(I know, I know, that's not the proper cover--but I can't locate an image of one more than about an inch square anywhere....)

Toshimaru Nakamura/English (Joe Foster, Bonnie Jones)- One Day (Erstwhile).

Very tough, excellent recording, hard (for me) to fully grasp--don't know that I have, yet--but I like it a lot. I often have this problem with "open-circuit" musicians, probably not for any good reason--it takes a while for things to sink in. Might also have to do with the way this music straddles and hops around the middle ground between extended sounds and isolated ones. Just when you're beginning to appreciate something on a drone-like level (more hum than drone, actually), it breaks off and just when you're beginning to enjoy the placement of small, crackly sounds in space, a hum sets in. You kind of have to aurally "step back" and reconcile the two--or I do, anyway, and that's only one thing going on here. Took me a good four or five listens to do so and I'm happily bathing in the music at this point. Really good, really challenging. After all's said and done, maybe my favorite release this year.

[Ok, here we go--it's a beautiful cover, worthy of reproduction]




I never quite understand how certain items find their way to my mailbox, though I'm generally grateful that they do. This is, by my tastes, an odd example of that phenomenon. Loïc Dequidt's "Nomade" (Kopasetic) is a quartet date with the leader on saxophones, Tommy Smith (I take it something of an ECM veteran) on piano, Mattias Hjorth on bass, and drummer Peter Nilsson. [Edit: Oy, I'm an idiot--see comments below. That's what I get for not reading the credits more closely. My general evaluation stands, however] I guess there are many of these types of musicians around, that is, Jan Garbarek disciples, but it's still a bit shocking to hear what sounds for all the world like a mid-70s Garbarek session. Odder still that, were it the case, it would be a really good one, something maybe short of "Witchi-Tai-To" (though probably at least as good as "Nude Ants"), but not unreasonably so. Now, I don't particularly understand why one would want to replicate the music some 30 years after the fact, but if that's your thing, give Dequidt a try--very strong on its own terms.



A quartet date, recorded in 2003 but just released, with Mike Bullock (bass), James Coleman (theremin), David Gross (alto sax) & Steve Roden (voice, objects, electronics) on (1.8)sec. Solid, quiet (mostly) improv recording with, occasionally, a bit of a ritualistic sound, as in the second cut (an excellent one) where Roden & Bullock (I think?) set up a slow, deep pulse, Coleman and Gross breathing above--very effective. Some of the best work I've heard from those involved.


Inveterate loon (I mean that in a good way) Tom Djll has teamed up with electronicist/turntablist/film maker Tim Perkis in a duo called Kinda Green (recorded three or four years ago), and has issued a self-produced disc that may not be available anywhere other than through the principals (try Tom's MySpace page). While my exposure to Djll's music in the past has been relatively small, what I have heard tended to contain more of a wacky component than I was typically comfortable with. While there's certainly a healthy dollop of wackitude (including some echoes of Sun Ra's goofier synth work) herein, there's also a level of restraint at play, a sense of molding the burbling hysteria, that works pretty well. The highlight is the 23-minute "Sagebrush Drip Kyrie", a cool, low-key rumination with much subtle variation in texture and color that maintains focus and commands attention throughout, with minimal joking. Strong piece.

***********************

Went out to fotofono in Brooklyn for the first time last night, experiencing a reasonably satisfying trio of performances--Will Guthrie, (great to see you again, Will!) solo, constructed an enjoyably rocky and bumptious set making much use of heavy springs strung across inverted cymbals and other amplified objects and dangling wires; he elbowed his way toward a couple of fine coalescences of sound.

Barry Weisblat (electronics) and Andrew Lafkas (string bass) played an unusual set where both stayed, for the duration, in a fairly tonal drone area, Barry playing far more smoothly than I've ever heard him before, Lafkas bowing richly. For the first six or eight minutes, it was absorbing but then something--always fascinating to try, unsuccessfully, to quantify exactly what--went awry and the remainder of the music failed to gel.

Guthrie then returned for a trio with Howard Stelzer (excellent meeting Howie for the first time!) on electronics and cassettes and Newton Armstrong on laptop. As in the opening set, it was deliciously awkward and pothole-filled with some fine music emerging from the inevitable collisions. Very nice mass to the sounds.

Nice, intimate place, Fotofono, too--something of a living room where about 20 can fit with not too much discomfort.

*************

Just arrived and on now, sounding very good: Esther Venrooy/Heleen Van Haegenborgh - Mock Interiors (entr'acte)

Also listened for the first time to the 3-disc set, "Chamber Music Concerts, vol. 1" on (deep breath) hibarislubloadfactor), featuring compositions by Masahiko Okura, Taku Sugimoto and Taku Unami (details here). Some very beautiful stuff buried in there, generally more "full" than I expected, requiring numerous more listens, though.

“We’re not playing to musicians alone,” Donavon said, “We are playing to the public, you dig, and it’s time for some new music. You say that the Japanese know more about our music than we do? That’s cool–but we made it.”

That was my result, from George Lewis' "A Power Stronger than Itself", when Robert Kirkpatrick, from A Spiral Cage tagged me in this round of the net version of a chain letter, wherein one must:

1) Pick up the nearest book.
2) Open to page 123.
3) Find the fifth sentence.
4) Post the next three sentences.
5) Tag five people, and acknowledge who tagged you.

Thus, I'll annoy several blogging friends, forcing them to play along. Hereby tagged guten well are: Richard Harland Smith (contributor to Movie Morlocks), Pete Cherches (Word of Mouth) and Caleb Deupree (Classical Drone).

Have at it gentlemen...don't blame me!

[edit: I'm only into the second chapter of Lewis' tome, but so far it's very engaging. He's balancing academic and street reasonably well, thus far, maybe a bit overboard on the biographical details, but conjuring up a good picture of the Chicago bop and proto-free scene in the 50s and (halfway through Chapter Two) the racial divisions in NYC in the early 60s. Fun factoid: Joseph Jarman, Fred Anderson and John Cage apparently performed in concert around '68.]

There are people who seem to possess an inherent musicality, something in them that causes virtually everything they do to manifest as "musical". In jazz, Monk is often so cited ("He even walks musical"), an assessment with which I agree. For myself, another has always been Don Cherry. It's as though melody is coursing through his
veins. However far he ranged, however blistering or abstract his playing, there was always, at least up to a certain point, a sense of song there. One of my favorite musicians.

I believe I only saw him perform three times. The first was at the old Kitchen, on Wooster and Grand, I guess around '76, in a loose knit band with his wife Moki on tambura (I think) and two or three others I can't quite remember, possibly Frank Lowe among them. Maybe Badal Roy? In fact, if you're still reading here Mark Forman, I think this concert was where we first met, which would place it around October of '76.

Saw Cherry with Ornette in the summer of '77 at Avery Fisher Hall in Lincoln Center, an amazing "double bill" with the Cherry/Redman/Haden/Blackwell quintet first, then Prime Time.

The last time was not so pleasant, a quartet date at a short-lived club on Houston St. called "Spiral", sometime in the mid 80s. Cherry was apparently in the midst of one of his bouts with heroin and was spaced out to the extreme, seemingly having little idea where he was, what was going on. Bob Stewart was with him on tuba (and was spectacular). There was a guitarist (I don't remember who) and a last-minute, young drummer who was clueless.





Playing through my Cherry vinyl, I begin with the two Mu sessions, two of the few original Actuel LPs I own (I have earlier Cherry, but on on disc). They still stand out for a kind of rawness, a real in-your-face recording quality that's very bracing. Great playing, of course (Blackwell, with Roach, still my favorite jazz drummer), wonderfully wide-ranging. I'm pretty sure these discs were my first exposure to the compositions of Dollar Brand.
















"Eternal Rhythm" remains my favorite recording under Cherry's name and, imho, one of the finest jazz records of the 60s. Wild, absurdly far-reaching from gamelan to the blues, awesome work by Sharrock and Karl Berger, an olio that has no business working but does so beautifully. More thoughts in my AllMusic write up here.


















Side One of "Relativity Suite" is just about as good, a gorgeous mini-suite that features some tremendous Cherry vocals (he's really one of my fave vocalists in jazz) and the sublime "Desireless", surely one of the loveliest melodies in the music. That wonderful rhythm in the 2nd section...The second side's more of a mixed bag but not bad at all, nice Bley piano and rousing Blackwell to finish up. Is this still not available on disc? iirc, Joe McPhee participated in rehearsals for this but couldn't make the recording date, a shame.

I have "Orient" as a double LP on Affinity (can't locate an image--currently available on disc with a cover showing an ant walking around a yellow fruit or lemon drop) though I think it's shown up in various guises. The first disc is a trio date from 1972 with Han Bennink and Moki Cherry. They begin with a version of "Desireless" then go out from there, a bit ragged but much fun. It's kind of a mess but Cherry was responsible for some glorious messes and that musicality and engaging spirit almost always carries the day. The other disc is from a concert with Okay Tamiz and the great Johnny Dyani. Should have been more Cherry/Dyani collaborations, two supremely musical fellows.

I think the album I have titled "Tibet" (on Picc-a-dilly) has also been issued elsewhere under different names--currently available combined with "Eternal Now"--recorded around '74, I think with Don Cherry (piano, percussion); Christer Bothen (piano); Bernt Rosengren (taragot); Agneta Ernstrom (tibetan bell, etc); Bengt Berger (piano, mridangam, etc). Good record, Cherry venturing out into areas even further removed from jazz, not playing trumpet at all, despite the cover photo. "Bass Figure for Ballatune" is a pretty amazing piece for pounded piano a la an especially vociferous Terry Riley.

Mighty big jump, chronologically as well as stylistically, to the next and final Cherry vinyl in the house, 1988's "Art Deco". Pretty widely heralded at the time for dopey reasons--Cherry coming back to the mainstream, showing those young lions a thing or two. It's smooth, accomplished and more than a bit bland. Nice quartet with James Clay on tenor, Haden and Higgins, Cherry's trumpet work is quite pure though lacking the passion of his best playing. Overall, I found the effort disappointing though I imagine, or hope, that the deal with A&M got him a bit of money. Some of his subsequent discs, particularly "Home Boy" & much of "Multikulti" were dreadful.

But overall a unique and wonderful musician. In peak form, probably no one I'd rather hear on trumpet. Thanks, Mr. Cherry.

I set foot on Staten Island for the third time in my life today. Staten Island, for those unaware, is a borough of New York City, one of five, though in virtually every respect--geographically, culturally, architecturally--it's part of New Jersey. There's an old neighborhood, St. George, near where the Staten Island Ferry docks after its trip from lower Manhattan, that retains vestiges of New York. The rest of the island, which is quite sizable, consists largely of private, middle-class houses--large and flimsily built--, many trees, strip malls and the world's most voluminous landfill.

I came here on a group trip when I was about 15, ostensibly to watch a Wagner College football game in the freezing, damp cold, ending up gallivanting around the campus with my friend Mike and two girls from Long Island we met at the field. (Now there's a memory that's remained undredged for many a year!)

About 15 years ago, my friend David and I biked to the ferry from the Upper West Side, took it over to Staten Island and toured the place, a fairly extensive, for me, ride of about 60 miles total. There are parts of it, when you get to the higher hills, where you think you might be in the Catskill Mountains, unpaved roads winding off into the thick woods, dead quiet, etc.

That's not where I was today.

A month or so back, Kurt Gottschalk contacted me, asking if I'd participate in a project, a realization of John Cage's "49 Waltzes for the Five Boroughs", written in 1977 and, as near as he could determine, only ever performed once. I knew the event was taking place but didn't for a moment think it appropriate to contribute. However, the score for the work instructs an individual to go to one of 147 designated locations (49 groups of three) and "do something". Kurt thought I could write about what I experienced there, particularly the sounds heard. Well, how could I refuse?

Being a Cage piece, I randomly generated a number between 1 and 49, garnering 26. Kurt had asked that, if possible, participants try to choose points on Staten Island as takers for those slots were likely to be harder to find. Having a car and easily able to approach from the Jersey side, I chose the one one of three possibilities so situated and come to find myself at the intersection of Richmond and Katan Avenues, settling in to write about what I hear, which I shall now proceed to do....

*******************

(later that same evening)

Nice day. The results of this endeavor will be posted at wfmu.org at some future date. As far as I know, people played music, made field recordings, videos, etc. Not sure if anyone else simply observed.

One amusing thing, in a dopey way, is that when I came home, I realized I'd misread my location! Staten Island is known, technically, as Richmond County and the address was listed as "Katan Ave. and Ridgewood Ave. (Richmond)" which I senilely read as "Richmond Ave." which, in fact, exists. Turns out I was four blocks away from the proper point. Ah well, nothing wrong with a bit o' randomness....

It was a purely residential neighborhood with no convenient sitting place on any of the four corners. I'd found an elementary school a couple blocks away with a nice set of stairs and almost substituted that but figured I'd play it straight. One of the odd things was that, for all the extensive car traffic, there were virtually zero pedestrians. People don't walk there, apparently. I counted two in an hour and could often look up and down Richmond, about 1/2 mile of straight road, and see absolutely no one on the sidewalks.

Very enjoyable undertaking though. I do a reasonable amount of "Cageian" listening in the normal course of things, not as much as I might but more, I daresay, than your average Joe. But it's different when you're constrained to do so for an extended period and, more, to write about it. You concentrate better, or at least I do. It's be nice to have that level of clarity at all times. Maybe some do.

Drove back into Manhattan to meet up with other participants at the north end of Madison Square Park, beneath the statue of Chester Alan Arthur, exchanging stories from around the boroughs. While in Staten Island, one of the nice, almost giddy sensations was knowing that 48 [it turned out, 61] other people were engaged in some tangentially related activity at the same time, elsewhere in New York. Something rather comforting in that.

When the results are posted, I'll let people know.

Thanks, Mr. Cage!

Ingar Zach was kind enough to send me copy of the new ECM release, Dans les Arbres, on which he plays with Xavier Charles (clarinet), Ivar Grydeland (prepared banjo) and Christian Wallumrod (piano).

A digression into my ECM history--I was a pretty early fan, coming into the label shortly after it was launched, mostly due to its presence in the New Music Distribution Service catalog in the early 70s. Maybe the first thing I picked up was the Music Improvisation Company album, entirely because of Jamie Muir's being there (I was still listening to Crimson at the time), giving me my first taste of Bailey and Evan Parker circa 1973 or '74. Was pretty well hooked for a few years thereafter, including (gulp) the first Jarrett solo albums (I still like "Facing You", dammit), early Garbarek, etc. I place the initial appearance of what would become known as "the ECM sound" (more an approach than a sound, maybe) with something like Garbarek's "Dansere" or Eberhard Weber's miserably titled, "The Colours of Chloe". It was apparent in the late 70s, somewhat assuaged by the adoption of the Art Ensemble, Reich, etc.

But by and by, I began ignoring the label as such, making the occasional purchase when an individual release warranted it. Over the last five or so years, I don't imagine I've bough more than two or three. I think the last may have been Marilyn Crispell's take on Annette Peacock (partially successful, imho).

Anyway, aside from an interest in what Charles has been up to and usually enjoying Ingar's work, I was curious if the ECM aesthetic was still in force, still tending to dominate a recording.

Well, yes and no. "Dans les Arbres" is a pleasant enough album, at a couple of points (the two longest tracks) emerging into the richly enjoyable. It's moody (the track titles, if my French serves me well, allude to various aspects of ennui), the textures have a watercolor-ish air even as they refer to Cage's prepared piano works. But there is a slight scrim over the music, a bit of the ol' gauze the label's known for. Maybe I'm bringing in past prejudices, but I did want to hear a sharper projection, a little more of the rough and tumble that surfaces briefly when Charles gets combative. A good record and I'm guessing a damn sight better than much that ECM issues these days, but I'd be curious to hear the same quartet on a different label.


Mathieu Saladin - 4'33"/0'00" - As everyone and their brother know by now, a reworking ("amplification maximum") of the Gianni-Emilio Simonetti recording of the Cage work, originally issued on Cramps in 1974. Well, pretty good I guess, especially when played loud. The variation you can pick out is interesting the effect (almost automatically) assaultive and overwhelming. Curious how much of the noise is vinyl-related, how much purely from the ambient sounds in the original situation (I haven't heard the Cramps LP). Nice idea anyway. Amused to see a price of 4.33 euros on the back of the sleeve....


An LP on Simple Geometry from Tetuzi Akiyama and Jeffrey Allport, containing two sidelong improvisations. Widely spaced guitar twangs and other sounds (the latter from Allport, I assume), with abundant ambient noise. Nice and relaxed, very casual. Not gripping, especially, but then, I doubt it's intended to be. Totally fine to leave on in the background and let blend with your neighborhood.

I've never been the biggest fan of Chadbourne (as a musician--I really enjoy his reviews on All Music, think they're among the best at that site). I remember seeing him at Environ around 1977, I think with Zorn, Polly Bradfield and a few others, maybe David Moss. He had his rake out. But in the early 80s, I picked up a few records, enjoying some aspects, not others. He's one of a sizable number of musicians who I'd prefer hearing perform straight than out, in Chadbourne's case tending to mean doing covers of folk and country favorites. His political rantings, well-intentioned though they may be, tend to be painfully shallow, obvious and naive, especially when set against, say, a Phil Ochs song. He's more Roger Miller than Ochs. Plus the fact that he's a dead ringer for the primordial grandmother.

The lo-tech approach was pretty cool then and still has its charms--abrupt edits, crappy sound, etc. "Country Music from Southeastern Australia" is the out-est of this bunch, humorously packaged as an ethnic field recording and vacillating between C&W wannabee songs and random noise. David Moss, Rik Rue and Jon Rose accompany. It's kinda fun; I could imagine hanging out in some seedy barroom, enjoying these guys farting about, chuckling at the lowbrow humor, immediately forgetting it on the way home.



"Country Protest" (surprised there's not a larger image around) is slicker, Chadbourne employing some traditional players, and it works reasonably well. This is from 1986 and you can hear the kind of ADD collage that Zorn would shortly pursue in the opening medley which, over 11 minutes, includes 14 pieces, among them "A Whiter Shade of Pale", "Misty", "To Sir with Love" and "The Shah Sleeps in Lee Harvey's Grave". His cover of Ochs' "When I'm Gone" is as stirring as his original, "Perverts on Northridge", is puerile.



Lastly is his collaboration with members of The Violent Femmes, "Corpses of Foreign Wars". For my money, the best of the three, maybe not coincidentally the most rockish. Still mucho annoying in spots, sophomoric to the extreme, but the Ochs medley that closes the album (Outside a Small Circle of Friends/White Boots Marching in a Yellow Land/I'm Gonna Say It Now) is my single favorite Chadbourne performance in my very limited listening, very strong.

Still, I gave up after this, around 1987.

For good measure, let's include an entirely obscure piece of vinyl, one which I'm not surprised at all to be unable to find an image of, Jose Chalas' "Living on Avenue F", recorded in 1986-87 for Sunjump Records. Mid-80s, Lower East Side jazz rock, notable for containing one of Dave Douglas' earliest appearances on record (also features a group photo on the back showing Douglas resplendent in a full head of wavy hair, kinda funny). Jim Mussen, a drummer who worked a bunch with Elliott Sharp, is also on hand. Chalas plays guitar; the music isn't awful but is rather forgettable, a bit of electric Miles, funk, DX-7 sounds; almost coulda been a Laswell production. Don't think I ever heard of Chalas again.

*************

New Books:

Thomas Bernhard - Frost
Alan Licht - Sound Art
Nathan Dunne (ed.) - Tarkovsky

An unholy mess but, in large part, a goofily, sometime brilliantly enjoyable one. Fifty or so musicians, under Keith TIppett's direction, Fripp in the control room, splayed over two LPs, mostly in free jazz mode but with nods to rock and folk. Something of a Who's Who in London jazz and prog on those three days in June of 1971, although notably without anyone from the Bailey/Parker/Stevens (aside from Paul Rutherford) axis (much less AMM). But you have the South Africans Pukwana, Feza and Miller, a few Soft Machine-ites, Maggie Nichols, Julie Tippetts and many more.

There's a lot of bluster, too much I suppose, but the piece trundles along gamely, pausing for some lovely moments like the vocal/violin/bass section at the close of Side One, as hippily pretty as you could want. The Pukwana/Stabbins feature on the rockish portion beginning Side Two is jaunty and fun then careens into a proto-metal riff that's just charming in its innocent strutting. The string of solos that follows is fine though unexceptional (Alan Skidmore's tenor run is rather strong and heartfelt) and the rhythm section slogs things down a bit, but the anthem that closes out the projects first half remains as stirring as ever. This is probably the point I began falling in love with Julie Tippetts.

Things begin to fall apart somewhat on Sides Three and Four. A march with an intriguing melody but Crimsonesquely plodding rhythm swells in volume to levels that engender murderous reactions in spouses but to no great effect other than loudness. A rather inchoate free section follows; not too bad but formless. Most of the last side is given over to a kind of Mingusian theme that segues into a lilting section that might work save for the three drummers stumbling over one another. Nice saxello work from the late Elton Dean. A chorus enters to chant the naive but inoffensive lyrics, perhaps leftover from some Peoples Liberation Music event. This section stumbles on for an ungodly length of time whilst (that's for Pinnell) the horns have at it way back in the mix. There's a fake fade-out then the vocals meander back in. It closes unexpectedly, and pretty nicely, with a duo of Charig and Tippett.

Unwieldy as hell but with enough bright spots and an obvious abundance of enthusiasm to recommend it.

(btw, always enjoyed the images of those bottles. Was that technique--coating a clear glass bottle with pigment on the inside then affixing an pic on the exterior--in vogue at some time? I don't recall seeing it elsewhere, though it's attractive enough)

Christopher McFall was responsible for a good record last year on entr'acte and here's another on Gears of Sand, "Solemn Words for a Fabled Apparatus". I'm still at something of a loss to quantify how one criticize field recordings except, obviously, insofar as one can detect the degree of construction that takes place on the part of the assembler. Even then, it likely is at least something to do with how one does it oneself, that is, how one organizes ambient sound when in a situation where one is thinking about it, say, standing on a street corner listening to what's going on. In any case, I get the sense McFall has done quite a bit of post-recording organizing here--there's more than a whiff of Ferrari--and I like what I hear. It's full, curvy, a-bubble with sounds that seem, more often than not, to derive from air, fire and hums (as opposed to clatter of one kind or another). Almost as enjoyable as doing it oneself. Good work. gears of sand


There are things that baffle me. Groups like Happy House, for instance. Presumably named after the Ornette tune, the quartet (Olivier Benoit/guitar, Julien Favreuille/saxophone, Nicolas Mahieux/bass, Jean-Luc Landsweerdt/drums) doesn't sound like Prime Time, which would be anachronistic enough, but instead sounds like a recreation of early Jan Garbarek, even earlier than the fine ECM bands, I'm talking Esoteric Circle from about 1967 (especially the Rypdalian guitar). Now that was an excellent group and what Happy House does, I guess you could say it does well, but to what purpose? Flashy, muscular, proto-jazz rock 40 years after the fact. Interesting question why Esoteric Circle remains very easy to listen to while this is a chore, but...that's the case. circum-disc

Berlin Electronics (absinth)
absinth (with Michael Renkel at the helm, from what I understand) returns to the 4-mini disc release format, though in a 5x7 inch packaging. Within which, unfortunately, the discs are overlaid in pairs, two by two and then, when the envelope is folded, atop each other. In my case, this resulted in the surface of one disc adhering to the little nubbin holding another across the way and removed a few square millimeters of CD surface, rendering the disc unplayable. So I don't know what Andrea Ermke's music sounds like. Nice hand-painted covers in indigo encaustic, though.

Two of the others, those by Gilles Aubry and Ignaz Schick, didn't do much for me either, the former consisting of computer-generated sound occupying feedback-y territory and the latter, from someone whose work I've enjoyed in the past, combines "naive" sounds (flute tones, jungle-y thing) with electronics in a gauzy, kind of insubstantial manner that never connected for me. Both are OK but didn't really leave much of an impression.

The saving Grace is Annette Krebs' "Untitled III variations/Excerpt" (Couldn't locate a cover image on-line, hence the pic of Annette above). Her sense of structure almost always syncs up well with my own so that juxtapositions which, objectively, I might consider "awkward" or jarring seem to possess some elusive naturalness that I find fascinating to attempt (unsuccessfully) to unravel the whys and wherefores of. This one features a rather disparate sequence of sound elements, sometimes overlapping but more often one after another, kind of like an array of objects on a table, allowing the viewer/listener to make connection or not. For me, it works quite beautifully and, at 15 minutes, is of perfect length.

*********
Been playing "The Breadwinner" a bunch over the last couple of weeks as well. It's a really strong recording, certainly one of the best things I've heard this year. Almost automatically, though unfairly, I mentally pair it with "Salmon Run" (I do hear it as a bit more Lambkin than Lescalleet for whatever reasons). They each have different virtues. "Breadwinner" is solider, more viscous. The earlier release is stranger, more oneiric. On a given day, I prefer one to the other. But there's not a weak track on the disc, a very fine release.

Was thinking about Rackstraw Downes this afternoon. Don't know that I've mentioned him here before but he's a big favorite of mine among contemporary painters. Born in 1939 in England (where else would he come upon an incredible name like that?), he began as an abstract-expressionist but in the mid 60s veered into a very idiosyncratic kind of realism. His paintings, both in reproduction and in life, often don't look like so much at first glance. Well enough done, but that's about it. Until you begin to see a couple of unique attributes. One is his use of multiple perspectives in a single scene. I wish there were better examples available on-line--if anyone knows, please fill me in--but often his landscapes have a wide enough aspect to require his point of view to change several times getting from the left to right edge. So you get a kind of arcing effect, including a bending of the horizon. It's something that hit home to me as I did similar experiments at Vassar, for instance doing a studio interior on a largish sheet of paper, beginning by drawing something on the far wall small enough that the top and bottom of the page would require that I look almost straight up and down. Very hard to accomplish and Downes, needless to say, pulls it off with far more subtlety than I.

The other, not always in evidence, is that one can discern, by observing shadows in the painting, that there are several hours worth of observation in play, the vertical umbrae splaying out at different angles. This plus the fine sense of air he imbues, imparts a unique kind of life into his landscapes and cityscapes.

I also love his choice of subject matter which tends toward the "mundane" and "featureless":


He did a few in Jersey City as well, at least one I can remember from underneath the Turnpike extension at Newark Ave., a great location indeed.

Last saw a show of his maybe two or three years ago in Chelsea which had a few striking works. Check him out if you get the chance.

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reading:

Lucretius - On the Nature of the Universe (Sisco recommendation)
Sebald - Austerlitz
Chomsky - On Anarchism

Record Club core member Nayland Blake received a nice feature in the Sunday NY Times today, in the article on portrayals of racism in contemporary art. The pertinent part:

Ethnically neutral? That’s just a code-term for white, the no-color, the everything-color. For whiteness is as much — or as little — a racial category as blackness, though it is rarely acknowledged as such wherever it is the dominant, default ethnicity. Whiteness is yet another part of the postracial story. Like blackness, it has become a complicated subject for art. And few have explored it more forcefully and intimately than Nayland Blake.

Mr. Blake, 48, is the child of a black father and a white mother. In various performance pieces since the 1990s he has dressed up as a giant rabbit, partly as a reference to Br’er Rabbit of Joel Chandler Harris’s Uncle Remus stories, a wily animal who speaks in Southern black dialect and who survives capture by moving fast and against expectations.

In 2001 Mr. Blake appeared in a video with another artist, AA Bronson. Each had his face slathered with cake frosting, chocolate in Mr. Blake’s case, vanilla in Mr. Bronson’s. When then two men exchanged a long kiss, the colors, and presumably the flavors, began to blend. Shared love, the implication was, dissolves distinctions between “black” and “white,” which, as racial categories, are cosmetic, superficial.

Can't believe he couldn't have gotten them to squeeze in mention of Record Club but otherwise, way to go, Nayland! btw, the slyboots mentioned nothing about this on Friday. That's Bronson pictured above, incidentally. Here's a shot of the project's denouement:

Ever exploratory provided it doesn't get too inconvenient, Record Club staged its first video version last evening and it went very well. One of the many fine things about the RC project, for me, is that I get exposed to music (and, here, video) from areas in which I would've thought to have little or no interest. Often I'm pleasantly shocked to find something of unexpected beauty. At the very least, even if I don't become a full fledged fan of a given person or form, I can at least gain a better understanding of why other folk love it.

One aesthetic that has always stuck in my craw is the "musical", especially in terms of Broadway but also in film in its show tune aspect. Well, Nayland brought in two excerpts that, I must admit, caused me to reconsider somewhat. The first was from "Sweet Charity", the 1969 Bob Fosse vehicle with Shirley McLaine based on Fellini's "Nights of Cabiria". The sequence he played was a medley of three dance pieces, "Aloof", one derived from boxing (can't remember the name) and a psychedelic, rocking finale. Really amazing choreography specially, as Nayland noted, in how independently the various parts of the dancers' bodies were coordinated. The second, from which the pic above is taken, was the dance of the exiled instrumentalists from "The 5000 Fingers of Dr. T", an extremely weird musical from 1953 based on the Dr. Seuss tale. I'd somehow never seen this, as a child or adult, but it's seriously freaky with astonishing homo-erotic overtones for the time. In excess of 50 green-painted individuals playing a huge range of fantasy instruments with apparently wild abandon but in amazingly interlocking precision. Eye-opening.

Speaking of things I wouldn't have thought I'd like so much, Dan showed Billy Preston's number from the Bangladesh concert, "That's the Way God Planned It". Very nice.

Nina was in bizarro Asian child mode, showing this young Korean girl singing "Hey Jude" and, far more horrfying, this Japanese teen ripping through Kansas' "Carry On" on what I take to be the latest in one-girl-band organ gimmickry. Sca. Ry.

Myself, I went with the great Son House, performing Death Letter from about 1965 and the classic (though, apparently, previously unseen by all present last night) John Cage appearance on "I've Got a Secret" in 1960. If you've never seen it, it's required viewing.

Julia ended the evening with a wonderful video by Spike Jonze of Fatlip from around 2000, I think.

While trawling through You Tube over the last few weeks in prep for this meeting, I was having a great time with older, acoustic blues musicians, finding tons of fantastic music. Spurred me, yesterday, to pick up the Bukka White release on Sonet (on at the moment, sounds great) and "The Definitive Charley Patton" 3-disc set, as well as putting in an ebay bid on Robert Pete Williams 1961 LP on Arhoolie, "Angola Prison"

I haven't heard this yet, though it arrived yesterday with a couple of other things for review at Squidco (two nice discs, on first blush, one from Brigit Uhler and Ernesto Rodrigues and the other on hat from the Makrokosmos quartet doing Crumb, Gervasoni & Haas). I hope to begin listening tonight--it's a three disc set.

I can't recall ever really hearing Lockwood's work though I must have, on radio, over the years. I know it's always been on the fringe of my mind to do so. Partly, I confess, it's because I find her name rather wonderful. I pronounce it Ah-NEE-uh, by the way; I'm not sure if this is correct. Hope it's not just "Anna".

Then there's this other thing. At two recent concerts I attended, the generally dreadful exhumation of early Bryars pieces at Roulette and the charming Christian Wolff recital, the same chipper, spruce lady was sitting in front of me. From her conversation and the effusive greetings she received from other audience members, including Robert Ashley at both, it was obvious she was a composer of some repute. Bothered the hell out of me that I couldn't put a name to her. I mentally ran through all female composers of her approximate age--she looked in her 60s--but came up empty. Now, of course, I realize it was Ms. Lockwood.

The above assembles field recordings, interviews and other sounds derived from several trips down the Danube river, I guess a bookend of sorts to her similar project on the Hudson from the late 80s. It comes with a fairly large foldout map of the region and translations of the interviews. Nice idea for a piece. I really hope it doesn't suck.

later...

Listening to Disc One and, so far, not so thrilled. The strange thing is that there's a relatively consistent water sound--it comes and goes, but it does so throughout, thus far--and given the nature of the project, it sounds oddly interior, like water being sluiced from one container to another. There's very little air around it. The depth of the piece is surprisingly shallow with only bird and insect chirps and some wind rustle to be heard otherwise (aside from the occasional voice, various interviewees speaking in the languages one encounters along the Danube). You don't get the breadth you do in Tsunoda, for example. Not bad, just a bit arid, ironically enough. We'll see....

still later....

Second disc is better, more varied. Still, even though something with the massiveness of a river would seem to easily deserve the 167 minutes here, I'm not sure this won't end up having been better served at a shorter length.

Yet more


Point4 is a quartet, not surprisingly, made up essentially of two keyboards and two percussionists (Kenneth Karlson, Jon Balke, Bjørn Rabben & Ingar Zach). “Panopticon” (Sofa) contains 19 tracks that tend toward the quiet, sometimes in a Boulezian vein, perhaps often Feldmanesque and not infrequently veering into more customary free improv space. The electronics (Balke) get awkward now and then but there’s a nice overall level of restraint and thoughtfulness. Worth a hearing for those softer, more introspective moments which comprise about half the disc. sofa


The indefatigable Asher sends along several new collections of sound. “Study for Autumn” (available for mp3 download here, is in keeping with some of his previous work wherein gentle piano notes are played singly among field recordings of creaking wood, windswept leaves, etc. Eno-esque, true, but/and beguiling.



















“A Map of the Ocean” a piece created in collaboration with Ubeboet (a name new to me), dispenses with the piano and utilizes rougher, more visceral field recordings; even the sloshing water sounds cold. Faint, organ-like tones waft by like so much flotsam. The piece has great breadth over its 40 minutes, almost steady-state but phasing through adjacent fields; fine work (and super cover) Also available as an mp3 at transparent radiation. “Intervals” (thelandof) is composed of 39 fragments spread over about 40 minutes. Given Asher’s normally languid pacing, I wouldn’t have thought this would work as well as it does but despite the variation in sounds, it manages to read pretty strongly as a whole, played as laid out or on shuffle. The sounds are a mix of various approaches he’s used before including the dulcet piano tones, static, the natural world, etc.; another nice one. Asher teams once again with Ubeboet for “cell memory” (winds measure), two tracks that settle into the soft rumble side of things, evoking far off engines heard from deep inside the earth or some massive structure—or maybe from inside an organic cell, hearing the plasma surging by outside. winds measure. There’s a running argument about artists releasing “too much” material. While I tend toward the side that says, “the more the merrier”, obviously there are occasions when the well just runs dry. Asher puts out a lot of music but, thus far, it's been almost always rewarding. A degree of sameness may set in for some listeners but it hasn’t done so for me as yet.

Rossbin’s been baffling me in recent times. Not so much that I have enjoyed a lot of the material over the past couple of years—I haven’t—but more so the rationale behind given projects. In this case it’s a 2001 session by Machine for Making Sense (Jim Denley, Rik Rue, Amanda Stewart, Stevie Wishart), music that might already have been deemed overly fussy and cluttered at the time, certainly more so in the intervening years. Not up my alley, but presumably enjoyable for fans of post-Zorn/Chadbourne style improv.

It’s worth pointing out that Alessandro has instituted a new “payment” policy with Rossbin and an apparently very admirable one: all proceeds going to a Peruvian institution that assists poor and disabled children. Details at rossbin

Two musicians I'd never heard who really impressed me these last couple of weeks have been Esther Venrooy (out of Belgium) and Vanessa Rossetto (from Austin). I'll be writing up both for Bags in upcoming weeks (I knew there'd be an exception to my rule now and then) but in the meantime, I'd strongly recommend checking out Venrooy's work on entr'acte and Rossetto's on 2008 music appreciation

Oh yeah, this one's not half bad either:

Recent pelf

After an initial flurry of recordings sent my way in January, things had quieted down a good bit for a few weeks and I figured the message had gotten out (dammit) that I wasn't going to be doing reviews this year. Then, last week, a whole passel of stuff showed up. Some bore notes to the effect that, "I know you're not writing up these things now but I wanted you to hear this", which sentiment is greatly appreciated, thanks.















Kostis Kilymis - .accumulated & Thessaloniki 1963, a diary from b to c (Organized Music from Thessaloniki) Two very enjoyable sets of collaged sound from Kilymis, each combining field recordings with direct input of an abstract electronic nature, the latter occasionally dipping into the everyday world of ring tones and other detritus. As with much of the better music I’ve heard recently, it’s not so much the newness of the sounds or conception, more the grace (or attractive awkwardness) with which the sounds are deployed. Never forced, moments that initially seem out of place make sense a minute or two onward and the variety of sounds and approaches always keeps things bubbling. Both discs work really well as wholes—nice to see a bunch of good work emanating from IHM denizens in recent months. Plus, the Thessaloniki 1963 disc comes in a lovely cloth disc cozy.


















Pascal Battus/Alfredo Costa Monteiro – Ductile (jointly released by OrgThel and A Question of Re_entry—I’m considering a campaign for shorter label names…) Costa Monteiro has issued at least two discs of solely paper-derived sounds; here it’s a duo of same and, as before, the results are strong and somewhat astonishing. Hard to get that “Gee whiz!” kinda thought out of my head, like, “This is paper?!?!”. “Ductile” tends toward the brutal as well, fierce waves of sound scouring one’s speakers clean, rumbling and pealing like nearby thunder. Harsh and then some.

Three fine releases right up front for this label—nice start!

Thessaloniki site


Phill Niblock – Disseminate (Mode) Part of my ongoing, if sporadic, attempt to Phill out my Niblockiana (this I bought). Three steady state works, one for orchestra, one for low winds (contrabasses flute, tuba & saxophone, this one constructed by Niblock from manipulated recording extracts) and one for a quintet of viola, cello, bass clarinet/soprano sax (Lucio Capece), flute and trombone. Fine “blank wall” listening, that is, each sounds like a changeless drone but listening with even a modicum of attention evokes all sorts of detail. Excellent stuff.


Our own Robert Kirkpatrick sent over two very strong works as well: “thaw”, a 3” disc blending water droplets with hyper-clear statics and keening whines, beautifully handled and a compilation of the first three releases on his Hollow Earth label under the title, “Documenting the Decline”. The trio of pieces originally released as “Sounds of the Hollow Earth” are quite good, especially the somewhat terrifying final one, all mutant bird squawks and generally fluttery horror. “Dance of the New Mysterians” is as loopy as its title but oddly hypnotic and fascinating. Order some and force Robert to burn more copies. hollow earth


Things are not so good on the Room40 front. I have nothing inherently against lullaby-pop or even waif-rock (is that a term in use?), but “The Bedtime Beat”, from Lullatone (Shawn Seymour & Yoshimi Tomida), pushed my limits. Kind of like Penguin Café Orchestra for tots, cutesy with the occasional semi-catchy melody, simply constructed, but several shades too saccharine, even with the “quirky” instrumentation, for its own good.


The Rational Academy’s “a heart against your own” harkens back to early 80s art-rock of the Weekend variety, not quite as good, a bit more slick. Lawrence English mans the electronics for this nonet; it might be more or less his band and his pieces, not sure. Very well produced, competently played and sung, but if you heard them over the closing credits of some trust fund indie film, you wouldn’t be surprised. Not unpleasant, but not memorable either.


Jeff Gburek’s “Virtuous Cycles” is an early favorite of mine this year but his concurrent “Red Rose for the Sinking Ship” (Triple Bath) doesn’t quite compare. Some nice sections (the third one, especially, with a subtle mix of street noise, obscure squeaks and faint chimes) but a bit rambling for my taste. It doesn’t gain the traction I wanted to hear, maybe only because I liked his preceding one so much. Not bad at all, but I wants me more meat. (Limited edition of 96, btw) triple bath

More to come a bit later.

I first heard percussionist Milton Cardona in the context of Kip Hanrahan's work in the early 80s. This album, "Bembe", appeared on American Clave in '86 and it's a beaut. It's entirely devoted to Santeria chants with a group made up of a lead singer and percussionist (Cardona) and an ensemble of response singers and percussionists (the drummers including Hector "Flaco" Hernandez, Steve Berrios and Jose Fernandez). My working knowledge of Santeria music is just above minimal so I can't really say how representative this is, but the impression I get is that Cardona knows what he's doing and it sounds damned real to me. Gorgeous Afro-Cuban melodies, stirring (and rough) choral singing and hypnotic percussion combine for a moving, thrilling recording. I'd appreciate any recommendations along this line.

While researching a bit, I noticed Cardona put out another disc under his name, "Cambucha", in 1999, also on American Clave; interested to hear that. Though Hanrahan-led or produced projects in recent years have left me a bit cold. I picked up Deep Rumba last year and, expecting great things, was let down.



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Along with Billie Holiday, Betty Carter has always been my favorite female jazz singer. I bought this recording pretty early in my listening, maybe around '76, rather odd in the context of the other things I was listening to at the time (AACM, Taylor, Ornette, etc.) but Carter's singing inevitably melted me. I have a few other releases but have always enjoyed this one the most. I believe it was something of a comeback record, recorded in 1969 at Judson Hall, NYC with Norman Simmons on piano, the great Lisle Atkinson on bass and Al Harewood on drums. A fantastic series of tunes including "Blue Moon" (taken drastically up tempo), "The Sun Died", "Girl Talk" and a fantabulous rendition of Randy Weston's "Ego". Her elasticity is astonishing, bending and warping the melodies into pure Carteriana.

I never had the occasion to see her perform, which I greatly regret. Everything I've read about her indicates, music aside, she was something special.



******************















There's one other Carter amongst my vinyl, John. Never really explored his work as much as I probably should have, with only this and the follow-up, "Dance of the Love Ghosts" under his name, plus a fine Hat disc with Bobby Bradford, "Movin' On".

I know this Ghana sequence (were there three or four albums in the series? I don't quite recall) is hailed by many as one of the signal achievements of jazz in the 80s. While I enjoy it very much, I've never quite gone that far. It's interesting, listening now, to hear tinges of the same tonalities that Ornette used in his symphonic work, "Skies of America" considering that they grew up together. The title track from this one is something of a monster, especially once Carter's burbling clarinet surfaces alongside Bradford's cornet. The remainder of the album doesn't quite live up to that, though it's fine in a good-Muhal kinda way, even if Terry Jenoure's vocals are a bit woozy.

"Dance of the Love Ghosts" (admittedly, I have a tough time getting past the title) strikes me as less focussed and a tad shrill; not bad at all but not the stuff of legends.

I get the sense that I'd generally have enjoyed Carter in small group settings (like that "Movin' On" date). Recommendations in that vein appreciated.

***********

Reading:

Knut Hamsun - Hunger

On Deck:

John Crowley - Little, Big

I've been listening to Cardew's recording of "Thälmann Variations" a whole bunch over the last couple of weeks. This is the Matchless recording which seems to be out of print? For some reason, I have it on vinyl, perhaps because it was never issued on disc? In any case, it's my only Cardew in that format, not counting the memorial concert double-LP on Impetus, which I wrote about here

"Thälmann" takes up all of Side One here and must automatically be compared with Rzewski's "¡El Pueble Unido Jamas Sera Vencido!" from around the same time. Indeed, I'm a little curious which came first or how much, if any, communication there was between the two at the time. I assume this and much more will be covered when John Tilbury's Cardew biography sees the light of day (I can't wait--anyone have recent news?). I first heard the Rzewski very soon after its release on Vanguard in, iirc, 1976 with Ursula Oppens at the piano and fell absolutely in love with it. Still am. This is doubtless a major reason why I'm more open to Cardew's worker's song period than many. Especially when divested of the banal lyrical content you find in People's Liberation Music, the melodies and variations stand quite well on their own, making their points all the more forcefully fpr the lack of explicit content.

[I don't know the circumstances of this recording, but it's interesting that one can pick up outside-the-room sounds, especially car horns, periodically. It imparts a real world tinge into the otherwise "classical" and removed situation.]

Like the Rzewski, Cardew's piece is kind of a theme and variations, though not as strict, here incorporating music from several sources including Eisler, Charles Koechlin (a song called, "Let's Free Thälmann"), popular worker's songs and funeral dirges. To my ears, it's not quite as impassioned as the Rzewski, not so brilliantly and intricately wrought, not as "hard fought", but it remains a lovely, moving work, a string of observations that holds together well, offering something of a panoramic view of the working class' struggles and occasional victories through the eyes of one who was fairly deeply involved. Though that goes to a whole other question of just how deeply artists like Cardew (or Rzewski) can really be when, as in his case, they came from extremely high-placed families and knew that there was always, if it came to it, a cushion to fall back on. I get the sense it was something that Cardew struggled with quite a bit and, again, I hope it's gone into by Tilbury.

In purely pianistic terms, I'm not sure that in this kind of music (as opposed to, say, Feldman) Cardew, fine as he is, can hold his own against someone like Rzewski who is simply astounding on a technical level. The romantic drama in his work fits that éclat perfectly. (Wondering if Tilbury ever tackled The People United...) Cardew's a bit more ruminative which works beautifully in the more pastoral sections, maybe a tad less convincingly in the rousing ones. Still, a fine piece deserving of being heard more often. Ironically, it's available these days on the New Albion disc with Rzewski at the keys and I actually prefer the airiness of Cardew's rendition.

The second side of the album contains six short pieces: the joyous march of "Bethanien Song" (interestingly commemorating a change in plans re: the conversion of an old hospital from an artist center to a children's hospital--wonder if the same feeling would hold today?); "The Red Flag", based on the changes to "O Tanenbaum"; "Soon", based on a pamphlet of Mao's from 1930 promising imminent revolution, lovely, quasi-minimalist piece; and a trio of Irish songs, "Croppy Boy", "Father Murphy" and "Four Principles on Ireland". These last seem loaded down with a bit more weight than they're capable of supporting, matters getting a bit sloggy and technique-strewn.

Well worth tracking down on the whole, however.

(I should mention that Robert has a fine review of a very recent Rzewksi concert at his Spiral Cage blog.)

Went to Issue Project Room last night to hear an evening of the music of John Cage organized by Kurt Gottschalk and John McDonough. I’m pretty sure I’ve never actually attended an all-Cage performance—technically, this wasn’t either, as we’ll see—and in fact, I can’t remember the last time I heard a Cage piece live at all. Aside from my own continuous renditions of 4’33”, of course.

The current site of IPR is a long, narrow, high-ceilinged room. When Keith and Julien played there in October, they made the wise decision to set up against a wall in its center, somewhat negating the unnecessary audience/performer dynamic (and, indeed, asking people to walk around at will and even question them about the score during the performance). This time, it was a more traditional format with the musicians at one end, for me not the most conducive structure. Too, they chose not to use (or maybe were unable to do so) the sixteen speaker in-house system, something that would have benefited the music greatly, imho.

Four works were presented: “Indeterminacy/Variations I”, “Cartridge Music”, “Radio Music” and a piece by McDonough, “Landscape Under Construction”. The first was for two guitars (Gottschalk and Russell Scholl) and voice (Kristen Persinos), the guitarists performing “Variations I”, the vocalist “Indeterminacy”. She began by asking an audience member to shuffle the several dozen pages of her text and then to “cut” it, as in a deck of cards, the text turning out to be from Gertrude Stein. It was something of a disjunctive performance. When Cage read text, his voice tended to flow at a fairly rapid clip and, while intimating both humor and intelligence, was undramatic enough so as not to stand out from whatever the other sounds were present; you can hear it both as an equal sonic element and as an imparter of verbal information. Persinos’ approach was somewhat more arch, with rather elaborate expressions ranging from wry to exasperated to mocking as well as including numerous physical gestures, all very well done (and with a very nice tonal quality to her voice) but serving to distance herself from the guitars, enough so that it was impossible not to hear the instrumental work as accompaniment rather than on an equal footing, especially as the guitars were almost always quite spare. Maybe the simple expedient of placing her behind the guitarists would have helped even things out but as was, things didn’t quite gel.

"Cartridge Music" involved five players on stereo cartridges and other electronic items. They performed under the steady and commanding gaze of a digital clock which, though I understand it's part of the deal, cast an uncomfortable, managerial aura. The score (I'm presuming, not having seen it, but Kurt could correct me) calls for certain actions to be undertaken at specific times, so the audience is presented with the picture of five guys moving around the stage, constantly looking back and forth at the clock and the small cards they carried containing the score, almost as if for permission to act. A certain sense of constriction comes into play though I suppose in 1960, when the piece was written, that would have been far less the case and would have served to open up previously unheard sound worlds. Today, there's something about it that struck me as oddly dated, the same way a Zorn game piece might. It would be interesting to compare the choices made by various possible musicians given the same constraints (how would Tudor have handled it? How would Rowe?), but those very constraints, in a post-AMM world, seem more binding than liberating.

The second half of the concert proved much more successful. Barry Chabala, one of eight radio operators, showed me his portion of the score beforehand. It runs for six minutes, divided into four 1 1/2 minute segments. Within each of those portions is a listing of AM radio frequencies, ranging (as best I can recall) from about three to maybe a dozen, each of which to be visited during the 90 seconds, I assume in the order listed). The effect was quite wonderful though, again, I would have loved to have heard the speaker system taken advantage of or to have had the radios dispersed among the audience. Even so, the chatter, the snatches of music, the sports play by play and the static or in between-ness (I think the frequencies are set, so that when performed in a given locale, they may or may not coincide with existing on-air stations) created a very enjoyable, absorbing cloud of sound. I've no idea whether or not it was one of Cage's ideas with the piece, but the sensation of understanding that one always dwells in this enormous web of generally unheard sounds was quite strong. Very different (and, for me, perhaps ultimately less rewarding) than what groups like [N:Q] are attempting, but on it own merits, quite fascinating and stimulating.

The highlight of the evening, a very pleasant surprise, was McDonough's own "Landscape Under Construction", for 1 to 42 CD players, here ten. As I understand it (again, Barry or Kurt can correct me), each musician selects a disc of Cage's music from 42 supplied by McDonough. (S)he then follows a time-based score (total time = 34'55") consisting of two columns which contained instructions on starting or pausing the disc (which is played from its beginning) as well as volume increases or decreases. At several points, the player can choose to cross over from one column to another and continue on from there. I'm wondering how much of the "success" of a given performance depends on what combination of discs is chosen, ie, how much variation and/or balance there happens to be. In this case, there were (I think) two that consisted of voice (one Cage's, one in German), a piece for solo cello, one for harp, one that utilized Western operas, one for strings, and other assorted noise, including percussion. Whatever, the result was a beautifully shifting landscape where the listener constantly makes pattern connections between ostensibly unrelated musics, almost all of them seeming to make "sense". It flowed along wonderfully, rarely losing traction, almost always maintaining interest. If I had a quibble, it was that McDonough's own player was a bit loud and that combined with the pieces emanating from it (a clattering percussion work and, I think, one for radios and/or record players--thought I heard snatches of Arthur Blythe and Zorn in there--) it occasionally dominated the proceedings to an untoward degree. As before, I'd love to hear it in a more expansive setting, maybe with more players. Though even as is, it could make a very fine CD on its own and it sounded like Mode is going to do just that in the near future. I suppose one would call this a process piece, and a damned good one.

A lovely evening. Would that this sort of affair was staged more often.

The correlation between love of jazz and love of baseball has, I think, been established in the past, at least among American white guys (Does this hold in Europe, substituting soccer--or, as they insist on calling it, "football"--for baseball?). Established by whom? I've no idea--I don't know of any studies on the subject--but from decades of casual conversation, it's entirely commonplace for serious baseball discussions to sprout at a jazz venue. Less so for eai? Dunno, though we have Mr.'s Abbey and Mitchell around who certainly fit the bill and Tim Albro and I spent many a minute in baseball discussions last year.

I'm wondering if it goes further than that. If we take, as a general rubric, the category "new music fan" (meaning an interest in the avant-garde in jazz, improv, contemporary classical, etc.), I'm betting that the representation of not only baseball fans but the subsection of those fans who whiled away thousands of hours casting pairs of dice on an APBA or Strato-Matic board far, far exceeds the national average. (These thoughts spurred, naturally, by the current thread at Jazz Corner)

I became hooked on the former in early 1973, playing the 1972 season. I've no idea how knowledge of this game entered my consciousness; certainly no one I knew was into it. My brother Drew and I placed the order, he taking the NL, me the AL. Not having a clear idea of the "value" of the cards, we traded a bit willy-nilly. I recall finagling Leron Lee from him, possessor, iirc, of a formidable 1-3-6-6 card. It's interesting that, many years since I last played a game of APBA, number combos like 1-1-4-5, 1-5-6-6 or *gasp* 1-1-4-5-6 can still elicit pangs of tingly nostalgia. It's a bit hard to reconcile the image of my 18-year old self, tossing the dice on the floor of my bedroom and consulting the play charts while the Art Ensemble is blaring from my wretched turntable above.

(I'm amusedly contemplating the doubtless majority of readers here wondering what the the hell I'm going on about).

APBA and the like involved abstracting the game of baseball, codifying a player's season into a concise series of numbers which, when combined with the play boards, yielded a near-infinite number of possible game outcomes, but a bound infinity within the probabilities of the game. Somewhere in there might be the connection to improvised music. Maybe.

Maybe not.