Rolling Jazz Thread 2023

Oh, because it's self-released. Apparently Blade also released a double album tribute to Bobby Hutcherson that has Jon Cowherd and Myron Waldon on it, and a live Fellowship bootleg from 2000. I've got some juicy catching up to do!

https://brianblade.bandcamp.com/album/live-from-the-archives

https://brianblade.bandcamp.com/album/volumes-l-ll-now-and-forevermore-honoring-bobby-hutcherson

Yeah, I bought two of those (the Fellowship and the Hutcherson, not the live thing).

My latest Stereogum column is up; I interviewed bassist Jason Ajemian about jaimie branch (they were friends and collaborators for more than 15 years), whose final album comes out this week.

Nice one, enjoyed the Brian Blade write-up.

I've been listening to that Pablo Held podcast and checking out some albums that get mentioned. There was a John Patitucci live trio album with Blade and Chris Potter that's nice, a bunch of Scott Colley records with Blade (and one with Nate Smith on drums), but what I'm really enjoying is this improvised piano & drums duo album from Kevin Hays & Bill Stewart, 'American Ballad' (from last year). Really really cool stuff.

genuinely not trying to speak ill of the deceased, but i simply don’t get what i’ve heard of branch. the energy and vision everyone talks about seems ham-fisted and the music is really dull, to my ears— is it one of those “you have to see it live” type of things that i will now, sadly, never experience?

Same, I try to hold my tongue because why trash something people are enjoying (especially now), but I've never gotten it or liked her playing. I figure it must be about the energy and maybe it's better to think about it as a theatrical performance/punk rock thing with jazz instruments and players, just not my thing.

Yeah, Branch was a had to see her live thing. The live album was also the key for me.

Yeah after I got over my "Jazz has to have long solos" prejudice I just enjoyed it for what it is. I have a feeling many people who are marketed as Jazz today are making "jazz-influenced, but not strictly jazz" and I have to recalibrate my expectations of like, George Coleman or something.

Yeah, the livealbum made me a fan of jamie branch too.

i had never heard of jaimie/fly or die but they opened for yo la tengo at one of the hanukkah shows and it was truly transfixing. i bought the live record vinyl and was sitting at the balcony bar holding it on my lap and she passed by and punched me in the shoulder and gave a smile & thumbs up and it was such a sweet moment. i wish i was able to see her/them many more times but sadly that was it. rip.

yeah, i kind of figured— wish i could have seen her and a group perform live!!!

in other news, in a poor financial but excellent happiness decision, i bought two tickets to see Natural Information Society in about a month here in Philly. exceptionally stoked.

yeah, i kind of figured— wish i could have seen her and a group perform live!!!

in other news, in a poor financial but excellent happiness decision, i bought two tickets to see Natural Information Society in about a month here in Philly. exceptionally stoked.

Today's listening is Jorge Rossy on various instruments after listening to his Pablo Held interview. I really didn't know that after leaving the Brad Mehldau Trio he switched to piano, and then has been making records on vibes as a leader ever since (while still acting as a sideman on drums). Sounds like he's much more interested in composing and playing piano & vibes and doesn't practice on drums anymore, but can't argue with people if they keep calling him to play drums, lol.

He's such a unique and sensitive accompanist though:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5lG7B0lRclU

Sounds like he's much more interested in composing and playing piano & vibes and doesn't practice on drums anymore, but can't argue with people if they keep calling him to play drums, lol.

Tyshawn Sorey is in a somewhat similar position — he wants to focus on composition but people keep wanting him to play drums for them.

Photographer & chef Frank Stewart has had 2 exhibits in DC this summer-- one at a gallery (exhibit has now closed but photos are on the link) and a larger one at the Phillips Collection museum (exhibit is open till Sept. 3). Plenty of jazz photos, plus New Orleans ones and more

Stewart was exposed to gospel, blues and jazz music through his mother Dorothy Jean Lewis Stewart as well as his stepfather, jazz pianist Phineas Newborn, Jr. However, it was not until the 1970s that Stewart began photographing jazz when he traveled with Ahmad Jamal. Later in the 80s and early 90s, he traveled with the Wynton Marsalis Septet and co-created the book, Sweet Swing Blues on the Road with Marsalis. During this time Stewart worked in jazz clubs in New York and Chicago and ultimately became the senior photographer of Jazz for the Lincoln Center in 1993.

http://www.galleryneptunebrown.com/20236-frank-stewart-exhibition-page

https://www.phillipscollection.org/event/2023-06-10-frank-stewarts-nexus

Don't really get this have to see live thing - fly or die were an electrifying live band, but the studio albums are very well crafted. The new one is a superb example of this: recorded mostly live, but with some edits, overdubs and creative mixing. I don't think anyone else in her generation has come quite as close to bringing avant-garde ideas - explorations of timbre, extended techniques and electronic processing, graphic notation etc - into such an accessible, uplifting and politically charged format. Of course it has broader influences, but it's absolutely jazz. She was a brilliant trumpet player. Even when playing short phrases or melodies her tone is so strong, and when she does take a longer solo it's fantastic. I'd recommend checking out her album with Ig Henneman and Anne Leberge to see how good she is in a free improvised context.

Don't really get this have to see live thing - fly or die were an electrifying live band, but the studio albums are very well crafted. The new one is a superb example of this: recorded mostly live, but with some edits, overdubs and creative mixing. I don't think anyone else in her generation has come quite as close to bringing avant-garde ideas - explorations of timbre, extended techniques and electronic processing, graphic notation etc - into such an accessible, uplifting and politically charged format. Of course it has broader influences, but it's absolutely jazz. She was a brilliant trumpet player. Even when playing short phrases or melodies her tone is so strong, and when she does take a longer solo it's fantastic. I'd recommend checking out her album with Ig Henneman and Anne Leberge to see how good she is in a free improvised context.

like honestly, i’ve never been more disappointed in a record that i bought because of the hype around it, only to find it’s not even something i want taking up space on my phone

Saw Jaimie live a couple years back and it still stands out as one of the best shows I’ve seen in the last decade. I didn’t listen to the previous studio albums much, but I’m not really feeling the new one…vocals are weak, lyrics are a little clunky, music almost feels corny at times. I’ll still give it a few more listens and it’s certainly possible I’ll change my mind, as I’ve only given it one listen so far. The trumpet playing is uniformly excellent even when I’m not really into the tunes.

Thanks for the xxxxpost pix, curm!

My label, Burning Ambulance Music, is putting out a CD in October that I think some folks here would like. It's by saxophonist Ivo Perelman and trumpeter Nate Wooley and it's called Polarity 2, a sequel to a set of duos I released in 2021. Here's a sample track:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwFeIJtPK04

It's out October 13, but pre-orders will launch on Friday, including a specially priced bundle so you can get both Polarity discs at once.

RIP Charles Gayle

https://www.npr.org/2023/09/08/1198248630/charles-gayle-saxophonist-obit

counterpoint:

fuck Charles Gayle

i'm certainly not trying to tell you how to feel

xp I will check out Ivo & Nate, thanks for the reminder!

Before I'd heard about Gayle, last night a friend sent me this:
Charles Gayle Trio live:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6mk-j8vsJM

& here they are with Joe McPhee:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPptathTLz0

gayle never did much for me even his supposed masterpiece “Touchin on Trane”. It’s just that I didn’t think there was really much that distinguished him from much superior exponents of free music.

gayle never did much for me even his supposed masterpiece “Touchin on Trane”. It’s just that I didn’t think there was really much that distinguished him from much superior exponents of free music.

I used to think that too. But I saw him live three times, twice playing sax and once playing piano, and when I dug into his catalog I found a whole lot of material that was much more thoughtful and carefully structured than the screaming-in-your-face stuff that people fixated on. In fact, he was an unbelievably technically skilled horn player, up there with Pharoah Sanders and Sonny Rollins in terms of absolute mastery of the instrument. His albums with two bassists — Translations, Raining Fire, Blue Shadows, and More Live at the Knitting Factory — are really beautiful.

Now Arthur Doyle — him I don't get.

Jordan posted great stuff about his teacher Richard Davis over on Roll Call: Jazz Heroes of the Upright Bass

You don't get Arthur Doyle? Not even Alabama Feeling or his playing on Babi?

Alabama Feeling still just about the RAWEST saxophone sound that I can think of, reason enough to dig Doyle.

I like Charles Gayle's drumming on The Blue Humans' Live in London 1994.

The one time I saw Gayle was an unforgettable experience: Cafe Oto in 2017 with John Edwards and Mark Sanders. Beautiful sax playing - as Phil says, a lot more to it that screaming and his piano playing was something else. He had the audience breaking out in spontaneous whoops and cheers, even a bit of singing IIRC. There were definitely spirits being channeled that night - the atmosphere was quite unlike anything I've experienced.

https://www.cafeoto.co.uk/shop/charles-gayle-john-edwards-mark-sanders-seasons-ch/

You don't get Arthur Doyle? Not even Alabama Feeling or his playing on Babi?

I like Babi, and Noah Howard's The Black Ark is an amazing record that uses Doyle as a special effect. But that's all he ever was — he was absolutely the one-dimensional shriek machine that people accuse every other free jazz player of being, and a little goes a very long way.

It is telling that on the Roisin Murphy thread everyone is saying that she’s fucked her career and yet a virulent and vocal homophobe and anti-choice dickbag like Gayle is getting treated with kid gloves here.

It’s fine if you want to listen to him, but at least respect why some of us don’t give a fuck about him and are glad he’s fucked off into Hell, where his hateful bullshit has taken him despite his probable belief to the contrary

I mean fwiw, I do acknowledge that everyone’s mileage varies with this kind of thing. I still think the Evan Parker and NIS record from 2021 is sick, tho Evan Parker is a nutso anti-vax fascist.

But as a gay dude, I’m just going to state that in my opinion, it isn’t free jazz unless it’s about liberation in sound and spirit, and while I might admire Gayle’s sound, the lack at his spiritual center sort of drowns out whatever pleasure I’ve derived from his sound.

It is telling that on the Roisin Murphy thread everyone is saying that she’s fucked her career and yet a virulent and vocal homophobe and anti-choice dickbag like Gayle is getting treated with kid gloves here.

I have written a much longer take which will be published on Wednesday in the BA newsletter. I'll link it when it's out.

...Charles Gayle. Gayle is notorious for his homophobic views, which he likes to express in the course of his performance

Table otm - what a stain this guy was

Can't blame anyone for rejecting Gayle based on his views and it certainly does test the limits of separating art and life. Matana Roberts had some interesting reflections on their Twitter about this.

As for Evan Parker, he's obviously deeply misguided with his anti-vax nonsense, but he's not a fascist. Like many an older lefty, he's probably been spending too much time on dodgy websites and the relative isolation and financial precarity brought about by Covid won't have helped. It's not like he's obsessively going on about it and I think a dose of reality (no gigs outside the UK for a couple of years, other musicians presumably having a word, and, ironically enough, a bout of Covid) may have pulled him back from the brink. Those close to him will have a better idea of what's going on. I guess time will tell.

it's good to see you posting, stew

table, i did not know those things about CG and it was not my intention to overlook or dismiss homophobia.

Not only did he have gross opinions, he'd apparently interrupt his performances to rant about abortion, et al.

I've never listened to Gayle, and also had no idea he was such a piece of shit, damn.

More importantly - do I go see the Chris Speed Trio with Dave King this week, or Amendola vs Blades w/Cyro Baptista next week? Leaning towards the latter since I've seen CST before (although it's always delightful to see such great musicians), and I'm betting Cyro Baptista will be a real fun time live.

Yeah I've never heard him either and had no idea, wow.

Would love to hear Cyro Baptista live. His album with Derek Bailey is a favourite of mine.

Huh, didn't know about CG's antichoice views/onstage rants until now; the one time I heard him live (in '95, with Rashied Ali and William Parker), he didn't say a word until show's end

cancelling the legacy of a jazz artist who i'd never heard of until he died just now

modernity is wild

I was a huge Charles Gayle fan from the moment I heard in him 1993, my first real brush free jazz as current vital force, not historical artifact, and it was through him I would discover, Ware, Parker, Shipp, et al and basically a whole universe music I'm still fascinated by to this day.

I never got to see him live, his one trip to Mpls I was aware of it but still underage, I tried to get into the show, couldn't.

I think I first heard his rants on "Testaments" (I think it's that one) so 1995 and it ruined his music for me, for at least twenty years I couldn't separate the art from the artist and even now I still can't really, but I can listen to those early records (and some more recent ones that record with Edwards/Sanders mentioned upthread is incredible) and hear the greatness of his playing and I have to admit he is still fascinating artist to me in spite of everything, though obv the line is different for everyone and even if he didn't have completely repellant homophobic and misogynistic views his music is really not for everyone, nor was he the kind of artist to compromise for any reason...I mean the whole "Streets" thing...

Matana Roberts's thoughts & livestream where very interesting and I mean, even in this thread there are youtube clips of Gayle playing with artists who would be the target of his rants, so I'm not sure how to square any of this...

This essay from 2018 gets at some things I agree with (again, I'll have a long piece going out on Wednesday).

Most scandalously, he began preaching his version of Christian salvation from the bandstand. And thus for Gayle—a modest, unassuming if eccentric working musician verging on retirement age—the shit hit the fan. The most contentious aspects of Gayle’s sermonizing were his insistence that abortion was nothing but “a slick word for killing babies,” and his decrying of “men lusting after men and women lusting after women” as an “abomination” and a “sin” on par with “lying, cheating, and stealing.” Audiences, club owners, and festival directors alike were bemused and put off. Work became harder to come by.

Now it probably goes without saying that, like most people my age in this country, I am cool with anybody lusting after anybody, and doing what they will with that lust, so long as all parties are consenting. Additionally, I will always be an advocate for a woman’s right to make her own decisions about reproduction and her own body. Gayle’s attitudes on these issues are not ones that I am in sympathy with. And I am not about to defend his right to profess those attitudes, since I know that, when expressed, they do real people real harm, especially when their expression is buttressed by institutional support.

But I also feel that it’s important to acknowledge that Gayle’s Christianity is, and has always been, firmly in the mainstream of American evangelical thought. When Gayle made these statements about abortion and homosexuality—just two years after Planned Parenthood v. Casey, and years before Will & Grace and Brokeback Mountain and Queer Eye, when “gay panic” defenses for murder still held some water in the American justice system—most Americans probably would have agreed with him. A jazz blog is a fine place for a reminder that the past, even the recent past, is often a bleaker place than we like to remember it.

Gayle’s fundamentalism is a reflection of a pervasive American situation. The fact that he — a penniless African-American musician with a negligible audience* that, by his own admission, probably disagrees with him — has been singled out for institutional censure thus makes me a little bit queasy. He’s an easy target. We can’t bring down Pat Robertson or James Dobson, but we can sure as hell can bring down Charles Gayle.

Gayle’s Christianity is actually a bit more nuanced than the spine-chilling pronouncements to which it is often reduced. A 1994 concert performance in Santa Barbara affords Gayle his longest and most poetic stay at the pulpit. Fired by Michael Wimberley’s drums, Gayle does indeed decry abortion and homosexuality. Outrageously, he implies that being “a homosexual” is equivalent to being “a murderer” in a long list of spiritual transgressions—as are smoking, and drinking, and being “a very arrogant person.” But, for all that, he gives no impression of moralistic hauteur. “You all got a slick word for killin’ babies,” he begins to say, and “a slick way of committing abomination” – but he suddenly corrects himself: “when I say you, I mean me.” In Gayle’s interpretation of scripture — and he does know his scripture — one Bible sin is as good as any other as a reflection of a person’s spiritual character. (Telling us that smoking is no different than lying or “fornicating,” he admonishes us — and himself — not to “try to get uppity-jumpity about what sin you’ve committed.”) He is aware that the New Testament says that no-one is without sin, not least the preacher himself. The nature of the sin is immaterial; even being a “good” person as opposed to a “bad” one is immaterial. What is material to Gayle is that sin itself is forgiven, as long as the sinner comes believingly to Christ. And that, he says, is the message of John Coltrane, Albert Ayler, and Eric Dolphy. Any other interpretation of the music of these African-American icons is, he decrees, an appropriation: if you haven’t “surrendered” to Christ, “don’t talk about Coltrane, don’t talk about Albert, don’t talk about Black music, because you’re talkin’ a lie.”

I saw Charles Gayle in 2001 or 2002. It was great. He played a lot of piano, which surprised me a little, but I really enjoyed. I sat at a table next to Roscoe Mitchell.

Eh, I think that take is bullshit, but considering the pushback I’ve gotten here and elsewhere about it, I’m just not going to say anymore about it in the hopes that we might talk about some newer jazz that actually matters instead of some deceased crackpot.