A rare beauty... Keith Tippett, playing with a string quartet, in a duo with Stan Tracey and in the second half, his wife Julie.
Starters – the mainly written piece for piano and the Elysian Quartet, 'Linuckia.' Tippett joined the other musicians, looking absurdly young and still affecting the muttonchop whiskers which, with his incongruous outfit of smart jacket, ratty blue jeans and watch and chain attached to his waistcoat gave some bizarre rural image of yesteryear. Squire Tippett, perhaps... The piece opened on strident morse code string patterns to be suddenly swept along by a rolling keyboard figure that travelled from top to bottom, a repeated call and response gesture. The quartet were also required to use some extended techniques – plucking, glissando and assorted scrabbling at their instruments as the piano answered and commented in kind. Tippett was using woodblocks and various foreign objects to interfere with his piano sonorities and timbres – devices he used throughout the evening, producing a wide variety of sounds – from blunted, choked back harpsichord to some wild bass figures that sounded at one point as if Meade Lux Lewis had been fed through a sawmill while performing his old boogie woogie. Coming off the 'serious' art music tradition but bent to his own shapes. (Don't you just love that word 'serious' – as if 'jazz' and its related musics are not). Alongside the sharp, disjointed jags he positioned longer melodic lines that reminded me of some bebop legacy. An intriguing start.
Then another Steinway was hauled into place and Stan Tracy, the old guv'nor of the British modern jazz scene – a full head of greying hair swept back flamboyantly, joined Tippett for a fascinating journey. Tracy is not a Brit jazzer I have followed much, to be honest – a lot of his playing back in the old days seemed to be coming a little too much off Monk for me – although his peers have always rated him highly. Tonight, he joined Tippett's sound space in two improvised duets that referenced jazz occasionally but seemed to be moved by more English ambiances, somehow. Hard to place this music which made it more interesting perhaps – the interplay was fascinating as a figure or fragment of melody was picked up and played with in a seamless reel of notes and clusters, occassionally grounded on a march-like succession of chords. Tracey hit out some of his old dissonant harmonies but, placed in this context, they seemed very much of the moment and transcended the obvious jazz lineage. Stan is certainly ageing well and playing with fire and subtlety – and freshness.
The second half was another duo – Keith joined by his wife, Julie. Who famously took a sideways step off the mainstream some time after her hit records with Brain Auger all those years ago. An old story – but I mention it to praise the integrity of someone who felt moved by other forces to dedicate their lives to the remorselessly thankless genre (in dear old Blighty, anyway) of free improvisation. I'm not a fan of vocalists – improv vocalists even less. But I was hauled out of my prejudice by her performance. Standing tall and elegant in front of what looked like a stall at a craft fair – exotic bowls and odd little instruments – she channelled her wide range of voices – from art music pointillistic stabs and intervallic leaps to stranger spaces, occasionally selecting a device for additional delicate sonorities. Accompanied by Tippett's piano, from his surging stormwind basses to filgree strands of sound produced again by objects placed and manipulated within the piano, this was a magical performance that held the audience tight in a warm embrace. A rare beauty was given... The compere at the beginning of the performance mentioned the spiritual aspect of Tippett's improvisatory muse. The journey we had been collectively offered to take surely and subtly demonstrated that premise. ALong with some subtle wit - did I imagine the tinkly music box effect playing the theme from 'The Godfather' at one point?
Walking out into the mild night and across the bridge over the Thames, I stopped to look at the familiar London skyline and a street musician started playing – alto sax, some nice lines that echoed out into the evening, free music, oddly continuing the inspired performance I had just witnessed...
Showing posts with label keith tippett. Show all posts
Showing posts with label keith tippett. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Saturday, December 15, 2007
John Surman... Keith Tippett... Gary Smith/John Stevens... Bert Jansch... Yusef Lateef... Ian Matthews... Scrapper Blackwell
So – back in God's Little Acre, preparing for Christmas... presenting some oddities...
I found this John Surman track on a Wire magazine sampler (no 13 – I have them all somewhere - which could be interesting, if I ever have the patience to dig them out). This is 'Way back when part 4,' recorded in 1969. Surman has a lighter style on soprano than the heavyweight model of the time – John Coltrane - less spiky than Steve Lacy, say. Lyrical and folksy over the busy, thrusting drums, electric bass and fairly muted electric keyboard comping. A session that reflects the disparate influences of the time lightly, when Miles was pushing hard in his rock/jazz integrations, a reminder, perhaps, that in the U.K. our intermingling of jazz with rock (and folk) possessed a distinctive flavour... see below... Surman, of course, is more famous for his innovative baritone playing and later investigations of electronics in his composing/improvising. The tapes for this album apparently had been lost until recently, recorded as a loose jam and put to one side, strangely enough... now released on Cuneiform, lord bless 'em, where you can find a basketful of the similar...
Another musician who is probably better known these days for his positioning on the free side of jazz improvisation but who was happy to swing between the genres in the late 60s/early 70s during the hazy existence of that temporary autonomous zone where much seemed possible – and inevitable: (at the time - hmmm) - and embrace the 'spirit of the age' is the English pianist, Keith Tippett. Here he is with a trio, playing a track called 'Glimpse' from his 1972 album 'Blueprint.' Tippett is a unique pianist, integrating post-Cageian under-the-lid tinkerings with a dynamic thundering keyboard style that builds up slowburning storms of overtones. I've seen him a few times down the years and he is one of my favourite indigenous musicians, a powerful player. Starts of with high treble over silvery rustling percussion to build strongly as he brings in that thundering bass – Babbington glisses in to join the fun. Ebbs and flows nicely between subdued filigree and near silence to stomping acoustic fisticuffs...
John Stevens was one of the founders of free improvisation in the U.K. (Little Theatre Club blah blah, via that curious post-WWII mix of Air Force band and Art College). This is a duet with Gary Smith from late on in the drummer's career (1993) (he died at the age of 54), taken from the album '7 Improvisations.' Don't know which number this one is, actually – I have it on a disc from the good Mr Teledu (the same source for the Tippett track above – as is the next selection,come to think of it. So much for even a pretense at coherence this day). Long-held grungy dark chords as Stevens goes busy. Spartan echoey guitar, the metal/rock timbres combining with the drummers free jazz free flow to create two spatial movements that intersect sporadically to lock it all together. A long way from his more terse/spare improv strategies - see SME - this is Stevens in mercurial fashion. Smith replies with sputtering lines and strummed chords that float across the rhythms...
This post becomes more and more elliptical, in time-honoured fashion. Just the way I have the tracks prepared (loosely - very loosely) for delivery – here is Tippett again, plinking away on a soft folk-rock number, which has a winsome charm (I suppose). Ian Matthews (of Matthews Southern Comfort fame - did anyone else hate 'Woodstock?' Sorry Joni...) heads the track up – and the late Sandy Denny, one of my favourite singers, plays harmonium and supplies some back up vocals. 'Never Ending,' from 1971. Richard Thompson (His Dourness) on acoustic guitar. Matthews has one of those light fey voices which on a good day can seem charming enough (compared to Thompson, who is a brilliant songwriter but always sings as if he has a potato up his nose), oddly backed by Sandy who could sing him into the ground on a bad day, here just content to do the friendship/session game. A curio... Fluff, really...
Unlike...
I could always hear the snap of Scrapper Blackwell somewhere in the back of Bert Jansch's playing, that distinctive rip of the strings that drove his playing along in such a powerful way. (Hell on the nails, as I can testify). This is another piece where a lot of the sixties influences that flowed so strongly through the U.K. to link the folk, jazz, rock and blues scenes arrive at an interesting convergence. Bert, backed by Danny Thompson on bass – one of the essential pivots of the scene(Pentangle/John Martyn etc), bringing his jazz chops to bear on disparate genres. 'Bittern,' from 1978. The tumbling 9/8 rhythm probably links back to Charlie Mingus's more gospel outings that were such a massive influence at that time. Plus folk slip jigs? This is also shot through with wah wah electric lead (from Martin Jenkins on amplified mandocello? - I know he played on the album, and I saw him with Bert round this time when I was back home in the U.K. for a visit). Meanders a bit but old Danny holds it together – and takes a neat solo, demonstrating his jazz credentials- which Bert never really had. But what a guitar player within his own self-created space... fire and soul move across genres...
Looking for a rogue cd that has slipped the pack somehow, I stumbled on this – Yusef Lateef, 'Revelation,' from his album 'The Centaur and the Phoenix.' Tenor states the theme, a twelve bar in D minor, joined by the tight-clenched ensemble as back drop in the second chorus. They drop out as the bass picks up a fast walk in four and Lateef solos over some punchy drumming (Lex Humphreys - snappy throughout). Succession of choruses from Clark Terry (I think), a robust Tate Houston, cool, somewhat detached and floaty Curtis Fuller, so so chorus from Zawinul before Lateef returns over clipped horns - into a brief fade out... The rest of the album is more interesting, but, hey, I'm perverse and this is a strange day... More soon...
So: mention of influence (fancied or otherwise) gives us: Scrapper Blackwell playing 'Down South Blues,' recorded in 1931. He teamed up famously with Leroy Carr. But cut a lot of tracks on his own. Maybe that distinctive treble string movement was developed to cut through in tandem with the piano playing of Carr in unamplified environments but he integrates it neatly into his solo style. An influence on Robert Johnson as well, perhaps? Or is it just the register of the voice? Fascinating interview with him here...
Hail the Scrapper anyway... reading this all back made me realise that I've been drowning in too much Olson recently on a re-encounter with his biography as well as the continuing encounters with the rest of his awkwardly brilliant oeuvre - but sad selfish fool in many crossed ways he certainly was... maybe my prose style is haunted by this, on a strange day with much movement close to me and mine, benign, malign, we shall see...
'The chain of resurrection is memory. I am a vain man...'
Yup... Warner to Maximus...
In the Videodrome...
Archaeologist of morning...
so: Creeley...
A brief snippet of Yusef out on the road recently... playing the blues...
Keith Tippett in Le Mans, 1998
Keith and Julie and Paul... improvise...
... reel back- 'Indian Rope Man.'
... jump cut to Evan Parker and Ned Rothenberg (saw them in July - one of the gigs of the year)
... run by our good friends Black Carrot...
... Rambling Jack Elliott anyone?
Sly Stone redux recently... (one for Etnobofin)
John Surman
John Surman (ss) John Taylor (p) Brian Odgers (b-g) John Marshall (d)
Way back when part 4
Download
Buy
Keith Tippett
Keith Tippett (p) Roy Babbington(b) Frank Perry (perc)
Glimpse
Download
Buy
Gary Smith/John Stevens
Gary Smith (el-g) John Stevens (d, )
Improvisation
Download
Buy
Ian Matthews
Ian Matthews (v) Richard Thompson (g) Keith Tippett (p) Sandy Denny (harm)
Never Ending
Download
Buy
Bert Jansch
Bert Jansch (guitar/piano), Martin Jenkins (mandocello/violin/flute), Danny Thompson (b)
Bittern
Download
Buy
Yusef Lateef
Richard Williams (tp) Clark Terry (flh, tp) Curtis Fuller (tb) Josea Taylor (basn) Yusef Lateef (ts, fl, argol, ob) Tate Houston (bars) Joe Zawinul (p) Ben Tucker (b) Lex Humphries (d)
Revelation
Download
Buy
Scrapper Blackwell (g, v)
Down South Blues
Download
Buy
I found this John Surman track on a Wire magazine sampler (no 13 – I have them all somewhere - which could be interesting, if I ever have the patience to dig them out). This is 'Way back when part 4,' recorded in 1969. Surman has a lighter style on soprano than the heavyweight model of the time – John Coltrane - less spiky than Steve Lacy, say. Lyrical and folksy over the busy, thrusting drums, electric bass and fairly muted electric keyboard comping. A session that reflects the disparate influences of the time lightly, when Miles was pushing hard in his rock/jazz integrations, a reminder, perhaps, that in the U.K. our intermingling of jazz with rock (and folk) possessed a distinctive flavour... see below... Surman, of course, is more famous for his innovative baritone playing and later investigations of electronics in his composing/improvising. The tapes for this album apparently had been lost until recently, recorded as a loose jam and put to one side, strangely enough... now released on Cuneiform, lord bless 'em, where you can find a basketful of the similar...
Another musician who is probably better known these days for his positioning on the free side of jazz improvisation but who was happy to swing between the genres in the late 60s/early 70s during the hazy existence of that temporary autonomous zone where much seemed possible – and inevitable: (at the time - hmmm) - and embrace the 'spirit of the age' is the English pianist, Keith Tippett. Here he is with a trio, playing a track called 'Glimpse' from his 1972 album 'Blueprint.' Tippett is a unique pianist, integrating post-Cageian under-the-lid tinkerings with a dynamic thundering keyboard style that builds up slowburning storms of overtones. I've seen him a few times down the years and he is one of my favourite indigenous musicians, a powerful player. Starts of with high treble over silvery rustling percussion to build strongly as he brings in that thundering bass – Babbington glisses in to join the fun. Ebbs and flows nicely between subdued filigree and near silence to stomping acoustic fisticuffs...
John Stevens was one of the founders of free improvisation in the U.K. (Little Theatre Club blah blah, via that curious post-WWII mix of Air Force band and Art College). This is a duet with Gary Smith from late on in the drummer's career (1993) (he died at the age of 54), taken from the album '7 Improvisations.' Don't know which number this one is, actually – I have it on a disc from the good Mr Teledu (the same source for the Tippett track above – as is the next selection,come to think of it. So much for even a pretense at coherence this day). Long-held grungy dark chords as Stevens goes busy. Spartan echoey guitar, the metal/rock timbres combining with the drummers free jazz free flow to create two spatial movements that intersect sporadically to lock it all together. A long way from his more terse/spare improv strategies - see SME - this is Stevens in mercurial fashion. Smith replies with sputtering lines and strummed chords that float across the rhythms...
This post becomes more and more elliptical, in time-honoured fashion. Just the way I have the tracks prepared (loosely - very loosely) for delivery – here is Tippett again, plinking away on a soft folk-rock number, which has a winsome charm (I suppose). Ian Matthews (of Matthews Southern Comfort fame - did anyone else hate 'Woodstock?' Sorry Joni...) heads the track up – and the late Sandy Denny, one of my favourite singers, plays harmonium and supplies some back up vocals. 'Never Ending,' from 1971. Richard Thompson (His Dourness) on acoustic guitar. Matthews has one of those light fey voices which on a good day can seem charming enough (compared to Thompson, who is a brilliant songwriter but always sings as if he has a potato up his nose), oddly backed by Sandy who could sing him into the ground on a bad day, here just content to do the friendship/session game. A curio... Fluff, really...
Unlike...
I could always hear the snap of Scrapper Blackwell somewhere in the back of Bert Jansch's playing, that distinctive rip of the strings that drove his playing along in such a powerful way. (Hell on the nails, as I can testify). This is another piece where a lot of the sixties influences that flowed so strongly through the U.K. to link the folk, jazz, rock and blues scenes arrive at an interesting convergence. Bert, backed by Danny Thompson on bass – one of the essential pivots of the scene(Pentangle/John Martyn etc), bringing his jazz chops to bear on disparate genres. 'Bittern,' from 1978. The tumbling 9/8 rhythm probably links back to Charlie Mingus's more gospel outings that were such a massive influence at that time. Plus folk slip jigs? This is also shot through with wah wah electric lead (from Martin Jenkins on amplified mandocello? - I know he played on the album, and I saw him with Bert round this time when I was back home in the U.K. for a visit). Meanders a bit but old Danny holds it together – and takes a neat solo, demonstrating his jazz credentials- which Bert never really had. But what a guitar player within his own self-created space... fire and soul move across genres...
Looking for a rogue cd that has slipped the pack somehow, I stumbled on this – Yusef Lateef, 'Revelation,' from his album 'The Centaur and the Phoenix.' Tenor states the theme, a twelve bar in D minor, joined by the tight-clenched ensemble as back drop in the second chorus. They drop out as the bass picks up a fast walk in four and Lateef solos over some punchy drumming (Lex Humphreys - snappy throughout). Succession of choruses from Clark Terry (I think), a robust Tate Houston, cool, somewhat detached and floaty Curtis Fuller, so so chorus from Zawinul before Lateef returns over clipped horns - into a brief fade out... The rest of the album is more interesting, but, hey, I'm perverse and this is a strange day... More soon...
So: mention of influence (fancied or otherwise) gives us: Scrapper Blackwell playing 'Down South Blues,' recorded in 1931. He teamed up famously with Leroy Carr. But cut a lot of tracks on his own. Maybe that distinctive treble string movement was developed to cut through in tandem with the piano playing of Carr in unamplified environments but he integrates it neatly into his solo style. An influence on Robert Johnson as well, perhaps? Or is it just the register of the voice? Fascinating interview with him here...
Hail the Scrapper anyway... reading this all back made me realise that I've been drowning in too much Olson recently on a re-encounter with his biography as well as the continuing encounters with the rest of his awkwardly brilliant oeuvre - but sad selfish fool in many crossed ways he certainly was... maybe my prose style is haunted by this, on a strange day with much movement close to me and mine, benign, malign, we shall see...
'The chain of resurrection is memory. I am a vain man...'
Yup... Warner to Maximus...
In the Videodrome...
Archaeologist of morning...
so: Creeley...
A brief snippet of Yusef out on the road recently... playing the blues...
Keith Tippett in Le Mans, 1998
Keith and Julie and Paul... improvise...
... reel back- 'Indian Rope Man.'
... jump cut to Evan Parker and Ned Rothenberg (saw them in July - one of the gigs of the year)
... run by our good friends Black Carrot...
... Rambling Jack Elliott anyone?
Sly Stone redux recently... (one for Etnobofin)
John Surman
John Surman (ss) John Taylor (p) Brian Odgers (b-g) John Marshall (d)
Way back when part 4
Download
Buy
Keith Tippett
Keith Tippett (p) Roy Babbington(b) Frank Perry (perc)
Glimpse
Download
Buy
Gary Smith/John Stevens
Gary Smith (el-g) John Stevens (d, )
Improvisation
Download
Buy
Ian Matthews
Ian Matthews (v) Richard Thompson (g) Keith Tippett (p) Sandy Denny (harm)
Never Ending
Download
Buy
Bert Jansch
Bert Jansch (guitar/piano), Martin Jenkins (mandocello/violin/flute), Danny Thompson (b)
Bittern
Download
Buy
Yusef Lateef
Richard Williams (tp) Clark Terry (flh, tp) Curtis Fuller (tb) Josea Taylor (basn) Yusef Lateef (ts, fl, argol, ob) Tate Houston (bars) Joe Zawinul (p) Ben Tucker (b) Lex Humphries (d)
Revelation
Download
Buy
Scrapper Blackwell (g, v)
Down South Blues
Download
Buy
Sunday, September 16, 2007
William Parker... Mal Waldron/Marion Brown... Joe Albany/Warne Marsh... The Number: Keith Tippett/Gary Curson/John Edwards/Mark Sanders
With that Charles Gayle gig pending (I'm off to Liverpool tomorrow) – here's something from the mighty William Parker who will be appearing with the saxophonist (plus our own Marc Sanders). From the 2005 album, 'Sound Unity,' this is 'Wood flute song.' A booting track – Hamid Drake flashes throughout and Parker anchors down deep – to let the two horns flow. Rob Brown is becoming a favourite of mine, a fluent and exciting alto player. I don't know the trumpeter Lewis Barnes but he's damn good. Drake takes a busy solo, yet has plenty of space to explore – a clear recording, live from the Vancouver International jazz festival in 2004. There is something delightfully infectious and warming about Parker's music, as is his contribution to the myriad of bands he leads/plays in. 'This album is of the God-Head; enough said.'
Mal Waldron covered a lot of ground... here he is in a duo with Marion Brown on the old ballad 'I can't get started' run together with 'Now's the Time.' Brown leads in on solo alto – a heartfelt purity here, one of those performances where you feel as if you are listening over someone's shoulder. Then a bounce into the old riff blues, joined by Waldron in a dance across time – in several senses.
Another duo, sax and piano, from some time back. Joe Albany and Warne Marsh recorded together in 1957, an informal session at the home of recording engineer Ralf Garretson. I upped a track from this album a few months ago and mentioned Albany's daughter, Amy - who has written a fascinating book about her father. This is the Clifford Brown line 'Daahoud,' given an elegant and sprightly reading that has plenty of sinew underneath... Masterful...
Mark Sanders is the third member of the trio, with Charles Gayle and William Parker, who are imminently touring in the U.K. Here he is with The Number – Keith Tippett, Gary Curson and John Edwards. 'Collective 2' is the first,long track from their album 'The making of quiet things.' Curson blows some wide-ranging alto as the group wrap round each other - Tippett is a fiery battering pianist with a large sonic range but he leaves plenty of space here when the flow demands. Edwards is an amazing player -I've seen him several times over the last couple of years in varying situations and he is always breathtaking. Sanders displays his range throughout - I'm looking forward to seeing him up close with the two guv'nors from New York tomorrow night...
Note: there is a replay of selections from this year's Vision Festival on BBC Radio 3/Jazz on Three here... Available for a week - and a great program - cured my hangover yesterday morning...
And a brief mention of the passing of Joe Zawinul and the English writer/critic Richard Cook. Darcy has a very good post here....
Etnobofin has some further thoughts and good links here...
Richard Cook was one of our best music journalists – here's the Independent obit - as well as co-editor of the jazz recordings bible with Brian Morton - always at my side when writing this blog...
In the Videodrome...
Warne Marsh with Tristano et al New York 1964
Joe Morris in Toronto
Roy Campbell does the Fire Waltz
Keith and Julie Tippett a couple of months ago...
Fascinating video of Keith Rowe...
Mark Wastell et al at the Termite...
William Parker
William Parker (b) Rob Brown (as) Lewis Barnes (t) Hamid Drake (d)
Wood flute song
Download
Buy
Mal Waldron (p) Marion Brown (as)
I can't get started
Download
Buy
Joe Albany/Warne Marsh
Joe Albany (p) Warne Marsh (ts) Bob Whitlock (b)
Daahoud
Download
Buy
The Number
Keith Tippett (p) Gary Curson (as) John Edwards (b) Mark Sanders (d)
Collective 2
Download
Buy
Mal Waldron covered a lot of ground... here he is in a duo with Marion Brown on the old ballad 'I can't get started' run together with 'Now's the Time.' Brown leads in on solo alto – a heartfelt purity here, one of those performances where you feel as if you are listening over someone's shoulder. Then a bounce into the old riff blues, joined by Waldron in a dance across time – in several senses.
Another duo, sax and piano, from some time back. Joe Albany and Warne Marsh recorded together in 1957, an informal session at the home of recording engineer Ralf Garretson. I upped a track from this album a few months ago and mentioned Albany's daughter, Amy - who has written a fascinating book about her father. This is the Clifford Brown line 'Daahoud,' given an elegant and sprightly reading that has plenty of sinew underneath... Masterful...
Mark Sanders is the third member of the trio, with Charles Gayle and William Parker, who are imminently touring in the U.K. Here he is with The Number – Keith Tippett, Gary Curson and John Edwards. 'Collective 2' is the first,long track from their album 'The making of quiet things.' Curson blows some wide-ranging alto as the group wrap round each other - Tippett is a fiery battering pianist with a large sonic range but he leaves plenty of space here when the flow demands. Edwards is an amazing player -I've seen him several times over the last couple of years in varying situations and he is always breathtaking. Sanders displays his range throughout - I'm looking forward to seeing him up close with the two guv'nors from New York tomorrow night...
Note: there is a replay of selections from this year's Vision Festival on BBC Radio 3/Jazz on Three here... Available for a week - and a great program - cured my hangover yesterday morning...
And a brief mention of the passing of Joe Zawinul and the English writer/critic Richard Cook. Darcy has a very good post here....
Etnobofin has some further thoughts and good links here...
Richard Cook was one of our best music journalists – here's the Independent obit - as well as co-editor of the jazz recordings bible with Brian Morton - always at my side when writing this blog...
In the Videodrome...
Warne Marsh with Tristano et al New York 1964
Joe Morris in Toronto
Roy Campbell does the Fire Waltz
Keith and Julie Tippett a couple of months ago...
Fascinating video of Keith Rowe...
Mark Wastell et al at the Termite...
William Parker
William Parker (b) Rob Brown (as) Lewis Barnes (t) Hamid Drake (d)
Wood flute song
Download
Buy
Mal Waldron (p) Marion Brown (as)
I can't get started
Download
Buy
Joe Albany/Warne Marsh
Joe Albany (p) Warne Marsh (ts) Bob Whitlock (b)
Daahoud
Download
Buy
The Number
Keith Tippett (p) Gary Curson (as) John Edwards (b) Mark Sanders (d)
Collective 2
Download
Buy
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
