Otherwise, we have a jazzy show, some so-called "desert blues," some jazzy new music, a leftover from the Rite of Spring show a few weeks back, and more.
See the playlist (plus some notes, and some more thoughts on Cecil Taylor) after the break...
Pots seems to be a (successful) attempt
for Cecil to spread his piano concept out across the ensemble, at
least in the written-out sections. In later years it seems the idea
was he did his thing while the other players did theirs - that is,
their thing in a space defined by his.
(Now that I think about it, Johnny Carisi was probably not really an up-and-coming composer in 1961, he did, after all, have a tune on Birth of the Cool ten or twelve years earlier.)
(Now that I think about it, Johnny Carisi was probably not really an up-and-coming composer in 1961, he did, after all, have a tune on Birth of the Cool ten or twelve years earlier.)
My regret at not seeing the
Taylor-Parker-Bendian trio at their Western Front show in 1989 is not
just reading all these people refer rapturously about it almost
thirty years on, but is compounded by my seeing Taylor and Parker
play a year or so later with a far less subtle drummer who seemed to
wish to fill up the entire sonic spectrum with his cymbal playing.
When he would all too momentarily lay out, it was like a fog being
lifted from over the rest of the band, or when a staticy radio
station finally comes in clearly. The Western Front show was also
likely 21+, which I was not at the time, so that might have been part
of it, too. Alex Ross (who's about a year-and-a-half older than me)
mentions that show here.
Ross also brings up Branford Marsalis'
quote on Cecil from the Ken Burns' Jazz series. Frankly, to consider
Taylor's music to be “total self-indulgent bullshit” is to be
guilty of the same. Sadly, this was the predominant view of any jazz
from Ornette Coleman and beyond during my time at Famous Music
College.
I spent a good chunk of Thursday and
Friday night digging through the unorganized boxes of CDs that
dominate my bedroom looking for my copies of It Is in the Brewing
Luminous and New York City R&B. I hadn't listened to either in
ages, but felt I couldn't do this program without them. Despite
consisting of one sixty-nine minute track, I recalled Luminous as having
several distinct sections, one of which I hoped would be of
reasonable enough length to extract. There's a fascinating section
where Cecil improvises against Jerome Cooper's cymbals (that may show
up on a later program), but since any retrospective of Cecil Taylor's
is incomplete without a consideration of Jimmy Lyons, his alto sax
collaborator of twenty-plus years (alto-ego?), his second solo,
fifteen of the last twenty minutes, is what I chose.
This process ended close to midnight,
so I wasn't quite up to giving New York City R&B the same level of review. I remembered O. P. as featuring
the co-leaders rather well, and added it to the playlist hoping it
held up to the memory. (It does!)
artist
|
title
|
album
|
comments
|
label / date
|
| Katie Lee | Real Sick Sounds | Songs of Couch and Consultation | 1st part of theme | Commentary Records 1957 |
| Naked City | Inside Straight | Naked City | 2nd part of theme | Nonesuch Records 1989 |
| Cecil Taylor Unit | Pots | Into the Hot | Cecil Taylor (p) Jimmy Lyons (as) Archie Shepp (ts) Henry
Grimes (b) Jimmy Murray (d) album credited to Gil Evans |
Impulse! 1961 |
| Dave Douglas | Stargazer | Stargazer | Dave Douglas (trp) Chris Speed (ts) Josh Roseman (tbn) Uri Caine (p) James Genus (b) Joey Baron (d) | Arabesque 1996 |
| Sun Ra | Unmask The Batman | Of Abstract Dreams | Sun Ra (p) John Gilmore (ts) Marshall Allen (flt, as) Danny Ray
Thompson (bs, prc) Atakatune (obe, cng) Eddie Thomas (d) Elo Omoe
(b clt, handclaps) Akh Tal Ebah (trp, voc) James Jacson (cgn, voc) from the Bandcamp page - “most likely recorded at the WXPN FM radio studios in Philadelphia, 1974-5” |
Strut 1974 or '75 |
| Wayne Horvitz | This New Generation | This New Generation | music behind DJ | Nonesuch 1985 |
| Jessica Lauren | Kofi Nomad (Radio Edit) | Kofi Nomad | Jessica Lauren (keys) Tamar Osborn (bs) Richard Ọlátúndé Baker, Phillip Harper (prc) Cosimo Keita Cadore (d) | Freestyle Records 2018 |
| Cecil Taylor | Pethro Visiting the Abyss | In Florescence | Cecil Taylor (p) William Parker (b) Gregg Bendian (d) | A&M 1989 |
| Kristan Jarvi / Absolute Ensemble | Dance Maschine | Absolution | music by Shafer Mahoney | enja 1999 |
| Dorothy Ashby | Moonlight in Vermont | The Jazz Harpist | Dorothy Ashby (hrp) Frank Wess (flt) Herman Wright (b) Arthur Taylor (d) song by Karl Suessdorf and John Blackburn originally from the album Hip Harp |
Fresh Sound Records 1958 |
| Eric Hofbauer Quintet | Dancing out of the Earth | Prehistoric Jazz, Volume 1 (The Rite of Spring) | Eric Hofbauer (g) Jerry Sabatini (trp) Todd Brunel (clt, b clt)
Junko Fujiwara (vc) Curt Newton (d, prc) music by Igor Stravinsky |
Creative Nation Music 2014 |
| Spaceheads | Trip To The Moon | Trip To The Moon EP | music behind DJ | Electric Brass 2014 |
| Tinariwen | Tilliaden Osamnat | Tassili | Ibrahim Ag Alhabib (g, voc, song) Alhassane Ag Touhami (voc, prc) Eyadou Ag Leche (g, b, prc, handclaps, voc) Elaga Ag Hamid (g, handclaps, voc) Said Ag Ayad, Mohamad Ag Tahada, Mustapha Ag Ahmed (handclaps, voc) | Anti- 2010 |
| Asiko Rock Group | Lagos City | Asiko Rock Group | music behind DJ | EMI Nigeria 1972 |
| Cecil Taylor & Buell Neidlinger | O. P. | New York City R&B | Cecil Taylor (p) Buell Neidlinger (b, tune) Billy Higgins (d,
tmp) tune dedicated to Oscar Pettiford |
Candid 1961 |
| Cathy Berberian | The Wonderful Widow of 18 Springs | magnifiCathy - The Many Voices of Cathy Berberian | Cathy Berberian (voc) Bruno Canino (p)
music by John Cage, text by James Joyce |
Wergo 1970 |
| Code Girl | The Unexpected Natural Phenomenon | Code Girl | Mary Halvorson (g) Amirtha Kidambi (voc) Ambrose Akinmusire (trp) Michael Formanek (b) Tomas Fujiwara (d) | Firehouse 12 2016 |
| Sviatoslav Richter | Etude Op. 65 - No. 2 in C# | Great Pianists of the 20th Century, Vol. 84 - Sviatoslav Richter III | composed by Alexander Scriabin | Phillips 1952 |
| Cecil Taylor | It Is in the Brewing Luminous [excerpt] | It Is in the Brewing Luminous | Cecil Taylor (p) Jimmy Lyons (as) Ramsey Ameen (vln) Alan Silva (b, vc) Jerome Cooper (d, stereo left) Sunny Murray (d, stereo right) | hat art 1980 |
| Charles Mingus and His Jazz Groups | Gunslinging Bird (or, If Charlie Parker was a gunslinger, there'd be a whole lot of dead copycats) |
Mingus Dynasty | Charles Mingus (b) Richard Williams (trp) Jimmy Knepper (tbn) Jerome Richardson (flt, bs) John Handy (as) Booker Ervin, Benny Golson (ts) Teddy Charles (vbs) Roland Hanna (p) Dannie Richmond (d, tmp) | Columbia Jazz Masterpeices 1959 |
| Herbie Hancock | Earth Beat | Future Shock | music behind DJ | Columbia 1983 |
| Miles Davis | One and One | On the Corner | Miles Davis (trp) Carlos Garnett (as, ts) Bennie Maupin (b clt) Herbie Hancock, Harold I. Williams (el-p, syn) Lonnie Liston Smith (org) John McLaughlin, David Creamer (g) Collin Walcott (sitar) Paul Buckmaster (vc) Michael Henderson (b) Jack De Johnette, Jabali Billy Hart (d, handclaps) Charles Don Alias, James Mtume Forman (prc, handclaps) Badal Roy (tabla, handclaps) | Columbia 1972 |
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