Robert P
Heavyweight Member
Joined: 28 Feb 2013
Posts: 2595
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 Posted: Mon May 01, 2023 11:14 pm Post subject: |
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| trickg wrote: |
| Robert P wrote: | | Later career Maynard was in terrible physical condition and he still had a strong high range. |
I went to hear Maynard a number of times in those later years and it seemed to me that his physical condition hampered his playing a good bit. I'd heard stories about Maynard from when he was in his prime where he was a monster - he could play continuously all night with accuracy, range and power. In those later years the songs were all structured to make the most out of the gas in the tank he had left, and he let his stable of young stallion players do the heavy lifting while he did lines here and there. He still had the sound power and the range, but it was in short bursts.
One of the times I went to hear Maynard we went with friends, one of whom was a registered nurse. She thought Maynard looked like he could have collapsed at any point in the middle of the show from the way he was breathing. We were at Blues Alley in Georgetown, so we weren't very far from him - close enough she could see and hear the way he was breathing.
All of that goes to show that it's probably a player's ability to move and control their airstream more than brute strength. |
I was just watching an interview with Maynard getting near the end of his life and I was struck by his labored breathing, like an asthmatic - it's amazing he could play at all. Yet he could still hit loud double Cs.
In his younger days he was a beast - have you seen the video of him playing "Maynard Ferguson" and "Viva Prado" live on the Ed Sullivan show?
Doc kept himself in fantastic physical shape - in his Never Too Late movie they show one of his workouts - he wasn't doing "old man" physical therapy workouts these were real gym rat workouts - preacher curls, squat machine, core work that would be challenging to you or me - he was past 90. Yet as he got toward and beyond 70 Doc's high range fell off, at least by his standards. By the time he retired he had a pretty decent reliable F and that was about it. Like I say - by his standards, most people would be tickled to have as easy a high F. At one time he could punch a hole in a wall with a dub C.
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