The Final Nite
Category: Music

Improvisation and Poetry: If you've been part of the improvised music scene in NY, you've most likely encountered poet Steve Dalachinsky who has a remarkable ability to spin words as an improviser throws notes out into the night without looking over his shoulder to see who is following or who may be left behind.

I met Steve while I was playing with John Tchicai in a duo concert for All About Jazz, the 1's and 2's festival at Cornelia Street Cafe in NYC. That evening, John wasn't giving up any secrets before the show, never even hinting as to what our set list might be. I had no reason to worry, we had more than a few tunes up our sleeves and there was a nice bottle of wine on the table in the company of good friends. It was my first duo with John, and I knew he often liked to set the music in motion by improvising the first number.

We got on stage and were ready to play when John leans over to me and whispers, "Let's make noise - you start." The entire first set was thus conceived in a single moment. It's hard to describe the feeling of totally improvising in front of an audience, the mixture of searching, discovery, assembly and disassembly that is part of a spontaneous performance.

In the second set, we returned to a few familiar melodies before Steve Dalachinsky joined us for the last tune. Steve had written a poem while listening to our music in the first set, and as he began to unfold his words, a unified energy guided the music without hesitation. It might have been the best tune of the night, or at least a very satisfying one for myself and John, the added muse appearing in the right moment.

Afterwards, Steve gave me a copy of the poem and every time since when we play in NY, Steve has been there, at all the various venues, often sharing the stage as a verbal sparring partner in creativity. He was there with Lee Konitz when the Tchicai quintet played at Birdland Jazz Club with myself, Charlie Kohlhase, Cecil McBee and Billy Hart. It was an unusual venue for our friend Tchicai, but to play for a week in a NY club was a welcome tribute after so many years since the mid '60's when John called NYC his home, playing with Albert Ayler, Archie Shepp, Don Cherry, Roswell Rudd and of corse John Coltrane. John Tchicai is also a lover of words and improvisation, often breaking into singing or poetry during a performance, especially when he's happy with the music. We recorded a double live cd at Birdland and captured some of these brilliant moments.

And Steve was there the next week when John and I returned to play a quartet with bassist Adam Lane and drummer Vijay Anderson at the Stone. It turned out to be a better gig in some ways, the audience was more in tune to our constellations, and Steve sat in again, reading from a handwritten book of poems he carries with him to which he constantly adds new words while listening to musical improvisations..

That's when I decided I had to buy Steve's book, "The Final Nite" written while listening to live performances of saxophonist Charles Gayle. I really liked this one:

Improvisation
like a fine cigar
can choke you
or be smooth
either way
it's wrapped in leaves
& leaves a smell
that some may call
Perfumed

Our most recent visit to Brooklyn to play at Zebulon seemed to begin as a lonely evening, destined by severe weather for a low turn out. There was more snow and ice than I had ever seen in NY, more than we had the week before when we played with the Good Night Songs trio in Portland Maine. The first group with Mary Halvorson started an hour and a half late because no one was there, but slowly and strangely it seemed, with snow still coming down, folks started to arrive and the music began to heat up the night. I love Mary's playing and by the time we went on, Zebulon was vibrating on another frequency. John Tchicai united us through his sound, deep attentive listening, sensitive imagination, humor and wisdom.

This story hasn't left out Steve Dalachinsky who surprised us (or possibly not?) by showing up for our set. I'll have to conclude this tribute by saying that even though Steve didn't sit in with us that evening, his presence, the sparse sentences he threw my way while I was tuning up, the observations audible only to a few of us in the corner, contributed to the following improvisations in a way I can't describe other than saying, "you had to be there." It was a night of many turns where doors opened and closed and opened anew, leading to multi directional pathways of converging sounds and rhythms.

The night ended when we dropped Steve off in a still snowing Manhattan as he gave me a gold sticker that was added to his book of poetry that won the book of the year award.

It's called "The Final Nite" on Ugly Duckling Presse. I suggest you look for it and enjoy his musical sounds, for as William Parker puts it; "This volume of spontaneous poems recalls one man's journey into the living word as reflected through sound. He uses the interval of the minor second, giving one the illusion of reading words in-between words much like the idea of the microtone."

& the city came down around us
like a shattered note and the note came due
and the voices of angels asked for water
on the city streets
& the voices of devils sounded like water
on the city streets
& the kingdom of god
became water on the city streets
& the ghost
who could not swim
gave up
and went obediently
home.

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The Music of Africa: J.H. Kwabena Nketia
Current mood: awake
Category: Music

I'm trying to figure out how to play my Balafon, well, I'm improvising and I find things sometimes, but it's not an organized approach, so it's a fortunate accident that in my favorite used book store, I encountered this book: The Music of Africa. Even the author's name sounds like music: Kwabena Nketia. It's a fabulous book describing the function of many instruments with photos, and musical examples of rhythmic and melodic styles.

I'm working on a new recording project of improvised music and writing a few new things when I came across this great line from the book: "... the African concept of a musical sound gives equal prominence to sounds of indefinite as well as definite pitch, instrumental combinations reflect this, being formed out of instruments of either or both categories." And he ends the chapter with another great statement, "the aesthetics of African music reveals a distinct bias toward percussion and the use of percussive techniques... because of a preference for musical texture that embodies percussive sounds or sounds that increase the ratio of noise to pitch."

That really speaks to the sounds I try to create on my guitar that is so well-tuned, it's often difficult to locate those non-defined pitches, but it's a rewarding effort. In Africa, a culture of music is built around that exploration! I know when I'm playing the guitar with a notched wooden stick or some metal object, that a deeper resonance is behind those sounds.

The best chapter in this book is 12: The Rhythmic Basis of Instrumental Music. "Since African music is predisposed towards percussion and percussive textures, there is an understandable emphasis on rhythms, for rhythmic interest often compensates for the absence of melody or the lack of melodic sophistication. The music of an instrument with a range of only two or three tones may be effective or aesthetically satisfying to its performers and their audience if it has sufficient rhythmic interest."

Nketia goes on to give specific examples of rhythmic density in African music and the divisions of duple and triple rhythms in the same time span (or time line). He explains the difference between divisive and additive rhythms: "While divisive rhythms follow the division of the time span, additive rhythms do not. Instead of a phrase of 12 pulses being divided into 6+6, it may be divided into 7+5 or 5+7."

He details the importance of keeping time by maintaining a subjective awareness of the original pulse or time span while playing divisive or additive rhythms in phrases of different lengths, and the difficulty performers have in developing this ability. Phrases can be started at any point in the time line and therefore it is easy to be confused about the original beat or pulse. It takes time until one can reach that point and feel comfortable while playing African cross-rhythms because you can't count beats, it has to become the subjective feeling that you carry inside you, otherwise the music sounds stiff. In any culture, that means it doesn't swing!

While I was playing and teaching with trumpeter Jimmy Owens, he often used to quote Dizzy Gillespie who told him, "You've always got to know where one is!" And another of Dizzy's famous lines goes: "I hear rhythms mostly, then I put notes to them."

Nketia's conclusion is that instruments of contrasting pitch are important to maintain a distinct organization of rhythmic structure as each instrument plays a different role, and in enabling each instrument to be distinctly heard from one another. "Although rhythm is the primary focus in drumming, some attention is paid to pitch level, for the aesthetic appeal of drumming lies in the organization of the rhythmic and melodic elements."

>ps: Our new CD of African, Free Jazz and Blues is out now: "The Lady of Khartoum" is an improvised guitar duo with friend Eric Hofbauer where we also play percussion and bells simultaneously - you have to hear it! Check back soon for availability.

Kindly,

Garrison

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Reading: Jazz Visions - Lennie Tristano
Current mood: peaceful
Category: Music

Jazz Visions: Lennie Tristano and his Legacy

A good friend of mine surprised me when he wrote to ask if I had read this book about Lennie, written by long time collaborator and friend, bassist Peter Ind. When I replied that I hadn't, he promptly sent me a copy from England. The interesting connection for me is that John Tchicai sent me this book, and knowing that nothing we do together has shallow intentions, I was curious to check it out and uncover the connection for myself. For example, Lee Konitz, a colleague of Tristano's, was an important influence on Tchicai as he developed his own sound before playing with Don Cherry in Denmark, then moving to New York in 1964 to form the New York Art Quartet and he played on Coltrane's 1965 lp Ascension.

I have all of Lennie Tristano's recordings and Peter Ind recorded some very fine dates with Warne Marsh and Lee Konitz. And for guitarists, Baubles, Bangles and Beads with Louis Stewart and Peter Ind on Peter's Wave label is simply an essential recording in Louis' slightly threadbare discography (Louis is truly one of the great jazz guitarists on any continent and a favorite of Kenny Burrell's). I recently subbed on a tour for a date that Louis recorded with pianist Frank Harrison and Louis' playing was as fine as ever.

In this book, Peter Ind articulately describes Lennie's influence on jazz and improvised music and musicians, breaking myths about Lennie, nay, unfounded urban legends to be more precise, and illuminates the positive contributions by this master composer, performer and teacher who was admired as a colleague and innovator by musicians such as Charlie Parker, Max Roach and Charles Mingus.

Many things attract me to this book and I will have to update this blog later to include them, but quickly, I'm touched by Peter's description of the commercial influence of jazz as a destructive element to creative music. This is highlighted in Lennie's teaching (I'm also a music professor and performing artist so it's a close subject).

"Other aspects of Lennie's teaching were learning melodies and then the "changes" (harmonic structures) underlying those melodies. This led to learning jazz solos from records. Lennie would advocate that his students learn famous solos. Lester Young was respected by Lennie, not because of Lester's fame but because Lester had, in his time, taken the nuances of improvisation further than anyone else on his instrument. Though Lester had influenced younger players such as Stan Getz and Zoot Sims, there were certain subtleties in his playing that neither Stan or Zoot appeared to realize. If players themselves were unable to realize certain subtleties, how can we expect critics or the jazz public to really appreciate the depths of the music? Without that appreciation, the music cannot be fully understood. In our culture, sadly, that means that product cannot be easily sold. And we seem to have reached the point whereby music is judged solely by its saleability." pg. 133

"Commercialism was anathema to Lennie. He remained unshaken in his view that as a creative jazz musician, you had a clear duty to be faithful to the spirit of the music alone. There is little doubt that the commercially non-compromising views of Lennie and those of many of his associates have contributed to their relative obscurity in the world of jazz. Increasingly, the outside world of commercial jazz seemed alien to the true spirit of the music." pg. 169

Jazz Visions contains excellent examples of jazz life in NYC in the '40's and of Lennie's involvement in developing a unique sound not only for himself, but creating opportunities for other great players who went on (and on) to make their own voices known within the hipper rings of jazz circles throughout the world.

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The Origin of Sound Unity

"All music, based upon melody and rhythm, is the earthly representative of heavenly music." - Plotinous, Hellenistic philosopher.

Ancient sites throughout the world were dedicated to following the movement of the planets. Thousands of years later, they still reach out to the stars, connecting humans to the universe in an extremely accurate manner just as a symphonic orchestra is tuned to each other around a specific pitch. The planets move in harmony, creating musical sounds, triads both major and minor, and rhythms that keep time in poly-rhythmic cycles. All of these can now be recorded and transcribed.

Harmony is reflected all around us as part of our daily lives. When at ease with those closest to us, we feel "in tune" with each other, and experience a sense of "harmony" between ourselves and others, to the point where two people say the same thing simultaneously... or when musicians are improvising freely and suddenly play the same note, melodic motif, rhythm, or chord without the use of charts or musical directions.

The microcosm perfectly reflects the macrocosm as scientists discover that the inner world of sound is based on harmonic overtones precisely aligned to musical theory, and they listen to the farthest reaches of the universe, through time, to hear the original sound of the universe at the moment of creation.

"Over all, I think the main thing a musican would like to do is give a picture to the listener of the many wonderful things that he knows of and sees in the universe... music is a reflection of everything. And it's universal." - Eric Dolphy

To increase the depth of our artistic abilities, we work diligently on both practical and spiritual levels to acquire greater knowledge of the eternal and mystic nature of life and the universe. Each note that sounds, every string or vocal chord that sets in motion a new vibration, is a call to awaken the eternal self that has always been at one with the original sound of the universe.

A note, a melody, a chord, or rhythm, when played sincerely, each is an expression of that harmonious unity.


recommended books:
Parallel Worlds by Michio Kaku
The World Is Sound by Joachim-Ernst Berendt
Eric Dolphy-A Musical Biography by Vladimir Simosko/Barry Tepperman
Free Play by Stephen Nachmanovitch

related websites:
Table of the planets sounds at: http://www.planetware.de/octave/table.html
NASA - sounds of saturn's radio emissions at: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/multimedia/pia07966.html

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Differences and Tolerance: Sun Ra from a Buddhist perspective

The subject today is Differences and Tolerance with reference to the poetry of Sun Ra from a Buddhist perspective. I will begin by citing Sun Ra's poem, "Differences" and conclude by quoting from author and Buddhist scholar Daisku Ikeda and revered Japanese Buddhist, Nichiren Daishonin whose 12th century writings were based on the Lotus Sutra.

In the poem "Differences", Sun Ra talks about ignorance and wisdom as co-existing forces in life, while his own at-oneness with "the force that made life be" provides him with the confidence and ability to perceive his true self, rather than the self others may arbitrarily choose to recognize when looking at him. This is especially clear in his lines: Sometimes in my amazing ignorance/Others see me only as they care to see/I am to them as they think/According the standard I should not be.

Sun Ra is playing with the word "ignorance" from several viewpoints in this poem. Here, he might easily be mixing racial issues with another type of prejudice he often encountered: those who viewed him as a charlatan or fool, talking nonsense about space and altered realities, when actually his thoughts were carefully crafted to reveal deeper meanings, simply asking one to have an open mind to consider alternative truths.

At the end of the poem, Ra says that he is seeing them 'as they are to is', in this eternal moment containing past, present and future, and not the 'seeming isness of the was' or the illusion they have to reality that is not a real isness.

From a Buddhist perspective, Ra's reference to ignorance and wisdom might also be interpreted as the two aspects of life; illusion, or fundamental darnkness, and wisdom, or enlightenment. Both exist simultaneously in the life of each individual. Depending on our life condtion, one or the other may be manifest at any given moment and influence our view of self and other. Awarness of life's eternal nature and our harmony with the universal dharma may be close to Ra's description of "invincible invisible wisdom" - something "greater than life... greater than extinction." In the end, Ra concludes by saying that when he looks at others, he sees this same universal wisdom, present in the everyday mundane reality of life. In this sense, Buddhism (and perhaps Sun Ra in this case) recognizes equally the potential for enlightenment in oneself and others, regardless of outwardly perceived differences.

The Differences

Sometimes in the amazing ignorance
I hear things and see things
I never knew I saw and heard before
Sometimes in the ignorance
I feel the meaning
Invincible invisible wisdom,
And I commune with intuitive instinct
With the force that made life be
And since it made life be
It is greater than life
And since it let extinction be
It is greater than extinction.
I commune with feelings more than
prayer
For there is nothing else to ask for
That companionship is
And it is superior to any other is.
Sometimes in my amazing ignorance
Others see me only as they care to see
I am to them as they think
According the standard I should not be
And that is the difference between I and them
Because I see them as they are to is
And not the seeming isness of the was.

Sun Ra

More background onformation and an online context for this poem is available at:
http://www.elrarecords.com/sunra.html



In his book, For the Sake of Peace (Middleway Press, 2001), Daisaku Ikeda includes a chapter titled, The Path of Dialogue and Tolerance, that I find relative to the preceding poem by Sun Ra. For knowledgeable Ra fans, Dr. Ikeda's use of the term "cosmos" will create an obvious relativity. He expresses his views regarding dialogue and its importance to both our individual and collective cultures and how an understanding of the interdependency of life allows us to create the type of tolerance that is needed to positively influence civilization today.

"Undeniably, in our information-saturated society, we are being inundated by ready-made stereotypes obscuring the truth of people and situations. This is why person-to-person dialogue is more than ever in demand.

I am convinced that we can solve any problem as long as we keep our minds open and stand firm in our belief in our common humanity.

Tolerance is more than just a mental attitude; it must grow out of a sense of larger order and coexistence, a cosmic sensibility that issues up from the deepest wellsprings of life. As explained by the Buddhist doctrine of "dependent origination," no phenomenon in either the human or natural domains arises independently of all others. The cosmos is created through the interrelation and interdependence of all things. Tolerance rooted in a world view of dynamic interdependence can, I believe, be instrumental in enabling us to transcend the threat of a clash of civilizations and to realize a philosophy of coexistence that will permit us to build a world of human harmony." - pg. 67

As I mentioned earlier, in Sun Ra's poem "Differences", "invincible invisible wisdom" is not far from the Buddhist concept of the equal worthiness of all life which inherently contains the wisdom of the universe. In The Major Writings of Nichiren Daishonin (Soka Gakkai, 1999) from the well-known treatise "On Attaining Buddahood in This Lifetime", Ra's "invincible invisible wisdom" is parallel to "the mystic truth":

"If you wish to free yourself from the sufferings of birth and death you have endured since time without beginning and to attain without fail unsurpassed enlightenment in this lifetime, you must perceive the mystic truth that is originally inherent in all living beings." - WND, pg. 3

Another line from the same work describes the process of perceiving this mytic truth in our own lives:

"A mind now clouded by the illusions of the innate darkness of life is like a tarnished mirror, but when polished, it is sure to become like a clear mirror, reflecting the essential nature of phenomena and the true aspect of reality." - WND, pg 4


In "The Entity of the Mystic Law", Nichiren writes, "The mystic principle that is the essential nature of phenomena posses two aspects, the defiled and the pure. If the deflied aspect is operative, this is called delusion. If the pure aspect is operative, this is called enlightenment." "Enlightenment means enlightenment to the essential nature of phenomena, and delusion, ignorance of it." - WND, pgs 417-18

The Chinese teacher T'ien-t'ai in his "Great Concentration and Insight" states, "Ignorance or illusions are themselves enlightenment to the essential nature of phenomena, but due to the influence of delusions, enlightenment changes into ignorance." Here, Tien-t'ai is saying that ignorance and enlightenment are a single entity, but ignorance must be curtailed while enlightenment requires effort in order to be manifested. Therefore, our individual efforts to aquire self-mastery are an important contribution to the construction of a peaceful society. Sun Ra often used the term "Disipline" when speaking of the efforts the musicians in his band made in order to play his arrangements "correctly", so that if someone played a "wrong" note, it would sound right because the whole band would play that note in the same moment!


To some, it may seem a stretch of cosmic proportions to compare Sun Ra and Buddhism, but I am convinced that many of Ra's writings can be interpreted from a variety of universal viewpoints, and many intersecting paths can be found that open a dialogue to the nature of humanity, society, culture and arts, without which our civilization would be something less than the sum of our creative spirits.

Kindly,
Garrison

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Jazz By Sun Ra -comments by Ra about his own music
Category: Music

It can be especially enlightening to read what Sun Ra thought about his own music. The following are excerpts from the liner notes of the 1957 lp, "Jazz By Sun Ra" on the Transition label, later reissued as "Sun Song" on Delmark. Having recorded singles until this point in his career, Sun Ra's first lp under his own name was an important musical step.

Sun Ra wrote these comments as a way of introducing and explaining the intent of his music to a wider audience and they illustrate his desire to contribute to a better world by raising the consciousness of people and their awareness of beauty and happiness as reflected in his music. Or, as he describes it, "to ignite that spark in people's hearts" and stimulate imagination through sound.

Ra refutes evil as a manifestation of ignorance while calling upon musicians to take responsibility for the future of good music, reminding them of their duty not to compromise by catering to "the basest public tastes, as popular music so often does." He defines the connection between poetry and music in his statement, "I consider every creative musical composition as being a tone poem" and finishes by instructing the "peoples of earth" to "learn to listen" and "open your ears!"

More information is available in the wikipedia listing of "Jazz By Sun Ra": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jazz_By_Sun_Ra

A complete version is available at: http://delmark.com/rhythm.sunra.htm


Kind Regards,

Garrison


"Jazz By Sun Ra" (edited version)

THE AIM OF MY COMPOSITIONS: All of my compositions are meant to depict happiness combined with beauty in a free manner. The real aim of this music is to co-ordinate the minds of peoples into an intelligent reach for a better world, and an intelligent approach to the living future.

THE TECHNIQUES I EMPLOY: I always strive to write the sounds I hear both inwardly and outwardly. I use the simple rules of harmony as a basis but I employ my own rule as well. My rule Is that every note written or played must be a living note. In order to achieve this, I use notes like words in a sentence, making each series of sounds a separate thought. My watchword is precision. l never forget that a sound "sound" is just as important as a sound doctrine in a nonmusical field.

POEMS ARE MUSIC: some of the songs I write are based on my poems; for this reason, I am including some of them with this album in order that those who are interested may understand that poems are music, and that music is only another form of poetry. I consider every creative musical composition as being a tone poem.

BEAUTY AND THE PEOPLE: We cannot afford to keep people musically ignorant; to cater to the basest public tastes as "popular" music so often does. I believe it is the duty of all leaders (music and otherwise) to teach the people, because not to teach them is compromising with evil. Ignorance is evil. My aim is to educate as many people as I can so far as the appreciation and enjoyment of good jazz music is concerned. The jazz leaders of today must prepare the way for the jazz of tomorrow. Many musicians think that most people are destined to be musically ignorant, but I know that there is a spark in every person which will respond and glow to the touch of beauty. Because I know this, I am going to continue presenting beauty to the world until I ignite that spark in people's hearts.

INSTRUCTION TO THE PEOPLES OF EARTH: You must realize that you have the right to love beauty. You must prepare to live life to the fullest extent. Of course it takes imagination, but you don't have to be an educated person to have that. Imagination can teach you the true meaning of pleasure. Listening can be one of the greatest pleasures. You must learn to listen because by listening you will learn to see with your mind's eye. You see, music paints pictures that only the mind's eye can see. Open your ears so that you can see with the eye of your mind.

AFTER-THOUGHT:

I take my magic wand in hand and touch

the mind of the world;

I speak in sounds.

what am I saying?

Listen!

"These are the things spoken from

my heart...

these are of and are my intimate treasures,

I give them to those who live and love

both life and living."


Sun Ra, 1957

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Sun Ra’s poetry
Current mood: creative
Category: Writing and Poetry

Anyone who knows me closely is aware of my fondness for Sun Ra's music, but perhaps less aware of my belief that his poetry has direct positive relativity to today's social and cultural challenges. Here are some of Ra's poetic works I would like to share with you, and allow them to speak for themselves while encouraging you to seek out other resources for his writings. An excellent book is Sun Ra: The Immeasurable Equation edited by James L. Wolf and Hartmut Geerken (Waitawhile).

Kindly,

Garrison

Somebody Else's World

Somebody else's idea of somebody else's world
It's not my idea of things as they are
Somebody else's idea of things to come
Need not be the only way to vision the future

- Sun Ra

The Outer Bridge

In the half-between world,
Dwell they: The Tone Scientists
In notes and tone
They speak of many things...
The tone scientists:
Architects of planes of discipline
Mathematically precise are they:
The tone-scientists

- Sun Ra

Freedom From Freedom

Freedom from freedom
From the liberty
Of the land
Where destruction's light
Is the land.

Freedom from the decree of freedom
From the liberty
Of the land of destruction
Is the decree
That can truly save
Those whose freedom
Is a burden and a shame
What price freedom that despairs?
What glory freedom that destroys?

- Sun Ra

Cosmic Equation

Then another tomorrow
They never told me of
Came with the abruptness of a fiery dawn
And spoke of Cosmic Equations:
The equations of sight-similarity
The equations of sound-similarity
Subtle Living Equations
Clear only to those
Who wish to be attuned
To the vibrations of the Outer Cosmic Worlds.
Subtle living equations
of the outer-realms
Dear only to those
Who fervently wish the greater life

- Sun Ra

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