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Category: saxophone

2011

Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Happy (75th) Birthday, Albert!

Albert Ayler, tenor saxophonist, July 13, 1936-November 25, 1970

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Albert Ayler Trio (Albert Ayler, ts; Gary Peacock, bass; Sunny Murray, drums), Spiritual Unity (ESP), 1964

“Ghosts: First Variation”

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“The Wizard”

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“Spirits”

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“Ghosts: Second Variation”

More? Here. And here. 

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lagniappe

random thoughts

OK, let’s talk physics. One problem with the term “free jazz” is that it suggests a sound world in which there’s no center of gravity—a world where everything pushes outward, where centrifugal force rules. But the reality, with many of the greatest artists, is different. Centripetal, not centrifugal, force is king. The musicians push inward, not outward, toward a center none ever inhabits individually but, collectively, they are always moving toward.

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The contributions of Gary Peacock and Sunny Murray are hard to overstate. Sidemen? There are none.

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Like Ornette Coleman, Albert Ayler is at heart a blues musician—one who, like Ornette, expanded the blues vocabulary.

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radio

Today, from noon to 9 p.m. (EST), WKCR-FM (broadcasting from Columbia University) is all Albert Ayler.

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2011

Friday, 7/8/11

It takes a village, in Fela’s world, to put on a show.

Fela Anikulapo Kuti, October 15, 1938-August 2, 1997

Live, Paris, 1981

Part 1

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Part 2

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1938 Born 15 October in Abeokuta, Nigeria to politically active and middle class family.

1958 Sent to London to train as a doctor, but instead enrolled in the Trinity College of Music. Formed Koola Lobitos in 1961.

1969 Took Koola Lobitos to Los Angeles. His political zeal was fired when he befriended radical black activists including Angela Davis.

1971 Kuti renames his band Afrika 70 (and later Eygpt 80), and, newly politicised, he determines to give voice to Nigeria’s underclass.

1974 After he enraged the Nigerian establishment, the army almost destroyed Kuti’s home while trying to arrest him.

1977 In a second government-sanctioned attack, 1,000 soldiers descended on Kuti’s compound. He suffered a fractured skull, arm and leg in the onslaught and his 82-year old mother was thrown from an upstairs window. He left for voluntary exile in Ghana.

1978 Ghanian authorities deported Kuti back to Lagos. On his arrival he married 27 women simultaneously. Divorcing them in 1986, he said: ‘ no man has the right to own a woman’s vagina’.

1979 Founded his own political party MOP (Movement of the People)

1984 Jailed in Nigeria for five years on what was regarded as sham currency smuggling charges, and released in 1986 after a change of government.

1996 Arrested and released on an alleged drug charge.

1997 Died of complications from Aids aged 59.

—Peter Culshaw, The Guardian, 8/15/04

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2011

Sunday, 7/3/11

This guy I can’t get enough of.

Vernard Johnson, “Don’t Wait ’Til The Battle Is Over, Shout Now!”; live, TV broadcast (Bobby Jones Gospel)

Vodpod videos no longer available.

Time for just one note? 6:23.

More? Here. And here.

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lagniappe

art beat

Lee Friedlander, Cherry Blossom Time in Japan (2006)

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reading table

Yesterday, opening my Emily Dickinson collection (The Poems of Emily Dickinson, edited by R. W. Franklin) at random, I came upon this.

We do not play on Graves —
Because there isn’t Room —
Besides — it isn’t even — it slants
And People come —

And put a Flower on it —
And hang their faces so —
We’re fearing that their Hearts will drop —
And crush our pretty play —

And so we move as far
As Enemies — away —
Just looking round to see how far
It is — Occasionally —

—Emily Dickinson (#599)

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listening room: what’s playing

• Echocord Jubilee Comp. (Echocord)

• Art Ensemble of Chicago, Full Force (ECM)

• Art Ensemble of Chicago, Urban Bushmen (ECM)

• Paul Motian (with Lee Konitz, soprano & alto saxophones; Joe Lovano, tenor saxophone; Bill Frisell, guitar; Charlie Haden, bass), On Broadway Vol. 3 (Winter & Winter)

• Rebirth Brass Band, Feel Like Funkin’ It Up (Rounder)

• Marc Ribot, Silent Movies (Pi Recordings)

• Wadada Leo Smith, Kabell Years: 1971-1979 (Tzadik)

• Charles “Baron” Mingus, West Coast, 1945-49 (Uptown Jazz)

• John Alexander’s Sterling Jubilee Singers, Jesus Hits Like The Atom Bomb (New World Records)

• Rev. Johnny L. Jones, The Hurricane That Hit Atlanta (Dust-to-Digital)

• Elliott Carter, composer; Ursula Oppens, piano; Oppens Plays Carter (Cedille)

• Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern, composers; Maurizio Pollini, piano, piano works (Schoenberg), Variations Op. 27 (Webern) (Deutsche Grammophon)

• Morton Feldman, For Bunita Marcus, Stephane Ginsburgh, piano (Sub Rosa)

• WKCR-FM (broadcasting from Columbia University)
—Bird Flight (Phil Schaap, jazz [Charlie Parker])
—Traditions in Swing (Phil Schaap, jazz)
—Daybreak Express (Various, jazz)
—Out to Lunch (Various, jazz)
—Jazz Profiles (Various, jazz)
—Jazz Alternatives (Various, jazz)
—Morning Classical (Various, classical)
—Afternoon New Music (Various, classical and hard-to-peg)
—Eastern Standard Time (Carter Van Pelt, Jamaican music)

• WFMU-FM
—Mudd Up! (DJ/Rupture, “new bass and beats”)
—Sinner’s Crossroads (Kevin Nutt, gospel)
—Give The Drummer Some (Doug Schulkind, sui generis)
—Downtown Soulville with Mr. Fine Wine (soul)

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2011

Friday, 7/1/11

scenes from New Orleans
(an occasional series)

Rebirth Brass Band, live, Maple Leaf Bar (where RBB plays Tuesday nights), New Orleans, 2011

“Big Chief”

Vodpod videos no longer available.

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“I Like It Like That”

Vodpod videos no longer available.

More? Here. And here. And here. And here.

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2011

Saturday, 6/25/11

nadir, n. the lowest point.

On July 29, 1946, Charlie Parker was arrested in Los Angeles, after starting a fire in his hotel room. Earlier that day, unable to score heroin, scratchy, drunk on whiskey, he recorded this track, which, depending on your point of view, is either one of the worst records he ever made (Parker’s view) or, despite (because of?) its raggedyness, among the greatest (Charles Mingus’s opinion). After his arrest he was confined, for six months, at Camarillo State Mental Hospital.

Charlie Parker, “Lover Man” (CP, alto saxophone; Howard McGhee, trumpet; Jimmy Bunn, piano; Bob Kesterson, bass; Roy Porter, drums), rec. 7/29/46

More? Here.

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lagniappe

rewarding the deserving

So often, it seems, when arts awards are announced, my initial reaction is: “Huh?” Not this time. The National Endowment of the Arts just announced their 2012 Jazz Masters Awards, which recognize, with Lifetime Honors, “living musicians for career-long achievement.” And the winners are Jack DeJohnette, Jimmy Owens, Charlie Haden, Sheila Jordan, and Von Freeman.

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reading table

The cafeteria in the hospital’s basement was the saddest place in the world, with its grim neon lights and gray tabletops and the diffuse forboding of those who had stepped away from suffering children to have a grilled cheese sandwich.

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The next day, I set up an iPod dock and played music, not only in the willfully delusional belief that music would be good for a painful, recovering brain but also to counter the soul-crushing hospital noise: the beeping of monitors, the wheezing of respirators, the indifferent chatter of nurses in the hallway, the alarm that went off whenever a patient’s condition abruptly worsened.

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One early morning, driving to the hospital, I saw a number of able-bodied, energetic runners progressing along Fullerton Avenue toward the sunny lakefront, and I had a strong physical sensation of being in an aquarium: I could see out, the people outside could see me (if they chose to pay attention), but we were living and breathing in entirely different environments.

—Aleksandar Hemon, “The Aquarium: A Child’s Isolating Illness” (behind a paywall), New Yorker, 6/13 & 20/2011

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2011

Wednesday, 6/22/11

His blues seem bottomless.

Arnett Cobb, tenor saxophonist, August 10, 1918-March 24, 1989

“Texas Blues,” live (with Ellis Marsalis, piano; Chris Severin, bass; Johnny Vidacovich, drums), 1984, New Orleans

Vodpod videos no longer available.

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“The Nearness of You” (mislabeled “Misty” on YouTube), live (with Wild Bill Davis, piano; Bernard Upsom, bass; Frankie Dunlop, drums), 1982, Germany (Berlin)

Vodpod videos no longer available.

One of my favorite moments comes at 2:48: “I hear ya, I hear ya.”

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2011

Monday, 6/20/11

Here’s another take on the blues.

Ben Webster Quartet (BW, tenor saxophone; Stan Tracey, piano; Rick Laird, bass; Jackie Dougan, drums), “Poutin’,” live

Vodpod videos no longer available.

More? Here. And here. And here.

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lagniappe

Sonny Rollins, Joe Lovano, et al., talk about Ben Webster

Vodpod videos no longer available.

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mail

You are sending out some great stuff at all times. . . . It’s always interesting, and the one you sent out today, Onmutu Mechanicks, was especially cool, since I hadn’t ever crossed their path.

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2011

Thursday, 6/9/11

kaleidoscopic, adj. 1. changing form, pattern, color, etc., in a manner suggesting a kaleidoscope. 2. continually shifting from one set of relations to another. E.g., the music of the Art Ensemble of Chicago.

Art Ensemble of Chicago (Roscoe Mitchell, saxophone; Joseph Jarman, saxophone; Lester Bowie, trumpet; Malachi Favors, bass; Don Moye, drums), live, Europe, 1980s

Part 1

Vodpod videos no longer available.

One of my all-time favorite musicians—no matter the instrument, no matter the genre—is the guy playing bass. If I’m feeling down, he lifts me up. If I’m feeling good, he makes things even better.

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Part 2

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How many trumpeters play so many different colors?

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Part 3

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Part 4

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Part 5

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Part 6

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Avant-garde? Their use of polyphony recalls the earliest New Orleans jazz.

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Part 7

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How many musicians not only roam so widely but swing so hard?

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lagniappe

more

Art Ensemble of Chicago with Fontella Bass, “Theme de Yoyo” (1970)

More? Here.

2 Comments
2011

Monday, 6/6/11

sui generis, adj. A person or thing that is unique, in a class by itself. E.g., Anthony Braxton, composer, reed player, professor, MacArthur “genius” grant winner, one-time professional chess hustler.

Happy (Belated 66th) Birthday, Anthony!
(born June 4, 1945)

Anthony Braxton with his 12+1tet, Ghost Trance Music
New York (Iridium), 2008

Vodpod videos no longer available.

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lagniappe

musical thoughts

I wanted to live. I wanted to be alive. This experience goes by very quickly. Part of the radiance of a moment, in my opinion, involves that which we call music.

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Suddenly, Coltrane solos become the “it” of music, when in fact, the records and the notated solos are the sonic footprints, the bone structure of what actually happened in the music.

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I wanted a system that would be equal to the dynamics of curiosity. I wanted to have a music where I could have some fun.

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There is the wonderful discipline of music and the ability of music to keep on opening up fresh prospects. I must say, what a discipline!

—Anthony Braxton

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2011

Monday, 5/30/11

Today we remember him with a mix of new clips and old favorites.

Gil Scott-Heron, April 1, 1949-May 27, 2011

new clips

“The Bottle,” live, Jamaica (Montego Bay, Reggae Sunsplash), 1983
Cool Runnings: The Reggae Movie (1983)

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“We Almost Lost Detroit,” live, Austria (Vienna), 2010

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Interview, England (London), 2010

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old favorites

Here’s a voice I didn’t know if I’d ever hear again.

Gil Scott-Heron, I’m New Here (out this week)

“Where Did The Night Go” (Gil Scott-Heron)

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“Me And The Devil” (Robert Johnson)

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lagniappe

I’ve had bad times in my life when I’d rather be somewhere else doing something else, for sure. But you get to my age, that shit happens. You get in trouble; you maybe lose some folks—a parent or a friend. Maybe your marriage breaks up, you lose your wife, lose touch with your kid. But what life does not have those things in it?—Gil Scott-Heron (in yesterday’s Guardian)

(Orignially posted 2/8/10.)

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I’m the person I see least of over the course of my life, and even what I see is not accurate.

—Gil Scott-Heron (New Yorker, 8/9/2010 [Alec Wilkinson, “New York Is Killing Me”])

Gil Scott-Heron, “I’m New Here” (2010)

(Originally posted 8/24/10.)

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It’s a remix world.

Gil Scott-Heron, “New York Is Killing Me” (2010), Chris Cunningham remix

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lagniappe

Here’s the original track, followed by a couple more remixes.

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With Nas

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With Mos Def

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langiappe

musical thoughts

In the dark times, will there also be singing? Yes, there will be singing. About the dark times.

—Bertolt Brecht

(Originally posted 12/16/10.)

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langiappe

remembrances

Alec Wilkinson (New Yorker)

Richard Russell (XL Recordings; produced and released GSH’s last album)

Eminem, Chuck D, Cee Low Green, Talib Kweli, et al.

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