listening to…May15-19, 2012

A few weeks ago, I stumbled into my copy of Cecil Taylor’s Momentum Space back in the vault. I guess I bought it, listened to it and filed it, now I’m crazy about this album. Top shelf production with stellar performances by the trio. Pretty exciting to have Elvin here and the opening phrases by Dewey remind me of Jimmy Lyons. I never know what Cecil is going to do next when he’s playing, that’s part of his magic. Truly a historic moment.

I was looking for my copy of Jack DeJohnette’s Special Edition with it’s heavenly version of Central Park West, so I pulled a few of his other albums. Saudades is a tribute to organist Larry Young, great but sometimes it slips too much into John Scofield’s thing. Beautiul when Young’s spirit shines through the music, Sco is still hip though.

DeJohnette’s Rev. King Suite on Sorcery reminds me of Alice Coltrane, melody on the organ. The low pass filter fluttering away on his drums is real trippy.

Both Kuhn and Kikuchi were recorded in NYC, Kuhn sounds like it and Kikuchi is a bit closer in feel to the ECM motherland. I’m familiar with Masabumi Kikuchi from recordings with Paul Motian, this is Motians last date before his passing last November.

May 15, 2012

Steve Kuhn Trio – Wisteria (ECM)
Masabumi Kikuchi with Paul Motian – Sunrise (ECM)

May 18, 2012

Cecil Taylor, Elvin Jones, Dewey Redman – Momentum Space (Verve)
Jack DeJohnette – Special Edition (ECM)
Jack DeJohnette, Larry Goldings, John Scofield aka Trio Beyond – Saudades (ECM)

May 19, 2012

Jack DeJohnette – Pictures (ECM)
Jack DeJohnette – Sorcery (Prestige)

For years I’ve posted what I’ve listened to during the day. I’ve been doing this on Facebook since Fall 2008, now I’ve decided to start doing this on the blog.

listening to…May 10-13, 2012

I’ve been on quite a Julius Hemphill festival this week, I bought Five Chord Stud, Fat Man and One Atmosphere a few years back. The CamJazz box really set me off and I’ve been enjoying this immensely.

Fred Frith’s Kick the Dog continues down the same path as old favorites Gravity and Speechless. Henry Cow is an early influential Frith group.

Historic Concerts is probably the only material from the Cecil Taylor box I haven’t heard yet, my interest in the man’s music continues to grow.

May 10, 2012

Cecil Taylor – Conquistador! (Blue Note)
Julius Hemphil – One Atmosphere (Tzadik)
Henry Cow – Stockholm & Goteborg (ReR Megacorp)

May 11, 2012

Fred Frith – Kick the Dog (Locus Solus/Cuneiform)
Julius Hemphill – Five Chord Stud (Black Saint)
Julius Hemphill – Fat Man and the Hard Blues (Black Saint)

May 12-13, 2012

World Saxophone Quartet (CamJazz box of Black Saint/Soul Note remasters)
Cecil Taylor and Max Roach – Historic Concerts (CamJazz box of Black Saint/Soul Note remasters)
Cecil Taylor – Winged Serpent (CamJazz box of Black Saint/Soul Note remasters)

For years I’ve posted what I’ve listened to during the day. I’ve been doing this on Facebook since Fall 2008, now I’ve decided to start doing this on the blog.

listening to…May 5-7, 2012

For years I’ve posted what I’ve listened to during the day. I’ve been doing this on Facebook since Fall 2008, now I’ve decided to start doing this on the blog…comments welcome.

May 5, 2012

Gilgamesh – Another Fine Tune You’ve Gotten Me Into (Splax France)
Gilgamesh – Gilgamesh (Virgin)
Shirley Scott – Blue Seven (Prestege)
Maurice MacIntyre – Humility in the Light of Creation (Delmark)
Herbie Hancock Trio with Tony Williams and Ron Carter (CBS Sony/Japan)
Miles Davis – In Person, Saturday Night at the Blackhawk, Vol. II (Columbia)

May 6, 2012

Cecil Taylor with John Coltrane – Hard Driving Jazz (aka Stereo Drive, Coltrane Time) (UA, Blue Note)

May 7, 2012

ROVA – the Works, vol. 3 (Black Saint)
World Saxophone Quartet – Plays Duke Ellington (Elektra/Nonesuch)

listening to…May 4, 2012

For years I’ve posted what I’ve listened to during the day. I’ve been doing this on Facebook since Fall 2008, now I’ve decided to start doing this on the blog…comments welcome.

Tonto’s Expanding Headband – Tonto Rides Again (Viceroy Vintage)
Edgar Froese – Aqua (Virgin)
Khan featuring Steve Hillage and Dave Stewart – Space Shanty (Deram)
Emerson, Lake and Palmer – Tarkus (Atlantic)
Herbie Hancock – Headhunters (Columbia)

Happy 5/4 Day:

listening to…May 3, 2012

For years I’ve posted what I’ve listened to during the day. I’ve been doing this on Facebook since Fall 2008, now I’ve decided to start doing this on the blog…comments welcome.

Ran Blake and Anthony Braxton – A Memory of Vienna (hatOLOGY)
Jan Garbarek – Afric Pepperbird (ECM)
George Russell – Live in an American Time Spiral (Soul Note)
World Saxophone Quartet – Steppin’ with the World Saxophone Quartet (Black Saint)
World Saxophone Quartet – WSQ (Black Saint)
Massacre (aka Fred Frith, Bill Laswell) – Killing Time (Fred Records)
The Microscopic Quartet – Friday the 13th, the Micros Play Monk (Cuneiform Records)

listening to…May 1, 2012

For years I’ve posted what I’ve listened to during the day. I’ve been doing this on Facebook since Fall 2008, now I’ve decided to start doing this on the blog…comments welcome.

Henry Cow – Western Culture (ESD)
ROVA – the Works, vol. 1 & 2 (Black Saint)
The Giuseppi Logan Quartet (ESP-Disk)
Paul Bley – Barrage (ESP-Disk)
Ornette Coleman – Town Hall, 1962 (ESP-Disk)
Lowell Davidson – Trio (ESP-Disk)
Paul Bley – Closer (ESP-Disk)
Paul Bley – Scorpio (Milestone)

Harold Budd string quartets

I’ve known the music of Harold Budd for years….the from the early albums produced by Brian Eno (Plateaux of Mirror, the Pearl) to more recent albums like Luxa, The Room, La Bella Vista and Avalon Sutra. The floating chords and spacious ambiance are so seductive.

I wish he’d write more music for chamber music ensembles. Here’s some rare performances of his string quartets that showed up on utube recently, performed at Beyond Music at Beyond Baroque, 12/10/11:

Harold Budd String Quartet 2001 – Formalist Quartet

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Harold Budd String Quartet 2003 – Formalist Quartet

Music for Airports, Brian Eno, Annie Gosfield, Glen Branca and Arnold Dreyblatt.

Music for Airports
Brian Eno’s seminal ambient masterpiece
as performed by Bang On A Can

also Annie Gosfield, Glen Branca and Arnold Dreyblatt
Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center, NY, NY.
March 7, 1998

I first heard about the Bang On A Can transcriptions on Brian Eno’s Ambient 1: Music for Airports last year when I endured the annual BOAC marathon. A transcription many people asked. Why? Dumb question. Cash for Eno. Cash for BOAC. Homage. Whatever. I went for the other composers anyway (more on that later).

The transcription is a bit more then that: also a re-orchestration, there were a few parts that weren’t on the original. A repeated microtonal ornament by the cellist, an out of tune trumpet in 1/1. During 1/2, the percussionist whipped out some brake drums and played them by rubbing something around the inside rim like a tibetan bowl. This resulted in a cool shimmering scraping sound like Superman lifting a manhole cover but what was it doing in 1/2??? What was that all about? Halfways through the tour, DJ Spooky will probably be up there spinning records.

Despite those problems, the BOAC arrangement (at least on cd) is stunning. The percussionist’s gong, vibes, marimba and tubular bells – among other instruments – with the piano, lend an almost Harold Budd atmosphere to the proceedings. Bowed vibraphone always lifts music to heaven and it’s use during 2/2 did just that.

Annie Gosfield’s been getting an increasing number of performances in NYC and tonight’s performance of “The Manufacture of Tangled Ivory” was another example of her fascination with detuned piano. In the first section, various studio enhanced samples of piano are pounded abstractly – early 20th century angst – on a keyboard. Followed by a thrashing band unison section where the guitar player would mute and slash at the strings and the cello and acoustic bassist abuse one note or drum on the bodies of their instruments. Likewise, the drummer, who sounded incredible in this hall, pounded out time on the toms. A regular uptown/downtown jungle/20th century angst fest.

When I got the promo post card from BOAC, I doubted that Glenn Branca was still a microtonalist. I thought that Branca abandoned just intonation, but apparently the BOAC commission “Movement Within” does the trick. Reviving his home made instruments: two keyboards, an organ, a guitar, a hammered dulcimer and a approximately 9 foot long steel guitar – all microtonal harmonic series tunings – this was the jaw dropping work of the evening. Nice stereo mix too, I was sitting in the back of the hall and the two keyboards seemed to be panned left and right, huge harmonic chords making the room pulse back and forth.

Arnold Dreyblatt’s “Escalator” is based on recordings of malfunctioning escalators. The band would hammer away on one note while the drums pounded with Beefheartian rhythms. Tense harmonies abruptly gave way to gentler sections while still maintaining typical Dreyblatt rhythms. “Escalator” sounded less like a malfunctioning escalators than an insanely mad town orchestra. BOAC should commission more works by New York City microtonalists like Branca and Dreyblatt.

db
3/9/1998

Originally published online at Juxtaposition Ezine.

Theatre of Voices, John Cage, Terry Riley, Paul Hillier

Litany for the Whale
Theatre of Voices
John Cage, Paul Hillier, Terry Riley
Harmonia Mundi HMU 907187

Paul Hillier is mostly known for his performances of early music, although he has recorded the music of Ingram Marshall, minimalist composer Steve Reich, Arvo Pärt and others. On this CD by radical avant gard American composer John Cage (1912 – 1992), Hillier is joined by his ensemble Theatre of Voices and special guest early minimalist Terry Riley. There’s a wide range of vocal music by Cage on this disc.

A pastoral duet between Theatre of Voices members Alan Bennett and Paul Elliott on Litany for the Whale opens the disc. 26 minutes of Cageian vocalese based on the word whale where two voices sound as one. I listened to this piece a few times and read the liner notes before I realized there was more than one person singing.

Aria No. 2 starts with thunder and a kiss, Paul Hillier explores vowels and consonants from five languages: Armenian, Russian, Italian, French and English. On the late Cage piece, Five, five voices blend harmoniously. Hillier’s solo voice on The Wonderful Widow of Eighteen Springs is accompanied by closed piano. One can hear him tapping about on the piano while singing text from Finnegan’s Wake. Solo for Voice from Songbooks, is split up between two performers who make textural breathing sounds that are in turn electronically processed.

Soloist Andrea Fullington sings Experiences No.2 based on e.e cummings “III,” Sonnets-Unrealities, Tulips and Chimneys (1923). This sweet ballad serves as an introduction to conversational tone of: Mesostics re and not re Marcel Duchamp as performed by Paul Hillier and Terry Riley. Back and forth: Riley recites and Hillier sings through various digital sound processing devices.

Aria (for Cathy Berberian) is a theatrical festival for seven voices and electronics. Hillier arranged the piece for multiple voices to cover the different vocal styles. The electronics give the listener an added colorful element of enviroment . Bells, breaking glass, water, the surf and other sounds illustrate the work.

A satisfying and frequently unpredictable survey of Cage’s vocal music as performed by Paul Hillier’s Theatre of Voices. Highly recommended.

David Beardsley
7/22/98

Originally published online at Juxtaposition Ezine.

Catler Bros.

Catler Bros.
Knitting Factory Alterknit Theater, New York, N.Y.
March 16, 1997

Just Intonation is a way of tuning instruments to intervals of whole number ratios. This is common in most non-western musical traditions. When mass production of the piano was started in the 1800′s, tuning was standardized to 12 tone equal temperament in the western world. In this century, modern post-classical composers like Harry Partch, La Monte Young and Ivor Darreg showed the way for composers interested in expanding their musical resources beyond 12 tet tuning.

At the Knit, Jon Catler, Brad Catler and Jonathan Kane showed that these tuning concepts can be used in the loose improvisational context of rock and jazz fusion. Not the lame Love Boat/Doctor’s office fusion of Kenny G. but a loose fusion of East/West jazz & Hendrix blues rock. Sort of like-raga-but-not-raga: modal.

The majority of the set was filled with tunes from the new Catler Bros. Crash Landing cd. Using a guitar with interchangeable fret boards, Jon Catler played mostly frettless guitar and occasionally 49 tone just intonation fretted guitar. Brad Catler played fretless bass with a truly gritty rock and roll tone and Jonathan Kane provided rock solid drumming through out the set.

For me, one of the revelations of the evening was Jon’s extended solos on fretless guitar. Apparently his fingerboard is made of steel like the Indian sarod. This enables him to get a harder tone than I’ve heard from guitars with a wood fingerboard. He could control feedback in a unique way by sliding around. Unlike a guitar with a vibrato arm where the strings go slack and the strings change tone, the strings on a fretless instrument retain their tone. Two of the non-album tunes covered by the band were Jimi Hendrix’s Little Wing and Ornette Coleman’s Free.

The Catler Bros. have been around New York for years with their own special blend of tuning and guitars. This version of the band is also known as La Monte Young’s Forever Bad Blues Band appearing on Just Stompin’: Live at the Kitchen (Grammavision). Both Jon and Brad have been frequent performers at the American Festival of Microtonal Music and will return for this season’s concert series. In April 1997, Jon Catler will be playing Harry Partch’s original Adapted Guitars I & II in the Newband’s production of Oedipus at the Modern Museum of Art.

David Beardsley
Originally published online at Juxtaposition Ezine.