| I think you are overlooking Cliffords contribution as a writer as well. Great tunes like Jordu, and Joy Spring are just a small taste of what could have been. I don't think anyone could say that Clifford or Lee would or wouldn't be innovative, as they were really in the infancy of their playing... I mean Clifford had only been playing 11 years at the time of his death.
Take Chet Baker and Miles, West Coast vs East Coast, both in the "Cool Jazz" Era, and very much battling each other through the entire era. Chet was not an innovator and Miles was. Why? Miles was looking forward and Chet was content to play My Funny Valentine every show for 40 years.
In the 50's Chet was very much the "golden boy" of the west coast jazz scene, and was even voted "Best Jazz Trumpeter" by Downbeat over Clifford, Dizzy and Miles... come on? How does that work?
Nobody can say this person could've would've or should've done anything... Clifford could have found heroin 5 years down the line and gone the Chet path. Or he could've been the innovator that Coltrane and Miles were... no one knows.
-J
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Bach 37
3C |