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Anthony Braxton


7/4

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Upcoming release on Tzadik:

- Braxton, Graves, Parker: Beyond Quantum [#7626]

Anthony Braxton, Milford Graves and William Parker are quite literally three of the most

important virtuoso instrumentalists in new music, each a vivid

conceptualist as well an influential composer/performer. This

intense improvisational outing features them at their best: excited,

inspired and in complete communication. Recorded and mixed by musical

alchemist Bill Laswell, sparks fly in this important and historic

meeting of creative music masters.

looks interesting...

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BraxtonTrioandDuet.jpg

This month I got Trio & Duet (1974 I think?) from eMusic and it is frankly superb. The second 'side' is my first experience of Dave Holland and it's a joy.

Oh boy...you gonna dig the Mosaic Braxton Arista box! :excited:

There's also some live recordings from that era of Braxton with Holland that are well worth checking out.

BraxtonTownHall72.jpgBraxtonDortmund1976.jpg

Edited by 7/4
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Can't wait for that bad boy! I don't own a Mosaic as I've never had enough cash to splash out £80 for 6 cds but in this case I will make an exception.

BraxtonTrioandDuet.jpg

This month I got Trio & Duet (1974 I think?) from eMusic and it is frankly superb. The second 'side' is my first experience of Dave Holland and it's a joy.

Oh boy...you gonna dig the Mosaic Braxton Arista box! :excited:

There's also some live recordings from that era of Braxton with Holland that are well worth checking out.

BraxtonTownHall72.jpgBraxtonDortmund1976.jpg

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braxton23Standardsqt2003.jpg

Anthony Braxton - 20 Standards (Quartet) 2003

braxton20Standardsqt2003.jpgBraxton8StandardsWesleyan2001.jpg

Anthony Braxton - 23 Standards (Quartet) 2003

Anthony Braxton - 8 Standards (Wesleyan) 2001

I've been listening to these lately and checking out the guitar playing of Kevin O'Neil. Quite nimble.

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braxton23Standardsqt2003.jpg

Anthony Braxton - 20 Standards (Quartet) 2003

braxton20Standardsqt2003.jpgBraxton8StandardsWesleyan2001.jpg

Anthony Braxton - 23 Standards (Quartet) 2003

Anthony Braxton - 8 Standards (Wesleyan) 2001

I've been listening to these lately and checking out the guitar playing of Kevin O'Neil. Quite nimble.

You're quite right about O'Neil. I have always enjoyed the 20 and 23 Standards sets. -- I haven't heard the 8 Standards (Wesleyan). But the two "standards" titles that I really love are Braxton's "Charlie Parker Project" (not universally admired, or so I've read) and "A Memory of Vienna" with Ran Blake, which I acquired earlier this year. I've never heard Braxton so lyrical as he is on the Vienna disc. The version of 'Round Midnight is gorgeous. And despite some criticisms of sloppiness on the Parker Project (criticisms which I'm not convinced are on the mark) I find the music riveting and perhaps more focused. Dealing with a single artist rather than a range of artists has something to do with that. And it may be more on the listening end than the execution end, I'll admit. But I love both of those, and put them right up there with the best of his output overall. (Dortmund, Montreux/Berlin, the Crispell-Hemingway-Dresser quartet, Iridium, to name a few of my faves).

:tup

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. And it may be more on the listening end than the execution end, I'll admit. But I love both of those, and put them right up there with the best of his output overall. (Dortmund, Montreux/Berlin, the Crispell-Hemingway-Dresser quartet, Iridium, to name a few of my faves).

:tup

I'm still trying to comprehend that Iridium set. I've only really listened to the first half of it (about 5 CDs). I love the wide variety of instruments but it is hard to digest even one disc at a time.

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. And it may be more on the listening end than the execution end, I'll admit. But I love both of those, and put them right up there with the best of his output overall. (Dortmund, Montreux/Berlin, the Crispell-Hemingway-Dresser quartet, Iridium, to name a few of my faves).

:tup

I'm still trying to comprehend that Iridium set. I've only really listened to the first half of it (about 5 CDs). I love the wide variety of instruments but it is hard to digest even one disc at a time.

It is ... and I know what you mean. One of the main things I take away from those live sets is a sense of pure joy emanating from the musicians. That's not always the case with Braxton's music for me. I get a very positive vibe from the Iridium box. I have more of an emotional response to it than is often the case with his music.

Edited by papsrus
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The Charlie Parker Project is one of Braxton's more interesting standards projects, yes, though it's a bit chaotic. -- On the other hand those 23 and 20 standards volumes just go on & on & on & on, and while O'Neil's great some of the playing is unbelievably careless (like, they just opened the fakebook & winged it--listen to the hash they make of some of the Brubeck tunes) & Braxton's really having trouble with the soprano & sopranino.

I look forward to the Arista box--somehow my copies of several of the LPs & CDs have vanished, including the 2LP solo album & the live date from Montreaux.

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Upcoming shows in Philly!!

Friday, October 10 | 8pm

Anthony Braxton Falling River Quartet

with

Anthony Braxton, alto/soprano/ sopranino saxophone + contrabass clarinet

Erica Dicker, violin

Sally Norris, piano

Katherine Young, bassoon

Settlement Music School

416 Queen Street

$35 General Admission

All ticket holders will receive free admission to the October 11 brass

music concert

Saturday, October 11 | 8pm

Composition 103 (for Seven Trumpets)

with

Taylor Ho Bynum, Tim Byrnes, Forbes Graham, Sam Hoyt, John McDonough,

Nicole Rampersaud, Nate Wooley, trumpet

Composition 169 (for Brass Quintet)

with

Taylor Ho Bynum, trumpet

Nate Wooley, trumpet

Mark Taylor, French horn

Reut Regev, trombone

Jay Rozen, tuba

Anthony Braxton, conductor

St. Mark's Church

1525 Locust Street

$10 General Admission

More info at:

http://arsnovaworkshop.com/

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Interesting. I expected the posting to be much more caustic, given the headline. I like the idea that Braxton's music can be much more playful and "fun" than listeners sometimes give him credit for. This is what I found in "Iridium." Not so much, however, in something like "For Alto." :rolleyes:

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Interesting. I expected the posting to be much more caustic, given the headline. I like the idea that Braxton's music can be much more playful and "fun" than listeners sometimes give him credit for. This is what I found in "Iridium." Not so much, however, in something like "For Alto." :rolleyes:

I find fun all through his small grp music - all those marches! - but not much in his "classical" music.

It's just a dumb WMFU sort of title.

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I am really enjoying the new budget 4-disc set GTM (2006) on Important Records.

The Iridium might have been a grander concept, but I much prefer the GTM music in this kind of standard quartet format with Braxton as the only reed player. This is like a more fully realized verion of the excellent Delmark album (Four Compositions (GTM) 2000).

The liner notes by Braxton are classic material. :) There are times when I think that he really is just jiving in the sense of making the text too dense and complex for anybody to understand. I particularly like his initial explanation and definition of GTM:

"The idea for GTM came about as a way to establish an "orbit" quandrant area universe schema that "gravitationally" affects neighboring "event-stream" sonic events in a multi-layer three dimensional imaginary universe of activities (and target materials)..."

:lol::lol::lol:

Edited by John L
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I am really enjoying the new budget 4-disc set GTM (2006) on Important Records.

The Iridium might have been a grander concept, but I much prefer the GTM music in this kind of standard quartet format with Braxton as the only reed player. This is like a more fully realized verion of the excellent Delmark album (Four Compositions (GTM) 2000).

The liner notes by Braxton are classic material. :) There are times when I think that he really is just jiving in the sense of making the text too dense and complex for anybody to understand. I particularly like his initial explanation and definition of GTM:

"The idea for GTM came about as a way to establish an "orbit" quandrant area universe schema that "gravitationally" affects neighboring "event-stream" sonic events in a multi-layer three dimensional imaginary universe of activities (and target materials)..."

:lol::lol::lol:

That's really a terrific set, and the first bunch of CDs, when I heard it a month or two back, that had involved me so much in a while.

I also got a copy of Comp. 247 recently--a bagpipe/2 reeds piece--and managed to obtain a copy of the score from James Fei. It is, I believe, from the second stage of ghost trance music, still emphasizing looped eighth note patterns but with some interesting, sometimes jarring interpolations. The score includes a number of Braxton's graphic/algebraic figures, the meaning(s) of which are sometimes intuitive and at other moments pretty mystifying. It's above all really beautiful to look at.

The whip/accelerated GTM phase, from which the box is derived, is a bitch to sight read. Obtuse tuplet streams at somewhat unmanageable tempi and with minimal preparation... I admire and commend any musician who can make this stuff with any sort of proficiency.

Braxton--you mad, crazy, mad genius you.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Anyone hip to this release?

Braxton / Graves / Parker -- "Beyond Quantum"

braxtonGravesParker.jpg

Trio sounds intriguing. Drooling a little, but if anyone's heard it ... comments?

Got it @ Borders today. Haven't listened yet.

Man. Your Boarders is a lot better stocked than mine! ... I went ahead and ordered from squidco. Looking forward to it. Be interested to hear your thoughts if you get a chance to spin it over the next couple of days.

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Anyone hip to this release?

Braxton / Graves / Parker -- "Beyond Quantum"

braxtonGravesParker.jpg

Trio sounds intriguing. Drooling a little, but if anyone's heard it ... comments?

Got it @ Borders today. Haven't listened yet.

Man. Your Boarders is a lot better stocked than mine! ... I went ahead and ordered from squidco. Looking forward to it. Be interested to hear your thoughts if you get a chance to spin it over the next couple of days.

I was surprised. We have three Borders here and two of them actually had this on release day! Listening to the first tune now; seems like an epic sopranino (how do you pronounce that, anyway?) solo so far, with lots of pushing by the drums. It just sounds great, too. I've heard a lot of detail in the percussion

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