4LP Review - Hasaan Ibn Ali - Retrospect In Retirement of Delay: The Solo Recordings

Hasaan Ibn Ali

Retrospect in Retirement of Delay: The Solo Recordings

(Omnivore) omnivorerecordings.com/ov-440/

Stop me if you're heard this one before. Or skip ahead to the next paragraph. Normally I'm not one to get excited about Record Store Day items. Typically there is nothing available on that day that is brand new. If there is, chances are I won't be able to nab a copy in time. And I'm not fighting crowds in the wee hours of the morning to get something like that. I don't do that for estate sales (at least not now) or for pricey new things. 

But at the Illegal Crowns show (covered in the previous post), a friend reminded me of the set of newly discovered solo performances by the elusive, late pianist Hassan Ibn Ali. The music had been released digitally last November, but on Saturday, June 18 the four-record edition of the Ibn Ali set was available as part of an RSD Drop Day, when some RSD releases were made available. When I realized I had that day off from work, I decided to try my luck, not at 6:00 a.m., but around 9:30 a.m. at the Attic in Millvale. Sure enough, several copies of Retrospect in Retirement of Delay: The Solo Recordings were still available. So I grabbed it. Yes, it was pricey but it might be the best $85 I've spent on one release. And that includes The Complete Lee Morgan Live at the Lighthouse. 

Hassan Ibn Ali barely registers as a footnote in jazz history, at least outside of his hometown of Philadelphia. Though he was widely admired as a pianist and composer, he only released one album in his lifetime, and that one piggybacked on the established drummer who helped make it happen: The Max Roach Trio Featuring the Legendary Hasaan (Atlantic, 1965). A second album was recorded, but Atlantic shelved it when Ibn Ali was arrested on a narcotics charge. It finally saw the light of day last year as Metaphysics, a wholly unique quartet set that featured Odean Pope on tenor. Unfortunately, the pianist died 40 years prior, never living to see recognition for his playing.

Retrospect in Retirement of Delay comes as a revelation, one that could actually elevate Hasaan Ibn Ali's stature far beyond the scope of jazz critics and collectors. These solo piano performances were recorded informally by Alan Sukoenig, a friend of Ibn Ali's, between 1962 and 1965 in lounges on the University of Pennsylvania campus and at a few apartments around the city of Brotherly Love. They are to the pianist what Dean Benedetti's tapes were to Charlie Parker - except with much better sound quality (raw as it often is) and complete performances. They provide a greater understanding of a truly unprecedented player. As Matthew Shipp says in the accompanying booklet, "Here we get a full look at his poetic vision and imagination as it manifests as an alternative post-bop universe of sorts, and as a pianistic orchestral complex slab of dense beauty."

The recordings include both originals and jazz standards, which, side-by-side, work together to provide a deeper look at the pianist. Nowhere is better exemplified than the sequence of "Body and Soul" and Thelonious Monk's "Off Minor." The former lasts close to 14 minutes, with Ibn Ali unleashing chorus after chorus without any break in the flow of ideas. He seems to utilize the entire range of the piano for the piece too. "Off Minor" was one of Monk's most characteristically swinging tunes, which inverted a classic chord pattern and produced one of his most hummable melodies. Ibn Ali treats it with respect but, as Shipp points out, bends the song to his own will in a very natural way, something that doesn't always occur in a Monk cover.

Ibn Ali's percussive attack in "Sweet and Lovely" hints at another iconoclastic pianist - Cecil Taylor, who also played this tune on his debut album. Between this and some of the rapid stop-start waves that almost evoke Bud Powell (one might almost expect to hear Ibn Ali quote "Glass Enclosures" in a few spots), the pianist puts himself in league with the major players that preceded him. His torrents of notes also recall Art Tatum (his "On Green Dolphin Street" almost gets a little too heavy), as well as Monk, Powell and Taylor. It's a stature the Hasaan Ibn Ali rightly deserves. 

In reading through the rest of the booklet, penned by Sukoenig with extensive quotes from others who knew the pianist, it's hard not to feel bad for the way for the way the man born William Henry Lankford, Jr. ended up. His odd personality (these days, he might be considered on the spectrum) made it hard for him to get gigs, so he stayed at home with his parents, playing piano all day. If he went visiting friends, he often sat down at their piano and kept playing. When a fire destroyed the Lankford home, eventually taking the lives of both parents, Ibn Ali was devastated and sent to live in a home. Yet, while he was there, Odean Pope visited frequently and his friend was still coherent enough to discuss music with him. 

Too often the word "genius" is thrown around at people who do groundbreaking work that impresses others. Sometimes they get recognition, sometimes they die before a major crowd knows what they've accomplished. Retrospect in Retirement of Delay - both the music and liner notes - might lead some people to call Hasaan Ibn Ali a genius, and maybe they'd be right. But every so-called genius is likely to be a guy from the neighborhood who just happens to be really damn good at what he does. So good that another neighborhood guy named John Coltrane might pick something up from him. Forget about the accolades and just listen, because you might not be the same after you do. 

Yes. It's that good. 

PS Although if your record store doesn't have the four-record set, there are several copies for sale on Discogs as of this writing, all for a bit less than what I paid.