Mark Turner on "The Man I Love"
The quarter note plays a big role in the Mark Turner sound, I think. I'm not sure what it is exactly, but there's something intensely pointed and focused about these lines of quarter notes, and they're in full display on this burning "The Man I Love," from Warner Jams, Vol. 2: The Two Tenors (also easily identifiable on other solos from the same record, like "The Plain But The Simple Truth" ). I remember being mesmerized as a teenager by Stan Getz's use of long, two-repeated-eighth-note melodies (the intro to "S-H-I-N-E" from West Coast Jazz might be the most obvious example), but aside from the technical aspect of its execution, I remember being able to hear the melodic improvised line more clearly—basically because there were half as many pitches in the same amount of time as an eighth note line. Mark's quarter note lines end up having a similar effect: aside from giving him and listener a break from the dense, substitution a...