Posted by Jon Abbey on February 21, 2005 07:09 AM
Axel's a bad example, as he spends quite a bit of his time playing music that most people would consider to be jazz, including a 3-4 hour set a couple of weeks ago in a Schlippenbach-led combo that played every composition Monk ever wrote.
but in general, if you used Axel as an example from the world of electroacoustic improvisation, I'd agree that jazz and eai are two largely separate worlds. my position on this has always been that eai is descended from jazz (among many other things, but I think the spirit of improvisation from jazz makes it the primary antecedent, in general), two generations down the road, with first-generation Euro free improv in between (Bailey, Parker, Schlippenbach, Brotzmann, etc.)
Posted by Adam Hill on February 21, 2005 07:40 AM
Chris,well-framed. i find myself in much the same area, though some of it has to do with my age, that is, i was born after all the major innovators made their mark, and so innovation per se, has never been something that matters that much in my choices.
my sense is that newness in itself is not necessarily a qualitative judgment, ie, just because something is declared 'new' doesn't mean it's any good. but its novelty can be exciting to a lot of people.
part of the obsession with what's new, in my opinion, is a lack of patience (i think i'm certainly impatient). it takes a long time to listen, really listen to music (as it takes a long time to really see a painting or read a poem) and most of us would rather move on to the next cool thing rather than spend serious time with something that's already old and in the canon. but how much time have we spent on it?
i've found myself going back and spending serious time with the "classics" because a lot of what's new has left me cold, and maybe that's because i didn't sepnd enough time with the foundational stuff to begin with.there's a lot i'm discovering about jazz from recordings of armstrong or bechet or don byas etc etc etc
Posted by Dave Erickson on February 21, 2005 08:31 AM
Thank you, Chris. Thank you. My greatest quarrel with the devotees of the New has less to do with our respective tastes in music than with their attitude that if I don't like what they listen to, then I'm "closed-minded." It's this sort of art-school fallacy: If it's original and new, then it's good. This precludes the issue of taste, because taste implies judgment, and judgment is NOT ALLOWED. How dare we say we think something is better than something else? It's all good! Well, it's not true. Some stuff is good, and some isn't, and if it makes me a bad person to think I know the difference, well, so be it. I don't like it, but I can live with it.
Meanwhile, I'm thinking about putting your comment about how "swing and blues feeling aren't just quaint notions" up in bright lights somewhere. Thanks again.
Posted by jon abbey on February 21, 2005 08:42 AM
as I've said many times, the bulk of what's being created in any genre is crap, be it new or old. with music from earlier in the century, a lot of the really subpar stuff has fallen off the map, whereas with music being created now, it's up to the listener to discern that for themselves, especially with how easy it is for recordings to come out these days.
so obviously "what's original and new" isn't necessarily good simply because of that. but there's also something to be said about creating music NOW, in the year 2005. there's something extremely exciting (for me) about focusing on an art form that's in the midst of developing, rather than looking back to one that took place before I was born. your mileage, of course, may vary.
[...]
Posted by jon abbey on February 21, 2005 10:43 AM
Intakt just released a 3 CD box of the Monk project I'm referring to, info towards the bottom of this page:
http://www.intaktrec.ch/informations-a.htm
ten years ago, I thought that improvised music containing an "essential jazz nature" was a good thing. I don't think so anymore, I think it's confining much more than it is freeing, in the year 2005.
Posted by derek on February 21, 2005 10:55 AM
Welcome to the mix, Chris. Had no idea you were signing on for Bag-duty.
Dorner's definitely got jazz chops. Check his work on SMACK UP AGAIN (a repertory disc on the Two Nineteen label paralleling Art Pepper's much earlier album), Sam Rivers' BACKGROUND FOR IMPROVISORS and the new MONK'S CASINO box for proof.
Not much to say on the whole 'newness' issue though I did use it as angle for a review of the new David S. Ware Thirsty Ear set (hopefully out tomorrow). I listen to what I listen to largely independently of whether its 'new' or 'innovative.' One of my favorite exemplars of the ultimate dispensability of the debate is Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis. Here's a guy who plied basically the same approach and esthetic for most of his career. No drastic refinements of technique or left-field launches into untried trajectories. He was even a vocal critic of the jazz 'avant garde'. But his music never fails to move me, and close listening reveals some very singular elements to his sound & style.
Posted by Adam Hill on February 21, 2005 12:10 PM
derek, i look forward to your Ware piece as oddly enough, my own Ware piece (to appear on OFN) also touches on the concept of innovation, though not at any length.
it seems some of the trouble with discussions about innovation, is too often these days, the accepted discourse inevitably involves a combination of eulogizing and prostelyzing, which has the effect of drawing people into camps.
[...]
Posted by Adam Hill on February 21, 2005 12:30 PM
Chris wrote: "That said, the very concept of originality tends to move me."
Could you elaborate on that, Chris?
My feeling is that orginality and innovation aren't necessarily the same thing. So for me, yes, originality, which to my mind means not derivative or imitative, is powerful and exciting.
Posted by derek on February 21, 2005 01:02 PM
Jon, I'm not sure I buy the whole "confining" argument as a differential btwn. jazz and other improv music. Music made with instruments is by nature confining; the musician is working within certain parameters, however broad they may be. Whether it's crafting a jazz improvisation on saxophone or shaping an eai piece with sine wave there are external & self-imposed boundaries to the action.
Adam, looking forward to your Ware piece too.
Posted by jon abbey on February 21, 2005 01:16 PM
"Jon, I'm not sure I buy the whole "confining" argument as a differential btwn. jazz and other improv music. Music made with instruments is by nature confining; the musician is working within certain parameters, however broad they may be. Whether it's crafting a jazz improvisation on saxophone or shaping an eai piece with sine wave there are external & self-imposed boundaries to the action. "
sure, of course. but having to incorporate elements like "blues feeling" and "swing" in order to remain directly under the jazz umbrella, while at the same time trying to avoid aping your more inspired and well-known predecessors is specifically confining to my ears, more so than improvised music which doesn't have to contain those elements. would you at least agree that playing in a big band, where you get maybe one solo during a set, is more confining than playing in a trio? this is merely a few more steps along the same road.
I agree with Chris that an artist has to express themselves naturally, and if they feel jazz is an essential part of their nature, then that's the way that they have to go. it's a well-trodden path, though.
Posted by derek on February 21, 2005 01:53 PM
Hmm, "blues feeling" and "swing" aren't necessities for 'jazz' expression (at least in my particular broth). And both allow for a lot of latitude IMO (ie. Warne Marsh's 'blues' is a very different beast than Willis Jackson's). All I'm trying to say is that there are rules and regs to other forms of improv too (eai included).
Also, I don't think it's the size of the band that necessarily dictates constraints. A trio could relegate itself to strictly playing charts, just as a big band could engage in collective improvisation; each with equally stultifying or satisfying results for the individual player depending upon the situation. But based on your narrowly-delineated example, yes, I agree.
Newer forms of improv are creating there own bodies of precedence that will probably match those of older forms as time progresses. The idea that these newer forms are somehow superior because of their 'newness' isn't something I buy. "Well-trodden" needn't be a bad thing.
[...]
Posted by derek on February 21, 2005 05:26 PM
Chris, I think we're coming from a similar angle, the bridging modifier being "inclusive." There are plenty of musicians who don't "swing" in the 'traditional' sense, just as there are many who exercise a "blues feeling" outside the common parlance of the term. One who leaps immediately to mind is Joe Maneri. To my ears there are definite 'blues' and 'swing' feelings in his playing, but many would & have argued vehemently otherwise. As in your Brötz example, they're elements more implied than overtly stated. Evan Parker and Guillermo Gregorio would be others.
My intent in balking at the signifiers was to resist the tendency of using such parameters as a means of fencing the music in (ie. this doesn't "swing" and/or this is devoid of "blues" ergo it can't be jazz).
But more importantly, you met Eddie Harris?!?!?!
[...]
Posted by walto on February 22, 2005 07:18 AM
1. It's not just "swing and blues" that seems to be often considered verboten in e-ai. Modern classical style improv doesn't have either of those (usually) but it's knocked out too.
2. What the hell is wrong with the echoplex?! I think Terry Riley's use of it did indeed produce a couple of "classic recordings" whatever they are. I use delays myself (FWTW) but, more importantly quite a bit of the music considered stoutly ea-i that I've heard also uses looping devices or some facsimile thereof.
[...]
Posted by walto on February 22, 2005 12:42 PM
Not sure how to put my first point much differently. It's just that absence of blues and swing from improv won't necessarily produce ea-i--even if one requires electronics (not that anybody said it would). I'm not sure if Jon's XXX is dead (or dying or well-trodden, etc.) requires a reference to the blues/swing elements or will also apply to broader characteristics that would encompass other types of modern (atonal--so we don't include, e.g., polka) improv as well.
[...]
Posted by jon abbey on February 22, 2005 01:54 PM
Chris, eai is a different area from "non-idiomatic improvisation", AMM were probably the major antecedent. there's a Dan Warburton piece on this site that talks about the term "eai", I believe.
like any genre term, it's less than ideal, but it is a decidedly different area from the one pioneered by Bailey, Parker, et. al., which is why some sort of general genre term is needed, and "eai" is as good as any I've heard.
[...]
Posted by anatole on February 22, 2005 07:27 PM
I wonder, chris, what you're feelings are about pieces by some of the names you mentioned in the article, which I would say don't have 'blues feeling' and do not 'swing', in the conventional sense, say 'rated x' by miles. do you consider them an aberration, or 'non-jazz'?
I guess what I'm getting at is: does one have to prove themselves to be a 'jazz' musician in order to then be able to be more flexible in their musical pursuits and still be followed by their jazz audience. it seems to me that this has always been an issue 'john coltrane is too out','miles davis is too rock', 'cecil taylor isn't tonal enough', etc.
I think people hear what they want to hear, I hear 'blues feeling' with every note that miles plays but i think context plays a large part in that, I'm willing to follow him through an echoplex maze to see what he is doing.this is ultimatly a very complex issue, and one way of skirting it is leaving labels alone and judging music by its inherent qualities. to paraphrase duke ellington, there are too kinds of music, music i listen to, and music i don't.
[...]
Posted by faster on February 23, 2005 12:12 AM
Not to derail, but to go back to the question of why some people (musicians, at least) are so drawn to "newness" (whatever that is):
For many, a big reason to try (and usually fail, I suppose) to find something "new" is to escape the baggage and judgement that comes with doing something that others consider themselves experts in. Who wants some dude stroking his chin and telling you you're not "swingin'" enough?
That may be a self-serving mode of thought, but most musicians I know got into it because they wanted to be more "difficult to judge" (quoting otomo) and to separate the urge or joy to play from the burden of others' approval.
Now, it certainly doesn't always work, and as has been dully noted "genres emerge, idioms ossify, protocols superimpose" or whatever. Regardless, it's super sucky to read music magazines (jazz or otherwise) and hear all this endless hairsplitting criticism and nitpicking, especially when you don't know or know of most of the music being disgussed. That can be disheartening, and seeking (if not finding) an end run around it is a natural response.
jpmf
ps: also, lots of people start music late without training and are loth to spend 20 years getting the chops necessary to become a simply adequate trad. player.
[...]
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 23, 2005 09:10 AM
it can take many years of intense study to come to grips with those other elements.
Though sometime they repeat the same mistakes for 30 years still
aside now : what s new these days around ?
[...]
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 23, 2005 10:53 PM
The only thing i d say on this particular subject is "Jazz" ( but which of them ?) is pretty precise in that it s mainly been Oral tution
you thaught yourself by listening, playing and particularly playing with advanced musicians as far as Practice ( scales and techniques and etc ) was involved you used any conventional ones
after a certain point ( what ? after "Fusion" ? the last Jazz movment maybe the late 70´s ?)what s been called jazz often sounds like ANY instrumental music involving Improvising on frames, changes or something like that ...
the same way it s hard to deny Free Jazz is also a return to "origins of jazz "( Free the Jazz from what jazz had became ...Hard Bop and Revival on a commercial level )
and as i undrestood it part of the EAI thing was also to Free Improv from "improvised Music Ltd" .. ( but just Partly , rest being from other sides too )
but what differs here and to come back to the original point is probably PLAYING
Jazz involves PLAYERS which is particular to Jazz i think
best
n
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 23, 2005 11:00 PM
But it also means you can listen to any music for its PLAYER aspects ...
Joey Ramone, Busch string quartet, eminem, Johnny Guitar Watson, Ted Nugent, Mireille Mathieu, Julio Iglesias, Al Casey or Baby Dodds
it just doesnt really brings the same with any music , some being more PLAYED than others ( still you can PLAY with the whole thing too )
best
n
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 23, 2005 11:05 PM
But if any JAZZ s left around i think it s "somwehere else"
( aside from Older orginal musicians still around and some more Local traditions kept as an ethno traditional thing )
[...]
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 24, 2005 07:01 AM
"Concerning your last post: I personally believe there's tons of jazz being played that is true to the music's original values, fostering a strong element of originality, passion, and spontaneity."
i didn´t actually wanted to start the old "jazz s dead or alive ..." discussion at all , i personally dunno, actually , all i meant is if you take a standard Jazz Festival in europe these days , i d put it that way : there s a lot of music AROUND jazz ...
and i m not at all a purist or restrictive person on what JAZZ IS and WHAT s NOT
still it seems to me ( and i d say the US have another tradition with it probably and of course ) but a lot of musics are more INSPIRED BY or AROUND, coming from etc
i see in jazz a very high level of both playing and interraction for example, like a sharp game i found later in like UK improv or others
i know it ll sound a stupid thing but take Drummers for example and A JAZZ RIDE CYMBAL and you may understand what i mean ...
one reason amongst others is "in the old days" musicians played A LOT together and for long periods , Clubs and so on as now many artists are thrown on the scene with Marketing rather than good opportunities to try out and go further inside , hours after hours ,
etc etc
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 24, 2005 07:07 AM
and i remember long time ago going to a Paris small Jazz club to listen to Dexter Gordon playing one FULL week ( wed-to Tue ) , 5 sets per night , went every day , sitting a meter from his sax pavillon
i dont any music book that gives you quite the same "information" for example
even they d give you some his passing tones you d be far from his SOUND and LAIDBACK position
best
n
[...]
Posted by tired of jazz on February 25, 2005 01:54 PM
you write and therefore act in this realm as consumers not creators. the latter reflect upon then act, not content with armchair harrumphs and filing in plastic sleeves the wall which encloses the body. one in the thread who said she thought jazz could absorb evevrything is the one who reveals the ideology lurking behind it. jazz hasn't absorbed everything. it can't because it's very tonal system is built on all those classical pianos. but the will to "absorb" (i.e. erase and nuetralize the difference of) is the will to supersede. but jazz has been left behind. libraries need to archive. artists need to move on
Posted by Narew Ramsh on February 25, 2005 03:47 PM
Wow... that's deep.
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 26, 2005 12:47 AM
but "TIRED of JAZZ" does still position you next to IT .... being tired of something does not really bring yet something else or ?
is it about expectations ? a future to come ? the big blast of modernism to fall on us ?
what if musicians went to the librairy as well
n
Posted by briter daze on February 26, 2005 03:27 AM
the library is his brain
all the leaves painted in it should be torn out and scattered anew
[...]
Posted by jon abbey on February 26, 2005 08:52 AM
Chris, I thought of you and this discussion when reading the Dave Eggers interview in the new Onion. some excerpts:
Eggers: "If you look at the books that we still remember, that are taught, that are canonical, I think a great percentage of them are formally groundbreaking."
Q: "Then are you personally producing experimental works primarily to satisfy readers who are seeking out non-mainstream work, or to wake up readers who have become inured to a mainstream style?"
Eggers: "Oh, that's a good question. Ooo, ooo. I don't know. To get interested in writing something myself, I have to look at it and say 'Okay, what's going to go on formally here that hasn't been done before? What can be done that would surprise people? As a reader, I need to be surprised by every sentence. I don't want to read to just find out what happens. I need to have that pleasure in the words, then in the thinking behind them. So I have to approach it that way to get interested in writing, myself. In terms of what the priorities are, when I'm really being true to myself--a friend of mine recently said that no matter what he's writing, he always writes the book he would want to read."
I've never read Eggers, and I personally tend to have much less interest in and time for experimental fiction than experimental music (not sure why that is exactly, but that's a different discussion). but some of his statements here mirror the way of thinking of musicians who are sick of what they feel to be the constraints of the jazz form, so I thought it was worth typing in.
[...]
Posted by jon abbey on February 26, 2005 10:30 AM
I think this is where we differ:
"Jazz is not an art form. *Music* is the art form. Jazz is more akin to a language, with infinite dialects. You can use that language to express anything that music is capable of expressing. "
I agree with the first part, that jazz is a language within the larger art form of music, where I disagree is with the rest of it, and very strongly with the last sentence. but we can probably agree to disagree.
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 26, 2005 11:14 AM
i just didnt really got the point to be "sick of something" while being anyway pretty far from it since the begining ?
was anyone ever forced to play a style that makes him / her sick ?
does getting sick of it gives any abilities ?
[...]
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 26, 2005 11:26 AM
oops
sorry wont disturb anymore
best
n
[...]
Posted by erasmus on February 26, 2005 02:11 PM
"Music's greatest virtue is the capacity to express feelings and thoughts that can't be put into words."
there are many levels of inexpressibility. the one where you try to express in music what you can't in words is the least interesting in my opinion. is this the reason a lot of jazz and eai is not so fascinating some of the time? conceptually bounded by the analogy to language. let music be the inexpressible. it is more like collage. to use words no human mouth has known. to use sound rather than a preconditioned sentimentality of scales. to start each time from the begining. in a sense, what we are doing is very old, not really new at all. but there are many first times to discover. many are happening that we ignore. an attitude of consciousness to the difference is required
Posted by a. young on February 26, 2005 02:26 PM
"a friend of mine recently said that no matter what he's writing, he always writes the book he would want to read."
"really being true to myself", why bother to read other people's books indeed? isn't my way of flapping my wings 'expressively' and the "creative fulfilment" i'm getting out of it the thing that "really" counts?
to paraphrase, 'a book is what it is. It exists. Nothing "needs" to be done with it. Whatever is going to happen will happen.' Hegel? Doris? que sera?
[...]
Posted by erasmus on February 26, 2005 02:56 PM
"for listeners who cut their teeth on Don Cherry, the music of someone like Axel Dörner, for example, might have little appeal"
i find this not to be the case at all and my own first hearing of cherry cutting a texture that seemed like a mixture of dragon breath, sea foam and dirt on the needle sliding across that ornette coleman record was something i heard taken even further when i first heard axel, accompanied by the same astonishment and ecstasy. my first experience of axel in ensemble however felt more like a stockhausen piece than any jazz ensemble people like axel cut their teeth playing in (among other things)
[...]
Posted by jon abbey on February 26, 2005 03:13 PM
"Music's greatest virtue is the capacity to express feelings and thoughts that can't be put into words. No genre or idiom has a monopoly on this. A metal tune can express emotional tenderness, just as a string quartet can evoke angry aggression. That's what I meant when I said of jazz, "You can use that language to express anything that music is capable of expressing.""
of course no genre has a monopoly on personal expression, but similarly, most genres have areas they're not really capable of expressing (just as written languages have concepts they're not capable of expressing fully) . To my ears, jazz is probably among the more restrictive, funny for a genre that prides itself on its freedom.
what jazz is capable of expressing the zen calmness of Tilbury's For Bunita Marcus? the closest I can think of is the Giuffre/Bley/Swallow trio, who I love, but that's really not close. Jazz is too fundamentally gestural to ever get into true Feldman-inspired territory, whereas other kinds of improvised music can.
180 degrees away from that, what jazz is capable of conveying the insanity of some Nurse With Wound (Spiral Insana, maybe, or his tribute to Automatic Writing, I forget the name)? again, my preemptive thought would be some John Zorn, maybe Kristallnacht, but again, not even close for me.
(my answers for the above two questions and "eai" would be the first disc of the Malfatti/Sugimoto release on IMJ (maligned by many, but the platonic form of this approach, incredibly powerful music) and Kevin Drumm's Sheer Hellish Miasma on Mego).
and as Chris advises, I have stopped listening to jazz, for the most part, certainly current stuff. which is sad, because I used to really love it more than anything, but you can only be disappointed so many times in a row as a listener before you start looking for something you connect with more. for me, jazz is a massively restrictive form in the year 2005, almost however you want to define it, and so for me, when you say something like "Jazz is more akin to a language, with infinite dialects. You can use that language to express anything that music is capable of expressing.", I'm really not sure what to make of it, it doesn't describe the world I live in. you seem to be certain that it describes the world you live in effectively enough, so I was happy to not discuss it anymore.
also, can we not play the "personal insecurity" game, please? you want to talk about music, let's talk about music.
Posted by tomas on February 26, 2005 03:17 PM
jon abbey wrote:
"but some of his statements here mirror the way of thinking of musicians who are sick of what they feel to be the constraints of the jazz form."
sure jon, but are you talking of "EAI"-musicians here? i think "EAI" or other forms of "newish" improv are developing exactly as much constraints as jazz or whatever other music style. the rules are (almost) not made explicit (yet) in this field, but it's clear that there ARE rules, implicit ones at least, that determine what makes a EAI record "good" or "bad". that's why, in my opinion, this music is becoming more and more foreseeable. your quote of eggers: "To get interested in writing something myself, I have to look at it and say 'Okay, what's going to go on formally here that hasn't been done before? What can be done that would surprise people?" - this is a question that i don't find on most of the records in this field today. it may have been there at the start, but now? (i am not saying that music needs to be "new" to be "good", by the way. but the question of "new" is a difficult one and i think there's less really"new" music than we sometimes think. if any at all).
Posted by jon abbey on February 26, 2005 03:42 PM
tomas, you know how tough a critic I am of "eai" music, and I don't disagree with you that it's probably more difficult than it was a couple of years ago to break new ground. most of the records in any field at any time are derivative or uninspired to one extent or another.
the main reason I started producing records in 1999 was to make sure there were records out there that were still blowing me away, because I was finding it more and more difficult to find them as a consumer. since then, I usually release 6-8 CDs a year, and if half of them are "groundbreaking", I'm happy. since the start of 2003, I'd stand by Duos for Doris, Good Morning Good Night, the Rowe/Beins, schnee_live, and the upcoming four hour set (how many of these have you heard, tomas? would you agree with the ones that you have? be honest, please.), plus maybe a few others. those five specifically have held up and even gotten stronger to my ears through fifty or so listens apiece (not the four hour one yet, that one takes some dedication, I think I'm around twelve or fifteen).
on a more personal note, you (tomas) shouldn't be intimidated, most of the musicians in the "eai" area making truly lasting art have been at it for decades. you're one of the most promising younger musicians around, you just need to relax and develop your own voice, you're already well on your way.
[...]
Posted by derek on February 26, 2005 04:48 PM
Jon, to me yours are apples & oranges comparisons and don't serve much purpose beyond the simple summary statement: "music 'X' no longer meets my needs." What eai is capable of hitting the soul-jazz gutbucket groove of Rusty Bryant backed by Johnny "Hammond" Smith? Or for that matter the deep and highly personalized blues hues of Fred Anderson? What eai can swing with the abandon of Pee Wee Russell in full bats-flown-the-belfry wail? None that I can think of in my admittedly tip-of-the-iceberg sampling of the music. You choose to see these methods of expression as constricting and limiting. Others view them as emancipatory. The whole agree to disagree pact seems like the most logical outcome.
After a lengthy & lusty love affair that's now just dying embers, jazz no longer stimulates or thrills you in the way it once did. A tough break & I agree with your assertion that this "is sad." Fortunately you've found other varieties of organized sound that gas your jets. I don't really get the point of poking holes in jazz through such categorically faulty and incongruous comparisons. It's as "broken-record" an approach as me harping on my absence of desire to explore eai (something I stopped doing awhile back when I began appreciating how tedious it probably was to readers, especially those enamored of the idiom).
Also, if I've got an itch for Feldman-style sparseness, say, I'll spin a Feldman piece. Why would I seek it out via a jazz artist when it's available directly from the source?
Not sure I fathom your "personal insecurity" remark either. Who was that directed to?
Posted by Adam Hill on February 26, 2005 05:26 PM
the whole jazz is dead and there is no new jazz worth listening to is a tiresome and condescending rant. i'm not sure why those who fetishize and prostelyze the "new" must necessarily eulogize what they don't dig anymore. (maybe it's my jewish heritage that makes me so culturally senstive to these new dispensation preachments.
Posted by jon abbey on February 26, 2005 05:49 PM
"Not sure I fathom your "personal insecurity" remark either. Who was that directed to? "
it was to Chris, who made it about me, and who already answered it.
I don't claim, and never have, that "eai" is all-encompassing in the human experience, although it's certainly more of a worldwide music in its developmental stage than jazz was for a few generations. the initial examples I used *Morton Feldman, Nurse With Wound) weren't "eai" musicians. Chris was the one making all-encompassing remarks regarding the possibilities of jazz, which is what I was commenting on. obviously all of these comments and opinions are subjective, I'm merely giving you my perspective.
going back to the language analogy, if English is the only language you're familiar with, it's easy to think it's a perfectly expressive language, whereas if you speak multiple languages, you become more aware of the strengths and weaknesses of all of them. not a perfect analogy, but it kind of works (coming from someone who only speaks English, but still).
"Now, "zen calmness" is not an absolute value, it's a subjective description you attribute to the music based on your perception, which is no more or less valid than Bill Evans' was about "Kind of Blue." One cannot presume that his own idea of "zen calmness" is definitive. What is "zen calmness" to someone who listens exclusively to jazz might be "ego-driven madness" to someone who prefers Feldman. Yet both listeners might use the phrase when describing their preferred music. Does that make either wrong? No, but it does mean that different musics can mean different things to different people. It follows that the entire spectrum of experiential possibilities can be present in a single piece of music. That's not likely, I confess, but it's possible. "
there's a bit of truth to this, but not enough that it really makes sense. you could take this argument to an extreme and say that the entire spectrum of experiential possibilities is present in any sound, which I think is kind of silly. but it gets hard to argue these things after a point when you haven't heard any of the music I'm citing, so I'll stop.
Posted by jon abbey on February 26, 2005 05:55 PM
"a tiresome and condescending rant"
I'll see that, and raise you one:
http://www.onefinalnote.com/columns/2004/eai/
http://www.onefinalnote.com/columns/2004/overblown/
Posted by Adam Hill on February 26, 2005 05:59 PM
don' think i could match all the threads on all the various bbs and forums where you say the same thing incessently, just in case there are some jazz fans who hadn't heard your sermon from the mount the first thousand times! :)
Posted by jon abbey on February 26, 2005 06:05 PM
I don't think Chris was aware of my perspective, at least not before a couple of weeks ago at JC, and he's the one who I was answering, I thought he and I were having a nice back-and-forth. I have plenty of respect for his perspective, even though I doubt our taste overlaps much at all, so I hope that's coming across also.
[...]
Posted by Adam Hill on February 26, 2005 06:10 PM
"although it's certainly more of a worldwide music in its developmental stage than jazz was for a few generations. "
this is a specious point. i mean jazz was developed by African-Americans in the early part of the 20th century, before there were convenient forms of transportion or even technology that could (but eventually would) broaden its base of artists and its audience. so, huh?
Posted by jon abbey on February 26, 2005 06:11 PM
"As recently as several months ago I thought that there was a real possibility that electronics could really reinvigorate jazz. "
I haven't thought this for a long time.
"I've become discouraged, however, by what I've heard so far. Maybe eai is what I'm looking for. Perhaps I'd find "swing" and "blues feeling" there, where I might least expect it."
doubtful, if those two elements are essential for your improvised music listening/playing, you should probably look elsewhere, with a few exceptions (Taku Sugimoto and Tetuzi Akiyama are both blues players, albeit extremely abstracted ones).
Chris, have you heard any of Otomo Yoshihide's jazz work, mostly in the ONJQ? he mixes covers of Mulligan, Dolphy, Erroll Garner, etc. with originals of his, and sometimes incorporates electronics into the results, which are usually somewhat deconstructed, with parts sometimes surprisingly straight. anyway, I'd be curious to hear your opinions on that project...
Posted by jon abbey on February 26, 2005 06:22 PM
"i mean jazz was developed by African-Americans in the early part of the 20th century, before there were convenient forms of transportion or even technology that could (but eventually would) broaden its base of artists and its audience. so, huh?"
right, it wasn't really possible, but the point is what actually happened, jazz developed in a single country for a long time, as opposed to "eai", which in its nascent stage, has (just to name the two most clearcut, yet extremely different aesthetics) very distinct Tokyo and Vienna schools, which doesn't prevent them from collaborating at times. even within Vienna, you have the group of musicians based around Polwechsel/Durian/Efzeg, coming from a classical/jazz/improv background, and the Mego guys, who mostly come from a techno/non-musical background. eai's become a worldwide (not totally, not Africa, and not too much from South American, but throughout Europe, Asia, Australia, North America) melting pot in its first decade of existence. this could be a bad thing if it ended up in some kind of overall homogenization, which it definitely tends towards a bit at times (what Tomas was talking about earlier, I believe), but I think by and large, it's a positive thing to keep the flow of exciting ideas coming for as long as possible in these fast-moving times.
Posted by derek on February 26, 2005 06:29 PM
"I don't claim, and never have, that "eai" is all-encompassing in the human experience, although it's certainly more of a worldwide music in its developmental stage than jazz was for a few generations."
Again, it's apples & oranges. As Adam notes, your generalization totally ignores the differences (temporal, technological, cultural, etc.) between the eras that jazz arose and that eai is currently arising within. Today's global 'climate' facillitates the sort of 'borderless' collaborations that are fueling a lot of the developments in eai. The early expansion of jazz is obviously snail-paced by comparsion.
"going back to the language analogy, if English is the only language you're familiar with, it's easy to think it's a perfectly expressive language, whereas if you speak multiple languages, you become more aware of the strengths and weaknesses of all of them."
So sussing from your (far from perfect) analogy eai is some sort of 'pan-linguistic' form and jazz is 'mono-linguistic'? Again, from my vantage, this sort of distillation doesn't hold up to scrutiny.
Jon, maybe it's the several fingers of Maker's Mark I've downed in the last hour, but I seriously don't understand the purpose behind your argument. It's interesting too that you bring up the respect you harbor for differing perspectives as that's not always obvious from your posts. Just being honest here.
Posted by Phil on February 26, 2005 07:06 PM
I was fascinated by this quote:
>eggers: "To get interested in writing something myself, I have to look at it and say 'Okay, what's going to go on formally here that hasn't been done before? What can be done that would surprise people?"
because it seems to me to be everything that's wrong with creative endeavors in the 21st century. Lately, I find myself returning to folks who work quite consciously and deliberately within genre constraints without attempting to interrogate them, or fuck with the formal structure in any way. This means everything from writers like Paul Bowles and Raymond Chandler to directors like Walter Hill and Sam Fuller to musicians like Hank Mobley and Lee Morgan. I don't know why I'm so crank-y lately (maybe because I'm in the process of revising a novel), but I'm finding the idea that traditional forms are handcuffs on the spirit, and that working within the boundaries of those forms is some kind of tedious capitulation unworthy of the serious artist, quite infuriating. To put it into a three-word sentence I've seen many, many times before...fuck Dave Eggers. And fuck anyone who brings that kind of attitude to their art. I have no time for that shit in my life right now. Gimme the tradition, whether it's Art Blakey or ZZ Top.
[...]
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 12:10 AM
Ok that s been a lot of things said since i last watched ... i ll just say again "sick of constraints of Jazz" brought all sorts of things already and historically but not necesseraliy SOMETHING ELSE, it also brought New Orleans Revival and i ve never ever seen the early European Improv as a reaction to constraints of jazz Only
(for sure a desire to take it FURTHER but thats the WHOLE jazz history , take things further and eventually by breaking them if required )
it carried also a savoir faire while i find these days such heavy "non idiomatic" ( i d say idiomless rather or too often ) musics often USES sentences like "SICK OF" to simply HIDE unablilities to bring things further FROM INSIDE
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 12:25 AM
And i think it s about time to mix, unlclear, undefine again categories, i guess that s always when things happens and not when every second one does the same iedology
whatever reasons are for that
i loved the real beginings around EAI ( i hate to use that term , i d rather talk of certain artists instead of a solid block of nonsense ) it was great and brought many people to think
it was also GREAT cause it was no question of bakgrounds really ( people came and joined somehow from all sorts of music, whether Jazz, Rock, Electro, composition and more )
but ( and no wonder it always happened like that after a pretty short period with any "new thing" ) it s time to RISK again
the safety of concepts are a business
these days people want to know in advance what they get mainly
hera we are since a while
and i wouldnt react quite the same way if it wasnt to hear and read how since EAI anything else is old fashioned and invalid around
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 12:45 AM
if EAI has nothing at all to do with JAZZ and EAI fans , artists and producers are sick of it anyway
what are we talking about then ?
Should Jazz fans be sick of EAI as well then ?
to me the main problem in most of Jon s answers is the idea EAI s A PROGRESS and everything else is left behind ( not all but a lot ) for nostalgy
time will tell ( i find it says already a lot )
also HOW many early FREE JAZZ musicians tried to come back later to mainstream with various results ?
i ve heard also quite some albums that sounds just like a Criss Cross or Steeplechase loosy jam session in the NEW MUSIC section but fits EAI aspects and rings a bell of better times
GIVE TIME A CHANCE
and the most interesting music will float we all know that
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 12:49 AM
also as soon ( and its starting i find ) as EAI will be a little less COOL you ll see many people leaving the boat quickly
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 01:06 AM
and not to start a war here again, Jon what i mean by ideas of progress i oppose it to this : i dont see mainly and only great new musicians ( in the whole history of it ) as people who makes whatever happened before sounds poor and old , often quite the opposite if i think of Ornette Coleman, Louis Armstrong, Markus Popp, Glenn Gould, Daft Punk or John Cage .....
i rather think these people brought a total different light together with a very deep personal view on THE SAME OLD THING
what s been great in EAI is how it brought us to hear differently and also a different position from the artists involved , ( after years of sweaty bollocks free jazz for example ) but when it cames down to the Evenloppe being more important than the letter ... that s simply loosing it
an interesting quote ( adressed to Lee Konitz ) from Derek Bailey is : all major artists goes BACKWARDS ... i think i understand that well
backwards as re-reading, deeper, again and again, ..probably ?
we ll probably see the next step when some EAI will reach the paradox : what s best ? keep the message or keep the outfit ?
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 01:17 AM
and sorry but i also see JAZZ more as a great Library with much authors from the past that i love than a style really alive that surpasses it all Still nowadays
i dont mean it s dead though cause for sure it still is a great source for many musicians today so things could happen .. why not
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 01:45 AM
i m just hoping the next move wont be based on musicians sick of constraints of EAI for example .....
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 01:50 AM
"but the question of "new" is a difficult one and i think there's less really"new" music than we sometimes think. if any at all)."
NEW doesnt sell by definition, it remains under the floating line , it has to be already EXPECTABLE to get around advertised as NEW
Posted by jon abbey on February 27, 2005 07:26 AM
yep, Noel's back all right. :)
two things:
I shouldn't have used the phrase "sick of", that was a poor choice of words, "taking it further", as Noel said, is obviously more correct.
I also pretty much agree with this, specifically the first half:
"i also see JAZZ more as a great Library with much authors from the past that i love than a style really alive that surpasses it all Still nowadays
i dont mean it s dead though cause for sure it still is a great source for many musicians today so things could happen "
but I take it a bit further to make a point, since it's basically been in this state for a few decades now. maybe it's not dead, maybe it's just been in a coma for a generation or so, only time will tell...
[...]
Posted by jon abbey on February 27, 2005 08:30 AM
obviously those musicians all have wide bodies of work, and all deserve more than a sentence or two, but I'll give you my very-boiled down current opinions of them (FWIW, I've probably owned 200 discs led by those 5 combined, and seen them play maybe 30 times, maybe more, all of them multiple times, Shipp by far the least on both counts):
Zorn (specifically Masada): nice project, but an extremely narrow vein that he's chosen to stay in far too long.
Cecil Taylor: still great, but with the Duval/Krall rhythm section, for the first time in his career he's chosen sidemen who don't push or challenge him, kind of like Sonny Rollins has almost exclusively for the last 3-4 decades.
Braxton: I used to be a staunch defender against critics who found his work too cold, now I think they were mostly right.
David Murray: a nice player and a very formative musician in my development as a listener (all of these first four were, actually, but Murray was playing in NYC all the time when I was really into him), haven't heard much from him in a long time. in his heyday, he would have been much better served to release half as many records and spend twice as much time on each of them, though.
Matt Shipp: acoustic, he's OK sometimes in a post-Cecil vein, I used to like him in the Ware quartet and Roscoe Mitchell's Note Factory specifically, and a few of his discs as a leader. but his electronic experiments are embarrassing (what I've heard). to make a sweeping generalization, the "downtown jazz" scene has no clue about subtlety when using electronics, although Ikue Mori has made serious strides recently towards that. Matt is the master of self-hype in this scene, and that's served him quite well.
I don't like posting honest opinions like this on this site specifically, as it always seems to end up in more backlash than it's worth, but you asked, and those are my honest opinions, so there you go. what are your honest opinions on those same five musicians, Chris?
[...]
Posted by jon abbey on February 27, 2005 09:32 AM
"I'm starting to believe that improvised electronic music and jazz are better off following their own somewhat related, yet separate paths. At least until I've heard evidence to the contrary."
yeah, I mostly agree. but you should check out the ONJQ, as I mentioned above, Otomo Yoshihide's New Jazz Quintet (recently renamed the 'New Jazz Ensemble'), you should be able to score one at DMG, or at least get Bruce to play you a track or two.
http://www.japanimprov.com/yotomo/newjazzquintet/index.html
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 09:41 AM
"but I take it a bit further to make a point, since it's basically been in this state for a few decades now. maybe it's not dead, maybe it's just been in a coma for a generation or so, only time will tell..."
i dont agree nor disagree with that Jon
i just meant i wouldnt go to see "new" silent films though they may still be such a source of influence and i still WATCH them
the same way i can always epext 18th century french litterature to inseminate new things
best
n
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 09:51 AM
in a bit more raw version
i was really glad to come and see Henry Grimes playing .... MUCH more than i enjoyed Van Dermark 10 years ago
if you see what i mean
NOW if a youngster would start after the same show of Grimes ...that could happen ?
that s the point i make with EAI , AMM is 40 years long ( legal history is 30 ) what if part of EAI was just a REVIVAL of that kind ( due to sickness of improv as it came out the last years and due to a lack of strong conceptual directions in a harsh quick world ?)
I DO NOT MEAN I M 100 % correct and also i KNOW i m just shaking the banana republic s tree
( but some % maybe ? as well ? or fine also if NOT )
best
n
PS i have to remember that many EAI werent EAI at all 5 years ago still
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 10:04 AM
Chris
i disagree often and even could fight with Jon on many levels ( but always for us all to go FURTHER once again )
but :
- Zorn (specifically Masada)
"Specifically Masada" sounds like a european festival All star very well paid gig to me at first But then i respect Zorn a lot , tough i haven t really loved any album after STRATEGY and early NAKED ( but without any paradox GOD all these works on Parachute wow )
Cecil Taylor (of today, not the historical Cecil)
STILL THE SAME !!!!!!!!!!
Braxton (ditto
)i ve seen him solo last summer and i havent seen anything like that for a long long while
i bought out all my old records AGAIN
David Murray
hummmmmmm noop
Matt Shipp (including his electric stuff)
really nice player wouldnt dismiss him but would easily file him in a discussion like this
i m back with a list for you then
n
Posted by Phil on February 27, 2005 10:06 AM
>He said he'd never seen the review, so nevermind...
HA! I know Matt well enough to know that he saw that review, wherever it ran. He's an obsessive tracker of his own press, on paper and online.
I'm probably the biggest fan of the Thirsty Ear electronics 'n' jazz albums on this site. I think each of the last half-dozen Shipp records has been better than the one before, and the last two, Harmony And Abyss and Equilibrium, are among the most pleasurable listening experiences I've had with jazz piano in the last few years.
As far as the other stuff (and yeah, I know nobody asked me):
I find Masada incredibly limited, and the little bit that I've heard (sorry, I just can't be bothered to go 10 albums deep) says nothing to me. But none of Zorn's Jewish-related projects have spoken to me - I think it's that I just don't have an ear for that kind of singsongy melody.
The only David Murray albums I've liked have been Shakill's Warrior (the first one only) and a gospelish disc he did with Fontella Bass on Justin Time a few years ago - can't even recall the title now. I think he's wildly overpraised.
I just saw Cecil at Iridium, in a trio but not with Duval/Krall. I like him a lot solo or in trio - his big-band/orchestral things fall flat for me. Too much going on all at once. I prefer to hear his piano, not the chanting vocalists and the ten blaring horns. For me, Cecil's music is about Cecil.
I've heard very, very little Braxton (the first 3-4 albums on Delmark and BYG, and then a live quintet date from 1977 on Hatology). The live one, Quintet (Basel) 1977, swings pretty hard and has some good solos. The other, ultra-formless stuff does nothing for me; it's dry, intellectualized quacking, and life's too short.
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 10:11 AM
Chris what would you answer to
Tim Berne ( in the last 15 years )
Diana Krall ( as a pianist )
William Parker ( as a leader )
Branford Marsalis
Pat Metheny ( on both sides )
Herb Ellis
Tzadik records
Concord Records
Taku Sugimoto ( as an improvisor )
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 10:15 AM
Jon
" I don't like posting honest opinions like this on this site specifically, as it always seems to end up in more backlash than it's worth, but you asked, and those are my honest opinions, so there you go. "
if we talk here it has to be a bit like that no ?
otherwise everyone can just produce "things" and wait for feedback
best
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 10:19 AM
http://www.japanimprov.com/yotomo/newjazzquintet/index.html
on that frankly electronics seems to me total casual aspect ...Jazz REALLY NOT
i wasn t surpised to read Otomo talking about UNDERCURRENT Jim Hall / Bll Evans
that s like an EAI SYMPTOM to me even
Posted by jon abbey on February 27, 2005 10:23 AM
Noel, yes, of course you've got something of a point in that some "eai" stems from AMM, and obviously Keith overlaps between the two.
however, 30-40 years of history is a bit misleading in this context. I think the primary touchstone is the version of the band after Tilbury joined, around 1980 sometime. the sixties version of AMM was very different, a formative influence on other scenes, noise, etc., but I don't think really on "eai". (I've discusssed this with Keith also, who agrees)
John brought a crucial element to the band, his Feldman-like ability to suspend time, which I think is the primary legacy of that group (now defunct) on the world of "eai". but it's important to remember (maybe easy to forget) that pretty much no one followed in the footsteps of AMM (and the Taj Mahal Travellers, as well as a few other projects, in Japan) until quite recently, so it's not territory that's been so thoroughly trodden as of yet, although it's certainly moving in that direction.
Posted by jon abbey on February 27, 2005 10:28 AM
"on that frankly electronics seems to me total casual aspect ...Jazz REALLY NOT i wasn t surpised to read Otomo talking about UNDERCURRENT Jim Hall / Bll Evans that s like an EAI SYMPTOM to me even "
I don't really know what you mean here, the project is obviously jazz-based in form with electronics added, but I think that may be the only way for the combination to really work. can you explain more what you mean by the Undercurrent sentence?
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 10:31 AM
"however, 30-40 years of history is a bit misleading in this context. I think the primary touchstone is the version of the band after Tilbury joined, around 1980 sometime."
Correct i see what you mean but we like to see AMM timeless and i included earlier strats
"John brought a crucial element to the band, his Feldman-like ability to suspend time, which I think is the primary legacy of that group (now defunct) on the world of "eai"."
I share that side and on the other one i m more surprised my Keith often today
but it's important to remember (maybe easy to forget) that pretty much no one followed in the footsteps of AMM (and the Taj Mahal Travellers, as well as a few other projects, in Japan) until quite recently, so it's not territory that's been so thoroughly trodden as of yet, although it's certainly moving in that direction
YESSSSSS
100 %
n
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 10:38 AM
all i mean is you re so excited Jon by all what s happening around in the last 10 years
and you ve done a very serious job
but what if in 20 years you re still want to be fair to you early emotions ?
that woul be total alright to me
but other people may see it at that time differently ...so lets not put walls but rather give hands TO NEXT and ORIGINS as well
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 10:43 AM
Can you explain more what you mean by the Undercurrent sentence?
yes ...as far as JAZZ in these terms is involved i hear Otomo 99%
again maybe not "sick" of jazz for electronics here but pretty periferic : for sure !
best
n
Posted by jon abbey on February 27, 2005 10:44 AM
Noel, maybe I haven't been totally clear here. I have full respect for jazz as a crucial, historic art form. my comments here were about jazz being produced in 2005, which you seem to mostly agree with.
and if I feel in the future that the area of "eai" gets to the point where I can't put together records that I'm happy with, I'll either start producing records in (what I feel to be) a more exciting area of music, or I'll stop producing records. right now, I'm doing all I can to postpone that probably inevitable day as long as possible.
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 10:46 AM
but i guess to me the last time i ve heard JAZZ again after really a long time ( not talking here of original artists carrying on ) was OTOMO JAZZ QUINTET
so
.....
[...]
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 10:52 AM
YES
"my comments here were about jazz being produced in 2005, which you seem to mostly agree with."
YES
...couldn t name ONE in 2005 without thinking of a comeback basically
"and if I feel in the future that the area of "eai" gets to the point where I can't put together records that I'm happy with, I'll either start producing records in (what I feel to be) a more exciting area of music, or I'll stop producing records."
..... At cahiers du cinema and nouvelle vague you say A GOOD FILM is a GOOD STORY AT THE RIGHT MOMENT
"right now, I'm doing all I can to postpone that probably inevitable day as long as possible."
i think i know that feeling .... i loved producing records when things happened , but as soon as they re fixed it s another story
that s why ( not only ) we stopped
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 10:55 AM
Chris
i ll be around
best
n
Posted by tomas on February 27, 2005 11:36 AM
a lot of action in here.
just as addition to the jazz + electronics debate: one record that i love and that incorporated both elements was "territory band 2 - atlas". i haven't heard the new one yet, but i'd be curious to hear opinions about that ...
Posted by jon abbey on February 27, 2005 11:48 AM
I haven't heard the Territory Band. I know Lasse Marhaug recently replaced Kevin Drumm in the electronics chair, though, an interesting addition.
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 11:56 AM
I liked 2 first "Saint Germain" albums
and i still do like "Improvise" Paul Bley
Annette Peacock and Han Bennink
as Jazz & tronics
funny you talk about this cause 5 years ago in Paris i couldnt avoid itw, special issues and so on presswise on that
cheers
n
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 27, 2005 12:04 PM
almost i d prefer Cal Cobbs with Ayler as "electronic disturbance" ( but that was Harpsichord i know ) in the genre
i was in London when all the Jungle d&b thing started and there was some jazz and electronics
best
n
the late HUGH DAVIES of course THEN RATHER
Posted by Adam Hill on February 27, 2005 05:00 PM
i still think there's a possibility of more interesting happenings with jazz and electronica. in my opinion, the most interesting electronica artists haven't worked in a jazz setting. there are much more intresting musicians out there than spring heel jack, dj spooky, and dj logic. maybe somebody will figure out a jazz/electronica project with Aphex Twin or Autechre or Squarepusher, just to name a few.
Posted by Adam Hill on February 27, 2005 05:03 PM
actually some of what i've heard from supersilent and jaga jazzist and few like that have been interesting and enjoyable. nothing terribly unique yet though.
Posted by jon abbey on February 27, 2005 05:24 PM
I saw Supersilent when they came through town a few months back, their first US tour. I thought they were very disappointing, essentially a seventies fusion band. if they had someone like the aforementioned Lasse Marhaug in the band to add some grit, I'd be much more optimistic about them.
I was a big fan of Autechre for a while also, I've seen them live three or four times, although not for a while. I'm not sure how well they'd adapt to any sort of collaborative context, as I'm pretty sure they exclusively work as a duo, and always have.
Spring Heel Jack were pretty good at one point within their area, although that was quite some time ago. and it's almost inconceivable at this point, but DJ Spooky was amazing when he first emerged, I saw him do a few incredible sets in the days of "illbient".
Posted by erasmus on February 27, 2005 10:49 PM
"however, 30-40 years of history is a bit misleading in this context. I think the primary touchstone is the version of the band after Tilbury joined, around 1980 sometime. the sixties version of AMM was very different, a formative influence on other scenes, noise, etc., but I don't think really on "eai". (I've discusssed this with Keith also, who agrees)"
the fact that this version of the group is thought of by jon as the "touchstone" for the music called "eai" by some of us is another dimension of the personal subjective made into a category that tends to be taken in objective historical terms. notice how it is justified by the reference that keith agrees. but this is only possible to say when you delimit the playing field in two ways: one is the AMM we accept as being seminal and the one's we see/hear as the eai players who have been inseminated thusly by that AMM. but it doesn't really matter ultimately because AMM has perhaps the richest legacy to impart from and the possibilities are in the future. (perhaps the new developments in eai are not going to appear in the historical record as influential and i would argue that is true in proportion to the risks these younger musicians won't take owing to whatever safety zone they want to remain in.) the earlier versions of the group are actually equally influential to the musical thinking of our times from my perspective. and its the players that shape the music we hear, some of them better known than others, who will create the sounds that will probably be misunderstood, ignored etc, much in the same way the AMM was not so well recieved. is the 80's version of AMM the last? what has not entered into AMM? plenty. but i will have to close this post on this note...
Posted by erasmus on February 27, 2005 11:31 PM
"I saw Supersilent when they came through town a few months back, their first US tour. I thought they were very disappointing, essentially a seventies fusion band"
supersilent have an ultimately depressing effect upon me in which i detect two causes. first is that yes they appear like a seventies fusion band, all the modal and chromatic cliches associated with it, the "harold budd" effects effect etc. secondly, i detect something of the culture and climate the music is made in. wintry melancholy. i feel it sounds at times like middle period pink floyd. pushing machines to the limit to create psychic distraction. (maja rajkte too a similar effect for me).
earlier chris stated he thought he couldn't hear in cherry elements that can be heard in axel's playing. true, cherry's overall style doesn't move in the direction of textural affect, but elements of this do exist in his playing. it is such textural elements that extend from jazz into the spectrum of eai playing. but the route to eai as it stands now passes equally through stochastic theory (xenakis' strategies) indeterminate music (cage and cardew --insert your fave here-- strategies), stockhausen's multi-levelled control-freak "games" and then the history of electronic music from the european and tokyo centers (& bell labs i guess) up to the current electronica exploring the noisier, glitchier aspecxts of the digital realm... all this goes to say is that, yes, if you ignore these influences--then yes, you will see the music sometimes called eai in a fundamentally different light than i do. but a player like axel is familiar with all of these things. i can't say the same for others of his age bracket or younger who populate his field of collaborators. eai does represent a more open field than any others in music. but the more it is spoken of a genre, the more it becomes disabled as a catalyzing force. some of this has to do with the press and labels trying to create the nec plus ultra position, narrowing the field down to technical experts and masters. but this will eventually go bankrupt as a leading concept i suspect. the players who dare to do what has been unthinkable do not neccessarily have to be in the know or in the tradition at all...you can't say this about what calls itself jazz in 2005...
Posted by erasmus on February 27, 2005 11:49 PM
"and deliberately within genre constraints without attempting to interrogate them, or fuck with the formal structure in any way"
works adhering to such a practice model would have to qualify as kitsch...and conservative... the writing analogy for music just doesn't work and is damaging to more open concepts of sound as source material for artworks... read e.m. cioran and i guarantee you will never see the "novel" in this same way again... (or not)... plenty experimental fiction and experimental poetry shares with the struggle of music like eai. the problem with eai is as noel says: we are at a juncture were some key formulas for its production have been established, albeit on a more or less subconscious level
Posted by jon abbey on February 28, 2005 12:10 AM
interesting posts, lots for me to think about there.
I don't really disagree with anything in your first one, although I'm not sure I fully understand all of it. to clarify, I don't think AMM is "the" touchstone for "eai", but they are an important antecedent for some parts of it. I also agree that sixties AMM has been roughly equally influential, just on different areas of music, but I see your point about those being dividing lines I'm creating, which there may be some truth to upon further reflection.
"eai does represent a more open field than any others in music. but the more it is spoken of a genre, the more it becomes disabled as a catalyzing force."
I used to think this was true, which is why I stopped trying to figure out a good genre name and why I'm OK with the semantically meaningless "eai". now I think it doesn't especially matter, it's just handy to have a general placeholder term when you're in discussions with people who haven't even heard AMM (not denigrating, just saying). what matters is what the musicians do, and that's going to happen regardless of what we talk about on discussion boards.
as for my specific perspective, I obviously have to be far more general in a discussion like this than I am when I'm working on Erstwhile, planning records or festivals or talking to musicians or whatever.
Posted by jon abbey on February 28, 2005 12:17 AM
"the problem with eai is as noel says: we are at a juncture where some key formulas for its production have been established, albeit on a more or less subconscious level"
that's not a problem so much as it is a challenge to break out of those formulas, a challenge I'm personally happy to accept.
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 12:56 AM
" that's not a problem so much as it is a challenge to break out of those formulas, a challenge I'm personally happy to accept. "
i m sure but that may also show one thing
often what people call here EAI is pretty strongly related to Jon and Erstw ( plus IMJ and few more ) that s also where i sometime have problems with definitions or views
ther reflect the idea of an Inclusive / exclusive scene of EAI and things around a nsamne artist on another context that may do something else as well looses totally the EAI sticker
that s why i asked what will stay basically from genre or artists
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 01:06 AM
i d say not as opposed but comparing maybe to if you d take single artists like Keith, Beresford or Fennesz and see that depending on the projects they do , they strongly sound their own but the project could be filed by various communities in various files like Free Jazz, Electronica, Surf or whatever
i think that was actually the case in the early mid 90 s , files didnt meant much then of course they come back alsways cause business and so needs FILES
i like for example Live at LU for that its pretty undefine and messy
not too far from the Daft Punk live album pretty improvised the same way
Yes for Squarepusher or Autechre
i remember obviously improvised shows in London really great in a good while ago
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 01:11 AM
"I used to think this was true, which is why I stopped trying to figure out a good genre name and why I'm OK with the semantically meaningless "eai". now I think it doesn't especially matter, it's just handy to have a general placeholder term when you're in discussions with people who haven't even heard AMM (not denigrating, just saying). what matters is what the musicians do, and that's going to happen regardless of what we talk about on discussion boards. "
Yes and No , i d say it might for a short while have sounded ( EAI ) as one possible flag
but pretty much since it started i felt Vienna, Tokyo, Berlin and AMM where really Different things already and they clearly are now
maybe only Duets allows too a mix of 2 approaches , funnily a lot of groups are in the scene , that s maybe the most AMM legacy i find as opposed to classic London improv where it s often been combinations of persons
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 01:22 AM
"but the more it is spoken of a genre, the more it becomes disabled as a catalyzing force. some of this has to do with the press and labels trying to create the nec plus ultra position, narrowing the field down to technical experts and masters. but this will eventually go bankrupt as a leading concept i suspect. "
For sure and especially as the things will get more difficult and keep searching further
that s what i meant by EAI being at some point advertised as something easily recognisable and its been also sometime PLAYED like that as well so ...fair enough
in france you say you cant have : the butter, the money for the butter and the ass of the Cremiere who sells it , ....
"the players who dare to do what has been unthinkable do not neccessarily have to be in the know or in the tradition at all...you can't say this about what calls itself jazz in 2005... "
That s a question for both sides / parties
who wants to be Jazz in 2005 , what for and how much is 2005 Jazz institutions able to recongnise something new in the area ?
in europe you have all sorts of cliches like Jazz artists getting y little more Freshy by including genres they think hip and for younger audiences ...like "Rap" and "Techno" of course having no idea at all what this music is but looks good probably on stage
when they do that it usually means this style or reference is far away from alive .... a bit like when D&B started to be uses for all sorts commercials
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 01:32 AM
Another question for Jazz 2005 is how come so many great artists from the 90 s became so mild ?
it s hard to hear a recent album of Bill Frisell or many of the ex JMT times these days like something got totally polished and pretty empty suddenly no ?
like SONG X from Metheny 20 years later
being the duo with Haden instead ... that s a little wild , is it just the time being so conservative and audience asking for "good old records" ?
also the Free Jazz revival came in between
Posted by tomas on February 28, 2005 02:49 AM
jon, to answer your question about "groundbreaking" erst records i need to know first how you'd define a "groundbreaking record"...what are the criteria?
i'm tired of ckoom.
Posted by tomas on February 28, 2005 02:51 AM
i'm not intimidated at all, btw.
Posted by walto on February 28, 2005 04:47 AM
"and if I feel in the future that the area of "eai" gets to the point where I can't put together records that I'm happy with, I'll either start producing records in (what I feel to be) a more exciting area of music, or I'll stop producing records. right now, I'm doing all I can to postpone that probably inevitable day as long as possible."
I think there's another possibility. "ea-i" (or at least that portion you're most enjoying) will change gradually--as, e.g. jazz did into SME, and you'll keep producing "it" if you can, when some people will say you're now making something entirely else. There'll be arguments about this, and everyone will be he/she has won each of them.
One likes what one likes. All these reasons/explanations/historical explanations, etc. come later. Jazz, whatever that is is/isn't dead, whatever that means. Who gives a flying fuck?
[It's kind of like most enjoying rooting for the Knicks (when it seems like they might win) then most enjoying rooting against the Knicks (when they're losing)--if they start winning, my guess is it will be most fun to start rooting for them again. :>} ]
BTW, my creds for all this arrogant certainty are that I never cared for either Mat Shipp or Masada--back when everybody else in the universe was fawning over them.
Posted by Alexandre on February 28, 2005 05:24 AM
waouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh!!!!!!!
oooooooooooooooooahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!
pffffff.
Posted by Alexandre on February 28, 2005 05:33 AM
at the moment, as an improviser (doesnt cover all in my music activities), i am fine to play in very various contexts or musicians, i could do with a rapper, a flute player, or i dont know, even someone who doesnt know so much about improv maybe, but, who will go with just PLAY and BE (there) (at the time we play).
dont HIDE!
btw, for me, this EAI thing has contamined and for a long while a large number of what was somehow the 'new' generation of musicians in the field of improv. its my feeling, for a while already. maybe it was like this before, but i wasnt there so....
now, musicians are just simply SCARED to play i think.
pfffff, i dont know. but... pffff
Posted by Alexandre on February 28, 2005 05:37 AM
one more,
even maybe, many musicians improvisers i see are just simply SCARED to hear what they COULD/MUST play.
and i dont talk even about their BODY, hein.... by refusing to let things TALK, you become fucking dead nothing.
Posted by matt m on February 28, 2005 05:51 AM
Jeez, if you only ever read Dave Eggers' interviews you'd think he was Joyce, or JH Prynne, or Ben Marcus, or someone. Instead Eggers churns out disingenuous, opportunistic, self-satisfied prose that flatters a moneyed, metropolitan coterie by investing its quotidian existence with a spurious, self-consciously "kooky" glow. He's also surprisingly inarticulate - he frequently misuses words in a way that makes you wonder what editors at publishing houses are paid for. His writing's more annoying than the movie "Amelie", and for very similar reasons.
Sorry, I hate Dave Eggers. No opportunity for dissing him should ever be passed over.
Posted by Joe Milazzo on February 28, 2005 06:36 AM
Eggers' worth as a writer aside, I have to disagree with the assumption I detect in his comment that form and content can be separated in any way. Particularly in fiction. (I would say music and poetry are somewhat different in that "form" is often more fixed and "external" or "pre-existing". But this also depends on what one has heard / read, under what circumstances, how much, etc.)
But to my admittedly afflicted way of thinking, one of the freedoms of improvised art is that every expression, whether it be sound or story, takes its own form. Said form may not be *new* per se, but it is unique. To me, the best novels, the best jazz, and the best "eai" (callitwatchawanna) all have this quality. Call it a sort of suspenseful inevitability.
ckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoom
ckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoom
ckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoom
ckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoom
ckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoom
ckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoom
ckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoomckoom
[Purging]
Posted by derek on February 28, 2005 06:39 AM
I think it's interesting how yet another Bags discussion, this one ostensibly about "New-ness in Jazz", has once again couched itself in the comforting cushion of eai (where the hell is Uli? :) The music has long been a primary pillar of the site so I suppose there's not much cause for surprise. Maybe it's just sour grapes though since I don't have anything to add from the eai angle. That said the discussion has been an interesting (if typically convoluted) read thus far & I'm enjoying it. Though I do wish Jon would switch off the 'rhetorical filter' he appears to have calibrated to my questions and stoop to answer them ;)
There seems to be a prevailing viewpoint that "formulas" and "rules" in music, whether the music be jazz or eai or whatever, are inherently bad or debilitating agents; strictures to be resisted &/or demolished rather than embraced & preserved. Again, I'm trying to understand why folks think this to be so. The relentless pursuit of the 'new' will always be an aim of diminishing returns.
Noel's question about the seeming pacification of 90s artists in the new millennium is a good one. William Parker's new piano trio disc on Thirsty Ear wouldn't be out of place on Steeplechase or even Criss Cross. Economics certainly have something to do with it. But there are still folks like Joe McPhee smudging the borders, sketching with charcoals and pastels rather than hard line ink and pencil.
[and to lob a cream pie back Walt's way: I dig both Masada and Shipp, though admittedly neither as much as I used to]
Posted by jon abbey on February 28, 2005 07:01 AM
actually the title of the piece is "New-ness and Jazz-ness", not "Newness in Jazz". and if Chris didn't mention Axel Dorner specifically, I probably wouldn't have answered to begin with.
as for my aptly named "rhetorical filter", is there really a point in removing it? I'm not trying to convince you of anything, just stating my own opinion.
ofnie!
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 07:04 AM
"btw, for me, this EAI thing has contamined and for a long while a large number of what was somehow the 'new' generation of musicians in the field of improv. its my feeling, for a while already. maybe it was like this before, but i wasnt there so....
now, musicians are just simply SCARED to play i think.
pfffff, i dont know. but... pffff "
i remember a Chet Baker show in Belgrade
huge theater, of course he arrived 2 hours after the beg, heavily stoned with his old jazz fest tee-shirt and n socks a la Chet
- in the audience someone shouted on him
PLAY IF YOU CAN !
he did ...damned HE REALLY DID
( for Alex )
Posted by Adam Hill on February 28, 2005 07:05 AM
dave's a nice guy, though i don't necessarily agree with his views, (and we'll be talking about it in april when he visits and we do a 'conversation' before an audience.)
another prominent dave (foster wallace) also feels the same way, though he's also a much better writer. oddly enough both like quite a lot of 'straight' fiction, though they would rather champion the stuff that they think is advancing the form or doing something different. i myself have always admired more than enjoyed a lot of the stuff that gets called 'new' in fiction. now back to music.....
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 07:08 AM
BLOW THE WHOLE THING TOMAS !
best
n
Posted by derek on February 28, 2005 07:10 AM
Semantics schmantics. It's a good thing Dorner was mentioned or we wouldn't have your modest litany of posts here (some of which I've found edifying). And I'm not looking to be convinced, just for clarification as to your reasons for continually placing jazz in a gilded coffin or on coma-induced life support. Yeesh! I'm not trying to get in a pissing match with you, just trying to figure your shit out.
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 07:14 AM
"to answer your question about "groundbreaking" erst records i need to know first how you'd define a "groundbreaking record"...what are the criteria?"
well orginally that s the only reason i came here on the Bag first ...cause i d listened to all these new music groundbreaking albums and i often didnt got the point at all
but what can we say that s not again going to end with I LOVE IT / I DON´T
Posted by jon abbey on February 28, 2005 07:18 AM
Derek, I'm not the only one with those opinions, either on this thread or in the world. again, my overarching observations about jazz seem as obvious to me, and plenty of other people, as "the sky is blue". seriously. the main reason I went there on this thread specifically was Chris' contention that jazz is "capable of expressing anything that music is capable of". that's a statement that is so far from the truth (for me), that I simply couldn't just let it sit there unchallenged.
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 07:20 AM
"Noel's question about the seeming pacification of 90s artists in the new millennium is a good one"
i meant here it s pretty easy to check what happened during mid 80s/mid 90 s and even produced on a pretty high and large ( quasi major labels ) level where you had many bands and projects really opening up and bringing things you didnt hear like that before
and then the last 2/ 3 years ... plus the return of post Glenn Miller jazz and singers
just concretely i mean
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 07:24 AM
"Semantics schmantics. "
excuse my english , that probably doesnt help being precise
but we try our best
cheers
n
Posted by Adam Hill on February 28, 2005 07:28 AM
"that I simply couldn't just let it sit there unchallenged."
why not? really, why the hell not?
imagine a world where all the, um, 'remarkable' things said on eai threads and forums got "challenged." (and i mean more than the occasional tweak by Uli or Pete).
Posted by jon abbey on February 28, 2005 07:33 AM
Adam, I had to know if he made that statement having heard a wide range of other music or not. after further discussion, I now get his perspective to an extent (very jazzcentric within improvised and experimental music), and would probably not challenge a similar statement again, just as I don't question Derek's reviews or perspective, no matter how little I agree with him.
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 07:34 AM
I see we re back into the HOT CLUB DE FRANCE Hugues Pannassié and the REAL THING
COOL or HOT ?
best
n
I cant remember who mentionned Joe Mac Phee indeed YES but again that s a lifetime career not just something new or something alive or etc etc it s a little longer
by the way Mc Phee and AMM could be compared then ... for bit keeping into and develloping in the area they invented
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 07:36 AM
back to Jazz i for example ( we both talked many times about it ...like why ?)
i understand why someone like Stefan Winter more or less stopped producing jazz these days ...while he brought so many with JMT in the 80 s
that s a bit if a fact i find
Posted by walto on February 28, 2005 07:48 AM
A smart poster at this site once asked me my opinion about the sorities paradox. (I said it was too hard to solve--certainly way too hard for me.) It was a good question, and quite relevant here, because wherever you have artificial kinds (like "jazz" or "ea-i" or "dead" [as applied to music, not, say, rodents] you can construct a non-transitive series("NTS"). Those are where A is indistinguishable from B, and B is indistinguishable from C, but A is distinguishable from C. Thus does "jazz" move into "non-idiomatic improv," (and "classical") and "non-idiomatic improv" move into "ea-i" (and thus will "ea-i" move into something else. Similarly, in the case of music, does "vibrant" glide into "comatose" and "comatose" slither into "dead." IMO, that's the main reason why these arguments can't go anywhere, in spite of their obvious entertainment value.
OTOH, "The sky is blue" is a bit different--at least if we use some non-subjective df. of "blue." That's because natural kinds don't produce generally NTS. (If "blue" means "seems blue to me"--you get the same kind of mess, though.)
Derek, what can I say, you're beginning to see the light on Masada and Shipp. This is how we grow. ;>}
[...]
Posted by derek on February 28, 2005 08:17 AM
I appreciate the direct response, Jon. I think my nose got bent by the "from the mountain-top" airs your perspectives sometimes seem to carry. They also strike me on occasion as baldly agenda-driven (some of the self-promotion you so readily ascribe to Shipp). I love jazz. You once did, but now don't. Actually, that's not accurate, as I know you still enjoy certain jazz artists/recordings (Tatum's group sides, Pharoah Sanders, etc.)
I've imagined myself in your shoes and it's a sobering thought. I've mulled about what it would be like if my affection for the music eroded away, replaced by disillusionment or an attitude of disdain; if I started to view jazz as an outmoded heirloom or antique means of expression. Whether I'd be dismissive and denigrating toward it too. Maybe, but I hope not. I personally don't enjoy eai, but recognize its worth as musical form and means. To accord a similar respect to jazz and the people still pursuing it as a vernacular of creative communication just seems natural to me.
As far as questioning my reviews or perspective, I'd welcome that, recognizing that there can be a wide divide between "questioning" and "patently dismissing as false." Thanks again.
Noel, your english is fine. That "schmantics" comment was directed toward Jon's helpful reminder to me of this thread's title :) I am confused by your McPhee observation though. Joe's been in the game a long time, but I'm not clear how the length of his career precludes him from being considered here as an agent of 'freshness' in jazz? Of younger folks I'd point to people like Rudresh Mahanthappa, Ellery Eskelin and Satoko Fujii among a host of others.
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 08:31 AM
Noel, your english is fine. That "schmantics" comment was directed toward Jon's helpful reminder to me of this thread's title :)
I understood i just wanted to say i cant COPE with your english and precise terms and things so i have to talk a little like that ....
I am confused by your McPhee observation though. Joe's been in the game a long time, but I'm not clear how the length of his career precludes him from being considered here as an agent of 'freshness' in jazz?
All i meant is i see him as an author who d be around for a long time and whom i like the sytle ...not as a resume for what still comes in these days ( dont get me wrong but a STYLIST is a long runner often it s a different perspective to me than moments where things happen, listening to Braxton doesnt mean to me i want to hear the WHOLE AACM catalogue again if you see what i mean here it s SOMEONE )
Of younger folks I'd point to people like Rudresh Mahanthappa, Ellery Eskelin and Satoko Fujii among a host of others.
YES Ellery particularly for me
but what i said is for example i loved Herb Robertson s playing , if i think of when i first discovered him on recorda and a NOW a possible equivalent recently ( plus Herb was part of a crew Tim, Frisell, Baron the Motian quartet etc you could see things going on on various levels ) ...i m a little mute ...
BUT maybe i also went away from all that
Posted by Joe Milazzo on February 28, 2005 08:54 AM
Herb Robertson is a fantastic player, and I think his records are really good examples of that (anti-)formal process I attempted to describe earlier.
A star next to Walter's name for trying to inject some logic into aesthetics.
Posted by erasmus on February 28, 2005 01:13 PM
"There seems to be a prevailing viewpoint that 'formulas' and 'rules' in music, whether the music be jazz or eai or whatever, are inherently bad or debilitating agents; strictures to be resisted &/or demolished rather than embraced & preserved. Again, I'm trying to understand why folks think this to be so. The relentless pursuit of the 'new' will always be an aim of diminishing returns."
your right, whoever, is saying this, that the pursuit of the new in the bane of modernism. but the acceptance of "the rules of the game" without messing with them is the error of a certain post-modernism that wants to let an allegedly self-conscious system adjust to equilibrium on its own. this latter is a false perspective i feel because each artist does interpret the rules and actually recreate them in his or her practice again. no one who is a great artist just plays by the rules. following a feldman stance: rule making is the game of the composer, for instance. but, to back up to another suite of statements from chris, few of those players you saw or hosted in nyc are in my opinion playing what i consider elecrtro-acoustic improvisation. but they may indeed all have projects which i may never have heard that i would consider eai. a saxophone solo by blaise siwula is not eai. work on an instrument that submits the sound (wave-form) signal to electronic transformation is what i see as the begining of electroacoustic process. that may seem narrow but its the working definition for my own process. for instance, it would leave out a set by bhobb rainey an greg kelly, even though one of their best mighgt be mistaken for electronic sound. but they both work with other musicians working with electronics. there is no hard rule of division, i should say, although we do make divisions on a case by case basis. but returning to the question of the rules, i would just point out that the rules an artist establishes don't have to come out of jazz and blues or serialism in order to be music or sound art. read the interview with annette krebs on the japan improv site. she points out the manifest absurdity of learning to make a scale at every point on the neck when the sounds she is most interested in organizing come from other parts of the guitar. andrea neumann may very well be capable of playing the piano. but her instrument is a major departure from all pianism --plenty of pianists muck about under the piano lid and very well. but few have taken the insides out and made it their main field of operations.
there is more to say. but also music to be made... must go...
[...]
Posted by derek on February 28, 2005 01:54 PM
"each artist does interpret the rules and actually recreate them in his or her practice again. no one who is a great artist just plays by the rules."
Well said, erasmus. But there's an important distinction between interpreting/recreating 'rules' and outright dismissing/demolishing them. Intimating from Joe's post buried above, the best rules allow latitude for amendment; they work as guideposts, not mandates. They also allow a means of tracing development and innovation. My point is that crux of the rules/freedom dynamic need not be "either/or", it can also be "and".
"but returning to the question of the rules, i would just point out that the rules an artist establishes don't have to come out of jazz and blues or serialism in order to be music or sound art."
I agree completely with this.
Posted by jon abbey on February 28, 2005 02:48 PM
Chris, this is the problem with the term "eai". yes, the musicians you name are using electronics in their improvisations, so yes, they're playing electroacoustic improv.
but I agree with erasmus that the bulk of the musicians you namecheck (not that I've heard them all) aren't working under what I consider to be the "eai" umbrella, with the exception of Sean Meehan, who also may have altered his approach quite a bit since you last saw him. the only reason this matters is that I don't think you have heard much or any of the music we're talking about, which again is fine, but it makes a back-and-forth hard.
[...]
Posted by adam hill on February 28, 2005 04:17 PM
i remember the old Uncle Floyd show where he played a casio and a uekele and it was very improvisational. no doubt jon is familair with Floyd. another eai precurser?
Posted by adam hill on February 28, 2005 04:27 PM
make that casio and ukulele
[...]
Posted by adam hill on February 28, 2005 05:04 PM
"I suppose my secondary point is that jazz is by no means dead (despite the fact that I quite honestly don't hear a whole helluva lot outside of what I myself do that excites me much). It's been dealt a few body blows by people who give originality short schrift, but there's nothing inherently limiting about playing music that swings or has blues feeling. There's just not. Originality in jazz lives, it's just hard to find. But that's as it should be. If it was easy to come by, it wouldn't be worth much."
absolutely. and it's not always easy to judge 'originality' either. a lot of the greatest jazz comes before most of us were born or had the knowledge to truly understand; and so much of that has been so well absorbed and synthezized that you have to be patient in your listening to hear why Armstrong is so important or Tatum or Bird so unique.
and then to hear less revolutionary originals like jackie mclean or lee morgan or one of my current faves tim berne.
it's a long listening journey, and great fun.
[...]
Posted by jon abbey on February 28, 2005 05:27 PM
"Is Evan Parker's Elctro-Acoustic Ensemble "eai"?
Is Chris Burns' work?
Is Han Tammen's?
Is Andy Moor's?
Martin Archer?
Walt Horn?
David Watson?"
no, still not the area I'm talking about, although some of those guys' work is in a grey area.
Taku Sugimoto, Tomas Korber, Julien Ottavi, Mattin, Margarida Garcia, Anthony Guerra, Toshimaru Nakamura, Burkhard Beins, Burkhard Stangl, Tetuzi Akiyama, Annette Krebs, Erik M, Giuseppe Ielasi, Gunter Muller, Jason Lescalleet, Greg Kelley, TV Pow, Kevin Drumm, dieb13, Cremaster, Oren Ambarchi, John Butcher, Kai Fagaschinski, Martin Tetreault, Christof Kurzmann, Otomo Yoshihide, Sachiko M, Phil Durrant, Andrea Neumann is a brief list naming some musicians who generally work within this area (not always, Butcher has a non-eai project with Andy Moor, for instance).
again, I'm not trying to draw lines between musicians, or create a genre, I'm merely pointing out that I'm talking about something different, which I don't think you've heard much of as of yet.
[...]
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 10:40 PM
"a lot of the greatest jazz comes before most of us were born or had the knowledge to truly understand; and so much of that has been so well absorbed and synthezized that you have to be patient in your listening to hear why Armstrong is so important or Tatum or Bird so unique.
and then to hear less revolutionary originals like jackie mclean or lee morgan or one of my current faves tim berne.
it's a long listening journey, and great fun."
Exactamundo.
Well that s why i pointed out ORAL TRADITION
cause that s through older jazz musicians who played with and knew who s who that i came across ... i dont think i would have listen Charlie Christian if i didnt met Kenny Clarke and others around in Paris who s said HE S THE GUY
best
n
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 10:48 PM
"again, I'm not trying to draw lines between musicians, or create a genre, I'm merely pointing out that I'm talking about something different, which I don't think you've heard much of as of yet. "
Well Jon , i ve heard more or less all the musicians above and again i have to say YES i know exactely which "sound" you re talking about but also YES as far as i remember you are one of the most active PROMOTER of that sound as EAI ... and the problem is not for me that such a Sound really exists and interests you a lot but that it draws a line between :
ACCEPTABLE, COOL and OK
Vs a little behind or frankly OUT
i have to remember that Keith sentence on "all musicians that still plays like before must have had a Brain Crash "
if you d play me Duet for Doris blindfold and ask me which year ... ( apart from technical quality of the recording ) i wouldnt decide between last week and 83 or 91
and the REST sure there is such a clear EAI area , the problem lays in how do you use that FLAG and what for
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 10:54 PM
and an interesting POINT if not crucial to me is
HOW do you come across these musicians ?
under which conditions can you see them , how much of them are working together in wich combination ?
if you watch that , you ll find another EAI line
a little more closed circle
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 10:58 PM
question : AMPLIFY
are you EAI because you played that festival or because you are EAI you play the festival ?
i dont mean it s so clearly set
i mean it s a SIGN nand signs are used around by people
and i dont really need an answer on Amplify
i know the idea , that s not a question here
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 11:19 PM
i ll end here on motivations :
and to be fair i need to say that of course i do react to the fact , on a total personal level indeed, that i have had to eat quite some shit because of such lines as EAI / not EAI
as i went a pretty long time ago in some directions that you could easily consider not very far from these ( wasnt called anything yet ) but didnt want to join it as more systematic genre ...
therefore i cant see EAI or esle to be ONLY what you play but HOW it is PRESENTED
i do mainly react to EAI producing social groups or/and the opposite , as i have to say it s pretty easy to draw another line , who BLESSES who through wich conditions and circuits
though i also stopped Jazz or a certain form of improv for same reasons ( that s keeps my interrest alive , see how you go somewhere elese, further , etc )
best regards
n
Posted by jon abbey on February 28, 2005 11:29 PM
just for the record, Noel, of my list above, maybe ten or twelve of those musicians haven't been part of any of the four AMPLIFY festivals so far. I intentionally made that list at least partly of musicians I haven't worked with, I could list another 30 that I've worked with, 30 more that I haven't, but since Chris kept listing sets of musicians, I didn't want to keep him guessing, I wanted to make it clear I was talking about an area he wasn't familiar with, which I did. I didn't spend very long compiling that list, there are obviously plenty of others I could have included.
Posted by Akchote Noel on February 28, 2005 11:51 PM
"I didn't want to keep him guessing, I wanted to make it clear I was talking about an area he wasn't familiar with, which I did. I didn't spend very long compiling that list, there are obviously plenty of others I could have included."
YES sorry i actually really thought both of you are more clear with Who and What you re precisely talking about
again to list people is just a way sometime to get more specific , i wouldn t go too far in that neither .. unless i have a specific point to make that i consider clearly a "group"
best
n
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 12:00 AM
and to clear another point i dont say that s how you work but i can tell you in return quite some people preceives these things as clear STAMPS ... and logos and stamps, being visible under certain circumpstances, is pretty crucial around this world
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 01:01 AM
pfffff, really that list is of musicians, its like, a bit sick no.
i'm glad not bein..... (;o)), but actually i might even be a bit older than Tomas Korber..... but i havent got a release on for4ears with the MASTERS (the door openers) to the BIG WORLD of EAI???????
I even wonder if someone like Mattin would be glad seeing his name in that list.... i dont think he would really appreciate too much that category maybe, and dont know if himself consider EAI as.... what? HIS category.... a member of.... i dont speak for him just a thought.... because i know him a bit.
Posted by tomas on March 1, 2005 01:03 AM
jon, to come back to your earlier question, and while avoiding to use the word "groundbreaking" (since i suspect you and i have different opinions on what it means)...
jon abbey wrote:
"since the start of 2003, I'd stand by Duos for Doris, Good Morning Good Night, the Rowe/Beins, schnee_live, and the upcoming four hour set (how many of these have you heard, tomas? would you agree with the ones that you have? be honest, please.)"
i have heard duos for doris, good morning good night and rowe beins.
i honestly like all three discs. my GUESS at which ones of these will be remembered in 10 or more years would be "good morning" and "duos for d." ... for different reasons. neither of them is a point of departure for me (which is probably how i would define "groundbreaking", if such a definiton can be made at all), but rather a culmination of something, for example "good morning" seems like a final point to something that might have started with the first filament disc (which i would consider to be "groundbreaking" according to the pseudo-definition above). duos for doris: i don't know enough about the story of AMM and what they did 20 years ago to make a statement of its historical value. i just think it's an excellent disc, and that's why it might be still remembered and influential in 10+ years. rowe/beins: a documentation of a good concert. interesting and rewarding to hear, but not something that would strike me as "grundbreaking"... but as i stated above, these are just GUESSES. i have no idea, really...just personal opinions. since you asked, here they are.
ofnie rules.
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 01:04 AM
also
and Martin T. neither probably.
actually its weird, because when i met Otomo, Sachiko and Martin back in 1999 and 2000, EAI name wasnt around, and it didnt seem to be MISSING, and the music still was there.
what was that NEED to just make it all like SHAPED and .....
LISSE - euh.... how to say that?
or business basically.
i think i follow you Noël when you talk about FLAG, what for?
what is it there to EMBODY and to DEFEND?
Posted by tomas on March 1, 2005 01:05 AM
alexandre: your post is just silly.
ofnie still rules.
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 01:16 AM
ah! yes! again, please, i've heard that shit already on here.
yeah, anytime i say a word that's what it is... its incredible
do you think i do it on purpose?
or i'm just really so STUPID?
yeah go ahead
OFNIE rules.... pfffffuit
yeah, maybe you can ask people from Bagatellen to prevent me from writing on their site because i AM so disturbing.
and, plus, really, it seems i am an easy target, hein, which doesnt make you look much BIGGER Tomas.....
Posted by tomas on March 1, 2005 01:56 AM
hehehe... alexandre, just chill it man. so now i'm your new bad boy? well you didn't seem to think so when you aked me to put up a show for us together a few weeks back, right?
so bottom line: i don't care at all what you write on bags about the MUSIC, but this sentence of yours: "actually i might even be a bit older than Tomas Korber..... but i havent got a release on for4ears with the MASTERS (the door openers) to the BIG WORLD of EAI???????" is just a silly statement, that's all. what's the reason for you to say stuff like that? did i ever behave arrogantly or something? i was at instants chavirees and i humbly faced your criticism. you asked me to trade records, and i agreed. you asked me to put up a show, and i tried. so: what's the problem? if you think everyone who is younger than you and has a (tiny little bit of) "success" didn't actually deserve it (because that's what your post is ultimately pointing at), your problem has a name: jealousy.
and what did ofnie do to you? leave it alone.
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 02:39 AM
pfffff, this i could bet you'd mention here that i made a proposition to you to organise a gig.
you're fantastic!!!!
well.
you're not my BAD BOY. come on! that would be, really, i have other things to do, yeah. and probably, i go for it, yeah, what is really terrific to see, on this web site, which isnt like for promotion or whatever, hein
when Abbey tells us that YOU are one of the .... cant find the words he used..... one of the.... fuck i should search for it.... something like 'a great hope for EAI', or even long time ago, saying that Keith Rowe and Nakamura are the best musicians in the world..... thats simply is getting hard to take, especially when we all know this is just concerning such small audience, and especially including many musicians in there already. its like hierarchy.
and really, i dont need a place in there, i am not JEALOUS, its just, really, you dont see that thing can work on a different level.
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 02:45 AM
i havent seen a single second Tomas albums as "looking for door openers"
i ve heard him seeking PARTNERS and naturally people he likes the music of
and by the way i found this album is also refershing the "big names" by Tomas
it s pretty natural to call the people you want to play with ... and frankly i hardly beleive it s gonna bring you anything serious to set up "all stars" just to show off
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 02:46 AM
jealousy, how you introduce it, would mean that i am feeling bad of not being in your little list, but, really, i am more carring about what i do, music and stuff, than this EAI whatever....
and therefore, maybe, my so-called 'jealousy' really would go to other people, in other fields, and then, i dont call it jealousy....
admiration, adoration, influences....
yep.
A
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 02:50 AM
what i find more a question is how it seems you need to bring SOMETHING to the communitee in order to get it back sometimes
it has for sure all sorts of reasons ( fact that often you have to do it all , from playing to the label, to set up shows and so on )
but i dont remember it s been so much of a trading business like it seems "from far" to me these days
i ve never asked people to give back anything when i called them , i just called them cause i wanted to share something and when i ve been in situations where i felt people expected something back i droped very quickly cause it s embarassing i find
now it s natural to trade and get some solidarity within a same group of interrest
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 02:57 AM
i wasnt 'attacking' Tomas on this in fact.... but wait..... pffffff.... never said he looked for that, being on this record. or what. i dont mind. its not FORBIDDEN. i might do this myself too. YES.
and yeah, i understand 'seeking partners' of course
its like, then, its just funny to mix all things up like this, by putting in same list someone like Mattin or Tomas and Keith Rowe or Otomo.
obviously, its not the same experience, time implication....
i myself would feel pretty funny to be compared too quick to like people who's worked for years..... unless you're obviously somekinda genious....
i think there we should go slower and let things happen and mature.... and not try to make everything thing the BEST, the MORE.....
Posted by tomas on March 1, 2005 02:57 AM
alexandre, after all your going overboard (and to finally bring this waste of time to an end) let me just ask you one question: if jon would ask you tomorrow to record a disc for erstwhile (let's say in a duo with nakamura): what would you answer?
"you dont see that thing can work on a different level."
oh yes, i see that you most definitely are on a "different level". (which is also why i won't waste any more time replying to you, btw.)
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 03:01 AM
Tomas, i guess we're bad kids, because, we did this once already to start bullshiting like this here, and for esrtwhile related reason already somehow.
me too, i found it a bit, boring, not such nice feeling really.
and its not what i want or prefer or research really!!!!
or i am the bad kid alone, then;...
Posted by tomas on March 1, 2005 03:03 AM
and thanks noël.
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 03:04 AM
"i wasnt 'attacking' Tomas on this in fact.... but wait..... pffffff.... never said he looked for that, being on this record. or what. i dont mind. its not FORBIDDEN. i might do this myself too. YES."
I m not here to do like Jon and give Tomas a passport or save him from critcs HE DOES SPEAK FOR HIMSELF very good
( and yes that Jon sentence to Tomas was over the top for me too but he ll answer that himself very well for sure so )
and yeah, i understand 'seeking partners' of course
I did that SEEKING PARTNERS before and i can tell you why so
its like, then, its just funny to mix all things up like this, by putting in same list someone like Mattin or Tomas and Keith Rowe or Otomo.
THAT is indeed Funny but has been explained i guess ... and a LIST is just a LIST after all
i mean if you say DISCO to someone and he looks at you like WHAT ???? you may give him a list
no ?
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 03:07 AM
oooopppppssssSORRY
i d rather say :
i mean if you say DISCO to someone and he looks at you like WHAT ???? you may give him YOUR OWN LIST ...
at least and as a start
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 03:08 AM
pffff, YES. okay. go for the list....
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 03:12 AMbut then that list about EAI.... i mean, of course, some of this musicians might do stuff sounding 'EAI'.... sometimes, also they do other stuff, so everyone is EAI.... in a sense.
and again EAI is it what : a genre/aesthetic or a description of the equipement used?
does duo of mattin/junko EAI or noise or what?
i dont want to put mess, i am just wondering, hein?
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 03:13 AM
" let me just ask you one question: if jon would ask you tomorrow to record a disc for erstwhile (let's say in a duo with nakamura): what would you answer?"
Yeah that s really BAD no ones never proposes Jon to record and no ones gives him a gig ...
first i beleive it s Jon and only him who asks people he want to produce
But second it s good Tomas writes it out cause that s the question i hear often around ( i mean often around in a tiny little scene of people playing music like that and starting more or less ) -
i have my answers to this one but every one should decide for himslef ...
at THE END it s not only a question of BEING VISIBLE i guess ?
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 03:24 AM
"i dont want to put mess, i am just wondering, hein?"
you don´t to me , it s a Bag with various people and various "variosities" so it s like usual in a society
first WHO wants to be EAI ? which musician (in that list or another ) ever named himself EAI ? Otomo named ONKYO at a time it helped maybe and then became a bore too
then the Label / image thing
i think you should never forget that the way you see a label ( in other words your desire to be on a label that you conisder Powerful or whatever ) is often far from the way its producer sees it, of course a producer sends a picture of what he does but doesnt mean that s the one people take ...
it has always a little fantasy aspect here
today Erstw, yesterday whatever, tomorrow another thing ...
i much more beleive in LONGER TERMS
i d rather see someone s work on 20 years
Keith is now playing often and in many places but SINCE WHEN ? so ..it s all VERY RELATIVE it comes and goes
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 03:27 AM
some of these artists named in one of these lists i ve already seen in 4,5 diffenrent contexts and even genres so ... many still do many different things too , some started in one category then slowly changed, some always did what they do, some stopped and disapeared, some we never hear of, some you may not see for the next 20 years etc etc
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 03:45 AM
hummm, so yes, it's not about being VISIBLE, at some point 4-5 years ago, i thought thats what it was (and probably i wasnt the only one), somehow, and soon realised, that what i want is what i do. and that, yes, if it takes 20 years, i am really fine.
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 03:48 AM
"who wants to be EAI?"
yeah, thats a good one, because, somehow i think in Paris, at least, even if not said, when the wave of this 'minimalism' (thats how it started no?) arrived.... with the onkyo thing somehow.... i think many people just thought 'me too, i wanna do that'
and i wonder if it was not a mistake for some of them, myself for two years i felt i was taken in that, before telling myself, 'no, that's not me'
Posted by Alexandre on March 1, 2005 03:51 AM
and again, i wouldnt say no for a set with EAI'ers (?), because, why not, i take it as a GAME somehow.... i can play different ways, of course, i'm full of ways.....
as much, as i wouldnt say no... to.... i mean, as long as its impov, duo for example, i think, i can make it 'work' (for myself i mean), even trios.... the STYLE is not EAI to me or ROCK, or JAZZ ness, its somewhere else.
but i think when it becomes a school.... there is a problem of THE school
Posted by walto on March 1, 2005 05:03 AM
"the problem is not for me that such a Sound really exists and interests you a lot but that it draws a line between :
ACCEPTABLE, COOL and OK
Vs a little behind or frankly OUT"
Yeah, I think that's it exactly, Noel.
Posted by walto on March 1, 2005 06:18 AM
I should add, though, that the fact that people are bothered by what may be called Jon's "exclusionary" approach (I'm not certain that's the right word) is a testament to his status as a key tastemaker in this area.
Creating Erstwhile, putting on interesting shows on several continents, making finely engineered, attractive records that people enjoy and that seem somehow "important," etc. has certainly made our Jon a mover and shaker.
Whatever ea-i may be, and whatever its relative importance, there can be little doubt that Jon is at its epicenter. Hence the fairly extreme sensitivity to his thumbs-downs, while that of most of us is greeted with ZZZZZZZZ.
Posted by Joe Milazzo on March 1, 2005 06:36 AM
Well, Walt, it is a comfort to me that at least I am more than a few Z's up on the rest of you; in fact, I put Warburton and Bivins to shame...
Yet, you're quite correct. We all know who will end up with the most toys.
[Edited because I forgot the punchline.]
Clive Davis!
Posted by uli on March 1, 2005 06:47 AM
Hey Walto, I thought you retired. None of you cats is so up with it as Ollie, That's fer sure.
[...]
Posted by jon abbey on March 1, 2005 07:25 AM
Noel, again for the record, I occasionally do projects that I haven't initiated. Cor Fuhler/Gert-Jan Prins, for instance, was a project I planned on proposing, but never got around to. so when they suggested it to me, I went for it. but for the most part, you're right about that.
Posted by Adam Hill on March 1, 2005 07:30 AM
this thread really got cooking until walto had to do that obeisance thing that i guess is required....
Posted by Adam Hill on March 1, 2005 07:47 AM
Chris is right (and I plead guilty).
I haven't seen many threads here or at JC that haven't been derailed and spoiled by these eai vs non-eai fights, even when they have NOTHING to do with eai.
Posted by soren on March 1, 2005 08:00 AM
"Is it *impossible* to elevate the discourse?"
look here: http://www.bagatellen.com/archives/row/000773.html
"What space does my existence fill? What melody sings in this song of pain and sorrow? Am I enduring some intense drama judging my own right to my own initiative? Or am I the prisoner of some ungodly historical circumstance? Is home tomorrow, or is tomorrow another hour, another season, or another lifetime in this cruel drama?" (Jewel?)
Posted by Joe Milazzo on March 1, 2005 08:21 AM
What I don't understand, soren, is why you don't comment here using your real name -- or at least a name that could be construed as real (and construed as yours) -- anymore.
Posted by walto on March 1, 2005 09:06 AM
Adam, I wasn't intending to fawn. As indicated repeatedly I don't think these claims (e.g., "Jazz is dead" "E-AI is vibrant") actually mean anything. I was just commenting on (and trying to explain) the fact that so many people--yourself included maybe?--seem to care so much when Jon frowns on this or that. My take is that it's because he's become "a playah." Nobody cares whether Joe or I think something is or isn't dead. Couldn't this be because we AREN'T playahs? E.g., WE can't put anybody on a decent stage or a pretty, well-distributed disk. So, it's not exactly obeisance, I don't think, just an empirical observation (which, of course, could be mistaken). Sure, I did say Jon's discs are attractive and well-engineered--and I think they ARE--but, at heart, I suppose I'm more of a Leo or Emanem guy myself really--whatever genre of music those guys happen to be putting out. They put out more garbage than Erstwhile is likely to, I think, but also more stuff that I'm likely to instinctively reach for.
Anyhow, I've always listened to much more classical than anything else (as does Rowe these days--woo-hoo! Like Derek, I guess he's learning too! ;>} ).
Uli, as for my retirement, I meant from reviewing recordings, not from the entire world of internet bullshit, where I obviously must continue to get my rocks off or.....expire.
Chris, that WAS kind of a holier-than-thou post you made. As I've mentioned to you, you can get sooooo preachy sometimes!
Posted by michael rodgers on March 1, 2005 09:14 AM
My point in writing the original piece was not to say experimental electronic improvisation was bad or inferior or the exclusive domain of charlatans or whatever. My point was simple: I like jazz, and I've come to the tentative conclusion that what separates jazz from other improvised musics are the swing and blues elements.
Though there's enough monkey wrenches in the works, I'd like to say that I play with a good amount of blues feeling (when on guitar), and I know a couple other players who do, but I certainly wouldn't file them or myself under jazz. Not an attack on the point, just an item to consider in the ever-difficult question of separation.
I wouldn't file myself or them under eai either. I think there is a definite element of truth to the idea of this 'eai' thing as a club or genre. There is a very identifiable group associated with the terms, however I doubt they got together and said 'yes we are eai, see you at the next club meeting'. The idea of Electro Acoustic Improvisation is simple enough, and by definition I could say that's what I'm involved with. But it's not that simple, there is something else to it, which is why I don't feel I am an EAI musician, nor seek to be one, and fine if I hang out or play with people associated with EAI.
I relate EAI to another 3 letter acronym: IDM. As with EAI I read this term for many weeks before I found out its meaning. (Perhaps its mystery is another appeal?) Intelligent Dance Music is a little more pompous claim to genre, but like EAI it has automatic associations with personnel, e.g. Kid 606, his label, and other laptop beat cut-ups. I could think of much dance music I consider intelligent that IDM exponents would exclude; just as musicians such as the ones Chris mentioned would not be EAI, even though they may make music through electro-acoustic means.
I prefer usage such as EAI to manifesto-ejaculating genres such as 'lower-case sound' and 'new london silence', so that's something going for it. Unfortunately it's not simply descriptive. But even as a socio-genre it's not so bad as I feel it's a natural grouping of people. I don't think there's too many musicians currently not labelled as EAI who wish they were. I bet there's more who wish they weren't! ;)
It's funny though how discussions of this 'genre' happen on JAZZcorner. Here it seemed more natural as I thought the roots of Bagatellen leaned more toward the experimental. Perhaps I was mistaken? It's all kinda funny when I think there's a big flaw to the notion that keeps experimental improvisation linked to jazz, as has been mentioned, that so many improvisors today have had nothing to do with jazz. No big deal in terms of this article if the focus is on the viability of jazz with respect to 'new' forms of improv. But many times I don't see why jazz is so heavily referenced over other musics when talking about EAI or whatever 'new'. This will change in time, for sure.
All that said, and all above read, I feel a certain happiness in deciding over the weekend to start a band with a friend of mine. :)
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 09:22 AM
I understand people starting with Jazz here got fed up to see EAI polemics again so i ll clear the space for now
but i entered it on "Sick of Jazz" and the idea that EAI would make Jazz a definitive past experience ... i personally react on the idea of A SUPERIOR music cause of its supposed modernity ...
as for things turning around Jon well that s simply because he stated the most "advanced" post on "jazz is dead" and he s a central producer of that EAI thing so ... that s just %
also Thumbed down people, let me clear that one thing : i have absloutely no reason at all to be working with Jon nor he, so that s out of any question here
i thought that s even the opposite on Bag that people that dont really meet usually could still talk , and exchange , i do like a lot of this Jazz music you re talking even if it s not that central for me as maybe before and wont judge people cause they love Emanem or other labels ( me too actually )
i was just a little under on Jazz 2005 than others ...
Cheers
n
Posted by walto on March 1, 2005 09:33 AM
Good luck with your new band, Michael. Gotta dump that blues feeling, though.
;>}
Noel, I didn't mean to suggest that the basis of your posts was a unmet desire to work with Jon--though I can see how you'd take my post that way. FWIW, I think your comments on this thread have been very insightful and interesting--whatever their motive(s)!
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 09:43 AM
Walto,
as it doesnt cost more to say things i d rather make the point clear
But in genral it s just to say Records are only a tiny postcard of a much wider scene which itself is often just a tiny bit of a much larger musical scene and so on Russian dolls
so it s hard for me not to associate at least a record with ALL the people INVOLVED around from the Producer to the critics and to the scene it belongs to and so on ... nothing is fixed, moves counts and situations
makes see things differently ...
best
n
Posted by derek on March 1, 2005 10:07 AM
"Nobody cares whether Joe or I think something is or isn't dead. Couldn't this be because we AREN'T playahs?"
I care, really & truly I do (but maybe not as much as I used to ;)
Whether or not the two of you are(n't) playas (lose the "h", Dog) is open to debate. Joe's bling addiction is in remission & since your *retirement* it ain't clear if you still gots game, so I dunno. At least you still be trickin' out your neighbors' rides with the fresh hydraulics & chrome.
I also care what Jon thinks. Despite his current displeasure with the jazz, he's got a deep knowledge base when it comes to the music (both recorded & in person). What puzzles/intrigues me is the tectonic shift in his thinking regarding it that's presumably transpired over the past decade or so.
Posted by uli on March 1, 2005 10:35 AM
"Uli, as for my retirement, I meant from reviewing recordings, not from the entire world of internet bullshit, where I obviously must continue to get my rocks off or.....expire."
Glad to hear that, Walto.
Posted by Rrrrrrrrrobbbbbbbbbbbbbb on March 1, 2005 01:18 PM
Hmmm... all seems like a tempest in a teapot to me. Honestly, we're all talking about various stuff with limited appeal and I bet if I played some eai for my sister and some free-jazz with electronics she wouldn't even know the difference or care or want to invest enough time in it to know the difference. Really, if I think about it there are very few revolutionary developments in the history of jazz (since that is where this whole discussion started). And even these are all sort of a gray area where people and ideas meld into each other. Way over-simplified, but here are what I think are revolutionary changes:
1. It's invention and development in terms of melodic based improvisation. (Armstrong, Ellingtonn, Fletcher Henderson)
2. Beb-bop (harmonic based improvisation). (Parker, Gillespie, etc.)
3. 'Modal' improvisation (Davis)
4. 'Free Jazz' Throwing out the changes entirely. (Tristano, Coleman, Taylor)
5. 'Structured improvisation' - improvisation based upon rules other than traditional harmonic or melodic rules. (Butch Morris, Zorn, etc.)
I'm not even sure that I'd count the 5th one, I think everything else we are talking about are stylistic variations. Fusion is just using more volume and electricity, but basically no different in terms of improvisation than any of the 5 above. One could argue eai falls into the same category, i.e. freely improvised music (or structured improvisation) using primarily electronic instruments rather than acoustic ones. Don't know that I agree with any of these theories, just tossing them out there.
mostly though, I don't care too much about how "new" or "groundbreaking" something is, but about how much I enjoy listening to it.
Rob
Posted by tomas on March 1, 2005 03:13 PM
rob wrote:
mostly though, I don't care too much about how "new" or "groundbreaking" something is, but about how much I enjoy listening to it.
i'd agree with that, although often i find stuff enjoyable that gives me something "new" (i don't mean something objectively "new", but just elements i personally haven't heard this way before). so, even if i don't explicitly care about something being new, it just often happens that i like stuff that is new TO ME (purely subjective).
btw: i want to clarify that it wasn't my intention to "fight" or anything. i just think people here should cool it with senseless personal remarks/attacks (especially if they don't have anything to do with the article itself or even the discussion). guess that's my final word on this, have fun + thanks for the discussion.
Posted by tim on March 1, 2005 04:54 PM
[btw: i want to clarify that it wasn't my intention to "fight" or anything. i just think people here should cool it with senseless personal remarks/attacks (especially if they don't have anything to do with the article itself or even the discussion). guess that's my final word on this, have fun + thanks for the discussion.]
Listen son if you've got something to say then spit it out...otherwise keep it zipped. You get me? :))
Posted by erasmus on March 1, 2005 07:27 PM
"Nobody cares whether Joe or I think something is or isn't dead"
jon is part of a community of listeners and thinkers and doers. no one's opinion here in my eyes is unworthy of consideration. i wouldn't read if there was't the possibility to change my own or other people's minds. it is a slow process to change an aesthetics. we can pursue an aesthetic path for years and years because we have assumed that its unpopularity proves it has been misunderstood. sometimes this is the case. other times it just stubborness and infertility of mind. my own interests in catalytic discourse are to reveal to myself and to others the bad habits if rationalization that lead to this infertility and stasis. my own reasons for partcipating are that we create a more exciting and perhaps better underestood music. the pissing contests are of course counter to this ineterest. as maybe are these occasional needs to restate hierarchies of importance. it is important to reveal the threads of one's listening and creative experience in order to do this efficiently
again... time to make music... later
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 11:28 PM
well probably is EAI the first improvised music related to jazz for some really obscure reasons ( often i mean ) that s really has nothing at all to do with jazz apart from trying to avoid ANY of the Jazz parameters
but Funnily if you watch carefuly at Otomo, Taku and Toshi s guitars ... well they re all very strongly JAZZ RELATED (Gibson or Guild often used in Jazz )
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 1, 2005 11:32 PM
and last point is , writting IMPROVISED and EAI together is already for me a mistake or misunderstanding as i find EAI barely not improvised anyway , if you want to think of improvisation as a FACT and not a genre at all
what you mentioned Tomas about NEW to YOU ...but as far as i know JAZZ is pretty new to you ? (or i got it wrong ?)
New to me is not related to "NEW" , in this case i d rather talk of ACTUAL
Posted by tomas on March 2, 2005 12:32 AM
well, OK, not the last word then ;)
noël wrote:
"what you mentioned Tomas about NEW to YOU ...but as far as i know JAZZ is pretty new to you ? (or i got it wrong ?)"
not exactly new, since my father for example always listened to jazz a la oscar peterson, so as a child i got to hear that kind of stuff all the time. but sure you have a point there: for example i listened the first time to ornette coleman's double quartet "free jazz" and coltrane's "ascension" maybe 4 years ago, long after having "discovered" all the noise stuff and it felt "new" and exciting to me. that happens all the time, like the first time i heard schönberg or webern.
tim wrote:
"Listen son if you've got something to say then spit it out...otherwise keep it zipped. You get me? :))"
nope, dad. what's the meaning of "zipped"?
Posted by Alexandre on March 2, 2005 02:47 AM
Noël said : "and last point is , writting IMPROVISED and EAI together is already for me a mistake or misunderstanding as i find EAI barely not improvised anyway , if you want to think of improvisation as a FACT and not a genre at all"
but, who wants to discuss that ..... really!!!!
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 2, 2005 03:01 AM
"not exactly new, since my father for example always listened to jazz a la oscar peterson, so as a child i got to hear that kind of stuff all the time. but sure you have a point there:"
didnt want to say it as a controversy but you understood it , just NEW to me starts with things i havent heard or listened that way at least
and in another way it also means as time passes that i listen differently and to different things in same albums or new ones
that s the whole thing, you may just listen to how many times is someone repeating a same pattern in Grant Green or Onkyo
Posted by Akchote Noel on March 2, 2005 03:07 AM
"but, who wants to discuss that ..... really!!!!"
i dunno ...really
n
Posted by Bill Ashline on March 3, 2005 05:33 PM
The discussion about whether jazz is dead or not always gets a lot of play, a lot of irritation, annoyance, and vitriole, but not a lot of analysis. Jazz still lives after the proclamation of its death just as people didn't stop going to church after Nietzsche declared the death of god. That's not really the point. the issue has to do with the invention of new forms. Jazz went through a number of magnificent revolutions up through the period of free jazz. New Orleans, big band, bebop, cool, post-bop, sheets of sound, fusion, free jazz. After free jazz, it became a well-worn idiom. it died with free jazz and then free improv in general signaled its death and John Zorn puncuated it with his pastiches of Naked City and Masada. That jazz is dead as an area for the invention of new forms doesn't mean the music is dead or that there aren't great releases or concerts. Otomo's ONJE is a radical way to keep the tradition alive while creating the bridge to EAI. It's his aesthetic which allows that tradition to speak all the while Marsalis continues to magnify its deadness as a form. But dead it is even while it plays on endlessly. To play it now is a form of tribute, not a new node of creativity. I speak as a big jazz lover as well as collector even to this day, but the avant-garde (I mean the "real" avant-garde--not the "genre" avant-garde) resides somewhere else. It's in EAI where the new forms are being built today--where the "new" can be heard it is truest sense, but even there, with so much being produced all of the time these days, the field will soon also reach its point of exhaustion where all of the vocabularies will be spent and the field will live on only as a mirror of its former self. Then the "music" will have to go somewhere else as it always has. the "death" of a music is a good thing, not a bad one. It means that creative work can start again to search for a new outlet. New forms can be invented. New musicians can find inspiration. Old musicians can be stirred from their slumbers.
Posted by hortense ellis on March 3, 2005 07:27 PM
"Jazz still lives after the proclamation of its death just as people didn't stop going to church after Nietzsche declared the death of god."
Depends on what you mean by "lives" after Nietzsche's declaration has changed the meaning of "death", whether god still goes to church or not.
Posted by Bill Ashline on March 4, 2005 01:42 AM
Exactly.
Posted by walto on March 4, 2005 08:21 AM
I love a good pronouncement. Something so....I don't know....authoritative about them! (Especially if they're made with a deep voice. They give me chills.) They're even a bit ofnie, maybe. (I think so, anyhow.)
Posted by hortense ellis on March 4, 2005 10:02 AM
"Jazz still lives... it died with free jazz... then free improv in general signaled its death...jazz is dead...Otomo's ONJE is a radical way to keep the tradition alive... It's his aesthetic which allows that tradition to speak... while Marsalis continues to magnify its deadness...dead it is even while it plays on endlessly...the "death" of a music is a good thing, not a bad one..."
Dead/"dead" or/"&" alive--welcome to Equivocations 101
Posted by hortense ellis on March 4, 2005 10:32 AM
But wouldn't you agree, Walto, that the deep voice (ofnie or not) makes for much better entertainment than something like--say--"And why 'pianism' in inverted commas?" (from a different thread here)?
Posted by walto on March 4, 2005 11:03 AM
Yes, certainly, but the ofnie does add a little gemultlichkeit, don't you think?
By the way, if "ofnie" isn't a phoneme at all, can it still be an "imaginary phoneme"? This has been puzzling me.
Posted by Joe Milazzo on March 4, 2005 11:37 AM
I keep forgetting to change that boiler-plate... these are imaginary *expletives*, not made-up phonemes.
Though I suppose there could be a langauge somewhere out there in the possible universe in which ckoom, ofnie, etc. might actually be the smallest units of speech.
Posted by Joe Milazzo on March 4, 2005 11:54 AM
Corrected.
Freakin' umumg "rebuild your site" crap.
Posted by hortense ellis on March 4, 2005 12:20 PM
"By the way, if "ofnie" isn't a phoneme at all, can it still be an "imaginary phoneme"?"
Would that be a "phony", or a "ghost" a la Freud in 'The Uncanny', sort of "dead" but not quite "dead" enough?
Posted by Bill Ashline on March 4, 2005 03:24 PM
"Jazz still lives... it died with free jazz... then free improv in general signaled its death...jazz is dead...Otomo's ONJE is a radical way to keep the tradition alive... It's his aesthetic which allows that tradition to speak... while Marsalis continues to magnify its deadness...dead it is even while it plays on endlessly...the "death" of a music is a good thing, not a bad one..."
'Dead/"dead" or/"&" alive--welcome to Equivocations 101'
Yes, there's a bit of play in my text off the hyperbole "creatively dead" versus "really dead." Somehow, i thought, Mr. Pretense, that you would pick up on that. do you have as equally a hard time in reading poetry? Does someone have to explain it to you.
Yeah, I'm sorry but my brief blurb wasn't a piece of anal-lick-it philosophy. It was some cultural criticism.
"I love a good pronouncement. Something so....I don't know....authoritative about them! (Especially if they're made with a deep voice. They give me chills.) They're even a bit ofnie, maybe. (I think so, anyhow.)"
He, per usual, pronounces authoritatively. sorry to ignore G.E. Moore's aesthetics here, but the field has developed immensely since the 19th century.
Posted by Alexandre on March 4, 2005 05:27 PM
maybe, somehow, i miss something about poetry.... not myself, i do somehow, but, in general.... pfffff, just because i heard this guy philippe Sollers mentionning (quoting Heidegger), something about human in this new century, not being able to read poetry, means not being able to hear ourself talk, which means we dont wanna talk, which means we dont want to BE..... maybe, in jazz-ness, i dont know, maybe to me, Coltrane is poetry! or, its poetrical to me rather.... bye
umumg ;o)
Posted by Alexandre on March 4, 2005 05:41 PM
well, i'm not saying neither Coltrane is like.... so everything for me... just i read the word poetry just somewhere up there.... and i thought..... hummm. somehow, improvisation is a.... must be a tool to reach some kinda poetry, why not! poetry, with all, its... power of explosion and darkness/beauty.... well, just my own poetry maybe
bye
Posted by walto on March 4, 2005 06:06 PM
[I deleted the rant that used to be here. It was kind of funny, yeah, but a little too harsh. I mean, here I say I like a pronouncement, but then when I get one I completely go off. Doesn't seem very consistent, really.]
Posted by hortense ellis on March 4, 2005 07:03 PM
"Does someone have to explain it to you."
you mean you're "doomed to entertain the next eternity with bad jokes"?
(Nietzsche)
Posted by Bill Ashline on March 5, 2005 07:00 PM
You're starting to become a continental philosopher, Walto :-)
This is your doom.
"you mean you're "doomed to entertain the next eternity with bad jokes"? (Nietzsche)"
Nice, but no...
Posted by jared/sonic1 on March 5, 2005 09:34 PM
Why is it such a threat to yal' if people want to play something else besides "jazz". Are we afraid that someone is going to take away someone's limelight?
All these same arguments have been made already, this is all rehash, only instead of talking about free jazz or energy music or avant-garde, we are talking about EAI.
Same fucking story though. The kids like something the old farts (and young farts who wannabe old farts) feel threatened by.
Why do them kids spend all the time listening to themselves breathe into a trumpet? Why are they just listening to sine waves? They are giving up on music! They are giving up on *gasp* jazz! They are rotting their brains!!
Jesus Christ people it is just music. Nobody's going to hurt you. If you don't like it, stick to what you like. I am not going around preaching that everyone should stop listening to Kenny G, though I think he does a lot more harm to jazz than EAI ever could.
It's like rap--a music I really don't like myself very much, but really enjoy how it freaks out old white people.
Lame attitude Chris, and very lame way to start your Bags contributions.
But hey, Adam Hill has a friend now.
.................................................. © 2003 - 2005 bagatellen ..................................................