#bob rosenbaum

[bobrosenbaum]

Ruins, Ancient Jewish Temple, Kerem Ben-Zimra, 1997.

“I wish it need not have happened in my time,” said Frodo. “So do I,” said Gandalf, “and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” ― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

[bobrosenbaum]

Archie Shepp, The Jazz Center, New York, 1985.

Saxophonist Archie Shepp remains a powerful, original voice in American music. As a musician, author, poet and teacher he has helped to build a new foundation for contemporary, uncompromised Black American culture -- a culture which has evolved over the last 50 years to thrive well beyond the lens of the dominant white American culture, and also without a need for often-misguided white promoters.

That's not to say that Archie Shepp creates music that is insular or closed to cultures outside his own. Quite the opposite is true, in fact.

ARCHIE'S MUSIC WILL will raise a few of your hairs, challenge a few of your conventions, and give a few of your angrier thoughts some free sparring time. It will also show you what swing is all about, as well as the true roots of the Blues.

I consider myself very fortunate to have heard Archie's timeless music so deeply, to have been able to experience and capture his performances, to have met and spoken with him for a time, and even to have served with him on the board of Music Inn Studios, a non-profit calling of our mutual Philadelphia-born friend, J.R. Mitchell.

I'm not going to try to tell you anything more about Archie, except perhaps to let you know that today is his birthday.

Here are just a few links to start hearing and learning about Archie Shepp from his ground-breaking, counter-culture work in the late '60s to his National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master recognition in 2016: Archie's mind-blowing take on Duke Ellington's Sophisticated Lady (1968); the beseeching Hipnosis (1975); his classic composition Steam live from the Montreaux Festival (1976); Archie in his seminal duo arrangement with pianist Horace Parlan on the spiritual Trouble in Mind (1986); his wonderful funky big band arrangement of another wailing classic 'Mama Too Tight' (2012); and finally Archie's NEA Jazz Master 2016 Biography.

May Archie Shepp's revolutionary artistic statement, his exhuberance and music live forever!

[bobrosenbaum]

Billy Harper, The Jazz Center, New York, 1982.

Billy Harper has the only tenor voice that, for me, attains the intensity of John Coltrane while retaining complete independence of thought and execution.

His appearance on the New York scene from the early 1970s felt like a natural extension of Coltrane's own musical statements, as well as those of McCoy Tyner's groups around that time. Billy was also boosted by memorable early partnerships with Gil Evans, Art Blakey, Max Roach and Randy Weston, to name just a few.

A seminal composer as well as a virtuoso saxophonist, Billy's music is infused with a powerful rhythmic swing, bone-level energy, and an ability to draw from the ancient sources for Black American music.

The first time I heard Billy, I was devastated, uplifted, astonished, unhinged, overjoyed, destroyed, recreated. His playing still reminds me today that even as a committed and devoted listener of this music and a veteran wordsmith, I'm incapable of composing words that describe it.

What Billy plays is so far beyond words, and all that. It's prayer.

In performance, one senses that his bands are pushing the edge of this art form right alongside him. To really hear where Billy is coming from, you need to experience one of his early milestones, Call of the Wild and Peaceful Heart from Black Saint, his 1975 breakthrough album. Together with pianist Joe Bonner, trumpeter Virgil Jones, bassist David Friesen on drummer Malcolm Pinson, he created a sound that merged all of the Black musical streams that were happening into a rich, pulsing wonder.

And there's Priestess, from Love on the Sudan in 1977, which has since become a classic tenor showpiece.

With time of course, Billy's playing has mellowed. But his projects remain huge -- like this full orchestra and choir performance of The Light Within, shot in a church in from Poland in 2004.

In strong contrast with the fierceness of his playing, Billy possesses a quiet cordiality on stage, and in person, that perhaps is the real reason he succeeds time and again in bringing all sorts of players together, spiritually as well as artistically.

We're fortunate that Billy is as hard working as he is gifted, and that he remains an influential, innovative leader and teacher. In recent years, Billy has been a key partner in The Cookers, a supergroup of jazz veterans that is constantly traveling, recording, and bringing this music to a broader listening.

And Billy was born on this day in 1943!

[bobrosenbaum]

Circus Captives, Eilat, Israel, 1998.

With the inevitable return to politics as usual, the Israeli Elections circus has also returned. As vocal as we are, we remain a nation of captive onlookers, constantly in awe of how low the standard for leadership can be set.

When do the clowns arrive?

[bobrosenbaum]

Spring Mud in Mitzpe Ramon Crater, March 2019.

[bobrosenbaum]

Feet in Clover, Binghamton NY, 1972.

A moment from a much gentler time. We were young and really feelin' the Earth, if you know what I mean. Why, even Earth Day was new!

"Don't it always seem to go, that you don't know what you've got 'till it's gone..."

-- Joni Mitchell                    

[bobrosenbaum]

Enlightenment. Gary Burton and Chick Corea. Saratoga, NY, 1978.

Chick and Gary's first duet album together, Crystal Silence, recorded in 1972 on the ECM label, was pure musical enlightenment for me.

This 1978 image (and performance) absolutely confirmed my aural vision, formed from listening to that first album, that Chick and Gary in fact were playing a single musical instrument. Pure love.

If you've never heard their duets, do yourself a favor. Relax into a comfortable chair, get the best headphones or speakers you can find, turn off all calls or notifications, and post a 'busy' sign on the door.

You'll want at least an hour for this.

Start here, a very early live performance that transmits the synergy of their duets: Chick Corea & Gary Burton In Concert, Berliner Jazztage, 1972

A few years later, the same energy, a bit more nuanced: Chick Corea & Gary Burton In Concert, Tokyo, 1981

Another jump here, to perhaps their most beautiful tandem vehicle: Chick Corea & Gary Burton, Crystal Silence, 2011

No serious introduction could be complete without a version of this tune: Chick Corea & Gary Burton, La Fiesta, Burghausen, 2011

A fitting wrap-up from (perhaps) one of their last duet performances: Chick Corea & Gary Burton, NPR Tiny Desk Concert, 2016

It's still hard for me to get my head wrapped around the idea that Chick has passed from this Earth. Thankfully for all of us, Chick and Gary's duets from over 40 years of performing together are well documented on many excellent recordings, as well as YouTube.

[bobrosenbaum]

Bennie Maupin, Binghamton, NY, 1975.

Bennie is not only a brilliant musician, but a master of sound. Here he is playing with Herbie Hancock and the Headhunters. What I remember most from that night's performance at the local University gymnasium was a totally new feeling: that real music was actually expressed in layers.

Not just scales and choruses and riffs (there are those too), but deeply-woven layers that contain all kinds of sounds that are happening in a continuum, as the musicians create them together.

Jazz was still an untapped reserve for me at the time, but after experiencing the Headhunters, even the Allman Brothers' music started sounding different to me -- more emotionally diverse, more exciting. Bennie's playing that night was probably as much responsible for my awakening as Herbie's.

Bennie's music still does that to me. He plays from a place where we can hear and touch multiple dimensions. There's his rich melodies of course, the rhythmic shifts too; there's Africa, the East, the European tradition, and of course black American jazz. But Bennie is also playing music on distinct, discrete physical planes and -- together with his companion players -- is weaving an audio experience like a craftsman weaves a carpet.

He plays so much and so exquisitely: tenor and soprano saxophone, flute, bass clarinet. Coming up in Detroit in the '60s he played with everyone, of course. And straight ahead too. Bennie is a huge touchstone for an entire musical generation.

I know this all sounds far out, so try this: First listen to Bennie's classic 1974 Jewel in the Lotus (which he recorded with Manfred Eicher on the ECM label, if that says something to you). Then listen to Bennie's 2008 recreation of the same song on his Early Reflections album. You'll hear and understand precisely what it is I'm talking about, I promise.

With all this, Bennie is a deeply quiet man who devotes himself to his art and his philosophy. His presence over the years in all the right places and at the right times says a great deal about his music. If you still don't find his name among the most talked-about players in jazz, it may simply be because that list is still not finished.

Born in 1940, today is Bennie's birthday. Happy Birthday, my friend. Until the next time we are fortunate enough to meet, on this plane or another!