Sonic Liberation Front

Meets Sunny Murray
High Two HT 027

A throwback in a good way to the time when the New Thing really was a New Thing, this new collaboration between legendary drummer Sunny Murray, now a Paris resident, and the Philadelphia-based Sonic Liberation Front (SLF) give reminiscences and fusion a good name.

At the same time, because the 13 players aren’t interested in recreating anyone’s idea of the 1960s, and whose idea of fusion mixes in Afro-Cuban and Native American rhythms, the CD unfolds more differently than a retrospective created by any of Jazz’s rapidly aging neo-Cons.

A chance wrong number lead to the accidental meeting of Murray, known for playing with everyone from saxophonists Albert Ayler to Tony Bevan, with SLF’s main man, percussionist Kevin Diehl. Murray was so impressed with the horns-and-drums outfit that he not only recorded with them – the most recent examples of which are this CD’s first five tracks – but played live gigs with it, including one at New York’s Vision Festival, which is captured on tracks 6 to 8 here.

Guided on both sessions by the rhythmic patterns of Diehl and Chuck Joseph, SLF’s chief exponent of the West African via Cuba batá drum, the beats never get hackneyed. That because, with four percussionists plus Murray, the batáists duel and duet among themselves, varying the rhythm as they maintain the bottom. On top of this sturdy yet balanced beat, the horns are able to play as freely as they wish. That means that cornetist Todd Margasak, who has recorded with saxophonist Matt Bauder, often brings a Donald Ayler-like upwards cry to his playing, especially on “Init”, while his brassy flutter tonguing exhibited on “Ochun Libre” suggests what may have resulted if Don Cherry gigged with Perez Prado. Meantime tenor saxophonist Terry Lawson, also a member of saxophonist Odean Pope’s Sax Choir, throughout and alto saxophonist Adam Jenkins on the live date, output enough split tones, glossolalia, tongue spits, reed squeals and stutters plus plain overblowing to reference Albert Ayler. At junctures it appears as if the bugling connective tissue is from a reed man, not the brass player.

Additional beats courtesy of congas, bongos and two sizes of batás, the large iya and mid-sized itotele, keep constant hand and drum stick ruffs, clatters and rebounds going. Murray contributes some tom-tom references that he likely remembered from his boyhood on an Oklahoma reservation. More to the point, the presence of so many rhythm makers frees Murray from having to play the role of solo percussion innovator. Instead he fits in comfortably as part of the ensemble. If there’s any place that he moves to the forefront, it’s on the final “Under the Wave of Kanagawa”. Following agitated note clusters from Lawson and Jenkins’ surprisingly melodic chromatic lines, the drummer surmounts trumpeter Kimbal Brown’s high-pitched tremolo squeals to lead the 10-piece strong SLF through a vocalized chant. More Sun Ra space music than “Siboney”, he sums up the joyous proceedings with mid-range percussion pops and drags.

As exciting harmonically as it is rhythmically this CD allows you to tap your feet without abandoning an intelligent appreciation for the subtle sounds of legitimate fusion music.

--Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Init 2. Knowledge of the Sun 3. Meaningless Kisses 4. Casa de Grupo 5. Ochun Libre 6. Some Other Times* 7. Nomingo* 8. Under the Wave of Kanagawa*

Personnel: 2008: Todd Margasak (cornet); Terry Lawson (tenor saxophone); Matt Engle (bass); Sunny Murray (drums); Kevin Diehl (drums and bata) and Chuck Joseph, Okomfo Adwoa Tacheampong and Shawn Hennessy (bata) 2002*: Kimbal Brown (trumpet); Adam Jenkins (alto saxophone); Lawson; Fahir Kendall (bass); Murray; Diehl; Joseph (iya); Nichola Rivera (itotele and conga) and Joey Toledo-Okonkolo (percussion)

January 30, 2012

Sunny Murray/John Edwards/Tony Bevan

I Stepped Onto a Bee
Foghorn FGCD 014

Justly praised as a master improviser on bass saxophone – to be honest, competition is very slim – Oxford-based Tony Bevan is also a first-rate tenor saxophone soloist, something that hasn’t often been showcased in recent years. I Stepped Onto a Bee rectifies this omission with Bevan exercising his tenor chops on a six-part invention, working in tandem with London-based bassist John Edwards and legendary Free Jazz drummer Sunny Murray now domiciled in Paris.

Edwards who has played with everyone from saxophonist Evan Parker to the Stellari String Quartet adds jabs, plucks and strums to the tracks here, while Murray, whose list of associates starts with pianist Cecil Taylor and saxophonist Albert Ayler and goes on from there, is sympathetic in his backing, ranging from martial rat-tat-tats to bounces, ruffs and slaps. Above all though, it’s Bevan’s show, as he weaves variation after variation, using legato and extended techniques.

As is probably obvious from the punning title, the program is initially a contrafact of “You Stepped Out of a Dream”. But during the extended reed essay, the saxophonist also alludes to other American songbook standards such as “Bubbles, Bangles and Beads” and “Gypsy in my Soul”. Not that any of the melodies are ever exposed to full recognition as older tenor saxophone interpreters such as Dexter Gordon or Sonny Rollins would do. On the other hand, the wit of the proceedings, coupled with the intensity in Bevan’s playing, brings to mind some of Rollins’ mid-century sax-bass-drum milestones like Way Out West.

Further east and closer to the Atlantic in a London studio many years later, Bevan’s way-out playing not only showcases deep-breathing flutter tonguing and legato vibrations, but also come to junctures where his strained glossolalia and rough reed bites bring out his axe’s metallic properties. At the same time, while he may exhibit Aylerian altissimo cries or guttural foghorn blasts – he has quite a familiarity with in the saxophones’ basso regions – this is all done at an andante gait with balladic nonchalance.

The bassist thumps and slaps when needed, and adds arpeggio-laden interjections elsewhere. For his part Murray contributes irregular rolls and paradiddles at times; drags and bass drum pops at others; and brings forth beats as different as pseudo-waltz time and shuffles. Most instructively, while Bevan’s narrative includes pressurized Morse-code-like bites and intense growling friction in equal measure, the balance among the three never shifts. It may be Murray who slows down the tempo to medium, or Edwards whose plucks stabilize it, but overall the results are concurrently impressionistically emphasized and steely inventive

With high quality work like this on show throughout the CD, maybe Bevan should bring out his smaller horn in public more often.

--Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. I Stepped Onto a Bee Part 1 2. I Stepped Onto a Bee Part II 3. I Stepped Onto a Bee Part III 4. I Stepped Onto a Bee Part IV 5. I Stepped Onto a Bee Part V 6. I Stepped Onto a Bee Part VI

Personnel: Tony Bevan (tenor saxophone); John Edwards (bass) and Sunny Murray (drums and voice)

December 25, 2011

Sunny Murray/John Edwards/Tony Bevan

Boom Boom Cat
Foghorn FGCD 011

By Ken Waxman

Although Sunny Murray, the dean of American free jazz drumming, is the best-known player here, the success of Boom Boom Cat depends as much on the contributions of the other two musicians, who are more than mere sideman. Bassist John Edwards and saxophonist Tony Bevan are both an integral part of London’s free music scene, working with everyone from saxophonist Evan Parker to drummer Steve Noble.

Veterans of thrash-rock ensembles as well as low-key improv combos, the two confidently partner Murray, who now lives in Paris, every time he visits Great Britain. Despite being children when Murray redefined drumming in the mid-1960s with pianist Cecil Taylor and saxophonist Albert Ayler, Edwards and Bevan are as confident in this context as any other. Bevan’s floor-vibrating bass saxophone gets a major workout on the shorter “Ballad for G”. But his deft manipulation of all its timbres, as well as those of the tenor and soprano saxophones, is brought into starker relief on the nearly hour-long title track.

Perhaps appropriately Bevan’s intense flattement, triple tonguing and pressurized split tones on tenor recall Ayler’s characteristic work, especially when the tempo solidifies into a child-like march. His glossolalia and tension-laden staccatissimo compact stentorian timbres into screaming altissimo and then splinter downwards as Edwards keeps the excitement on a rolling boil with buzzing string slaps. Meanwhile Murray’s muscular strokes, pops and rumbles advance with constant stick motion and a fluid, elasticized rhythm. Edwards leaning into the beat and exposing harsh passages from the bottom register underlines Bevan’s lyrical soprano saxophone interlude. Later, the bassist’s crying spiccato lines make common cause with the saxophonist as Bevan’s bass horn propels gusts of pedal-point multiphonics. Subtly backing all this with minimized polyrhythms, Murray confirms his mastery with traffic cop-like directions for the others and a conclusive snare whack.

Respected for his innovations and longevity, this CD demonstrates that with the right associates, Murray’s music is as contemporary as today.

Tracks: Boom Boom Cat; Ballad for G

Personnel: Tony Bevan: soprano, tenor and bass saxophones; John Edwards: bass; Sunny Murray: drums

-- For All About Jazz New York January 2011

January 8, 2011

Odean Pope

Plant Life
Porter Records PRCD-4017

Charles Gayle Trio

Forgiveness

NotTwo MW 805-2

Superficially similar, each of these dates is lead by a veteran American saxophonist on either side of 70, adds the contributions of a bassist and a drummer, and consists of a program of mostly originals plus a different famous composition by John Coltrane. Although neither reaches the top rank, certain cohesive warmth and looseness in performance makes alto saxophonist Charles Gayle’s Forgiveness more enticing than tenor saxophonist Odean Pope’s Plant Life.

What’s actually most surprising is why Pope’s session is so remote and wearying. Best-known for work with his own Saxophone Choir, jazz-funk fusion band Catalyst, and a 30-year association with master drummer Max Roach, North Carolina-born, Philadelphia-based Pope is the epitome of the journeyman jazzman who can be relied upon to produce consistent, swinging work no matter the circumstances. Plus his sideman here include Sunny Murray, one of Free Jazz’s pioneering inventive percussionist; plus lesser-known bassist Lee Smith. In contrast, Buffalo-born, New York-based Gayle has only worked regularly since the late 1980s – about 30 years after Pope established himself – and following a period living on the streets now numbers established players like drummer Rashied Ali – who helped liberate percussion along with Murray in the 1960s – among his cohorts. This live gig from Lodz, Poland, however, features German drummer Klaus Kugel and another steady but unheralded bassist, Hillard Greene.

Recorded in a Philly studio, Pope’s nine tracks seem to suffer from both coldness and literalism. Murray, who has a habit of disassociating himself from a situation for no apparent reason, appears particularly disconnected here. Certainly his half-hearted rolls and rim-shots, substandard flams and drags plus distant cymbal cadences don’t add much rhythmic impetus. When he rouses himself though, he pumps out a respectful and languid beat, relating overall to the Latin and Bop conventions that he actually helped to push aside in the 1960s.

With Murray nearly hors de combat, it’s left to Shaw to keep the bottom solid, and he does a yeoman job throughout, with tough walking pulses, sul tasto resonations and double stopping. “I Want to Talk about You” – closely identified with Coltrane after he recorded it in the 1960s – even brings out near C&W twanging from his bull fiddle.

Pope’s melodious soloing is most assured on that track – at more then nine minutes the CD’s lengthiest as well – but his inspiration merely underlines the isolation elsewhere. Respectful and low-key, he exhibits double-and triple-tonguing here and in other spots but evidentially has trouble connecting with the other players. Sheets of sound, reed-biting obbligatos, warbling vibrato and accented flutter tonguing are tremendous exhibits of reed power and inventiveness; but cohesion would have been just as welcome.

Perhaps enlivened by a club audience on the other hand, members of the Gayle trio are more unified and superficially exciting than the Pope crew. If anything, their run-through of “Giant Steps” may be the least memorable track, since so many jazz musicians have played it so frequently. Still Greene’s bass pulse is as solid as Paul Chambers’ on the original; Kugel’s slaps and stomps speed by more quickly faster than Art Taylor or Elvin Jones ever did; and Gayle’s theme-shredding coupled with shrieks and cries at least moves the head from Trane to Gayle territory.

Additionally, despite the audience’s enthusiasm, the trio’s performance of Gayle’s ecclesiastically titled tunes is a pretty standard Free Jazz trope. The sax man repeatedly piles glossolalia, jagged vibrato screams and squirming piles of notes on top of the drummer’s insistent cross-sticking, rat-tat-tats, cymbal slides and bass drum thumps, while the bassist pumps, thumps and practically directs traffic to keep the staccato motifs from careening off the sonic road. Jagged, ragged and emotional, it still resembles a peacock tail of colors when compared to the near-chiaroscuro tail feathers of Pope and company.

Curiously, one of Plant Life’s rather standard tracks is entitled “Multiphonic”. Yet the undulating resonation of a typical Forgiveness piece such as the nearly 17-minute “Holy Birth” includes more obvious and un-named multiphonics than the entire other CD. Moving from military stop-time – courtesy of Kugel’s drum strokes – to balladic properties – when Greene’s thick string pops reign in the others – Gayle’s meanwhile studs his solo with split tones. Harsh passing tones, altissimo octave screams, buzzing triple-tonguing and a capella curves are his most common recourse. Ending with pitch-sliding slides, extended passages are distended with klaxon-like honks and cries.

Frankly, any one who has followed Gayle’s career over the years will admit he has done better, more focused work. Still this CD is nothing for which to seek forgiveness. In comparison, while steady as say, a Hank Mobley or a Charlie Rouse-led date would have appeared 50 years ago compared to a Coltrane set, Plant Life is also a respectable effort. But its appeal will be more for Pope followers than for those seeking sonic revelations.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Plant: 1. Two Dreams Part 1 2. Happiness Tears 3. Plant Life 4. I Want to Talk about You 5. Scorpio Twins 6. Thoughts 7.Multiphonic 8. Two Dreams Part 2

Personnel: Plant: Odean Pope (tenor saxophone); Lee Smith (bass) and Sunny Murray (drums)

Track Listing: Forgiveness: 1. Living Waters 2. Glory, Glory, Glory 3. Holy Birth

4. Confess 5. Song To Thee 6. Giant Steps 7. Forgiveness

Personnel: Forgiveness: Charles Gayle (alto saxophone); Hillard Greene (bass) and

Klaus Kugel (drums)

April 23, 2009

Charles Gayle Trio

Forgiveness
NotTwo MW 805-2

Odean Pope

Plant Life

Porter Records PRCD-4017

Superficially similar, each of these dates is lead by a veteran American saxophonist on either side of 70, adds the contributions of a bassist and a drummer, and consists of a program of mostly originals plus a different famous composition by John Coltrane. Although neither reaches the top rank, certain cohesive warmth and looseness in performance makes alto saxophonist Charles Gayle’s Forgiveness more enticing than tenor saxophonist Odean Pope’s Plant Life.

What’s actually most surprising is why Pope’s session is so remote and wearying. Best-known for work with his own Saxophone Choir, jazz-funk fusion band Catalyst, and a 30-year association with master drummer Max Roach, North Carolina-born, Philadelphia-based Pope is the epitome of the journeyman jazzman who can be relied upon to produce consistent, swinging work no matter the circumstances. Plus his sideman here include Sunny Murray, one of Free Jazz’s pioneering inventive percussionist; plus lesser-known bassist Lee Smith. In contrast, Buffalo-born, New York-based Gayle has only worked regularly since the late 1980s – about 30 years after Pope established himself – and following a period living on the streets now numbers established players like drummer Rashied Ali – who helped liberate percussion along with Murray in the 1960s – among his cohorts. This live gig from Lodz, Poland, however, features German drummer Klaus Kugel and another steady but unheralded bassist, Hillard Greene.

Recorded in a Philly studio, Pope’s nine tracks seem to suffer from both coldness and literalism. Murray, who has a habit of disassociating himself from a situation for no apparent reason, appears particularly disconnected here. Certainly his half-hearted rolls and rim-shots, substandard flams and drags plus distant cymbal cadences don’t add much rhythmic impetus. When he rouses himself though, he pumps out a respectful and languid beat, relating overall to the Latin and Bop conventions that he actually helped to push aside in the 1960s.

With Murray nearly hors de combat, it’s left to Shaw to keep the bottom solid, and he does a yeoman job throughout, with tough walking pulses, sul tasto resonations and double stopping. “I Want to Talk about You” – closely identified with Coltrane after he recorded it in the 1960s – even brings out near C&W twanging from his bull fiddle.

Pope’s melodious soloing is most assured on that track – at more then nine minutes the CD’s lengthiest as well – but his inspiration merely underlines the isolation elsewhere. Respectful and low-key, he exhibits double-and triple-tonguing here and in other spots but evidentially has trouble connecting with the other players. Sheets of sound, reed-biting obbligatos, warbling vibrato and accented flutter tonguing are tremendous exhibits of reed power and inventiveness; but cohesion would have been just as welcome.

Perhaps enlivened by a club audience on the other hand, members of the Gayle trio are more unified and superficially exciting than the Pope crew. If anything, their run-through of “Giant Steps” may be the least memorable track, since so many jazz musicians have played it so frequently. Still Greene’s bass pulse is as solid as Paul Chambers’ on the original; Kugel’s slaps and stomps speed by more quickly faster than Art Taylor or Elvin Jones ever did; and Gayle’s theme-shredding coupled with shrieks and cries at least moves the head from Trane to Gayle territory.

Additionally, despite the audience’s enthusiasm, the trio’s performance of Gayle’s ecclesiastically titled tunes is a pretty standard Free Jazz trope. The sax man repeatedly piles glossolalia, jagged vibrato screams and squirming piles of notes on top of the drummer’s insistent cross-sticking, rat-tat-tats, cymbal slides and bass drum thumps, while the bassist pumps, thumps and practically directs traffic to keep the staccato motifs from careening off the sonic road. Jagged, ragged and emotional, it still resembles a peacock tail of colors when compared to the near-chiaroscuro tail feathers of Pope and company.

Curiously, one of Plant Life’s rather standard tracks is entitled “Multiphonic”. Yet the undulating resonation of a typical Forgiveness piece such as the nearly 17-minute “Holy Birth” includes more obvious and un-named multiphonics than the entire other CD. Moving from military stop-time – courtesy of Kugel’s drum strokes – to balladic properties – when Greene’s thick string pops reign in the others – Gayle’s meanwhile studs his solo with split tones. Harsh passing tones, altissimo octave screams, buzzing triple-tonguing and a capella curves are his most common recourse. Ending with pitch-sliding slides, extended passages are distended with klaxon-like honks and cries.

Frankly, any one who has followed Gayle’s career over the years will admit he has done better, more focused work. Still this CD is nothing for which to seek forgiveness. In comparison, while steady as say, a Hank Mobley or a Charlie Rouse-led date would have appeared 50 years ago compared to a Coltrane set, Plant Life is also a respectable effort. But its appeal will be more for Pope followers than for those seeking sonic revelations.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Plant: 1. Two Dreams Part 1 2. Happiness Tears 3. Plant Life 4. I Want to Talk about You 5. Scorpio Twins 6. Thoughts 7.Multiphonic 8. Two Dreams Part 2

Personnel: Plant: Odean Pope (tenor saxophone); Lee Smith (bass) and Sunny Murray (drums)

Track Listing: Forgiveness: 1. Living Waters 2. Glory, Glory, Glory 3. Holy Birth

4. Confess 5. Song To Thee 6. Giant Steps 7. Forgiveness

Personnel: Forgiveness: Charles Gayle (alto saxophone); Hillard Greene (bass) and

Klaus Kugel (drums)

April 23, 2009

Gyldene Trion

Live at Glenn Miller Café Ayler Records aylCD-079

Sunny Murray/John Edwards/Tony Bevan

The Gearbox Explodes!

Foghorn FGCD 009

Stark examples of the fissure that in many cases separates younger musicians from slightly older ones, the ironic situation pinpointed in these releases is that in some cases it’s elders who are willing to try more experiments in their playing than their junior counterparts.

Both of these saxophone-bass-and-drums CDs provide interesting listening, but if one is expanding the improvised music tradition, the other is merely extending it. What’s paradoxical is that The Gearbox Explodes! includes sounds from a saxophonist in his fifties, a bassist in his forties and a drummer heading for his seventy-first birthday. Meanwhile members of the Gyldene Trion are in their twenties and thirties.

There may be a certain geographical poignancy here too since Gearbox drummer Sunny Murray, an American Free Jazz pioneer who now lives in Paris, often played in Stockholm – where Live at Glenn Miller Café was recorded – with leaders such as pianist Cecil Taylor and saxophonist Albert Ayler years before any one of the Gyldene Trions was born.

Murray’s associates on Gearbox recorded at “live at St. Domincs (sic) Retreat Working Mans (sic) Club Newcastle Upon Tyne” are both from the United Kingdom. Tenor and bass saxophonist Tony Bevan is someone whose interpretative work with players like guitarist Derek Bailey created to a new roll for the giant saxophone in Free Music. Versatile and solid, bassist John Edwards is a frequent associate of saxophonists ranging from Evan Parker to John Butcher. As for Murray, he has been the epitome of the Free-Jazz drummer for almost 50 years. Excerpts from this concert appear in Antoine Prum’s documentary film Sunny’s Time Now as well.

On the other disc, tenor and baritone saxophonist Jonas Kullhammar is a multiple jazz poll winner in Sweden, who has played with wide-cross section of musicians ranging from pianist Ran Blake to the Norrbotten Big Band, while bassist Torbjörn Zetterberg and drummer Daniel Fredriksson are part of his working quintet. The rhythm section also plays in Copenhagen-based Italian saxophonist Alberto Pinton’s Quintet, and additionally Fredriksson and Kullhammar are members of Zetterberg’s perhaps sardonically named Hot Five

While the Murray Trio’s three long tracks are evidently long improvisations, the Gyldene Trion stick to songs. Kullhammar and Zetterberg each contribute a line, with the other tracks – Thelonious Monk’s “Friday The 13th” and “Stuffy Turkey” and the standard “The Night Has A Thousand Eyes” – augmenting the saxophonist’s stylistic resemblance to Sonny Rollins. On the other CD, playing tenor, Bevan too seems to be emulating Rollins, although his free-form innovations relate to Rollins most experimental period. Bevan however is also no one but himself on bass sax.

Having toured as a trio three years earlier, Murray, Edwards and Bevan are comfortable in each others’ company – with no one (i.e. Murray) pulling rank due to fame or age. There are some drawbacks in this however, since it seems as if each man must take a lengthy solo on each track. Considering each one is operating at the top of his game however, most of the solos are memorable themselves.

On the title tune, for instance, Bevan’s Rollinesque trills, honks and spetrofluctuation gradually build up to renal cries and extended half-swallowed broken tones. Meanwhile Edwards’ double thumping and stroking intensifies to such an extent that the resulting tone adumbrates Murray’s time-keeping. This includes flams and duple time resonations, spectacular cymbal resonation and press rolls. The finale is parceled out among staccato strums from Edwards and march-tempo tongue slaps and smears from Bevan.

More impressive is “Right On Guys”, with a percussion introduction by Murray which encompasses snare and tom tom rat-tat-tats, skittering paradiddles plus rattling and reverberating cymbal snaps. By the time Bevan and Edwards enter they have to work energetically and percussively just to keep up with Murray. The saxophonist tries out reed bites, forced air snarls and molten phrasing to highlight a theme awash with growling note clusters.

Strumming clawed handful of strings and pounding the instrument’s wood for additional reverberation, Edwards’ solo evolves in unison with Bevan’s work and at such fervor that the later is soon triple-tonguing and using glottal punctuation to vigorously push the thickening results decisively. Murray’s rebound introduce a slight Latin tinge, but as soon as Bevan brings out the bass saxophone for round after round of fortissimo gravelly timbres and Edwards responds in kind with spiccato-slicing, the older man simply lays out. With the reed output a mix of mine-shaft-deep honks and squealing tongue slaps and the bass centred on arco double-stopping, Murray mumbles “right on guys” and lets them take the tune out.

Melody and energy aren’t a problem for the Gyldene Trion. But somehow the compositions’ solid centres appears to be missing among the sluicing and snorting altissimo saxophone lines, the drummer’s cymbal smashes, press rolls and drags and the bassist’s sul tasto thumps. Unhurried, “The Night Has A Thousand Eyes”, for instance, has a basically conservative structure firmly rooted in the 1960s. As for the Monk tunes, in the trio’s interpretations, the little-heard “Stuffy Turkey” could be a Swing era throwback, while the treatment of “Friday the 13th” transforms it into a literal finger-snapper. Fredriksson’s drum head popping and snapping and Zetterberg’s a capella triple stopping output enough power. But when coupled with Kullhammar’s theme variations and quotes, the effects skirt Monk’s originality. As for band’s originals, ones such as the bassist’s “Hurricane Ann” merely serve as a showcase for his moderato walking and the saxophonist’s unaccompanied trills.

Kullhammar’s “Snake City Rundown”, named for the area in which he lives, is probably the best performance. On top of dense andante lines from the bassist, he snorts, sallies, cries and rumbles, repeatedly emphasizing similar phrases and resonating note clusters. Still the saxophonist’s point of reference appears derivative, though here it’s John Coltrane rather than Rollins.

Obviously those who follow Swedish jazz more carefully and fans of the Gyldene Trion members’ other bands may give the performance a higher grade. But matching man-against-man, singly and together, the judgment remains that more experienced players who have slogged out endless nights on the bandstand – such as Sunny Murray’s three – can impart a few lessons to younger improvisers.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Gearbox: 1. Right On Guys 2. Hold It Right There 3. The Gearbox Explodes!

Personnel: Gearbox: Tony Bevan (tenor and bass saxophones); John Edwards (bass) and Sunny Murray (drums)

Track Listing: Live: 1. The Night Has A Thousand Eyes 2. Hurricane Ann 3. Stuffy Turkey 4. Snake City Rundown 5. Friday The 13th

Personnel: Live: Jonas Kullhammar (tenor and baritone saxophones); Torbjörn Zetterberg (bass) and Daniel Fredriksson (drums)

July 30, 2008

Sunny Murray/John Edwards/Tony Bevan

The Gearbox Explodes! Foghorn FGCD 009

Gyldene Trion

Live at Glenn Miller Café

Ayler Records aylCD-079

Stark examples of the fissure that in many cases separates younger musicians from slightly older ones, the ironic situation pinpointed in these releases is that in some cases it’s elders who are willing to try more experiments in their playing than their junior counterparts.

Both of these saxophone-bass-and-drums CDs provide interesting listening, but if one is expanding the improvised music tradition, the other is merely extending it. What’s paradoxical is that The Gearbox Explodes! includes sounds from a saxophonist in his fifties, a bassist in his forties and a drummer heading for his seventy-first birthday. Meanwhile members of the Gyldene Trion are in their twenties and thirties.

There may be a certain geographical poignancy here too since Gearbox drummer Sunny Murray, an American Free Jazz pioneer who now lives in Paris, often played in Stockholm – where Live at Glenn Miller Café was recorded – with leaders such as pianist Cecil Taylor and saxophonist Albert Ayler years before any one of the Gyldene Trions was born.

Murray’s associates on Gearbox recorded at “live at St. Domincs (sic) Retreat Working Mans (sic) Club Newcastle Upon Tyne” are both from the United Kingdom. Tenor and bass saxophonist Tony Bevan is someone whose interpretative work with players like guitarist Derek Bailey created to a new roll for the giant saxophone in Free Music. Versatile and solid, bassist John Edwards is a frequent associate of saxophonists ranging from Evan Parker to John Butcher. As for Murray, he has been the epitome of the Free-Jazz drummer for almost 50 years. Excerpts from this concert appear in Antoine Prum’s documentary film Sunny’s Time Now as well.

On the other disc, tenor and baritone saxophonist Jonas Kullhammar is a multiple jazz poll winner in Sweden, who has played with wide-cross section of musicians ranging from pianist Ran Blake to the Norrbotten Big Band, while bassist Torbjörn Zetterberg and drummer Daniel Fredriksson are part of his working quintet. The rhythm section also plays in Copenhagen-based Italian saxophonist Alberto Pinton’s Quintet, and additionally Fredriksson and Kullhammar are members of Zetterberg’s perhaps sardonically named Hot Five

While the Murray Trio’s three long tracks are evidently long improvisations, the Gyldene Trion stick to songs. Kullhammar and Zetterberg each contribute a line, with the other tracks – Thelonious Monk’s “Friday The 13th” and “Stuffy Turkey” and the standard “The Night Has A Thousand Eyes” – augmenting the saxophonist’s stylistic resemblance to Sonny Rollins. On the other CD, playing tenor, Bevan too seems to be emulating Rollins, although his free-form innovations relate to Rollins most experimental period. Bevan however is also no one but himself on bass sax.

Having toured as a trio three years earlier, Murray, Edwards and Bevan are comfortable in each others’ company – with no one (i.e. Murray) pulling rank due to fame or age. There are some drawbacks in this however, since it seems as if each man must take a lengthy solo on each track. Considering each one is operating at the top of his game however, most of the solos are memorable themselves.

On the title tune, for instance, Bevan’s Rollinesque trills, honks and spetrofluctuation gradually build up to renal cries and extended half-swallowed broken tones. Meanwhile Edwards’ double thumping and stroking intensifies to such an extent that the resulting tone adumbrates Murray’s time-keeping. This includes flams and duple time resonations, spectacular cymbal resonation and press rolls. The finale is parceled out among staccato strums from Edwards and march-tempo tongue slaps and smears from Bevan.

More impressive is “Right On Guys”, with a percussion introduction by Murray which encompasses snare and tom tom rat-tat-tats, skittering paradiddles plus rattling and reverberating cymbal snaps. By the time Bevan and Edwards enter they have to work energetically and percussively just to keep up with Murray. The saxophonist tries out reed bites, forced air snarls and molten phrasing to highlight a theme awash with growling note clusters.

Strumming clawed handful of strings and pounding the instrument’s wood for additional reverberation, Edwards’ solo evolves in unison with Bevan’s work and at such fervor that the later is soon triple-tonguing and using glottal punctuation to vigorously push the thickening results decisively. Murray’s rebound introduce a slight Latin tinge, but as soon as Bevan brings out the bass saxophone for round after round of fortissimo gravelly timbres and Edwards responds in kind with spiccato-slicing, the older man simply lays out. With the reed output a mix of mine-shaft-deep honks and squealing tongue slaps and the bass centred on arco double-stopping, Murray mumbles “right on guys” and lets them take the tune out.

Melody and energy aren’t a problem for the Gyldene Trion. But somehow the compositions’ solid centres appears to be missing among the sluicing and snorting altissimo saxophone lines, the drummer’s cymbal smashes, press rolls and drags and the bassist’s sul tasto thumps. Unhurried, “The Night Has A Thousand Eyes”, for instance, has a basically conservative structure firmly rooted in the 1960s. As for the Monk tunes, in the trio’s interpretations, the little-heard “Stuffy Turkey” could be a Swing era throwback, while the treatment of “Friday the 13th” transforms it into a literal finger-snapper. Fredriksson’s drum head popping and snapping and Zetterberg’s a capella triple stopping output enough power. But when coupled with Kullhammar’s theme variations and quotes, the effects skirt Monk’s originality. As for band’s originals, ones such as the bassist’s “Hurricane Ann” merely serve as a showcase for his moderato walking and the saxophonist’s unaccompanied trills.

Kullhammar’s “Snake City Rundown”, named for the area in which he lives, is probably the best performance. On top of dense andante lines from the bassist, he snorts, sallies, cries and rumbles, repeatedly emphasizing similar phrases and resonating note clusters. Still the saxophonist’s point of reference appears derivative, though here it’s John Coltrane rather than Rollins.

Obviously those who follow Swedish jazz more carefully and fans of the Gyldene Trion members’ other bands may give the performance a higher grade. But matching man-against-man, singly and together, the judgment remains that more experienced players who have slogged out endless nights on the bandstand – such as Sunny Murray’s three – can impart a few lessons to younger improvisers.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Gearbox: 1. Right On Guys 2. Hold It Right There 3. The Gearbox Explodes!

Personnel: Gearbox: Tony Bevan (tenor and bass saxophones); John Edwards (bass) and Sunny Murray (drums)

Track Listing: Live: 1. The Night Has A Thousand Eyes 2. Hurricane Ann 3. Stuffy Turkey 4. Snake City Rundown 5. Friday The 13th

Personnel: Live: Jonas Kullhammar (tenor and baritone saxophones); Torbjörn Zetterberg (bass) and Daniel Fredriksson (drums)

July 30, 2008

Sunny Murray/John Edwards/Tony Bevan

Home cooking in the UK
Foghorn

By Ken Waxman

November 29, 2004

Deeply felt music transcends arbitrary definitions attached to terminology, generation or nationalism. You can hear that clearly on this standout live session by three exceptional improvisers.

What could cause disquiet is that two of the players -- bassist John Edwards and saxophonist Tony Bevan -- are baby boomers and committed British Free Music players. Part of that sometimes-insular scene, they often work with guitarist Derek Bailey, major domo of that genre, who insists on Free Music’s distance from Jazz. Yet the third participant in this series of first-time meetings, recorded on tour in Britain, is 67-year-old drummer Sunny Murray. Not only is Murray, who lives in Paris, a jazzman without compromise, but he was one of the men who helped birth the so-called New Thing. He held the drum chair with both Cecil Taylor’s and Albert Ayler’s trios in the mid-1960s and afterwards led or participated in a clutch of sessions that defined so-called Energy Music.

Be that as it may, everything musical meshes on the three long tracks found here. For someone who participated in creating the style also stuck with the label Fire Music, Murray is still a remarkable subtle percussionist, sensitive to every shade and nuances in the others’ players. Bevan and Edwards’ output, while non-idiomatic, has the toughness that moves it about as far away from the precious, so-called insect music of doctrinaire BritImprovisers as Murray’s is from bebop.

That said, the centrepiece of the CD is the nearly 29-minute title tune, which at times takes on freebop configurations. But it’s just one of the references that show up as the bubbling foghorn-like bluster of Bevan’s buzzing bass saxophone finds common ground with Edwards’ sul tasto arco patterns and Murray’s barely-there cymbal and drum top rattles.

Shunned by most musicians except for Adrian Rollini (1904-1956), the unwieldy bass sax gives Bevan and unprecedented range -- and he makes the most of it. Double tonguing and smearing, he blasts stentorian honks from his horn’s bottom range, produces snappy doits and slides from its mid-register, and ejaculates irregularly vibrated split tones from its screaming top range. Dexterous as well as glottal, at several points he moves into Sonny Rollins’ tenor saxophone-like mode for split seconds, often sounding as if he’s playing parts of half-forgotten jazz standards without revealing the shape of the melody. Other time he introduces buzz-saw obbligatos in false registers that lacerate any stray notes and chords that fall in their way.

Unable to match Bevan’s aural authority, the bassist and drummer take a different tack, projecting strength from understatement. Murray wipes the toms and spanks the snares with pixie-light jumps more often than he crashes and rolls. Edwards strums with a 12-string guitar-like intensity, and at one point introduces languid ponticello lines that shuffle accelerated and decelerated timbres from the strings. He even plays some modern jazz-inflected walking bass. Other times, his rattling, buzzing lower strings can mirror in almost verbal unison the reverberating snorts of Bevan’s reed beast.

Although the reedist’s serpentine circular-breathed melodies and altissimo triple tonguing confirm his versatility throughout, he lets loose with protracted sepulchral blasts just before the finale to ultimately remind you that he’s playing the low-pitched sibling of the saxophone family.

Earlier, Murray supplies an object lesson in Free Jazz drumming, applying just enough torque to vary the rhythm from flams, drags and forced ratamacues, clattering the cymbals. Then the saxman responds by sprays stuttering split tones at him.

“Split Decision”, the final track with Bevan on tenor saxophone, is more fervent than the others, with the reedman’s snaking tone and false fingering moving over time from double-tongued moderato to dog whistle screeches and grainy, speedy overblowing. As the saxman speeds up his output so do the other two -- and Edwards promptly strokes an assembly line of bass tones from his axe. As he boots the bull fiddle’s output still further, Bevan sounds nearly frenzied and almost ragged, spitting into the reed and mouthpiece without waiting for each sound to exit the bell. Finally the bassist modulates down to near silence, Murray repeatedly crashes his cymbal -- then produces a conclusive press roll.

A fine trio effort, the CD should impress most listeners, no matter on which side of the Free Jazz-Free Music line they may stand.

November 22, 2004

ASSIF TSAHAR/PETER KOWALD/SUNNY MURRAY

MA: Live at the Fundacio Juan Miro
Hopscotch 15

MARIO SCHIANO/XU FENGXIA/MARTIN BLUME
Dear Peter…
Improjazz PRGT 001

German bassist Peter Kowald’s peripatetic life and willingness to improvise with musicians of all stripes and nationalities immensely widened the circle of musicians who mourned his sudden death from a heart attack at 58, in September 2002.

His enthusiasm for musical collaboration, which seemed to augment in the year or so before his death -- a characteristic he shared with other first generation European improvisers such as Peter Brötzmann, Evan Parker and Derek Bailey -- has meant that a raft of recent CDs have celebrated the bassist’s skills. Although not one is the definite last session, MA is one of the more impressive efforts.

That’s because it has elements of both familiarity -- his linkage with Israeli-born, Brooklyn-based reedman Assif Tsahar, with whom Kowald had recorded in the past -- and freshness, since it’s the first and last meeting between the bassist and veteran American Sunny Murray, drummer on the Albert Ayler LPs Kowald so admired as an apprentice Free Jazzer in Wuppertal.

DEAR PETER on the other hand, recorded in Rome a little more than a month after the bassist’s passing, is a celebration of Kowald’s achievements though non-specific improvisations. Rather than featuring a bassist trying to replicate his style, the trio involved includes a fellow German, veteran drummer Martin Blume; Italian saxophonist Mario Schiano, who has intersected with German, British and other improvisers since the 1970s; and Chinese-born, Berlin resident Xu Fengxia on guzheng and voice, whose improv partners have included German multi-reedist Wolfgang Fuchs and American bassist Joe Fonda.

As a matter of interest, MA, recorded live in Barcelona, Spain, two months before Kowald’s death, is cast in the classic Ayler Trio mould, with one more than 70 minute instant composition divided on disc into seven tracks for easier playback.

More discordant than melodic, Tsahar, 33, spends most of the CD on tenor saxophone advancing the type of screeching slipsliding sounds Ayler brought to jazz. His bass clarinet improvisations are harsh as well, but with an undercurrent of buzzing melody that peeps through every so often to mate with Kowald’s unvarying rhythmic pulse. Senior citizen Murray, 66, remains in clangorous and obstreperous form nearly 40 years after he first recorded with Ayler. There are times, in fact, that between the rumbles from his bass pedal and snare plus brush-directed scrambles from his ride cymbal that you have to sense more than hear Kowald’s contributions. At the same time longtime Free Jazz followers may be surprised to hear the bassist introduce standard 4/4 time one-third of the way through “Ya” and direct the beat that way for the remainder of the track.

Although much of the reedist’s improvising starts in overdrive and goes on from there, his altissimo flurries and extended hocketing yowls add to excitement, as does the spetrofluctuation and key pops he exhibits on “Da”. At times he uses overblowing to generate intense honks or float tiny tunelets à la Sonny Rollins. Mixed with the squeals and flutter tonguing are some genuine melodies -- one of which towards the end eerily and unintentionally resembles “God Save The Queen” -- and on close listen, he sounds surprisingly straightahead.

Also unexpectedly restrained when he relaxes into it, Murray’s ruffs and drags are focused with pinpoint accuracy to elicit dark-toned, four string bowing from Kowald, while his steady flams and rat tat tats meet lacerated string sounds and tiny, below-the-peg squeals from the bassman. There’s even a point where the drummer sounds out a definitive march tempo.

Double-pulsed guitar-like strums inform some of Kowald’s work here, but his most characteristic trope occurs on “Ka”, where he moves nearly soundlessly to the foreground, stretching the strings with tiny bow movements, producing clicking sounds from below the bridge, as flinty reverberations fellow each thrust. Flailing vibrations create wailing tones that reify the mettle of those steel strings. At points the differentiated timbres created resemble those of a ngoni or African lute.

Xu’s guzheng or so-called Chinese zither is the real unconventional instrument on the four similarly titled improvisations that make up DEAR PETER. But such is the versatility of the 25-string machine -- not to mention her technique honed by years of traditional study -- that when not used in an Oriental manner, the zheng has tones that can resemble the Western double bass or 12-string guitar.

An example of this appears on “Dear Peter part 3”, where Schiano’s crooked alto tone encourages bowed accompaniment from the bass strings of Xu’s instrument. Plucking the strings with her right hand and touching the strings with her left hand to produce the desired pitch, she replicates the dark-toned bass scrawls of the European instrument. Subtly Blume uses rubbed drumsticks as his percussion contribution. Later when he mixes in more parts of his kit, flailing guitar-like noises appear from the zheng, though it’s as if she has a effects pedal underfoot, since her strings ring with what could be electrified distortion and delay. As he does in almost every performance, the altoist quotes “Lover Man” at this juncture, but considering the circumstances the lyric “Oh lover man where can you be” seems particularly apt.

The only other spot where the performance is particularly funereal is on “Dear Peter part 1”, where Xu’s keening vocal line and the harp-like glissandos from the zheng add up to intimations of a threnody -- at least to Western ears. It’s a good bet that followers of Chinese traditional music may not hear it the same way though, since at points her vocal, while definitely Oriental includes the strained delivery and guttural tones of a blues singer. She’s obviously as expressive with her voice as her axe. Schiano’s repeated honklets that ascend to high-pitched cries add to the mood, while Blume’s percussion manages to approximate the sound of an African hollow log. Later on, a single bell peal may indeed reference Christian burial rites.

Three-sided conversation among accomplished improvisers, neither of these CDs should be limited to being heard as a dirge for a departed hero. Instead both are excellent demonstrations of Kowald’s life force celebrated in proper settings.

Meanwhile life goes on. Younger improvisers like Xu and Tsahar show in their playing and associations in general that Kowald’s welcoming of different forms of improvisation is ongoing.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: MA: 1. Ma 2. Ya 3. Ka 4. Da 5. Ba 6. Wa 7. Ma

Personnel: MA: Assif Tsahar (tenor saxophone, bass clarinet); Peter Kowald (bass); Sunny Murray (drums)

Track Listing: Dear: 1. Dear Peter part 1 2. Dear Peter part 2 3. Dear Peter part 3 4. Dear Peter part 4

Personnel: Dear: Mario Schiano (alto and soprano saxophones); Xu Fengxia (guzheng, voice); Martin Blume (drums)

November 10, 2003

TELETU

Quartetos
Clean Feed CF006 CD

As with any empirical formula, changing one part of a musical equation can result in a completely different outcome. Compare John Coltrane’s quartet with McCoy Tyner on piano to the one with Alice Coltrane on piano for instance. Or think of how different the Modern Jazz Quartet sounded with Connie Kay instead of Kenny Clarke on drums.

Portuguese total improv ensemble, Telectu, has done something like that on this three-CD set. Together for more than 20 years Telectu’s guiding duo -- pianist Jorge Lima Barreto and guitarist Vìtor Rua -- have over the years adapted variation of electronica, minimalism, musique concrète, art rock and lounge jazz to its improv foundation, collaborating with musicians such as experimental American guitarist Elliott Sharp and French clarinetist Louis Sclavis. Recently, despite side projects in theatre works and poetry, the band has become more acoustic, especially when Rua’s self-designed 18-string guitar is put into play. British soprano saxophonist Tom Chant has been the third Telectuan since 1990.

However, the idea behind the live concerts on QUARTETOS seemed to be to “make it new” by changing the drummer each time out. Thus venerable American New Thing drummer Sunny Murray is one disc one, British improv pioneer, percussionist Eddie Prévost is on disc two, and American drummer Gerry Hemingway is on disc three. Happily, although each offers an astute rhythmic variation to the proceedings, Telectu’s group identity is strong enough so that the results aren’t that dissimilar from disc to disc.

Although it’s instructive to compare each performance to one another, don’t try listening to the set all at once. Almost three hours of music is more than anyone can take in a single sitting. Instead relish each singly.

Interesting enough, it’s Hemingway who seems to get the three Telectu members thinking along different lines. During the course of that 56-minute performance Barreto suddenly appears to be working in straight lines, adapting a variation of 20th century classical piano music to his output, while Chant’s bird-like soprano cackles are sometimes met with the keyboardist’s expressive left hand decorations as well as delicate brush work on the toms, cymbal and snare. Harp-like glissandos issue from Rua’s 18-string contraption, which is also where some unclassifiable tones arise as well. Finally, novel textures and exaggerated densities are introduced to the sound picture by Rua’s judicious use of electronics.

Issuing wild fowl quacks, tongue slaps, rolling chirps and reverberated tones from within his horn, Chant is partnered by the drummer’s percussion scraping, Afro-Cuban intimations and a point where it seems objects are rolling on the snare and toms. Three-quarters of the way through Rua’s waterfall-like string patterns the intensity rises as he begins pulling on his strings with bodybuilder’s strength. Barreto works his way around the piano keyboard, probably investigating the timbres created by forearm pressure, and brings the sustain pedal into play. Bass drum resonance issues from Hemingway, while Chant varies his lines with obtuse, unconnected reed abstractions. Eventually, after it seems as if the drummer has unleashed a suitcase full of whirring mechanized objects, the pianist, whose playing has been understated before this begins creating modified, Iberian boogie woogie-like walking basses. Soon the soprano sax hits its high-pitched false register, and, as Chant slurs out accents, Hemingway exercises his hi-hat and sizzle cymbals and Rua provides lacerated comments from both his instruments.

Bonded to his loose-limbed style of 40 years, Murray is the most extruding of the drummers. During the nearly 61 minutes that make up his Portuguese connection, he takes more solos than the other two percussionists combined, including one right at the top of the piece. Although 21st century modernity is present in miscellaneous electronic crackles, guitarharp glissandos and some bubbling chirps from Chant’s soprano, Murray, unimpressed, sticks to his own drum-and-dab style. At times, in fact, it appears as if he’s trying to put Barreto and Chant into the Cecil Taylor and Jimmy Lyons roles that he was familiar with from his tenure with that pianist’s band.

One-third of the way through, Chant’s soft peeping tones, Barreto’s high-intensity piano chords plus accelerated yanks on Rua’s 18 strings at last push Murray’s rumbling drum beats in the same direction as the others. Operating on all cylinders, the drummer sounds out rolls, roughs and drags, Barreto hits the keyboard with more force and Chant creates some trilling, penny whistle tones.

Eventually the program become more impassioned, as the pianist formulates a fantasia of tremolo runs; somehow Rua replicates what could be an electric bass part; and the saxist tries speedy tongue slaps, rolling split tones and circular breathing exercises. Somehow Murray is pushed into a more restrained, almost EuroImprov state of mind and execution.

Not that there’s much comparison between his Murray’s style and that of Prévost, one of the creators of the EuroImprov genre. Prévost, in whose trio Chant also plays, initially finesses his oversized snare and undersized cymbals in such a way that Barreto begins taking on the understated persona of pianist John Tilbury the drummer’s AMM playing partner. Keyboard expression then slackens, and Rua appears to be affected by the same creeping malaise, underscoring his output to such an extent that he starts to sound like an enervated Harpo Marx.

Luckily, before all individuality is lost, Prévost’s distinctively scraping chains on his drumheads awaken the others to their individual roles. Chant’s output starts to mix what sounds like balloon inflation with squeaks and wiggles; Barreto trifles with straight jazz time; and Rua -- plus electronics -- comes up with the subtle voicing of oddball sonics. As the reedist turns from multiphonics to a concentrated line that arches over the other sounds, the drummer bisects all this with anvil-like hits on his kit. The pianist turns to circular sound patterns and Prévost responds with scrapes, scratches and rolling tidal wave like movements. Adagio, the 52-minute performance wraps up with guitar-like plucks from Rua; a harder and more stressed pitch from Barreto; whistling reed tones from Chant and a single, clear cymbal touch from the drummer.

Like a proper Iberian meal, each course of this set should be savored for its sensations and flavor before going on to the next. That way QUARTETOS will provide a nourishing and succulent musical repast.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: CD1: 1. With Sunny Murray CD2: 1. With Eddie Prévost CD3: 1. With Gerry Hemingway

Personnel: Tom Chant (soprano saxophone) Jorge Lima Barreto (piano, prepared piano); Vìtor Rua (18-string guitar, electronics); Sunny Murray~ or Eddie Prévost* or Gerry Hemingway+ (drums)

July 14, 2003

ALBERT AYLER

The Copenhagen tapes
Ayler aylCD-033

Almost 33 years after his death in New York’s East River, an apparent suicide, the stature of tenor saxophonist Albert Ayler as a major musical force keeps growing. His redefinition of horn playing away from empty technique and towards emotional vulnerability, and his insistence on articulating simple themes that easily became vehicles for improvisation, has been acknowledged by everyone short of the most reactionary jazz neo-con.

Today with indie rock stars looking for street cred and exploratory contemporary classical composers joining jazzers in placing the saxophonist in the pantheon that includes Cecil Taylor, Ornette Coleman and John Coltrane, it seems that his influence is everywhere. Some commentators even call this musical time the Post-Ayler epoch.

With a recording career that almost exactly paralleled in brevity that of cornettist Bix Biederbecke, another innovator with a truncated career, most of Ayler’s work has been issued and reissued many times. Yet these exceptional 10 tracks are for many new discoveries. Not 1964’s justly celebrated studio session issued on various labels, these more than 68 minutes of prime Ayler come from earlier live and studio dates recorded during that same trip to Copenhagen.

Exhibiting the saxophonist’s superhighway-wide vibrato and unique sense of timing and intonation, the tunes also feature Ayler’s most cohesive rhythm section and an exceptional front line partner. Drummer Sunny Murray, who would go on to play with avant-garde ensembles of varying quality in the following decades, had already codified his unique metric sense here. Sloppy as the sound of trash men tossing garbage can lids -- and a perfect foil for the saxophonist’s extended glossolalia -- precise as microsurgery elsewhere, Murray may not emphasize the beat like a bopper, but his rolls and sudden flams definitely keeps the tunes moving. Bassist Gary Peacock’s trajectory started with the likes of flutist Bud Shank and pianist Bill Evans before this and appears to have reached its zenith with his present fame as one-third of pianist Keith Jarrett’s standards trio. He was actually no more experimental with Ayler than with his other employers. Yet his burnished arco slides and solid pizzicato timekeeping made a perfect foil to Murray’s percussion explorations.

Over and above all this is the presence of trumpeter Don Cherry, probably the most cohesive and erudite brassman who ever worked with the saxophonist. Anomalous when compared to the style of the saxophonist’s most consistent playing partner, his brother, trumpeter Don Ayler, Cherry’s scope is far different. In truth, Don Ayler was for all intents and purposes an apprentice, transferring Albert Ayler concepts to the valve instrument; Cherry was a mature stylist on his own.

He was already an apprentice hard bopper who had converted to the New Thing when he met Coleman. From that point on, the trumpeter showed then, and in his later creation of a variant of nascent so-called World Music, that he was easily able to mix the brassy showiness and rhythmic intensity of pre-Free Jazz soloists with a propitious inquisitiveness. By 1964 Cherry had not only played alongside Coleman for years in that saxophonist’s most significant combo, but worked with both Coltrane and Sonny Rollins. Thus, throughout the disc, rather than guiding a proselyte, Ayler faces a foil who can match his intensity and emotion every step of the way. Furthermore the trumpeter’s capricious sincerity gives these mostly familiar tunes an added fillip and adds an astringent condiment to the saxophonist’s sometime mawkish, over-the-top presentation.

Recorded at Copenhagen’s Café Montmarte and a Danish radio studio, the CD includes announcements and asides by Ayler, an explanation of and introduction of the music and musicians by a local announcer and a brief, biographical statement by the saxophonist. He says that he had wanted to go to Scandinavia for some time because --“over here I feel quite free”. Subsequent performances would suggest that much of his freest playing was indeed done in Europe.

Lax in naming his compositions, this session features versions of tunes like “Saints”. “Mothers”, “Vibrations” and “Mothers”, which may or may not have been record under those names later on. There are multiple versions of some of the titles here as well. Yet Ayler was proof of drummer Shelly Manne’s definition of jazz musicians: “we never play anything the same way once”.

Ayler fans and anyone interested in a well-recorded document of one of jazz’s justified legends would be wise to pick up this disc.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Spirits 2. Vibrations 3. Saints 4. Mothers 5. Children 6. Spirits 7. Introduction 8. Vibrations 9. Saints 10. Spirits

Personnel: Albert Ayler (tenor saxophone); Don Cherry (pocket trumpet); Gary Peacock (bass); Sunny Murray (drums)

February 17, 2003

SUNNY MURRAY

Sunshine & An Even Break (never give a sucker)
Fuel 2000 Records 302 061 215 2

Potentially the time when Energy music of both the American and European varieties reached the zenith of acceptance, 1969 was also unique because it suddenly seemed that the very fabric of society was ripping apart.

Riots were commonplace on both continents. Radicalized students were staging sometimes-violent demonstrations to demand more liberalized education processes and to protest against local repression and the war in Viet Nam. Fringe groups had turned to kidnapping, bomb throwing and arson in Europe, while in the U.S., the Black Power Movement had moved into its short-lived, so-called revolutionary phrase.

Articulate American provocateur/musicians, including members of the Art Ensemble of Chicago (AEC) and especially poet Amiri Baraka and tenor saxophonist Archie Shepp were making incendiary statements. And in Paris newly created BYG/Actuel records was attempting to get as many of the new avant gardists on tape.

Looking back from the 21st Century, many of the actions seem futile, as they encouraged greater repression and the election of right wing governments. Many of the so-called generational spokespeople retreated into business or academe, including Shepp and jazz then sought refuge in fusion and neo-conservatism.

Yet some fine CDs were made at that time, including, very definitely this one. Already known because of his association with pianist Cecil Taylor and tenor saxophonist Albert Ayler, drummer Sunny Murray’s first LP had been recorded under the aegis of Baraka and he was playing Europe his band in 1969. Combing two LPs on one CD, this disc features the drummer’s regular combo augmented by guests.

The most ferocious -- and longest -- performance comes on “Flower Trane”, which adds the AEC’s trumpeter Lester Bowie and alto saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell, plus alto saxophonist Arthur Jones and Shepp to Murray’s group. It’s a dense, snaky, highly rhythmic assault, built on the dual bass strength of Alan Silva and the AEC’s Malachi Favors plus the drummer’s cymbal splashes and snare pulse. With the horns playing screaming, off-kilter multiphonics practically in unison, despite the line-up, no single reed-bleater stands out. It does show however that “Ascension”-like group improvisations work.

Free of the visitors and goosed by Murray’s kit and Favors’ boomeranging 4/4-time invention, little-known Jamaican tenor saxophonist Kenneth Terroade turns out some memorable reed-biting smears and cries here. “Red Cross” -- not the Charlie Parker tune -- features more musicians as well, with individual saxophone lines -- most prominently Shepp’s avant-mainstream tenor -- and Bowie screeching trumpet, combining, splitting and leaping up and down the octaves.

Somewhat more cleanly recorded, the remaining numbers find Philadelphia reedman Byard Lancaster joining Terroade, Favors and Murray. Using both whirling saxes as backing ballast and point makers while exhibiting his percussion collection, Murray intones a portentous Black Nationalist poem on “An Even Break” very much under Baraka’s baleful influence.

With Lancaster screaming in ear-bleeding register and Terroade honking on his instrument’s bottom keys, the saxes construct extended smeary countermelodies on “Giblets - Part 12”. But even Favors’ virtuostic bass thump can’t disguise the tune’s origin as a simple R&B style riff. Resembling Ornette Coleman’s folksy material as well as AEC sound experiments, the final tunes work the same groove, with heads that reappear throughout, unison horn lines and an overall sound and sliding motion very much of their time.

Not the best example of Energy music in existence, this CD still offers up a hearty slice of 1969 free jazz played by some of its most accomplished practitioners, especially the still active, but under-recorded Murray.

Now, if somebody could only locate saxophonist Terroade, who was rumored to have returned to Jamaica in the early 1970s. If he’s still with us, it would be interesting to hear how his musical conception has evolved.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Flower Trane*#+ 2. Real; 3. Red Cross+#*; 4. An Even Break&%; 5. Giblets - Part 12% 7. Complete Affection% 8. Invisible Rules%

Personnel: Lester Bowie (trumpet)*; Arthur Jones+, Roscoe Mitchell+ (alto saxophones); Byard Lancaster (soprano and alto saxophone, bass clarinet, flute)%; Archie Shepp*, Kenneth Terroade (tenor saxophone, flute); Dave Burrell (piano)#; Alan Silva*, Malachi Favors (bass); Sunny Murray (drums, balafon and poetry reading&)

October 7, 2002

ARTHUR DOYLE/SUNNY MURRAY

Live at Glenn Miller Café
Ayler Records aylCD-002

There are some people who regard Alabama-born tenor saxophonist Arthur Doyle as an idiot savant. Others drop the savant part.

Certainly Doyle's odd personal and playing history, checkered recording career and sometimes bizarre pronouncements give fuel to those who see all first-generation energy players from Albert Ayler to Charles Gayle as just one step away from the psycho ward.

Actually, the saxophonist who has suffered mental breakdowns and (unjustly) spent time in prison, is a primitive in the best sense of the word. Even more than in his past work with more balanced types like drummer Milford Graves and saxophonist Noah Howard, here he uses his horns as a mirror to the inner workings of his psyche. Luckily drummer Sunny Murray, who has had bouts of strangeness himself in the almost 40 years since he first came to prominence with Cecil Taylor, is here to offers some focus.

Most of Doyle's playing is harsh and gravelly if it isn't in the upper range of altissimo. He'll never screech when a squeal will do, and never play a simple melody when overblowing will distort it some more. Multi-noted atonality is his stock in trade and he seems to begin his police siren-like horking at the point where Pharoah Sanders or Peter Brötzmann at their most discordant would have run out of steam, and go on from there. Unfortunately, as on "Joy" there seems to be no beginning or end to his honking attack and it falls to Murray's virtuosic snare and cymbal work to supply a structure.

You could accept what Doyle terms "free jazz soul music" and even be impressed by its sheer stamina, if the fear didn't exist that some of what he produces is by accident rather than design. This suspicion deepens when on "Two Free Jazz Men Speak" he begins playing the same notes over and over again and even segues into phrases that sound most like the children's ditty "In the land of France/where the ladies wear no pants." This artlessness slops over into his flute playing, which despite Murray producing a quasi-Latin rhythm seems to dissolve into miniature, vocalized metal note shards.

That still doesn't take into account Doyle's vocalizing, displayed on that tune and the standard "Nature Boy". With a delivery that makes Chet Baker sound like Mel Torme, he rumbles, mumbles, bumbles and shouts nonsense syllables that appear to relate neither to the compositions or what Murray is playing. A combination of falsetto whoops, speaking in tongues and primitive scat, it's horrifying and mesmerizing at the same time to hear a 57 year old man create something that sounds like a baby's first attempts at speaking and singing. While it goes on, the drummer first tries a military beat, then switches to brushes for a stealthy offensive and finally with protracted tom tom work pushes Doyle back into a more comfortable register.

Sheer inventiveness characterizes Murray's playing throughout, with Doyle and, on the first three tracks, where he accompanies alto saxophonist Bengt Frippe Nordström. A Swedish free jazz pioneer whose sax tone resembles that of a tenor, Nordström was ill at the time and died shortly afterwards. We would assume that the pastiche of Albert Ayler licks and garden variety energy tones he displays here was only an echo of better playing from his heyday.

New Thing fanatics, who remember his 1960s and 1970s discs, may find a certain perverse fascination in hearing Doyle's ravings and rudimentary soloing. He might think of himself as a Nature Boy, but his vocal delivery is now pushing him into Wild Man Fischer territory.

Lazy commentators often compare any free saxophone and drum duet to John Coltrane's final work with Rashied Ali. Neither of the saxophonists here approach Trane's artistry and this session is more SUNNY'S TIME NOW then his legendary 1965 record with that title. So, if Murray is your drummer of choice than this CD will attract your interest.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Spontaneous Creation, Part 1 2. Spontaneous Creation, Part 2 3. Spontaneous Creation, Part 3 4. African Love Call 5. Two Free Jazz Men Speak 6. Nature Boy 7. Joy

Personnel: Bengt Frippe Nordström [tracks 1 - 3](alto saxophone); Arthur Doyle [tracks 4 - 7] (tenor saxophone, flute, vocal); Sunny Murray (drums)

November 5, 2001