Anthony Braxton

[Chuck Nessa]

Rhymes with 'tween.

[7/4]

Thanks guys....they're right.

.

[JSngry]

Nina never knew.

[Chuck Nessa]

Nina never knew.

That was a grandmother's name and it was a "hard I" - Ny na.

[JSngry]

Jim never knew!

[GregK]

Wow. I was way off. I had it closer to sop-RANIN-o. Good thing no one heard me.

On the last tune now. This album is very good after one listen. I don't always get Braxton (actually, I doubt I ever do), but this one sounds like he was absolutely on fire for the session. Most of my Braxton listening recently has been the GTM stuff, so it's good just to hear him with less density. My only problem with this new one is the singing that someone is occasionally heard doing.

[PHILLYQ]

You can order direct from Tzadik or Downtown Music Gallery

[7/4]

You can order direct from Tzadik or Downtown Music Gallery

DMG processes the orders for Tzadik so it's almost the same thing.

.

[Chuck Nessa]

You can order direct from Tzadik or Downtown Music Gallery

DMG processes the orders for Tzadik so it's almost the same thing.

.

'cept the percentages.

[J.A.W.]

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.

Montreux, not Montreaux.

Edited August 20, 2008 by J.A.W.

[papsrus]

In the FWIW department, "Beyond Quantum" gets 5 stars here. And this guy listens to a lot of free.

[ep1str0phy]

In the FWIW department, "Beyond Quantum" gets 5 stars here. And this guy listens to a lot of free.

He's a little dismissive of Braxton's compositions, which he calls "often abstract, distant, and cerebral", a broad statement which I think renders his opinion here a little suspect.

[ep1str0phy]

And also, reading that review again, the passage:

"This is music without boundaries. Anything is possible. Because of their skills. Because of their vision. Because of their creativity. This is music that demonstrates that any written part would have acted like a cage. This is wild as it should be. True. Fierce. Naturally restrained. Authentic. This is free in its truest sense."

Comes across as douchey. Free dogmatism (as opposed to dogmatism that is free) can be a pain.

[papsrus]

In the FWIW department, "Beyond Quantum" gets 5 stars here. And this guy listens to a lot of free.

He's a little dismissive of Braxton's compositions, which he calls "often abstract, distant, and cerebral", a broad statement which I think renders his opinion here a little suspect.

And also, reading that review again, the passage:

"This is music without boundaries. Anything is possible. Because of their skills. Because of their vision. Because of their creativity. This is music that demonstrates that any written part would have acted like a cage. This is wild as it should be. True. Fierce. Naturally restrained. Authentic. This is free in its truest sense."

Comes across as douchey. Free dogmatism (as opposed to dogmatism that is free) can be a pain.

Fair enough, but in defense of the guy, I think he's just a regular Joe out there who is real excited about free and improvised music. He seems to listen to a ton of stuff, so he's either a wealthy regular Joe or ... I don't know, actually. ... Anyways, his comments come across to me as some regular guy just telling you how the music hits him.

The other thing is, he does hand out 4 and 4 1/2 stars pretty liberally, (although 5 stars is fairly rare) so I keep that in mind. He really likes a lot of stuff, basically. ... I can relate to that.

[GregK]

I don't know much about criticism or reviewing, but I do know that I like this new one a LOT.

[ep1str0phy]

OK--fair, and granted, I want to hear this, too-

Something about the review is dangerously close to the "Braxton is too serious about what's he's doing"/can't get under a table thing, which strikes me as shockingly backassward. Granted, he doesn't generalize about Braxton as a totality, and he obviously likes the new album, but to lump this whole part of Braxton's oeuvre into this "inaccessible" thing is--I mean, this thread. Just read this whole thread.

I don't know what true freedom is anymore, anyway. Even in the Bay Area--free improv people don't trust the Euro free improv people, neither group being trusted by the free jazz people, and none of them are trusted by the "free" performance art/fluxus people, though everyone listens to free folk and free rock even though I don't know if anyone really likes it.

[ep1str0phy]

And to add to that, the advice that Roscoe Mitchell always gives--"Just study music." A-f'in-MEN.

[AllenLowe]

it's an important debate - my belief, and I've said it on this forum before, is that there is a generation of musicians who can talk the talk but have musically little to say - they've go the musical psychobabble down, they love talking about process, but they've confused mannerism with style, gimmick with idea - sorta like the whole drone thing, and a lot of the free-folk I've heard falls under this, too - it's kinda like the good news/bad news part of the internet and the proliferation of cheap digital technology - when everybody can do it everybody WILL do it, and a lot of it is just plainly bad music - too many short cuts are taken, not enough self-education takes place, there is too much cultural name-dropping without a real understanding of what prior music says or means -

and I would venture to say that Braxton feels EXACTLY the same way that I do (he actually said same when I met with him last summer) -

Edited August 23, 2008 by AllenLowe

[papsrus]

it's an important debate - my belief, and I've said it on this forum before, is that there is a generation of musicians who can talk the talk but have musically little to say - they've go the musical psychobabble down, they love talking about process, but they've confused mannerism with style, gimmick with idea - sorta like the whole drone thing, and a lot of the free-folk I've heard falls under this, too - it's kinda like the good news/bad news part of the internet and the proliferation of cheap digital technology - when everybody can do it everybody WILL do it, and a lot of it is just plainly bad music - too many short cuts are taken, not enough self-education takes place, there is too much cultural name-dropping without a real understanding of what prior music says or means -

and I would venture to say that Braxton feels EXACTLY the same way that I do (he actually said same when I met with him last summer) -

Interesting -- I had always thought of Braxton's method of composition -- particularly GTM -- as being all about process. Sort of a "journey is the reward" kind of thing. I say this having only a layman's understanding of his compositional methods, but I think I understand enough to realize his methods are in large part about creating opportunities and "freedom" for the musicians performing his pieces. In this respect I would agree that characterizing his compositions as too restrictive or serious is to miss what's going on. I get the sense that the musicians performing his music are often giddy as they probe and explore the possibilities in the compositions. I've said before (in this thread, I think) that I find a great deal of joy (and freedom) in much of Braxton's composed music -- Iridium in particular.

Also, I think you are right on in pointing to the "proliferation of cheap digital technology" as a culprit in spawning all sorts of noise that chews up way too much bandwidth, and possibly creates as much confusion as clarity among the various tribes ep1str0phy mentioned. But as long as artists who wouldn't otherwise be heard can use the technology to reach us in new ways, I'll drink from the trough willingly.

[AllenLowe]

process in itself is not the villain, and is rather an important part of new music going back to John Cage - it's just that when process becomes a substitute for substance, or an end in itself, the result is a kind of perversion of the whole idea of the new, of the concept of the new aesthetic, I think - there's just, IMHO, to many musicians who think that by coming up with an idea they have already solved a musical problem; they lose the idea of execution -

Edited August 23, 2008 by AllenLowe

[JSngry]

I don't know what true freedom is anymore, anyway. Even in the Bay Area--free improv people don't trust the Euro free improv people, neither group being trusted by the free jazz people, and none of them are trusted by the "free" performance art/fluxus people, though everyone listens to free folk and free rock even though I don't know if anyone really likes it.

Freedom without a feeling of confidence and trust is no freedom at all.

I give you Billy Strayhorn's Four Freedoms, the credo by which he tried to live his life:

1. Freedom from hate, unconditionally

2. Freedom from self-pity

3. Freedom from the fear of doing something that would help someone else more than it does me

4. Freedom from the kind of pride that makes me feel I am better than my brother.

Think about that.

[papsrus]

I don't know what true freedom is anymore, anyway. Even in the Bay Area--free improv people don't trust the Euro free improv people, neither group being trusted by the free jazz people, and none of them are trusted by the "free" performance art/fluxus people, though everyone listens to free folk and free rock even though I don't know if anyone really likes it.

Freedom without a feeling of confidence and trust is no freedom at all.

I give you Billy Strayhorn's Four Freedoms, the credo by which he tried to live his life:

1. Freedom from hate, unconditionally

2. Freedom from self-pity

3. Freedom from the fear of doing something that would help someone else more than it does me

4. Freedom from the kind of pride that makes me feel I am better than my brother.

Think about that.

Prompted me to think of Isaiah Berlin's Two Concepts of Liberty. From Wiki:

Berlin is best known for his essay "Two Concepts of Liberty" ... He defined negative liberty as the absence of constraints on, or interference with, agents' possible action. Greater "negative freedom" meant fewer restrictions on possible action. Berlin associated positive liberty with the idea of self-mastery, or the capacity to determine oneself, to be in control of one's destiny. ... As a matter of history the positive concept of liberty has proven particularly susceptible to political abuse.

(...)

Berlin argued that, following this line of thought, demands for freedom paradoxically become demands for forms of collective control and discipline – those deemed necessary for the "self-mastery" or self-determination of nations, classes, democratic communities, and even humanity as a whole.

Not sure what the implications, if any, might be for the arts, but it is interesting in this context that Strayhorn focused exclusively on "freedom from," or what Berlin would call negative liberties. ... I suppose there are obvious reasons for that.

[JSngry]

Well, between Isaac Berlin & Irving Berlin (and the Berlin Wall), I think we can see why people be runnin'!

[papsrus]

Well, between Isaac Berlin & Irving Berlin (and the Berlin Wall), I think we can see why people be runnin'!

[Late]

This may have been posted earlier (didn't check), but just in case it didn't:

Anthony Braxton sings a Lee Konitz solo to Lee Konitz as Chick Corea watches ... then shreds "Impressions"