Carla Bley - C or D/S or D?

bumping because I just spent way too long trying to make sense of Bley's bizarre prison-themed Web 1.0 (maybe Web 1.5) website at http://www.wattxtrawatt.com/

It's been updated at least since 2016 as there is a bit about putting Donald Trump in jail somewhere in it.

Finally, I discovered that her daughter Karen Mantler rocks the same hairstyle as her she does, perhaps for some kind of Gallagher 2 scenario.

ngl got nervous about this bump given her age. 'escalator over the hill' is an all time great, always loved this write up:

Marcello Carlin, writing for Stylus Magazine, considers the album to be "the greatest record ever made." He said: "No protest, no social commentary. No expression of love, of grief, of hope, of despair. It is literally whatever you want to make of it. It is devoid of every quality which you might assume would qualify it to be the greatest of all records. And yet it is that tabula rasa in its heart, the blank space which may well exist at the very heart of all music, revealing the hard truth that we have to fill in the blanks, we have to interpret what is being played and sung, and our interpretation is the only one which can possibly be valid, as we cannot discern any perspective other than our own.

tropic appetites & dinner music after that...

France Musique is reporting on their X (Twitter) that she has passed away, shared by folks like Robert Beatty and Oren Ambarchi, though I can't get a working link since I'm not signed into X on this computer.

Noooooooo

Pianiste, organiste, leader de premier plan et compositrice aux œuvres protéiformes, autant inspirées par le jazz que la musique classique, religieuse et folklorique, la jazzwoman américaine Carla Bley est décédée ce mardi matin. Elle avait 87 ans.https://t.co/jXM5upZGrI

— France Musique (@francemusique) October 17, 2023

wow. a true giant. RIP.

oh shit, one of the greats :(

rip!!!! :(

Couldn't say it was unexpected, just that her music means so much to me.

RIP legend

one of those titanic artists whose music I’ve never been sophisticated enough to appreciate but whose interviews I love reading. and the best hair.

sorry if that sounded flippant, I admire her a lot

I'm a grunting troglodyte and love loads of her music! Not just Escalator Over The Hill or one of the best ecm albums ever with Haden, Ballad of the Fallen, loads of her late period stuff was great as well.

You want flippant? I've always meant to listen to more of her albums but the covers were so uniformly terrible that I never took the plunge. I've only heard about half of Escalator Over The Hill and her three most recent ECM releases — Trios, Andando El Tiempo, and Life Goes On. Those last three are all really beautiful, though.

she composed the Ida Lupino tribute on Paul Bley's Closer, just one of the most beautiful things ever.

The Lost Chords one with Paolo Fresu is another beauty.

RIP Carla. Responsible for so much great, and diverse, music.

Nick Mason's Fictitious Sports is one of my favorites albums ever. It's her album all but in name.

Really horrible news. R.I.P.

I think in interviews she said Ellington was a freeriding parasite feeding off Strayhorn's talent. Not something I'd agree with - but still v funny!

Which of her other records come closest to Escalator, Tropic Appetites and the Nick Mason album, in terms of being song-based and "rock-friendly"?

If Marcello still posted here he'd probably have a few answers, but Night-Glo but would probably be among them.

I think it’s mostly Michael Mantler’s album but it think she had something to do with the Edward Gorey tribute The Hapless Child .

"After giving up the church to immerse herself in roller skating at the age of fourteen, she moved to New York at seventeen and became a cigarette girl at Birdland."

is this amazing origin story common knowledge?

her own recordings, her work with mantler, the haden collaborations (& yes ida lupino!) so much great music.

Which of her other records come closest to Escalator, Tropic Appetites and the Nick Mason album, in terms of being song-based and "rock-friendly"?

more a mantler joint than strictly bley though she's a big part of it, but maybe SILENCE (though not the biggest fan of it myself tbh)

RIP. Would also highly recommend A Genuine Tong Funeral by Gary Burton, where Carla wrote all the tunes and plays piano alongside an incredible band. V much a trial run for Escalator.

I saw her live once, playing with Charlie Haden and a late version of the Liberation Music Orchestra during Ornette Coleman's Meltdown Festival in London. It seemed significant that she was the only musician on the night who didn't take an extended solo - a sign of reticence, even then? Or a commitment to thinking always as a composer/arranger first and foremost?

If Marcello still posted here he'd probably have a few answers, but Night-Glo but would probably be among them.

RIP. Would also highly recommend A Genuine Tong Funeral by Gary Burton, where Carla wrote all the tunes and plays piano alongside an incredible band. V much a trial run for Escalator.

Seconded.

It's basically the opposite of song-based and rock-friendly, but my favorite Carla piece is 3/4, her relentless sidelong exploration of triple meter from the 1975 split LP with Michael Mantler's 13. Somehow it's never been released digitally (on CD or otherwise). Hopefully someone steps up to reissue, though original vinyl copies are still pretty cheap for now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fAJ3z293GA

xp re: song-based stuff, check out the first (live) half of I Hate To Sing if you have a high tolerance for whimsy/goofiness.

Time/Life, a tribute to Charlie Haden mostly made up of her compositions, with her arranging and on piano is absolutely beautiful and i hate it never got a vinyl release. In my top 5-10 ECM releases.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lj_Z2nhDlh4

realised i'm a dummy and its not actually an ECM release! feels like it should be?

Regarding 3/4, while working on the archive for Glasgow arts space the Third Eye Centre (now the CCA), I came across a copy of the reduced score alongside a letter from Bley on JCOA headed paper. One of those amazing moments in a researcher's career when you stumble across gold. From the letter, it seems that there were plans to perform the piece in Glasgow with Scottish musicians, but it never came to fruition - mostly likely the usual logistics and funding. Bley's humour really comes across in the letter. She had visited the Third Eye in 1975 when touring with Jack Bruce, but didn't play Glasgow as leader until 1992. Photos here:
https://thirdeyejazz.blogspot.com/2021/09/the-third-eye-carla-bley-connection.html

wow

*applause*

Nice one Stew. Now where can I get some of that JCOA stationery...

https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-HgaUYa9wwcA/YUnuA7UOkYI/AAAAAAAACX8/Y7GDd4-3YcgfCWmQ_gxjjyJxdC6_NMj7ACLcBGAsYHQ/s640/carla%2Bbley%2Bpipe.jpg

When the kush hits

RIP to a giant. i discovered carla bley via emily haines of metric; the artwork of her heartbreaking solo piano album 'knives don't have your back' is a homage to 'escalator over the hill', one of the most mystifying records in the world, to which her father paul haines (magic jazz poet who WROTE IN ALL CAPS ALWAYS) wrote the libretto. <3

Marcello Carlin, writing for Stylus Magazine, considers the album to be "the greatest record ever made." He said: "No protest, no social commentary. No expression of love, of grief, of hope, of despair. It is literally whatever you want to make of it. It is devoid of every quality which you might assume would qualify it to be the greatest of all records. And yet it is that tabula rasa in its heart, the blank space which may well exist at the very heart of all music, revealing the hard truth that we have to fill in the blanks, we have to interpret what is being played and sung, and our interpretation is the only one which can possibly be valid, as we cannot discern any perspective other than our own.

Dave Douglas/Riverside also did a Carla Bley tribute album with 3 of her compositions in 2017.