Playlist, Week of 2024-03-24

Busy week, with Big Ears taking up most of the listening time... there may be a Big Ears report at some point... Best of show: Ingrid Laubrock, Myra Melford, Kris Davis, Ches Smith, Tomeka Reid...

Playlist 2024-03-25:

*Muhal Richard Abrams: Vision Towards Essence
*Jon Anderson: Olias of Sunhillow
*Rodger Coleman and Sam Byrd: 2023-12-29 Nashville (rough mix wav)
*Miles Davis: The Complete Jack Johnson Sessions (disc 5)
*Dave Douglas: Five
*Grateful Dead: 1974-07-25 Chicago (CDR) "Dark Star"
*Jefferson Pilot: The Return of Troubled Youth Orchestra "TYO/Open Your Eyes"
*Roscoe Mitchell and the Note Factory: 1994-08-28 Saalfelden (CDR)
*New Ting: 2024-03-04 "Slippery Traffic" (wav)
*Richard Pinhas: Tranzition

*David Sancious and Tone: Transformation (The Speed of Love) "Transformation (The Speed of Love)"
*Sharp/Lopez/Kaiser/Amendola: Minus X: A Tribute to the Music of Iannis Xenakis (disc 2)
*Wayne Shorter: 2010-10-27 Zurich (CDR)
*Ches Smith: Laugh Ash
*Sun Ra: Blue Delight "They Dwell on Other Planes"
*UYA: 1992-11-03: The Jazz Stains (wav)
*Anna Webber: Shimmer Wince
*John Zorn: Bagatelles Vol. 9: Asmodeus

Reading List, Week of 2024-03-24

Reading List 2024-03-25:

*Sorrentino, Gilbert. Little Casino (reread/started)
*Austen, Jane. Sense and Sensibility (reread/finished)
*Mendelson, Cheryl. Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Keeping House (in progress)
*Shakespeare, William. Timon of Athens (Arden 2nd ed., ed. H.J. Oliver) (reread/in progress)

Tim Berne Trio at the Camel, RVA

Excellent show last night from Tim Berne, with Gregg Belisle-Chi on guitar and Tom Rainey on drums. This was the first time I'd seen Rainey, and he was a pleasure to watch. Berne's knotty compositions were the perfect framework for Rainey to build slowly-evolving sound constructions. Rainey is not a timid player. Berne's razor-sharp tone was in full effect. A fascinating show, and a great appetizer for Big Ears...

 

Playlist, Week of 2024-03-17

These four medium-sized big band Muhal Richard Abrams studio recordings from the early '90s all kind of run together in my mind... I obviously need to listen to them more in order to differentiate them... there's a lot going on in them, with each piece stylistically its own thing... Something I need to come to terms with: I am not so fond of his synthesizer work... what he's playing is fine, and fits in with the pieces, sort of, but it feels like he is using manufacturer pre-set tones... perhaps it's grossly unfair to compare his synth work with Sun Ra's, but who else in the jazz big band universe employs synthesizers in these ways? (I'm sure there are others.... let me know who I'm missing...)... to me, Sun Ra's use of synthesizers is more organic and inventive, and is better integrated into the music... but (in all seriousness) what do I know? Muhal's synthesizer work doesn't move me like Ra's does... This coming week I'll be taking a short break from my Muhal Richard Abrams deep dive... I'll be attending Big Ears and thus will be otherwise preoccupied! Will pick it back up the week after... 

Playlist 2024-03-18:

*Muhal Richard Abrams Sextet: 1973-11-04 Berlin (CDR)
*Muhal Richard Abrams: 1986-03-28 Charlottesville VA (CDR)
*Muhal Richard Abrams: FamilyTalk
*Muhal Richard Abrams: Think All Focus One
*Muhal Richard Abrams: Song for All
*Muhal Richard Abrams: One Line, Two Views
*Louis Armstrong: The Louis Armstrong Story Vol. 3: Louis Armstrong and Earl Hines (side 1)
*Art Ensemble of Chicago: Non-Cognitive Aspects of the City: Live at Iridium (disc 2)
*Daniel Barbiero/Cristiano Bocci: Now/Here
*Paul Bley: Live in Haarlem
*Terri Lyne Carrington: New Standards, Vol. 1
*Rodger Coleman and Sam Byrd: 2023-12-29 Nashville (rough mix wav)
*John Coltrane: The Prestige Recordings (disc 11)
*Chick Corea: The Complete "Is" Sessions (disc 2)
*Bob Dylan: Highway 61 Revisited (side 2)
*Duke Ellington: The Best of Duke Ellington (side 2)
*Duke Ellington and His Orchestra: The Treasury Shows, Vol. 6 (disc 1)
*Farmers By Nature: Love and Ghosts "Aquilo"
*Kate Gentile: Find Letter X (disc 2)
*Samuel Goff: Transmissions
*Grateful Dead: 1973-06-10 Washington DC (CDR) (disc 4)
*Grateful Dead: 1990-03-19 Hartford CT (CDR) (disc 1)
*Mary Halvorson: Cloudward
*Andrew Hill Trio: 1972 Yellow Springs, OH (CDR)
*London Jazz Composers Orchestra featuring Anthony Braxton: 1988-03-25 Basel, Switzerland (CDR) (disc 2)
*Charles Mingus and His Jazz Groups: Mingus Dynasty (side 1)
*Roscoe Mitchell and the Note Factory: 2000-09-02 Chicago (CDR)
*Roscoe Mitchell: Not Yet: Six Compositions
*National Health: National Health (side 1)
*New Ting: 2024-03-04 "Slippery Traffic" (wav)
*Sam Rivers: Sizzle (side 1)
*Ernesto Rodrigues/Guilherme Rodrigues/Daniel Barbiero: [The] Nature [of Things] Likes to Hide
*Ches Smith: Laugh Ash
*Soft Machine: Fourth (side 2)
*Sparks: Propaganda (sides 1, 2)
*Sparks: The Rest of Sparks (side 1)
*Sparks: Big Beat (sides 1, 2)
*Sun Ra And His Intergalactic Research Arkestra: Paradiso Amsterdam 1970
*Sun Ra and His Arkestra: Saturn XIII (side 1)
*Sun Ra and His Arkestra: Omniverse (side 2)
*Cecil Taylor Quartet: In Europe (side 1)
*Cecil Taylor Feel Trio: Two Ts for a Lovely T (disc 7)
*Henry Threadgill Ensemble: The Other One
*UYA: 1992-10-27: The Flaw Won (wav)
*UYA: 1992-11-01: Actifact (wav)
*Various artists: 7 x 7
*Anna Webber: Shimmer Wince 

Reading List, Week of 2024-03-17

Reading List 2024-03-18:

*Austen, Jane. Sense and Sensibility (reread/started)
*Shakespeare, William. Timon of Athens (Arden 2nd ed., ed. H.J. Oliver) (reread/started)
*Carroll, Emily. A Guest in the House (started/finished)
*Empson, William. Seven Types of Ambiguity (finished)
*Paulo, Joaquim. Jazz Covers (finished)
*Subitzky, Ed. Poor Helpless Comics! The Cartoons (and More) of Ed Subitzky (finished)
*Mendelson, Cheryl. Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Keeping House (in progress)

 

Cecil Taylor: Memories and Some Resources

 

Six years after his death, I find myself listening to Cecil Taylor as much as I ever have. I was lucky enough to see him several times. The first time was one of the greatest concerts of my life: the Unit at Blues Alley in Washington DC in 1980, for two sets of incredibly dense and unrelenting energy. Cecil Taylor, Jimmy Lyons, William Parker, Rashid Bakr. Blues Alley was a fairly small club, with no stage, and our table (me and my brother and our bemused but patient girlfriends) was directly in front, right in front of Cecil. The piano was angled so we could see his fingers and the piano keys from the angle of his right shoulder. This was almost too much to bear; I get chills thinking about it even now.

Afterwards we were lucky enough to talk to both Cecil and Jimmy Lyons (and yes, this white fanboy got their autographs on my copy of Spring of Two Blue-J's). They were both gentlemen, if a bit reticent and wary (I mean, after all, they had just exploded the cosmos for two hours), but they put up with us for a few minutes. What would I say to him now? Thanks again, for blowing my mind all these years?

Here's a random list of various resources and writing about Cecil Taylor that I have found useful over the years. It's hard to write about music, and it's especially difficult to write about the titanic maelstrom and towering achievements of a giant like Taylor, so I really appreciate it when I come across writing that manages to capture some of his intensity and originality in print. This list is not meant to be exhaustive by any means; this is just some of my favorite writing about Taylor: useful places to explore.

Gary Giddins has long been a champion of Taylor's, and his writing is always impeccably astute. The essays and reviews in Visions of Jazz (especially pp. 455-467) and Weather Bird are always enlightening, and, like any good music writing, send you back to the music.

Richard Cook and Brian Morton, in their exemplary Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD (my favorite edition is the 5th, the last to include an in-depth and indispensable index) always provide excellent reviews and critical assessments.

I love Ekkehard Jost's relatively early (1974) take on Cecil's music, in his book Free Jazz, with his description of Taylor's emphasis on "a kind of playing whose dynamic impetus arose not from off-beat phrasing but from combining the parameters of time, intensity and pitch, thereby creating a new music quality, energy"(p. 69).

Musician Alex Ward has done some amazing detailed analysis of Taylor's work, both on his blog and in three extended compilations on YouTube. There's a lifetime of listening in his analyses alone!

After Taylor's death, there were naturally a lot of testaments, tributes, and career summaries on the web. Some of the best included:

 

--Alexander Hawkins: "The Unit Structures of Cecil Taylor" (the Wire)

--Taylor Ho Bynum:  "Visceral and Cathartic Joy: An Appreciation of Cecil Taylor" (Point of Departure) with reminiscences of his playing in Cecil's large ensembles.

--Adam Shatz: "The World of Cecil Taylor" (the New York Review of Books)

--David Grundy: " '...And Not Goodbye': Cecil Taylor" Part 1 and Part 2 (from his blog Streams of Expression) --includes an invaluable extended analysis of Taylor's poetry

--the Free Jazz Collective blog ran an excellent three-part "tribute to Cecil Taylor's music through his discography": Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

I am looking forward to Phil Freeman's upcoming biography of Taylor, due out later this year. I also read somewhere that Ben Young was working on a Taylor book, but I have heard no more about that.

Playlist, Week of 2024-03-10

My Muhal Richard Abrams deep dive continues... as you can tell, I am repeating a lot of albums, since these recordings are so dense and rich and I love returning to them... I am starting to get into the later orchestra and medium-sized group albums, which I am less familiar with, and they sound great!... On Anthony Braxton's Creative Orchestra Music 1976, "Comp. 55" (side 2, track 2) has a beautifully compact Muhal piano solo... 

Playlist 2024-03-11:

*Muhal Richard Abrams: Spihumonesty
*Muhal Richard Abrams: Mama and Daddy (side 2)
*Muhal Richard Abrams Quintet: 1977-03-04 NYC (CDR) (disc 1)
*Muhal Richard Abrams Orchestra: The Hearinga Suite
*Muhal Richard Abrams Orchestra: Blu Blu Blu
*Muhal Richard Abrams Orchestra: 1991-11-01 Berlin (CDR)
*Muhal Richard Abrams: FamilyTalk
*Muhal Richard Abrams: Think All Focus One
*Art Ensemble of Chicago: Non-Cognitive Aspects of the City: Live at Iridium (disc 1)
*Beach Boys: Wake the World: The Friends Sessions
*Beethoven: String Quartet No. 13, Op. 130 (Juilliard String Quartet)
*Anthony Braxton: The Complete Braxton 1971 "Comp. 6J"
*Anthony Braxton: Creative Orchestra Music 1976 (side 2)
*Anthony Braxton Large Ensemble: 2008-12-03 Wesleyan (CDR) "Comp. 100/134/91"
*Anthony Braxton's Sonic Genome Project: 2010-01-31 Vancouver (CDR) (disc 1)
*James Brown: Papa's Got a Brand New Bag (side 2)
*Rodger Coleman: Real Gone "Moogertron"
*Rodger Coleman and Andrew Dickson: 2016-11-02 Nashville (CDR)
*Rodger Coleman and Sam Byrd: 2023-12-29 Nashville (rough mix wav)
*John Coltrane: The Prestige Recordings (disc 10)
*Chick Corea: The Complete "Is" Sessions (disc 1)
*Sylvie Courvoisier/Ikue Mori/Evan Parker: 2017-06-04 Moers (DVD)
*Creative Construction Company: Creative Construction Company Vol. II
*Daft Punk: Discovery
*Danger Mouse: The Grey Album
*Miles Davis: 1973-01-12 NYC (DVD)
*Duke Ellington: 1938 (side 3)
*Kate Gentile: Find Letter X (disc 1)
*Grateful Dead: 1970-02-05 Fillmore West, NYC (CDR)
*Grateful Dead: 1983-10-12 NYC (CDR) (disc 3)
*George Lewis: Shadowgraph, 5 (Sextet)
*Muffins: 1979-02-25 Bethesda MD (CDR)
*New Ting: 2024-02-19 RVA (wav)
*Annette Peacock: I'm the One
*Prince: 1999 (side 4)
*Sparks: Angst in My Pants (sides 1, 2)
*Sun Ra and His Solar Arkestra: Secrets of the Sun (side 2)
*Cecil Taylor: 1999-04-21 Culver City, CA (CDR)
*Cecil Taylor Ensemble: Almeda
*Henry Threadgill Zooid: In for a Penny, In for a Pound (disc 2) "Unoepic (for Guitar)"
*David Torn/Tim Berne/Ches Smith: Sun Of Goldfinger "Spartan, Before It Hit"
*UYA: 1992-09: Live Masscann and After (wav)
*UYA: 1992-09-29/10-04: Puff Rub (wav)
*UYA: 1992-10-04/10: Melt the Chocolate (wav)
*XTC: Rag & Bone Buffet
*Dionne Warwick: The Complete 1960s Singles Plus (selections)
*Anna Webber: Shimmer Wince

Reading List, Week of 2024-03-10

My son says a better title for the Empson book would be "Six or Seven Types of Ambiguity"...

Reading List 2024-03-11:

*Empson, William. Seven Types of Ambiguity (started)
*Paulo, Joaquim. Jazz Covers (started)
*Garner, Dwight. The Upstairs Delicatessen (finished)
*Williams, William Carlos. The Farmers' Daughters: The Collected Stories of William Carlos Williams (finished)
*Mendelson, Cheryl. Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Keeping House (in progress)
*Subitzky, Ed. Poor Helpless Comics! The Cartoons (and More) of Ed Subitzky (in progress)

Playlist, Week of 2024-03-03

Two major big band masterpieces from Muhal Richard Abrams this week: The Hearinga Suite and Blu Blu Blu... so much to say about both of these... well, I ain't saying anything now... except that Blu Blu Blu has an excellent reworking of "Bloodline" that features absolute killer piano from Abrams... and: let's hear it for the whistler!

Playlist 2024-03-04

*Muhal Richard Abrams: 1978 Laren, Holland (CDR)
*Muhal Richard Abrams: Rejoicing with the Light (side 2)
*Muhal Richard Abrams Orchestra: The Hearinga Suite
*Muhal Richard Abrams Orchestra: Blu Blu Blu
*Muhal Richard Abrams and Roscoe Mitchell: Duets and Solos
*Barry Altschul: You Can't Name Your Own Tune
*Arctic Monkeys: Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not
*Beach Boys: The Smile Sessions (sides 1, 2, 3, 4)
*Jacob Bivins/Ian Davis: Benthic
*Anthony Braxton: The Complete Arista Recordings of Anthony Braxton (discs 7, 8)
*Anthony Braxton: Two Compositions (Orchestra) 2005
*Anthony Braxton: Echo Echo Mirror House (NYC) 2011
*Ornette Coleman: Ornette at 12, Crisis to Man on the Moon Revisited
*Rodger Coleman and Sam Byrd: 2023-12-29 Nashville (rough mix wav)
*Elvis Costello: Taking Liberties (sides 1, 2)
*Aaron Diehl and the Knights: Zodiac Suite
*Fats Domino: They Call Me the Fat Man... (The Legendary Imperial Recordings) (selections)
*Duke Ellington: Ellington '66 (side 2)
*Nick Fraser/Kris Davis/Tony Malaby: Zoning
*Glass Triangle: Blue and Sun-Lights
*Grateful Dead: 1983-10-12 NYC (CDR) (disc 2)
*Fletcher Henderson: The Complete Fletcher Henderson 1927-1936 (side 4)
*Ingrid Laubrock/Tom Rainey: 2017-01-04 NYC (CDR)
*Thelonious Monk: Monk's Music
*New Ting: 2024-02-19 RVA (wav)
*Original Silence: The Second Original Silence
*Tony Oxley/Derek Bailey Quartet: Tony Oxley/Derek Bailey Quartet
*Tony Oxley Sextet: 1998-09-10 Cologne (CDR)
*Jeff Parker: The New Breed
*Annette Peacock: 4 Emilia-Romagna W/LV
*Max Roach: The Max Roach Trio Featuring the Legendary Hasaan
*Rolling Stones: Aftermath (Expanded mono ed.)
*David Sancious: The Bridge
*Sleepwalker: Skopofoboexoskelett
*Tamio Shiraishi: Sora
*Tyshawn Sorey and Marilyn Crispell: The Adornment of Time
*Sun Ra And His Intergalactic Research Arkestra: Paradiso Amsterdam 1970 (side 2)
*Cecil Taylor Big Band: 1995-07-03 NYC (CDR) (disc 2)
*Traffic: John Barleycorn Must Die
*UYA: 1992-09-09: What Gomer Likes (wav)
*Various artists: Masters of the Modern Piano 1955-1966 (side 2)
*Various artists: Ethiopian Groove: The Golden Seventies
*WSAM: D.Reamin' (CDR compilation)
*John Zorn Electric Masada: 2003-01-30 NYC (CDR) (discs 1, 2)
*John Zorn/Brian Marsella Trio: 2023-09-01 San Francisco "Suite for Piano" (CDR) 

Reading List, Week of 2024-03-03

Reading List 2024-03-04:

*Subitzky, Ed. Poor Helpless Comics! The Cartoons (and More) of Ed Subitzky (started)
*Williams, William Carlos. The Farmers' Daughters: The Collected Stories of William Carlos Williams (started)
*Marshall, James. George and Martha: The Complete Stories of Two Best Friends (started/finished)
*Cisco, Michael. Animal Money (finished)
*Partridge, Andy. Popartery (finished)
*Garner, Dwight. The Upstairs Delicatessen (in progress)
*Mendelson, Cheryl. Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Keeping House (in progress)