A double CD which continues to explore Ghost Trance Music series devised by
Anthony Braxton. Composition N. 227 is performed by Chris Jonas (soprano,
alto, tenor saxophones), David Novak (bassoon, contrabassoon, etc), Anthony
Braxton (alto, F-alto saxophones, clarinet, flute). Composition N. 228 is
performed by Jackson Moore (clarinet, alto & baritone saxophones), Seth
Misterka (alto, baritone saxophones), Anthony Braxton (bass, contrabass
saxophones, contrabass clarinet). As Steve Day writes in his liner notes,
Anthony Braxton "has gathered a new, younger generation of saxophone players
around him. Together this "new collective" has been responsible for another
set of post-Wesleyan classic recordings..."
SAXOPHONES, when they are blown from the breath of the insides, swollen up
with a private language ready for translation, when they are wavering
stories that cannot come out in words, when they change from major to minor,
stinging, whining, when they ripple like Mr Getz, soften like David S. Ware
a la Albert Ayler crushing "Autumn Leaves", or spin like Yardbird on his
fifth take of "Parker's Mood", when the other classic Parker on a single
straight saxophone can multiple sound in your ear-drum, or an Ellington horn
section rides down from the mountain as if they are a male-voice choir
stuffed into the Sugarhill "A-Train", or Ornette Coleman sobs a smile as he
changes the century before him, then it is great music. The Hawk sung "Body
and Soul", I believe it was some kind of prelude. Since then I have heard
the heavy tenor tonic that came out of Chicago, Mr Anderson, Mr Jarman and
Mr Mitchell. I have heard an Englishman, Paul Dunmall, blowing a C-Melody
sax into alto space, and his conservative countryman, Alan Barnes, who I
once mistook for The Professor singing standards because it was not a sax,
but a bass clarinet. Yes, he's that good. And how about all the guys who
rarely catch a credit. The dead ones; the insightful Jimmy Lyons, the
precious secret that was to become Thomas Chapin, Warne Marsh, who every
time he took the stand deconstructed his own heart's tongue, and the serious
junkie who was so much bigger than his habit, another chorus Mr Pepper, one
more time again. Today, all over this small fragile planet, the saxophone
talks a common language; musicians like the Russian, Vladimir Chekasin, or
Stefano Maltese in Sicily, Peter Brotzmann in Germany, Sweden's Bernt
Rosengren, they are part of a voice more articulate than speech, more
generous than politics, more beautiful than those glossy magazines, more
truthful than angels. That is what I believe. No one can take that away
from me.
And so to Anthony Braxton, the one I call The Professor. I use this phrase
not because of his role at Wesleyan University or any academic interest on
my part. No, for me it is about the critical place which he now inhabits
within this huge body of music. Before he went to the university faculty in
the early-1990's, he had already designed a blown music capable of
controversy and substance. Classic recordings like "For Alto" (Delmark),
"Town Hall 1972" (Art Union), "Koln (Creative Orchestra) 1978" (Hat-Art) and
"Six Compositions: Quartet" (Antilles) are (almost) random selections from
his output between 1968 and 1981. However, in a way, he was already alone.
I have come to this conclusion because what Anthony Braxton has sought to
define through Adolphe Sax's invention, via solos, duos, trios, small and
large creative ensembles, orchestra's larger than anyone's ears, the
thirty-six Trillium opera's, is a vocabulary so vast in its intention and
invention that its documentation is totally outside the oeuvre of any other
saxophone player. A big statement, and of course there are people who will
want to argue about it. Even other saxophone players have felt the need to
grumble in the dark. Phil Woods and Lee Konitz are two memorable examples,
there have been others. Let them argue. They too have made their
contributions. I am not writing an argument, time is too short and the page
too precious.
The great irony about Anthony Braxton The Professor is that although he has
usually found himself walking down his own private highway continuum without
too many of his peers to keep him company, he has gathered a new, younger
generation of saxophone players around him. Together this "new collective"
has been responsible for another set of post-Wesleyan classic recordings,
initially through The Professor's own Braxton House label, but increasingly
via Leo. The release of "Two Compositions (Trio) 1998" stands alongside
"Composition 169 + (186+206+214)" (Leo LR 320/321), "Composition 247" (Leo
LR 306), and "Ninetet (Yoshi's) 1997 Vol. 1" (Leo LR 343/344); all are as
essential to the Braxtonian canon as any of his previous works and are
related to the Ghost Trance Music (GTM) series devised by Anthony Braxton.
(Want a definition? Here is my attempt: GTM is a description of Mr
Braxton's long developed interest in presenting in parallel both multiple
composition and improvising structures within a single performance as part
of a continuous process.) Jackson Moore (Composition 228) and Chris Jonas
(Composition 227) have been gigging and recording GTM with The Professor
since 1996. Mr Moore's early saxophone studies were with the great alto
player Jackie McLean, but it is Jackson Moore's involvement in Anthony
Braxton's activities in Middletown, Connecticut which have shaped his
direction. Mr Moore's own Laboratory Band (find them on Peacock Records)
used Michael Roller's "Ghostcity" artwork on their debut recording.
Explicit connections. As for Chris Jonas, he has been ripening the reeds in
William Parker's Little Huey Creative Orchestra whilst producing two fine
CD's under his own name for Hopscotch Records ("The Sun Spits Cherries" and
"The Vermilion"). Other key figures within the Braxton sax players pool are
James Fei, Brandon Evans, J.D. Parran, and Andre Vida, all of whom have been
active in the Ghost Trance Ensembles. Seth Misterka's (Composition 228)
profile has not been quite so high, though he played alto horn at the
Anthony Braxton Library of Congress gig in Washington in 1998, subsequently
released on the Braxton House label. Arguably the real odd one out on this
CD is David Novak (Composition 227), and not merely because he blows bassoon
rather than sax. Mr Novak was born in London but lives in Harlem. He has
played with people as far apart as Merzbow and Otomo Yoshihide through to
Maestros, a weird lo-fi electronics duo with James Fei, a crucial horn
player within the Braxton collective.
I am still listening to the crux in the curve of "227" and "228"; I bathe in
the repetition pass the point where it stops, only to find Anthony Braxton's
alto shuddering forward at the edges of my expectation. The brief flute
passage twenty minutes into "227" feels like a sound sojourn. Big music
seeking a small corner to take breath. On "228" the baritones and the bass
horns dance at both extremes of pitch possibilities. There is an eloquence
in the intelligence, yet "trance" always gives the game away. To my ears
these two performances are really about extending the visual experience of
the visionary into an aural equivalent. The Professor was fifty-three when
these rites of riddle and continuous composition were played. He still has
much to do. The essence is very simple, cease to breathe, we die. For the
saxophone player, cease to blow and the music will stop. The importance of
Mr Moore, Mr Jonas, Mr Novak and Mr Misterka is understood and absolute;
they should continue to blow. Here their presence is not passive. By
taking part in the Ghost Trance Music they have committed themselves to the
necessity of the continuum. Saxophones, when they are blown from the breath
of..........
-- STEVE DAY (January 2003)
"The trance will come only later." Albert Camus
