John Coltrane at the Plugged Nickle, 1966

[Michael Fitzgerald]

db May 5, 1966 p.25

Spotlight Review - Avante-Garde Summit

* * * * *

This is possibly the most powerful human sound ever recorded. Coltrane has collected 10 other soloists, each a distinctive voice in contemporary jazz. All hold in common the ability to scream loud and long. If the music coheres, it does so because everyone is screaming about the same thing. The album is a recording of a single work which lasts more than 35 minutes.

In the liner notes, Shepp speaks of the music this way:

"It achieves a certain kind of unity; it starts at a high level of intensity with the horns playing high and the other pieces playing low. This gets a quality of like male and female voices. It builds in intensity through all the solo passages, brass and reeds, until it gets to the final section where the rhythm section takes over and brings it back down to the level where it started at... The ensemble passages were based on chords, but these chords were optional. What Trane did was to relate or juxtapose tonally centered ideas and atonal elements, along with melodic and nonmelodic elements. In those descending chords there is a definite tonal center, like a B-flat minor. But there are different roads to that center."

In the notes, Brown says that the music has "that kind of thing that makes people scream. The people who were in the studio *were* screaming.... You could use this record to heat up the apartment on those cold winter days."

There are two things to consider here. The first is the actual experience these musicians shared in the recording studio on June 23, 1965. The other is this phonograph record of the event.

Ordinarily we can accept these two things as one. The differences, though important, are not crucial. True, one had to "be there" when Horowitz returned to the concert stage last year in Carnegie Hall. But the recording of that concert captures enough for us to re-create the event through the music. In fact, the music transcends the event. The event has meaning through focused concentration on the quality of the music.

This is not so in the case of Ascension. The vitality of this music is not separable from "being there." The music does not transcend the event. In fact, the music *is* the event, and since there is no way of reproducing (i.e., reliving) the event except by doing it again, the music is in essence nonrecordable.

This brings us to a difficult subject involving not only this music but also much other contemporary art.

In our growing esthetic, "the moment" emerges as sacred. The "now" is the reality from which a new esthetic of the religious is flowing. Perishable sculpture points this out to the observer. Musicians like John Cage offer variations on this theme.

Present time has always been most crucial to jazz. Yet nowadays, as a revolution crystallizes, what was once merely crucial is now the thing itself.

This revolution, the black one, has a vested interest in "now" as *opposed* to "then." The forces that spawned it are wasting no love on old things. The old order was "then." It passeth to "now." No one alive today can remember a more concerted cry for a new social being.

Ascension is (among other things) at the center of this cry. The spiritual commitment to present time vibrates around Earth; the vibration is focused and intensified in music like this. To offer it on a "recording" is in some sense *against* the thing itself. Ascension is a recording not of an event, but of the sounds made during an event, and these sounds by themselves do not give us the essence of the event.

If the listener is informed enough to be able to imagine what it was really like when this event took place, then the record may have meaning. But it would seem that a listener so informed would not especially need or want a reminder of another "then."

It is my feeling that gradually there will come a music informed by the freedom and power of Ascension, but which has more artistic commitment beyond the moment of recording. Such music is already forming (although with less muscle - no music matches Ascension for sheer strength and volume.) The few moments when Tchicai is soloing constitute one of several places where this more subtle light shines through strongest. Distinctions are close; everything seems *about* to happen.

Meanwhile, it is useful to regard this album as a documentation of a particular space of history. As such, it is wonderful - because the history is. If you want immersion in the sounds of these men, if you want their cries to pierce you, if you want a record of the enormity and truth of their strength, here it is.

(B.M.)

Mike

[Lazaro Vega]

Thanks!

Where did you find it?

I'm kind of surprised that there isn't any breakout of the music itself, the juxtaposition of collectively improvised ensembles and soloists, or of the modal character of the music, or how it relates to the new music scene in general. Mathieu had the education and experience in music to have at least touched on how this was put together as music.. (Not that he was a "free" guy).

Which again just points out how incrediblely attuned Roscoe was to the music of this time period: to have heard this energy music and to have reacted to it so quickly in a way that makes use of it yet is still personal and unique. Who else was as up on this sea change outside of New York?

Edited September 19, 2004 by Lazaro Vega

[Michael Fitzgerald]

I found it less than 10 steps from where I am sitting. I have an almost complete run of db from the sixties to the present. Among other things.

I agree that the review is less than what it could be, particularly given that opening line.

Mike

[JSngry]

Which again just points out how incrediblely attuned Roscoe was to the music of this time period: to have heard this energy music and to have reacted to it so quickly in a way that makes use of it yet is still personal and unique.

Exactly.

[Chuck Nessa]

FWIW, Mathieu wrote a similar 5 star review of Roscoe's "Sound" (a few months later) AND a couple of arrangements for Ellington's "Piano In The Background".

[JSngry]

Yeah, he wrote a thing or two for Maynard's Roulette band as well.

Who WAS this guy anyway?

[Leeway]

Even at its best, the music never achieved the free flow of Ornette (the comings together and conversation of Free Jazz), or the arranged blossoms of sound-clusters of Sun Ra, or the paradox of complete control/freedom clarity of Albert Ayler (those open ringing bronze Bells, vibrating to their own self-shaping song and logic), but it does have excitement and immense raw power – an experience in itself. What they did prove was just how hard they could try. That they could beat themselves bloody pounding at the farthest reaches of experience and come back with only their effort as an answer. Perhaps that alone is their answer.

I thought this the best, and most perceptive, part of the Coltrane review. Re-reading it, it seems to me that the author's reaction to it all was rather ambivalent, despite the hot house prose (which I enjoyed and which we could use moe of these days of commerical blandness).

[Joe G]

Yeah, he wrote a thing or two for Maynard's Roulette band as well.

Who WAS this guy anyway?

There's also this (from AAJ):

Standards in Silhouette is one of Kenton's finest albums of ballads, and is unusual in that it features exclusively the arrangements of the then 22-year old Bill Mathieu. The selection of tunes is outstanding. From well known standards like "Willow Weep for Me" (also recorded previously by Kenton with a vocal by June Christy), Harold Arlen's "Slow Wind" and Hoagy Carmichael's "I Get Along Without You Very Well" to numbers you wouldn't expect to hear a Kenton band performing like John Lewis' "Django," this album is an aural delight for Kenton cognoscenti and newcomers alike.

And here's where he is today: William Allaudin Mathieu

I've read his books (and loved them), and actually had a music lesson with him back in '99 at his home in northern California. A beautiful (and knowledgeable) cat, for sure.

edit: I'm not absolutely sure if this is the same Bill Mathieu who wrote the DB review, as this is the first I've heard of it.

Edited September 19, 2004 by Joe G

[JSngry]

WHOA, dude took a HARD left, I see...

Pretty sure it's the same guy who wrote the review.

[Chuck Nessa]

Same guy.

[7/4]

This quote is on the back cover of Harmonic Experience:

"Mathieu is consistently proving himself to be one of the best in musical theory."

John Coltrane in Downbeat Magazine "

[Chuck Nessa]

I thought this the best, and most perceptive, part of the Coltrane review. Re-reading it, it seems to me that the author's reaction to it all was rather ambivalent, despite the hot house prose (which I enjoyed and which we could use moe of these days of commerical blandness).

Jerry/Jamil was a great friend (and guide) for 30+ years. He was "perceptive" but NEVER "ambivilent" about anything. Late Coltrane was of great importance to him. Great "critics" take big chances when saying anything "negative" about artists they love.

[jazzbo]

Hey, anyone know the address of The Red Rooster club in Philly where the historic meeting of Trane and Tyner occurred?

I ask because. . . I lived at the corner of Baldwin and Summerset (I think I have that spelled right and that it is the right street corner) from 1957 to 1966 and on the other corner of the same side of the street was a bar, The Red Rooster. . . .! Anyone know if this Rooster was near Connie Mack Stadium at that time?

[Leeway]

I thought this the best, and most perceptive, part of the Coltrane review.  Re-reading it, it seems to me that the author's reaction to it all was rather ambivalent, despite the hot house prose (which I enjoyed and which we could use moe of these days of commerical blandness).

Jerry/Jamil was a great friend (and guide) for 30+ years. He was "perceptive" but NEVER "ambivilent" about anything. Late Coltrane was of great importance to him. Great "critics" take big chances when saying anything "negative" about artists they love.

Chuck, thanks for responding to my thoughts on the Coltrane article; however, I'm not sure I quite follow your line of thought. But just to clarify my own, what I was trying to convey is that, despite the fervent prose and he author's obvious sense of engagement with the musicians, my sense of the piece was that the author admired, respected, was even in awe of what Coltrane and the other musicians were doing, but I perceived a certain reservation about it all. It was shock and awe, but not pleasure and enjoyment. Therein, I think, lies the ambivalence, which I think the author recognized. At least, that's my reading of the article.

Great "critics" take big chances when saying anything "negative" about artists they love.

I'm not sure how you meant this in the context of the article. But, in one way at least, it supports what I am saying: when critics, great or small, both love and criticize an artist, they are expressing a kind of ambivalence about the artist, between what they love and what they do not, or maybe, what is versus what they wish would be.

Anyway, a provocative and atmospheric report from the "front lines," "back in the day."

[Lazaro Vega]

I caught Walter Cronkite on C-Spann yesterday, a rebroadcast, where a young reporter asked about bias in reporting. Cronkite said use bias to motivate, inspire, drive -- he said it was a good thing. But when it came time to write the article as a journalist you have to drop the bias and give both sides of the story. No ifs. Brian Williams, the NBC Peter Jennings look a like, added that's why don't work for (he didn't name it, but you knew he meant to say) Fox if you want to keep that integrity. That's what Chuck may be getting at. It is one of the principles of the news paper writer/reporter's profession.

Given the music under review one of the "ambivilancies," if that is even a word, that one might encounter is the shortness of language to get the long emotional view of what one just heard, i.e. the art conflicting with the writer's own ability in expression, seeing the distance from words up to the level of what was encountered. Figi does an incredible job -- shock and awe is often how one feels after this dynamic of a performance as you may know if you've heard live concerts by the energy players -- and it is very different, to me, than hearing a loud concert. Energy and loud volume aren't the same thing. As you know, Jazz musicians also "play the room," and the overtones created in a space give the sound that much thicker, or more piercing, a presence. The shit stacks up and up and up. Monk did that, and I bet he taught Trane well.

One of the hardest things in the world to do is encounter something this new, this life changing, and under deadline pressure and with only a first impression (not repeated listenings to double check) to spit out a readable, sensible description.

And as a writer the way he works the implied comparison to the sound of animals throughout the piece -- without going into some racist b.s.: an incredible bit of tight rope walking -- brings the ferocity alive.

His comparisons to other aspects of the new music shows how, like others in Chicago, he saw there was room for growth in these innovations, and also reveals an incredible understanding of the changes going on in jazz, something many people today still don't fully appreciate.

Edited September 20, 2004 by Lazaro Vega

[Chalupa]

Hey, anyone know the address of The Red Rooster club in Philly where the historic meeting of Trane and Tyner occurred?

I ask because. . . I lived at the corner of Baldwin and Summerset (I think I have that spelled right and that it is the right street corner) from 1957 to 1966 and on the other corner of the same side of the street was a bar, The Red Rooster. . . .! Anyone know if this Rooster was near Connie Mack Stadium at that time?

Chris A. would probably know. I think he was living in Philly around that time.

[jazzbo]

Thanks, I'll pm him!

[blue lake]

The story continues.....

Dear Lazaro,

Thanks for writing.

Wow! What a long time ago. Maybe too long. So I'll make you a deal.

Send me a copy of my review (which I only vaguely recall, and don't have a

reference copy of) and I'll try to respond intelligently. I do remember that

at the time, my inclinations were very much toward Cecil, and in Chicago we

had a group of players who were finding Cecil-like free music through

invented game structures (a 1971 recording of the Ghost Opera Company is

soon to be re-issued on CD).

About Ascension, maybe I didn't understand the music well enough, or

resonate at that time with the principles of extended modality. I do

resonate with it now, of course -- most clearly in my own music. But even

now I suspect the real contribution of Coltrane doesn't consist in the

technical or theoretical aspect of his music. His real leap of genius was

psychological and spiritual, and he used what was at hand, probably as a

natural outgrowth of the way he practiced his horn. (I think, a few years

earlier, and farther west, the same was true for Bird.)

So send me a review (and a copy of Ascension if you can-mine seems too have

disappeared-or I'll buy another) and I'll say something perhaps more useful.

Allaudin (Bill) Mathieu

[Peter Johnson]

Hey, anyone know the address of The Red Rooster club in Philly where the historic meeting of Trane and Tyner occurred?

I ask because. . . I lived at the corner of Baldwin and Summerset (I think I have that spelled right and that it is the right street corner) from 1957 to 1966 and on the other corner of the same side of the street was a bar, The Red Rooster. . . .! Anyone know if this Rooster was near Connie Mack Stadium at that time?

Hey, anyone know the address of The Red Rooster club in Philly where the historic meeting of Trane and Tyner occurred?

I ask because. . . I lived at the corner of Baldwin and Summerset (I think I have that spelled right and that it is the right street corner) from 1957 to 1966 and on the other corner of the same side of the street was a bar, The Red Rooster. . . .!  Anyone know if this Rooster was near Connie Mack Stadium at that time?

Lon, I'm not sure if it's the same place, but the online directories show a Red Rooster at 7960 Dungan Rd, corner of Rhawn and Dungan. Still in business, apparently!

[Joe G]

The story continues.....

Dear Lazaro,

Thanks for writing.

Wow! What a long time ago. Maybe too long. So I'll make you a deal.

Send me a copy of my review (which I only vaguely recall, and don't have a

reference copy of) and I'll try to respond intelligently. I do remember that

at the time, my inclinations were very much toward Cecil, and in Chicago we

had a group of players who were finding Cecil-like free music through

invented game structures (a 1971 recording of the Ghost Opera Company is

soon to be re-issued on CD).

About Ascension, maybe I didn't understand the music well enough, or

resonate at that time with the principles of extended modality. I do

resonate with it now, of course -- most clearly in my own music. But even

now I suspect the real contribution of Coltrane doesn't consist in the

technical or theoretical aspect of his music. His real leap of genius was

psychological and spiritual, and he used what was at hand, probably as a

natural outgrowth of the way he practiced his horn. (I think, a few years

earlier, and farther west, the same was true for Bird.)

So send me a review (and a copy of Ascension if you can-mine seems too have

disappeared-or I'll buy another) and I'll say something perhaps more useful.

Allaudin (Bill) Mathieu

Coolness!

[jazzbo]

Peter,

Thanks. I'm pretty sure that is not the same place that was on my streetcorner unless it has been moved (quite likely). . . may be the same place Trane and Tyner met at. . . .!

[Chalupa]

Did you PM Chris A.???

[jazzbo]

Yes I did.

He's looking into it. His wayback machine is nearly up and running!

[Chalupa]

LOL!

Let us know what you find out. If it's not too far out of the way I might be able to drive by and snap a picture.

Edited September 23, 2004 by Chalupa