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Albert Ayler Quintet: Copenhagen, Bordeaux 1966 & Newport 1967 Live First Release
by Mark Corroto
Heroin addicts often speak of chasing that first high for the rest of their lives. A similar impulse can be found among devoted listeners of Charlie Parker, the Grateful Dead and especially free jazz, perhaps most intensely among followers of saxophonist Albert Ayler. That initial encounter with Ayler's music, whether live or on record, can feel transformative, even overwhelming. Once experienced, it becomes something listeners spend years trying to rediscover. Maybe you were fortunate enough to hear Ayler ...
Continue ReadingAlbert Ayler: Live Greenwich Village to Love Cry Revisited
by Giuseppe Segala
Nel 1996, quando fu pubblicata la prima edizione della sua biografia dedicata ad Albert Ayler, Spirits Rejoice!, il contrabbassista e musicologo tedesco Peter Niklas Wilson scriveva nella prefazione: “La sua musica resta controversa: per alcuni fu un profeta, per altri un ciarlatano. (...) Ayler resta oggi tanto controverso quanto esile è la base per una discussione obiettiva sul suo contributo alla musica degli anni Sessanta." Anche tra i colleghi musicisti c'era chi ne apprezzava la potenza innovativa e propulsiva e ...
Continue ReadingNew York Art Quartet: New York Art Quartet Revisited
by Alberto Bazzurro
Questa preziosa (ancora una volta) riedizione di oltre un'ora e un quarto di musica riunisce i primi due album di uno dei gruppi più leggendari della stagione free, il primo intitolato semplicemente col suo nome e pubblicato dall'altrettanto leggendaria ESP fondata nel 1963 da Bernard Stollman (incisione del 16 novembre 1964), il secondo, Mohawk, di pochi mesi successivo (17 luglio 1965), edito su Fontana. Il gruppo è per tre quarti identico in entrambe le occasioni, allineando figure nodali di quella ...
Continue ReadingAlbert Ayler: More Lost Performances Revisited
by Chris May
A state-of-the-art sonic restoration of obscure but historically important Albert Ayler material by Switzerland's ezz-thetics label, which with its parent label, Hat Hut, has been creating an audiophile archive of Ayler recordings with the support of his estate since 1978. All too often, “more" in an album title means “Beware: barrel scraping in progress." Not in this case. More Lost Performances Revisited is primetime Ayler. The disc draws from three sources over a five-year timespan. The earliest ...
Continue ReadingWadada Leo Smith with Milford Graves and Bill Laswell: Sacred Ceremonies
by Karl Ackermann
As he approached his eightieth birthday, Wadada Leo Smith could have been content to sit out the year of nothingness that Covid-19 brought in 2020 and beyond. With his 2013 Pulitzer Prize nomination, a 2016 Doris Duke Award, and nearly one-hundred recording credits, the trumpeter & multi-instrumentalist has landed at the top of countless polls throughout his distinguished career. But, stepping away from the music, if only for a brief respite, is not part of the improviser's plan so, in ...
Continue ReadingMilford Graves al Centro di Ricerca Musicale di Bologna
by Libero Farnè
Milford Graves -"Cell Melodies" Centro di Ricerca Musicale Bologna 07-09.11.2016 Un evento unico. Un incontro fra musica e scienza nel segno di più generali connessioni universali dai risvolti quasi mistici. Una full immersion di tre giorni per presentare e verificare esperimenti sulle diverse risposte delle cellule staminali a differenti stimoli musicali. Si è trattato di “Cell Melodies," presentato da VID art/science in coproduzione con Angelica -Centro di Ricerca Musicale e il Conservatorio G.B. Martini di ...
Continue ReadingMilford Graves: Time Piece
by Marc Medwin
"Don't tell me how many years you've been doing something." Milford Graves's delivery is surprisingly restrained given the directness of his statement. “I want to know how completely you're filling that time, how you're spending each nanosecond." The statement defines the energy and vitality that this extraordinary musician brings to every aspect of his artistic life. To label Graves as one of the pioneers of free jazz is to define his work in far too narrow a scope. ...
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