Patrick Scheyder: Improvisations à l'improviste

Patrick Scheyder - Napolitaine
Patrick Scheyder - Dernier Chant
From Solo Piano II: Leo CDLR 362 [Buy Here]

French pianist Patrick Scheyder is equally at home intepreting Chopin or playing in improvised settings. Scheyder has even recorded with Evan Parker (Evan Parker and Patrick Scheyder, Leo CDLR326) and vocalist Lauren Newton (Altered Egos, Omba Records OMBA-004CD). However, these two selections are the opening and closing tracks from Scheyder's album of solo piano improvisations, Solo Piano II.

Patrick Scheyder

We are generally used to improv bandits emerging from a jazz background, so what is perhaps most interesting about this record is hearing how a musician approaches improvisation when they are grounded (and still active) in the classical tradition. When one's reference points are Schubert and Rachmaninoff rather than Monk and Coltrane, the music is going to sound different, and this record is an excellent illustration.

I picked up this CD as a castoff from a friend who gets hundreds of CDs each year to review. I held onto it for two reasons: firstly, I found the opening song, Napolitaine, immediately fascinating, and secondly, the album was recorded in Guebwiller in Alsace, just 15 minutes up the road from where I used to live in France.

Elephunk

Thai Elephant Orchestra - Thung Kwian Sunrise
From Thai Elephant Orchestra : Mulatta MUL004 [Buy Here]

Tangerine Awkestra - all of the humans blow up
From Aliens Took My Mom : Mulatta MUL001 [Buy Here]

The world is bound to end soon. All the signs are there. So occasionally, just occasionally, musicians and listeners need to stumble across something that restores their faith in choosing to live on this noisy, extraordinary planet. Two such experiences are provided by Mulatta Records, in the form of an elephant orchestra, and a bunch of supremely confident Brooklyn kids whose musical reference points are Roscoe Mitchell and Ornette Coleman.

The band, in between recording sessions

Thai Elephant Orchestra are a group of twelve elephants based at the Lampang Elephant Conservation Centre near Bangkok. Are their self-titled debut, and the group's sophomore effort Elephonic Rhapsodies, just novelty albums? The answer is probably yes, and yet the internal logic and beauty of these improvisations is difficult to deny.

Tangerine Awkestra - Intergalactic Sound Adventurers

While I was at university, I earned some extra cash by teaching trumpet to kids. One of the warm-up games I would play with the group classes was "Traffic Jam" - where each player would have to choose a different kind of vehicle to be (fire engine, Ferrari, milk truck...). "Zoo Visit" would work along the same lines, with kids taking the part of animals. The success of these activities convinced me that the instinct for free improvisation is something that is innate, but often bred out of us through excessive emphasis on notation, theory and playing "correctly".

Tangerine Awkestra are a bunch of 2-9 years olds from Brooklyn who demonstrate that free improv is not a pretentious construction of bored intellectual adult musos. The same imaginative strategies and interactive methods that these children employ in performing on unfamiliar instruments are the same as those they would use in their non-musical play.

On their album Aliens Took My Mom, the Awkestra recounts the story of an invasion of planet Earth by aliens from Jupiter, who destroy Antarctica and all human life before succumbing to nuclear bugs. Sun Ra would have been proud.

R.I.P. Paul Hester, 1959 - 2005 drummer in Split Enz and Crowded House

The Mighty Sparrow: Calypso King of the World

The Mighty Sparrow - Going Home Tonight
The Mighty Sparrow - Honesty
From 45 rpm single - National NSP 078 A/B

In the mid 60s my dad spent a year as a contract engineer in Trinidad and Tobago building an oil pipeline for Shell. One of the lasting legacies of his time in the Carribean was a modest collection of calypso and ska/rocksteady on 45. Among my parents' collection of vinyl dominated by Mozart and Dave Brubeck, I was always fascinated by these dwarf records in stained brown paper sleeves. Through the miracle of digitisation, I'll be posting some of the selections over the next few weeks.

Slinger Francisco, better known as "The Mighty Sparrow", was born in Grenada in the 1930s but moved to Trinidad as a young child. He had his first hit in 1956 at the age of 20, and continues to perform and record to this day, becoming the dominant voice in calypso and "soca" (soulful calypso) in the 1960s. His career is described in more detail on his website.

The two songs here are from a 1966 45rpm single recorded for the National label in Trinidad, accompanied by the National Recording Calypso Band under the leadership of Bertram Inniss. Calypso is particularly noted for its pull-no-punches social commentary, and the flipside of the straightfoward Carnival narrative Going Home Tonight is Honesty, a pretty direct complaint about the inequalities between the working class and the rich elite.

Anyway, more mid-60s singles from the Carribean next week !

From our Japanese Hip Hop Research Labs

Rip Slyme - By the Way
Rip Slyme - バンザイ
From Tokyo Classic: Warners WPC7 - 10147 [Buy Here]

Bit of an Easter Egg Special today: Japanese hip-hop. Not underground, not obscure, just lots of fun. When I was over in Japan travelling last year, it was very clear that Rip Slyme were one of the most popular local bands in the land - posters everywhere, and they seemed to be special guests on every game show on TV every night (along with Akebono, who appeared to be promoting some kind of i-Mode mobile Playstation compatible network robot from Sony, or whatever. It hardly seemed to matter).

After a friend of mine played me a couple of Rip Slyme songs, I knew I had to get one of their albums as an ultimate souvenir of my trip. This record reminds me of what an amazing and strange place Japan is for a Eurofried white male New Zealander with a backpack. Tokyo is surely the only city in the world that has turned itself into a mind-altering substance.

Given that most of the stuff on the web about Rip Slyme is in Japanese (and my Japanese extends to ordering green tea from the trolley lady on a shinkansen, and little else), there's very little I can actually tell you about these guys. Five guys - 4 MCs (Ryo-Z, Ilmari, Pes and Su) and DJ Fumiya. They won the award for best rap group in Japan in 2002. Japan Today has a reasonable article in English.

Shinjuku, Tokyo - it's really like this, and more.

As for the music, it ain't nuthin' but a party y'all. Mostly Japanese lyrics sprinkled with a refracted J-English of insignificant meaning. Listen and be boggled.

Mucho Respecto:
To Los Cabrones, the Afro-Cuban outfit from Australia who played at Galatos in Auckland last night. Their second tune was Indestructible by Ray Barretto, and they had me hooked from that point onwards. Very, very impressive. They're over here to play at the Easter weekend Jambalaya festival in Rotorua, so their brief stopover in Auckland was much appreciated !

Leon Thomas: Kosmic Wisdom out of '73

Leon Thomas - It's My Life I'm Fighting For
Leon Thomas - Balance of Life (Peace of Mind)
From Full Circle: Flying Dutchman FD10167/BMG [Buy Here]

A DJ acquaintance of mine is doing the normal kiwi thing and heading to London to live and work for a while with his girlfriend. So he’s selling up some of his excess vinyl, (record cases being generally not very practical on jumbo jets), and I manage to get my hands on a few choice pieces, some of which are ultimately blogworthy....

Full Circle is a 1973 Leon Thomas joint recorded for Flying Dutchman. Given that I was only familiar with Leon Thomas through his work with Pharaoh Sanders (The Creator has a Master Plan on the Sanders album Karma), I was somewhat surprised that the bulk of the material on Full Circle was fairly standard orchestral soul and blues (OK, with Bernard Purdie handling the drums). But for me the highlights are these two selections: some nice modal/spiritual departures in which Thomas shows off his overwhelming, rich voice, with essential contributions from the band - Richard Davis bass, Neal Creque keys, Jimmy Owens trumpet, Joe Farrell flute, Pablo Landrum percussion.

Leon Thomas had an interesting career, (including working as a sideman on a Louis Armstrong recording in 1970, and with Carlos Santana and Count Basie), which is described here.

Random Elements for the Day:
ErrantFrenchNonsenseWithIncomprehensibleFlashDesign on yomgaille.com
Transcriptions of Buddy Rich tearing chunks off his incompetent bandmembers.

Tomasz Stanko: War Songs

Tomasz Stanko Quartet - Maldoror's War Song
From Matka Joanna: ECM 1544 [Buy Here]

Tomasz Stanko and the Motion Trio - Tchetchenie
Live recording from Polish Jazz Network

Yeah, let's carry on with trumpet players shall we? Tomasz Stanko is a European musician who is finally getting some of the attention he deserves, thanks in large part to some landmark recordings on ECM in the past ten years. But of course his career goes back far longer, having played at one time or another with many of the European avant garde and mainstream.

Image Copyright Karlheinz Kluter

The first Stanko CD I bought was 1994's Matka Joanna, an album that pretty much threw my expectations of jazz up into the air, blasted them apart into a gazillion tiny pieces and I spent the rest of the afternoon trying to reassemble an opinion from the debris. Maldoror's War Song is my favourite Stanko composition (reprised in a warmer context on 2002's Soul of Things). This is the classic bop "song" form, (head-solos-head), but there is massive freedom implied throughout the bulk of the piece. Check Tony Oxley's drumming!

The other selection I've posted here is Tchetchenie, a live performance of Tomasz Stanko with fellow Polish musicians, the extraordinary accordionists, The Motion Trio. A sometimes searing performance that (judging by its title) is intended as a commentary on the continuing conflict in Chechenya. I found this recording on the Polish Jazz Network site, so you can either download it above, or find the file on their site here.

Honourable mentions for a Monday:
David Fenech links to a site (eye-watering design!) featuring the Sounds of the Strasbourg Underground (or D'Klangen us d'Untergrund vo Strossburi, or something like that if you speak Alsatian) . So this is what young French people are getting up to these days.

Ubuweb has posted a complete version Marshall McCluhan's 1960's recording The Medium is the Massage. Trust me, being a Canadian intellectual has never sounded so much fun!

Paul Brody - Turning Turtle

Paul Brody Octet - Caravan
Paul Brody Octet - Lament
From Turtle Paradise: 99 Records 2133 [Buy Here - if you can]

Jazz-fusion gypsy music from Berlin with a pants-wettingly great horn section who sound like they're having the best party of their life? Try these couple of choice tracks from trumpeter Paul Brody's 1995 album Turtle Paradise.

Caravan is just a complete gas, and the Lament is quite possibly the most perfectly mis-named composition I know! I've already posted about Paul Brody so if you want some more info on him, look here. And good luck trying to find this CD for sale anywhere :-)

Worth a visit: Baby Snakes, an mp3 blog masquerading as a bulletin board, with a nice Frank Zappa 101 lecture - informative both for committed Mammy Nuns and still-clueless Gregory Peccaries.

White Spaces

Christine White - Deep Throat Kissing
Recorded live at Radio New Zealand, Auckland, 17th May 2000 - some source noise
Christine White - Michelangelo
From Pure White : Independent [Buy Here]

New Zealand singer-songwriter Christine White has been rattling around the local scene here in Auckland since the early 1990s and the not-quite-famous Christine White Band.

Tonight (Friday, 18th March) she's launching her second solo album Pirouette at the Odeon Lounge in Mount Eden (that's just a short walk from my place). And yes, I'm in the band for the evening.

I'm lucky to count Christine among my most intelligent musical colleagues and friends, and some of our adventures together include writing horn arrangements for a live Radio New Zealand date, as well as a mission to Wellington to play a midwinter duo gig in a freezing Bluenote Cafe...

Christine's songs often set themselves lyrically around a single metaphor explored in depth, with Deep Throat Kissing and Michelangelo being good examples of her work. If you find these interesting, more songs from the new album Pirouette can be heard for free (RealAudio) on her website, where both Pirouette and the 1999 solo acoustic disc Pure White are for sale.

Gato Barbieri: The Cat in South America

Gato Barbieri with the Escola do Samba do Niteroi - Marissea [Removed]
Gato Barbieri with the Dino Saluzzi band - Nunca Mas [Removed]
From Latino America: Impulse! IMP 22363 [Buy Here]

In 1973 Gato Barbieri, still hot from the success of his soundtrack for "Last Tango in Paris", was sent to South America to record an album with South American musicians.

What the hell was the record company smoking? Barbieri's paint-stripping post-Coltrane tenor fused with ensembles of largely unknown musicians from the pampas and favelas? Gato Barbieri was still a fully paid-up member of the avant-garde, having worked with Pharoah Sanders, Charlie Haden's Liberation Music Orchestra and Don Cherry on Complete Communion: hardly a truly profitable proposition. And recording the entire juggernaut in the marginally less-than-stable-politically nations that were Argentina (Péron was about to return from exile) and Brazil (under military dictatorship) in 1973? The plan could have easily capsized at any moment.

Gato Barbieri in Portugal, 1975. Copyright Catedral.

Originally released on two LPs called Latino America, Chapters 1 & 2, the results of this improbable project were, naturally, astounding. Barbieri's playing is muscular, the melodic lines are drawn simply, and the various ensembles he plays with are nailing it. This is one of my absolute favourite albums, a veritable desert island disc.

When one thinks of the fusion of American jazz and Latin American musics, one turns reflexively to the Africanised strands - samba, salsa, mambo... Barbieri recorded several numbers with a samba school in Rio, (including Marissea available above). But Latino America also evokes the traditions of the indigenous "Indian" populations of the Andean cordillera - including instruments such as wooden flutes, arpa India, charango and other indescribable exotica. The effect is quite unique. And of course, as an Argentinian, Gato slips in an effortless nod to tango on Nunca Mas.

The reissue on double CD is accompanied by some highly entertaining liner notes by producer Ed Michel, who describes the whole enterprise with great relish.

Also worth checking out... Gunter likes french fries, a new mp3 blog (in French). Check out the latest post on conch master Steve Turré!

Ulrich Lask: Jazz of the Unnecessary

Ulrich Lask - Geometry 1001 [Removed]
Ulrich Lask - Geometry 1003 [Removed]
From Indéan Poa: CMP CD 62 [Buy Here]

Ulrich P. Lask - saxophonist and electronic musician, sound artist and composer of film scores, German nationality. Based variously in Aachen, Paris and Arjeplog in Finland. He apparently recorded two albums for ECM in the 1980s, but they are now out of print. A new album, "Polar Circles" is due out in April this year on Nabel Records. That's just about all I know, and I can't even find an album cover image of Indéan Poa on the web. If anyone can supply some more information, I would be grateful!

I picked this disc up in a bargain bin in Auckland about 8 years ago. (I'd love to know how it got to NZ - possibly it was a reviewer's copy that got dumped?). According to the only information about the album that I can find, (in German), the compositions were constructed from lots of separate sound fragments recorded between 1985 and 1995.

UPDATE: thanks to jvgaspar who has kindly found the image of the album cover online!

I like the way that Lask makes a feature of this cut/paste method: the listener is always conscious of the assemblage, layering and looping of sounds, and the interplay of composition, improvisation and dumb luck. Harmolodic dub? There's certainly a trace of Ornette Coleman in Lask's own playing. To me, (particularly on Geometry 1001), the musical elements sound vulnerable, as if they will disappear back into silence at any moment. It almost seems we are fortunate to hear any of it at all.

Ray Barretto: A Hard Handed Man

Ray Barretto - Adelante Siempre Voy [Removed]
From Salsa Caliente de Nu York!: Nascente NSCD 075 [Buy Here]
Ray Barretto - Dancing Winds [Removed]
From Handprints: Concord CCD 4473 [Buy Here]

If I had the choice of being born again at any time and playing in one band, I would probably choose one of Frank Zappa's ensembles. But running a very close second choice would be Ray Barretto's salsa bands who recorded for the Fania label in the late 70's. One listen to Adelante Siempre Voy (originally released on the storming 1979 Rican/Struction) should tell you why. The other track, Dancing Winds is from the 1991 album Handprints on Concord Picante.

Weekend Hollas to...
Taxi Driver and Brother B. Deenie who've been riffing on various different versions of Spinning Wheel over on their blogs. Also to Damien at Marbecks in downtown Auckland who did me a great deal today on a Kenny Wheeler album I've been looking for ages.

Bandwidth Limited

Vielen dank an alle der Leute auf Totally Fuzzy, die haben Mother and Child Reunion gefunden! Leider habe ich im moment nur ein kleines Bandwidth, und es ist moeglich, dass Sie einige Probleme mit der Downloads haben koennte. Ich hoffe dass Sie in Zukunft andere Lieder auf meinem Blog finden, die Ihnen gefallen.

Apologies to anyone who can't download mp3s at present (and apologies for my German, but it's worth a try once in a while)- there have been a large number of friendly visitors who like Horace Andy. Bandwidth should be restored in a few hours.

(I have learned my first lesson in audioblogging - the effect of having one very popular song linked by one very popular site)

Jim and Tom's Raga Rage

Jim Langabeer and Tom Ludvigson - Improvised Raga
Recorded live at Odeon Lounge, Mount Eden, Auckland, New Zealand, Monday 7th March, 2005

Jim Langabeer: tenor and soprano saxophones
Tom Ludvigson: piano

This is an extract of a spontaneous performance based around what Jim Langabeer described as a "Sunset going through to a couple of hours before midnight raga". The interjection by a bus outside the café right before the end is a nice touch !

Tom and Jim are typical of most musicians in Auckland in that they've played just about every kind of music at one time or another....The "Obi-Wan Kenobi of the sax" Jim Langabeer is one of New Zealand's most remarkable woodwind players, (saxophones, flutes and shakuhachi), with interests that stretches from free improve to jazz and world musics. Tom Ludvigson was pianist in lounge jazz group Bluespeak with Greg Johnson, and does everything from electronica through to TV scores and unclassifiable spacy stuff.

Jarrettronique

Keith Jarrett - Funky Tonk (Solo Excerpt) [Removed]
From Miles Davis Live-Evil: Sony/Columbia 65135 [Buy Here]

Keith Jarrett - Pastel Morning [Removed]
From Keith Jarrett Jack DeJohnette Ruta and Daitya: ECM 1021 [Buy Here]

Keith Jarrett is famous for many things, and one of them is his complete rejection in the early 70s of electric or amplified instruments. After the supercharged electric brew of Miles' groups in 1970 and 1971, he demanded the space and clarity afforded by purely acoustic instrumentation.

Keith Jarrett with the Miles Davis band, 1971

Jarrett's legacy since the early seventies is well documented and extensively recorded. But it's often forgotten that Keith Jarrett made some very beautiful music during his short electric period. Here are two great examples: his now-famous solo from Live-Evil, where he plays with a broken key on his Fender Rhodes; and Pastel Morning, the final track on his much-overlooked duet album with Jack DeJohnette for ECM, Ruta and Daitya.

Dave Allen Quartet @ Vitamin S, 07.03.2005

Dave Allen Quartet - Excerpt 1 [Removed]
Dave Allen Quartet - Excerpt 2 [Removed]
Recorded live at Odeon Lounge, Mount Eden, Auckland, New Zealand, Monday 7th March, 2005

Dave Allen: electric guitar
Sam Hamilton: alto saxophone
Joe Pineapple: bass and screwdriver
Bruce Morley: batterie and ballons de tennis

Two short excerpts from the performance by Dave Allen's quartet at Monday night's Vitamin S extravaganza. Hopefully tomorrow my bandwidth will be sorted out so I can post a longer duet by Jim Langabeer and Tom Ludvigson!

Keeping Some Cash 'Andy

Horace Andy - Mother and Child Reunion [Removed]
From Mr Bassie: Heartbeat 617588 [Buy Here]

Johnny Cash - Ring of Fire [Removed]
From Ring of Fire: The Very Best of Johnny Cash: Sony/Columbia 66890 [Buy Here]

Like most white folks of my age, I got my first introduction to Horace Andy through his work with Massive Attack, and particularly their 1991 album Blue Lines. Mr Andy has an unmistakable voice, and one always has the sneaking suspicion that he's always singing flat. Nevertheless, this doesn't spoil a fun 1970s Studio One rendering of Paul Simon's hit song.

Johnny Cash is one of those rare country performers who managed to be immensely popular not only with C+W aficianados, but retained a cachet of cool among urban rock fans. When I was still at school in the mid-nineties, listening to Auckland's 95bFM, Johnny Cash got playlisted alongside Sonic Youth Washing Machine, Pavement's Gold Soundz EP and the Beastie Boys Ill Communication. And it was ALL good.

I also dreamed about this song last week. So here it is, ready for download in the real world.

Stompin'

Louis Armstrong & his Orchestra: Coal Cart Blues [Removed]
Louis Armstrong & his Dixieland Seven: Mahogany Hall Stomp [Removed]
From Satchmo in the 40's: ASV Living Era CD AJA 5402 [Buy Here]

Righto, etnobofin is slowly moving towards becoming almost completely about music, so rather than resist this movement, I'm going to embrace the error of my ways and start audioblogging.

And what better way to start than with the acknowledged master of my chosen instrument, Louis Armstrong, here recorded with some pretty hot sidemen - Sidney Bechet on Coal Cart Blues, Kid Ory and Barney Bigard on Mahogany Hall Stomp.

Image: Louis Armstrong House and Archives, Queens College, CUNY

For me, the greatest trumpet players have been vocalists, whether they know it or not - Armstrong, Miles Davis, Tomasz Stanko, Kenny Wheeler. And Louis Armstrong was possibly the greatest exponent of the understated, well-turned phrase, whether on his Hot Fives and Sevens from the 20s or his duets with Ella in the 50s. Hell, he even made What a Wonderful World into a great record.

What a Tangled Web We Weave

The Internet is at its most wonderful in the moments when little discoveries, (or rediscoveries) are made. I've noted this before, but today I've stumbled across two friends blogs online, and it's the smallest gesture I can make to provide permanent links to them from my most modest corner of the www.

Non so, il tutto e greco a me!
tash.mcgill

I should probably say more, but I think their own thoughts recorded online are probably more than I could ever manage to say myself. These chicks are deep*.

*NB. This is officially the cheesiest sentence that I've written on etnobofin so far.

Pre-Hype

The most anoymous and sweaty MKD has been emailing some pre-hype about our gig this evening for the AK05 Festival. I reproduce sections here absolutely without his permission. Opinions expressed may not be those of etnobofin International Inc.

ONE MILLION DOLLARS and ODESSA are playing at the WINTER GARDENS which are not really gardens but actually a bloody nice venue at the Civic Theatre.
YOU'RE SO NOT READY FOR THIS ONE the only thing that feels better than rocking out to these two great bands is devotional prayer and buying me a motorcycle. One Million Dollars recently returned from Sydney where they straight slayed everyone and showed up the Cat Empire for the Greek dialect novelty rap act that they are. My homeboy was telling me that girls in Sydney are all crazy and wild and got more camel-toe than a camel got toes, also they lie on the beach all naked and shit. WHAT I'M SAYING IS - the mad Sydney beezy is all in love with ONE MILLION DOLLARS now, and would easily pay one hundred AUSTRALIAN dollars EACH to be able to dance the dirty row-boat moves they copped from Sean Paul's last video in front of "today's Brad Pitt" Richie Setford this Friday night. And for you it's absolutely free, all under the auspices of the "Auckland - Not So Sucky As You May Think" Festival.

Odessa - Recently released from jail after a spell of excessive funkiness

MEANWHILE Odessa have BEEN RELEASED FROM CUSTODY after being convicted of STARTING A GODDAMN RIOT at the Cuba Street Carnival. NOT BECAUSE THEY ARE INNOCENT but because no man-made cell can contain the power of ultimate rocking force. IN FACT THEY ARE VERY GUILTY, GUILTY of whipping up such frenzy that the street boiled over with violent shirtless enthusiasm, CHOKING THE ARTERIES OF GRANNY WELLINGTON such that the parade got held up for several minutes and one guy fell off his unicycle. NOW THEY HAVE COME TO AUCKLAND TO DESTROY YOU.

Paul Brody

I was first turned onto Mr Paul Brody in about 1996 when I heard his German Octet's version of Caravan on 95bFM's Sunday jazz show - it's a complete blast from the first trombone eruption through to the rollicking end with Van Halen guitar lead and a shitload of close horn harmonies. Several months later I accidentally fell across the album Turtle Paradise in a record shop in Auckland - my student income managed to stretch to the $40.00 required to purchase. And now as far as I can tell, this CD is really hard to find, even on the web.

Humour, great drumming from Bob Moses, overexposed baritone sax parts. It's a complete masterpiece.

This US- born trumpet player is based in Berlin and is very much doing his own thing, today exploring the outer reaches of jewish folk music and other exciting stuff that you probably can't do very easily in America. MP3 snippets of the lovely noise of his DetoNation Orchestra (from the album Animals and Cowboys) can be found on the web:

Groundhog
16 Tons