Rising Tones Cross (Ebba Jahn, 1985)
https://memora8ilia.com/index.php/2023/04/29/rising-tones-cross-ebba-jahn-1985/
jazz
Cecil Taylor in Imagine The Sound (Ron Mann, 1981)
https://memora8ilia.com/index.php/2023/04/12/cecil-taylor-in-imagine-the-sound-ron-mann-1981/
The Cry of Jazz (Edward O. Bland, 1959)
❝ Edward O. Bland’s low-budget dramatic filmmaking is stark, but his cultural insights—as seen in this philosophical featurette, from 1959, based on his own writings—are profound. It’s set at a party, in Chicago, at which white jazz enthusiasts ask Black friends about the music. The protagonist, Alex (George Waller), relates the form of jazz—and the existential edge of Black musicians’ performances—to history and politics, and, remarkably, predicts both the dwindling of jazz as a genre and its inspiration of real-world change. Filmed performances by Sun Ra and other musicians are intercut with trenchant documentary footage—of double Dutch and street basketball and church services, substandard housing and neglected public spaces—that displays what Alex calls the “joy and suffering” of Black American life. The movie, which is as passionate as it is analytical, suggests a new dimension in music criticism. ❞ *
https://memora8ilia.com/index.php/2023/04/08/about-the-film/
Kirk Knuffke / Joe McPhee Quartet + 1 – Keep Up The Dream
An incendiary improv jazz flavor from Joe McPhee and pals to close the week and launch me sky-high onto the weekend.
❝ I’ve never been late to any session, let alone my own! But this energy made it into the music somehow, this crazy morning. Jim the engineer was ready to go and we were tracking the first track within minutes of my coming through the door. It was like walking in while already playing. The music took off on an amazing flight. ❞ *
https://memora8ilia.com/index.php/2023/03/31/kirk-knuffke-joe-mcphee-quartet-1-keep-the/
Psychic Temple Plays Planet Caravan
❝ But in the darkness still we find an obsidian shimmer. Heather Sommerhauser drones starless synthesizer tones. Billy Mohler’s upright bass sculpts the cosmic web. It quickens; it thickens. It recedes; it gives slow shape to chaos. Then at drummer Ben Lumsdaine’s sudden rat-a-tat crescendo, everything snaps into place. Welcome to Plays Planet Caravan. Chris Schlarb helms Psychic Temple, the decade-spanning, member-fluid group that revels in wild combinations. ❞ *
Yes, it is a jam-jazz cover of the Black Sabbath song. And it’s terrific.
https://memora8ilia.com/index.php/2022/08/05/psychic-temple-planet-caravan-psychic-temple/