Roscoe Mitchell at Hothouse last night

[Larry Kart]

Heard Roscoe at Hothouse Friday night, preceded by almost hour-long live interview with Roscoe (in a genial, informative, statesman-like mood), a fine set by Ted Sirota's Rebel Souls (with Steve Berry subbing for Jeb Bishop and Jeff Parker in fine form). Roscoe was with Corey Wilkes, Harrison Bankhead, and Vincent Davis -- not my favorite Mitchell associates but none of them got in the way, and Wilkes at odd moments showed signs that he might become more than a circus musician. During the interview, Roscoe said something about how on some nights you can do whatever you want, and in some nights you have to work at it. This seemed like a night of the first sort. Wide variety of approaches from Roscoe on various horns -- flute, piccolo, sopranino, soprano, alto, tenor, and bass saxes. I was particularly struck by how much time he spent on note-wedded-to-note linear playing rather than on circular firestorms (though "circular" is just shorthand on my part, don't think it's the right term.) In the linear realm, Roscoe is incredibly lucid-compositional -- beginning on flute, it seemed like he could have sustained the skein of his thinking forever; it was like watching a painter who never needs to lift his brush from the canvas. Linked to this (partly because Roscoe lines were relatively exposed in this setting) is something I've never felt as strongly before: For a supposedly "free" player, Roscoe is a potent, novel harmonic thinker -- a la Bach in the solo cello or violin works, his lines (when he's in a linear groove) always imply a bass line that exists in meaningful dialogue with the horn line we actually hear. In fact, as John Litweiler pointed out when we were talking afterwards, this is in part built into Roscoe's sound, on alto especially -- the way most of his notes, timbrally, have a top, middle, and bottom (at the very least). And all of this is linked to Roscoe rhythmic concept(s), which to coin a term I'd describe as "anti-fluid." That is, he likes to build musical machines whose workings always expose the fact that they are doing the work that they're doing, that explain themselves in the act. Thus perhaps, his penchant for finding what I'd call "offbeats of offbeats" -- where Roscoe places his accents (this is especially clear in his solo percussion forays, though there none of them last night) are places where no music I'm aware of has ever gone before; it's as though, in the melodic realm, he had discovered twelve new notes in the octave, ones that somehow didn't seem like variations on the pitches we know. Though we do feel to some degree the "offness" of the these new places, especially rhythmically, it's mostly ( or more like, or wants to be) another centered world (a la Monk). As with Monk, perhaps, the drive on Roscoe's part is not only simply "This is what interests me, and maybe no one has been here before" (i.e. exploration rather than upheaval--at one point during the the interview, he wryly said that if he had to start all over, he'd want to be an astronaut) but also (as implied above) exposure of the workings to himself and to us; he makes a completely lucid music that at once moves like crazy and stands there like a building, a music you can be overwhelmed by (if you're so inclined) and think about at the same time.

[.:.impossible]

Thanks for the write-up Larry. Sounds like a great night.

[Rob C]

I was at the show, and that was a very nice write-up of it. I also liked Corey Wilkes better than I had in the past, I thought he and Roscoe engaged in some actual interplay, unlike the last time I saw them together (at the Malachi Favors memorial concert).

Ted Sirota's Rebel Souls were no slouches, either, they played a very good set. But Roscoe is in another sphere all together--I haven't seen him live but a few times, but that was far and away the best playing I've seen from him, and his band was right there with him.