist's improvisation) previously but this was a complete concept album dedicated to Jack Kerouac. When asked about his favorite personal recordings years later in an interview with Ted Pankin for ''Jazziz,'' Murphy said, "We accomplished some rather remarkable things with ''Bop for Kerouac'' and the second Kerouac record. I was really responsible, I think, for bringing the Kerouac name back into the fore, because two years after my record came out, I noticed that the records started putting out

stuff. Hmm! I was never given any credit for it, but anyway, that was my thought on it". Dan Ouellette, writing in a feature in ''

DownBeat ''DownBeat'' (styled in all caps) is an American music magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond", the last word indicating its expansion beyond the jazz realm that it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1 ...

'' in 1997 singles out for praise Murphy's "bold Kerouac projects" in which Murphy "unleashed a dazzling display of rambling, hip-daddy-o, stream-of-consciousness

... What started out as an experiment in capturing Kerouac’s spirit of wordplay turned into some of Murphy’s most organic, inspirational and spur-of-the- moment material". Ouellette quotes Murphy:

"Basically I was looking for another way to do a bebop album. I never met Jack, and I never expected I’d become a Kerouacian, but I am one of the lucky people still alive who did see
Lord Buckley Lord Richard Buckley (born Richard Myrle Buckley; April 5, 1906 – November 12, 1960) was an American stand-up comedian and recording artist, who in the 1940s and 1950s created a character that was, according to ''The New York Times'', "an unl ...
perform...What really turned me on about this guy was that he wrote like an improvising musician...I really connected to him".

Murphy told James Gavin, "Why should I do another be-bop album and leave out the man who re-created the bop era for us all"?

Recording

Working on a tight budget and "allotted with just six hours to do the entire project",

was hired to arrange, conduct and produce the recording by

Joe Fields Joseph Charles Fields Jr. (born November 14, 1953) is an American former professional football player who was a center and guard in the National Football League (NFL) for the New York Jets and the New York Giants. Early life and education F ...

Muse Records Muse Records was a jazz record company and label founded in New York City by Joe Fields in 1972. Fields worked as an executive for Prestige Records in the 1960s. Several of the albums were previously released on Cobblestone Records. Muse also ...

. Bill Mays said,

"I hate working that fast really. I mean, even to have just another six hours would take the pressure off ... But Mark was very well prepared. Before we went in, he and I rehearsed very thoroughly at my apartment, where I had a nice Steinway piano. Mark had me underscore the readings much like I might do in a film segment. We knocked out an awful lot of music in six hours."

He hired Richie Cole and

Bruce Forman Bruce Forman (born 1956) is an American jazz guitarist. Forman took piano lessons at an early age before picking up the guitar at age thirteen. In 1971, his family moved to San Francisco, where he led his own groups in the area and performed wit ...

. Mays said, "The thing about that album that I'm proud of is that I had a small group, and I made it sound like a little big band, especially "Boplicity"." Murphy had definite ideas about how he wanted each tune to go. Murphy was essentially the co-arranger on many of the tunes. Mays characterized Murphy as loose, go-with-the-flow, never getting angry. The day of the recording a film crew blew out the power, delaying the start of the recording and Richie Cole's car was hit in the parking lot. Even so they finished on time within the tight six hour schedule. The album sleeve features short notes from beat poets

Lawrence Ferlinghetti Lawrence Monsanto Ferlinghetti (March 24, 1919 – February 22, 2021) was an American poet, painter, social activist, and co-founder of City Lights Booksellers & Publishers. An author of poetry, translations, fiction, theatre, art criticism, and ...

and

Gregory Corso Gregory Nunzio Corso (March 26, 1930 – January 17, 2001) was an American poet. Along with Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and William S. Burroughs, he was part of the Beat Generation, as well as one of its youngest members. Early life Born N ...

, as well as

Steve Allen Stephen Valentine Patrick William Allen (December 26, 1921 – October 30, 2000) was an American television and radio personality, comedian, musician, composer, writer, and actor. In 1954, he achieved national fame as the co-creator and ...

, publisher

Jay Landesman Irving Ned "Jay" Landesman (July 15, 1919 – February 20, 2011) was an American publisher, nightclub owner, writer, and long-time expatriate resident in London, England. With the Beats He was born in St. Louis, Missouri, the youngest of the fo ...

, Kerouac biographer Lawrence Lee, and

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

club-owner Fred Kuh. In addition, a quotation from a 1959 ''

Playboy ''Playboy'' (stylized in all caps) is an American men's Lifestyle journalism, lifestyle and entertainment magazine, available both online and in print. It was founded in Chicago in 1953 by Hugh Hefner and his associates, funded in part by a $ ...

'' article by Kerouac, "The Origins of the Beat Generation" is included. Author Peter Jones said that Murphy "appreciated the freedom he had with Muse to pursue his own creative projects". Murphy said, "I never could have done Kerouac anywhere else".

Touring

Murphy tried out the entire album live at Le Café in

Sherman Oaks Sherman Oaks (founded in 1927) is a neighborhood of the city of Los Angeles, California within the San Fernando Valley region. The neighborhood includes a portion of the Santa Monica Mountains, which gives Sherman Oaks a lower population densit ...

. Murphy was happy with the reception. He said, "But each night the one they roared for and sometimes stood for was the 8 minute track combining the last page of Kerouac's ''On the Road'' and the Landesman/Wolfe song (written for Jack's Beat Generation) "The Ballad of the Sad Young Men".

Reception

Overall the critical reception to the album has been positive. Most reviewers find the album to be excellent, one of Murphy's essential recordings. The album helped establish Murphy as a bebop singer and forever associated him with the Beat lifestyle and to bebop music. Reviewer's find the Kerouac readings to be highly expressive and to blend perfectly with the associated tunes. Many of the recordings were popular in Murphy's live performances for the rest of his career. The album was nominated for a 1982 Grammy award at the 25th annual

Grammy awards The Grammy Awards, stylized as GRAMMY, and often referred to as The Grammys, are awards presented by The Recording Academy of the United States to recognize outstanding achievements in music. They are regarded by many as the most prestigious a ...

for

Best Jazz Vocal Performance, Male The Grammy Award for Best Jazz Vocal Performance, Male was an honor presented at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, to male recording artists for quality jazz vocal performances ...

, but lost to

Mel Tormé Melvin Howard Tormé (September 13, 1925 – June 5, 1999), nicknamed "the Velvet Fog", was an American musician, singer, composer, arrangement, arranger, drummer, actor, and author. He composed the music for "The Christmas Song" ("Chestnuts Roa ...

for '' An Evening with George Shearing & Mel Tormé.'' In his book, ''A Biographical Guide to the Great Jazz and Pop Singers'', author

Will Friedwald Will Friedwald (born September 16, 1961) is an American author and music critic. He has written for newspapers that include the ''Wall Street Journal'', ''New York Times'', '' Village Voice'', ''Newsday'', ''New York Observer'', and ''New York ...

says that the recording is "Murphy's most successful concept album" and calls it "extraordinary". Friedwald calls Murphy a cultural critic and says this recording along with the later ''Kerouac, Then and Now'' to be his "ultimate statement on literary and musical beatnikism...focusing on Kerouac as a pop culture hero, and dwelling on the music of

Charlie Parker Charles Parker Jr. (August 29, 1920 – March 12, 1955), nicknamed "Bird" or "Yardbird", was an American jazz Saxophone, saxophonist, bandleader, and composer. Parker was a highly influential soloist and leading figure in the development of beb ...

and his inner circle of bebop heroes, such as

Charles Mingus Charles Mingus Jr. (April 22, 1922 – January 5, 1979) was an American jazz Double bass, upright bassist, composer, bandleader, pianist, and author. A major proponent of collective Musical improvisation, improvisation, he is considered one of ...

and

Sonny Rollins Walter Theodore "Sonny" Rollins (born September 7, 1930) is an American retired jazz tenor saxophonist who is widely recognized as one of the most important and influential jazz musicians. In a seven-decade career, Rollins recorded over sixt ...

." Friedwald laments that the vocal versions of jazz instrumentals would have been better left wordless (tracks 2 and 5). He singles out the ballads and prose recitations as high points. He finds the final track "The Ballad of the Sad Young Men" with the Kerouac introduction to be "stunningly perfect". The

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

entry written by Sott Yanow gives the album 4.5 stars saying, "this poetry and jazz set works surprisingly well". Yanow also includes the album in his list of best individual Muse sets by Mark Murphy in his book ''The Jazz Singers: The Ultimate Guide.'' The Virgin Encyclopedia of Popular Music rates the release as excellent ''(4/5, ''meaning a high standard album from this artist and therefore highly recommended)''. '' Andrew Gilbert, writing for MusicHound Jazz, calls the album a "highly effective jazz/literature project". The

Penguin Guide to Jazz ''The Penguin Guide to Jazz'' is a reference work containing an encyclopedic directory of jazz recordings on CD which were (at the time of publication) currently available in Europe or the United States. The first nine editions were compiled b ...

assigns 3 stars (meaning a good if middleweight set; one that lacks the stature or consistency of the finest records, but which is certainly rewarding on its own terms). John Swenson, in ''

The Rolling Stone Jazz & Blues Album Guide ''The Rolling Stone Album Guide'', previously known as ''The Rolling Stone Record Guide'', is a book that contains professional music reviews written and edited by staff members from ''Rolling Stone'' magazine. Its first edition was published in 1 ...

'', assigns the album 4 stars (excellent, representing peak performances in an artist's career, and providing the best introduction to an artist's work) and calls the recording "an engaging mixture of bop standards interspersed with Kerouac readings". ''

Stereo Review ''Sound & Vision'' was an American magazine, purchased by AVTech Media Ltd. (UK) in March 2018, covering home theater, audio, video and multimedia consumer products. Before 2000, it had been published for most of its history as ''Stereo Review' ...

'' gives the album an Honorable Mention in its annual Record of the Year Awards for 1981, selected by editorial staff and critics.

Chris Albertson Christiern Gunnar Albertson (October 18, 1931 – April 24, 2019) was a New York City-based jazz journalist, writer and record producer. Early life Albertson was born in Reykjavík, Iceland, on October 18, 1931, but his father left the family b ...

writing a 1982 review of the album in ''Stereo Review'' calls it a contender for vocal album of the year and says he was "overwhelmed" by the results achieved by Murphy and Richie Cole and calls the blend of poetry and jazz "perfect". Owen Cordle, writing in DownBeat magazine in 1982 likens Richie Cole playing Bird (Charlie Parker) to Mark Murphy's

Miles Davis Miles Dewey Davis III (May 26, 1926September 28, 1991) was an American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. He is among the most influential and acclaimed figures in the history of jazz and 20th century music, 20th-century music. Davis ado ...

, capturing a "detached cool intensity" in the bebop music. He gives the album a 5 star rating. He says that "Boplicity" ''"''slips in like the

birth of the cool ''Birth of the Cool'' is a compilation album by the American jazz trumpeter and bandleader Miles Davis. It was released in February or March 1957 through Capitol Records. It compiles eleven tracks recorded by Davis's nonet for the label over the ...

, deliberately laidback, smoldering underneath". Writing about the recordings of "The Bad And The Beautiful" and "Ballad Of The Sad Young Men" (with a reading from ''On The Road''), Cordle says they "become a cathartic ache in the heart as Murphy stretches his phrases nearly to the tensile limit of emotion, most like early Miles". Author, singer, musician, and composer Peter Jones notes that "Bop For Kerouac combines the sadness and the euphoria of the intertwined jazz and beatnik lifestyles that Murphy knew from the inside, but it isn't the crazed, ecstatic homage to bebop that one might expect...the overall tone is elegiac, and ballads dominate". Writer James Gavin said, "It remains, I think, his greatest achievement on record, and an album that I play to this day. It has all of the best of Mark and none of the worst of Mark." James Gavin calls the album "one of the most moving vocal albums in jazz". He finds the tracks with Kerouac readings highly evocative of the 1950s jazz club scene with Murphy an ideal storyteller to take you there. He singles out the

Lester Young Lester Willis Young (August 27, 1909 – March 15, 1959), nicknamed "Pres" or "Prez", was an American jazz tenor saxophonist and occasional clarinetist. Coming to prominence while a member of Count Basie's orchestra, Young was one of the most i ...

portrait in Joni Mitchell's lyrics to the Mingus tune "

Goodbye Pork Pie Hat "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat" is a jazz instrumental composed by Charles Mingus, originally recorded by his sextet in 1959 and released on his album '' Mingus Ah Um''. One of Mingus's best-known compositions, "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat" became a jazz sta ...

" and likens Richie Cole as the Young to Murphy's

Billie Holiday Billie Holiday (born Eleanora Fagan; April 7, 1915 – July 17, 1959) was an American jazz and swing music singer. Nicknamed "Lady Day" by her friend and music partner, Lester Young, Holiday made significant contributions to jazz music and pop ...

. Commenting on the ballads, Gavin finds those recordings capture the loneliness of the Beat lifestyle and likens Murphy's Kerouac readings to

Montgomery Clift Edward Montgomery Clift (October 17, 1920 – July 23, 1966) was an American actor. A four-time Academy Award nominee, he was known for his portrayal of "moody, sensitive young men", according to ''The New York Times''. He is best remembered f ...

in vocal expressivity. In an article for the ''

Village Voice ''The Village Voice'' is an American news and culture publication based in Greenwich Village, New York City, known for being the country's first alternative newsweekly. Founded in 1955 by Dan Wolf, Ed Fancher, John Wilcock, and Norman Ma ...

'' Gavin calls ''Bop for Kerouac'' a masterpiece with a "gripping portrait of the '50's underworld".

Track listing

# "Be-Bop Lives ( Boplicity)" (

, Ray Passman, Holli Ross) – 6:39 #"

" (

Joni Mitchell Roberta Joan Mitchell (née Anderson; born November 7, 1943) is a Canadian and American singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and painter. As one of the most influential singer-songwriters to emerge from the 1960s folk music circuit, Mitch ...

) – 4:53 #"

" (

King Pleasure King Pleasure (born Clarence Beeks; March 24, 1922 – March 21, 1982) was an American jazz vocalist and an early master of vocalese, where a singer sings words to a well-known instrumental solo. Biography Born as Clarence Beeks in Oakdale, ...

) – 4:33 #*Includes a reading from ''

'' by

#"You Better Go Now" (Irvin Graham, Bickley Reichner) – 3:26 #"You've Proven Your Point (Bongo Beep)" (Charlie Parker) – 3:47 #"The Bad and the Beautiful" (

David Raksin David Raksin (August 4, 1912 – August 9, 2004) was an American composer who was noted for his work in film and television. Raksin had more than 100 film scores and 300 television scores to his credit. Some sources called him the "Grandfather of ...

Dory Previn Dorothy Veronica "Dory" Previn (née Langan; October 22, 1925 – February 14, 2012) was an American lyricist, singer-songwriter and poet. During the late 1950s and 1960s, Previn was a lyricist on songs intended for motion pictures and, with h ...

) – 3:54 #" Down St. Thomas Way" (

, Ray Passman, Herb Wasserman) – 5:06 #"

Ballad of the Sad Young Men The Ballad of the Sad Young Men (1958) is a popular song with music by Tommy Wolf and lyrics by Fran Landesman written for the 1959 Off-Broadway musical ''The Nervous Set''. The song depicts young men, sitting alone in bars, "drinking up the night ...

" (

Tommy Wolf Thomas Joseph Wolf Jr. (1925 – 1979) was an American composer and piano player. He was best known for his songwriting collaboration with Fran Landesman. Life Born in St. Louis, Missouri, Wolf met Fran Landesman while playing piano at the Jeffers ...

Fran Landesman Fran Landesman (born Frances Deitsch; October 21, 1927 – July 23, 2011) was an American lyricist and Poetry, poet. She grew up in New York City and lived for years in St. Louis, Missouri, where her husband Jay Landesman operated the Crystal Pal ...

) – 7:37 #*Includes a reading from ''

'' by Jack Kerouac

Personnel

; Performance * Mark Murphy – vocals *

Bob Magnusson Bob Magnusson (born February 24, 1947, in New York) is an American jazz bassist. Career Magnusson studied French horn for 12 years before switching to bass in 1967. He toured with Buddy Rich's Orchestra in 1968 and played with the San Diego Symph ...

– bass * Luther Hughes – bass *

Jeff Hamilton Jeff Hamilton is the name of: *Jeff Hamilton (1840–1941), enslaved man and free servant of the Houston family. See Sam Houston and slavery § Jeff Hamilton *Jeff Hamilton (drummer) (born 1953), jazz drummer *Jeff Hamilton (baseball) Jeffrey Ro ...

– drums *

Roy McCurdy Roy McCurdy (born November 28, 1936) is a jazz drummer. Early life McCurdy began playing drums around the age of 10 in his hometown of Rochester and took lessons from Eastman percussionist Bill Street as a teenager. He spent three years in the A ...

– drums *

– keyboards, arranger, conductor * Richie Cole – alto saxophone, tenor saxophone *

– guitar * Michael Spiro – percussion ; Production * Jim Mooney –

engineer Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who Invention, invent, design, build, maintain and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials. They aim to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while ...

* Bill Mays – producer * J.P. ‘‘Really Happy’’ Kuhn – cover * Cathleen W. Chin – photography * Mark Murphy – liner notes

References

External links

*
Bop for Kerouac
' at

MusicBrainz MusicBrainz is a MetaBrainz project that aims to create a collaborative music database that is similar to the freedb project. MusicBrainz was founded in response to the restrictions placed on the CDDB, Compact Disc Database (CDDB), a database for ...

(release group) *
Bop for Kerouac
' at

Discogs Discogs ( ; short for " discographies") is a database of information about audio recordings, including commercial releases, promotional releases, and bootleg or off-label releases. Database contents are user-generated, and described in ''T ...

(release) *
''Bop for Kerouac''
at

(release) * ''

Bop for Kerouac ''Bop for Kerouac'' is a 1981 studio album by Mark Murphy. ''Bop for Kerouac'' is the 18th recorded album by American jazz vocalist Mark Murphy. It was released by Muse in the United States in 1981 when Murphy was 49 years old. The release is ...

'' at

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...

* ''Bop for Kerouac'' in
The Virgin Encyclopedia of Popular Music
' at Internet Archive * ''Bop for Kerouac'' i
MusicHound Jazz
at Internet Archive * ''Bop for Kerouac'' in
The Penguin Guide to Jazz
' at Internet Archive * ''Bop for Kerouac'' in
The Rolling Stone Jazz & Blues Album Guide
' at Internet Archive *
Ted Pankin Mark Murphy interviews and liner notes
{{Authority control 1981 albums Mark Murphy (singer) albums Adaptations of works by Jack Kerouac