Wildflowers - The New York Jazz Loft Sessions
| Wildflowers - The New York Jazz Loft Sessions | |
|---|---|
| Studio album by various artists | |
|
Publication |
1977 |
| Label (s) | Douglas Music , Casablanca Records, Knit Media |
|
Format (s) |
5 LP / 3 CD |
| occupation |
|
|
Studio (s) |
RivBea Studios, NYC |
Wildflowers - The New York Jazz Loft Sessions is a series of five jazz albums are added to various formations between 14 and 23 May 1976, New York RivBea studio of Sam Rivers and 1977 first published in Douglas Music and Casablanca Records . The recordings were first released in 1999 as a 3-CD edition.
The music of the album
One of the most important changes in the 1970s came with the Loft concerts , which emerged in New York as an alternative to the commercial clubs and concert halls. Mostly operated in a cooperative manner by the musicians themselves, the lofts became centers of creative activity in order to create an environment outside the constraints of the music industry that also offered opportunities for experiments.
As early as 1972, an alternative jazz festival took place in Sam Rivers ' loft, "which marked the unofficial beginning of the loft jazz era"; a development that resulted in the opening of the Knitting Factory, which "represented a stable base of operations for downtown improvisers and avant-garde jazz musicians". Sam Rivers' loft in New York City was the meeting place for a musician scene, which in May 1976 hosted a series of experimental jam sessions over seven evenings involving 60 musicians.
The Wildflowers Sessions, originally published on five LPs (or in 2000 on 3 CDs), finally documented the music of most of the creative and avant-garde jazz musicians living in the United States during this era . In addition to artists from the New York scene of the 1960s ( Sunny Murray , Byard Lancaster , Marion Brown , Dave Burrell , Andrew Cyrille , Jimmy Lyons , Randy Weston , Ken McIntyre ), musicians from the Chicago AACM such as Anthony Braxton , Fred Hopkins and Roscoe Mitchell also came or the Trio Air , the Black Artists Group from St. Louis (like Hamiet Bluiett , Oliver Lake or Julius Hemphill ) and younger players like Olu Dara , David Murray , Ahmed Abdullah and David S. Ware .
Scott Hreha explains that the musical changes of this era are already evident in Jay's first track , in which Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre plays his tenor over a “super-funky electric bass-driven groove” . Other titles show the " Free Jazz at the beginning to open up to more enjoyable elements", which led to different results under the label Jazz Fusion . The other music on the first CD contains music by Ken McIntyre , Sunny Murray, who analyzes the jazz standard Over the Rainbow with his band Untouchable Factor , as well as Sam Rivers, the jazz trio Air around Henry Threadgill , and the percussive-oriented ensemble Flight to Sanity around the pianist Sonelius Smith , and Marion Brown , the lyrical soloist in And Then They Danced .
The second CD contains music in a range between more structure-oriented, fusion-influenced music and free play, whereby the “structuralists are clearly given the greatest space.” The chamber music work Locomotif No. 6 by Wadada Leo Smith and his formation New Delta Ahkri , the flamenco-folk-influenced Clarity 2 by Michael Gregory Jackson , the hard Chicago blues of Hamiet Bluiett in Tranquil Beauty and the pleasing Pensive by Julius Hemphill. This is followed by Ahmed Abdullah's fusion experiments in Blue Phase , in which he combines electric bass and double bass. Andrew Cyrilles Short Short offers improvised music .
The third CD contains shorter tracks such as Oliver Lake ( Zaki ), with Michael Gregory Jackson's guitar that has been heavily modified by the synthesizer, Jimmy Lyons ' Push Pull , with percussion and Karen Borca's bassoon playing . There are also two longer recordings, on the one hand Roscoe Mitchell's Chant (in which he completes a marathon in circular breathing ), and the 17-minute Something's Cookin ' by Sunny Murray and his formation The Untouchable Factor , which is “as a fragile network through Murray's cymbal whisper is initiated "; the mood flows into Jamal's vibraphone playing and a dialogue between David Murray and Byard Lancaster to end in a spiritual with Hopkins' bowed bass and Lancaster's flute.
rating
According to Scott Hreha, the recordings of the sessions from Sam Rivers' Loft Studio Rivbea capture a kind of grass-root energy that, from today's perspective, captures the early aesthetics of the New York music scene that later culminated in events like the Vision Festival . The edition of the Knitting Factory's Knit Classics brings back some usable music; Even if there are some less successful titles on the phonograms, the edition is very significant simply because of its booklet with the archive material of photographs, poster reproductions and the historical essay by the critic Howard Mandel .
In his review of the album Jazz Loft Sessions in Allmusic, Ken Dyden notes the breadth of the music avant-garde; Among the notable titles he counts Tranquil Beauty, a "curious blend of New Orleans jazz with free jazz" and Randy Weston's dramatic portrait of Frank Edward Weston . The only noticeable disappointment is David Murray's Shout Song , "a squeaky miniature that serves as evidence why author [and musicians involved] Stanley Crouch called himself a renegade avant-garde jazz drummer." May the album contain enough valuable music to be worth buying. Scott Yanow gave the complete edition Wildflowers: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions - Complete the highest grade; However, he noted that the two extended sessions ( Wildflowers 5 ) with Sunny Murray and his quintet and with the Roscoe Mitchell Trio were primarily something "for listeners with open ears who are interested in exploring music."
Edition history
The first five editions of the sessions were released on LP by Douglas Music and Casablanca Records. 1999 all sessions were released on 3-CD compilation Wildflowers: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions - Complete (Knit Classics - KCR-3037); 2005 the 3-CD edition Wildflowers Loft Jazz New York 1976 (Douglas AD-10).
List of titles
Wildflowers 1
- Wildflowers 1: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions (Douglas - NBLP 7045)
1 - Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre : Jays 6:00
- Tenor Saxophone - Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre
- Drums - Jumma Santos
- Electric bass - Chris White
2 - Ken McIntyre : New Times 7:25
- Piano - Richard Harper
- Percussion - Andrei Strobert
- Congas - Andy Vega
- Alto saxophone - Ken McIntyre
3 - Sunny Murray & The Untouchable Factor: Over The Rainbow ( Harold Arlen ) 5:30
- Tenor Saxophone - David Murray
- Vibraphone - Khan Jamal
- Bass - Fred Hopkins
- Drums - Sunny Murray
- Alto saxophone - Byard Lancaster
4 - Sam Rivers: Rainbows 10:00
- Soprano Saxophone - Sam Rivers
- Bass - Jerome Hunter
- Drums - Jerry Griffin
5 - Air: Usu Dance 7:45
- Drums, percussion - Steve McCall
- Bass - Fred Hopkins
- Alto saxophone - Henry Threadgill
Wildflowers 2
- Wildflowers 2: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions (Douglas - NBLP 7046)
1 - Flight to Sanity: The Need to Smile 10:47
- Soprano Saxophone - Art Bennett
- Bass - Benny Wilson
- Tenor Saxophone - Byard Lancaster
- Drums - Harold Smith
- Piano - Sonelius Smith
- Trumpet - Olu Dara
- Congas - Don Moye
2 - Ken McIntyre: Naomi 6:31
- Percussion - Andrei Strobert
- Piano - Richard Harper
- Percussion, congas - Andy Vega
- Flute - Ken McIntyre
3 - Anthony Braxton: 73 ° -S Kelvin 6:41
- Bass - Fred Hopkins
- Guitar - Michael Gregory Jackson
- Percussion - Phillip Wilson
- Drums - Barry Altschul
- Trumpet - George Lewis
- Alto and bass saxophone, clarinet - Anthony Braxton
4 - Marion Brown: And Then They Danced 7:00
- Congas - Jumma Santos
- Bass - Jack Greg
- Alto saxophone - Marion Brown
5 - Leo Smith & The New Delta Ahkri: Locomotif N ° 6 6:00
- Piano - Anthony Davis
- Trumpet - Wadada Leo Smith
- Bass - Wes Brown
- Drums - Paul Maddox, Stanley Crouch
- Alto saxophone - Oliver Lake
Wildflowers 3
- Wildflowers 3: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions (Casablanca Records - NBLP 7047, Douglas - NBLP 7047)
1 - Randy Weston: Portrait of Frank Edward Burton 9:17
- Piano - Randy Weston
- Bass - Alex Blake
- Congas - Azzedin Weston
2 - Jackson: Clarity (2)
- Alto saxophone, flute - Oliver Lake
- Bass - Fred Hopkins
- Guitar - Michael Gregory Jackson
3 - Dave Burrell : Black Robert 6:30
- Piano - Dave Burrell
- Bass - Stafford James
- Drums - Harold White
4 - Ahmed Abdullah : Blue Phase 12:37
- Electric bass - Leroy Seals
- Double bass - Rickie Evans
- Guitar - Mashujaa
- Drums - Rashied Sinan
- Trumpet - Ahmed Abdullah
- Saxophones (tenor, soprano) - Charles Brackeen
5 - Andrew Cyrille & Maono: Short Short (Cyrille) 7:30
- Trumpet - Ted Daniel
- Tenor Saxophone - David S. Ware
- Bass - Lisle Atkinson
- Drums - Andrew Cyrille
Wildflowers 4
- Wildflowers 4: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions (Douglas - NBLP 7048)
1 - Hamiet Bluiett: Tranquil Beauty 6:17
- Guitar - Billy Patterson, Butch Campbell
- Clarinet, baritone saxophone: Hamiet Bluiett
- Trumpet - Olu Dara
- Bass - Juney Booth
- Drums - Charles Bobo Shaw, Don Moye
2 - Julius Hemphill: Pensive 9:54
- Guitar - Bern Nothing
- Percussion - Don Moye
- Alto saxophone - Julius Hemphill
- Drums - Phillip Wilson
- Cello - Abdul Wadud
3 - Jimmy Lyons : Push Pull 5:20
- Bassoon - Karen Borca
- Bass - Hayes Burnett
- Drums - Henry Maxwell Letcher
- Alto saxophone - Jimmy Lyons
4 - Oliver Lake: Zaki 9:30
- Electric guitar - Michael Gregory Jackson
- Bass - Fred Hopkins
- Drums - Phillip Wilson
- Alto saxophone - Oliver Lake
5 - David Murray: Shout Song 2:30
- Tenor Saxophone - David Murray
- Trumpet, flugelhorn - Olu Dara
- Bass - Fred Hopkins
- Drums - Stanley Crouch
Wildflowers 5
- Wildflowers 5: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions (Douglas - NBLP 7049)
1 - Sunny Murray & The Untouchable Factor: Somethings Cookin 17:00
- Alto saxophone, flute - Byard Lancaster
- Vibraphone - Khan Jamal
- Tenor Saxophone - David Murray
- Bass - Fred Hopkins
- Drums - Sunny Murray
2 - Roscoe Mitchell : Chant 25:19
- Percussion, drums - Jerome Cooper
- Drums - Don Moye
- Alto Saxophone - Roscoe Mitchell
Individual evidence
- ↑ Wildflowers Edition at Douglas Music ( Memento of the original from October 11, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Peter Cherches: Downtown Music, 1971-1987: An Overview and Resource Guide (2007)
- ↑ a b c d e f g Scott Hreha: Wildflowers: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions (2000)
- ↑ Rivers lived in the loft together with his wife Bea, after whom it was named.
- ↑ Review of Ken Dryden's Jazz Loft Sessions album at Allmusic . Retrieved September 29, 2011.
- ↑ Review of the album Wildflowers: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions - Complete by Scott Yanow on Allmusic (English). Retrieved September 30, 2011.
- ↑ a b Wildflowers 1: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions at Discogs
- ↑ a b Wildflowers 3: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions at Discogs
- ↑ Wildflowers: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions - Complete at Discogs
- ↑ Wildflowers Loft Jazz New York 1976 at Discogs
- ↑ Wildflowers 2: The New York Loft Jazz Sessions at Discogs
