"Fate in a Pleasant Mood/When Sun Comes Out" - Sun Ra

Originally released as two separate LPs under Sun Ray’s Saturn label, Fate in a Pleasant Mood (1961)/When Sun Comes Out (1963) really allows the Myth Science Arkestra and the Astro-Infinity Arkestra breath and offers listeners a chance to really hear and understand each musician -- whether they are playing within in their own mode, or if Sun Ra is directing them.

The opening track, The Others in Their World, is a mellow theme to set the course for the album before being followed by Space Mates, offering warm sounds of percussion and bass under a flute arrangement before Sun Ra himself closes the track with a short, yet intrinsic solo. One thing I love about Sun Ra is that his recordings sometimes come off almost like instrumental concept albums, if such things exists. Even though I am unaware of the continuing narrative being conveyed, the songs suggest a visual plot without needed verbal connotations. They contain ups, downs, climaxes, and resolutions. This is especially perceived in the third track Lights of a Satellite.

The climax clearly begins with We Travel the Spaceways (now on the When Sun Comes Out half of the album). It’s a cosmic struggle between each player of the Arkestra; being the core of the aesthetics of the group. It’s almost like the first two thirds of the record were a build up to this culmination. It is brief, and we are left in a state of uncertainty as the loose, unbound stylings continue with Calling Planet Earth. I particularly enjoy the tenor solo over the eruption of bass and drums.Dancing Shadows is a pretty straight ahead post-bop rendering of sorts. The tonality of the bass is spot on. Not over bearing but noticeably enough to complement the drums and generate the environment for the front line to improvise over.

The plot’s struggle still continues with The Rainmaker. This is terrific free playing that deserves multiple plays. The group collectively supports each other while knowing when to aid or stray away at the right moments. Dimensions in Time gives you the needed conclusion to allow this story to rest until another moment in the future.
1961/1963 - Saturn.

"Uhuru Na Umoja" - Frank Wright

Frank Wright is one of the avant-garde sax players I have only just been jumping into in the last year and a half or so, and man can he swing. Uhuru Na Umoja is a really heavy and powerful album that even though it's a baseless quartet, it assaults the listener as if it were Coleman's Free Jazz or Coltrane's Ascension. Originally part of the American Records catalog, the series is now reissued under the Verve label under the series Free America and is definitely worth diving into with other artist like Mal Waldron, Steve Lacy, Anthony Braxton, Archie Shepp, Paul Bley and others. The album showcases Art Taylor in rare form as he strays away from his usual bop performances. And Bobby Few lays another amazing session on the ivory keys.

The opening cut, Oriental Moods, starts off with a subtle, melodic theme that sets the tone for the rest of the album. It is beautiful yet striking with layers and textures of piano and percussion. You can definitely here the influence Albert Ayler has had on Frank Wright and it's hard to imagine him blowing sessions with B.B. King and other blues and R&B artists earlier in his career. Aurora Borealis is the second tune which starts off with a cloud of slowly building free playing that's reminiscent of some Pharoah Sanders material from Impulse.

My favorite is the closing track, Pluto, which starts off with a quick written part that reminds us of the chords in Oriental Moods with more variations on the notes within them and a faster tempo. It's so catchy that even my girlfriend (who can't stand free improvised jazz) over heard me listening to it and was like, 'wow I can dig this.' Within 30 seconds of the cut it further erupts into an Ayler-esq montage and far out free improvisation before it ends up back to the original compositional theme to ultimately close out the album. I could listen to it 10 times a day and never get bored of it.
1970 - America Records/Verve.
Arthur Taylor - Drums; Frank Wright - Tenor Sax ; Bobby Few - Piano; Noah Howard - Alto Sax.

Lagging

Sorry posts have been slow lately. I have been having a lot of projects going which has been pulling myself away from the blog. I just wanted to drop in and posts some interesting tidbits.

Howard Mandel made a great post about Cecil Taylor in honor of his 80th birthday.

Taylor belongs to no school but his own yet has influenced and generated a legion of followers on piano and every other instrument, too. He identifies with the jazz tradition, many of whose most ardent adherents have regarded him since his 1950s debut insultingly, incredulously, quizzically, disdainfully, reluctantly, regretfully or not at all. But he does not limit himself, or his defininition of the jazz tradition: he draws from all music's history and partakes of the whole world's culture.

Part two of Mandel's Cecil Taylor at 80 can be found here.

The latest Wax Poetics is a Jazz issue. I haven't picked a copy up yet but I'm sure it will be nice treat once I do.

Otherwise things have been down for me and I haven't been able to grab some new albums lately. I did have a great listen to Muhal Richard Abram's 1989 Hearinga Suite. I'm normally not attracted to the stylings of big bands or orchestras, but I decided to investigate this one and it was quite enjoyable. Maybe I'll do a full post on it soon. I particularly liked the compositions "Oldfotalk" and "Find It Now."

Lou Donaldson / Bobby Hutcerson - LIVE!!!

Definitely the most exciting event (for me) of the festival was the chance to see Lou Donaldson and Bobby Hutcherson live at the Crystal Ballroom. This double billed event (with the exception of McCoy Tyner on the previous weekend) was the biggest highlight of earlier generation Blue Note artists.

Artistic Director of PDX Jazz, Bill Royston, introduced Lou Donaldson as he entered the stage with his organ quartet. A fine establishment of musicians consisting of Lou, the organ, drums and guitar. This was as close as one is going to get as to seeing a band with the same nature as say Grant Green or Jimmy Smith. Before playing their initial theme Lou introduced the band and started again with his humorous rants. "Today you are going to see jazz, not fusion, not confusion, but jazz," he would say, "not snoop doggie dog or 50 Cent who aint worth a quarter."

For me the highlight of his set was when he played Ray Noble's composition Cherokee. While Donaldson played the melody and every harmonizing note around it, the group vamped the chords in support. I never quite heard it that way and it was one of the best interpretations of the tune that I have listened to. He also sang a couple blues pieces. One about a woman who drank a lot of whiskey and the other -- if I'm remembering the lyrics corectly -- about dreams and then reality having an ironic twist in opposition to the dreams. Both with clever puns and silly rhymes to match Lou's personality.

Before Bobby Hutcherson took the stage Howard Mandel came up to introduce him. Hutcherson didn't look too hot as he has been suffering from emphysema. Regardless of that, after a couple of compositions he certainly had gotten into the mode. Rather than the more technical, bebop and soul jazz stylings of Lou's set (and there wasn't anything non-technical about Hutcherson's), his was more physical and throught provoking. Definitely allowing the audience to have a more transcendent experience. The highlight for me was when Hutcherson played Coltrane's Spiritual. Seeing a legend who had recording amazing albums for Blue Note play one of my favorite Coltrane compositions was an exceptional delight. And he played it good, really good.

It was a great festival this year. It's hard to say if it was better than last years giving my awesome experience with my favorite, Ornette Coleman; but I guess you can't compare the two. Alls I know is that festivals with headliners like this are going to become more and more rare. I also have to give a shout out to the Operations Director of PDX Jazz, Brad Nelson, who was gracious enough to supply me with a couple of tickets to this event.

Conversation with Lou Donaldson

The second talk I attended for the 2009 Portland Jazz Festival was a conversation with Lou Donaldson at the PCPA Art Bar. It was moderated by Larry Appelbaum of JazzTimes for a piece called "Before and After." Appelbaum described this to the audience as a blind fold test where tracks were played and Lou was meant to discuss them and share his wealth of knowledge. Out of the 11 songs displayed, he was able to identify, I'd say at least nine of the horn players on them. Being 82 years old and the oldest living Blue Note artist, he had quite the opinion to share about each tune -- old and new, positive and negative.

Rather than talk about each song played and Donaldson's input I'll just share his personality and some of his knowledge (I'll let the article in JazzTimes elaborate further about the tracks). First of all, Donaldson doesn't look anything like 82 years old, he could pass for an early 70s, perhaps even late, late 60s. He's been on the scene since his military days playing clarinet for the Navy Band in Chicago during the 1940s. That's when he first heard Bird and was inspired to toss his clarinet into the water and stick to alto. "I'm a Parker man, everything else is just sax playing," he said as he further discussed Parker's tone and how he would move around the chords. I was surprised to hear some of Donaldson's opinions on a lot of other musicians of his era. Most of them quite low, but you couldn't help to not judge him -- even though he was trashing some of my favorites like Thelonious Monk, John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, and Eric Dolphy -- This man has been around and his expressions of these artists are more authentic and sincere than mine or any jazz critic.

For example, Lou stated you can't play jazz unless you can play the blues. I'd say that's a fair assessment. However, when asked about Coltrane he said Coltrane could never play the blues. Right there he just proclaimed Coltrane couldn't play jazz. But who cares! It's Lou Donaldson and his thoughts were absolutely brilliant. Another example is he said Monk was a terrible performer. That he was a genius bop composer but couldn't play greatly -- another pretty wild fact to state. Again, if this was a random local at the pub telling me this I would argue them into the ground, but Lou Donaldson was there. He knew these guys. He recorded hit records on Blue Note. So one has to take these words with sheer credibility.

I did get some homework from this talk. When talking about Hank Crawford, Donaldson noted his favorite album of his was Misty. And when asked what his top five all time favorite records were, Lou was hesitant to list them, but did mention Flying Home by Illinois Jacquet as the greatest he had ever heard, but not in his top five. These are added to my list of records to get.

Post about the concert next.

2009 Portland Jazz Festival

The 2009 Portland Jazz Festival rapped up last night. With the theme celebrating 70 years of Blue Note Records, and featuring artists both past and present, there was bound to have a little something for nearly every jazz fan. I was only able to see one concert this year, but--in my opinion--it was probably the most, must see performance.

Before I talk about seeing Lou Donaldson and Bobby Hutcherson live I'm going to talk about some educational talks I attended. Last Sunday I went to a Panel Discussion about Blue Note cover art. You can't be a fan of Blue Note records and besides the recordings themselves, not instantly be drawn to the cover art. I remember purchasing my first Blue Note album, Genius of Modern Music Vol. 1 by Thelonious Monk (the LP reissue from 10" that was Red Miles' first design for Blue Note). I was certainly a jazz novice then and I new the name on the record jacket, but it was that displayed cover that instantly drove me to purchase it. Upon listening, the recordings themselves were no joke and at that point I wanted everything and anything Blue Note; the terrific album artwork is just an added bonus.

The panel discussion was narrated by Portland's Tim DuRoche and consisted of four other individuals. Of great surprise to me it included author Ashley Kahn, and producer, jazz historian, writer, archivist -- however you want to label this great man -- Michael Cuscuna. To hear these two talk in person was a great honor. They primarily talked about the golden age of Blue Note Records when Reid Miles was designing covers from 1956 to 1967. But I learned about Martin Craig creating the unique "Pac Man" look on the record circular labels. The artwork Craig designed were surrealist in nature which fit into the Modern aesthetic fully endorsed by Alfred Lion. These early album covers were defying the standards by using the artists themselves on the covers to market the recordings. This as a whole was a major turning point in jazz record artwork from the mid 1950s onwards.

In the mid 1950s Reid Miles entered the picture, and from reading the Blue Note: The Biography book by Richard Cook, I already understood that Miles actually did not like jazz but was a classical music listener. As a result, all of the free promo copies he acquired from Blue Note were traded in for classical records. Michael Cuscuna elaborated on how Miles relied on Lion to convey the mood, feeling, and stylings of these recordings to complete a design that communicated the audio in which it enclosed.

Miles' last album was for Hank Mobley's Hi Voltage. At this point the label was already sold to Liberty Records and a new direction for the company was already being distinguished. Reid Miles went on to do photography which would later be included in a lot of 1970s rock covers. I was contacted by a rep from Capitol Records and was supplied with this link of a Blue Note album artwork slideshow. Even after seeing these covers for years, they still appear great and inspiring. There's nothing like seeing one of these Reid Miles designs and instantly wanting to hear the music underneath the artwork.

More posts to follow about the Festival.

"Bap-Tizum" - Art Ensemble of Chicago

Rolling off the needle of my turntable, this disc delivers a live performance by the group during the 1972 Ann Arbor Blues and Jazz Festival. Unedited and exhibited in its entirety, the set showcases an adrenaline rush of tunes that leave the audience (as well as myself, the listener) begging for more.

The band here is appearing for the first time shortly after returning from a four year stay in Europe and also introduces Don Moye -- to America -- on drums (who provides the outstanding drum ensemble composition, Nfamoudou-Boudougou to start the set). Particularly, I love Roscoe Mitchell's Unanka, allowing a simplistic, slow tempo bass line while allowing Mitchell freely distort the tune.

Things remain timid with Ooufnoon while the two reedist and Bowie produce sounds hardly imaginable on their instruments. For the climax, the group erupts with Ohnedaruth, a fast tempo, 15 minute free for all track that displays the group's stamina and devotion to their intentions. Odwalla contains a more conventional approach as the tune closes out the set. It show Mitchell's universal abilities as a composer which further demonstrates the ensembles ability to reach so many dimensions of jazz, allowing it to truly be "great black music."

1972 - Koch Records.

Roscoe Mitchell and Joseph Jarman - Reeds; Lester Bowie - Trumpet; Malachi Favors - Bass; Don Moye - Drums.

"The Night of The Cookers" - Freddie Hubbard

As we all know, the passing of Freddie Hubbard has tragically occurred this week. He was a true legend and the jazz world will be sad to see him go. He played his trumpet with an incredible amount of passion, and weather it was a ballad or an uptempo track, you could always hear it. He was also incredibly universal, stepping out of his element with avant-garde on Ornette's Free Jazz and Dolphy's Out to Lunch, and a hard bop soldier for Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, as all as a sideman for more post bop-esq recordings with Bobby Hutcherson and Andrew Hill -- this is just a conservative list of what he was able to achieve, and he was successful with all of it.

The Night of the Cookers: Live at Club La Marchal was originally issued in two volumes on Blue Note. A dual disc CD reissue appeared containing the whole set which I was able to pick up used way back. I believe it may have been the second Hubbard album I obtained with him as a leader. This is an interesting set and I was not really prepared for it being the jazz novice that I was years ago. The compositions are long, requiring a serious ammount of stamina and attention, and the recording quality is fairly good.

The best thing about this recording is Lee Morgan and Hubbard playing off of each other. Having two of the best trumpeteers from the 60s is a rare treat for the ears. Pensativa is the first track clocking in at over 22 minutes. Its aesthetic resembles sort of a coctail party sound; smooth and mellow. Big Black's rhythms on the congas and James Spaudling's flute playing are a perfect complement to Hubbard and Morgan as well as Harold Mabern's vamping on the keys. Following this tune is the classic composition Walkin'. Filled with energy and excellent accompaniment by Pete La Roca on drums. The solos are powerful and extensive. Two thirds into the track Morgan, Hubbard, and Spaudling trade forths with La Roca and Big Black.

I enjoy the second half of this date the best. Jodo, a composition written by Hubbard, is fierce on its intent, and Hubbard and Morgan take advantage of that with their solos. About nine minutes into the track, you can hear Hubbard trying to direct Spaudling's alto solo by playing quick cord vamps. The band returns to a more mellow, repetativie tune with Breaking Point, also written by Hubbard, to end the set. With a grooving chord progression the tune can make anyone at least tap their foot without them even realizing it.
1965 - Blue Note.
Freddie Hubbard - trumpet; James Spaulding - alto saxophone, flute; Lee Morgan - trumpet; Harold Mabern - piano; Larry Ridley - bass instrument; Pete La Roca - drums; Big Black - congas.

More Blue Note Influence on NBC

Was watching SNL on Saturday, December 6th and came across this clip:



Check out these two covers; and they are just the two that are of immediately thought. There's definitely a lot of text and color design influenced from Reid Miles appropriated in this SNL clip.

'Quartet (Dortmund) 1976' - Anthony Braxton

Anthony Braxton screams modernity! From the way he titles his works, to his album covers, and through the aesthetic of his sound. Amazingly he has adhered to this image even up until today. One aspect of free jazz that I love is the subtle and subliminal intuitiveness between a group of musicians, and Braxton consistently achieves this with his musicians.

This record is supplied with four compositions buy this stunning quartet. It's insanely well produced and each instrument is mixed amazingly in the channels. George Lewis is heard on trombone in the left channel while Braxton is pertained to the right. To me what makes it brilliant on the ears is the echoing acoustics of Braxton's reeds on the left channel. You hear his notes and riffs mimicking themselves as they bounce around the venue.

Composition 40 F / Composition 23 J is a 26 minute long track that starts off with his whimsical, ambient, and often times almost minimal (comparatively speaking) free form playing before erupting into the more aggressive, straight ahead free jazz style to top the track off -- Is that an oxymoron or what, straight-ahead free jazz? -- I guess what I mean is a sound more stylized like Ornette Coleman; and there is nothing straight-ahead about Ornette.

The rest of the set demonstrates this similar concept. Composition 40 (O) and Composition 6 C are more ambient before the whole set finishes with Composition 40 B. This conclusion is a stellar performance by the whole group creating an incredible peak to the set. [As an added note, I think Dave Holland's best recordings are with Braxton's groups]
1976 - Hat Hut Records.
Anthony Braxton - alto, contrabass & sopranino sax, clarinet, EB & contrabass clarinet; George Lewis - trombone; Dave Holland - bass; Barry Altschul - drums, percussion.