Month of August , 2007

George Bowering, Canada's first poet laureate on NPR's This I Believe:

I believe that the human intellect is the closest thing we have to the divine. It is the way we can join one another in spirit.

Sometimes when you are listening to a great jazz musician performing a long solo, you are experiencing his mind, moment by moment, as it shifts and decides, as it adds and reminds. This happens whether the player is a saxophone player or a bass player or a pianist. You are in there, where that other mind is. His mind is coming through your ears and inside your mind.

The first time I heard Charlie Parker playing "Ornithology," I was delighted. I was about 11 years old. You are so much alone with your mind as a kid, so when you hear someone else's mind improvising, you feel an excitement you will never get from some music that just wants to keep a steady beat.

I got that delight again when I first heard great improvisatory poetry. When I read "The Desert Music" by William Carlos Williams, the book fell out of my hands and made a loud splat on the library's concrete floor. Later I would hear the poet Philip Whalen call this kind of poetry "a graph of the mind moving." Yes, it is.

Read/hear the rest here.

It's Oscar Peterson's birthday today. The Oscar Peterson Trio Live in Chicago was one of my early jazz purchases when I was a young lad, based on no real knowledge or reasoning. I vividly remember listening to it over and over again, digging Oscar's playing and vocalizations. The Ray Brown/Ed Thigpen rhythm section was something to be reckoned with. I've heard through the grapevine that Mr. Peterson's health has not been the best of late, so now is as good a time as any to give him the props he is due.

It's also Sri Aurobindo's birthday. Involution! Involve.

A quote from Sri Aurobindo:

"Rhythm is the premier necessity of poetical expression because it is the sound-movement which carries on its wave the thought-movement in the word; and it is the musical sound-image which most helps to fill in, to extend, subtilise and deepen the though impression or the emotional or vital impression and to carry the sense beyond itself into an expression of the intellectually inexpressible - always the peculiar power of music..."

and

"Music deepens the emotions and harmonises them with each other. Between them music, art and poetry are a perfect education for the soul; they make and keep its movements purified, self-controlled, deep and harmonious. These, therefore, are agents which cannot profitably be neglected by humanity on its onward march or degraded to the mere satisfaction of sensuous pleasure which will disintegrate rather than build the character. They are, when properly used, great educating, edifying and civilising forces."

Muhal Richard Abrams solo piano tomorrow evening in Millennium Park here in Chicago, 6:30 PM, free.

I apologize for the tumbleweeds around here of late. It probably won't get much better until after Labor Day weekend when my schedule settles down, and then the deluge of backlogged reviewing and writing will come tumbling forth.

Nicole Mitchell convened an expanded version of her Black Earth Ensemble, for this occasion called the Black Earth Orchestra, last night at Millennium Park for a tribute to the late great Alice Coltrane. Featuring a stellar lineup of local musicians, she also brought in Myra Melford on piano and harmonium, Matana Roberts on alto sax, and Maia on harp. The instrumentation of the local musicians included two violinists, two flutes in addition to Ms. Mitchell's, trumpet, tenor sax, bass and cello, a vocalist, a drummer and a percussionist.

Nicole named the concert Many Paths to the Sea, and all of the music was brand new compositions for this one time show. It wasn't a tribute where the artist's music is played repertory style; instead, Nicole drew from the inspiration of Alice Coltrane and also from some of the same areas that inspired Mrs. Coltrane, such as her spiritual practices.

In front of a large crowd at the park (I'd estimate somewhere in the realm of 5,000 in attendance), the band opened up with what I'd call a structured free improvisation. There was definitely free improvising going on, but I could see Nicole leading and there was a sense of arc, entrances and exits by various instruments, and it ended in a very clear manner.

A bunch of people got up and left during this portion. A mini-exodus. Amongst the things I heard uttered:

"Are they just warming up or is this supposed to be music?"

"You've got to be kidding me, this isn't serious music."

"They should be ashamed of themselves for playing like that in front of people."

It should be made clear that lots of tourists come to these Millennium Park shows completely unaware of what they're getting themselves into. I oftentimes wonder what they imagine when they hear about a "jazz concert": did they think Benny Goodman would be there to move them with swing? Were they expecting Bill Evans to caress them with his melodic lyricism? Maybe they were expecting Charlie Parker to rise from the dead and delight them with his bebop virtuosity?

It's a shame that some people have such a low tolerance for risk, and such small reserves of patience in their music listening habits. If they stuck around they would have heard a little bit of something for everyone.

In any case, people left, but many, many more remained.

From there Nicole unleashed a tour de force of music, combining complex composed arrangements with incredible playing from all the members of the band. Myra Melford did some time on harmonium, fitting in a tribute to Alice Coltrane. If I had to identify an element of the music that drew from the well of Mrs. Coltrane's sound it would be the groove and sense of trance and drone. There were some heavy grooves laid down by bassist Josh Abrams and cellist Tomeka Reid, with Marcus Evans on drums and Avreeayl Ra on percussion embellishing and aiding the groove.

There were pieces that featured the two violins and three flutes featured that displayed Nicole's classical influences, and I think it was great for her to have flutes to write for. She so often sounds like more than one flute on her own, so I think it allowed her to flesh out her ideas of the possibilities for the instrument.

Some personal highlights included a fantastic piano solo by Myra Melford about halfway into the show, and some intense sax solos from David Boykin and Matana Roberts, who complimented each other so well in style and presence.

All said and done it was an hour and a half straight of music from the Black Earth Orchestra. I don't know if Nicole has considered doing so, but if she hasn't I'll be the first to say that she should listen to the tapes and release this live recording if it holds up to repeated listens (which I think it will).

Next week in Millennium Park we have Muhal Richard Abrams playing a solo set, opposite ragtime wiz Reginald Robinson playing a set. Should be an interesting juxtaposition.

Until next time....

Howard Mandel is blogging

Steve Coleman is M-Base blogging

Deconstructin(g) Jazz Improvisation: Derrida and the Law of the Singular Event

Whitney Sun Ra gig reviewed

Making money out of music: how can regional music economies remain successful (who wouldn't want to know that!)

Rudresh Mahanthappa  interviewed

Apologies for the tumbleweeds around here of late. Life and daily responsibilities have grabbed me by the proverbial cajones (without my permission might I add) and left behind very little in the way of spare brain cycles or luxuriant blogging time.

“My own feelings about the direction in which jazz should go are that there should be much less stress on technical exhibitionism and much more on emotional content, on what might be termed humanity in music and the freedom to say all that you want.”
~ Booker Little