DAVE BRUBECK - Time Out

When he was Editor-in-Chief of « Down Beat » (1959-1962), Gene Lees recounted that for a long time — he’d been « intimidated » by the number of potential opponents, and given to believe that he could not possess alone a truth rejected by the immense majority of his fellows — he didn’t have the guts to stand up to them and admit the respect that Dave Brubeck’s undertaking had inspired in him. Lees limited himself, with prudence, to noting Dave’s aptitude for composing. Until, that is, his friend Oscar Peterson, the pianist he placed above all others, declared to him that appreciating Dave’s playing was the most legitimate attitude he could adopt : it was the duty of anyone who knew how to listen. In a portrait published while Brubeck was still of this world, The Man On The Buffalo Nickel, Lees concluded : « The public was right ; the critics were wrong. Dave Brubeck, part Modoc Indian, is one of the great jazz musicians.” In any case, that is what he became, which is perhaps even more glorious.

Text by Alain Gerber