Rest in peace, Pam

My dear friend Pam passed away on Monday, after a long battle with cancer. Even though I prepared myself for this, it's still hard to take. I believe that she is the first friend of mine who has died. Sure I've lost relatives close to me, but never one of my running buddies. And she was up there on the Running Buddy list.

Pam loved music as much as me, having sung in a band and even run away to join the Doobie Brothers as a back-up singer. (Hold your salty Doobie comments out of respect for the dead, por favor; I am.) Unfortunately she was still a teenager and her mom made her come home. Later on in life she whooped it up with Rick James and Three Dog Night, the latter band being one of my favorites from back in the day, making us kindred spirits.

When she was getting ready for chemo last year, I wrote a set of lyrics that were like an open letter to her, and the Love Letters still perform it. The point of the song was not to give up hope, even in the darkest days. It actually worked for a while: when she went in to have a cancerous growth removed, it was gone. Alas she wasn't out of the woods, but for a minute I believed in miracles. Or positive vibrations. Of the latter, I'm still fairly convinced. We'll see if I can still sing it.

Pam could be rather dark and bleak, but she was also wickedly funny. And easy to crack up. I never heard her sing, but she says she used to do a killer take on Smith's version of "Baby It's You." I just hope the next time that comes on at work, I don't lose it and have to go running.

Pam, wherever you are, I love you. Keep an eye on me. And with God as my witness, I swore turkeys could fly. (In-joke. Google it for reference.)

CD Review: Steve Coleman & Five Elements

Steve Coleman & Five Elements

Harvesting Semblances and Affinities

(Pi)

Steve Coleman's liner notes for this album begin by explaining, "The main theme of this CD is the musical realization of temporal impressions. The recording of these compositions happened during the traditional time of the harvest [October 6, 2006], as the Sun was in the waning degrees of Libra. The previous full moon that occurred was the Harvest Moon, another sign that the harvest season was in full force...[M]y intent was a type of energy harvesting, i.e. the gathering, through musical symbolism, of the energy of particular moments." He goes on to say that the material is a musical interpretation of 13th-century philosopher Ramon Llull, who worked with numbers representing universal truths.

As time goes on, I personally feel that the idea of our lives being affected by vibrations could be true. It works on guitar strings when they aren't exactly in tune. The moon affects the tides. Get a bunch of people to think positively and who knows what'll happen. So maybe Coleman's thoughts about the timing of these recordings actually holds some ground. But still, most people will come back to the big question - does it swing?

The answer is yes. But it's still a pretty challenging listen. Of course, you ought to expect that from an album with a pithy title like Harvesting Semblances and Affinities.

The first remarkable thing that stands out on the album comes with Jen Shyu's performance. She is a vocalist who uses her voice like an additional instrument. Once in a while it sounds like she's using lyrics (She begins the album with a phrase that sounds like, "I sawwww a guy."), but unless she's garbling everything or singing in some strange foreign tongue, the bulk of her performance isn't words coming out of her mouth. Most importantly, Shyu pulls off the nearly impossible tasks of neither getting in the way of the other instruments or getting really annoying and ruining the music with bad theatrics.

Alto saxophonist Coleman, trumpeter Jonathan Finlayson and trombonist Tim Albright play some patterns together that feel pretty rigid. Tyshawn Sorey (drums) and Thomas Morgan (bass) are right there with them, either spurring on those oddly shaped phrases, and in turn giving them more clarity, or else they act as a counterpoint to them. It sounds funky, but not in the traditional sense. Don't expect 4/4 grooves.

Towards the end of the album, things get a bit too busy. Whereas "Attila 02 (Dawning Ritual)" opens the album by displaying the potential of what will come as the album continues, its ending counterpoint "Attila 04 (Closing Ritual)" sounds tense and staccato and hard to appreciate beyond it's technical skill, most of that coming from Storey's accents. "Vernal Equinox 040320-0149 (Initiation)" sounds like everyone is blowing for themselves, which contrasts with the earlier, 14-minute epic "060706-2319 (Middle of Water)" where it seems like everyone is playing a written part, no one is actually soloing and the end result in an unrelentless, but intriguing piece. Yet up until those final tracks, Coleman really produces a impressive and cerebral set that has as much emotion at its core as it has chops and numerical basis. If he can include a piece by a Danish composer based on a Latin text and make it fit within his own compositions - save for Shyu's more operatic performance - the saxophonist needs to be explored further and further.

Woodstock 41 - reflections a week later

I realize that my blogging output is way lower than other folks. Many people ramble on about all the events of their day, before, during and after they happen. Anyone reading this entry has probably seen enough of my posts to know that I don't roll that way. Nevertheless, it came to my attention that not only do I need to write an entry about the Love Letters show from this past Saturday, but I also never wrote anything about the Woodstock 41 show that happened at Howler's on Sunday, August 15. I participated in that show too, playing in Refried Boogie, a Canned Heat tribute band. There's a lot tell about that show, so I'm going to run out of time before I can get to the Love Letters.

The Woodstock show was put together by Brian Colleran (man of many local bands, including but not limited to Weird Paul and Thee Starry Eyes) and Read Connelly (also of Thee Starry Eyes, Beagle Brothers). Reed started the show around 6 pm with a Ritchie Havens set that was as much shtick as it was music - in a good way. When he played "Freedom," he walked offstage up to Brian and asked "Are any of the other bands here yet," just as Havens did 41 years ago. Mr. Connelly is a ham.

Next up was a duo credited as Elliott Sussman and Middle Children, although I saw Mr. Sussman perform one night later and he didn't quite look like the gent who was in this duo. Anyhow, they recast Jefferson Airplane with pre-programmed computer beats, which was a clever twist from the usual homages that the rest of us were doing. For yuks, they threw in Starship's "We Built This City," in which "rock and roll" was switched out for "cock and balls."

Alicia Fronczek from the Garment District also rearranged Janis Joplin in a slower, almost goth way by skipping drums, but having guitar, bass and keyboards/lap steel back her up. On guitar was my once-and-forever bandmate Mike Prosser, who knows all the Big Brother licks anyway. Sara K from the Garment District was in the tricky position of playing bass and holding the tempo together and she was like a rock. Solid, that is. Eric, the fourth guy, sometimes got a little drowned out, which was unfortunate especially when he whipped out the saw. And Alicia was great as Janis. This dame can sing!

El Grosso cranked up the amps and did a great job with Creedence Clearwater Revival. Those songs are so straight ahead that it's easy to play them without getting the subtleties down, but these guys clearly knew what they were doing and whipped up the energy level in the room.

Next up was Refried Boogie. Now, at the real Woodstock, Crosby, Stills and Nash started their set by saying, "This is only our second gig and we're scared shitless." With us, it was only our second time playing together as a full band, and the first at full volume. Prosser and I had been talking about playing Canned Heat for several months prior to the show. For awhile it looked like I might be the second guitar player, since I was filling the role of Alan "Blind Owl" Wilson in the singing department. Luckily that never happened because even with an open tuning, I'm not to be trusted with six strings. We got James Hart from the Harlan Twins, who belongs in this kind of band anyway. When a guy who looked the part of drummer Fito de la Parra couldn't make the gig, we recruited Harlans drummer Neal Kling. Jason "Underwater Culprit" Baldinger rounded out the band, filling the role of Bob "The Bear" Hite. Our only five-piece practice occurred in Mike's apartment with acoustic guitar, practice pad and low volume bass.

"Refried Boogie" is the name of a 40-minute live track on a Canned Heat album where each member of the band gets a long, indulgent solo, but we avoided that in favor of the band's more popular, accessible (i.e. good) material - "Rollin' and Tumblin'," "Going Up the Country," "Let's Work Together," and "On the Road Again," the latter where we pulled a guy up from the audience to drone on the tamboura. Jules from the Harlans was supposed to play it - and it was his axe - but he disappeared during our set. Hence the special guest.

Mrs. Paintbrush - aka Jackson from Grand Buffet - did a tribute to folksinger Melanie next. What I like about this guy is he's a badass mc, all fiesty and rowdy onstage, ready to drop f-bombs, but he knows Melanie's music and his professed love of it didn't sound ironic at all. And you have to love a guy who likes Melanie in part because she reminds him of his mom.

Cactus Wheelhouse, something of local supergroup, did Mountain next. Dave Wheeler (guitar) and Jake Leger (drums, also of Karl Hendricks) have played together before but the aforementioned Jules Krishnamurti (Harlan Twins) filled in for their regular bass player. Ear drums were damned when these cats started. Dave can chew up the scenery as both a guitarist and a singer, and he made a great Leslie West, albeit a lot lighter in weight. The two electric fans were blowing his and Jules' hair which only added to the visual effect.

They were so loud that I had to listen to the Weird Paul Rock Band do Joe Cocker from outside. Surprisingly Paul handed the role of Joe over to his keyboard player Ben, who put on a great show.

By the time Prosser, Baldinger, Connelly, Colleran and whoever else was up doing Country Joe and the Fish, I felt kind of spent. A lot of music had gone down that night. It was great to see Prosser clearly in ecstasy onstage, churning out leads and making rocking-out moves. Baldinger also seemed to reach transcendence as he got into the sermonizing aspect of the set. He was really into it.

BUT THEIR SET WOULDN'T END. It was hard to tell if things were falling apart or if the songs had a lot of breakdowns in them. They did "Rock and Soul Music" which Prosser said was a pretty long piece. But he and JB kept talking over each other and it got a little frustrating, so I had to get some water and clear my head.

Honorable mention goes to DJ Stripey who spun during the sets and actually avoided his uber-obscure usual habits and plays some pretty popular (and good) '60s stuff.

Who's Killing the Music Industry?

An article appeared in the New York Times several weeks ago which profiled a woman who works for BMI. It chronicled her struggles, as it were, in getting clubs to be compliant with the performance rights groups so that musicians will get paid each time their song is played. The article was also picked up by a Pittsburgh jazz blog of which I and many local and international jazz musicians are members.

First of all I want to say that I believe musicians are entitled to get money for their art. If you work hard at creating something - music that you hear in your head that motivates you to create and express yourself - and at some point after expressing yourself there is money to be made at it, you should get that money.

But this whole thing about BMI and ASCAP going after these deadbeat clubs or coffee shops because these places are denying musicians of their hard earned dollars - that starts heading into the category of malarkey. Or else it only serves to make sure that the big musicians get more money, not the little guys.

The way I see it, the money that these establishments pay to BMI or ASCAP goes into a big pool. It's not as if they're going to make sure that Dean Wareham gets paid for the Galaxie 500 song that might get played in some little boho coffee shop. If a club has a bunch of Blue Note CDs on their jukebox, or if they're played through the sound system, can you guarantee to me that Hank Mobley's estate is going to get a cut of the money? I'm sure that T.S. Monk and Miles Davis' estate both have strong grips on everything associated with their fathers' name and that they will get some percentage of what happens to it. But the rest of the guys? Don't count on it. The money paid to these performance groups probably flows towards the bigger performers. Fill in the blanks with names of them here, because I'm really out of touch with specifics. Let's just use the blanket term American Idol winners.

When I interviewed John Petkovic from Cobra Verde a couple years ago, he told me a story about what happened when the band's version of "Play with Fire" was used on True Blood. Great exposure for the band right? Sure, five guys from Cleveland who have day jobs and still play music get a little more exposure and get a few more downloads of songs. The other thing that came along with this was lawyers representing the Rolling Stones, who called day after day demanding that the figures about how many downloads the band received and how much money they owe the Stones for it. "I was like, you know I understand that Mick and Keith don’t the luxury to fall back on day jobs, but we do. But do you know that the money were talking here is less than the price of two tickets to see the Stones? If I joked [the lawyer said], 'This is a matter of getting publishing and mechanics paid up.'"

In this case, we're talking about ABKCO, the Stones' publishers, which is different than BMI or ASCAP, but it point out the same idea, that the big guys will go after the little guys to squeeze the last nickel and dime out of them, while less established musicians in that same position get very little.

It's also easier to talk about how any type of CD sharing or burning is bad when you know people are out there getting free copies of Britney Spears songs. Poor Britney is being denied her money because people are getting those songs for free. And that's because any copying of CDs is bad, right? You're taking money away from artists who deserve it right?

Well let's look at this: You have all of Thelonious Monk's albums on Riverside and you have the Blue Note box set. You either bought them new or someone got them for your as birthday and Christmas presents. You're interested in his Columbia albums because you might like to add to your collection, although you've read and heard from friends it's not the best period of his career. Very good in parts but not excellent, and maybe it's not worth the $15 risk. So a friend burns you a copy of It's Monk's Time. Turns out you really like it. A year later, you're in a CD store and see a copy of Monk's Dream, another Columbia album, and you decide to buy it based on what you thought of the other album. Six months after that you see Underground and you really dig the front cover. You make a mental note that it might be worth getting someday because it looks like some of the songs aren't on any other Monk album. (This is true. Three songs were new on that album.) Mum and Pop want a Christmas list from you. Since they won't be able to find a Tim Berne CD, you put down Underground.

Now if you're friend hadn't burned It's Monk's Time for you, you might not have ever considered purchasing the other ones. That's because for people who really like music this whole argument about "you burn CDs and you're killing music" is only true to a certain point. People who really like music and put the time, and effort into listening to it, will purchase it. We don't want a wall full of CD cases with handwritten covers.

Let me update that last image: We don't want a long of song titles on our computers taking up space. We want tactile pieces of music. We want artwork. We want liner notes. And we want to hear everything, maybe more than once. (Which gets harder once you pass 40 and kids factor into your daily life.) And as much as this might bug some people, if a person borrows a copy of Andrew Hill's Passing Ships from the library and copies it, there's still a good chance that he or she will buy Hill's Pax or Black Fire knowing that the Andrew Hill name is synonymous with good albums. AND FUNDS ARE LIMITED AND WE CAN'T BUY EVERYTHING.

If record labels limited access to songs - by making it hard to download songs and impossible to get them onto your IPOD unless you bought a tactile CD, what would happen? "Well, uh, then sales would plummet." Yeah, but only people that really wanted the music would buy them.

Jandek in Pittsburgh

Did you know that Jandek played in Pittsburgh a few weeks ago? It seemed like a pretty monumental event since actual performances by this elusive, prolific guy are extremely rare.

I didn't go because I had band practice that night and lately they've been hard to organize. But I heard he played for over two hours with no break. The person who reported this to me said it wasn't all that interesting. I'm interested in any comments on it.

Playing catch-up with ESP-Disk

I've been really behind in my commentary of ESP-Disk releases. They've released several new albums in recent months, but this entry is going to just cover reissues. Going back nearly 12 months ago, their reissue series brought back several albums that proved their jazz roster consisted of more than unfettered free blowing, and including frenzied sessions that had plenty of chops to go along with squonking.

In particular, last summer or fall saw the re-release of the Revolutionary Ensemble's Vietnam, a suite divided between both sides of an album that came pretty close to 50 minutes altogether. The Ensemble consisted of violinist Leroy Jenkins, bassist Sirone (who passed away right around the same season of this reissue) and drummer Jerome Cooper. As Sirone stated in the brief liner notes, the trio took its name from the fact that even among the avant garde players, this instrumentation seemed pretty radical. It is a pretty dense sound but Jenkins avoids the nails-on-the-chalkboard fiddle attack in favor of something more harmonic and engaging. Not until the second half of part two does it start to head over the top, and by then they've won you over.

According to the booklet with the Albert Ayler box on Revenant, Charles Tyler left Ayler's band because he didn't want to play with Michel Sampson, a white violinist. If that's the case, it's surprising that Charles Tyler Ensemble includes a cellist named Joel Friedman, whose name implies that he's not only white but Jewish too, another attribute that many militants took issue with. Regardless, Tyler and Friedman make great music together along with Henry Grimes (bass), Ronald Jackson (drums, who is probably the same man who would start using the middle name Shannon before long) and Charles Moffett (orchestral vibes). Tyler plays in a manner similar to Ayler, with long, wide vibrato. Some moments are pretty free while other uses a simple riff life as a jumping off point into some blowing that's pretty heavy for an alto. "Three Spirits" sounds like a sibling of Ayler's famous "Ghosts," and I mean that in the best possible way. Tyler's solos frequently overflow with machine gun delivery of notes, rather than merely taking a few choice tones and wringing the life out of them with extreme vibrato and blowing.

The final album in go-back-and-find-these list is Marion Brown's Why Not? Brown, an overlooked alto saxophonist with a pretty diverse discography, appeared on John Coltrane's Ascension session, but this album reflects the influence of Trane's work about a year prior to that landmark session. Stanley Cowell plays with the dynamic, supportive presence of McCoy Tyner and Rashied Ali fills the drum chair, in a recording that was made the year after Trane died. Sirone fills out the group on bass. The ballad "Fortunato" could be a distant relative of both "After the Rain" and something Jackie McLean might have dreamed up. Two of the four tracks take interesting turns because they sound like they're winding down only to go into another solo, which takes a drastic drop in volume when Sirone is the soloist.

Among ESP's more recent reissues, the one that probably has the most intrigue is Sun Ra's College Tour Volume One: The Complete Nothing Is... Originally a 36-minute album with a few choice selections from a 1966 concert at St. Lawrence University, this two-disc set contains the entire set that generated those tracks, along with a partial second set and soundcheck material.

The liner notes call Nothing Is... "one of the most important albums of its and all time," going on to place it in the presence of two revolutionary albums that would appear one year after the album's release: Are You Experienced and Sergeant Pepper. I'll leave that assessment to more knowledgeable Sun Ra experts, but suffice to say this is some high quality Arkestra work, even in the moments when the rhythm section seems to get ahead of the horns during a swing vamp. One thing liner note writer Russ Musto nails is that the period of this recording was a pretty revolutionary time and Sun Ra was able to get his musicians to shift from steady swing to free shrieks within a song or two. What appeared as individual songs on the initial release now come across as different passages of a bigger picture. (As an aside, the original running order almost went in reverse of how the performances happened, or at least jumped back and forth during the set.)

This version of the Arkestra includes saxophonists/devotees John Gilmore, Marshall Allen and Pat Patrick, bassist Ronnie Boykins and drummer Clifford Jarvis (who turns in another excessively long, somewhat dull solo). Allen's oboe showcase on "The Exotic Forest" over a repetitive bass line and beaucoup percussion, also sounds more engaging amidst everything.

Sonny Simmons' Staying on the Watch can be said to have taken on greater significance in retrospect. For one thing, it's one of the few "new thing" albums to feature a woman on the front horn line, his wife Barbara Donald, whose horn is recorded with a bit of overmodulation, which only adds to the impact of her playing. John Hicks, one of the most prolific pianists, and sideman with a lot of hard bop sessions and, in more recent years, with David Murray, made his debut on Staying on the Watch.

The first track, "Metamorphosis" has a stop-start AABA melody that again reminds me Jackie McLean's Destination Out period, though Simmons has a voice all his own. Hicks proves himself an able accompanist in this setting too. "City of David," the kickoff track for side two continues in this vein, with a pedal point drone riff that launches 15 minutes of free bop exploration. The two tracks that concluded each side both adapt the instrumentation. "A Distant Voice" is a pensive alto and bass duet, while Hicks lays out for "Interplanetary Travelers" which channels Ornette Coleman more so than Sun Ra. Definitely in the upper echelon of the ESP catalog.

One of the more far-flung releases to come in ESP's final years, Michael Gregory Jackson's Clarity finds the guitar player dabbling in chamber music, folk and free blowing, all with the help of David Murray, Oliver Lake and Wadada Leo Smith popping up in different tracks. The title track opens the album in a perfectly odd way, with an acoustic guitar, flute and saxophone trio sounding semi-classical but quickly giving way to a folkie melody that Tim Buckley would've appreciated. "Prelueoionti" has some beautiful picking, but at eight minutes gets a little long for a solo piece. The lack of a genuine rhythm section (Jackson and Lake pick up some percussion occasionally) gives some of the pieces the feel of early Art Ensemble of Chicago with a little more cohesion, like the taut "Oliver Lake" which features its namesake. "A-flat B-flat 1-7-3 degrees" makes that AACM comparison apt, though Anthony Braxton never dueted with wah-wah guitar during this time, as far as I know. Jackson later shifted his focus towards fusion and R&B. This album bears all the signs of an artist trying to figure out where his true interests lie, and that sense provides the album's strength.

The kid's first 78 & my first bandmate

I was singing "Doggy in the Window" to Donovan earlier this week and thought he needed to hear the original Patti Page version. When I found my 78 of it, there was a huge chunk busted out of it, which didn't leave enough of the song for him to hear. So one day after daycare, I took him to Squirrel Hill for his first trip to Jerry's Records. Jerry's son Willie actually runs part of the store with nothing but 78s in it, and that was our destination.

Donovan was in my arms going up the steps and around the corner past the huge speaker that was booming old r&b ("That's loud!"). I'm glad he was because if there's any place where you don't want to unleash a bouncy three-year old, it's a 78 shop.

We found the heavy crate full of Patti Page records and I started thumbing through them. He was standing next to me by now and he seemed excited because he kept asking, "Where's 'Doggy in the Window'? Where's 'Doggy in the Window'?" Knowing how popular the song was, I was confidant there was at least one copy. And knowing that Donovan wouldn't stay still for long, I grabbed the first one I saw, even though it had a flimsy sleeve. Besides it was in great shape and only $2.

Donovan will often get very excited about something until he actually gets it, at which point his loses interest. Not so with "Doggy in the Window." When we put it on that night, he wasn't freaked out by the Victrola volume and he clearly got a kick out of the song. Thankfully, he doesn't want to hear it five times a day, but he has asked for it since then.

Speaking of kids and records and (from the last post) talk of neighbors and their records, I heard back from my long lost friend Eric last week. When we were in kindergarten - and probably long before that because memories get fuzzy at that age - we were both into music, listening to it constantly and making up skits that he would tape on a big honkin' reel to reel player in his room. We were going to have a "band," even though neither of us played anything. But he moved to Columbus in first grade, which kind of ended that. Each time he visited Pittsburgh, though, he'd spend the night at my place and we'd put on a concert in my basement with the help of my brother Tom. The concert consisted of us lip-synching to records and playing guitars that Tom fashioned out of bamboo poles and cardboard.

Eric - if you're reading this, my sister reminded me that there's a Facebook group called "I played in a band with Mike Shanley," which you have every right to join since you were the first.

Just because he played with Bird doesn't make him hip

I was obsessed with records before I could read the writing on their labels. The colors, designs and shapes of the words used to guide me. When I would go visit families around the neighborhood, I probably asked them what records they owned, hoping most likely that they'd whip out some Herb Alpert or Fifth Dimension.

It was during one of these visits to an older gentleman across the street from our house that I first heard the phrase "Sing Along with Mitch." I didn't know at the time that those words were synonymous with "Squaresville." The rhythmic sound of them was pretty cool. Luckily, Mitch and the Gang were never thrown on the phonograph or the hi-fi and my ears were spared the chestnuts like "Ida, Sweet as Apple Cider" or "Michael Row the Boat Ashore."

These memories came back to me this week because Mitch Miller passed away at the ripe old age of 99. I admire him for his longevity, but that's about it. When it came to the music industry, he was The Man, not like "my main man," but like "I'm sick of being hassled by the man." From forcing Frank Sinatra to record "Mama Will Bark" - a novelty song [that I have somewhere on 78] complete with dog barks and a deadpan duet partner named Dagmar - to refusing to sign any rock and roll acts to Columbia to those blankety-blank Mitch and the Gang albums, Miller personifies unhip.

However, he did a few things that made some good: He insisted that Rosemary Clooney record "Come On-A My House," a snappy little number with the fiestiest harpsichord solo ever; he got Frankie Laine to sing "Mule Train," which should be internalized by any kid who likes to sing loud; and he got Tony Bennett to sing "Because of You." It's funny that all of these songs wound up on an compilation album called Remember How Great, Volume 2 which I can practically guarantee you can find at any thrift store or used record store.

Finally, Mitch played oboe on a couple of Charlie Parker's Bird with Strings sessions. I have to wonder what he thought of Bird's soloing style. I also have to wonder what the energy in the studio was like that day, considering the hippest cat and the squarest man were in such close proximity.

The week in music - in person and (soon to be) in print

Playing right now: Ornette Coleman - The Great London Concert. (Specifically, "Falling Stars," which features both Ornette's trumpet and violin work. He's no Billy Bang, but the fiddle wasn't as bad as I expected.)

It's been a week of writing. I even called off a day from work to make sure I'd get things done. The biggest thing was a piece on Allan Sherman, whose Warner Bros albums are all being reissued in September. Blurt is running a short piece in their fall issue, and I interviewed Allan's son Robert, as well as Dr. Demento, who wrote the liner notes for all the albums. (Weird Al's people gave me a generic "Sorry, no can do.") Both of the interviewees were great. Robert spoke at length about his dad and how his gift for parodies developed. We talked for about an hour. Dr. Demento was also a great interview, very friendly and able to give me some great quotes. The struggle was getting all the info and a couple good quotes into a 300-word piece. (Something longer will appear on the Blurt website.)

I also had to review the new Blonde Redhead and Azure Ray albums by yesterday. And if all that wasn't enough, I had to review four albums for JazzTimes by Wednesday. One of those reviews covered three different albums by one artist, and one was a two-disc set.

Between all that, the Aram Shelton Quartet finally made it to town. (Note: I say that because I thought they were coming a week earlier, and when I discovered there was another week of anticipation, I wanted to see them more.) They came to the Thunderbird, and first let me say that it was odd how much several of them reminded me of people I know or have seen around town.

Three out of the four of them have played in the revolving leadership band Fast Citizens - alto saxophonist Shelton, tenor saxophonist Keefe Jackson and bassist Anton Hatwich. Drummer Marc Riordan is the newcomer of the band. This quartet recently released a CD on Shelton's own label (These Times, on Single Speed, www.singlespeedmusic.org) from which their set drew pretty heavily.

Shelton is an interesting alto player, influenced a good deal by Ornette Coleman, by his own admission, but the music doesn't end up sounding like Coleman Quartet Worshippers No. 232. In the song "These Times" he started his solo in the lower register of his alto and hung around there for a remarkable amount of time before getting into the more significant trademark alto area. During the same tune, Jackson took a tenor solo that reminded me of John Tchicai, in the way that he played freely - or maybe arhythmically is a better word - over the rhythm section and still managed to interact with them. There were elements of modern post-bop in the music, as well as some more droning moments. Shelton doubled on clarinet, which he really gave a unique voice, thanks to his exploratory nature. Jackson switched to bass clarinet on a couple tunes too. [Note - I took fairly copious notes that night, but I can't find them and don't want to delay this review so this is all I'll write on the topic.]

I tried to get more people to come out to the show and had a few lined up to meet me there, but they all had to cancel out or email me later explaining what was up. Jackson said he might be coming back in October with another outfit, the Chicago Luzerne Exchange, so maybe if that happens I can get some hipsters out to see it.

Last night, Gooski's had show featuring a band from Omaha called Landing on the Moon. I caught about half their set and found them pretty amazing. Very loud five piece with 2 guitars, keys, bass and drums, with the lead guitar player handling a lot of the singing. The drummer did a lot of harmonies too, even while he was tearing out some unorthodox accents.

I was actually there to check out a new local band called Neighbors, on the advice of a friend who I bumped into last weekend. He's tight with the singer of the band, Mike, who I also kind of know. I'm glad I took his advice to check them out. (The recommendation was that they were close to the "noisy pop" description that applied to the Love Letters.) They kind of had me hooked on the first chord, some kind of 7th chord, which made it sound like a Bacharach tune. Overall they had a sort of Jam sound going for them. A band called Satin Gum played third but I split before they went on, only because I was tired.

Speaking of tired I have nodded off about three times since I started this entry. Time to go.

William Hooker beats the heat

"So it this music blues or jazz?"

A 50-something fella asked me that last Monday at the Thunderbird, pointing at the albums that William Hooker was setting up on his merchandise table. The real answer to that question is, "Neither." So I was naturally hesitant to say "jazz" since "It's free improv," is the more sensible answer. Plus I was worried that Hooker might actually hear this exchange and go off on how his music isn't jazz.

I forget exactly what I said, but this guy said he asked because he thought it might be blues and that Hooker might be John Lee Hooker's son. Hmm, I wondered. Is that because his name is Hooker and he's black? Are you that naive? A few minutes later, I was sitting out on the stoop waiting for a phone call and the guy came out again and repeated what he told me inside. This time I used the phrase "free improv" and he said, "What's that?" I should've said "Noise," but I didn't want to have the guy decide to leave and I still didn't feel like being blunt.

When I went back in, Matta Gawa, the opening band, was tearing it up. I mean tearing. Drummer Sam Lohman was crashing and exploding all over his kit. Next to him Ed Ricart was triggering some bass-like loops and tearing it up over top of them. It got to a point where the effects were getting as much attention and tweaking as his fretboard, but his playing still had a strong basis in melody, as fragmented and wild as it might have been. In other words, he was not just noodling and skronking for his own personal satisfaction. One tune - all were improvisations - had the same feel as one of the ballads on the Sonny Sharrock Ask the Ages album: it combined delicate melodic work with a smouldering undercurrent.

I had hoped that William Hooker might be playing with Sabir Mateen since their interaction on the drummer's latest album was so great. But that kind of double-bill (at least it is for us Pittsburghers) was not going to happen for a $12 cover. Not only did Hooker not bring Mateen, he didn't bring anyone with him. He played solo.

Some people walked out before his 40-minute set was completed (the heat of the room didn't make it any easier) but I found the whole thing pretty captivating. Plus Hooker has such a command of his kit. His presence made me stop and play close attention, waiting to see where he would take things. He rolled on his cymbals for a good five minutes at the beginning before he finally moved to his drums. When he did, he pulled some great low pitches out of his floor tom. The way he played made the whole thing feel like a musical statement too, not just some tinkering on the trap kit.

Hooker was set up slightly towards stage left so the main focus was the screen behind him. It projected a computer program throughout the whole set, beginning with rather typical "objects on a desert landscape" kind of scene. As it continued, though, this got a little more detailed and beyond the ordinary, much like the set. It was hard to tell if he was playing "along with" the images or the synchronization was just coincidental.

The whole thing last the perfect length for me - about 40 minutes, and including some brief bits of spoken word text at certain points. They all seemed to riff on the first installment: "Feel the heat of the third rail. Don't touch!" Some of it was clearly too much for folks in the audience, including the gent I might at the beginning of the night. To his credit, he checked out most of Matta Gawa and sat through a bit of Hooker's set, but didn't make it to the end. I stayed for the duration, but once I said my goodbyes, I too tried to cool off and get away from the hot room.

I thought Aram Shelton was coming this Monday, but it turns it, his show is a week later. That's not necessarily bad news, but I was hoping to see him sooner. Boooooooooooooooo!

Rebecca Pronsky reflections

Playing right now: Lou Reed & John Cale - Songs for Drella
(It was the next disc in the CD player after one that I have to review.)

I never got a chance to write anything about going to see Rebecca Pronsky, who played at Howler's about nine days ago (not this past Thursday, but the previous one). She's a singer and guitarist from New York who knows Greg Hoy, a Pittsburgh ex-pat who lived in NYC until very recently when he moved to Boulder for work. Rebecca is one of the few musicians I've met from New York who was actually born there. She was raised in Brooklyn which was a place to fear during her youth - as she tells it - which is ironic considering it's the hipster mecca of the world now.

But that which doesn't kill you makes your act stronger, and Ms. Pronsky is as funny a storyteller as she is a great songwriter and singer. I have a soft spot for people who are good with the between-song shtick, and she had it down, telling stories about a song winding up in a Polish soap opera, what her mother had to say about that, etc.

Even though her "band" consisted of her and guitarist Rich Bennett, the two of them filled the room up with their sound. Rich is a master of high lonely twangs on the guitar, placing slides or lead melodies in just the right place. Coupled with Rebecca's strong voice and steady acoustic guitar, they put on a really good set.

Locals Emily Rodgers and Pete Bush & the Hoi Polloi played before and after Pronsky, respectively. I caught a few of Emily's songs which were fairly epic in length but pretty spellbinding too. Bush's trio was pretty intense and included my old pal Jesse Prentiss on upright bass. I only heard them with half an ear but plan on checking them out at length sometime soon.

Just saw that Rebecca used a quote from my City Paper preview on her list of press pull quotes. Hubba hubba!

Johnny Mathis and his impact on the world. And me

"Strange isn't it? Each man's life touches so many other lives. When he isn't around, he leaves an awful hole, doesn't he?"

Clarence the Angel says that to George Bailey in It's a Wonderful Life and I believe it's in one of my favorite moments in the film: There's a closeup of George (Jimmy Stewart) and his face isn't centered in the shot. There's a look of horror on his face because he's finally realizing that he is seeing Bedford Falls as it would've been without him.

I've been thinking about Clarence's comment today in reference to both Gene Ludwig (see previous entry) and about Johnny Mathis, who I saw last week at Heinz Hall. Where would the world be if Mathis had decided that being a singer with a fleeting thing and that he would be much better off participating in the Olympics? No one would've heard that vibrato, "Misty" wouldn't've been as big a hit, numerous couples might not have fallen in love........ I'm overthinking the idea but it is kind of mind boggling if you think about it.

Last week, I went to Heinz Hall with my fellow Love Letters bandmate Erin and our friend Sandi to see Mr. M do his stuff. And let me tell you, he had me by the second syllable. He opened with "When I Fall in Love" which included the opening verse, which is when I knew he still had it. That vibrato, that impeccable phrasing and execution were all still there.

He didn't talk too much between songs and when he did, it seemed like his speaking voice betrayed his 74 years, and didn't sound quite as rich. So he might've been saving its strength for the music. The set really didn't disappoint. A Henry Mancini-Johnny Mercer medley including "Charade," "The Days of Wine and Roses" and - of course - "Moon River." He pulled out "Wild Is the Wind," "Misty" (in the middle of the set, surprisingly, not as an encore) and "Gina" which I swear would've made anyone with that name swoon.

I take it back -there was one disappointment. I really wanted to hear "When Sunny Gets Blue," which has an amazingly beautiful set of chord changes. It is a deep cut, sort of, so I can understand why it was skipped. Sandi also made a point after the show that I didn't think about: he didn't do "Wonderful Wonderful." Oh well. I was okay without that one

Some casual readers might be surprised that I'm so into Johnny Mathis, since my tastes usually fall on the other end of the musical spectrum. But Mathis is one of the last of those consummate entertainers from a bygone era. Besides Tony Bennett (who, I'm sorry to say, is starting to lose his voice) there aren't any of these crooners left - except maybe Canonsburg's own Bobby Vinton. But I would bet that Vinton's set plays into a lounge act that caters to an audience in Branson - i.e. predictable, scripted etc. Johnny didn't do that. He really seemed to be into each individual song. Plus when he brought out his guitar player for a spotlight moment, he talked him up and didn't realize until a song later that he forgot to mention the guy's name, proving that this wasn't a show where every last step was choreographed.

The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra accompanied him and sounded great. But on the predictability scale, their opening set stuck with a lot of tried and true tunes that the audience would know like "The William Tell Overture" and "Hoedown" by Aaron Copland.

In closing, I for one am glad Johnny Mathis made the career choice that he did. Thank you, Mr. M. And Gene Ludwig, again I thank you too.

A Fug and an Organ Man

Playing right now: Lee Konitz New Quartet - Live at the Village Vanguard (Enja)

There's a lot to report from the last week, but right at the moment time doesn't allow, so I'll cut to the chase - two more deaths of unique individuals.

First on Tuesday came news that Tuli Kupferberg of the Fugs passed away a day earlier. He considered himself "the world's oldest rock star," since he was well into his 40s by the time he started the Fugs. He had already established himself as a poet and Lower East Side fixture by then, a role he continued probably until his last days. He had the demeanor of both a bohemian wild cat and a warm Jewish grandfather, of which he was probably both.

I met Tuli in 1989 at the CMJ Music Marathon. He was in the audience at a panel discussion where Kramer was one of the panelists. Shimmy-Disc was getting ready to put out Tuli's first album in decades. He offered me some simple but effective advice about continuing to publish a fanzine - which could probably be boiled down to "write what you feel - don't fight the feeling - keep doing it." He looked a little scruffy, but upstairs he had it all together.

I deeply regret not having seen Gene Ludwig play more often. He was truly a master of the B-3. He had a deep, deep sense of swing and knew how to make that 400-pound beast move as lightly as an alto. Maybe it's time to stock up on Gene Ludwig albums in the collection.

The Post-Gazette obit said that he flipped a coin to decide whether he was going to be a full-time musician or a civil engineer. Guess which one out. And think - as I always like to point out - where we'd be if he had gone with civil engineering. One person's decision can affect a lot more people than they realize, directly or indirectly.

Kahil El'Zabar & Hamiet Bluiett Lift the Bandstand

It was pretty cool to walk up the steps into the stage area of the Thunderbird Cafe and see it filled with people there to see the Kahil El'Zabar/Hamiet Bluiett Ritual Trio. There might only be about 20 tables total on both the floor and the upper level by the second bar. But typically, shows like this - avant garde/small scale/call it what you like jazz shows - in Pittsburgh don't typically attract that much of a crowd. I can recall a Steve Swell show a few years ago where I was the only person in the audience right as the set was about to start.

But anyway, it was a good start to the first of a four-part concert series. The Thoth Trio opened the show with a mood that made up for the long gaps between their shows. Ben Opie (tenor and alto saxophones), Paul Thompson (bass) and Dave Throckmorton (drums) each have numerous other projects going on, and Thoth as it is doesn't get to play a lot of gigs. The highlights included: "Ammonium" where a bluesy bass line gets caught up with a sax melody that's like a sideways drunk "Jitterbug Waltz"; Thelonious Monk's rarely heard "We See," which moved away from its Monkism but was a treat since you never heard a tenor player outside of Charlie Rouse or Frank Foster playing it; and a lengthy piece that I think was "Nocturnal" in which Opie ran shot up the register of his horn, running right off the rails of what his horn could blow, and Throckmorton shows how time can be so elastic, pulled back and held tight for dramatic impact and then released. I swear that guy could walk out of a room with playing the beat with his sticks, say hi to a few people he knew, get a drink of water, check his messages and walk back in the room without diverging from the tempo.

Kahil El'Zabar started the Ritual Trio's set with the same kind of intensity and focus. For 15 minutes, he sustained a tempo and groove on the kalimba, tapping his right foot (on which he wore bells) and vocalized along with serious spirit in his voice. The band didn't introduce themselves, they just took the stage, did some soundcheck tweaks and then El'Zabar got into it. Hidden behind shades (which came off after that tune), he had us in the palm of his hands.

Last year, when El'Zabar and Bluiett came to town, it was just the two of them, but this time Junius Paul was along on bass, which helped to open up the songs. While the kalimba set the groove and Bluiett sometimes vamped along with him, Paul often broke into solos or ideas that spun off the grooves. Many of the songs were fairly straight vamps, but that left a lot of room for funky stuff to be added, for some baritone wails to go in, and for any and all of the musicians to sing or moan along. One time when Bluiett was playing flute, El'Zabar's growls mixed with the woodwind and it sounded like Rahsaan Roland Kirk was blowing the instrument.

When El'Zabar moved to the trap kit, he sometimes made faces that were a lot like Throckmorton. (For those out-of-towners, Dave often makes faces like he has a lemon wedge between his cheek and gum - a real sour puss.) He bashed away at the crash cymbal so loudly, I had to cover my ear a couple times.

When I think of Hamiet Bluiett, I think of the baritone sax in all its commanding presence; the kind of instrument and person you don't mess with. And I've seen him close to half a dozen times in the last 25 years. So it was a dose of reality seeing this gentleman onstage who looked like someone's grandfather. Don't get me wrong, the man is still mighty on that horn - and he let fly one of the most spirited vocal yells of the night during one of the other songs. But the recent passing of Fred Anderson was another sad reminder of the humanity of these artists and I thought of that several times last night while looking at Mr. B. I hope he keeps going and I hope traveling by van to club dates isn't too much for him.

When we were leaving, we walked past the van where the trio was loading up, and Hamiet was talking, presumably about the set and the spirit that was on the stage. It was good to hear that and I thanked him for a great show. And then I thanked him for everything. If I had said more, it might sounded maudlin or awkward, so I stopped there. In talking about it with my friend Lena on the ride home, I realized what I really thinking: I sincerely hope that musicians like that - who can get completely whipped up in what they're doing and ride that wave of bliss - know that they're appreciated while they're here.

That show was a perfect example of lifting the bandstand - playing a groove for 10 to 15 minutes, having it stay alive during that time, having the drummer walk through the audience and get us to clap along (even those who don't usually feel like it) and have it feel like this is what we're here for - to enjoy this music. It was a great time.

Summer Jazz Mondays

Now I'm a bit of a Shanley-come-lately on this, but I went to Paul's CDs trying to buy tickets for the Kahil El-Zabar & Hamiet Bluiett show yesterday only to discover that the show is the first in a four-week series of shows at the Thunderbird Cafe. This first show happens on Monday, July 8. It's $15 in advance, $20 day of show. (And you can't get the tickets at Paul's. You have to go to www.thunderbirdcafe.net.) The Thoth Trio is supposed to open.

Next Monday, contrary to what I blogged about last week (which has since been corrected) William Hooker will be there, with Matta Gawa. $10-$12.

On July 26, I am really stoked because Aram Shelton is coming. I reviewed his album on January 2 this year. He's part of that extended family of Chicago jazz guys that includes Josh Berman and Jason Adasiewicz. David Bernabo and Daryl Fleming open the show.

On August 2, the Ernest Dawkins New Horizons Trio plays, with Lee Robinson & Ed Tarzia opening. $15-$20.

Should be a good time. If everyone who read this blog went to those shows, I'd........ be really happy.

Fred Anderson, thanks, wherever you are

It was just a few weeks ago that I mourned the loss of Bill Dixon and here I am again writing about the death of another jazz titan - tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson. And when I say "titan" I mean the definition of the term.

When I was reading the Post-Gazette this morning, something told me to take a lot at the obituaries. That's where I saw that Anderson had passed away. But my eyes must've glazed over the death date, because I had no idea that he died on June 24. I was under the impression it happened this week and it wasn't until I read the article I've linked here that I was found out.

When I reviewed Fred's trio album on Engine last year (see entry on July 26, 2009), there was a moment when I opined that he should live forever because he "has an unending font of ideas." Not only that, a lot of people depended on him, directly or indirectly. His Velvet Lounge served as a home to so many musicians, and there were probably a lot of nights when musicians made plans to record or work together, making plans that might not have otherwise come together. These unspoken catalysts should not be overlooked.

There were also nights when he tended bar at the Velvet and played a set. You're not going to find many musicians with that sort of work ethic. It makes you wonder a) what most of today's jazz musicians will be doing when they're 81 years old and b) whether anyone have that type of tenacity to keep an operation going, without being either a victim or a follower of the almighty dollar.

Don't know about Fred Anderson? Check out this fine piece that Kurt Gottschalk wrote for All About Jazz: http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/article.php?id=36920

Then buy a handful of CDs by him.

Thanks, Fred. You were a walking inspiration.

CD Review: Giuseppi Logan Quintet

The Giuseppi Logan Quintet

(Tompkins Square)

Giuseppi Logan's tone on tenor and alto saxophone was pretty raw and thin back in the '60s, although he did manage to execute some good ideas on those horns. With Don Pullen, Eddie Gomez and Milford Graves backing him up, it was raggedy, but engaging free jazz set. (For more details, see my entry from August 19, 2008)

In recent years, Logan reemerged in New York City, where he was busking in Tompkins Square Park. Then last fall, the label named after that park took him into the studio with Dave Burrell (piano), Warren Smith (drums), Francois Grillot (bass) and Matt Lavelle (on the unusual doubling of trumpet and bass clarinet).

The first thing that hits you upon hearing opening track "Steppin'" is that Lavelle and Logan don't sound in tune with each other. This is not the same kind of "not in tune" criticism that was thrown at Ornette Coleman or Jackie McLean through the years. This is the sound of a saxophone mouthpiece being shoved too far onto the neck of the horn - or maybe not far enough - and no one testing it against the A on the piano. Based on a riff that recalls "Giant Steps," the song's arrangement sounds a little sloppy too, as if no one knew if the head was repeated twice or if it lead straight into the solos. There are several tracks, in fact, where the band seems to have an uncertain feeling where the music should head next, which is surprising for a band that includes Burrell and Smith.

Unlike Logan's ESP albums, this quintet tries to play straightahead jazz rather than blowing free, which is part of the problem. While free musicians can take liberties with regard to things like tempo and intonation, that kind of approach just sounds sloppy in this situation. The ballad "Around" has a pretty theme, but it's hard to get past the sharpness of Logan's tone. "Bop Dues" offers some hope, with a clever head that comes with a "mop-mop" tag at the end of each phrase. Logan only solos briefly, followed by Lavelle who's trumpet solo has a rough but impressive quality.

Ironically, Logan's take on "Blue Moon," where he plays piano, comes off as one of the stronger pieces on the album, because it proves that something delicate can surface amidst all the rawness of his horn playing. The other piano piece, an original called "Love Me Tonight," almost borders on exploitation. Here Logan sings, clearly frail of voice, betraying a set of bad dental work, if he has any at all. The folks at Tompkins Square might have thought this heartfelt message would close the album on a sweet note, but instead it comes off sounding kind of sad.

I'm glad Logan is alive and doing well and getting to play again. But if he's going to record, he needs to be put in a situation that will bring out the best in him. That didn't happen here.

Other stuff I wrote & "Mark your calendar" info

All the CD reviews here on the blog focus mainly on jazz, but that's because I've written about the rock and the roll for other places. Last week at Blurt, they ran my review of Goodbye Killer, the latest album by my beloved Pernice Brothers: http://www.blurt-online.com/news/view/3821/.

This week, I filed a review of the Germs' final performance, Live at the Starwood, December 3, 1980, which ought to be up any day now. They also have a few reviews in the can from me, the names of which I'll drop when they're up on the site.

There's a pretty interesting singer-songwriter named Rebecca Pronsky coming to Pittsburgh in a few weeks. I just wrote a preview for her July 8 show for City Paper. That'll be up on the site and in print by Wednesday. In the meantime, check her out at http://www.rebeccapronsky.com/. She has a really great voice that's a lot like Neko Case. Her 2007 album Departures and Arrivals is especially strong, though she also did an EP last year called The Best Game in Town.

Speaking of shows coming to Pittsburgh, free improv drummer William Hooker is coming here on July 12! [Date corrected since this entry was initially published.] That should be a pretty great show because his new album Yearn for Certainty is really strong. I just filed a review with JazzTimes. It has Sabir Mateen playing saxophones on it, and he really sounds great. (He's also on the latest from trombonist Steve Swell, which I also wrote about for JT. It's a great album and Mateen is really earth shattering there too.) Hopefully Sabir will be coming with Hooker.

Before that show happens, Kahil El'Zabar & Hamiett Blueitt are coming back to town on July 5 to the Thunderbird Cafe. Thoth Trio is opening, which is kind of a rare event in and of itself because those guys are all on different schedules and rarely get a chance to play together.

And the big show I already have tickets for................... drum roll, please....... on July 10.......is Johnny Mathis!

Yes, that's right folks, I'm going to see Johnny freakin' Mathis. Two friends of mine from work (one is Erin from the Love Letters) and I all thought we ought to check it out. Since all three of us thought the same thing, it's a slamdunk. Expect a dispatch.

CD review: Chicago Underground Duo - Boca Negra

Chicago Underground Duo

Boca Negra

(Thrill Jockey)

Bill Dixon's death made me think about the Chicago Underground Duo, specifically their Boca Negra album that came out a few months ago. Dixon had collaborated with CUD member Rob Mazurek in his other project, the Exploding Star Orchestra, and his playing reminded me a bit of Dixon's anyway, so I thought it was time to pull that disc out again and write about it.

Glad I did because it sounds even stronger than it did a few months ago. Maybe I just needed time to get to know it a little bit better, and listen to it with a different set of ears or expectations. The Chicago Underground Duo, which is completed by drummer/percussionist Chad Taylor can't really be listened to the same way that you listen to jazz. They're a little more AMM than ECM. They create sound sculptures that should be explored more for their sonic architecture than for the way Mazurek blows and Taylor cooks. "Left Hand of Darkness" has some weird electronics, coupled with some pitch bending and tremolo, while the trumpet gets bathed in echo. Two songs later on "Quantum Eye," things get all wobbly and trippy, like the Duo is playing underwater.

What can be really disarming about Boca Negra is how several songs sound like the work of more than two musicians. "Confliction" has a bass riff (preprogrammed on keys or samplers, presumably) with drums following along with it, and the whole thing almost sounds like a Soft Machine piece. "Spy on the Floor" does sound like a riff to a spy movie theme, with a lot of bass and drums, pausing frequently for a vibes breakdown in the middle of it. In a cover of Ornette Coleman's "Broken Shadows" Taylor is actually dueting with himself, since his loose drumming backs up the vibes, which state the melody. His free drumming sounds like it could have been played first, as he sang the future vibes part in his head. Or maybe he played the vibes first, leaving enough room for free drumming. It sounds like overthinking, but actually these questions make the piece, and in turn the whole album, a little more compelling as they draw you in.

Some of the album gets pretty repetitive. The synthetic loop of "Hermeto" gets to be a bit much, but when Taylor and Mazurek groove on mbira and trumpet duet ("Laughing with the Sun") and distort both instruments, they added sound manipulation keeps the scene from getting drab.

Perfect Pitch?

Sunday night, Jennie asked me how good I was at hearing pitches and knowing what notes they were. She blew on an empty water bottle and I guessed that it might be an A. Donovan told her it was a B when she blew on it for him earlier in the day. Curious, I decided to go to the piano and play a B to see how close he was. Since he was still awake in his crib upstairs, I had to do it quietly.

He was right. It was B.

Last night I decided to test his ear when we were in the living room. I started off with something easy and played Middle C. "Hey, Donovan, what note is this?"

"C."

"How about this?"

"A."

"What's this one?"

"D."

He got all of them right. In case you think it was a lucky guess - I wondered the same thing - I banged an A# on the xylophone a few minutes later. He got that one too. When I played the piano, he was across the room, and when I played the xylophone, he had his back to me. There were no lucky guesses.

This morning I played my favorite key to see if the magic was still there in his head. "That's an F#."

It's cool enough that the two musical acts he mentions by name are Echo & the Bunnymen and Sun Ra, but perfect pitch? That's crazy. Well maybe not. He's been exploring that piano obsessively for about six months now.

Bill Dixon, RIP

...or should I call this entry, "Here's one of those entries where I get maudlin again."

(By the way, playing right now: Chicago Underground Duo - Boca Negra)

I just got an email that trumpeter Bill Dixon passed away on Wednesday at the age of 84. He had been battling an unidentified illness for the last two years. Which means he was probably not in the best of health when he recorded with the Exploding Star Orchestra for Thrill Jockey. Not that you could tell that by the quality of his playing.

Dixon had a pretty unique style of trumpet playing. For years I thought the master version of "With (Exit)" on Cecil Taylor's Conquistador was inferior to the alternate take because in the master, Bill sounded like he lost his embouchure and was blowing a lot of air and the notes were slipping away. Then a couple years ago, I heard a recent recording by him and discovered this is an intentional way he plays. It's his style.

If you're suffering from some disease, would you keep it a secret from the public? If you've built your career on defiance and the pursuit of original ideas, chances are you wouldn't want to sound like you're trying to get sympathy for your situation. You just keep plowing on. I mean, look at David S. Ware. He soldiered on while in need of a kidney transplant doing dialysis by himself. He's not in the best of health, but he's still here. Do we sit back and say, "Wow, that's really a shame," and leave it at that, or should we do something else? Buy albums? Pray?

Sorry, no answers tonight, just a bunch of rhetorical questions.

By the way, here's the official Bill Dixon obit, provided by his family: http://www.improvisedcommunications.com/blog/2010/06/17/dixon-obit

CD Review: Kenny Dorham - The Flamboyan, Queens, NY 1963

Kenny Dorham
The Flamboyan, Queens, NY 1963
(Upfront)

During the late '80/early '90s, we college radio geeks had different perspectives on what made a band successful in our eyes. A band that released an album on a label like Homestead, SST or, later Matador, was about to get blown out of the water and make a name for themselves, or so it seemed. The reality was that a band on any of those probably wasn't all that different from an underground band in Pittsburgh (heck, our own Weird Paul Petrosky fit both criteria) except that they had an album on those labels. And maybe a few more people around the country knew about them.

50 years later, nearly everyone who released an album on Blue Note Records is looked at as anything from unappreciated genius to god. For a musician to be on that label, it meant that you had it made. The reality is that these jazz musicians might really have been on the same boat as indie rockers were in the early days of the labels mentioned above. Time has a way of changing perspectives on things like this.

All this came to mind while listening to this release from Upfront Records of a radio broadcast of Kenny Dorham's quintet. Dorham, the trumpeter who had played with Charlie Parker and later held a spot in the original Jazz Messengers, was leading a group with tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson in 1963. The pairing was considered a hot commodity. Henderson was the new guy in town, about to be record with the trumpeter and eventually get signed to his own Blue Note contract. One year later, he'd appear on Lee Morgan's "The Sidewinder," which turned the imprint into a successful label.

So it's ironic to hear these two playing on a Monday night at a bar in Queens that must not have been very full, judging by radio MC Alan Grant's virtual pleas to listeners to stop by and check it out, which almost sound a little desperate. What's even more illuminating is that the band doesn't sound like their firing on all cylinders at the beginning of that night, although that could be the fault of the recording not bringing out everyone's true nature. Pianist Ronnie Matthews has some punchy comps during his own "Dorian" that borrow from McCoy Tyner's solo in "My Favorite Things." (That piece and this one feature bassist Steve Davis, it should be noted.) But Dorham's solo consists of long tones and quick phrases that don't always connect to a full idea. Henderson stokes the fires though those fast triplets that he'd unleash in "The Sidewinder" and in a few of his own pieces.

Henderson sounds ready to cook from the beginning, but Dorham takes a few tunes to sound close to the Kenny Dorham. It happens around "My Injun From Brazil," which thankfully was retitled "Una Mas" by the time it was recorded in the studio. By this part of the set, the quintet has gone through passable versions of "I Can't Get Started" and "Summertime," the latter getting a little more kick going for it. By the time the Dorham original is reached, the trumpeter is engaged in some spry staccato lines, with drummer J.C. Moses (a Pittsburgher, which is mentioned by Grant!) doing some good ride cymbal work behind him. Moses plays it pretty straight, not going in the direction he would with Eric Dolphy or the New York Contemporary Five with Archie Shepp, but he's still solid.

By the time they get to "Dynamo (Straight Ahead)" they start to chew up the song's "I Got Rhythm" chord changes. Good things might've been coming in the next set, but unfortunately that's the end of the show, and Grant signs off and the music fades after four minutes. Speaking of Grant, the DJ serves as a good host, without any of the condescending swarm of Symphony Sid or acting with the pretentious hipster aura of radio men that might follow him. When he talks to Dorham he doesn't sound stiff either, but respectful. It's another sad reminder of something that you can't get on commercial radio anymore: live people on the air after midnight broadcasting a live performance, which you could potentially attend if you were still making plans that late in the evening.

Aside from that bout of nostalgiz, The Flamboyan doesn't exactly rank as required listening or a holy grail of hard bop, but does have some fine moments from two strong players who were a bit under the radar in comparison to some of their peers.

Love Letters at Irma Freeman Center

On Friday, work was pretty busy and felt like a constant game of Beat the Clock. If that wasn't enough, I got there nice and early, only to realize - as I was walking across the parking lot - that I had forgotten to pack my change of clothes for the Love Letters show that night. And there was no way I was going to wear a work t-shirt during our set - as much as I love the company that employs me. So I drove home, expletives spewing out that car window, and got the clothes.

The Love Letters played at the Irma Freeman Center for Imagination, a really beautifully designed gallery in Garfield. As part of the First Fridays/Unblurred/gallery crawl that happens each month, our set was one of three performances that coincided with an opening of an exhibition of Evan Knauer's paintings. (Evan is the brother of LL's guitarist Buck and is a Pittsburgh music vet himself). I missed Erin Snyder's classical duo since I was still at work, and I arrived as the trio of Bob Wentzel (sax), Emmett Frisbee (bass) and Winston Goode (drums) were playing.

Once I got there, all the stress of the day started to dissipate. I had been looking forward to this show more than I realized and a lot of people whom I was hoping to see were there: my sister, a long lost friend who recently stumbled across me, this friend's mom (who was more like a bonus guest) and another friend who had an art closing that same night and still managed to arrive and turn our set into a dance party.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

The room where we played is a converted garage, which looks great but still might be a little boomy and echoey. We weren't worried, though and there was a p.a. for all four vocals so the voices could compete with the instruments. I couldn't hear the voices clearly, so I'm not sure if I was on key but it felt like it. We started with "The Last One," which is a pretty charged-up number when we're firing on all cylinders. And I think we were. It was a good indicator of what was to come.

One of the things that I want to do with the band is dig up songs by old local bands (i.e. my friends) that would otherwise be lost to the ether. This is sort of an extension of playing songs I wrote in previous bands, I suppose. We've done at least three Mofones songs, and one Bone of Contention song. (A new Love Letters song is a rewrite of one of my old songs, but that was conceived about four or five years ago, so maybe that doesn't count.)

So far, we've done a song by Catamount and one by the Smoking Pets (which was never released). A few months ago, Buck has brought up the idea of doing a song or two by his first band, Cousin It. They were a great band, existing right around the time that Bone of Contention first came together, and I always liked them. "Shower of Dreams" is/was a great psychedelic droning pop song with room for a lot of harmonies. Not only was I thrilled to do it, but Buck was going to sing lead. Something he's never done in 24 years of playing in bands.

The last practice before the show, I asked if he was going to introduce the song that night. "Uh, no." Fine with me, because even though a little context would've been nice, I wasn't about to tell him what to do. But sure enough, he gave a nice intro and some background that night. Playing it felt really good. Playing Aimee's new song felt good too, even though I messed it up and only by the grace of Erin our drummer did it hang together while the three of us got our balance.

Then there were the dancers who showed up about 1/3 or halfway through the set and brought more energy to the room. It was a good time. And it made going to work the next day kind of hard. Mostly because I felt a little sore.

We need to book another show.

What the thought of death brings out in me

It's been a strange week. And it's only Wednesday.

I was driving around yesterday when I heard on the radio that Hank Jones died. All I could do was take off my beret and salute him. It's sad - he's the last of three Jones men of jazz to go, with brothers Thad and Elvin before him. But then, Hank was 91 years old. And he played like he was 60. I saw him last year at the Detroit International Jazz Festival and although he did sort of look his age around the eyes, he was eternally young around the fingers. All I can say is I'm glad I caught him before he split.

Of course, the world lost Lena Horne last week too. There's no need for me to rehash what's been written about her over the past week, but suffice to say, she was always one of those artists that I just kind of took for granted. I never owned any of her albums until about eight years ago when I found two RCA records at a flea market. Whoa, goddam. That's what I felt after listening to her. She's freaking amazing, with a ton of fire power. No wonder Cecil Taylor loves her.

Plus I love the fact that she was on Sesame Street a few times and once, she helped Grover overcome his shyness and he told her she was a great kisser. Lucky monster.

Tonight I finally wrote a review for Blurt of Susan Cowsill's latest album, Lighthouse. Normally I wouldn't tell you anything about it here and urge you to read the online review. But for one thing, I haven't sent it to them yet. (I always sleep on it, unless I'm right on a deadline.) For another thing, there's one song that's been heavy on my mind lately that I feel the need to write about. "River of Love" was written by Susan's brother Barry who was in the Cowsills with her. The song has a lost-love theme where the singer hopes they'll be reunited again by the river of love. But considering the theme of loss that runs through this album, it's clear that the song is now more about Barry, who drowned in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and wasn't found for about four months. His own song is a tribute, a wish to him. That's heavy enough but Susan got her surviving brothers Bob, John and Paul, and sister-in-law Vicki Peterson Cowsill (yes, that Vicki Peterson, my fave Bangle), to join her on the chorus and lift the bandstand.

And boy, do they ever. The song makes me fucking cry every time I hear it. It's like "The Bleeding Heart Show" by the New Pornographers, except that this time the emotion is based on real events. And the music has all the trappings of a perfect pop song.

Death has been on my mind lately. I was worried that if death always comes in threes, who would be the next jazz person to leave? Please not Sonny Rollins. Not Cecil either. Then I remembered Ronnie James Dio was gone, making Hank #3. Small consolation, but I needed it.

Last night a longtime friend was telling me about going to Lillydale and trying to communicate with her dead grandparents. It sounds like she did, but it wasn't the conversation she had hoped to have. It was just kind of typical, average conversation. There were no over-arching pearls of wisdom, just some random everyday observations.

While it bothered her - and me, in a way - it did make me think that these methods of communication can probably happen but that we can't expect to get major insight from talking to the dead anymore than you could've gotten immediate changes in yourself from talking to John Coltrane when he was alive. He wasn't an actual God. He was a guy, albeit one that was extremely talented. And the dead... are the people who loved you and you love them. They're just in a different place now. That sounds sad, but the best was to keep from feeling sad is to go on living.

CD review: Rempis/Rosaly - Cyrillic

Rempis/Rosaly
Cyrillic
(482 Music)

Horn and drum duo sets can explore any number of different formats: balls to the wall honking, screeching and splattering; pointillist dots of sound that may or may not yield a complete statement; or a strong dialogue that gives the impression that at least one of the musicians is hearing a full band in their head and using that as a guide.

Saxophonist Dave Rempis and drummer Frank Rosaly draw on a little bit of each of these ideas, which keeps their duets flowing and makes sure that they won't lapse into anything too familiar. Of course, they aren't exactly strangers either. Rempis (who also plays in the Vandermark 5) has lead a quartet that includes Rosaly as one of its two drummers. The saxophonist changes horns on each track, playing alto, tenor and baritone. Different instruments bring out different ideas in his playing, although his baritone tracks seem to feature the most diversity, going from long, vibrato tones to the one track that seems to possess a stated, almost staightforward theme. Frank Rosaly, whose shows up on a myriad of Chicago sessions, begins the album in a most unorthodox manner - considering his background at least - and acts like the in-tune partner throughout, listening closely to Rempis's developments.

On that opener, "Antiphony," ("anti-phony" or "an-TIF-o-nee" - you be the judge), Rosaly's drumming begins by emulating what sounds like the classic "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover" drum riff, and taking a detour into waltz time before finally playing a heavy backbeat towards the end. Over this relatively fluid action, Rempis emits short bursts of ideas that blend well.

The other alto showcase, the nearly 16-minute opus "How to Cross When Bridges Are Out," indicates the duo uses time wisely to build and rebuild on ideas. Rempis blows a mix of fast lines, crazy trills, and upper register panic, before his partner takes a solo marked by fast rolls, rim shots and crashes. There is a minute when things get too noodly, but they lock into a wail fest before attrition sets is.

On tenor, Rempis takes a stab at the "classic" free jazz attack on "Tainos" and lands a hit, running fast and wild, with Rosaly moving all over his drum kit to goad him to take it ever higher. "Don't Trade Here," features a lot of staccato tenor, as well as what sounds like a passing reference to Monk's "Evidence."

Only one track fails to break from the meandering. "Still Will" is full of baritone honks and splats and cymbal clicks that plumb the instruments' sonic possibilities, but it doesn't fare well in the momentum department. But otherwise, Cyrillic, which ends with the relatively melodic "In Plain Sight," delivers a focused set of duos.

Love Letters latest show

Just got back a little bit ago from a Love Letters gig. We played at Rock 'n Bowl, which takes place at Arsenal Lanes in Lawrenceville. People pay $8 to bowl all night and they get to have us serenade them from Lane 14, which gets covered up with a blanket so we have a nice non-slippery place to stand.

The last time we played there, I was in an awful mood. It was about a week after the big snowfall in Pittsburgh. Highland Park was still under siege, with a lot of snow still in the middle of the streets, making it hard for us to load out and get to the show. A layer of ice was forming as we unloaded equipment. I was all out of caffeine, so everything was bugging me. Then at the end of the night, after playing to uninterested bowlers and four friends, we were paid pretty handsomely. It was kind of a trick ending to a bad night.

Tonight was the opposite, at least in terms of the set up. We got there way early, had time to set up in a leisurely manner, and played everything we knew, in the form of one set list. And we sounded really together, the tightest I think we've been since we started. There weren't as many bowlers there but a few friends showed up too so it was pretty worthwhile.

By the way, in case you didn't know the new New Pornographers album came out yesterday. Guess who was the first person to by it at the local new record store! C'mon guess.............

Tonight in the jukebox

Playing right now: Hafez Modirzadeh - Dandelion (bought it at his show last week.)

Tonight's listening pleasure included: Liz Phair's Whip-Smart, which has held up remarkably well, especially the first half of it, which I like best; Big Brother & the Holding Company's version of "Ball and Chain," which beats the pants off the live version on Janis' greatest hits album if only because the searing guitar work holds up under repeated listens better than Janis' "I don't understand why half the world is cryin'...., man...." spoken interlude; and Sonic Youth's Confusion is Sex, which is not a consistant album, but when it's good it's really dangerous. It reminds me of being 16 and getting my head blown off. And knowing that I could clear a room by playing it.

Between "Ball and Chain" and Sonic Youth, I had to check out the BB&tHC performance of that song from the Monterey Pop movie courtesy of youtube. Janis is stunning. Absolutely electrifying. After than I had to see Jimi Hendrix smash his guitar after "Wild Thing," also at Monterey. That's probably the most pornographic rock and roll performance ever. And I mean better than GWAR because Jimi was just doing what comes naturally. The best part is after he set the guitar on fire, it's still making noise. Even after he starts smashing it. Amazing.

CD Review: Mike Reed's People, Places & Things: Stories and Negotiations

Mike Reed's People, Places & Things

Stories and Negotiations

(482 Music)

Even when some of those Chicago guys pay homage to past masters, they still sound like they're on a modern track. The latest by drummer Mike Reed's People, Places & Things bares this out. A percolating group improv kicks off the opening minutes of the album, giving the faint impression that the octet will be blowing free for the entire program. But after a few minutes, they lock into some hard-swinging bop in the form of John Jenkins' "Song of a Star." This might be a lot more straight ahead than the previous minutes alluded to, but Reed's version of straight swings much like Sun Ra's Arkestra (more on them to come) did: the rhythm section moves with so much authority, with a propulsive beat and taut basslines, and takes it beyond any older period of the music and lands with a crash in the here and now.

Reed started PP&T to focus on "under-recorded, under-recognized aspects of the vibrant Chicago jazz scene circa 1954-60" and they've released two previous CDs. This one expands the concept because the core quartet of Reed, Jason Roebke (bass), Tim Haldemen (tenor sax) and Greg Ward (alto sax) are joined by three players from that era - one time Arkestra member Art Hoyle (trumpet, flugelhorn), bandleader Ira Sullivan (trumpet) and extensive sideman and leader Julian Priester (trombone) - plus one more Windy City modern cat, Jeb Bishop (trombone). Less a meeting of old blood and young blood, the 2008 concert recorded for this album presented a group where everyone was on the same page. In explaining the solo order, the liner notes say that the trombonists have a vastly different sound from one another and only attributes one specific solo to Bishop. The rest is just guesswork for the listener. It's frustrating to those of us who want to be sure, but it also shows how cohesively this band works together.

Reed picked four relative deep cuts for the set from the city's history: the aforementioned "Song of a Star" by an alto player known to this writer predominantly for an appearance on an early Hank Mobley album; Sun Ra's "El is a Sound of Joy" is built on a vicious groove pinned down by one of the tenors while the other horns blow in and around it. Wilbur Campbell's "Wilbur's Tune" is another strong piece in a hard bop-esque mold as is Priester's "Urnack" which he recorded with Sun Ra and here starts like "Song" with two minutes of free exchanges of ideas. Clifford Jordan's "Lost and Found" features Sullivan and Haldeman in an old style tenor duel, as well as a penetrating solo from Hoyle, who throws in a quote from "Little Rootie Tootie" as things almost unwind.

The drummer also penned one piece each for the veteran guests of the set. "Third Option," for Hoyle, has rich voicings that ought to impress fans of large ensembles as traditional as the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, which speaks to Reed's skills as a composer. "Door #1," dedicated to Priester, begins like a loose tone poem, before locking into a progression that could slip into "You Don't Know What Love Is," with an exquisite quality to match that standard. Sullivan's salute, "The And of 2," features not only his tenor but Ward's alto getting prodded along by shouts from the other horns during solos.

What feels especially exciting, musically, about this meeting of minds is that Stories and Negotiations looks at the past but it concerns itself with making today's music that's more than just a tribute.

Part two

There was an article in the Post-Gazette previewing the ElSaffar/Modirzadeh show, where ElSaffar mentioned that most of the suites that he and Modirzadeh composed are written out and don't rely as much on improvisation. So I went in to the Warhol show thinking about that and trying to separate the written from the spontaneous. A lot of it did seem mapped out and similar to what I remember specifically from the album. (I listened to a lot when reviewing it, but I don't know it inside out. Something like this takes a long time to wrap your head around.)

A remarkable thing about the opening notes of ElSaffar's "Copper Suite" is how you can really feel the vibrations between the notes that he and Modirzadeh play. It was almost like when you're tuning a guitar and playing two strings together: the farther you get from the correct pitch on one of the strings, the more the sound vibrates. First they played long pitches like that, then they started echoing each other. Alex Cline was rolling all over his drum kit and it was loud and relatively free, but it never got bombastic, never to that feverish point that a lot of free drummers hit. Mark Dresser was plucking his bass strings really harshly. It sounded like he was really clenching his fingers on them.

When Modirzadeh took what seemed like a solo, he stopped fingering the pads of his saxophone and just grabbed the bell of his tenor sax, letting his mouth bend the pitches of the notes. Earlier in the piece, he started playing the upper pads of the sax with both of his hands, whereas normally the right hand handles the lower pads. It's all part of reworking these instruments to incorporate scales and pitches that they weren't built to play.

Modirzadeh's "Radif-E-Kayhan" bears some Ornette Coleman influence, but to really imagine that comparison accurately you almost have to take Ornette's ideas and utilize a different set of scales and tones to play them. About five minutes into the piece, Dresser started playing a blues riff of sorts, to which Cline responded with some press rolls and fills to kept it from getting too complacent. ElSaffar wailed and peeped before it shifted back to a rubato tempo and then on to a 4/4 tempo. When ElSaffar started playing with a Harmon mute, the band took on the spectre of the Miles Davis' famed Plugged Nickel performances. This was equally as spacey. A passing phrase almost sounding like a disembodied quote from "Hot House" in there too.

All four of those guys were incredible. The two leaders of course made their instruments do things that no one has really done before, in terms of playing foreign musics on them. Dresser was great, holding down the helm or going off on his own tear. Cline did a lot but made it seem like a piece of cake. You could tell he was really listening to everyone by what and how he played.