Guelph Jazz Festival

Guelph, Ontario
September 9 - 13, 2009

Always populist, the annual Guelph Jazz Festival extended its support of outdoor improvisation plus interaction between Third and First World musicians in its 16th edition, without lessening its commitment to Free Music. Much of the outstanding music-making came from the later however, with American pianist Marilyn Crispell one standout.

Featured in American, European and Canadian group settings, Crispell’s playing was powerful and outer-directed at the River Run Centre concert hall, in a trio with two AACM stalwarts, seemingly ageless tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson and colorful percussionist Hamid Drake, whose rhythmic conception is comfortable in any context. Anderson often quivered or vibrated reflective lines that were paralleled with linear arpeggios or kinetic pedal-pushed frequencies by Crispell. Meantime Drake’s palm or stick movement conveyed all the rhythm. Climax was a version of Muñoz’s “Fatherhood”, built on ecclesiastical chording from the pianist, ruffs and rebounds from Drake and gospel-like preaching from Anderson.

Only one member of the Stone Quartet is European – French bassist Joëlle Léandre. Yet when she and the Yanks – trumpeter Roy Campbell, violist Mat Maneri and Crispell – intersected with limpid, sophisticated and intuitive improvising in the sanctuary of St. George’s church, the outcome related more to Continental sounds than American Free Jazz. Subtly phrasing, Campbell at points appeared to be breathing in notes rather than expelling them. Hand-muting asides were another favorite strategy, clutching a tone until it dissolved. Crispell rumbled or spun out connective chords, decorating the improvisations. Maneri shredded fiddle notes in a deadpan fashion, equally honoring Paganini and Stuff Smith. Léandre sometime bowed with excruciatingly heavy motions as if physically pulling the notes from the bass, and other times sliced, diced and rubbed timbres from the instrument while yodeling in a pseudo-operatic soprano. Adapting to the moment she emphasized her resounding pizzicato pulse.

At the River Run the next night, Crispell was featured in Ottawa bassist John Geggie’s trio with Toronto drummer Nick Fraser. Without perpetuating Canadian stereotypes, Geggie’s compositions – and the affiliated improvisations – were more cerebral and studied than those from American bands. Yet there was enough sense of space and structure to separate them from European conceptions. The bassist confined himself to thumping tone-bonding or resonating picking, leaving theme statements to the pianist’s key patterning and downshifting runs. Fraser’s inventions included irregular clip-clopping and the suggestion of bell-pealing on the Gregorian chant-based “Credo”.

Canada’s other solitude was represented by a rip-snorting performance at St. George’s church hall by Jean Derome et les Dangereux Zhoms + 7. With both extended performances post-modern pastiches, individual talents of the 12 musicians gave the Montreal-based reedist/composer scope to express his heraldic, heroic ideas. As Martin Tétreault’s pressurized turntable drone created a crackling ostinato and Joane Hétu’s moist murmurs, hiccups and yodels verbal commentary, the pieces mixed rock beats from the electrified rhythm section; legato pacing from the violinist and violist; and jazz-inflected jabs from pianist Guillaume Dostaler, gutbucket blows from trombonist Tom Walsh and expressive triplets from trumpeter Gordon Allen.

Equally flamboyant days later at the River Run Centre, was World Saxophone Quartet plays Hendrix Experience. Resplendent in sharp suits, the four reedists – David Murray, Tony Kofi., James Carter and Hamiet Bluiett – were backed by Lee Pearson’s showy drumming and the electric bass of Jamaaladeen Tacuma. Crowd-pleasing when Person played with his sticks behind his back, while balancing another stick on his head, and when Murray or Carter ripped off a series of screaming vamps while body-swaying across the stage, Southern Soul riffs mixed with Free Jazz-extended techniques were more obvious than any direct link to Jimi Hendrix. “Hey Joe” was announced and a snatch of “Fire” heard, but the pumped drum backbeat and finger-popping bass work alluded to Funk not Fusion. Off to one side, Bluiett was most notable when he eschewed baritone sax snorts for a spidery, tremolo clarinet solo.

As self-effacing as others were flamboyant, Léandre’s solo performance Saturday afternoon at the Guelph Youth Music ignored the bass’s percussiveness to concentrate on the instrument’s other qualities. Performing on a bare stage, at one point Léandre drew an imaginary line on the floor with her bow, then proceeded to rub arco timbres from different parts of the bass: its back, belly and bridge, as well as the strings. Clipping and clapping the strings as well as spanking the wood and whisking the bow through the air, she encouraged sounds with body English. Creating distinctive multiphonics, she spiced her improvisations with bel-canto shrieks and onomatopoeia that sibilantly deconstructed the textures of certain phrases.

Solo expression was also the leitmotif later that same afternoon for Acoustic Orienteering, the most grandiose of the festival’s outdoor installations. A “cartographic composition” by Scott Thomson for 15 freely improvising musicians, the 45-minute piece featured performers circumnavigating downtown Guelph as they played. Audience members were given maps so they could follow particular musicians or choose a place to stay and let the players pass them. While acoustics in certain areas aided the expression of Paul Dutton’s sound-singing or the fluttering ripples from Jean Martin’s trumophone, the only provision made for musical interaction seemed to be serendipity. If a listener stayed in one place, it meant that a musician hovered into view, played a coupe of notes then moved on.

Interactivity was on display in profusion at Mitchell Hall later that night, when veteran Ethiopian tenor saxophonist Getatchew Mekuria and dancer Melaku Belay performed with Dutch Punk-Jazz outfit The Ex . Perform is the operative word, since in short pants and Doc Martens, Ex guitarists Andy Moor and Terrie Hessels skittered and slid over the stage as they unleashed feedback torrents and frenzied riffs; trumpeter Arnold De Boer emphasized with spastic movements the lyrics he shouted; while Belay wiggled and shifted with Jell-O-like undulations, sometimes on his feet, yet parallel to the floor, and other times upright, performing choreography half-way between the Moon Walk and the Saint Vitus’ Dance. Drummer Kat Bornefeld pounded away as well as contributing one echoing vocal in Amharic

As for Mekuria, who at one point topped his flowing white robes and Ethiopian flag color sash with an embroidered hat and cape, he moved regally across the stage playing with wide vibrato a decidedly pre-modern style that recalled Swing saxophonists like Ben Webster. Yet his solos fit in with the cacophonous electronic pulse that shuddered almost visually, as well as reed counterpoint that encompassed alto saxophonist Brodie West’s split tones plus clarinetist Xavier Charles’ squeaks and squiggles.

A similar cultural blending had been attempted earlier that night at the River Run Centre never achieved the same reckless exuberance. Toronto’s Woodchoppers Association and two Malian musicians created an interaction whose sum was less than its parts. Seemingly most comfortable singing gentle folk songs, the Malians adopted a simplified World Music style with the Choppers. Wearing matching white outfits the vamping Choppers aimed for the greasy Funk the WSQ would play in lieu of Fusion, but came across as tentative improvisers.

Now a robust teenager, the Guelph Jazz Festival appears intent on exploring new sounds and fusions. With its Free Music orientation solidified, experimenting this way should be a productive path to follow.

-- Ken Waxman

-- For MusicWorks Issue #106

March 8, 2010

Fred Anderson Trio

Birthday Live 2000
Asian Improv AIR “Official Bootleg”

Fred Anderson Quartet

Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III

Asian Improv AIR 0074

Fred Anderson

Staying in the Game

Engine e029

Fred Anderson

21st Century Chase

Delmark DE 589

Consistency of expression is what has characterized the playing of Chicago tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson over the years. Furthermore, unlike many other musicians, there hasn’t been a subsequent lessening of his powers as he ages. As a matter of fact, now that he’s reached the venerable age of 80, his improvisational skills are at an exalted peak. Listen to these CDs for proof. They were recorded not only at Anderson’s 80th Birthday Bash, but when he was a comparative youngster of 79, 78 and even 71.

A founding member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, who recorded sparingly between the late 1960s and mid-1990s, Anderson has nurtured some of Chicago’s younger talents both by gigging with them, as well as giving them a place to play in his now legendary Velvet Lounge. Those years out of the limelight also created an idiosyncratic soloist, who – like Sonny Rollins and Eric Dolphy before him – now possesses an unmistaken reed texture whose sharp split tones carve a unique niche in every tune. Not only does the sax man put a lie to the cliché that “jazz is a young man’s art”, but he also proves that when they age jazzman don’t have to be cuddly and comfortable like Doc Cheatham or Eubie Blake. Additionally, as he demonstrates in four contexts here, stamina, innovation and sonic color aren’t the preserve of any generation. His playing can be threatening to saxophonists of any age.

Over the years Anderson has developed a tight coterie of associates, with many turning up on these discs. The oldest session, Birthday Live 2000, is a trio CD with bassist Tatsu Aoki and drummer Chad Taylor. Seven years later, with Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III, Taylor and Aoki are still on board and tenor saxophonist Francis Wong joins the trio. Staying in the Game – an understatement if there ever was one when Anderson is concerned – from 2008, features him with bassist Harrison Bankhead and drummer Tim Daisy. Finally 21st Century Chase from 2009, retains Bankhead, brings back Taylor and adds guitarist Jeff Parker and tenor saxophonist Kidd Jordan – the later five years Anderson’s junior – whose tenure on the New Orleans scene is roughly analogous to Anderson’s in Chicago.

Anderson’s mature style is much in evidence as early as the first track on Birthday Live 2000. Both incendiary and knife-sharp, his carved-up timbres partition still further as he churns out double-and-triple tongued trills plus jagged Woody Woodpecker-like bites. Rappelling from just below the ligature down through the bow to the bell of his horn and back up again, the saxophonist’s glissandi radiate every which way. His explorations are backed by slapping bass strings plus opposite sticking and cross pulsing from Taylor.

Indefatigable and seemingly never at a lack for ideas – or breath, Anderson brings the same toughness to the third tune, which for all intents and purposes resembles a blues-flecked ballad. After an a capella intro from the tenorist, Aoki’s vibrating and quavering bass line moulds itself around Anderson’s rasping notes as the narrative is lengthened with emphasized phraseology and half-recognizable quotes from other tunes.

Flash forward eight years, and while Anderson has maintained his form, his playing is mellower. Bankhead’s supple walking now explores additional peaks and valleys in his accompaniment, while Daisy’s rolls, pops and bass drum kicks are as sturdy as Anderson’s solos. With the sidemen proficient players on other instruments as well as their own, intimations of other textures – if not the instruments themselves – show up on several tracks.

You could swear for instance that kalimba plucks are pressed into service on “Wandering”, or that Bankhead – who plays the six-string – has added guitar licks to his backing as well. Still the saxophone lines are moderato and unstrained, languid enough to indulge in an interlude of parlando, seconded by Bankhead’s unforced bass strokes. Similarly Daisy’s mallet-driven pulses on “Changes and Bodies and Tones” border on marimba textures as the bassist’s sul ponticello squeaks are moderated mid-range. Summing up the situation, Anderson builds his solo with pointillism, elongating and expanding note dabs and smears into a cohesive whole.

Mellow, yet still tough in his outings, the saxophonist manages to stretch tones almost to the breaking point, without ever severing the thematic thread. If he overblows while vibrating his horn’s metal, as he does on “60 Degrees in November”, the supplementary intervals and vibrations are perfectly balanced as they’re masticated with bites and tongue slaps. Chromatic improvisations from all hold everything together.

This relaxed, yet bellicose command is maintained when facing off against another tenor man, as Anderson does on the last two discs. No one plays for almost 70 years without devising strategies for different situations. Recorded at 2007’s Chicago Asian Jazz Festival, Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III, for instance, allows the veteran tenor saxophonist to maintain his parameters throughout.

Case in point is a tune such as “Beyond the Bridge”. The head is sounded by Anderson’s harsh, irregular vibrato, then echoed with similar – but more accommodating – tones from Wong’s sax. Gritty, with reed bites and tongue stops, the two aurally march in unison with Taylor’s sticks flying into ruffs and rebounds and Aoki stop-start bass thumps. At times Wong, whose timbre is thinner than Anderson’s, could be playing “Hickory, Dickory Dock” as he operates in double counterpoint to the older saxophonist. That is until the drummer’s double-timed ratamacues and the bassist’s vibrating strings push Anderson to unleash his idiosyncratic stabbing pitches which are then answered by jagged, staccato octaves from the younger saxophonist.

An equivalent tart interface occurs on “Positive Changes”. However the impetus for Anderson and Wong combining for a series of tongue flutters and split tones which modulate up the scale with rubato intonation is some impressive bass work from Aoki. Moving beyond sul ponticello to a strained, near-vocalized pitch, the bassist descends the scale while sounding every string simultaneously.

The scene had been set with “Andersonville”, where each player stakes out his individual musical turf. Aoki’s thumps and pumps, Taylor’s whapping snares and cymbal vibrations plus the lockstep reed-biting and sonic curves from the saxophonists kick in almost as soon as Anderson sounds his signature ferocious cry. From then on Anderson appears to pushing and prodding every musical tone he can find in as many varied angles as he can – and Wong does the same. Steaming ahead, the two build up a polyphonic head of steam, double and triple-tonguing, appending connective arpeggios and sluicing vamps. Crumbling the lines to fine musical powder, the simultaneous staccato spewing never completely obliterates the piece’s musical shape.

Two years later Anderson’s 80th birthday bash at the new Velvet Lounge, not far from the old location, and featuring 75-year-old Jordan as well, was no exercise in nostalgia. The only bow to the past is that the two-part title tune reflects comparable tough tenor battles of the 1940s and 1950s. Adherents of the style were Sonny Stitt and Gene Ammons and most pointedly Dexter Gordon and Wardell Gray “The Chase”. However sharp ears will notice that by the end of the almost hour long improv here, both John Colrane and Johnny Griffin have been nodded to as well.

No exercise in neo-con nostalgia, this “Chase” announces its modernity from the top: a capella squeaks and squeals in altissimo variants played by Jordan with vocal exhortations and hard air expelling. Anderson counters with a “Pop Goes the Weasel” theme, Taylor and Bankhead hit, Parker twangs – and the chase is on. Jordan, a horse-raising aficionado, uses smears, clipped notes and effective glossolalia to take the lead as Anderson canters besides him with lower-pitched contrapuntal runs. Neck and neck, Jordan’s tone is more splintered and almost in the alto range while Anderson’s growls are practically moderato in comparison. Taylor’s ruffs and flams plus Bankhead’s walking stay back on the track, while Parker’s knob-twisting licks and abrasive twanging provide the equivalent of a spur to a horse’s flanks.

Eventually as diaphragm-vibrated timbres, elastic tonal interpolations and ragged split tones rend the air, both tenor men reach an extended rapprochement. Agitato and staccatissimo, neither can best the other – if that ever was the intention – and each maintains his distinctive identity. Getting to the point where each finishes each other’s phrases, a coda includes Jordan’s nod to Griffin via a quote from “Wade in the Water” and Anderson to Coltrane with a snatch of “A Love Supreme”. The finale showcases perfect parlando double counterpoint.

Bankhead’s sul ponticello introduction of the second part spectacularly exposes both the root notes and their fundamentals, but this pacific interlude soon gives way to more reed flaunting, taken chromatically or in broken octaves. Here and throughout the rest of the CD, the heavily vibrated multiphonic reed runs shares space with the guitarist’s curvaceous strums plus an occasional clank and click from the drummer. With Trane’s “Cousin Mary” and “Giant Steps” alluded to, the two wrap up the exciting essay in impov by honoring their direct influence as well as their tenor forefathers.

An equivalent chase in the future from others would undoubtedly have to touch on the saxophone advances of Anderson himself. From the originator, however, most of are exhibited in multi-faceted examples on these four discs.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 21st: 1. 21st Century Chase Part I 2. 21st Century Chase Part II 3. Ode to Alvin Fielder

Personnel: 21st: Fred Anderson and Kidd Jordan (tenor saxophones); Jeff Parker (guitar); Harrison Bankhead (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

Track Listing: Birthday: 1. 22:40 2. 13:14 3. 14:24

Personnel: Birthday: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone; Tatsu Aoki (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

Track Listing: Staying: 1. Sunday Afternoon 2. The Elephant and the Bee 3. 60 Degrees in November 4. Wandering 5. Springing Winter 6. Changes and Bodies and Tones

Personnel: Staying: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone; Harrison Bankhead (bass) and Tin Daisy (drums)

Track Listing: Live: 1. Andersonville 2. Acceleration 3. Beyond the Bridge 4. Positive Changes 5. Best Time of Life 6. Discreet Identifier

Personnel: Live: Fred Anderson and Francis Wong (tenor saxophones); Tatsu Aoki (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

December 17, 2009

Fred Anderson

21st Century Chase
Delmark DE 589

Fred Anderson Quartet

Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III

Asian Improv AIR 0074

Fred Anderson

Staying in the Game

Engine e029

Fred Anderson Trio

Birthday Live 2000

Asian Improv AIR “Official Bootleg”

Consistency of expression is what has characterized the playing of Chicago tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson over the years. Furthermore, unlike many other musicians, there hasn’t been a subsequent lessening of his powers as he ages. As a matter of fact, now that he’s reached the venerable age of 80, his improvisational skills are at an exalted peak. Listen to these CDs for proof. They were recorded not only at Anderson’s 80th Birthday Bash, but when he was a comparative youngster of 79, 78 and even 71.

A founding member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, who recorded sparingly between the late 1960s and mid-1990s, Anderson has nurtured some of Chicago’s younger talents both by gigging with them, as well as giving them a place to play in his now legendary Velvet Lounge. Those years out of the limelight also created an idiosyncratic soloist, who – like Sonny Rollins and Eric Dolphy before him – now possesses an unmistaken reed texture whose sharp split tones carve a unique niche in every tune. Not only does the sax man put a lie to the cliché that “jazz is a young man’s art”, but he also proves that when they age jazzman don’t have to be cuddly and comfortable like Doc Cheatham or Eubie Blake. Additionally, as he demonstrates in four contexts here, stamina, innovation and sonic color aren’t the preserve of any generation. His playing can be threatening to saxophonists of any age.

Over the years Anderson has developed a tight coterie of associates, with many turning up on these discs. The oldest session, Birthday Live 2000, is a trio CD with bassist Tatsu Aoki and drummer Chad Taylor. Seven years later, with Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III, Taylor and Aoki are still on board and tenor saxophonist Francis Wong joins the trio. Staying in the Game – an understatement if there ever was one when Anderson is concerned – from 2008, features him with bassist Harrison Bankhead and drummer Tim Daisy. Finally 21st Century Chase from 2009, retains Bankhead, brings back Taylor and adds guitarist Jeff Parker and tenor saxophonist Kidd Jordan – the later five years Anderson’s junior – whose tenure on the New Orleans scene is roughly analogous to Anderson’s in Chicago.

Anderson’s mature style is much in evidence as early as the first track on Birthday Live 2000. Both incendiary and knife-sharp, his carved-up timbres partition still further as he churns out double-and-triple tongued trills plus jagged Woody Woodpecker-like bites. Rappelling from just below the ligature down through the bow to the bell of his horn and back up again, the saxophonist’s glissandi radiate every which way. His explorations are backed by slapping bass strings plus opposite sticking and cross pulsing from Taylor.

Indefatigable and seemingly never at a lack for ideas – or breath, Anderson brings the same toughness to the third tune, which for all intents and purposes resembles a blues-flecked ballad. After an a capella intro from the tenorist, Aoki’s vibrating and quavering bass line moulds itself around Anderson’s rasping notes as the narrative is lengthened with emphasized phraseology and half-recognizable quotes from other tunes.

Flash forward eight years, and while Anderson has maintained his form, his playing is mellower. Bankhead’s supple walking now explores additional peaks and valleys in his accompaniment, while Daisy’s rolls, pops and bass drum kicks are as sturdy as Anderson’s solos. With the sidemen proficient players on other instruments as well as their own, intimations of other textures – if not the instruments themselves – show up on several tracks.

You could swear for instance that kalimba plucks are pressed into service on “Wandering”, or that Bankhead – who plays the six-string – has added guitar licks to his backing as well. Still the saxophone lines are moderato and unstrained, languid enough to indulge in an interlude of parlando, seconded by Bankhead’s unforced bass strokes. Similarly Daisy’s mallet-driven pulses on “Changes and Bodies and Tones” border on marimba textures as the bassist’s sul ponticello squeaks are moderated mid-range. Summing up the situation, Anderson builds his solo with pointillism, elongating and expanding note dabs and smears into a cohesive whole.

Mellow, yet still tough in his outings, the saxophonist manages to stretch tones almost to the breaking point, without ever severing the thematic thread. If he overblows while vibrating his horn’s metal, as he does on “60 Degrees in November”, the supplementary intervals and vibrations are perfectly balanced as they’re masticated with bites and tongue slaps. Chromatic improvisations from all hold everything together.

This relaxed, yet bellicose command is maintained when facing off against another tenor man, as Anderson does on the last two discs. No one plays for almost 70 years without devising strategies for different situations. Recorded at 2007’s Chicago Asian Jazz Festival, Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III, for instance, allows the veteran tenor saxophonist to maintain his parameters throughout.

Case in point is a tune such as “Beyond the Bridge”. The head is sounded by Anderson’s harsh, irregular vibrato, then echoed with similar – but more accommodating – tones from Wong’s sax. Gritty, with reed bites and tongue stops, the two aurally march in unison with Taylor’s sticks flying into ruffs and rebounds and Aoki stop-start bass thumps. At times Wong, whose timbre is thinner than Anderson’s, could be playing “Hickory, Dickory Dock” as he operates in double counterpoint to the older saxophonist. That is until the drummer’s double-timed ratamacues and the bassist’s vibrating strings push Anderson to unleash his idiosyncratic stabbing pitches which are then answered by jagged, staccato octaves from the younger saxophonist.

An equivalent tart interface occurs on “Positive Changes”. However the impetus for Anderson and Wong combining for a series of tongue flutters and split tones which modulate up the scale with rubato intonation is some impressive bass work from Aoki. Moving beyond sul ponticello to a strained, near-vocalized pitch, the bassist descends the scale while sounding every string simultaneously.

The scene had been set with “Andersonville”, where each player stakes out his individual musical turf. Aoki’s thumps and pumps, Taylor’s whapping snares and cymbal vibrations plus the lockstep reed-biting and sonic curves from the saxophonists kick in almost as soon as Anderson sounds his signature ferocious cry. From then on Anderson appears to pushing and prodding every musical tone he can find in as many varied angles as he can – and Wong does the same. Steaming ahead, the two build up a polyphonic head of steam, double and triple-tonguing, appending connective arpeggios and sluicing vamps. Crumbling the lines to fine musical powder, the simultaneous staccato spewing never completely obliterates the piece’s musical shape.

Two years later Anderson’s 80th birthday bash at the new Velvet Lounge, not far from the old location, and featuring 75-year-old Jordan as well, was no exercise in nostalgia. The only bow to the past is that the two-part title tune reflects comparable tough tenor battles of the 1940s and 1950s. Adherents of the style were Sonny Stitt and Gene Ammons and most pointedly Dexter Gordon and Wardell Gray “The Chase”. However sharp ears will notice that by the end of the almost hour long improv here, both John Colrane and Johnny Griffin have been nodded to as well.

No exercise in neo-con nostalgia, this “Chase” announces its modernity from the top: a capella squeaks and squeals in altissimo variants played by Jordan with vocal exhortations and hard air expelling. Anderson counters with a “Pop Goes the Weasel” theme, Taylor and Bankhead hit, Parker twangs – and the chase is on. Jordan, a horse-raising aficionado, uses smears, clipped notes and effective glossolalia to take the lead as Anderson canters besides him with lower-pitched contrapuntal runs. Neck and neck, Jordan’s tone is more splintered and almost in the alto range while Anderson’s growls are practically moderato in comparison. Taylor’s ruffs and flams plus Bankhead’s walking stay back on the track, while Parker’s knob-twisting licks and abrasive twanging provide the equivalent of a spur to a horse’s flanks.

Eventually as diaphragm-vibrated timbres, elastic tonal interpolations and ragged split tones rend the air, both tenor men reach an extended rapprochement. Agitato and staccatissimo, neither can best the other – if that ever was the intention – and each maintains his distinctive identity. Getting to the point where each finishes each other’s phrases, a coda includes Jordan’s nod to Griffin via a quote from “Wade in the Water” and Anderson to Coltrane with a snatch of “A Love Supreme”. The finale showcases perfect parlando double counterpoint.

Bankhead’s sul ponticello introduction of the second part spectacularly exposes both the root notes and their fundamentals, but this pacific interlude soon gives way to more reed flaunting, taken chromatically or in broken octaves. Here and throughout the rest of the CD, the heavily vibrated multiphonic reed runs shares space with the guitarist’s curvaceous strums plus an occasional clank and click from the drummer. With Trane’s “Cousin Mary” and “Giant Steps” alluded to, the two wrap up the exciting essay in impov by honoring their direct influence as well as their tenor forefathers.

An equivalent chase in the future from others would undoubtedly have to touch on the saxophone advances of Anderson himself. From the originator, however, most of are exhibited in multi-faceted examples on these four discs.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 21st: 1. 21st Century Chase Part I 2. 21st Century Chase Part II 3. Ode to Alvin Fielder

Personnel: 21st: Fred Anderson and Kidd Jordan (tenor saxophones); Jeff Parker (guitar); Harrison Bankhead (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

Track Listing: Birthday: 1. 22:40 2. 13:14 3. 14:24

Personnel: Birthday: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone; Tatsu Aoki (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

Track Listing: Staying: 1. Sunday Afternoon 2. The Elephant and the Bee 3. 60 Degrees in November 4. Wandering 5. Springing Winter 6. Changes and Bodies and Tones

Personnel: Staying: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone; Harrison Bankhead (bass) and Tin Daisy (drums)

Track Listing: Live: 1. Andersonville 2. Acceleration 3. Beyond the Bridge 4. Positive Changes 5. Best Time of Life 6. Discreet Identifier

Personnel: Live: Fred Anderson and Francis Wong (tenor saxophones); Tatsu Aoki (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

December 17, 2009

Fred Anderson

Staying in the Game
Engine e029

Fred Anderson Quartet

Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III

Asian Improv AIR 0074

Fred Anderson Trio

Birthday Live 2000

Asian Improv AIR “Official Bootleg”

Fred Anderson

21st Century Chase

Delmark DE 589

Consistency of expression is what has characterized the playing of Chicago tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson over the years. Furthermore, unlike many other musicians, there hasn’t been a subsequent lessening of his powers as he ages. As a matter of fact, now that he’s reached the venerable age of 80, his improvisational skills are at an exalted peak. Listen to these CDs for proof. They were recorded not only at Anderson’s 80th Birthday Bash, but when he was a comparative youngster of 79, 78 and even 71.

A founding member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, who recorded sparingly between the late 1960s and mid-1990s, Anderson has nurtured some of Chicago’s younger talents both by gigging with them, as well as giving them a place to play in his now legendary Velvet Lounge. Those years out of the limelight also created an idiosyncratic soloist, who – like Sonny Rollins and Eric Dolphy before him – now possesses an unmistaken reed texture whose sharp split tones carve a unique niche in every tune. Not only does the sax man put a lie to the cliché that “jazz is a young man’s art”, but he also proves that when they age jazzman don’t have to be cuddly and comfortable like Doc Cheatham or Eubie Blake. Additionally, as he demonstrates in four contexts here, stamina, innovation and sonic color aren’t the preserve of any generation. His playing can be threatening to saxophonists of any age.

Over the years Anderson has developed a tight coterie of associates, with many turning up on these discs. The oldest session, Birthday Live 2000, is a trio CD with bassist Tatsu Aoki and drummer Chad Taylor. Seven years later, with Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III, Taylor and Aoki are still on board and tenor saxophonist Francis Wong joins the trio. Staying in the Game – an understatement if there ever was one when Anderson is concerned – from 2008, features him with bassist Harrison Bankhead and drummer Tim Daisy. Finally 21st Century Chase from 2009, retains Bankhead, brings back Taylor and adds guitarist Jeff Parker and tenor saxophonist Kidd Jordan – the later five years Anderson’s junior – whose tenure on the New Orleans scene is roughly analogous to Anderson’s in Chicago.

Anderson’s mature style is much in evidence as early as the first track on Birthday Live 2000. Both incendiary and knife-sharp, his carved-up timbres partition still further as he churns out double-and-triple tongued trills plus jagged Woody Woodpecker-like bites. Rappelling from just below the ligature down through the bow to the bell of his horn and back up again, the saxophonist’s glissandi radiate every which way. His explorations are backed by slapping bass strings plus opposite sticking and cross pulsing from Taylor.

Indefatigable and seemingly never at a lack for ideas – or breath, Anderson brings the same toughness to the third tune, which for all intents and purposes resembles a blues-flecked ballad. After an a capella intro from the tenorist, Aoki’s vibrating and quavering bass line moulds itself around Anderson’s rasping notes as the narrative is lengthened with emphasized phraseology and half-recognizable quotes from other tunes.

Flash forward eight years, and while Anderson has maintained his form, his playing is mellower. Bankhead’s supple walking now explores additional peaks and valleys in his accompaniment, while Daisy’s rolls, pops and bass drum kicks are as sturdy as Anderson’s solos. With the sidemen proficient players on other instruments as well as their own, intimations of other textures – if not the instruments themselves – show up on several tracks.

You could swear for instance that kalimba plucks are pressed into service on “Wandering”, or that Bankhead – who plays the six-string – has added guitar licks to his backing as well. Still the saxophone lines are moderato and unstrained, languid enough to indulge in an interlude of parlando, seconded by Bankhead’s unforced bass strokes. Similarly Daisy’s mallet-driven pulses on “Changes and Bodies and Tones” border on marimba textures as the bassist’s sul ponticello squeaks are moderated mid-range. Summing up the situation, Anderson builds his solo with pointillism, elongating and expanding note dabs and smears into a cohesive whole.

Mellow, yet still tough in his outings, the saxophonist manages to stretch tones almost to the breaking point, without ever severing the thematic thread. If he overblows while vibrating his horn’s metal, as he does on “60 Degrees in November”, the supplementary intervals and vibrations are perfectly balanced as they’re masticated with bites and tongue slaps. Chromatic improvisations from all hold everything together.

This relaxed, yet bellicose command is maintained when facing off against another tenor man, as Anderson does on the last two discs. No one plays for almost 70 years without devising strategies for different situations. Recorded at 2007’s Chicago Asian Jazz Festival, Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III, for instance, allows the veteran tenor saxophonist to maintain his parameters throughout.

Case in point is a tune such as “Beyond the Bridge”. The head is sounded by Anderson’s harsh, irregular vibrato, then echoed with similar – but more accommodating – tones from Wong’s sax. Gritty, with reed bites and tongue stops, the two aurally march in unison with Taylor’s sticks flying into ruffs and rebounds and Aoki stop-start bass thumps. At times Wong, whose timbre is thinner than Anderson’s, could be playing “Hickory, Dickory Dock” as he operates in double counterpoint to the older saxophonist. That is until the drummer’s double-timed ratamacues and the bassist’s vibrating strings push Anderson to unleash his idiosyncratic stabbing pitches which are then answered by jagged, staccato octaves from the younger saxophonist.

An equivalent tart interface occurs on “Positive Changes”. However the impetus for Anderson and Wong combining for a series of tongue flutters and split tones which modulate up the scale with rubato intonation is some impressive bass work from Aoki. Moving beyond sul ponticello to a strained, near-vocalized pitch, the bassist descends the scale while sounding every string simultaneously.

The scene had been set with “Andersonville”, where each player stakes out his individual musical turf. Aoki’s thumps and pumps, Taylor’s whapping snares and cymbal vibrations plus the lockstep reed-biting and sonic curves from the saxophonists kick in almost as soon as Anderson sounds his signature ferocious cry. From then on Anderson appears to pushing and prodding every musical tone he can find in as many varied angles as he can – and Wong does the same. Steaming ahead, the two build up a polyphonic head of steam, double and triple-tonguing, appending connective arpeggios and sluicing vamps. Crumbling the lines to fine musical powder, the simultaneous staccato spewing never completely obliterates the piece’s musical shape.

Two years later Anderson’s 80th birthday bash at the new Velvet Lounge, not far from the old location, and featuring 75-year-old Jordan as well, was no exercise in nostalgia. The only bow to the past is that the two-part title tune reflects comparable tough tenor battles of the 1940s and 1950s. Adherents of the style were Sonny Stitt and Gene Ammons and most pointedly Dexter Gordon and Wardell Gray “The Chase”. However sharp ears will notice that by the end of the almost hour long improv here, both John Colrane and Johnny Griffin have been nodded to as well.

No exercise in neo-con nostalgia, this “Chase” announces its modernity from the top: a capella squeaks and squeals in altissimo variants played by Jordan with vocal exhortations and hard air expelling. Anderson counters with a “Pop Goes the Weasel” theme, Taylor and Bankhead hit, Parker twangs – and the chase is on. Jordan, a horse-raising aficionado, uses smears, clipped notes and effective glossolalia to take the lead as Anderson canters besides him with lower-pitched contrapuntal runs. Neck and neck, Jordan’s tone is more splintered and almost in the alto range while Anderson’s growls are practically moderato in comparison. Taylor’s ruffs and flams plus Bankhead’s walking stay back on the track, while Parker’s knob-twisting licks and abrasive twanging provide the equivalent of a spur to a horse’s flanks.

Eventually as diaphragm-vibrated timbres, elastic tonal interpolations and ragged split tones rend the air, both tenor men reach an extended rapprochement. Agitato and staccatissimo, neither can best the other – if that ever was the intention – and each maintains his distinctive identity. Getting to the point where each finishes each other’s phrases, a coda includes Jordan’s nod to Griffin via a quote from “Wade in the Water” and Anderson to Coltrane with a snatch of “A Love Supreme”. The finale showcases perfect parlando double counterpoint.

Bankhead’s sul ponticello introduction of the second part spectacularly exposes both the root notes and their fundamentals, but this pacific interlude soon gives way to more reed flaunting, taken chromatically or in broken octaves. Here and throughout the rest of the CD, the heavily vibrated multiphonic reed runs shares space with the guitarist’s curvaceous strums plus an occasional clank and click from the drummer. With Trane’s “Cousin Mary” and “Giant Steps” alluded to, the two wrap up the exciting essay in impov by honoring their direct influence as well as their tenor forefathers.

An equivalent chase in the future from others would undoubtedly have to touch on the saxophone advances of Anderson himself. From the originator, however, most of are exhibited in multi-faceted examples on these four discs.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 21st: 1. 21st Century Chase Part I 2. 21st Century Chase Part II 3. Ode to Alvin Fielder

Personnel: 21st: Fred Anderson and Kidd Jordan (tenor saxophones); Jeff Parker (guitar); Harrison Bankhead (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

Track Listing: Birthday: 1. 22:40 2. 13:14 3. 14:24

Personnel: Birthday: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone; Tatsu Aoki (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

Track Listing: Staying: 1. Sunday Afternoon 2. The Elephant and the Bee 3. 60 Degrees in November 4. Wandering 5. Springing Winter 6. Changes and Bodies and Tones

Personnel: Staying: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone; Harrison Bankhead (bass) and Tin Daisy (drums)

Track Listing: Live: 1. Andersonville 2. Acceleration 3. Beyond the Bridge 4. Positive Changes 5. Best Time of Life 6. Discreet Identifier

Personnel: Live: Fred Anderson and Francis Wong (tenor saxophones); Tatsu Aoki (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

December 17, 2009

Fred Anderson Quartet

Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III
Asian Improv AIR 0074

Fred Anderson

Staying in the Game

Engine e029

Fred Anderson Trio

Birthday Live 2000

Asian Improv AIR “Official Bootleg”

Fred Anderson

21st Century Chase

Delmark DE 589

Consistency of expression is what has characterized the playing of Chicago tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson over the years. Furthermore, unlike many other musicians, there hasn’t been a subsequent lessening of his powers as he ages. As a matter of fact, now that he’s reached the venerable age of 80, his improvisational skills are at an exalted peak. Listen to these CDs for proof. They were recorded not only at Anderson’s 80th Birthday Bash, but when he was a comparative youngster of 79, 78 and even 71.

A founding member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, who recorded sparingly between the late 1960s and mid-1990s, Anderson has nurtured some of Chicago’s younger talents both by gigging with them, as well as giving them a place to play in his now legendary Velvet Lounge. Those years out of the limelight also created an idiosyncratic soloist, who – like Sonny Rollins and Eric Dolphy before him – now possesses an unmistaken reed texture whose sharp split tones carve a unique niche in every tune. Not only does the sax man put a lie to the cliché that “jazz is a young man’s art”, but he also proves that when they age jazzman don’t have to be cuddly and comfortable like Doc Cheatham or Eubie Blake. Additionally, as he demonstrates in four contexts here, stamina, innovation and sonic color aren’t the preserve of any generation. His playing can be threatening to saxophonists of any age.

Over the years Anderson has developed a tight coterie of associates, with many turning up on these discs. The oldest session, Birthday Live 2000, is a trio CD with bassist Tatsu Aoki and drummer Chad Taylor. Seven years later, with Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III, Taylor and Aoki are still on board and tenor saxophonist Francis Wong joins the trio. Staying in the Game – an understatement if there ever was one when Anderson is concerned – from 2008, features him with bassist Harrison Bankhead and drummer Tim Daisy. Finally 21st Century Chase from 2009, retains Bankhead, brings back Taylor and adds guitarist Jeff Parker and tenor saxophonist Kidd Jordan – the later five years Anderson’s junior – whose tenure on the New Orleans scene is roughly analogous to Anderson’s in Chicago.

Anderson’s mature style is much in evidence as early as the first track on Birthday Live 2000. Both incendiary and knife-sharp, his carved-up timbres partition still further as he churns out double-and-triple tongued trills plus jagged Woody Woodpecker-like bites. Rappelling from just below the ligature down through the bow to the bell of his horn and back up again, the saxophonist’s glissandi radiate every which way. His explorations are backed by slapping bass strings plus opposite sticking and cross pulsing from Taylor.

Indefatigable and seemingly never at a lack for ideas – or breath, Anderson brings the same toughness to the third tune, which for all intents and purposes resembles a blues-flecked ballad. After an a capella intro from the tenorist, Aoki’s vibrating and quavering bass line moulds itself around Anderson’s rasping notes as the narrative is lengthened with emphasized phraseology and half-recognizable quotes from other tunes.

Flash forward eight years, and while Anderson has maintained his form, his playing is mellower. Bankhead’s supple walking now explores additional peaks and valleys in his accompaniment, while Daisy’s rolls, pops and bass drum kicks are as sturdy as Anderson’s solos. With the sidemen proficient players on other instruments as well as their own, intimations of other textures – if not the instruments themselves – show up on several tracks.

You could swear for instance that kalimba plucks are pressed into service on “Wandering”, or that Bankhead – who plays the six-string – has added guitar licks to his backing as well. Still the saxophone lines are moderato and unstrained, languid enough to indulge in an interlude of parlando, seconded by Bankhead’s unforced bass strokes. Similarly Daisy’s mallet-driven pulses on “Changes and Bodies and Tones” border on marimba textures as the bassist’s sul ponticello squeaks are moderated mid-range. Summing up the situation, Anderson builds his solo with pointillism, elongating and expanding note dabs and smears into a cohesive whole.

Mellow, yet still tough in his outings, the saxophonist manages to stretch tones almost to the breaking point, without ever severing the thematic thread. If he overblows while vibrating his horn’s metal, as he does on “60 Degrees in November”, the supplementary intervals and vibrations are perfectly balanced as they’re masticated with bites and tongue slaps. Chromatic improvisations from all hold everything together.

This relaxed, yet bellicose command is maintained when facing off against another tenor man, as Anderson does on the last two discs. No one plays for almost 70 years without devising strategies for different situations. Recorded at 2007’s Chicago Asian Jazz Festival, Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume III, for instance, allows the veteran tenor saxophonist to maintain his parameters throughout.

Case in point is a tune such as “Beyond the Bridge”. The head is sounded by Anderson’s harsh, irregular vibrato, then echoed with similar – but more accommodating – tones from Wong’s sax. Gritty, with reed bites and tongue stops, the two aurally march in unison with Taylor’s sticks flying into ruffs and rebounds and Aoki stop-start bass thumps. At times Wong, whose timbre is thinner than Anderson’s, could be playing “Hickory, Dickory Dock” as he operates in double counterpoint to the older saxophonist. That is until the drummer’s double-timed ratamacues and the bassist’s vibrating strings push Anderson to unleash his idiosyncratic stabbing pitches which are then answered by jagged, staccato octaves from the younger saxophonist.

An equivalent tart interface occurs on “Positive Changes”. However the impetus for Anderson and Wong combining for a series of tongue flutters and split tones which modulate up the scale with rubato intonation is some impressive bass work from Aoki. Moving beyond sul ponticello to a strained, near-vocalized pitch, the bassist descends the scale while sounding every string simultaneously.

The scene had been set with “Andersonville”, where each player stakes out his individual musical turf. Aoki’s thumps and pumps, Taylor’s whapping snares and cymbal vibrations plus the lockstep reed-biting and sonic curves from the saxophonists kick in almost as soon as Anderson sounds his signature ferocious cry. From then on Anderson appears to pushing and prodding every musical tone he can find in as many varied angles as he can – and Wong does the same. Steaming ahead, the two build up a polyphonic head of steam, double and triple-tonguing, appending connective arpeggios and sluicing vamps. Crumbling the lines to fine musical powder, the simultaneous staccato spewing never completely obliterates the piece’s musical shape.

Two years later Anderson’s 80th birthday bash at the new Velvet Lounge, not far from the old location, and featuring 75-year-old Jordan as well, was no exercise in nostalgia. The only bow to the past is that the two-part title tune reflects comparable tough tenor battles of the 1940s and 1950s. Adherents of the style were Sonny Stitt and Gene Ammons and most pointedly Dexter Gordon and Wardell Gray “The Chase”. However sharp ears will notice that by the end of the almost hour long improv here, both John Colrane and Johnny Griffin have been nodded to as well.

No exercise in neo-con nostalgia, this “Chase” announces its modernity from the top: a capella squeaks and squeals in altissimo variants played by Jordan with vocal exhortations and hard air expelling. Anderson counters with a “Pop Goes the Weasel” theme, Taylor and Bankhead hit, Parker twangs – and the chase is on. Jordan, a horse-raising aficionado, uses smears, clipped notes and effective glossolalia to take the lead as Anderson canters besides him with lower-pitched contrapuntal runs. Neck and neck, Jordan’s tone is more splintered and almost in the alto range while Anderson’s growls are practically moderato in comparison. Taylor’s ruffs and flams plus Bankhead’s walking stay back on the track, while Parker’s knob-twisting licks and abrasive twanging provide the equivalent of a spur to a horse’s flanks.

Eventually as diaphragm-vibrated timbres, elastic tonal interpolations and ragged split tones rend the air, both tenor men reach an extended rapprochement. Agitato and staccatissimo, neither can best the other – if that ever was the intention – and each maintains his distinctive identity. Getting to the point where each finishes each other’s phrases, a coda includes Jordan’s nod to Griffin via a quote from “Wade in the Water” and Anderson to Coltrane with a snatch of “A Love Supreme”. The finale showcases perfect parlando double counterpoint.

Bankhead’s sul ponticello introduction of the second part spectacularly exposes both the root notes and their fundamentals, but this pacific interlude soon gives way to more reed flaunting, taken chromatically or in broken octaves. Here and throughout the rest of the CD, the heavily vibrated multiphonic reed runs shares space with the guitarist’s curvaceous strums plus an occasional clank and click from the drummer. With Trane’s “Cousin Mary” and “Giant Steps” alluded to, the two wrap up the exciting essay in impov by honoring their direct influence as well as their tenor forefathers.

An equivalent chase in the future from others would undoubtedly have to touch on the saxophone advances of Anderson himself. From the originator, however, most of are exhibited in multi-faceted examples on these four discs.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 21st: 1. 21st Century Chase Part I 2. 21st Century Chase Part II 3. Ode to Alvin Fielder

Personnel: 21st: Fred Anderson and Kidd Jordan (tenor saxophones); Jeff Parker (guitar); Harrison Bankhead (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

Track Listing: Birthday: 1. 22:40 2. 13:14 3. 14:24

Personnel: Birthday: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone; Tatsu Aoki (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

Track Listing: Staying: 1. Sunday Afternoon 2. The Elephant and the Bee 3. 60 Degrees in November 4. Wandering 5. Springing Winter 6. Changes and Bodies and Tones

Personnel: Staying: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone; Harrison Bankhead (bass) and Tin Daisy (drums)

Track Listing: Live: 1. Andersonville 2. Acceleration 3. Beyond the Bridge 4. Positive Changes 5. Best Time of Life 6. Discreet Identifier

Personnel: Live: Fred Anderson and Francis Wong (tenor saxophones); Tatsu Aoki (bass) and Chad Taylor (drums)

December 17, 2009

Kidd Jordan

The Vision Festival New York
June 11, 2008

Figuratively – and usually single-handedly – carrying the banner for experimental Jazz in New Orleans for many years, tenor saxophonist Edward “Kidd” Jordan, 73, must have felt metaphorically out-in-the-cold on many occasions. But heat was certainly in evidence – literally and emotionally – mid-June in New York as a turn-away crowd helped celebrate the reedman’s Lifetime Achievement with a series of concerts.

Highlight of the 13th Annual Vision Festival that took place at the Lower East Side’s Clemente Soto Velez Cultural Center, the five sets honoring Jordan were hot – as was the venue. Despite a few strategically placed revolving fans, the temperature hovered around 35 degrees Celsius in the venerable space, with body heat from the packed audiences adding to the ventilation challenges.

Besides working as a sideman in Crescent City bands and an educator at Southern University, introducing generations of students – including his own children – to improvised music, Jordan has been playing “outside” since the 1960s, but wasn’t really recognized until collaborating with outsiders in the late 1970s. His most affecting work during the festival was with two of those ensembles.

Culmination of the evening was an incendiary workout between Jordan and another Free Jazz pioneer, 79-year-old tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson of Chicago backed by the unbeatable rhythm section of Chicago’s Hamid Drake on drums and New York’s William Parker on bass. Earlier there was as impressive a collaboration with some of Jordan’s Southern associates: pianist Joel Futterman from Virginia, New Orleans trumpeter Clyde Kerr, plus Parker and – subbing for indisposed Mississippi-based drummer Alvin Fielder – New York drummer Gerald Cleaver. As if he was playing at New Orleans’ Preservation Hall, Kerr remained seated on a chair throughout the set.

Perhaps the most notable part of this meeting was how seamlessly the full rounded tone of Kerr’s trumpet fit with Jordan’s split tones and frequent altissimo excursions, plus Futterman’s hunts, pecks and stops both inside on the piano strings and on the keyboard. Kerr’s burbling, heraldic timbres and carefully measured lines existed besides, but not quite in the same time-space as the other four. Yet even as Futterman jabbed the keys and Parker played sul tasto vibrations, Jordan made common cause with the brass man without altering his characteristic style. Knitting quotes from late period John Coltrane ballads and the familiar “Sometimes I Feel Like A Motherless Child” to Kerr’s grace notes, Jordan ensured harmonic inclusion, with the improvisation’s conclusion as tender as a lullaby.

The saxophonist’s gift for melodic interpolation was used even more effectively in the evening’s first set which matched his long-lined theme elaboration with the baritone saxophonist Hamiet Bluiett’s high pitches. Backed by Dave Burrell pounding high frequency piano chords and Maynard Chatters stretching the piano strings, the baritonist however seemed to feel he had to mirror every one of Jordan’s excursions into altissimo, shrilling similar pitches on his larger horn. Rarely was the baritone’s basso timbre properly exploited. But again – with some help from Burrell’s boogie-woogie-like arpeggios – it was Jordan who kept the exposition on an even keel.

Segueing into “Body and Soul” references, he moderated the bigger saxophone’s altissimo blats. Following Chatters’ piano string scraping and Burrell’s song-like patterning, Jordan interpolated the hymn “Wade in the Water” into the mix, had the melody doubled with gospel chording from Burrell and finally had it accepted by a more relaxed Bluiett.

Jordan could relax himself in a later set of nimble swing that paired him with animated violinist Billy Bang, backed by Parker and Drake. With the bassist flaying his strings rhythmically and the drummer sounding a powerful backbeat, the bravura front line lobbed sound shards at one another – but shards that owed more to the blues than dodecaphony.

Often operating in double counterpoint, the two were a study in contrasts. Bang, who sometimes swayed in an Elvis-like snake-hipped dance as he double-stopped and picked at near warp-like speed, faced Jordan, who at one point sprawled on a nearby chair and fired off chorus-after-chorus of multiphonics and double tonguing while foot-tapping. With Bang replicating participation in a demented hoedown, the saxophonist varied his responses with Woody Woodpecker-like cries and staccato trills. Finally over a chorus of brittle, jagged sweeps from Bang, he shouted out a series of vocalized exhortations, which rather than being disruptive, fit jigsaw-puzzle-piece-like with the fiddler’s runs.

Jordan’s skills so energized Bang’s imagination, that in the late-night finale, after prowling the stage, he made an unannounced addition to the Anderson-Jordan quartet romp. So too, mid-way through that set, did another veteran Chicago tenor saxophonist, Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre. Unlike Bang whose broken octave confrontation with Anderson and Jordan provided spirited contrapuntal lines to the dual tenor’s exposition, McIntyre merely vamped, and his sound was eventually subsumed beneath the churning Parker-Drake rhythm section.

Upfront Anderson and Jordan perfectly complemented one another. Despite the geographic gap, the two have worked frequently in a quartet configuration since the late 1980s, after discovering they were reedists of a similar age, who had been attempting similar experiments independently of one another. That night, preferring staccato breaks and splintered altissimo runs, the animated Jordan’s improvisations were easily distinguished from Anderson’s, whose meditative exposition is explicitly linked to the classic tenor saxophone tradition that encompasses Coleman Hawkins as well as John Coltrane.

Someone who bends into a semi-crouch when he plays, Anderson expanded his sounds with foghorn honks, while Jordan splayed split tones, alternating with sudden reed bites. With Bang playing near-saxophone-like lines as well, the three produced a series of chases and shouts. Eventually the tune turned towards steady blues progression as Parker walked and slapped and Drake thickly press rolled the beat. Diminuendo, the tune climaxed as the saxophone honked lustily and gradually more softly.

Each of these varied collaborations made it clear why Jordan had been honored. Although his saxophone conception takes its basic vocabulary from the advances of John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman, unlike some others he was quickly able to escape their influence and forge his own style. Another saxophone veteran of the 1960s, altoist Sonny Simmons who played in the next day, provided a contrasting example of someone who never escaped the Trane-Coleman trajectory.

Jordan, who wryly noted that if you live long enough you become appreciated, also deserved his accolades for passing on improvisation skills to further generations, even if – like his own sons, trumpeter Marlon Jordan and flutist Kent Jordan, who played less interesting contemporary sounds with their own band in a set honoring their father that night – the aim becomes professionalism rather than invention.

--Ken Waxman

-- For MusicWorks Issue #102

November 20, 2008

Variations on a Theme

Guelph Jazz Festival Musicians On Their Own
Extended Play

Barry Guy/Mats Gustafsson/Raymond Strid

Tarfala

Maya MCD0801

Junk Box

Cloudy Then Sunny

Libra Records 203-019

John Zorn

News For Lulu

hatOLOGY 650

Matana Roberts

The Chicago Project

Central Control CC1006PR

Wadada Leo Smith’s Golden Quartet

Tabligh

Cuneiform Rune 270

AMMÜ Quartet

AMMÜ Quartet

PAO 50030

Healthy in its adolescence, the Guelph Jazz Festival (GJF) has become Ontario’s pre-eminent festival for improvised music. Now in its 15th year, the GJF presents improvisers in concerts, workshop and symposia. An appealing factor for listeners is that GJF concerts highlight only one of the versatile musicians’ many activities. Recent CDs capture other aspects.

Take British bassist Barry Guy, at Guelph with violinist Maya Homburger and bass clarinetist Jeff Reilly. Except for Guy’s string prestidigitation, that chamber-improv is nearly the opposite of the go-for-broke Energy Music on Barry Guy/Mats Gustafsson/Raymond Strid, Tarfala Maya MCD0801. Two high-octane Swedish players, saxophonist Gustafsson and percussionist Raymond Strid complete the band.

Spewing accentuated timbres, Gustafsson’s cries and snorts demand muscular retorts from the bassist. On the title track Guy uses guitar-like arpeggios to match the saxophonist’s echoing split tones, wrapping the friction of individual string pressure into a contrapuntal response. Strid’s rim shots and rattling snares provide the rhythmic glue. Eventually Guy’s harsh twanging plus abrasive sawing at strings near the scroll move the saxophonist’s smears, flattement and flutter-tonguing into contrapuntal counterpoint.

Chromatic bass thumps and conga-like pops from the percussionist push Gustaffson’s extended glossolalia from discursive to convergent on “Icefall”. Guy’s ostinato underpinning and Strid’s pats and pumps neutralize Gustafsson’s honks and tongue slaps into a diminuendo conclusion.

Resolving the clash between rough and gentle voicing, staccato and legato pitches also characterize Junk Box’s Cloudy Then Sunny Libra Records 203-019. Two members of the trio, Japanese pianist Satoko Fujii and trumpeter Natsuki Tamura play the GJF. A composer-arranger, Fujii explores new territory on this CD, using graphic notation to spur the improvisations. Junk Box’s third member is American drummer John Hollenbeck, capable of rhythmic interaction ranging from rattles and pumps from tam-tams and marimba to full military press rolls and bass drum thwacks.

On “One Equation”, Tamura uses split tones and triplets to create a call-and-response section all by himself, as Fujii plays the tremolo melody in tandem. “Opera by Rats” emphasizes piano pedal action as the theme shifts from Bop to Stride, while the trumpet brays and Hollenbeck snaps cymbals and pops snares. This popping serves as a coda to “Back and Forth”, which also describes the trio’s tonal connection. Tamura’s timbre is French horn-like as he echoes Fujii’s phrases, and the track concludes with cascading piano chords draping themselves over the others’ note clusters.

There a similar interchange among alto saxophonist John Zorn, trombonist George Lewis and guitarist Bill Frisell on News For Lulu hatOLOGY 650. This 1987 reissue is different, yet somewhat similar to the three sets of Radical Jewish Culture Zorn is presenting at GJF this year. Rather then re-interpreting and re-conceptualizing Jewish melodies, Lulu does the same for Hard-Bop classics. Yet as devotional or freylach-like ditties are transformed with percussion, electronics and electric guitars by Zorn at GJF, this CD performs a similar conversion as raucous blowing vehicles become recital-ready.

Both the guitarist and trombonist – who have performed at Guelph – are responsive enough to keep things moving, despite the lack of a rhythm section. Surprisingly, it’s often Lewis’ gutbucket braying which holds the pieces together from the bottom. “Venita’s Dance”, has the trombonist comping as the guitarist loops licks that turn to single-note filigree. Later Zorn steadily peeps and Lewis chromatically exposes the head. “Funk in Deep Freeze” isn’t funky, but instead finds Frisell distorting country-styled licks, Lewis roughening his tone and Zorn’s alto texture slinky and airy.

“Sonny’s Crib” plays up gospel inflections with the two horns passing on the theme like relay runners. Zorn double times, Lewis plays rubato variations and Frisell picks out blues tonality until the introduction is recapped by the altoist. “Melody for C” with conclusive organ-like reverb from Frisell, provides an opportunity for three-part harmony, with the trio’s improvisations divided into fuzzy multiphonics.

Matana Roberts also twists the jazz tradition, but less radically. The alto saxophonist, who brings her Coin Coin Continuum to the GJF, celebrates her own home town on The Chicago Project Central Control CC1006PR. Other Chicagoans contribute: drummer Frank Rosaly, bassist Josh Abrams, guitarist Jeff Parker – whose band Tortoise is at Guelph this year – and veteran tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson. In 2002 Anderson, played an incendiary GJF set with Kidd Jordan. Saxophonist Jordan (see Whole Note Vol. 13 #9) plays Guelph again this year.

In the same league as the Jordan-Anderson meeting, Roberts a capella duet with Anderson features swirling staccato lines intersecting contrapuntally – finally reaching rapprochement. On “Nomra”, she and Parker prove that free improvising can be low-key and supple, highlighting resonating guitar licks and tasteful saxophone arpeggios. Tunes are tougher elsewhere. “Exchange”, built on a walking bass line and the drummer’s repeated flams showcases Parker’s distorted flanges and bottleneck-sharp runs that contrast with Roberts’ fruity tone and slide-slipping vibrato. “Thrills” is a POMO blues with the saxophonist rooster-crowing and double-tonguing, Parker snapping delayed echo and Rosaly smacking the backbeat.

Pianist Vijay Iyer produced The Chicago Project and he’s at GJF 2008 with DJ Spooky. But it’s electric piano and synthesizer he brings to trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith’s Golden Quartet CD Tabligh Cuneiform Rune 270. Drummer Shannon Jackson and bassist John Lindberg are equally “Golden”.

Atmospherically referencing Fusion, but with simplistic beats leeched out, the disc’s color comes from Iyer’s Fender Rhodes pulsations. Strumming cadenzas backed with swaggering synthesizer drones, Iyer lets Jackson’s solid ruffs and Lindberg’s four-square rhythm anchor the compositions. On top of this ever-shifting bottom, Smith arches long-lined slurs and unhurried grace notes. Replicating a bugler’s tattoo, on “Rosa Parks”, or a bellicose call-to-arms on “DeJohnette”, the trumpet’s lines encompass high-pitched brassy trills and sputtering Bronx cheers. Extended essays in improvisations, Tabligh’s tunes bond fragmented brass slurs, cross-handed rim shots, kinetic piano cadences and string scratches into throbbing instant compositions.

Instant composition describes the music of Holland’s Instant Composers Pool (ICP), in residence at the GJF this year. But the creative ferment generated by the band is equally expressed when ICP band members work in smaller groupings. One is AMMÜ Quartet’s AMMÜ Quartet PAO 50030. Raucous drummer Han Bennink – with the band for 35 years – and unflappable violinist Mary Oliver – a 10-year ICP veteran – join forces with Munich-based cellist Johanna Varner and trombonist Christopher Varner. The Varners produce the sort of timbres Oliver and Bennink hear in the ICP from trombonist Wolter Wierbos and cellist Tristan Honsinger.

Never one to play presto when he can play staccatissimo, or pianissimo when fortissimo can be sounded, Bennink continually clinks, clanks, bangs, whacks and thwacks. So it’s instructive to hear his duets with the trombonist. Varner ejaculates speedy, emphasized brays, moving from vocalized syllables to tongue stops and alp-horn-like flutters. Amazingly this results in textures that fit hand-in-glove – or mute-in-bell –with the drummer’s bomb-dropping bangs and cymbal crashes. On their duet Oliver squeaks and spatters sul ponticello as the cellist responds with strums and shuffle bowing.

This comfortable creativity amplifies when the four play together. On “Improvisation II”, the trombone’s contrapuntal buzzes and the violin’s spiccato runs chase one another as the cellist double-stops and Bennink jabs and rebounds. As the strings distort into double counterpoint, the trombonist puts aside distended subterranean timbres for dog-whistle shrilling. Other times the drummer’s kettle-drum-like resonation faces legato coloration from the cello; alternately, wide, chromatic notes from the trombonist complement string-stropping from Oliver. Stop-time and polytonality characterize “Ammü”, although pitch clusters from the strings and horn can’t overcome Bennink’s frenetic time-keeping.

GJF audiences, exhilarated by what they hear live can be equally impressed by these CDs.

-- Ken Waxman

-- For Whole Note Vol. 14 #2

October 8, 2008

The Velvet Lounge: On Late Chicago Jazz

by Gerald Majer
Columbia University Press

By Ken Waxman
October 10, 2005

A non-faction memoir of tales that may or not have happened, this volume is, to overstate the case a bit, sort of an American À la recherche du temps perdu. Gerald Majer, an English professor at Villa Julie College in Baltimore, utilizes his listening experiences involving major Chicago jazz musicians, as an entrée to his ruminations and meditations on growing up in that Midwestern city.

Don’t be fooled by the photograph of tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson on the cover or the two-page discography at the end of the volume however. Although Majer deals, in greater or lesser degrees, with the sounds of, among others, tenor saxophonist Gene Ammons, Anderson, bandleader Sun Ra, multi-instrumentalist Rahsaan Roland Kirk and Art Ensemble of Chicago members Roscoe Mitchell and Malachi Favors, this is no music encyclopedia or a collection of album and CD reviews.

Instead, like Proust in recherche du temps perdu, who evolved his pioneering modern novel from the sensations and memories unleashed when he tasted a madeleine cake dipped in linden tea, similar to those he was given as a child, Majer’s tastes of modern and so-called avant-garde jazz prompt similar autobiographical and poetic musings.

Here’s his introduction to an apocryphal retelling of the circumstances surrounding Ammons’ 1962 heroin bust that can serve as an explanation of how many of the experiences outlined in the book should be taken:

“My account will only be a partial one – the version of story I heard and have remembered and imagined for many years, the story that called me to attempt to speak of another’s life...”

Link that statement to another he expresses later while detailing a 1973 Auditorium Theater performance by Sun Ra and his Arkestra:

“Behind the curtain of memory, I see that night though there were others over the years and inevitably the memories drift and fuse and overlap.”

In other words these non-faction incidents are his usually successful attempts to capture the feeling of jazz through his own emotional response to certain situations.

Thus, for example, a section involved with recalling the power of Elvin Jones’ drums he felt during a matinee show at the Jazz Showcase when he was a teenager, leads to a recollection of how he first noted Jones’ name while listening to John Coltrane’s My Favorite Things LP, the title of which he relates to the poet Arthur Rimbaud’s system of vowels. Simultaneously, Jones’ real-time exertions remind him of the dangers and excitement of playing games in a vacant lot near his childhood home, one of which was a test of kids’ endurance they called “the punching game”.

Or read how he spins his reminiscence of pianist Andrew Hill and tenor saxophonist’s John Gilmore’s work on “Le Serpent Qui Danse” on a late 1960s Hill LP into a meditation on South Side Chicago blues, Hill’s compositional links to Thelonious Monk, and – with Gilmore – to Sun Ra; as well as the composition’s link to the myth of Apollo and Python, elaborated by the metaphors of Charles Baudelaire’s poem of the same name. Finally, he uses these combined sentiments to arrive at the emotions he and his then-girlfriend experienced at a Sunday afternoon Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) big band gig in 1976.

Stylistically, many of Proust’s sentences in recherche du temps perdu extend several pages in length. Thankfully, Majer’s don’t. But his all-embracing metaphors and similes do, descriptively uncoiling a meditation, activity or idea through a few paragraphs, pages or entire chapters, only abandoning the concept when every last implication and inference has been drained from it – not unlike the way Coltrane, or come to think of it, Kirk or Sonny Stitt – both celebrated in the book – would play a solo.

Along the way, The Velvet Lounge: On Late Chicago Jazz does double duty as a celebration of the Windy city, and what Majer calls “the trite and secret motto of Chicago: to live is to work, to work is to live”. As an academic, Majer is an anomaly in his tales populated by working class muscle and fortitude, whether it’s expressed in the assembly line work of his North end Polish-American family and friends, or in the prodigious efforts of Black musicians from the South Side to band together into the AACM – and he proudly ticks off the collection of blue-collar jobs he had as well.

Majer doesn’t just poetically rhapsodize about the street and trees and buildings of Chicago, but celebrates its street markets, book stores and libraries plus its roads and highways, ground level transit and elevated and underground trains. These modes of transportation and services available to all were also inspirations to composers like Ra, who created compositions like “Magic City” and “El, the Sound of Joy” from those experiences.

Although Majer touches on similar live shows elsewhere, a performance at Anderson’s Velvet Lounge justly deserves its place of prominence. That’s because the author’s 18-page portrayal of an evening he and his wife spent listening to tenor saxophonist Ari Brown’s trio – and a sitter-in – at that down-at the-heels music shrine – interrupted, as expected, with numerous conceptual memory excursions – is probably the single most arresting recounting of the improvisational experience you’ll ever read in print.

Mixing in a tribute to a late rock musician friend who was buoyed by how the Lounge was a space “to keep the music alive, uncompromising and uncompromised”, Majer sketches the circumstances of how a routine Wednesday night gig at the Lounge in the middle of August – cover charge five dollars – changed in an instant to “music that doesn’t level off … but instead exposes its instant of creation”.

The dramatis personae, besides Brown on sax and electric keyboards are bassist Favors, drummer Avreeayl Ra, and a sitter-in on tenor saxophone named only Paul. A Lounge regular, who at one point worked for the Chicago Transit Authority, Paul’s command of saxophone improvisation is perhaps made more mythically transcendental by the author’s prose. Using this figurative language allows Majer to imaginatively capture the sensation of exhilaration and release that top-flight improvisation involves.

For instance, after he suddenly grasps that he’s been unconsciously mesmerized by the music for an extended period, Majer writes:

“I want everyone to be there, the living and the dead, I want to record this moment for posterity though its power must be precisely in its coming and its passing without any possibility of saving it … I let out a shout. I can’t help it …”

And later on, writing in the third person about audience reaction in general:

“A sound leaped out of you that was all yours and that wasn’t yours at all. You yelled for joy.”

It’s this sort of writing which is the volume’s strength, but which makes it so difficult to slot into any category. The author is a sophisticated enough writer so that even when he goes on metaphoric flights, his descriptions actually make you want to hear again – or listen to for the first time – the music described. Still, the elegiac first-person details of his upbringing and coming of age may not strike a resonating chord in every reader, unless he or she revels in quirky details about the United States’ Second City and its local characters.

In short, like improvised music itself, the audience for this book may be small, but fervent. As Majer writes about jazz, but perhaps describing his books as well: “following its track might mean not so much loving jazz but loving the interval that it opens…”

In reality no more challenging a read than “late Chicago jazz” is a listen, The Velvet Lounge: On Late Chicago Jazz deserves to achieve eventual reception and respect not too dissimilar from what the music itself has earned.

October 10, 2005

FRED ANDERSON/HAMID DRAKE

Back Together Again
Thrill Jockey thrill 139

Thirty years after they first played together Chicago-based tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson and drummer Hamid Drake have finally got around to recording a duo session.

Fuelled by the flexible sophistication of the percussionist and the homebody maturity of Anderson, there are many fine passages throughout. But as good as it gets, the limitations of hearing only one saxophone and a drummer over more than 72½-minutes -- plus an additional CD that includes a QuickTime movie -- are apparent.

Known as the lone prophet of the Prairie, Anderson, a founder of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians in the 1960s, kept a low profile for many years. Although he has led bands since that time, it’s only in the past decade that Anderson, and the Velvet Lounge bar he runs on the city’s near South Side have become internationally known.

Many of his earlier bands were almost workshops for developing talent and his most promising discovery was Drake. Although born in Anderson’s hometown, Monroe, La., the drummer was younger than Anderson’s sons were when he finally hooked up with the older man in Chicago. His versatility in all forms of music has since led to Drake becoming an in-demand percussionist internationally. His associations range from kora player Foday Musa Suso, sintar player Hassan Hakmoun, German saxophonist Peter Brötzmann plus longtime connections with reedist Ken Vandermark and New York bassist William Parker.

Here Drake’s game plan involves outlays of cross-sticking, inverted sticking, bounces, flams, ruffs and rebounds on the regular kit, as well as an extended workout on the resonating frame drum.

It’s his work on that primitive instrument, highlighted on “Lama Khyenno (Dearly Beloved)”, that’s most illustrative of the connections and separateness of the two men. For almost 13 minutes, Drake coaxes a variety of echoes and vibrations out of the large hand drum, chanting and whispering as he manipulates the single drum skin. While keeping the ratcheting beat, the percussionist’s outlay is undeniably mystical, not imitation Third World, the way some jazzbos have approached these sorts of sounds.

While Drake follows his muse, Anderson, whose duo drum partners encompass Robert Barry and Kahil El’Zabar, spins out breathy obbligatos that give as much shape to the other’s lines, as if he was backing up a Billie Holiday ballad, not an ancient chant.

“Black Woman”, which Anderson first recorded in the mid-1990s with a quartet featuring Drake, is another standout. With the saxman’s spiky melody made even starker with minimalist backing, Drake contributes hi-hat splatters and bass drum thumps, while the theme picks up a certain chant-like elaboration.

The older man’s hard and austere texture, with its echoes of 1960s Sonny Rollins, is still flexible enough to adapt when Drake’s hand drumming begins sounding as if he’s whaling a Native Indian drum. Other places Anderson’s repetitions and pitch vibrations often push the younger man into New Thing-like door-knocking rhythms and rim shots.

A shared background may be why the aptly named “Louisiana Strut” appears to shift from calypso to Zydeco. But it’s not the only place Drake plays a shimmy. His shuffle rhythm is so authentic he could be playing at a country dance, while Anderson’s flutter tonguing repeats the same lilting phrases. Putting aside so-called modernism he follows Drake’s flams and hi-hat paradiddles by reprising the melody as the finale.

The almost 14-minute title track points out all the strengths and weaknesses of this dual approach. Although Drake lets loose with beboppy slams and Anderson repeatedly worries phrases with characteristic long-lined but unbending runs, hands, feet and lungs can only produce so many variations. With snorts and glottal stops, Anderson complements Drake’s counter rhythms. Yet by the time the last note is sounded, your aural memory isn’t of the lighter phrases, but of how close this tune sounds to others.

Committed Anderson and Drake fans may ascribe more strength to this singular meeting. Yet the challenges and color of larger combos seem to work better for both.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Leap Forward 2. Black Woman 3. Back Together Again 4. Losel Drolma 5. A Ray from THE ONE 6. Louisiana Strut 7. Know Your Advantage 8. Lama Khyenno (Dearly Beloved)

Personnel: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone); Hamid Drake (drums)

December 20, 2004

FRED ANDERSON

Back At The Velvet Lounge
Delmark DG-549

He was a late starter when it came to a recording, but now in his early seventies, tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson turns out new CDs with regularity of a lunchtime chef at a down-home pancake house. Like that cook, Anderson’s stack of hotcakes are unpretentious, filling, and of uniformly high quality.

Anderson, who has owned, managed and played at his Velvet Lounge club in Chicago’s South Loop for more than 21 years, has dealings with the public on the par with any pancake spot manager. While the jazz he plays at the Lounge is consistently piping hot, he’s enough of as businessman to often vary the menu slightly.

This time out Tatsu Aoki, his regular bassist, shares the timekeeping duties with 8 Bold Souls’ Harrison Bankhead on one track, while Bankhead adds his acoustic guitar to Jeff Parker’s electric on another. Chad Taylor, who now lives in New York, holds down the drum chair. But the biggest change is with the brass section. Instead of Anderson’s longtime associate Billy Brimfield, the trumpeter is Maurice Brown, a player who is a scant 52 years younger than Anderson.

All and all, though, this is what you might hear on a typical evening at the Velvet, where any advertised band usually has a few guests sitting in before the end of the night. There are only fives tunes -- titled after the fact -- with the shortest running more than 10 minutes.

That one, “Syene”, gives the trumpeter space to show off his mellow, muted tone, playing at a leisurely pace before finally twisting out a brassy tone. After he works his way chromatically up to some spectacular buzzes that explode from the bell, Anderson takes over, slurring severe lines with just bass and drums behind him. By the end he’s leading Brown, who follows his lead like a puppy chasing a fox.

The older man’s barbed, biting tone gets a workout on the almost 15½-minute “Olivia”, a dissonant ballad. Anderson’ sour cutting tone with its hints of Sonny Rollins-style harshness, is put in greater relief by gentle chording from Parker. Throughout the six-stringer’s airy finger picking is light and smooth enough to earn comparisons with Jim Hall; there’s certainly little hint of the post-rock persona he used with bands like Tortoise or Isotope. After a solid, if unspectacular, low-toned workout from Bankhead, Anderson’s reenters and interrupts the growls, that help him scoop out great shovelfuls of perfectly balanced notes, for variations on the same seven-note pattern -- an old Rollins trick -- that gets him and the tune to the end.

That same sort of high intensity output enlivens the rest of the CD. Taylor adroitly sounds his cowbell, woodblock and snares, while Aoki’s deep tone cleaves to the beat, then slithers down the scale. Brown trills triplets and ricochets tones around the room, while never overpowering the rest with a Gabriel-like stance. When he solos, Brown approaches notes from many angles, then snaps out new variations at higher pitches. As always, Anderson sounds as he could go all night, pushing out R&B-style honks and tobogganing repeated split tones without the hint of difficulty or age.

“Job Market Blues”, featuring Bankhead’s acoustic guitar is the one misstep however. Clanking dual guitars make the piece sound a lot more like a bossa nova than a blues and Bankhead’s acoustic bottleneck grates against Parker’s more assured style. Overall the vamps and resonation appears to make the piece discordant in an off-handed manner, with the result shaped by confusion rather than plan. Even Anderson sounds little nonplussed.

Still you have to give the 74-year-old credit for experimenting with new condiments added to his usual menu. Skip over the blues and you’ll hear another first-class Anderson session all the way.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Fougeux+ 2. Olivia+* 3. Job Market Blues^* 4. Syene* 5. King Fish*

Personnel: Maurice Brown (trumpet); Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone); Jeff Parker (guitar); Harrison Bankhead (guitar^, bass+); Tatsu Aoki (bass)*; Chad Taylor (drums)

March 1, 2004

VARIOUS ARTISTS

Live from the Vision Festival
Thirsty Ear THI 57131.2

The next best thing to being there, this combination CD and DVD package offers a distillation of some of the outstanding performances from last year’s Vision Festival in New York’s Lower East Side. Lacking the name recognition of Newport, Montreux, or any other capitalist entity-associated international star festival, in its less than 10 year existence, Vision has still promulgated a unique artistic vision.

Built around the vision of bassist William Parker, it’s a place where pioneering avant gardists from the 1960s mix it up with younger players who are carrying on experimental ideals. It’s cross-cultural, national and international as well, with the musicians showcased on this session arriving from Germany, Korea, Philadelphia, Chicago, Boston, Minneapolis, Valencia, Calif., New Orleans… and Brooklyn,

Substantiating his ubiquity, Parker holds down the bass chair on five of the nine tracks --in five different bands, Fellow bull fiddle masters Tyrone Brown, Reggie Workman and the late Peter Kowald are represented as well.

Longest performance, at more than 11 minutes, is “Crepuscule IV in Powderhorn Park”, which reunites three founding members of Chicago’s Association for the Advancement of Creative Music who now reside in different parts of the country. Minneapolis-based Douglas Ewart shows up with his reed collection -- some of which are homemade -- to improvise with the woodwinds of Brooklyn’s Joseph Jarman. From California, Wadada Leo Smith adds his trumpet to the duo, and the three members of the front line are backed by the unbeatable rhythm section of Chicago’s Hamid Drake and Parker.

Perhaps it’s the strength of the go-for-broke rhythm of the bassist and drummer, but the performance is more convincing than some recent CDs by each of the front line partners. Expelling a mixture of gritty bluesiness and elegant, brassy grace notes, Smith states the theme, which is then elaborated by Jarman’s soprano saxophone. Using whistles and straining his notes sharply to make a point, the saxman turns rubato with a brief stop-time section, which is then echoed by Ewart’s tenor sax undertow and Parker’s perfectly proportioned bass line. Finally the three horns conclude triple forte, with Drake’s rolling roughs giving them enough leverage on which to soar.

The same rhythm team backs up tenor veterans Kidd Jordan from New Orleans and Chicago’s Fred Anderson. Each pushing 70, the extended multiphonics they propel from their horns often mix with a primeval funkiness, hinting at how Johnny Griffin and Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis might have handled Free Jazz. At a little more then four minutes though, “Spirits Came In” is barely long enough to let everyone feel the spirit.

Almost double in length, but flashing by at supersonic speeds is “Bangart 100”, performed by unconventional fiddler Billy Bang, World Saxophone Quartet anchor, baritone saxophonist Hamiet Bluiett, and contemporary composer Jin Hi Kim on Korean komungo. With his unaccompanied attack as reminiscent of hoedown as Heifetz, here Bang’s technique keeps up with his emotionalism. Working the opposite end of his horn’s palate, Bluiett ignites basement tones, altissimo wild pig squeals and growling feline feints. Keeping this all-together fingerpicking on her multi-stringed traditional instrument is Kim.

Other highlights include the definition of “Existence” provided by the duo of Dave Burrell on piano and bassist Brown. Cognizant of jazz history, like the late Jaki Byard, Philly’s piano pride mixes several of the music’s key streams on his keyboard. Initially he outputs high frequency, percussive cadenzas that are as far out as anything practiced by the New Thing, which counted Burrell as a member for his work with Archie Shepp. Later, providing fills behind Brown’s ringing tones, he shows off his lyric side that characterized him as a “song man” when he played with David Murray.

Then there’s Kowald’s stinging, more then 10½-minute solo “Improvisation”. Sometimes appearing to make his bass talk in several voices, the German maestro wraps together pizzicato buzzing strings, vocal drone and some grating, yet impressive arco thrusts into a characteristic show-stopping display.

Running down the outstanding merits of every track would be pointless, since each offers a different perspective on modern free sounds. The weakest piece, in fact, is also the first: “Truth Is Marching In”. Not the Albert Ayler standard, this reunion tune by alto saxophonist Jameel Moondoc’s Muntu quartet, featuring trumpeter Roy Campbell, drummer Rashid Bakr and bassist Parker seems, like the composition’s title, to be more caught up in New Thing revivalism than inventing the music anew. But isn’t nostalgia one construct of reunions?

Couple the more than 70½-minutes of music with the images available on the DVD and you’ll yearn to be in attendance at the Fest next time it takes place. Making light of geography, this VISION package means you can experience some of festival highlights at home.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing:1. Truth is Marching In 2. Existence 3. Bangart 100 4. Crepuscule IV in Powderhorn Park 5. Speech of Form 6. 45 Hours 7. Synchronicity 8. Sprits Came In 9. Improvisation

Personnel: 1. Muntu: Roy Campbell (trumpet); Jameel Moondoc (alto saxophone); William Parker (bass); Rashid Bakr (drums) 2. Dave Burrell (piano); Tyrone Brown (bass) 3. Hamiet Bluiett (baritone saxophone); Billy Bang (violin); Jin Hi Kim (komungo) 4. Wadada Leo Smith (trumpet); Douglas Ewart (bass clarinet, clarinet, tenor saxophone); Joseph Jarman (alto clarinet, bass clarinet, flute, bass flute, alto saxophone); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums) 5. Mathew Shipp (piano); Mat Manner (viola); William Parker (bass) 6. Rob Brown (alto saxophone); Karen Borca (bassoon); Reggie Workman (bass); Newman Taylor Baker (drums) 7. Ellen Christi (vocals); Rolf Strum (guitar); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums) 8. Kidd Jordan; Fred Anderson (tenor saxophones); William Parker (bass); Hamid Drake (drums) 9. Peter Kowald (bass)

June 16, 2003

FRED ANDERSON

On The Run
Delmark DE-534

FRED ANDERSON
Dark Day
Atavistic Unheard Music UMS/ALP 218 CD

Good things come to those who wait is an expression that was never has more currency than when it’s applied to the career of brawny Chicago tenor sax stylist Fred Anderson. Anderson, was practically unknown and definitely under-documented for almost three decades after his recording debut on Joseph Jarman’s SONG FOR in 1966.

Today that’s all changed. He practically doesn’t have the time to play at and manage his bar, The Velvet Lounge, in Chicago’s near South Side, so busy is he travelling in North America and Europe and working with his own bands and other members of the improv community. He even has a personal manager.

Because of this, CDs of newer and archive material are continuously being released. ON THE RUN, for instance, was recorded in March 2000 at the Velvet Lounge. DARK DAY, which dates from 1979, couples a quartet session done in Chicago with a never-before-released souvenir of the same band’s appearance at a festival in Verona Italy.

One glance at the personnel gives an idea of Anderson’s appeal and persistence. Drummer Hamid Drake is on both sessions, recorded 21 years apart, while quartet trumpeter Billy Brimfield regularly plays with Anderson to this day. ON THE RUN’s bass duties are handled by Tatsu Aoki, a long time Anderson associate, who often leads his own Asian-American projects in Chicago, while the unknown Steve Palmore was on hand in 1979.

As a literal record of what a typical set at Velvet Lounge sounds like, the new CD is instructive. But, like many performances put together without recording in mind, a certain sameness creeps in after a while. It’s not that the playing isn’t good. Exciting playing is given an added impetus by immediacy and location. On disc, though, certain planning should be done with art that’s going to be consulted again and again -- especially when only a trio is involved.

The disc starts out promisingly enough with a breath-taking 4½-minute unaccompanied tenor solo from Anderson, with his hard, harsh tone reverberating throughout the room. It certainly proves that at 71, Anderson has lost none of his stamina or inventiveness.

However when Aoki and Drake get a chance to individually take solos on the final two tracks, each wisely limits himself, allowing the other two to spell them before they go too far. Aoki’s archer’s pull on the strings works because Anderson places a short, jaunty melody in its vicinity, begins trading fours with Drake and interests the bassist in creating percussion sounds on the side of his instrument, punctuating that with the odd string pluck. Later the saxophonist’s Sonny Rollins-like Caribbean-Latin phrases and some bass runs leaven Drake’s work out on the final track before the drummer becomes overbearing. Seemingly the saxophonist still has more energy than his younger compatriots.

As a matter of fact, it appears that this session works best when the other two get out of the way and give Anderson all the room he needs. Even on the slower numbers he builds his solos out of knife-sharp single notes embellished with the occasional protracted tone swoop, sometimes digging down to baritone range. To keep up, Drake will often splash his cymbals, begin tapping on cowbells, or introduce Art Blakey-style press rolls. Aoki, on the other hand, will move the beat up and down, sometimes appearing to entangle himself at the very top of the bass neck. When that happens, the saxophonist has to call one or both back to the theme with something that resembles a higher-pitched clarion. Fewer solos and more group music would have improved then situation.

It’s a different story on the 1979 discs, centred around the two-part harmonies which Anderson and Brimfield even then had been working on for years. The difference is that on tunes like “Saxoon” Anderson plays the same as he does today -- and probably did in the 1960s -- while the trumpeter works in a quicksilver, freebop, almost hard bop style. The same thing happens on the title tune with the saxophonist honking and double-timing, backed by thunderous bass chords, while Brimfield’s work seems more conservative.

Proceedings get a little harder and rougher on the Chicago version of “Three On Two”. Especially impressive is when the sax player begins constructing variations upon variations on a tune he obviously knows well and is instantaneously joined by the snare and cymbals of Drake. Reminiscent of Jimmy Garrison, the previously and afterwards unknown Palmore asserts himself with a bowed bass interlude that while a little screechy in the upper register at least allows him to sound two strings simultaneously. As he strums, plucks and bows Drake brings out his mallets for a firmer attack.

Only 23 at the time, his own “The Prayer” -- now called “Bombay[Children of Cambodia]” and still played today -- highlights the drummer’s future stature. He performs the leisurely composition on tablas, gradually revving up the tempo as his notes are mirrored by the bassist playing in cello range and sharp trumpet lines.

Brimfield was in particularly fine form four days later at the Verona Jazz Festival, creating some of the most unfettered and edgy improvisations of his career. Palmore and Drake sound fine as well, but much of Anderson’s work is sabotaged by the recording equipment. Somehow the mikes seems to have been placed in such a way that the rhythm section is overloud and the saxophonist consistently distant. It gets a little irritating to try to hear him solo in the background as the bass and drums loudly accompany him in foreground

On this version of “Three On Two”, which counts in at about twice the length of the Chicago one, he nearly disappears at the beginning of the track, only to be succeeded by the trumpeter when he starts to pick up speed. Brimfield is exceptional, though, playing with the familiar melody the way Anderson did in Chicago and pumping out little ditties in the course of his solo. Drake’s subtle cymbal timbres frame the saxophonist, unlike the rest of his drum kit, and when he can be heard more clearly Anderson seems to be building his contribution out of single notes held for inordinate lengths of time.

Balance is almost restored on “Dark Days” - - which is also, in a shorter version, on disc one -- as the saxist and brassman create some two-part harmony, playing parallel lines and almost the same notes at complimentary tempos and pitches. On his own, perhaps conscious of the strange mike placement, Anderson appears to be biting off little parts of the head and playing rugged variations on them. Even Palmore gets into the spirit, producing tough, guitar-like strums.

So there you have it, three live views of Fred Anderson’s art, recorded at different times and places with mike placement, crowd sounds, impressive improv flights and mistakes preserved for all to hear.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Run: 1.Ladies in Love 2. On The Run 3. Smooth Velvet 4. Tatu’s Groove 5. Hamid’s On Fire

Personnel: Run: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone); Tatsu Aoki (bass); Hamid Drake (drums)

Track Listing: Dark: Disc 1: 1. Dark Day 2. Saxoon 3. Three on Two 4. The Prayer. D Disc 2: 1: The Bull 2. Three on Two 3. Dark Day

Personnel: Dark: Billy Brimfield (trumpet); Anderson; Steve Palmore (bass); Drake (drums)

December 24, 2001

ROBERT BARRY/FRED ANDERSON

Duets 2001
Thrill Jockey Thrill 101

Refutation of the hoary cliché that jazz is a young man's art happened a generation ago when Swing and Bop era giants like Coleman Hawkins, Pee Wee Russell and Dizzy Gillespie routinely turned out masterpieces in their fifties and sixties.

When many of the initial Free Jazz players reached senior citizen's status recently, the foolishness -- not to mention the sexism -- of that statement was brought into bolder relief. Steve Lacy, a sprightly 67, has insisted that "free jazz keeps you young". And certainly pioneers like Cecil Taylor, Bill Dixon, Derek Bailey and the musicians featured here have shown that major musical statements can be made past some folks' 70th birthday.

Tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson, 72, has been recording more in the past decade than anytime before, for the simple reason that his playing is getting better and better. Fellow Chicagoan Robert Barry is less celebrated. But, the uninitiated hearing his drum inventions for the fist time may not guess his earlier notoriety came from powering the original Sun Ra Orchestra in the Windy City way back during the mid-1950s.

Although they moved in similar circles, this recording was only the second time Anderson and Barry played together. You'd never know it, there's no hesitation and no roughness. The two just set up on stage in front of an exceedingly quiet, but ultimately appreciative audience, play all out for 53 minutes plus, and go home. That the music is uniformly excellent is no surprise. Anderson, especially, seems incapable of creating any other kind.

Faintly reminiscent of Sonny Rollins at his most focused, the saxophonist bends over in his characteristic crouch and sprays out sharp stalagmites of notes. No blustery blower, his solos are made up of limitless tones, as notes arrive one at a time. Individually shaped, weighed and displayed, he examines each of their properties and then passes on to the next one. A solo is worked to its conclusion and then he stops, acknowledges applause and starts again.

Working with his idiosyncratic tiny kit, Barry maintains the sort of nimble, swinging pulse you'd expect from a man who was one Chicago most in-demand drummers for nearly 50 years. Busy, but not showy, the only time Barry's drum sound is in any way different comes on "Taps". There he begins the number by concentrating on the snare, working it like a metallic conga. Throughout, the two instruments intertwine like lovers who achieve satisfaction simultaneously.

Truth in packaging note: Although the CD is entitled DUETS 2001 and Anderson and Barry are pictured in the booklet posed in front of the distinctive wallpaper of the saxophonist's South Side club, The Velvet Lounge, the session was actually recorded in 1999 at the Empty Bottle on the North Side.

Little matter, it couldn't be improved upon in any other location.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Bouncing 2. Speed Way 3. Taps 4. Off Blue 5. We 6. Dark Day

Personnel: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone); Robert Barry (drums)

June 7, 2001

FRED ANDERSON

Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume Two
Asian Improv Records AIR 0054

If there's a prime example of the adage "good things come to those who wait", it's veteran Chicago tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson. One of the founders of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians in 1965, he spent most of the subsequent 25 years close to home, being fitfully recorded, but still training a gang of younger creative musicians, most prominently trombonist George Lewis and multi-instrumentalist Douglas Ewart.

Within the past decade, however, the man once dubbed the "lone prophet of the Prairies" has come into his own. Regularly touring North America and Europe, he's also been showcased on nearly a dozen CDs, including this exemplary two-CD set recorded live at his home base.

A grungy, miniature bar on Chi-Town's near South Side, the club which Anderson owns, manages, plays in and at which he sometimes bartends, would never be mistaken for Carnegie Hall. But it's here, against the backdrop of the faded flowered and striped wallpaper that the newest AACM generation hones its chops.

Confirming once again the AACM's ideals which encourage sitting in and different combination of musicians, the personnel of Anderson's quartet has altered from that heard on an earlier superb club session LIVE AT THE VELVET LOUNGE VOLUME ONE (Asian Improv). Powerhouse bassist Tatsu Aoki is still on board, but this group is filled out by drummer Hamid Drake, who performs with everyone from lung-bursting German saxophonist Peter Brötzmann to MacArthur fellow Ken Vandermark, plus guitarist Jeff Parker, a charter member of post-rock bands Isotope 217 and Tortoise.

Recorded "during 1999 season", the all original music is classic jam session fare with the shortest tune clocking in at a little more than 12 minutes and two others, 37 plus and 34 plus minutes each. What this does is allow the musicians space to let loose.

Anderson dominates by example. With a powerful as a weightlifter's tone that belies his 71 years, he also has a supply of ideas so seemingly limitless that on the aptly named "Jeff's Turnaround" the tenor saxophonist forces Parker up a new melodic path to escape his influence. Anderson then comes back stronger than before to engage in a Latin-tinged duet with the guitarist, matching him bar for bar and note for note. Other times the Anderson sound can be as light as an alto's as it glides over the rhythm section

No rocker here, Parker sticks pretty much to single-string shading, proving once again that most styles don't faze AACMers. On "Road Trip", for instance, when he's not comping, his logical solo construction would mark him as a harder-edged, blusey bopper in another context.

Drake's skill is such that he can sound like the most conventional -- but exceptional -- jazz drummer going or change the mood with exotic percussion. Investigate his protracted traps workout on "Look Out", for instance, where outside of the pile driver power, nothing would frighten a Buddy Rich fan. Then contrast it with the novel accents he coaxes out of his hand-stroked African percussion on "Exotic Dreams". At that time the strings respond with blurred Middle Eastern-like motifs to cement the mood.

Aoki provides the bottom throughout. Dramatically ingenious on all part of the bass if the occasion warrants it, he stays true to his designated role as house timekeeper here after years at Anderson's side.

Like many live sessions there are occasional imperfections in the on-location sound, with a slight logginess the beginning of one track, and another point where Anderson begins a solo before he's fully on mike.

Still these missteps can be overlooked when considering the whole picture. In essence what you have here is an aural picture of a couple of excellent sets at The Velvet Lounge. It's as close as a unique Chicago experience you can get without being there. Savor the disc and don't stint on a visit either.

--Ken Waxman

- Track Listing: Disc 1: 1. Look Out! 2. Road Trip 3. Tomato Song ; Disc 2: 1. December 4th 2. Exotic Dreams 3. Jeff's Turnaround

Personnel: Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone); Jeff Parker (guitar); Tatsu Aoki (bass); Hamid Drake (drums, percussion)

October 31, 2000

FRED ANDERSON

The Milwaukee Tapes Vol. 1
Atavistic/Unheard Music Series UMS/ALP 204 CD

If there's a trajectory that bisects the career of Chicago tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson it's the year 1993. Since that time there have been two or more CDs a year to trace the evolution of the 70-year-old AACM veteran as his fame spreads beyond the Windy City. Before that, there were only one or two scattered documents available of the playing of the brawny stylist once characterized as the "lone prophet of the Prairies" -- including his recording debut on Joseph Jarman's "Song For" in 1966.

Now thanks to Atavistic's Unheard Music Series, a prime cut of vintage Anderson circa 1980 has surfaced. The biggest surprise about it is no surprise. At that time Anderson was working with Brimfield and Drake two of the men he still works with today, and his playing was as accomplished then as it is today.

This isn't damning the man with faint praise, either. For anyone who has seen (or heard) Anderson improvise, will know that he puts a lie to the cliché that jazz is a young man's art. "The Bull" may be the title of one of tunes here, and it could describe the solid Anderson who forged ahead with his own vision of jazz for years even if it meant he had to work at non-musical jobs and face critical indifference.

Look at this CD, however for an example of his art. On "A Ballad For Rita," for instance, he goes it alone for nearly the entire 17 minutes of the tune and he's as impressively inventive as he's volcanic. In the background, Drake, who since then has put in time with the likes of Pharaoh Sanders and Peter Brötzmann, keeps the rhythm boiling with different percussion nuances. And that's only the first track.

Listen to "The Bull" for another idea of how this quartet worked. Brimfield, who has spent years as a faithful Tonto to Anderson's Lone Ranger, turns in a dignified, yet constantly swinging, long-lined solo. Even lesser known than Anderson, the trumpeter is the connection between 1950s hard bop and the ACCM. Yet he's never recorded a session under his own name, at a time when any neo-con with a suit and a music degree can get a multi-year contract.

Looking for a change of pace? Then follow Drake's tabla pulse on "Bombay" previewing the sort of hand drumming he would use to greater effect in the years to come with bands like the cooperative DKV trio.

Even Hayrod, who spent only two years in the Anderson orbit and who seems to have disappeared since then, is a solid, unshowy timekeeper. He keeps the rhythm going throughout the date, letting the others excel in the front line.

THE MILWAUKEE TAPES is a valuable addition to the Anderson canon, recorded during what had been his undocumented period of 15 years. It also proves that there was a heck of a lot more going on in jazz at the cusp of the 1980s than the flaccid fusion and groping bop-by-the-numbers retreads that were released at that time.

And it makes you anxious to see what other unexpected gems will be unearthed on the promised second volume of this session.

--Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. A Ballad For Rita 2. The Bull 3. Black Woman 4. Bombay (Children of Cambodia) ; 5. Planet E

Personnel; Billy Brimfield (trumpet); Fred Anderson (tenor saxophone); Larry Hayrod (bass); Hamid Drake (drums, tablas)

July 22, 2000