*** Cecil Taylor ***

[7/4]

(and this Shawn poster in monkey see monkey duh mode)

Okay Chauncey, Clem, whatever you're calling yourself this week...got a great idea, why don't you go outside and play hide and go fuck yourself?

No one should have to put up with personal attacks from Clem. Clem should go fly a kite.

[marcello]

What makes you think this is Clem?

Do you really think that Clem gives a flying you know what about NYT copyright issues?

I know I don't, so post away, David!

[7/4]

What makes you think this is Clem?

Do you really think that Clem gives a flying you know what about NYT copyright issues?

I know I don't, so post away, David!

ChaunceyMorehouse writes like Clem and mysteriously writes about the same issues as Clem.

Smells like Clem. Walks like Clem. Looks like Clem, apparently I'm not the only one who thinks so.

[Aggie87]

What makes you think this is Clem?

Do you really think that Clem gives a flying you know what about NYT copyright issues?

I know I don't, so post away, David!

ChaunceyMorehouse writes like Clem and mysteriously writes about the same issues as Clem.

Smells like Clem. Walks like Clem. Looks like Clem, apparently I'm not the only one who thinks so.

But Chauncey claims to be a 64 year old grandmother!

Though a grandmother that's equally at home discussing handjobs and Thom Yorke's solo album and Radiohead's humor-impaired fans. How many 64 yr olds would even have a clue about what Radiohead fans are like?

Or know Organissimo board members as well as she does after only being on the board for 10 days?

[AllenLowe]

CAESAR STABBED TO DEATH

ROME TIMES 15 March BCE

Julius Ceasar was stabbed to death today by a conspiracy of disgruntled Roman Senators. According to Dannus Gouldus at a rally afterwards, "any fuckin' moron can see that J.C. was murdered by a lone nut."

Gouldus than informed the crowd that "the world is fuckin' flat."

Edited June 24, 2008 by AllenLowe

[ep1str0phy]

I stopped paying attention to Gouldus a long time ago.

[clarke68]

i know i for one would never see any of these articles if not for people like 7/4. so i am glad they are here even if i never read 90 percent of them.

though i had thought up until yesterday i needed to log into the nytimes online to read anything and i guess that isn't true.

but still...i am too lazy.

I think Chauncey's point, overstated tho it is, is more that these articles should be linked to, rather than cut & pasted outright, so the the author('s website) can see some of the resulting clickthrough/ad impressions/income/whatever.

I'm with you that I wouldn't see a tenth of these articles if they weren't pointed out here or on JC...and despite the quality concerns Chauncey brings up (maybe more other place than here...the Taylor article wasn't bad), I see no issue with mentioning an article about Cecil Taylor in a thread about Cecil Taylor, with or without commentary.

Very cool Taylor will be playing SF again this year...I heard he all but cleared the room the last time he played Grace Cathedral in 1991. I've only seen him once, at the North Sea Jazz Festival in 1990 (with Tony Oxley and William Parker, I'm pretty sure), and was profoundly blown away. I'd love to hear him with this recently introduced (?) spaciousness in his playing...hopefully I can make the gig in October.

[ep1str0phy]

One of my bandleaders did one of those massive blowout workshops with Cecil in the Bay Area a few years back--it culminated in a recording session at Mills, cut off abruptly when Cecil wasn't too psyched about, I think, the financial situation. He gave the band a lecture about the music industry and everyone went home; I brought this up to someone later on and apparently it's not uncommon with Cecil. With the note about Grace Cathedral, which in other places and to other people might be depressing, I imagine just how resolute Cecil is and how much (or how little?) he probably gives a damn.

[AllenLowe]

he's full of shit - ask him what he pays his sidemen -

[marcello]

I can see your point Ms. Morehouse, if in fact internet stats are important to a writer and his editor, but I still think it's a small point and I will not get in the way of any pissing contest between members. I don't think 7/4 ever claimed he was a writer, as a point of fact, and if I post a article, I'm reminded to just post the link.

Best,

Tom Marcello

[AllenLowe]

7/4 Nabbed in Internet Probe

6/24/08 Hobarfus, New Jersey

UPI

Organissimo board member 7/4 was arrested today along with 3 druids, 4 hermaphrodites, 7 Jews and a 14 year old girl by the ATF in a city-wide dragnet-sting of internet copyright criminals. Claiming that the 14 year old was his wife, 7/4 said that the Jews and hermaphrodites were part of a scientific experiment to determine if people of different cultural and religious backgrounds could learn to improvise using hard-boiled eggs and kosher salt. "Jazz is my life," 7/4 said under intense police interrogation, "but I do know the difference between a hermaphrodite and an Israel-ite."

[jlhoots]

Since I have 2 posters on "ignore" (guess which 2), this seems mostly like the usual bullshit.

Of course, I could be wrong, & this ignored stuff will all change the course of human discourse. I can live without it.

What a relief!!

[king ubu]

now if you all allow me to mention something actually related to CT again for a change...

a friend of mine finally got hold of "Akisakila Vol. 1" (the Konnex CD, I own Vol. 2 which holds the final 20 minutes of the 80+ minute improv by CT/Lyons/Cyrille, plus a solo album called "Lono").

Now what about sound? It seems the recording is balanced rather badly, too loud at some moments. Was that the case with the original vinyl issue already? Has this never been a great-sounding recording, really? Can anyone shed some light, please?

[AllenLowe]

Chauncey, I think you mean Carlos (don't forget the S, my love) Marcello, one of the plotters to kill JFK -

as for what I've said here previously, who knows? I'm on my own ignore list, so I can't quite recall -

honored, however, to be placed among the fluxus art, for which I clearly have a capacity (a fluxus capacity, we might say) -

Cecil needs to pay his younger sidemen a living wage - as Braxton does, with his ultimate and personal compassion, honesty, and fairness -

Edited June 25, 2008 by AllenLowe

[paul secor]

Cecil needs to pay his younger sidemen a living wage - as Braxton does, with his ultimate and personal compassion, honesty, and fairness -

Perhaps you can elaborate, Allen.

[7/4]

So all I have to do is post a full article without a link and Clem's head will explode?

Cool...

.

[AllenLowe]

my reference to wages has to do with concerts a few years ago in which Cecil did a series, hired a lot of young musicians, and basically paid them nothing -

[king ubu]

my reference to wages has to do with concerts a few years ago in which Cecil did a series, hired a lot of young musicians, and basically paid them nothing -

well, for them it was learning experience, wasn't it? others pay for that

(aren't similar stories being told about Braxton when doing large ensemble stuff with young musicians?)

[JETman]

I'd be curious to know what Braxton paid Crispell, Hemingway and Dresser back in 1985.

[AllenLowe]

I do know that Braxton paid his sidemen well when he did his opera a few years agao - too well, from what I hear - as for the learning experience, well, that is the usual claim, but that does not mitigate the unfairness, I think, of underpayment - it's just one more rationalization from musicians who should know better. It's a question of them getting just a little bit less and allowing their musicians to get a decent pay date - for one example, a very famous jazz musician used to get about $7500 for his quartet, and paid his sidemen about $250 each - they were kids in their 20s, but it was still work - and do the math; he could have paid them, say, $750 each and still made more than $5000 for about one hour's work in concert.

Edited June 25, 2008 by AllenLowe

[musicmargaret]

Getting back to the subject of the music of Cecil Taylor, if I may, he played solo on June 2Oth at the Ethical Culture Society auditorium here in New York City as part of the JVC Jazz Festival; George Cables also played solo as the opener. They had an enormous Steinway to play, but it was not in top condition, and it was painted bright red as though it were a garish piece of furniture. There was a review in "The New York Times," but apparently the critic heard some other concert than the one we heard. Ah, well, no surprise.

Mr. Taylor is scheduled to play duets with Tony Oxley at the Village Vanguard, also here in New York City, July 15th-2Oth ('O8), www.villagevanguard.net/html/schedule.htm.

Doubtless there are more Cecil Taylor concerts scheduled as well, but one I know about is listed at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco on Friday, October 24th in the San Francisco Jazz Festival: www.sfjazz.org/concerts/2008/fall/artists/Taylor.asp.

(photo by Vanita or Joe Monk, Berlin, 'O3)

About what Prof. Braxton may have paid the musicians in his opera project, I haven't done any research or made any inquiries on this, but I heard that he had just won his MacArthur "genius" award (some $3OO,OOO in cash at the time), and that is how he wanted to spend it. And he did. (Does anyone know the Sara Teasdale poem that includes the line "Spend all you have for loveliness"?)

Very briefly, on the topic of what individual musicians get paid for concerts (or recordings), often it's the producer and / or manager and/ or booking agent who handles this, and it's a great relief to the leader not to have to get involved with the business side of things at all, though the leader CAN set down a ruling such as "Everybody in my band gets paid the same as I do" (I hate to tell you how rare those leaders are, but they do exist), or "I get half, and you divide up the other half with the rest of the musicians," or "Give the trumpet player more because he wrote three of the arrangements," or....

If sidemen / woman have complaints, they can address them to the leader, but most likely their contract, if they have one, will come from a business entity such as the booking agency. Sometimes there isn't any contract because only the leader has one, and of course the side players don't know its provisions, so it's impossible to know what to ask for. And without an individual contract, there is no recourse.

"King Ubu," no doubt you were joking, but about musicians exploiting their colleagues, whether young or not, it's very sad when this happens. Not only does it cause the exploited ones hardship (unless they have independent means), but it teaches them the wrong lessons.

Edited June 26, 2008 by musicmargaret

[king ubu]

Of course, that was meant tongue-in-cheek...

Anyone knows about the sound quality of the original "Akisakila" vinyl release? Is it as bad as the Konnex CDs? I asked this above, but it seems mostly this thread has gone so far from CT's music that no one even noticed yet.

[Chuck Nessa]

Of course, that was meant tongue-in-cheek...

Anyone knows about the sound quality of the original "Akisakila" vinyl release? Is it as bad as the Konnex CDs? I asked this above, but it seems mostly this thread has gone so far from CT's music that no one even noticed yet.

Assumptions, hearsay and fading memory regarding Akisakila - I have the original vinyl, heard the Konnex discs were needle drops and own a Japanese cd reissue on AMJ. I bought the cds about 8 years ago and memory says it was better/different than the original lps.

[king ubu]

Of course, that was meant tongue-in-cheek...

Anyone knows about the sound quality of the original "Akisakila" vinyl release? Is it as bad as the Konnex CDs? I asked this above, but it seems mostly this thread has gone so far from CT's music that no one even noticed yet.

Assumptions, hearsay and fading memory regarding Akisakila - I have the original vinyl, heard the Konnex discs were needle drops and own a Japanese cd reissue on AMJ. I bought the cds about 8 years ago and memory says it was better/different than the original lps.

That would be the Japanese 2CD reissue that does only contain the actual Akisakila, then? (as opposed to the Konnexes which also have the "Lono" solo album to fill up the second volume)

Thanks a lot Chuck, for weighing in!

[Chuck Nessa]

That would be the Japanese 2CD reissue that does only contain the actual Akisakila, then? (as opposed to the Konnexes which also have the "Lono" solo album to fill up the second volume)

Correct. I have the solo disc on vinyl and a Japanese cd from 2002.