A couple of 10 second excerpts of his music on the BBC radio obit doesn't seem adequate, playing the entire side 1 of Air Above Mountains would have been a more fitting for such a star.
― calzino, Friday, 6 April 2018 20:52 (six years ago) link
*tribute
I think about the first thing I heard about him was an NME article from the start of teh 80s that had a bit talking about I think John Coltrane having picked up a new piano that needed to be worn in or something. From what I remember it was located in his bedroom and he asked Cecil to play it, then sat on the bed dodging piano keys as they flew past him because Cecil played so hard.
I was also knocked out by hearing that he was a chess hustler since being able to think strategically that far ahead etc seems phenomenal.
I like his mid 60s stuff. Need to hear a lot more of his recordings though.
― Stevolende, Saturday, 7 April 2018 06:22 (six years ago) link
I was blasting out some of his 50's stuff that I hadn't listened to much previously this morning. Jazz Advance is an absolute classic, and with a young Steve Lacy in the band as well.
― calzino, Saturday, 7 April 2018 10:14 (six years ago) link
This was Sunny Murray, actually; I was just reading this story in Valerie Wilmer's As Serious as Your Life, which is an amazing book and highly recommended.
It was Anthony Braxton who was a chess hustler for many years in New York. Cecil had some real crap jobs in the early 60s; he was a dishwasher in jazz clubs that wouldn't hire him to play.
― grawlix (unperson), Saturday, 7 April 2018 13:22 (six years ago) link
http://freakytrigger.co.uk/ft/2018/04/eagle-god-turned-trickster-gremlin/
Although not a posthumous tribute, I liked this a lot.
"By temperament, Taylor had chosen ‘Out’ before Ayler, Coltrane or even Coleman, playing ‘free’ years before this became the term for the play, his example encouraging each of them to take similar steps."
― calzino, Saturday, 7 April 2018 16:15 (six years ago) link
I wrote something for The Wire.
― grawlix (unperson), Saturday, 7 April 2018 17:47 (six years ago) link
Fenway organ, 1st inning: I assume that all @MLB organists are paying tribute to #CecilTaylor this weekend. I went with the intro to "Rick Kick Shaw" from his 1956 debut album "Jazz Advance," recorded right here in Boston.— Josh Kantor (@jtkantor) April 7, 2018
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Saturday, 7 April 2018 17:54 (six years ago) link
Saw him on the festival circuit in 2002, lotsa heavies in the crowd soaking in the 88 tuned drums.
― Jersey Al (Albert R. Broccoli), Saturday, 7 April 2018 18:10 (six years ago) link
Nice piece Phil
I love this recording, one of his first (THE first?) collaboration with Sunny Murray...all three of these musicians dead within the last few months...too bad about the amateurish visuals
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jNJYe2tuUu4
― Scape: Goat-fired like a dog! (Myonga Vön Bontee), Saturday, 7 April 2018 20:14 (six years ago) link
yes, nice
I've been playing my boxset of 2 Ts for a Lovely T. what an amazing recording
― Dan S, Sunday, 8 April 2018 00:20 (six years ago) link
WMSE had a nice 3 hour show celebrating Taylor. The 4/08/18 show:
https://www.wmse.org/archives/?time=64800
― nicky lo-fi, Tuesday, 10 April 2018 13:05 (six years ago) link
In Cecil Taylor's honor, @EMPACnews is *giving away* copies of 'Solo | Duo | Poetry,' 2008 DVD featuring Cecil performing with the great Pauline Oliveros. DVD also includes 78-minute focus on Taylor's poetry. You pay only 0 shipping. https://t.co/cMREGoGDNO— Steve Smith (@nightafternight) April 10, 2018
― j., Wednesday, 11 April 2018 00:16 (six years ago) link
$10 for, should say
I love Cecil as an artist and as a human being. And miss his presence already. This world just gets sadder and duller all the time. But what i mostly came to say is My God, he is expensive to collect! All the really important, "must have" stuff by him is just insanely expensive. I don't know, i guess i'll just have to keep downloading them instead.
― VyrnaKnowlIsAHeadbanger, Wednesday, 11 April 2018 05:07 (six years ago) link
I kee[ thinking that artist's deaths lead to reissue campaigns but not sure how true that is. Would be good if it was though.
― Stevolende, Wednesday, 11 April 2018 07:39 (six years ago) link
All the really important, "must have" stuff by him is just insanely expensive.
Some of his career highlights (for me) are still pretty cheap and easy to find: Unit Structures, Conquistador!, the aforementioned trio with Bill Dixon and Tony Oxley on Victo. But yeah, his vast output on FMP is either not-exactly-cheap (around $30), crazy overpriced ($150 for The Hearth, a trio with Evan Parker and Tristan Honsinger), or just impossible to find.
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Wednesday, 11 April 2018 14:20 (six years ago) link
I have really got into the unrelenting brilliance of his Feel Trio album with Oxley and Parker. Fuck, it is amazing.
― calzino, Friday, 20 April 2018 12:30 (six years ago) link
I can't put my finger on what it is I like about Parker's contribution to this awesome recording, but I love any band with him in it.
― calzino, Friday, 20 April 2018 13:21 (six years ago) link
The writer knew Cecil a bit so there are some good, reflective quotes from Taylor's past relationships with various people in the artistic Black community he was part of, and fought with.
http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2018/05/16/the-world-of-cecil-taylor/
― xyzzzz__, Thursday, 17 May 2018 11:32 (five years ago) link
Yeah, that's a beautiful piece.
It's funny, Taylor has a habit of viciously (and sometimes hilariously) shit-talking people he'd been friends and/or collaborators with for years, or sometimes decades, but no one's ever said, "Then why did you continue to work with them?" or "Then why did you make four albums and go on tour with that musician who couldn't grasp your music?"
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Thursday, 17 May 2018 13:30 (five years ago) link
Shatz also did a rather wonderful piece on Mal Waldron in The Nation last year.
― calzino, Thursday, 17 May 2018 13:40 (five years ago) link
My favorite nickname he had for a fellow pianist he wasn't too fond of (this was when I was assisting on a documentary about him) was "Herbulous Hunchback"
― Acid Hose (Capitaine Jay Vee), Thursday, 17 May 2018 13:46 (five years ago) link
lol!
― calzino, Thursday, 17 May 2018 13:48 (five years ago) link
If I ever fully transcribe our "interview"/"conversation" for The Wire, I feel like I should subdivide it into categories:
- Cecil shit-talks his former collaborators (Bill Dixon and Ronald Shannon Jackson were the two who got hit hardest)- Cecil shit-talks other musicians (Miles Davis was the clear winner here, though Keith Jarrett and the Rolling Stones came up too)- Cecil praises other musicians, all of whom are dead (Billie Holiday, Horace Silver, Max Roach, Jimmy Lyons)
― grawlix (unperson), Thursday, 17 May 2018 14:19 (five years ago) link
I just picked up the double of Cecil’s concert with Mary Lou Williams. I’d never heard of it, but now I’m reading it’s regarded as a disaster... but how bad could it be?
― Scam jam, thank you ma’am (Sparkle Motion), Wednesday, 13 June 2018 00:30 (five years ago) link
One weird thing about that record is the slap-back echo effect on Cecil's channel. Weirdly, for the most part, it works.
I love the record, and it's fascinating to hear each player edge towards each other's approach, however minimally or briefly. For some reason, though, whoever set the thing up did so not realizing that Cecil Taylor is gonna do what Cecil Taylor does. That was apparently a source of tension for Williams and (especially) her rhythm section.
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Wednesday, 13 June 2018 00:37 (five years ago) link
https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2018/05/16/the-world-of-cecil-taylor/
As we ate, a procession of admirers and hangers-on stopped by our table to pay their respects. One was a tall West Indian man in a homemade white turban who called himself The Captain, and seemed to know Taylor well. I asked him what sort of work he did. “I do a variety of things,” he replied.
nice Shatz piece written shortly after his death. Blasting out Conquistador whilst reading it felt good!
― calzino, Tuesday, 2 October 2018 11:10 (five years ago) link
Yeah, definitely one of the better pieces on Cecil. And my friend/collaborator trumpeter Arthur Brooks is in the photo from the Amsterdam Concertgebouw (far left, back to camera). Brooks and Frank Wright (far right, seated at the piano) were chosen by Cecil to be the co-lead soloists on an orchestra piece, and Brooks rehearsed the band. George Lewis and (I think) Anthony Braxton were also part of this group.
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Wednesday, 3 October 2018 18:14 (five years ago) link
whenever I get about 10 mins into part 2 of Is It In The Brewing Luminous - I go into hyperbole mode and start thinking this is the greatest piece of art of the whole 20th century.
― calzino, Sunday, 24 February 2019 15:25 (five years ago) link
what happens later
― j., Sunday, 24 February 2019 15:42 (five years ago) link
usually someone walks into the kitchen and destroys my reverie with: turn down this shite i'm watching coronation st!
― calzino, Sunday, 24 February 2019 15:48 (five years ago) link
need to add cecil and acker bilk to the olimpo rock poster imo
― mark s, Sunday, 24 February 2019 15:54 (five years ago) link
did cecil have any opinions on does your chewing gum lose it's flavour..? tbh I've got a genuine affection for that one - with it being part of a load of ex-juke 45's that comprised my mum's record collection in my 70's childhood.
― calzino, Sunday, 24 February 2019 16:28 (five years ago) link
for those who are interested friend and musician alex ward has been creating a place to put his ongoing cecil taylor studies:https://alexwardmusicblog.wordpress.com/
― Fizzles, Sunday, 24 February 2019 16:56 (five years ago) link
just happen to be listening to the last one Alex mentions: One Too Many Salty Swift And Not Goodbye. It's a reet set!
― calzino, Sunday, 24 February 2019 18:39 (five years ago) link
one too many salty swift and not goodbye on my stereo again... my goodness!
― calzino, Wednesday, 22 May 2019 14:50 (four years ago) link
cecil taylor reads a poem (this is the first time i've seen footage of him reading his poems it is way better than looking at them printed on a page) https://t.co/XyzmTHxDQ1— roland barfs (@rolandbarfs) May 4, 2020
― xyzzzz__, Sunday, 24 May 2020 15:02 (three years ago) link
everything about this is great. he has a lovely voice
is it you who put it on youtube ?
― budo jeru, Monday, 25 May 2020 14:11 (three years ago) link
There were a bunch of CT spoken word things on ubuweb bitd
― What fash heil is this? (wins), Monday, 25 May 2020 14:50 (three years ago) link
Still there! I actually wasn’t sure if ubuweb was still a thing
― What fash heil is this? (wins), Monday, 25 May 2020 14:52 (three years ago) link
The scene in the tweet is from a 1981 documentary called Imagine The Sound. In addition to Cecil, it features interviews with, and performances by, Bill Dixon, Archie Shepp, and Paul Bley -- not with each other, as I don't believe any were on speaking terms with one other at the time. I think the film is on a streaming service (Amazon, maybe), not positive, though.
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Monday, 25 May 2020 15:02 (three years ago) link
thanks for the context !
― budo jeru, Monday, 25 May 2020 15:17 (three years ago) link
think this was posted upthread but it's gone now
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_dfetfG6zA
live in paris 1969
the "student studies" 2xLP is a 1966 recording, but the angle / outfit of cecil at the piano in this video look just like the cover art of that release
― budo jeru, Saturday, 8 August 2020 22:52 (three years ago) link
JUst grabbed Cecil Taylor Unit cos I saw it online.
wondering what is essential by him.
GOt a couple of lps from the mid 60s and probably should have had more. Offcial stuff at least.
― Stevolende, Wednesday, 19 August 2020 21:20 (three years ago) link
i found her cartoon doppelgangerhttps://i.imgur.com/AWj8YFB.jpg🕸
JUst grabbed Cecil Taylor Unit cos I saw it online.wondering what is essential by him.GOt a couple of lps from the mid 60s and probably should have had more. Offcial stuff at least.
― Boring, Maryland, Wednesday, 19 August 2020 21:25 (three years ago) link
Conquistador! is essential. As the FMPs go, you can’t go wrong with the percussion duos. And the orchestra work, Alms/Tiergarten (Spree), was called “the best thing Cecil’s ever done” by Bill Dixon. The recently-released Birdland, Neuburg 2011 (duo with Oxley) is amazing, both musicians confounding expectations at every turn.
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Wednesday, 19 August 2020 21:36 (three years ago) link
it is in the brewing luminous is just so good, his 50's albums like jazz advance, looking ahead! have aged well ... ah too much essential. Even less celebrated albums like student studies, cell walk for celeste, the world of.. just get try the lot Stevo!
― calzino, Wednesday, 19 August 2020 21:42 (three years ago) link
Silent Tongues is perfect
― syphilitic wolf prose errata (Hadrian VIII), Wednesday, 19 August 2020 21:44 (three years ago) link
My recommended starting points:
• Everything by the 1978 Unit (Cecil Taylor Unit, 3 Phasis, Live in the Black Forest and One Too Many Salty Swift and Not Goodbye)• Solo albums: Indent, Silent Tongues, Air Above Mountains, Garden vols. 1 & 2, The Willisau Concert• The Feel Trio 2 Ts for a Lovely T box (10 live sets by Taylor, William Parker, and Tony Oxley)• Conquistador! > Unit Structures, but you need both• Cecil Taylor/Bill Dixon/Tony Oxley
― but also fuck you (unperson), Wednesday, 19 August 2020 21:54 (three years ago) link