Albert Ayler

[sidewinder]

There's a showing of the Ayler documentary at the Purcell Room in London on Saturday (11th). Preceded by a discussion with Henry Grimes, who is over here doing gigs this weekend !

[Swinger]

I can't get my DaD copy to burn to DVD correctly, no sound on the DVD , yet its there when played back on my PC using a variety of media players.

Any way nice looking production, guess I'll have to view it on my PC unless any one has any helpful suggestions. I wondered if the problem was that the files are VOB but I have other Video-downloads as VOBs which seem to work fine with the same DVD burning software (PowerProducer)

I use http://www.dvdshrink.org/ to burn all those files on DVD. It works perfectly and it's really easy to use.You can even decide the maximum burning speed and region codes.

[sidewinder]

I've now watched the film all the way through. Very fine - and I'm no great Albert Ayler fan.

One of the best things about the film are the audio interview excerpts of Ayler's voice. Certainly helps to give an impression of what made the individual tick.

Edited November 12, 2006 by sidewinder

[brownie]

The New York Times reviews Kasper Collin's film in today's edition.

Movie Review

My Name is Albert Ayler (2005)

November 8, 2007

Free-Jazz Pioneer, Aware of His Legacy

By MATT ZOLLER SEITZ

The Ohio-born tenor saxophonist Albert Ayler probably would have gotten a kick out of Kasper Collin’s documentary about his life, “My Name Is Albert Ayler,” which opens today at the Anthology Film Archives. Named after one of his albums and built around snippets of audio interviews with Mr. Ayler, it attempts and often achieves a fresh, playful style that’s equally informed by jazz traditions and Mr. Ayler’s urge to shatter them.

Mr. Ayler used marchlike structures as the foundation for multiple, chaotic improvisations by himself and his band mates. The solos on his landmark 1964 album “Spiritual Unity” are musical action paintings in which feeling dictates form.

Mr. Ayler’s sound was formed during a rhythm-and-blues-influenced adolescence, a stint as an Army musician and a two-year sojourn in Northern Europe in the early ’60s that included exposure to the music of the free-jazz innovator Cecil Taylor.

The attention-getting final stretch of Mr. Ayler’s life started in 1963 in New York City (where he barged onstage with his sax during a John Coltrane performance and, to everyone’s astonishment, earned himself a fan and a sometime patron) and ended in 1970, when he went missing for two and a half weeks, then turned up floating in the East River.

In his time Mr. Ayler was marginalized as a grandiose, spaced-out eccentric who played like Charlie Parker trapped under something heavy. As the bassist Gary Peacock, one of many former Ayler band mates interviewed by the director, puts it, people either loved or hated Mr. Ayler’s music: “Nobody said, ‘Ah, he has his good points.’” A straightforward, PBS-style documentary about Mr. Ayler would have seemed clueless. Thankfully, Mr. Collin hasn’t made one.

The documentary is far from perfect. It compresses Mr. Ayler’s complex, contradictory, Christianity-derived spirituality into New Age hash. It gives short shrift to the women in Mr. Ayler’s life, especially Mary Parks, his final companion and de facto manager, who has been vilified for building a wall between him and the world. (She spoke to Mr. Collin on the phone but refused to appear on camera.) And it waits too long to reveal that Mr. Ayler’s brother and sometime band mate, the trumpeter Donald Ayler, exhibited obsessive and abrasive behavior because he was psychotic. (He died on Oct. 21.)

Luckily the movie’s missteps are eclipsed by its confident and appropriate style. Mr. Collin and his team of editors treat the sparse physical evidence of Mr. Ayler’s life as the filmic equivalent of a melodic through-line in jazz, staging areas from which to mount improvisations: a montage of newsreel footage of bustling Stockholm thoroughfares, circa 1960; blurry, weirdly poetic details from snapshots and home movies; oft-repeated images of the white-bearded Ayler blowing his sax.

The movie starts and ends with shots of Mr. Ayler’s 89-year-old father searching for his son’s gravesite in an Ohio cemetery, and black-and-white film snippets of the saxophonist standing against a blank wall and somewhat furtively looking into the camera, as if daring us to connect with him.

Throughout, Mr. Collin repeats certain quotations as if they were signature riffs recurring in a tune. The most electrifying is a statement from Mr. Ayler, confidently predicting the staying power of his music: “If people don’t like it now, they will.”

MY NAME IS ALBERT AYLER

Opens today in Manhattan.

Written, produced and directed by Kasper Collin; director of photography, Peter Palm; edited by Eva Hillstrom, Patrick Austen and Mr. Collin. At the Anthology Film Archives, 32 Second Avenue, at Second Street, East Village. Running time: 79 minutes. This film is not rated.

[Lazaro Vega]

Was it mentioned that Donald Ayler passed away on October 21st?

http://www.ayler.org/albert/html/what_s_new.html

[brownie]

Previous Don Ayler thread.

[brownie]

The New York Times by the way did not bother to print a story about Don Ayler's death.

They just mentioned that he passed away in their review of the 'My Name is Albert Ayler' film

[Lazaro Vega]

Thanks Brownie. I see you were way up on this.

[baptizum]

spiritual unity is prettymuch the best album ever. never heard anything else that he headed

[clifford_thornton]

Worth listening to all of it.

That's right, ALL of it.

[AndrewHill]

Interesting item on Ebay-appears to be an Ayler record store poster from the late '60's. Can anyone verify if this is the case?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ALBERT-AYLER-RECORD-ST...1QQcmdZViewItem

[clifford_thornton]

Probably - images appear to be those from the Impulse cover shoot.

Cool, thanks for posting...

[AndrewHill]

No problem! If it would remain affordable, I would consider bidding; now that would be a nice item to hang in the listening room.

[clifford_thornton]

Buy it...

[AndrewHill]

If it stays around $60, maybe...

[clifford_thornton]

Yeah, funny enough I don't think I've paid more than $20-$30 for an Ayler LP!

[jazzbo]

According to an ESP email newsbit there are about 500 copies of the Ayler box set (Revenant) available and there won't be a repressing/reprint.

This is a musthave box set for anyone who is seriously into Ayler. Just thought I'd put it out there if you were "waiting." I'm sure there's still some time, but I wouldn't take for granted it'll always be around.

[AndrewHill]

Second that. A pity that there's not going to be a repressing. Any Ayler fan in the future will be hard pressed to get so much great music for a reasonable price.

[clifford_thornton]

I think Revenant made too many of those. It doesn't have the crossover appeal/lavishness of the Patton box or the rock-completism of the Beefheart box.

Don't get me wrong, some interesting and important music contained therein (and a fine book) - just think it could've been slimmed down and made in a smaller edition.

[jazzbo]

I think they made enough. . .most of those that really wanted this box have it or plan to have it by now, except new fans (they're always the victims of the jazz collecting wars). I'm glad they made these exactly as they did!

[king ubu]

500 in total, or 500 remaining (how many in total then)?

great box, in my opinion (only bad is the overlap with the Ayler release, but I've said that before...)

[jazzbo]

500 remaining, no idea how many were made.

Here's the text:

In July, 2007, Revenant Records granted ESP-DISK' exclusive distribution rights for its Grammy Nominated Albert Ayler 9-CD box set entitled Holy Ghost: Rare & Unissued Recordings (1962-70) (RVN213).

This box set will not be re-printed and there are only 500 left. If you don't have one, act now!

Available at http://catalog.espdisk.com

[king ubu]

500 remaining, no idea how many were made.

Here's the text:

In July, 2007, Revenant Records granted ESP-DISK' exclusive distribution rights for its Grammy Nominated Albert Ayler 9-CD box set entitled Holy Ghost: Rare & Unissued Recordings (1962-70) (RVN213).

This box set will not be re-printed and there are only 500 left. If you don't have one, act now!

Available at http://catalog.espdisk.com

Thanks, makes more sense than 500 alltogether... great box, and one of the very things so far that I've actually pre-ordered (or at least I ordered it just when it was released, can't even remember).

[Late]

Rather than start a new thread, I thought I'd bump this one up — it's old, but worth reading.

I wanted to ask a few questions though:

Did the 50th anniversary edition of Spiritual Unity actually come out on compact disc? I only have the (legal) download, but couldn't find evidence of a hardcopy. The bonus track, which was new to me, is wonderful. I haven't yet listened to the session outside of the laptop, but it seems to have improved sound. One thing I did notice (and don't notice on the ZYX compact disc edition) is the glaring edit (just after :01) in "Spirits." A bad splice if there ever was one. Anyone else hear this?

[jazzbo]

It has come out on CD. I've had it and spun it but haven't really been able to sit down with it and really listen. Seems a bit improved, the bonus track is great to have there, and I didn't notice the edit last time through.