Albert Ayler: The Other Stuff

[ep1str0phy]

I'm currently in the midst of an Albert Ayler listening binge--which is tantamount to jogging in quicksand, as far as I'm concerned. For me, spending time with some of Ayler's music means spending time with all of Ayler's music. I've heard the opinion that Spiritual Unity is the perfect, singular encapsulation of what made Ayler so special--and it certainly is his iconic recording--paradigmatic, in a sense--but far from the whole picture. Spiritual Unity is only the zenith of Ayler's music insofar as the Ayler of a certain juncture ('64-'64ish) was absolutely sui generis and, by virtue of its precedence and influence, the apex of its genre. But (other than the heroic album art, its place/historical ordering in the emergence of free jazz, the weird, ghastly test signal toward the end of the record--which reminds me a bit of the fetishized, conspicuous silence at the heart of Yoshihiro Nakamura's Fish Story) there's not much that makes Spiritual Unity in and of itself better than Prophecy, Spirits Rejoice, The Hilversum Session, or (my personal favorite) Vibrations/Ghosts.

*(I will note that a close friend of mine--present for Ornette and Monk, respectively, at the Five Spot, Trane's stints at the Half Note and Village Gate, the NYAQ in Copenhagen--I have no idea how he was in so many interesting places in such a narrow span of time--noted that Spiritual Unity comes closest to how Ayler sounded live. I will admit that there's something really blunt and confrontational about the sound quality and balance on that album, and maybe it's that starkness that makes it the classic.)

Even limiting things to the epochal '64-'65 recordings means that we miss the development of the "string band" (which really did sound different with each personnel change), the wild but occasionally rewarding later Impulse sessions, and the Fondation Maeght recordings. Stopping after Peacock leaves the band ignores the fact that Ayler's playing did go through futher, increasingly bizarre evolutions as the 60's wore on--that piercing altissimo that dominates the string band recordings, for one, and the hardcore/post-Lionel Hampton band chording/rasp that he achieves on the final Impulse sides for another.

Throwing the door open, maybe we can talk about some of our favorite less celebrated Ayler recordings? A couple of my picks:

The Copenhagen Tapes

Straight up, Vibrations is my favorite Ayler and the Cherry quartet is my favorite Ayler band. I heard the stories about Dolphy joining up with this group, and had that quintet been a thing, it would have been unbeatable in that idiom. Talk about a freaking supergroup. Cherry at this historical juncture ('64 or so) is both an original player and a phenomenal mirror--someone who manages to frame other instrumentalists in interesting, revealing ways whilst retaining a very personal musical identity. What Cherry does in this quartet is amazing--he is Ayler's melodic equal but very distinct in terms of color and attack (mostly much lighter). The unison and collectively improvised (i.e., two horn) passages in this band are just ridiculous, because they're bebop-caliber tight--they manage to endow Ayler's lines with a sense of logic and inevitability that just isn't there on the trio recordings.

I'm singling out the Copenhagen Music because they're bad to the damn bone. Ayler is operating at a technical level similar to, but maybe even more extreme than the Spiritual Unity/Prophecy stuff. The September 3 version of "Vibrations" is just fucked up--that's the sort of stuff that makes you jump out of your seat if you're not prepared for it. I don't think Ayler had quite reached the facility on upper register that he did/would with the string band, and that extra bit of effort expended on getting the notes out juuuust right gives the music this sheen of agony and power that is absolutely spine-tingling.

June 30/July 1 1967, Newport - Albert Ayler Quintet

-This one was on Disc 6 of the Holy Ghost box, and I think it may be the best of the recorded string band music. I've heard plenty of people complain about the fact that there's simply too much of this band to digest--on the epic Greenwich Village sides, Slug's Saloon, and on Discs 3-5 of Holy Ghost--and I might agree with that to an extent. I think the excess and insistency of this music is both its weakness and its strong point--it's almost a dance band, simplifying everything--motivic complexity (both in a global thematic sense and in terms of the tiny melodic cells that serve as transitions within the pieces--I once heard someone make the point that this is probably because of Donald Ayler's technical limitations, and I'm inclined to agree), improvisations (Ayler is at full tilt altissimo for almost all of his solos), and especially rhythm (whereas Murray was exaggeratedly dynamic, Beaver Harris and, to a lesser extent, Ronald Shannon Jackson are content to thrash). On the other hand, if Ayler's goal was to communicate--or, rather, to frame his talents in "intelligble" terms--this band comes closer than any of Ayler's music to striking a balance between complexity, simplicity, and virtuosity.

The Newport set might be my favorite because it is intense, complex, manages to feature all of the band members to striking effect, and is short. It packs all of the intensity of the Slug's sides--plus Milford Graves--into under 25 minutes. The band wants to make it count. Michel Samson gets his chirping upper register interlude--and it's brief. Donald Ayler squeezes off a brief, effective barrage of limited range firepower. Albert plays one of the most blistering altissimo solos of his career, and he even manages to fit in some weird vocals ("Japan," which is the same song the Pharoah features on Tauhid) and some alto and soprano playing.

[jeffcrom]

Great post, not surprisingly. I agree with almost all the above. Since the Holy Ghost box set came out, the 1967 Newport set is the music I turn to most often - it catches that band at a peak.

The session called Witches and Devils in the U.S. and Spirits in Europe was the first Ayler I heard, and it's the first Ayler album on which he totally abandoned song forms and regular pulse. I actually first heard just one track, "Spirits," on an Arista/Freedom sampler LP. I was shocked and horrified - why would anyone want make music which sounded like that? But the same question intrigued me, so I kept playing that track. After about half a dozen listenings, I realized that it was a semi-improvised rondo - Ayler kept coming back to the melody between improvised passages. It made sense to me after that, and I actually started enjoying it. Witches and Devils is tentative compared to Spiritual Unity and the next few recordings, but I love the atmosphere; Ayler and the band are feeling their way into a new way of making music.

A one-off track is one of my favorite Ayler recordings: "Holy Ghost" from The New Wave of Jazz on Impulse. Incredible focus and intensity here, along with a great cello solo by Joel Freedman (Friedman?). To me, that track marks the end of an era, for better or worse. With the next recording, Bells, the simple melodic material Ayler used started taking on more importance; the composed melodies got longer and the solos started getting shorter. That was a change which was apparently important to Ayler, but whatever was gained, I feel that something was lost.

Edited November 16, 2012 by jeffcrom

[jazzbo]

What an amazing musician Albert was. Great post and thread ep1strophy.

The Revenant box was such a huge boon to Ayler fans. Even though I had much of it there were exciting portions I had not heard before. I really like the material with Samson.

Lately I've revisited "Live on the Riviera" which hadn't really touched me before, and I'm really enjoying this final period of Ayler, and thinking about what that may have developed into.

[colinmce]

I might have more to add later, but I'll note that Spirits Rejoice is my favorite Ayler album. I love the cavernous sound and the three horn front line. While Don Cherry was "better", I like Donald best of all next to Ayler. The version of "Angels" here, with that huge echo, is mesmerizing. I'll never forget blasting it to high hell in the college radio station-- my show was Sinday nights so I had the whole place to myself. And the wind-up on the opening title track is like nothing else. This is Ayler at his most gorgeous.

I'm also a big fan of the string band. My favorite stuff is the Europe 1966 material on Holy Ghost and hatOLOGY.

[JohnS]

I'd go along with Holy Ghost from the New Wave In Jazz as being my favourite Ayler. I'll spin the Newport music tomorrow.

So fortunate to have seen Albert live. What an amazing sound.

[jeffcrom]

Okay, talk about "less celebrated"....

This morning I listened, for the first time in awhile, to the two albums which came out of AA's last Impulse sessions (August 26-29, 1969). Music is the Healing Force of the Universe and The Last Album are often ignored, and when not ignored, reviled. And not without reason - Healing Force is pretty bad, for the most part (although I've always liked the blues/rock energy of "Drudgery"), and Mary Maria/Park's contributions mostly make me want to stick my head in an oven. ("Again Comes the Rising of the Sun," which she recites on The Last Album, is one of the most inane poems I've ever heard.)

But as I said in the vinyl thread, The Last Album came across as one third painfully bad, one third okay/listenable, and one third excellent. The excellence is found in the last two tracks, "Birth of Mirth" and "Water Music." "Birth" builds to one of those high-energy, atonal, climactic solos that had become rare in Ayler's output by 1969. And "Water Music" is deep and elegiac - it reminds me of "For John Coltrane," another favorite Ayler track of mine.

Much of the rest of these albums is hard going. But I would hate to be without "Drudgery," "Birth of Mirth," and "Water Music."

And did Mary Parks really compose (or co-compose) every single piece from these two albums, including tracks that were obviously improvisations? Please.

[John L]

Okay, talk about "less celebrated"....

This morning I listened, for the first time in awhile, to the two albums which came out of AA's last Impulse sessions (August 26-29, 1969). Music is the Healing Force of the Universe and The Last Album are often ignored, and when not ignored, reviled. And not without reason - Healing Force is pretty bad, for the most part (although I've always liked the blues/rock energy of "Drudgery"), and Mary Maria/Park's contributions mostly make me want to stick my head in an oven. ("Again Comes the Rising of the Sun," which she recites on The Last Album, is one of the most inane poems I've ever heard.)

But as I said in the vinyl thread, The Last Album came across as one third painfully bad, one third okay/listenable, and one third excellent. The excellence is found in the last two tracks, "Birth of Mirth" and "Water Music." "Birth" builds to one of those high-energy, atonal, climactic solos that had become rare in Ayler's output by 1969. And "Water Music" is deep and elegiac - it reminds me of "For John Coltrane," another favorite Ayler track of mine.

Much of the rest of these albums is hard going. But I would hate to be without "Drudgery," "Birth of Mirth," and "Water Music."

And did Mary Parks really compose (or co-compose) every single piece from these two albums, including tracks that were obviously improvisations? Please.

I agree. Ayler's output on the latter Impulse! albums may have been uneven, but the high points were remarkable. Drudgery is certainly one of them. Sun Watcher is another. Ayler could sound great in a roots R&B/blues context. I wouldn't be without any of the Impulse! albums, despite the low points on some of them. I wish that there were more Ayler gospel albums, or at least one where he really lets go over some gospel songs, maybe together with singers.

Among Ayler's various bands, the only one that can sometimes wear thin on me pretty fast is the string band with Samson. But I see that there are big fans of that band here as well.

Edited November 16, 2012 by John L

[ep1str0phy]

Right on, jeffcrom. Your post reminded me that we definitely talked about this stuff before--then I realized that this thread happened:

I'm not sure my opinion has changed, but I'm right with you on the quartet tracks. I'm not sure what the motivations behind recording such a grab bag of pieces was--nothing on those two albums sounds commercial, and the bagpipe pieces have to rank among Ayler's most alienating, forbidding music. Maybe Ayler was trying to break formula (after the relatively slight but consistent Love Cry and the disaster/brave experiment of New Grass--dependent on who you ask), maybe we has scrambling to try some new things out. Unlike Archie Shepp, whose albums in the late 60's/early 70's were similarly scattershot but retained a sense of conceptual and psychological unity, the last two Ayler albums sound desperate and confused, like someone who'd suddenly forgotten what his music was supposed to sound like.

Apparently this wasn't the case live--not if the Fondation recordings have anything to say about it--but we'll never really, fully know. I've been rereading the Holy Ghost book here and there--apparently that final live recording on the disc 7 of the box is closer to the music Ayler was developing at the time (he selected the Fondation repertoire under the premise that it had all been recorded before and, thusly, he wouldn't get ripped off nearly as bad when the concerts got issued on record). Anyway, that last concert is really perplexing--he still sounds like Ayler, naturally, but many of the arrangements are (if anything) more conventional than the stuff played at the Fondation concerts--disarmingly so, in much the fashion cats like Shepp, Pharoah, and (from personal experience) Eddie Gale reverted to playing "straight" music without really buttoning down their freer tendencies (when soloing).

What really strikes me about the last two Impulse albums is that, taken as works of "music" (rather than Ayler albums), there's a lot of really interesting arranging and deft conceptualization going on. I would be completely into "Music Is the Healing Force of the Universe" or "Island Harvest" if they'd been recorded by, say, the Battered Ornaments, whose first album was actually a (sort-of) British take-off on New Grass. Also, there's not a lot separating the ensemble improvisations on Healing Force from some of Frank Wright's later music (w/Eddie Jefferson--around the time he got into those weird modal/blues hybrid records)--and Ayler sort of "borrowed" Wright's trademark rhythm team for this album, anyway (Few and Ali). It's all sloppy and tentative on the Impulse sides, but I do think Ayler was on to something.

[clifford_thornton]

Yes on Battered Ornaments!

It's interesting that you bring up Wright's later straight-ahead/blues numbers, which are disheveled but ultimately quite strong dates in my opinion. I think like Ayler, Wright's primary desire was to communicate a range of emotions to a lot of people. In Europe, for a certain amount of time, he got that - the Center of the World group and Unity (with Jack Gregg in for Silva, IIRC) were quite well-regarded on the festival circuit. The groups he led with Georges Arvanitas and Eddie Jefferson (among others) were a merger of his innate Wright-ness and a post-bop sensibility that was just as rousing as the more "free" ensembles.

If you want to talk about really hit-or-miss weirdness, check out Wright's LPs with the German artist/amateur musician A.R. Penck. They are gloriously messy combinations of free music, rock, and R&B influences, unhinged fun but probably not for everybody.

[ep1str0phy]

Yes on Battered Ornaments!

It's interesting that you bring up Wright's later straight-ahead/blues numbers, which are disheveled but ultimately quite strong dates in my opinion. I think like Ayler, Wright's primary desire was to communicate a range of emotions to a lot of people. In Europe, for a certain amount of time, he got that - the Center of the World group and Unity (with Jack Gregg in for Silva, IIRC) were quite well-regarded on the festival circuit. The groups he led with Georges Arvanitas and Eddie Jefferson (among others) were a merger of his innate Wright-ness and a post-bop sensibility that was just as rousing as the more "free" ensembles.

If you want to talk about really hit-or-miss weirdness, check out Wright's LPs with the German artist/amateur musician A.R. Penck. They are gloriously messy combinations of free music, rock, and R&B influences, unhinged fun but probably not for everybody.

Wow--I had no idea about Jack Gregg playing in that band. Something new every day...

In much the manner that the "House of Trane" was sort of de facto partitioned after Coltrane's passing--Archie Shepp continued/developed the tradition of sideman sponsorship via massive recording projects, Pharoah took on the spiritualist modal angle, Alice picked up on Trane's baroque conceptual apirations and developed her own wild orchestral music, Rashied cultivated the DIY/loft aesthetic (to say nothing of guys like the sidemen of Trane's sidemen--Dave Liebman, Steve Grossman, Azar Lawrence, etc. who picked up on and shadowed Trane of various vintages)--Ayler's legacy fell upon a bunch of other folks who did sundry, sometimes very artful things with it. Peter Brotzmann was one--he secularized the Ayler aesthetic and in turn transformed it into something almost punkishly violent, confrontational, and ambivalent (which speaks/spoke to a whole other type of listening). Frank Wright, on the other hand, seemed capable of sustaining the consistent ensemble and singular sound that Ayler struggled to keep going for more than one or two years at a time in the 60's--he realized a certain part of the "spirit" of Ayler's music (the celebratory, ecstatic part), and I guess he was sort of rewarded for that.

[clifford_thornton]

Yeah, true re: Wright but he had a naturally "funky" side that I never heard (please correct me if I'm wrong!) in Ayler's music. Not really. I can't imagine "Church Number Nine" coming from the Ayler camp, for example.

[B. Clugston]

And did Mary Parks really compose (or co-compose) every single piece from these two albums, including tracks that were obviously improvisations? Please.

It was a royalties thing. It's possible she may have had a hand in some of the pieces beyond the lyrics, but there are all Ayler pieces, except for the blues songs, which Ayler co-wrote with Henry Vestine and Bill Folwell. "Water Music" actually dates back to the Ronald Shannon Jackson era.

A pretty good single album could be created out of the final two Impulse albums.

[brownie]

Something that always struck me was the failure of fully capturing on record the sonic intensity of his music.

It was a volcano eruption.

Albert Ayler's meteoric presence in our midst prevents me from focusing on lesser albums.

There are not enough recorded testimonies of his music to differentiate between them.

All of it need to be heard as evidence of a man with a total musical honesty.

Just wish there was enough material available on unknown on tapes to warrant a second Revenant box...

[John L]

Something that always struck me was the failure of fully capturing on record the sonic intensity of his music.

It was a volcano eruption.

Albert Ayler's meteoric presence in our midst prevents me from focusing on lesser albums.

There are not enough recorded testimonies of his music to differentiate between them.

All of it need to be heard as evidence of a man with a total musical honesty.

Just wish there was enough material available on unknown on tapes to warrant a second Revenant box...

One of my big regrets is having never seen Albert Ayler live.

[Pete C]

There's some interestesting things going on in the electric Ayler stuff, but only promise. I think if he were around 20 years longer and could have worked with Laswell something interesting could have happened (based on Ask the Ages and Too Much Sugar for a Dime).