Friday, March 15, 2024

- commercial break -

 
While I'm in the process of preparing another proper post, there have just been a couple of things brought to my attention:

1. The 4-cd box set Four Compositions (Wesleyan) 2013, credited jointly to Anthony Braxton / Roland Dahinden / Hildegard Kleeb and released on Prague Music Platform last year - maybe? supposedly - has never yet shown up in any of the usual online retailers outside of eastern Europe (or even in any unusual ones, as far as I can tell, although sundry Czech websites have continued to list it as if it were readily available). I have been keeping an eye out for its wider distribution ever since last October, if not somewhat before; but it's beginning to look as if it may have a different release date in this part of the world: several sites now list it as available for pre-order, coming out on 5th April. (For example, there is this one; I can't vouch for the seller, and indeed their quoted price seems ruinously expensive, especially for something which (ostensibly) has already been on sale for around half that price, or less, allowing for the currency conversion.) I will believe it when I see it, at this point; but I'm very likely to buy it if it does eventually show up at a reasonable price. PMP, meanwhile, have more pressing concerns, pun not intended: as previously reported, they have been trying to raise money for a more ambitious box set (although the campaign is now said to have ended almost a month ago, and they only achieved 20% of their target; how much money did they think they would raise in a fairly short time?). Nothing else to report on any of this, just yet...

2. McC tells me that two more dates with Wolf Eyes have been arranged - one of which has been rescheduled from January - so I suppose it's official, and this is a long-lasting partnership... it struck me as rather overdoing it to say (as the Ars Nova Workshop page does) that "the collaboration ... has lasted now for nearly two decades", since the association has been far more off than on, but still: allowing for the fact that I have probably missed some repeat encounters along the way, this is indeed the twentieth year since that famous first (onstage) meeting. Evidently, all concerned find something of value in these groupings, which is very encouraging to know; even better, we can infer from these announcements that there have been no long-lasting concerns over the maestro's health and fitness. The first of these shows is due to take place in Greenwich Village, NYC on April 18th, and the following night they will play in Philadelphia. Indeed that second show is already sold out, despite tickets being rather pricey ($40 for a standing show?!) - that in itself is heartening to know. The Ars Nova page doesn't exaggerate at all in describing B. as "one of the most important musicians, educators, and creative thinkers of the past 50 years" and notes in conclusion that he "has created a unique musical system that celebrates the concept of global creativity and our shared humanity". Damn straight! 

STOP PRESS... "this just in", and neither significant enough to put it elsewhere, nor so utterly trivial that I didn't want to mention it at all: Discogs is still listing the spurious Elegy For a Goose album, credited supposedly to "Charlie Mariano Meets Anthony Braxton". I discussed this in some detail last year, so I'm not going into all that again now, but suffice it to say: at time of writing, its collector stats read Have = 0, Want = 53, Ratings = 0, Never sold. No, of course it's never been sold, because it doesn't exist, any more than the Mariano Studios record label exists. The 53 very optimistic would-be buyers out there are probably the kind of people who used to send on those emails back in the day that read "If you forward this to everyone in your address book, Microsoft will pay you for testing their software" (... designed to overload corporate email servers). As for Discogs, they presumably can't take the listing down until they get some sort of concrete proof that it's not real, although how one goes about proving that something is completely fictitious... anyway. "It's cool to be fooled"... what I (still) don't get is why someone bothered doing this in the first place, unless maybe it was for a bet..?

Sunday, March 10, 2024

Stairway to ... ?



Eight Compositions (Quintet) 2001 (CIMP)
 

This was an entry I had often wondered about, coming across it in the discography: unlike its similarly-named predecessor from the previous year, it is not a collection of modern standards, but rather a set of original pieces - featuring opus numbers one is unlikely to encounter elsewhere... and there is that highly unusual line-up: two reeds, three African(-style) percussionists. Not exactly what one would think of when hearing the term "quintet", however technically accurate that might be...

Copies of the CD are not especially commonplace, and it was never - as far as I know - something readily available in the blogosphere. I had it on one of my vague "one day" lists for years, but it was only last year that I really made any serious attempt to do something about that; as it happened, it was then one of the very first items to get crossed off the same list, when one of the blog's longtime readers and friends hit me up with a rip. Only the audio files were included, so I had no access to the liner notes and had to draw my own conclusions about the music.

At first I was preoccupied by trying to work out what I was hearing. Some of the pieces were clearly identifiable as (some form of) GTM, but others were less definite - and even the ones which I was sure about did not sound like GTM, third species as such. We know - I knew already, from years back - that Comp. 292 was very much in that category; and the numbering on the CIMP album picks up immediately after that, containing Comps. 293-300 inclusive, though not in that order, and with two different takes of the last piece. Yet we also know that opus numbers in the low 3xx range were not necessarily allocated to continuations of the GTM project: it is not difficult to locate several examples which demonstrate that

In the event, those next few months saw me acquire so many new recordings that I had no real opportunity to listen over and over again to any one of them in particular, and after a couple of intrigued plays of the CIMP album, I pushed it to the back of my mind somewhere and moved on. So it wasn't until the end of January, when I was surprised to see a physical copy listed for sale here in the UK, that I came back to it. Once I had the actual album in my hands, with its detailed liners, I had an answer to my question: it was not what I expected, at all. 

The Artist's Notes - as distinct from the Producer's and Recording Engineer's Notes - begin by stating that the "compositions which comprise this CD demonstrate the first of the fourth species prototype Ghost Trance Musics", an intriguing assertion, since in hindsight we know that there is no GTM, fourth species. I had never come across any reference to this prototype anywhere else, in all the time I have been exploring B's music; we know now that the third species generated its own offshoot, the accelerator class, and that the final parts of this massive system - culminating in Comp. 362 - were of that precise subset. But nowhere else will one find reference to a "fourth species" GTM: apparently this prototype led no further, was discontinued. In the huge fantasy theme park which is Braxtonland, there is a pathway seldom taken, tucked away behind all the main attractions, and it leads to an ornate (but dusty) gate, behind which is a spiral staircase leading... to nowhere at all, as it turns out. Here, in other words, is a rare example of an idea not followed through, a false start, a leftover from a time when the pioneer headed off in a new direction, only to have second thoughts and turn back. That alone makes this release a fascinating anomaly, unique in the recorded canon.

The album is obscure enough that most people won't have access to it, and until such time as I am in a position to share the files, there is little to no point in writing in any detail about the actual music; nevertheless, this seems a good time to make some observations about B's (fairly brief) involvement with CIMP, and some more generic observations about that (somewhat controversial) label. 

What happens in The Spirit Room...

This was B's third session for CIMP, and for whatever reason(s), it would prove to be his last - a bit of a shame then that he was just starting to know the way there (according to the Producer's Notes), only overshooting the driveway "by about 100 feet" on this occasion. Previous sessions had yielded nineteen modern standards, mainly by Andrew Hill (released across two different albums) - and a bizarre set of duets with vocalist Alex Horwitz... but we don't really talk about that one. Still, those four duet compositions were all in the 28x range, and they were not GTM* - so we do know that not all high opus numbers were allocated to this continuing project (as it was then). This third and final session was the only one in Rossie, NY, which really produced cutting-edge original pieces, and it seems to have come about through an association between Sipho Robert Bellinger (one of the three African-style percussionists on this disc) and Richard McGhee III, the second reedman, who had worked with the maestro at least once before, a couple of years earlier. Bob Rusch may not have been quite correct in saying that B. "had never recorded in this type of instrumental setting before"**, but he also was not entirely wrong, given that the precise instrumentation used here is quite possibly unique, and must at the very least be extremely unusual.

B's own Artist's Notes include potted musical biographies of his collaborators - a habit he picked up somewhere along the line, and frequently indulged - but they focus chiefly on the music itself, making it clear once and for all that this was not just a practice-run for what later became the accelerator class, but something else, brought about by the one-off combination of musicians available for the date - and limited to that date. The composer explains that by the term fourth species GTM he is "referring to a set of structural prototypes that contain (1) re-centred pulse construction strategies and (2) the additional use of rhythmic compound cell modules". Crucial to this prototype is the idea of "combination rhythm sets", and more specifically of "four different compound rhythms", both of which relate quite definitely to the particular circumstances of this recording, rather than to anything else which was going on at the time. B. did not usually get to play with three different percussionists at once, never mind with those of an African-diaspora focus or lineage, and the possibilities inherent in this grouping are what led him to compose this set of eight pieces.

Now, as to whether this environment was the optimal place to try all this out... well, one problem we don't have to worry about here is the role of the bass, since there isn't one. CIMP is notorious for its own militantly-obstinate approach to recording aesthetics, insisting that their way of doing things - recording live to 2-track with all the musicians present in the same space, and resisting any temptation to mess around sonically with the results - is the only way to hear what was actually played; various loyal musicians have been quoted over the years as saying that Rusch père et fils are the only producer and engineer who have ever given them back exactly what they put out, free of artifice or ornamentation. Nevertheless, their recordings do have a tendency to sound... oddly lifeless (which itself is pretty ironic, given that the label's Statement of Purpose - present on the back cover of every CD, which itself can be a problem (as we will see in due course) - refers to the way that "compression of the dynamic range is what limits the 'air' and life of many recordings" - said compression being a complete no-no for the Rusch family, of course); and most infamously, the contrabass - when present - can end up being more or less inaudible. Yet anyone who has listened even slightly carefully to creative music for more than a very short time would surely agree that that instrument has a very powerful and versatile voice, in the hands of a good player. Somehow, in their quest to create recordings with no trickery or over-engineering or post-production, etc etc, these guys manage to produce albums which sound singularly sterile. Or at least that is how they very often sound to me; perhaps my noise floor is not low enough for their standards. Certainly, my equipment is not up to what they would doubtless regard as an adequate standard; but here's the paradox: I nonetheless manage to hear most other recordings in great detail...

... and here's the real clincher: on this recording, I struggle much of the time to recognise B's voice, even on alto, which is (frankly) almost incredible. Leave aside any doubts as to whether my ears are really as good as I might like to think they are - just the thousands of hours I have spent listening to that voice are sufficient for me to be able to pick it out of a crowded soundscape, within the first few seconds, even when everyone is playing a saxophone***. Yet when I listen to this album - it became especially noticeable when I actually got hold of it on CD - I find many places where I can't identify that voice in the same way, and this just feels really weird to me at this point. Of course, I can identify him easily enough anyway, by virtue of what he plays; I had no problem pinpointing him and McGhee in the stereo image. But it's still a most disconcerting experience to realise that I am listening to the most familiar instrumental voice in the world, to my ears, and that if I didn't already know in advance who it was, I might not be able to recognise it. Yes, yes: this is of course because only the Rusch family understand how to render that voice with true fidelity: if I don't hear what I'm expecting to hear, it's only because I have never before heard the true, unadulterated voice. But would they really have me believe that every other recording of this musician is false in precisely the same way? I would never accept that, so let's hope nobody tries to persuade me of it... No: the purity of the label's vision seemed to me so strong that for years I wouldn't allow myself to be overly influenced by the negative opinions of numerous other listeners, but I finally have to admit to myself that I don't really like the way their recordings sound. 

There are other issues, mainly concerning the packaging: I have no problem with the cover, or even with the fact that all the covers are painted by (daughter) Kara D. Rusch#; that's part of their house style and it gives the label a part of its identity. But their insistence on emblazoning the Statement of Pomposity Purpose on the back cover, regardless of whatever else might need to be displayed there, causes a major problem in this instance, at least: the graphic titles for the pieces are supposed to be in colour, at this point; and they are supposed to be reproduced large enough that the viewer can actually make them out. Instead, in this case, they are all black and white, and all so tiny that there is really no point in having them on there at all. That, at any rate, was not properly thought through; and while I'm at it, is it really necessary to credit Susan Rusch with hospitality, again right there on the back cover? In all seriousness, this risks giving the impression that the Rusch family ethic somehow outranks every other consideration here, including the music, and that really does feel like the crowning irony.

Was this, then, a case of "what happens in The Spirit Room, stays in The Spirit Room"..? Did B. decide after the fact that he wasn't bound by his declaration of intent with regard to "fourth species GTM", because it was only revealed on a CIMP album and many people would never find out about it? That seems an uncharitable conclusion, and is probably assuming rather too much. What does remain true, either way, is that he never recorded there again... make of that what you will.

This is still a very interesting recording, not least because it represents a time when B. started off in one direction then changed his mind - but not just because of that, either: it is worth the time to track it down, for anyone with a serious interest in the maestro's music. At some point, I will try and make the files available - and when I do, I will have something to say about the actual music itself. In the meantime, apparently there was quite enough to get out of the way beforehand...

(...


... and yes, I am well aware that my accusing anyone else of pomposity is a flagrant example of the pot calling the kettle black. What ya gonna do?)




* Or were they?! Besides the tiny sample-files which McClintic Sphere passed to me last year after I made that request, I have still heard almost none of this album... its reputation, as it transpires, rather precedes it... and yet, and yet, there was that recent concert revisiting the very same material: someone likes it, anyway. Presumably they could also confirm whether or not it has any connection to GTM, but I can't, at least for the time being...

** I wrote not long ago about B's concert with master percussionist Abraham K. Adzenyah, which comfortably predates the CIMP recording; of course, that was a duo performance only, and featured a continuous set of entirely improvised music, but it's still an encounter with a percussionist in the African tradition, and one must presume that Rusch Sr. was unaware of it.

*** I would have to hold my hand up and say that on another occasion when everyone was playing a saxophone, I also struggled to locate B's voice, and even expressed my consternation to McC about precisely that; but it was only on the first track, and only because B. plays bass sax on that piece - not the voice I was listening out for..! (The same is not true of the rest of that album, even when Andrew Voigt is also playing alto.)

# Even the fact that Robert (producer/father), Marc (engineer/son) and Kara (visual artist/daughter) all share the middle initial D. feels, frankly, a little creepy - and seems to be information ever so slightly overshared. (Does it stand for the same thing in each case? Is it one of those peculiar things that only Americans do, giving each other middle initials which don't stand for anything at all - on the pretext that this somehow lends the name extra gravitas..? I'm possibly better off not knowing.)


Sunday, March 3, 2024

Two masterclasses

 


Two more videos coming up, one of which was already plugged in these pages, albeit somewhat in passing... these feature the two current "travelling experts" on B's music, so to speak - the two figures who seem to have been busiest lately in terms of teaching the maestro's music to eager musicians. One is a short documentary, the other a (longer) piece of concert footage, and both of them offer windows into the warped and wonderful world that is Braxtonland*

In truth, neither video needs very much commentary. The first, put together by or on behalf of Kobe Van Cauwenberghe, is a bite-sized and very digestible documentary showing the guitarist preparing his Ghost Trance Septet  for their performance at Philharmonie Luxembourg, as part of the Rainy Days Festival in November 2021; it is handily indexed into parts, five of which centre on specific compositions used as tertiary materials (6f, 40f, 40b, 58 & 34**) - other sections focus on the treatment of language music types or secondary materials, etc. It is both charmingly relaxed and indicative of how into the music all of the individual musicians are: all six of the band members (besides the leader, of course) are interviewed, albeit briefly, and their fascination with B's music - and its unique challenges and freedoms - is readily apparent. I wondered at first whether Van Cauwenberghe's addressing his group in English was purely something done for the camera's benefit  (although Belgium is a polyglot country, and this is not always a trouble-free issue***), but when we hear violinist Winnie Huang speak (around 7.15), she does so in more or less unaccented English - and possibly, therefore, does not speak either French or Flemish very fluently. (Coincidentally, she is also the one player who is no longer in the band: she was replaced by Anna Jalving for the group's superb double-CD.) The video explains very clearly what tertiary materials are, as well as secondary materials - although this is slightly more confusing, largely thanks to a misleading title for the segment beginning around 6.30# - and the impression given is that the leader's relaxed and confident approach facilitates the understanding for the players, as well as for any potential viewers.

Van Cauwenberghe, besides leading this highly-rated## group, is currently focusing on B's music in his PhD at the Antwerp Conservatory (according to his official bio), which helps to explain why his expertise has been so sought after in recent times. Our next masterclass is given by one of B's heirs apparent, whose credentials have already been established in these pages. 

Here, Roland Dahinden conducts (what appears to be) a thirty-one-piece orchestra through a thirty-two-minute performance entitled simply "Language types", at the Archa Theatre, Prague, in October 2021. This time, such commentary as might be needed - in terms of filling gaps in understanding which might easily arise from a close watch of the video - is unfortunately beyond me to supply. When the cameras pick up visible sheet music, it does indeed appear to contain nothing more than a list of the primary language types - long sounds, staccato attacks, trills, multiphonics and so on - together with the symbols used to denote these within B's scores; but the music we hear is not simply a series of exercises, rather it has its own continuity and internal structure, and although the conductor is showing the performers how and when to play, that does not explain how they know what to play. There is nothing random-sounding about this, suggesting that a schema must have been worked out in advance and then carefully rehearsed prior to the performance. This becomes most evident at times (for example from around the 17-minute mark) when different sections of the orchestra are producing different types of attack, but really it is apparent throughout, to a viewer who is paying attention. If all that had been decided beforehand was that the orchestra would be taken through a sequence of language music types, with no other limitations specified, the results would doubtless be very different from what we actually see and hear. Still, the closeness with which all eyes watch RD, and the rapidity with which the orchestra responds to him, leave us in no doubt that the assembled players have complete trust in the conductor to guide them through this piece. As someone with a background in martial arts and qigong, I was very impressed by Dahinden's excellent posture and whole-body movement, in which his limbs are perfectly aligned to a straight spine, resulting in clear and commanding gestures at all times. If I can't claim to make total sense of what happens in this video, I can at least say that it provides clear insight into Dahinden's skill and aplomb as a conductor - and it ought to prove helpful, when I finally get to the point of attempting a breakdown of Ensemble Montaigne (Bau 4) 2013

In the meantime, the obvious place to seek direct comparisons is the opening track of Creative Orchestra (Köln) 1978...  

The maestro was present for both of these events, by the way: in Luxembourg, the septet's set was one half of a double bill with a performance by B. himself###, and the previous month's Prague concert had him there in some capacity too. In both cases he looks delighted by the interpretations of his work (in Prague he appears to have been almost overwhelmed). Like I say: two masterclasses...



* This reference will make sense to anyone who watches the first video - though you do have to keep watching till the very end!

** 34 is listed in the video as 34a, a persistent anomaly - the origins of which predate the guitarist's birth: listed on the 1981 Antilles album as Comp. 34, this has very often been cited as 34a - including the only other time it was officially recorded, as part of (the live portion of) Willisau (Quartet) 1991 (the half of that '92 box which has yet to be reissued in remastered form). Yet there has never been any mention of a "Comp. 34b" or the like... the roots of the confusion go back to the Composition Notes, where Book C in fact begins with the notes for 34a, described passim with that precise title, but with no real explanation given. The catalogue of works, on the other hand, lists 34 - as the first of "Three Compositions (1974)"... despite the fact that, according to the actual notes, 34(a) was composed in Canada in 1975. Small wonder, then, that nobody has ever been quite sure how to refer to this marvellous piece. (Given the number of times it is named as 34a in the notes, I am inclined to go with that - even if it doesn't really make sense..!)

*** My information on this subject is admittedly a couple of decades out of date, but Mrs C. and I found Belgium a frustrating country to drive around, as different areas would display road signs in one language only - so that in some cases one could be heading for a town or city only to find that one has changed from a Walloon district to a Flemish one, or vice versa, and the name of one's destination is now completely unrecognisable. Historically, the different areas had a problematic relation to each other (and I have seen for myself how French-speakers in Flemish Belgium might be totally ignored by the locals, who would answer questions in English but would refuse to acknowledge French at all). However, I have also met several Belgians who were perfectly fluent in both - as well as In English - and in a situation where people come together to cooperate, I'm sure there wouldn't be any such problem...

# Actually, this segment is a little confusing all round. The title for it - both onscreen and in the indexation for the video - probably should be "Composition 358 (secondary material)", where the wording "Tertiary material" is probably left in there by mistake, carried over from the previous segments. But although Comp. 358 is another of the works which this group did play - on the album, for instance - the video as a whole is supposedly all about a rehearsal and performance of Comp. 255 only. That in itself is probably a mistake on the part of whoever edited the video for release, since not all of the five tertiary materials relate to the group's arrangement of 255; and besides, even to call 255 itself "second species GTM" is not strictly accurate as it is really a Syntactical GTM piece... of course, with no vocalists present, there would be little point in emphasising that. - As usual, I am compelled to point out all these little details, but the main thing is just to enjoy the video and not to worry too much about the particulars...

## The septet's CD - which I still haven't got round to writing about, yet! - has been much lauded: several reviewers considered it to be one of the best recordings of 2022. (Without giving much away here, I also consider it to be about as good as any reading of B's work would need to be, or as any listener might wish it to be.)

### At least, there are references online to this having been the case, though I've not yet been able to verify it: the TCF events page actually has a conspicuous 2021-sized hole in it, so who knows what really happened in Luxembourg. We do know, of course, that B. was present, as we can see for ourselves that he took his applause at the end of the septet's set...

Sunday, February 25, 2024

Help!

 


I'm looking for something... but before I get to that, for those of you who might be looking for a quick and easy blast of Braxton on a Sunday in late February, here's a video of Bobby Spellman's Free Brass Trio playing Comp. 23j outside a record store in Newburyport, MA, in April 2016. Spellman himself does a sterling job on the written line, and although the support isn't quite in the same class, I'm completely with them in spirit. Just the thing to liven up a rainy and miserable Sunday! (Well - it is here. For those of you reading this in other parts of the world: hope your weekend weather is better than ours...)

***

So, the request: I am trying to locate an online rip of B's quintet performance from the 1976 Newport Jazz Festival. I don't think I even knew about the existence of this event until last year, when I was listening to Four Compositions (Washington, D​.​C​.​) 1998 - a fabulous album, by the way - and reading Bill Shoemaker's notes, which explain that (the work now known as) Comp. 70 was originally written for - well, funnily enough, for the 1976 Newport Jazz Festival. The working group was of course basically a quartet at that point - Lewis Holland Altschul - but this was augmented relatively frequently* by Muhal Richard Abrams, and in the case of the work in question, B. composed it with this specific quintet in mind. There was no official recording made of the performance, and so it wasn't until more than twenty years later that Comp. 70 was properly documented... anyway, I read that much last year, but what I didn't realise at the time was that there was already an entry in the discography for the original recording, which was (apparently) offered for download in 2011. The link included in that archival entry no longer resolves to a valid page, indeed it doesn't even seem to redirect to a valid page; but once I could see where to look, it wasn't hard to find the right page within the "Wolfgang's" site.

Clips from the performance - with a pretty good sound - can be sampled right there. However, it doesn't look as if the full files are available for download as such, only for streaming; and that is limited to members. I have more than enough music to listen to without signing up for a service promising access to thousands of live shows; the "free trial" is one of those deals which is only available if you first hand over your credit card details, and I'm not about to do that, so this was a dead end. [Besides... I'm not convinced I like the look of the site. They also sell merch - in B's case, they have some of his CDs for sale, but at what look to me fairly outrageous prices.]

Still, now that I knew about the existence of this 1976 Carnegie Hall concert... I figured it had to be around somewhere. The Yale Library collection (as detailed in these pages last year) contains more than 750 recordings, so obviously it'll be in there... right? No, apparently not. - And when I checked the list of my tape collection, it's not there either. Now, what's going on here? There is a live recording of well-established provenance, with confirmed date, venue, occasion and personnel, which became available in one place only thirty-five years after it was recorded, and it's never been available anywhere else? That borders on the preposterous, yet that is seemingly what we're dealing with... anyway, regardless, if anybody does happen to have a copy of this recording, could they please let me know..? That would be awfully well appreciated :)

***

Just briefly going back to that video clip linked up above: it is, unfortunately, one of several such to have attracted identical "trolling" comments from a Youtuber using the handle rinahall, who seems to have some sort of personal grudge against the maestro (people in such situations always claim to have arrived at their extreme positions after doing "some research" - as here - but invariably give themselves away, by going way too far with their supposed conclusions: "instrumental technique is close to zero"; is that right?! LMFAO). Bobby's answer is about the best I've seen; in other places, some people have attempted to argue, and I was tempted to do so myself when I first came across this nonsense last year, but what on earth is the point? The best course of action is surely to ignore it altogether... still, it did get me thinking: is this in any way, shape or form related to whatever (ostensibly) caused Jason G. to close Restructures when he did**? I never did really find out what B. was supposed to have said or done, but whatever it was, it has not led to a mass cancellation of him by the musical community... far from it, if the events in Darmstadt last year are anything to go by... nevertheless, it clearly pissed some people off at the time, and I did vaguely wonder whether "rinahall" might be one of them. Then again... who the hell cares?



* Muhal sat in with the group on multiple occasions around this time, both before and after Holland and Altschul left. One such occasion would appear to have been a short residency in Minneapolis, a few months after the Carnegie Hall concert - although on the later occasion, no new material was presented. (I have long since "firmed up" my tentative conclusions about that bootleg recording.)

** I have said before that JG must have had some other, more personal reason(s) for acting as he did, and just used the "storm in a teacup" as a pretext for it. I still think that's the most likely explanation, but (of course) only he knows for sure...

Sunday, February 18, 2024

On the subject of wilful obscurity

 


[I posted last year about some potential difficulties inherent for the serious listener in B's approach to writing music; and I've pointed back to that in subsequent posts, and will continue to do so. This post right here is a sort of blood relative to that one (and will be linked back in the same way from now on, at least that's the idea).]

I came across something interesting in the course of researching for the previous post. The books of Composition Notes published by Frog Peak all include various unnumbered appendices; besides the Catalogue* of Works, the Glossary of Terms and so on, each volume contains interviews and related articles of interest to friendly experiencers. It's been a long time (far too long... not much I can do about that now) since I really delved into this stuff, and in truth it only happened this time by accident... I was flipping through the book trying to get back to the notes for Comp. 92, and something caught my eye: this turned out to be an undated interview with Cadence**, but it was a specific section from that. B. is asked about the books he is writing, and begins to answer that he has "three books which are totally finished", meaning the Tri-Axium Writings. The interviewer interrupts to ask whether he has had any success in trying to get them published. B. replies that he has had several offers, but that he wants to put them out himself. Initially he cites Harry Partch, W. C. Handy and Sun Ra as pioneers in musical self-publishing and says he wants to follow in their tradition, but when he is pressed: "So you'd have control over the way they're presented?", B. is immediately drawn into the heart of the matter. He is "very much aware of what the record companies are doing... on this record I did on Antilles [Six Compositions: Quartet]... they even changed the order of the pieces on the record."***

Now that he is getting into it, B. needs minimal prompting and the briefest of cues starts a protracted explanation:

...I've found that they don't want you to have any idea about how your music should
be packaged. My liner notes... have become a source of irritation for many of the 
journalists. They don't want that kind of input, they don't want a musician defining his 
own terms, especially if that musician is an African or African-American. Because somehow,
for me as a Black creative person to define my own terms... # it's viewed as a violation
of what other African, Trans African pedagogies supposedly do. We are looked at as exotic
creatures with all this natural feeling... no intellectual process happening, we just have this 
great feeling for being able to bugaloo (sic) and to be able to catch the football and to make 
the hip dunk shot. And when we go to play, if a given focus or postulation is viewed as of 
genius or 'genius' (so-called), it's also quickly covered with an "Oh yeah, well, it's natural."

He illustrates this with reference to Charlie Parker - who may well have had a great deal of natural talent, but who also worked extraordinarily hard at improving that talent, and who was most definitely not "unstudied" as a player or composer - but then proceeds thus:

I have found... five million different levels of criticism of my liner notes :- "Did I have a
comma in the right place?"  "What does he mean by this particular term?" Cries of pseudo-
intellectualism, etc. But in the fifteen, twenty years that I've been documenting my music, 
I've never heard anyone challenge some of the liner notes which have been on my records or
on the records of musicians, so-called 'jazz' musicians for the last fifty years. You know,
liner notes written in the most beautiful English, where the Queen herself would have
approved of the structure. But articles which didn't know what the fuck they were talking
about. And so there's very little tolerance for someone like myself defining my own terms.
But there's a lot of tolerance for a so-called 'jazz journalist' who might not know anything 
about what they're talking about, but who can write very eloquently... it' s acceptable. In
fact, it's the standard of the day.##

- A further question and answer makes it clear that B. did not construe this as a straightforwardly racist problem: "If a White... musician tried to define his or her terms in the way that I've been trying to do, I think that they'd be put down too, because the White improviser is in what I call one of the 'sacrifice zones'... in the same position as the Black composer or the creative woman." ### Of course, the entire interview - being conducted by way of intelligent questions from someone who is genuinely interested in the answers - bears close inspection, and raises far more points than I can tackle here. B. also uses the term "cancelled" in a way that is extremely common just lately; but I didn't know anyone was saying things like that in 1982... Anyway, what I want to zoom in on now is this point about wanting to self-publish, refusing to let others speak for him (though of course this did change a little as he got to know Lock, Lange et al - and realised that there were some writers out there who would take the time and trouble to find out what the music was really about).

B. is of course the expert on his music, and his palpable disgust at having writers hired to make uninformed statements about it, based on guesswork or false assumption, is completely understandable and justified. While I was reading this material last weekend, I was reminded of something I learned as a philosophy undergraduate. I went up to university with (among other things) a cheap edition of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, an outdated translation. I soon learned that students were encouraged to buy a more expensive edition, in the translation by Norman Kemp Smith; the problem, I was told, lay in Kant's highly idiosyncratic German, giving rise to numerous passages where the text was susceptible of multiple interpretations. Translators had been forced to make their best guess as to what the writer had intended, in such cases; but, being themselves not trained philosophers, their guesses were just that. Once Kemp Smith had delivered his English translation - the first to be produced by a philosopher who was also thoroughly familiar with German and well placed to make properly-informed decisions about what Kant had really intended, out of the various plausible options - it was found to be so illuminating that (so I gathered^), not only were English-speaking students encouraged to work from his text, German philosophy undergrads were themselves encouraged to read the book in Kemp Smith's translation, not in their own native tongue, as it was thought to have rendered the text much less ambiguous than it was considered previously.

The problem here is: in this analogy, B. himself is as much Immanuel Kant as he is Norman Kemp Smith. That he knows his music better than anyone else, understands it more clearly and fully, is beyond any possible doubt; but his manner of discourse - written and indeed spoken, to a fair extent - is fundamentally esoteric: accessible only by initiates. Hence, he has written at considerable length to explain not only the principles of his work, but also the stated intentions of a great many of his compositions; however, he has done this in language which not only eludes (and therefore alienates) the less patient reader, but tends to confound even the reasonably-patient and well-intentioned reader as well^^. I've said before - including just recently - that B. has no mandate to make his writings easy to understand, and every right to make the reader work very hard at them; don't forget, the maestro himself quickly jettisoned his plans to major in music upon discovering that the Roosevelt music faculty was still bitterly at war with itself over whether or not Schoenberg was "valid"; he then decided to major in philosophy instead, and presumably began germinating right then the ideas that would eventually coalesce into an integrated system. He has every right to create his own tailored vocabulary for that system, indeed; but with this inevitable consequence: most people will not be able to follow him there, and thus will very quickly abandon the attempt. Worse, because his music has always generally been perceived as impenetrable and incomprehensible, for a long time it seemed to be a "free hit" for people who wanted to grab a bit of unearned credit - by saying things that sounded like profound insights, but weren't anything of the sort - since nobody was likely to be able to call this behaviour out^^^. Nor was this latter frippery confined to music fans / listeners: jazz critics may not have been asked any more to write liner notes for this music (which they had no intention of trying to understand on its own terms), but they could take their revenge easily enough, by spouting all manner of platitudinous nonsense in reviews and in their own books~

We could argue, or at least speculate, about the extent to which B. has deliberately propagated his discourse in a manner which is abstruse and obscure. When we hear him speak, after all - on pretty much any subject, not just on music - he does so in a way which is closer to his writing style than to most people's spoken English. This must be a habit of long years, and is now just ingrained to the point where no effort has to be made to sustain it; indeed it must probably have reached that stage some decades ago. But it must have been obvious to him, in his younger years, that the people around him generally did not talk (or write) like that, and his continuing to do so represents on some level, at a certain point in B's life, a decision to set himself apart from them. It goes far beyond - but is undoubtedly linked to - affectations such as the smoking of a pipe in public (as seen on various album covers and in publicity shots); it has to be seen as part of a calculated plan to reinforce the image of an intellectual (as if in anticipation of the same objections he raised later, with regard to the music business and its attitude towards black composers and improvising musicians). It's not lost on me how much this conclusion tends to imply that B's struggle to shake off the label of a "purely cerebral" musician is to a fair extent a problem of his own making~~.

Anthony Braxton's music is an extension of his thought, and is inseparable from it - at least for him. There is nothing wrong with his developing a specialist vocabulary for his system, as many others have done before him - especially where existing language did not seem to cover the exigencies of what was to be explicated. But we've already seen the effect that has had; ultimately, he could never be his own Norman Kemp Smith: he needs someone else to fill that role. Graham Lock filled it extremely well for a while; Lock himself was not a musician, but his close access to B. for a prolonged period allowed him to make up for that, to a very great extent. Mike Heffley probably had the best opportunity, being both a musician and a student of B's, but his book was only in print very briefly, and I am no position to vouch for how successful he might have been in making the music more exoteric. In any case, that few people have ever seen the results of that experiment provides the question with its own answer... Ronald Radano wrote in language almost as dense as the maestro's, and thus was never really in a position to help spread the message more widely; since then, we have had other works by the likes of Stuart Broomer and Timo Hoyer, but I know that B. thought the former had raised interesting questions without really furnishing any answers~~~, and the latter's book has yet to be translated from the German. Superior liner notes over the years from the likes of Art Lange and Bill Shoemaker have never (yet) been developed into anything more substantial.

As for myself: the number of comments I received in the blog's first few years suggests that I did in fact succeed in penetrating (some of) the music and unpacking it in such a way as to help (some) listeners get closer to it; but as we've all seen, I was unable to sustain this and have only recently been able to come back to the work. Much as I would like to think that I still have a role to play in this regard, it very much remains to be seen whether or not I can reach enough people to make a real and lasting difference. (It also remains to be seen how long I can keep it up, this time...)

There may yet be others, though... indeed, as I suggested just this month, word seems to be ever so slowly getting around, and as more musicians get bitten by the bug, there is more of a chance that someone will yet be able to construct the definitive bridge between the maestro and the music-loving public. In the meantime, the best way to make meaningful contact with B's world is simply to listen and listen




* Unlike last time out, I'm spelling this word the way *I* would write it. Yes, B. writes it Catalog - because he is American. It is not necessary for me to render it the exact same way he did in order to be "authentic" or whatever - it's not a matter of citing the title of an artistic work, rather the name is purely descriptive and functional. Of course I will continue to quote from his writings exactly as he wrote them. But in this case, I am using the same word, we just happen to spell it differently. Hope that makes sense, but if it doesn't... tough ;-)

** Several points about this. One, the interviewer is listed solely as "Cadence" (thereafter CAD). It's been a long time since I saw any of those Cadence interviews in the original format etc, and I can't remember if they are always presented that way, but in any case I think I'm right in saying that Bob Rusch conducted them himself. [More about him coming soon, funnily enough...] Two, I thought that these articles were usually (notoriously) long, whereas this one is - well, maybe it's fairly long: I suppose by music mag standards it is pretty long, at that. I just would have expected it to be longer... Three, there is no date given. However it is clear from context that it must have been some time in 1982: B. refers to a performance "in April" - meaning April of the same year the conversation was taking place - and [1982] is slotted in afterwards. Also he talks about working on (what eventually became) Comp. 103 (for seven trumpets) - and the publication date for that is given elsewhere as 1983. His referencing the Antilles album - recorded in October 1981, released 1982 - further helps to narrow this down.

*** The archival entry for this album on Restructures notes that "the graphic titles for 34 and 40 A are transposed in the sleevenotes", and cites Lock for this. This could itself be indicative of what B. is saying in the interview: he presented the pieces in a certain order, but the label changed that because they thought they knew better how to sell it to their putative demographic; maybe they just didn't bother to switch the titles as well, since - I mean, who the hell was going to notice, right? This does feel like the kind of decision a record label would (still) take without missing a beat.

# Aposiopesis is present in the actual text here - I didn't put this one in. (Yep - contrary to what most people think, it's only an "ellipsis" if something is missed out; if the same "..." indicates a lengthy pause or a tailing-off, that is different, and thus has a different name. Not a lot of people know that, these days...

## Quoted material in this post is taken from Anthony Braxton, Composition Notes Book D (Synthesis Music/ Frog Peak, 1988) pp. 495-

### - Not straightforwardly (or exclusively) racist, no. This is absolutely not to suggest that B. didn't think there was a very strong current of racism running through the whole situation - he goes on to make it perfectly clear that he did. I am also certain that he was completely right about that. It's too big a subject for me to get to grips with it here. 

^ Several points to make about this: 1. Not wishing to bang on about something I have mentioned many times before, I was an undisciplined and easily-distracted student, and learned far less at university than I might have done... when it came to Kant, as it happens the only part which I found really interesting was the very first bit ("Transcendental Aesthetic"), and I never found it necessary to buy the recommended edition; everyone I knew who really got their teeth into Kant swore by the Norman Kemp Smith translation, and this was the story everyone told about it. Was it true? I don't know. It doesn't actually matter whether it was true or not, for the purposes of this post; 2. It goes without saying that anyone studying Kant at a higher and/or deeper level would eventually need to deal with the original text, rather than any translation (however excellent). Nobody ever meant to imply that the improved translation rendered the original redundant; it was just thought to be sufficient for a undergraduate course, where Kant is only one element of the syllabus. 3. I did also think of another example at the same time - that of a martial-arts master of my former acquaintance, the first proven fighter to translate some core classics on taijiquan (tai chi chuan) from Chinese into English; in this instance, previous translators had no experience of using tai chi for combat and were therefore not qualified to... etc. This felt like one example too many, hence its being tucked away down here (and not fully explained)...

^^ I did try, a number of years ago, to read the Tri-Axium Writings. I didn't manage to get very far, although I took this more as a reflection on my shortcomings as a serious scholar than as a judgement on the original material; I may try and make a second concerted attempt this year. But I don't know how many people have really read this stuff, never mind understood it. I've mentioned before (musician and Youtuber) Brian Krock's video on the maestro, for which he claimed to have taken a deep dive into the written material; the conclusions he reached, as far as I recall, were not really of a sort that he could not have gleaned pretty easily from other sources. This is not said with a view to undermining Brian - rather it highlights how difficult the writing is, if even trained composers can struggle to get to grips with it. (One would also suspect that only so much reading and research was ever going to be done for a thirty-odd-minute video presentation.)

^^^ That did change a bit, in some circles at least, when I started my work here; some people who had been exploiting B's forbidding reputation to make themselves look cleverer than they were had to cut that out once they realised there someone around who wouldn't stand for it, or let it go unchallenged. I am also sure that one of the things B. liked about what I was doing was the fact that I did voice (considerable... ahem) dissatisfaction with certain critics, and their facile glosses on music which they were not really engaging with before passing judgement on it. Whether those same critics ever knew about that is another matter...

~ I eventually got rid of my fifth-edition paperback copy of The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD - not just because of what those guys were saying about B's music; but my understanding how far they fell short of properly understanding his music was what allowed me to see their more general shortcomings. It must be said, I received a fair amount of resistance from the online community at the time for some of the things I said about those critics, who were still quite revered by most people (apparently). There's no doubt they know jazz; possibly they were unwilling to recognise their own limitations (or more likely still, figured they could get away with a lot when discussing music of strictly minority appeal).

~~ This does not excuse the people who have reached for that lazy assumption, repeatedly, over the years. Assuming that an intellectual must always make cerebral, unemotional music is more or less the same as the very prevalent tendency among the music-buying public to allow their impressions of music to be prejudiced by the appearance of the packaging: if an artist's last album had a dark and sombre cover, and their latest is presented in bright colours, amateur reviewers will immediately and inevitably say that the "new album is much more positive and upbeat" than the last one. 

~~~ I know this because that's what B. told me, shortly after the book's publication, the last time I spoke to him on the phone. It is also the case that Broomer was not exactly trying to unpack or explain B's music anyway; rather he set himself a very specific remit - and one which probably very few people were qualified to judge as regards the results. (Nevertheless, a number of online reviews suggest that not a few readers were largely unimpressed.)

Sunday, February 11, 2024

Random rep (Comp. 92)

 


[Another one in an occasional series - except that this time things are rather different: instead of looking at a "cover" of a piece B. already performed, here we have one which had never been recorded prior to the version under consideration...]

The New York Composers Orchestra
First Program in Standard Time 
(New World/Countercurrents 1992)

[see 4 below for link]

1. Background/context
2. Taxonomical nerdery
3. Theory
4. Practice

1. I had skated past this entry in the discography who knows how many times, without ever really registering it properly, before a coincidental listing on Discogs last year (from a seller whose items for sale I was looking at for entirely different reasons) saw me snagging a copy of the CD. It was only at that point that I really took note of why this represents quite a significant (if minor) entry on said discography... but that will be covered under point 2 below.

NYCO was formed in 1986 by the husband-and-wife team of Wayne Horvitz (keyboards) and Robin Holcomb (piano), "as an antidote to the other things (Horvitz) was doing" - the "other things" being his activity on the NYC Downtown scene: "I wanted to see what I could do with something more conservative."* There was an album before this one, in 1990, featuring originals by Holcomb, Horvitz, Marty Ehrlich and (reedman) Doug Wieselman arranged for a big band; we may presume that when Horvitz says "conservative" he means something more obviously in the jazz tradition compared with what he was doing with Zorn et al: no crazy electric guitars, no turntables, no samples, no punk or metal or no wave. Almost inevitably, some fellow-travellers from Horvitz' day job - so to speak - got roped in, so we find Bobby Previte and Steve Bernstein involved from the start, as well as outward-facing players such as Ehrlich and Ray Anderson, but the ensemble as a whole was not just cobbled together from a week's work at the Knitting Factory. Players had to be skilled readers, who were also adept in section playing as well as improvising.

This second (but final) album, then, branches out somewhat in that it already includes pieces by composers from outside the NYCO, played by a fifteen-piece big band**: besides three numbers by Horvitz, one by Holcomb and one by Previte, there is one by Lenny Pickett, one by Elliott Sharp***... and kicking things off, this catchy little number we're examining here.

2. The archival entry for this on Restructures gave the piece the following title: "For Creative Orchestra {Comp. 92 (+ 30 + 32 + 139) + (108 C + 108 D)}", but that's not what it's actually called on the CD. The designation "For Creative Orchestra" is drawn from the composition notes, and is presented as a subtitle. The title of the piece is, correctly, given as the diagram for Comp. 92, followed by NYCO's best attempt to render the materials in a format of which B. would approve: 92 + (30, 32, 139) + (108c, 108d). - a pretty subtle distinction, yes, but if we can't make those here, of all places... anyway. Unlike Ictus and friends, and the Plus-Minus Ensemble (as detailed in the previous two posts), NYCO did not simply call their confection by a generic name.

Leaving aside the ultra-finicky question of whether the titular punctuation could have been improved upon, for once we can see at a glance that we shan't need to worry about where the collaging is worked out, or where one piece ends and another begins, any of that sort of thing. Comps. 30, 32 and 139 are all solo piano pieces - each of which has been used extensively in collaging, as well as being interpreted in toto by several different pianists - whilst the 108 series comprises the first four pulse tracks. We can very safely assume that the contents of the first set of brackets relate to materials played by the two founder-directors, at different times#, and that the second brackets contain materials incorporated by the bass and drums. (Those, at least, we can try to listen out for.) But the main thing is: this is not a medley as such. The whole duration of the recorded piece comprises the premiere reading of Comp. 92, with (what we would now think of as) tertiary materials interpolated by specific players along the way. Of course, quite how much material from (a total of) more than two hundred pages of solo piano music can be shoehorned into these eleven minutes... well, that's something which remains to be seen.

As stated, this was the first time 92 had been recorded by anybody - which is what necessitates the closer look at the theory in point 3 below. (Much later, another star-filled big band would have a crack at it, this time with the maestro himself involved.) That alone makes this quite a significant undertaking, albeit one which is (as I myself have already demonstrated) embarrassingly easy to overlook.

3. As suggested above, the "virgin status" of this piece necessitates reference to the notes - specifically, in this case, to Composition Notes Book D. But first, it's worth just having a quick look at the album's own liners again to see if anything of lasting value was said there...

Penned by (it says here) Bay Area freelancer Derk Richardson##, these particular notes do manage to say something pungent, by no means a given for this sort of exercise###. "Like Cecil Taylor, Braxton is one of the most restless and probing architects of modern music, absorbed with the possibilities of sound and its implications for culture and consciousness". The phrasing here is so typically don't-examine-this-too-closely journalistic that it would be easy to glide on past the statement without realising how astute an observation is actually being made. Many music writers didn't even notice this about B. and his music, never mind take the trouble to point it out. It is, however, bang on the money - not that it should come as a surprise to anyone reading this, but it is surprising enough to encounter it in a commissioned liner essay that it seems only fair to single it out... as regards the actual piece, mind you, all Richardson manages to say is that "for all its complexity... (it) also swings like mad". This, too, is something that not everyone realised about B's music - so we'd better give that due credit as well. Still, this is not an album of Braxwerks, so it's quickly on to the next number from there.

B's own notes, naturally, are both hyper-detailed and densely abstruse. They are also, in this instance, bestrewn with errata and gaps; for example, "Comp. No. 92 is dedicated to         " (- and this is literally followed by several lines of blank space before the next paragraph). Still, they clear up right away the question of what was meant by "for creative orchestra (1979)" - this subtitle appears right next to the graphic title, at the top of p.429. [This is p1 of the notes for this piece, and from now on I will give only the page numbers for this set of notes, not the volume.] NYCO did nothing wrong by including this wording, nor did they try to turn it into the title of their composite reading. The piece is actually part of a set: Comps. 89-93 inclusive all bear the same subtitle, and were all composed "for Swedish radio". (Exactly what is meant by that is not explained; presumably some sort of commission was involved, although if the works themselves were unrecorded - which all five of them were, prior to 1989^^ - what did "Swedish radio" actually get..?) As regards the notes specific to this single piece, as opposed to all five: these run to nine full pages of text as well as diagrams and extracts from the score. Even were I qualified to analyse all this material in depth - which I'm not - it would not feel appropriate to do that here, in order to assess one individual reading of the piece by an external set of musicians. I'm just going to try and sift through it all, to see what emerges at "top level"...

... and what does can, I reckon, basically be reduced to three categories:

3a. Influences/reference points. In the first section of the notes, 92 is described as "an extended be-bop-like structure"; almost immediately afterwards we are told that the piece is "a music state that seeks to forward the affinity nature of the big band context - so that we can recall the wonder of that music." So, those are our first two references right there; a couple of pages later we hear about "a dynamic strong sound universe that is steeped in the tradition of big band interpretation dynamics". Besides a passing reference to "the music of (Charles Mingus and) Woody Herman", that's about it for big bands as such; on the other hand, the spirit of be-bop is invoked continually, although B. seems at pains to clarify that any formal similarities to bop are not to be taken as emblematic of the essence of the piece (more on this in 3c below): "the nature of (92) only proceeds from a be-bop 'surface housing' (that places the context of the music in what is perceived as a 'known state') as a basis to form fresh moment solutions that emphasise 'known and unknown' variables." Again, further on, we hear of "a be-bop sensibility - but with different apparent tendencies." This is effectively summed up on p5 of the notes, thus: "In the beginning the music is perceived as normal within the tradition of what be-bop is 'supposed to be' - later as the music continues forward it becomes apparent that 'there are other factors happening within the work'."

Two other reference points emerge later on. On p9 we read about a "session 'sound universe' that mechanizes John Coltrane's composition 'Ascensions' (sic) to create a 'construction universe' sound context that breathes fresh light into the vibrancy of creative music" - this being typically obscurantist and, well, deliberately difficult ^^^ - as well as introducing a concept that might feel strange to most readers ("breathing light") but is probably quite natural and intuitive for the synaesthetic maestro. On the following page: "I recall during the construction of this effort that I became very aware of Thelonious Monk's music (and harmonic nature) and some of that awareness was put into the lining of Comp. 92 (but none of this was approached as an empirical directive)." One could posit that Ascension bears a tangential relation to big bands, and Monk to bop, but in both cases this would really be stretching the functional definitions of those terms beyond the point of utility. So: four musical reference points to keep in mind.

3b. Formal structure. 92 "is a series of sequenced material and open parameters" which "unfolds as a nine-part component structure that alternates from written notated materials to extended improvisation." This is codified by B. as A (S) C (S) E (S) G (S) I, where S = solo (i.e. improvised section); these latter are subdivided into "two tempo soloist open parameters and two collective improvisation parameters". These four sections, not being notated by definition, may "position as many solos... as desired... depending on the needs of the moment or intention". The diagram which occupies p3 indicates that the first and third such sections are "tempo solos" and the second and fourth are "collective".

3c. The essential character of the piece. I could go on at quite some length here, quoting the text in numerous places - but I already took rather longer than planned over 3a above, and I really did want to avoid getting bogged down in this. As I understand it, the animus (as it were) of the piece is encapsulated in the phrase which is found on p2: "a series of simultaneous events"~. There are (of course... why would there not be) at least two different aspects to this: at any given time during the notated parts, the different sections - in the traditional sense of reeds, brass, etc (in keeping with the spirit of the big band era, at least up to the time of Ellington~~) play long written lines which overlap, but which act independently of one another; and the rhythm section has its own duality going on, alternating between a "swinging role function (in the traditional sense" and acting as a "fourth line variable"~~~. In other words, the entire flavour of the piece is contrapuntal, in a rather radically extended sense of that term, and the rhythm section plays a very active part in this: alternately, the rhythmic contours may "appear 'off' of the principal pulse of the music" or may "emphasize (their) relationship to the principal pulse". This being the case, it makes perfect sense for  NYCO to have collaged in the two pulse tracks; it even feels like an inspired decision. @

There are a few other bits worth quoting from the notes, before we (finally) move on...

Comp. 92 "is a non-harmonic (not atonal) be-bop sound structure" ( - this distinction is not clarified at all, but it is obviously a significant one for the composer, and must therefore be borne in mind)

"Nothing is emphasized and nothing is repeated"

"This is the blues, my friend" ( - it really isn't what most of us would think of as the blues, but it's very interesting to know that B. thinks of it in that way... he is discussing the principle of tension and release at this point in the notes)

"... a composite linear maze of linear constructions is placed into the space of the music in a manner that allows it to still meet the dictates of a 'swinging' music state" ( - unbeknownst to him, Richardson echoed this statement in his liner notes)

That concludes the theory bit. [I have endeavoured to reproduce the quoted text as accurately as possible, retaining all of B's punctuation, spelling and grammar]

4. Maybe it felt as if we would never get there, but... now for the actual music. (I am not in a position to offer downloads at the moment, but the music - courtesy of the official NYCO Youtube channel - is available here.)

Ehrlich is credited as director for this number - which, as previously mentioned, opens the CD. Of the fifteen players, he was one of (I think) just two who had prior direct experience of B's music: the other was of course Ray Anderson, who spent several years as a member of the actual working band and was in principle far more qualified for the job; Ehrlich is quite strongly associated with B's standards groups, having got the call on more than one occasion, when the maestro fancied playing piano and needed a versatile and technically-robust reedman to step in; but those dates were a couple of years in the future at this point. The only time he had played with B. prior to this, that I can find, was in 1978 - and that was indeed a creative orchestra affair (Anderson also present, right in the middle of his tenure in the working group).

The word "arranged" does not appear anywhere in the liner notes, but we'll have to assume that this job was included in Ehrlich's remit. Then again, with the instrumentation so close to that specified by B., it might be argued that the piece "arranges itself": all that really needs to be worked out is the identity and order of the soloists, the manner of linking up the structural phases, the precise allocation to the three main sections (Ehrlich has at his disposal five woodwinds including himself - he will take the first solo - plus three trumpets, two trombones and french horn; the two keyboards, bass and drums will presumably more or less take care of themselves)... and the backing for the four solo phases. That sounds like quite a lot of work, come to think of it... maybe "director" is indeed the optimal term.

I played this a few times last week (doing so was what prompted me to write this in the first place), but I have put in a lot of research since then and my understanding of the piece is rather deeper. The main take-away from previous spins was how old-fashioned the horn arrangement sounded, as if any "big band" piece must sound like something from the 1920s (not really, of course) - but then, having looked at the notes I withdraw this observation, and besides: it does also sound pretty similar to the 1976 Arista bash, being (I thought) especially reminiscent of Comp. 55... well before the end of the piece, it gets extremely hot and intense, and generally gives the impression of being a good and worthwhile reading.

Then I wrote most of the above, before returning to the music. Once you know how the horizontal structure is set out, and have an understanding of the ethos or flavour of the piece, it is very easy to follow what's happening in real time - at least, as regards the actual primary territory. There is a very short introduction, establishing the rhythm and tempo while Anderson and one of the trumpets warm up, then at 0.11 we are straight into the A phase. This does exactly what we would (by now) expect: the reeds, trumpets and lower brass start up "three independently superimposed sectional phrase grouping line formations that are cast over a medium to fast tempo driving rhythm section." This phase lasts about forty-five seconds - long enough for the notated material to be played through - and then a brief swelling chord takes us into the S1 phase, where Ehrlich takes his solo@@. This consists exclusively of fast runs and assorted extended techniques, entirely in the spirit of the music and not in the least bit "jazzy", and it sounds fine if at times maybe a little hesitant. Backing statements are provided principally by Anderson, with Holcomb mainly laying down sporadic (dis)chords and Previte providing a steady beat, which nevertheless sounds at times as if it might be edging towards a pulse track.

An organ phrase from Horvitz at 2.08 signals the switch to the C phase, and we're back to the threefold notated material. This time, Previte - with Horvitz and (bassist) Lindsey Horner - is definitely laying down a pulse track as opposed to a steady beat. Here, then, is the "fourth line" strategy we read about earlier. Anyone who isn't really paying attention would miss this altogether in the maelstrom of sound; by 3.04, Anderson has begun flexing his way into the S2 phase, and this begins properly at 3.11. His solo is complemented by crazy, queasy swirls from Horvitz over a backing in which Horner plugs away at a walking bass line while Previte pretty much plays as a second soloist. At 4.14, more written unison material tells us we are now already in the E phase. The rhythm section "behaves itself" again here, reinforcing the tempo rather than disrupting it, but as we approach the end of the fifth minute the mood is very intense, and stabbing chords from Holcomb see her getting ready for her solo, ushered in by Horner's switching to arco bass at 5.10. 

This S3 phase sees Holcomb playing (I would guess) more freely than she ever did in her whole career, taking her cue perhaps from Marilyn Crispell (though without MC's preternatural fluency) - while (second trombone) Art Baron interjects and Horner and Previte both break things up. This does not sound like a pulse track as such, not least because the bass and drums play completely independently of one another at this point. Previte keeps foot to throttle, but there is not really a steady beat during this very open phase. At around 6.20 Holcomb signs off and at once the G phase is underway; from around 6.30 a long roll on Previte's snare seems to cue up the second pulse track, both he and Horner now once more taking the "fourth line" approach. This is a brief phase, and it precedes what is easily the longest: the S4 phase, which comes closest of all to the "collective solos" specified in B's original plan, begins at 7.06 and lasts almost three minutes.

A sustained organ note ties the G and S4 phases together, during which time the bass and drums suddenly start playing at furious speed. The featured soloists in this final open phase are the three trumpeters, in the order Jack Walrath - Eddie Allen - Steve Bernstein, but what that really reflects is the order in which they start, since improvised phrases from all three get traded back and forth as this phase progresses. The pickup of the pace, in the meantime, sounds so natural and subtle that it could go completely unnoticed - until one eventually realises how fast Horner and Previte are playing: as the trumpets continue to trade phrases over increasingly intense backing, the mood becomes terrifically exciting, and this is underlined by the "traffic noise" interpolations from the other horns and the keys, which build little by little to an almost unbearable pitch. This phase really does feel like a sort of tightly-marshalled chaos, if that makes any sense; by 9.20 there are effectively as many as seven or eight "soloists" all doing their thing at once, and the intensity is sustained all the way until 9.56, when the final I phase begins. This is preceded (just) by a quick press roll from Previte, signalling what is then a seamless switch from a furious flat-out sprint to the badass swing of the closing written statements, leading up at last to a six-second crescendo attack from the horns, whipped home with a few final snaps on the snare. 

- And that's that. We might quibble: the S4 phase is clearly along the lines of a "collective solo", but is there really enough of a distinction drawn between "tempo solos" and "collective" in the other three S phases? For that matter, the piece is really quite short and could in principle have been developed quite a lot further. But as regards the second point, it's not an album of B-rep as such, and a really long and involved reading could have unbalanced the overall programme; trust me, most of the rest of the album does NOT sound like this. Besides, as regards both quibbles: some (most?) of these players were not used to negotiating material of this level of complexity or ambition, and within certain inescapable limitations, the orchestra delivered the most successful outcome which could have been expected. Nor is that intended as faint praise: Ehrlich and Anderson do a great job, Holcomb and Horvitz do too, and both Horner and (especially) Previte just tear the place up. The rest of the ensemble acquits itself extremely well on this highly challenging material, and everyone could be justifiably proud of this reading.

The one legitimate gripe concerns the use of the solo piano music. Even if we assume that Holcomb's solo consists exclusively of excerpts from all three of those scores, and for that matter if we assume further that every note played by both keyboardists originated from somewhere in amongst them - which is unlikely - that still adds up to a vanishingly small percentage of the actual total available to them, and one is left wondering if maybe it wouldn't have been more honest to cite just one of the three piano pieces (- even then, only a tiny portion could actually have been used). As it is, the impression is given that this rendition utilised collage elements from five different pieces equally, which simply cannot have been the case. But if that is the only real demerit here - and I would say it is - then we can easily find it in our hearts to overlook it. I really enjoyed this delightful one-off, and the effort I put into making sense of it definitely helped me to appreciate it more.

If you've read this far, thank you, and well done! I hope that it aids you, too, in enjoying this intriguing addition to the discography.




* As one would hopefully infer from the inverted commas, these are direct quotes attributed to Horvitz, included in the liner notes for the CD. (Just to confirm that I am not putting words into his mouth: "antidote" and "conservative" would both sound highly inflammatory if said by anybody else...)

** One of the Horvitz pieces, "Paper Money", uses a slimmed-down nonet, featuring Butch Morris (making what by then must have been a rare appearance on cornet); he does not play on the rest of the album.

*** I don't mind saying that the album as a whole is rather too "conservative" for my tastes: there are plenty of charming details if one pays close attention, but it's all too easy to use (most of) the album as background music, and the majority of the pieces sound... a little unambitious. To my (admittedly warped) ears, Sharp's knotty and dissonant "Skew" is easily the most interesting thing on here (with the obvious exception of the opener).

# This is about as precise as I am ever likely to get: I could live to be 150 and I doubt I would ever reach the point where I could confidently say which solo piano piece is being quoted when. (Indeed we might go further: given that at least two of the three pieces used here consist of multiple written pages to be assembled in whatever order the performer chooses, we can infer that even pianists who have played these works might not necessarily be able to say for sure "these fifteen seconds are from page ten of 32... these eight seconds are from page sixty-five of 30", etc. The task is almost unimaginably difficult: more than three decades later, I doubt really that Horvitz or Holcomb could tell us either, unless of course they made exceptionally detailed notes at the time of performance.)

## This is not a typo: he is actually credited as Derk, not Derek (or Dirk). New one on me.

### I say this as someone who did write music reviews for a magazine for a few years, a long time ago - albeit not professionally. It can be extraordinarily difficult to find things to say under these circumstances, unless the writer is actually powerfully impressed by what s/he is hearing. You do end up racking your brains to avoid simply repeating the same stuff ad nauseam.... I could never have done it full-time. 

^ Restructures also included the following rubric for Comp. 92: Twenty-six pages of notated music with improvisation, for the creative orchestra. Instrumentation: 3 reeds (alto, tenor, bass), 3 tpt, 3 trom, b. trom, TB, guitar, piano, SB, Per (set). This is not from the full notes as such, but rather from the Catalog of Works - I feel obliged to use the US spelling there, which I would not normally do - at the end of the book. The instrumentation is not precisely replicated by NYCO, although they come pretty damn close, and do (coincidentally) comprise a quindectet, as specified here! In any case, whilst B. often wrote with specific instrumentation in mind, it was very seldom (if ever) the case that a given interpretation would not be "valid" if it didn't stick to the prescribed instrumentation. (Quite the contrary, if anything.)

^^ The earliest recording I can find of any of these five pieces is on Eugene (1989) on Black Saint, which includes both 91 and 93. (The exact same programme was of course later replicated by the official bootleg BL024/-025 Creative Orchestra (Portland) 1989.) The album was actually released in 1991 - twelve years after these works were composed, and one year before NYCO's sophomore effort (which would appear to be less than coincidental); Jump or Die was also recorded in 1992, including Comp. 90 (in collage form), and again this doesn't feel like a coincidence. The upshot is, none of these five works were officially recorded until 1989, though naturally this does not mean that none of them was performed before then; who knows, some Swedish collectors may have airshot recordings which would prove that they were..? (What a tantalising possibility that is...)

^^^ This is not a criticism, nor is it said in irony: B. has every right to make his writings difficult, and demanding of close and careful reading. I have been thinking quite a lot about this, and will make it the subject of another post, later this month (at least, that's the idea...)

~ This phrase, which I wrote down and underlined as I was working through the notes, is taken directly from the text; but I have exercised some considerable licence in using it, since the phrase appears in the middle of a much longer sentence, in which the "series... of events" is not strictly a definition of the actual piece. 

~~ To say this is not my strong suit would be an understatement, but one detail I have retained from the jazz history books which I read twenty or so years ago is that prior to Ellington, big band arrangers routinely played sections off against one another, voicing one individual written part for reeds then giving the next to the brass, etc; Ellington is (as I recall) credited with being the first leader to use the innovative technique of "scoring across sections" (in works such as "Mood Indigo") by pairing, say, a clarinet with a trombone. [This is all unpacked a bit further in the next footnote.]

~~~ Fourth, because in B's original chart, the three sections which voice the written lines comprise the reeds, the trumpets and the trombones. Bass trombone was presumably included in the latter group, whilst I would guess the tuba was intended to be in the rhythm section (as a brass bass, to complement the string bass). This is all notional of course, since we don't have any recordings of B's own arrangement(s), and NYCO's instrumentation does not include either of those voices. - As we can see, B's chart gives the sections of the orchestra their own parts, and of course Ellington very often would have continued to do this as well; I don't mean to imply that he always scored across sections, once he had begun to experiment with that. 

@ It is a creative choice which wouldn't have been available to the composer, in 1979: the pulse track per se had not yet been invented, although of course it was foreshadowed in 1975, by Comp. 23g... [Incidentally, if anyone - besides the present writer - has ever wondered why B. used the term "pulse track" for rhythmic lines which are generally irregular, the answer is found in the Glossary of Terms (one of the numerous appendices in the books of Composition Notes): pulse "is my term for tempo when the actual tempo is removed and the force of the operative is retained". OK, so that may not exactly explain things, but... it helps?]

@@ I thought that the lower notes - and general tone - sounded more like a tenor sax, but the liner notes say the solo is on alto. (Ehrlich plays both, plus soprano sax and two clarinets, over the course of the album.)