Slow-burning Free Jazz

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Free jazz does not always equal noisy. Help me find free jazz records full of improv just not as intense, loud or confrontational as Ayler. Conference of the Birds but even more relaxed. As out as can be but slow-burning.

― mcd (mcd), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 15:39 (twenty-one years ago)

Tony Oxley, The Baptised Traveller.

― hstencil (hstencil), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 15:40 (twenty-one years ago)

yeah the Oxley is great, or also Spontaneous Music Ensemble - Karyobin.

Steve Lacy Quartet - The Forest and The Zoo .. two simmering side-long tracks, featuring one of my favorite bassists Johnny Dyani and a really on-form Enrico Rava; just listened to this one Saturday. RIP Steve.

Maybe get the Art Ensemble of Chicago's People in Sorrow - one long track spread over two sides, and a pretty sterling example of 'slow-burning'; doesn't really get wild and wooly until the end.

If you haven't already, you ought to check out Jimmy Guiffre's groups - go for Free Fall, a real touchstone of sustained soft intensity.

I dunno .. many others; my brain is failing this morning.

― Broheems (diamond), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 16:09 (twenty-one years ago)

Actually both Art Ensemble of Chicago's "A Jackson In My House" and "Message to Our Folks" have chilled out moments

― Dadaismus (Dada), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 16:14 (twenty-one years ago)

I still need to get Karyobin. There's a CD reish of that around, right? 'Cause finding the vinyl would be tough.

Yeah, AEoC stuff has some slow-burn stuff, esp. the America label ones. The Albert Ayler tribute on Phase One has got some nice near-psych-sounding percussion stuff at the beginning.

― hstencil (hstencil), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 16:21 (twenty-one years ago)

Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre's "Humility in the Light of the Creator" is probably the album that got me into free jazz. slow and beautiful with just a few freaked out moments.

― JaXoN (JasonD), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 16:27 (twenty-one years ago)

Any of Susie Ibarra's records. Maybe some Wadada Leo Smith...I know there's a big one that I'm forgetting, hopefully it will come to mind.

― Jordan (Jordan), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 16:33 (twenty-one years ago)

There are some fine suggestions here. Thanks.

Yeah, all that Art Ensemble stuff I have, and is indeed the kind of thing I am thinking of, although admittedly Art Ensemble I always think of as its own separate branch of music.

I was just going to ask about Susie Ibarra. I love her playing on the David S. Ware albums. I'm woefully inexperienced in her solo work. Any record in particular?

― mcd (mcd), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 16:37 (twenty-one years ago)

Check out "Nuba" by Andrew Cyrille, too.

― poop (poop), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 17:09 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm not sure Baptised Traveller, great tho' it is (the follow up, 4 Compositions, might be even better) entirely works as a 'slow-burner' - it might not be as full-on fierce as lots of US equivs, or those early Brotzmann albs w/ a lot of the same players, but it still gets squally/noisy pretty quickly.

Karyobin was reished on CD on in the UK six years or so ago - it has since gone out of print again, but shldn't be too tough to track down.

If you like Conference of the Birds, then there are quite a few other ECM albs that deliver a similar kind of chamber free jazz - Afternoon of a Georgia Fawn by Marion Brown etc.

My suggestion - one of Cecil Taylor's more 'meditative' recs - Double Holy House on FMP, maybe

― Andrew L (Andrew L), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 21:17 (twenty-one years ago)

The Baptised Traveller has those great quiet sections with Derek Bailey playing through a volume pedal (imagine that!), and that's what immediately came to mind when I thought of "slow-burning."

― hstencil (hstencil), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 21:19 (twenty-one years ago)

Doesn't Bailey quite often play with ('through'?) a volume pedal?
I take yr point abt 'slow-burning' not necess equalling 'building to a big finish', tho...

What abt AMM?

― Andrew L (Andrew L), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 21:30 (twenty-one years ago)

yeah, Baptised Traveller's a busy record, a mass of percolating voices, but is it really loud? Parker and Wheeler never really get into screeching tones, multiphonics and overblowing and the like, do they? I guess that's why I think the British school of improv tends to come to mind as a sort of converse to the likes of Ayler/Shepp and their descendants in America. I'll listen again.

― Broheems (diamond), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 21:31 (twenty-one years ago)

Bailey seems to play through a pedal less and less, and obviously a lot of what he plays on isn't really jazz (as opposed to the Oxley record, which clearly is). Also, AMM isn't jazz (don't mean they don't slow-burn, tho).

― hstencil (hstencil), Tuesday, 8 June 2004 21:34 (twenty-one years ago)

The first thing that came to mind with the subject heading was the title track to Shepp's Blase.

― Vic Funk, Tuesday, 8 June 2004 23:04 (twenty-one years ago)

I don't think of Karyobin as free jazz really.

I thought the title track to 'blase' was fairly intense but I heard it a while back.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 07:16 (twenty-one years ago)

Other people have heard a lot more Susie Ibarra than I, but Flower After Flower. Very relaxed, pretty, meditative free jazz.

― Jordan (Jordan), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 10:31 (twenty-one years ago)

Some of the ideas on this thread might apply, as well: Soft Improv. (Actually I think some of the same suggestions appear.)

― Rockist Scientist, Wednesday, 9 June 2004 15:05 (twenty-one years ago)

listen to "our prayer" by ayler himself on live in greenwich village. its beautiful.

― tom cleveland (tom cleveland), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 15:10 (twenty-one years ago)

Also, as I said on that other thread, I think lots of Sun Ra's work might fit, but I can't think of one single CD of his that stays in that vein. Maybe his solo Monorails and Satellites, but some of that is fairly inside playing. (Regardless, I think it's well worth hearing.) Much of Out There a Minute is free without being crazed, though there are some wild and wooly moments.

― Rockist Scientist, Wednesday, 9 June 2004 15:13 (twenty-one years ago)

J Church

― jack cole (jackcole), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 15:18 (twenty-one years ago)

A lot of the late-60s/early-70s Pharoah Sanders albums: Karma, Izipho Zam (my favorite), Summun Bukmun Umyun, Jewels Of Thought, Live At The East, Black Unity...basically, all the albums with only 2-3 tracks each. They're all great.

― Phil Freeman (Phil Freeman), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 15:26 (twenty-one years ago)

ill second those pharoah sanders suggestions...

― peter smith (plsmith), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 15:58 (twenty-one years ago)

Alice Coltrane - S/D
Don Cherry - s/d

― JaXoN (JasonD), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 16:06 (twenty-one years ago)

I didn't realize Izipho Zam was reissued. I want that.

― mcd (mcd), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 17:10 (twenty-one years ago)

John Coltrane- Stellar Regions

― earlnash, Wednesday, 9 June 2004 21:12 (twenty-one years ago)

Well at least parts of it are slow burning.

― earlnash, Wednesday, 9 June 2004 21:56 (twenty-one years ago)

the second track on the spring heel jack live thing, maybe

― tom west (thomp), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 23:30 (twenty-one years ago)

three years pass...

http://cgi.ebay.com/Kalaparusha-Maurice-McIntyre-FORCES-AND-FEELINGS-lp_W0QQitemZ190120291133QQihZ009QQcategoryZ306QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

^^^ This record. It is amazing. Get it.

― ian, Saturday, 1 March 2008 22:52 (seventeen years ago)

Motian/Peacock/Bley - Not Two, Not One

― Hurting 2, Saturday, 1 March 2008 23:14 (seventeen years ago)

Marion Brown - Afternoon of a Georgia Faun might fit this

― wmlynch, Sunday, 2 March 2008 00:42 (seventeen years ago)

the second side of meditations is pretty soothing slow burn i think

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Sunday, 2 March 2008 01:23 (seventeen years ago)

Human Arts Ensemble, "Whisper of Dharma"

― Sparkle Motion, Sunday, 2 March 2008 05:54 (seventeen years ago)

Bill Dixon owns this thread -- Son Of Sisyphus, Vade Mecum (volumes 1 & 2), Papyrus (volumes 1 & 2), Berlin Abbozzi...he defines the slow burn like no one else.

― Standing In The Shadows Of Bob, Sunday, 2 March 2008 06:50 (seventeen years ago)

that maurice mcintyre record ian mentioned is in my to sell pile :-/

i'll listen to it tonight. times may have changed.

― jaxon, Sunday, 2 March 2008 07:54 (seventeen years ago)

i really like both the Mcintyre LPs on Delmark. Humilty In The Light... may be better, but Forces & Feelings is aweome as well IMHO.

― ian, Sunday, 2 March 2008 21:53 (seventeen years ago)

Can't recommend these enough:

Air - "Air Time"
Jimmy Giuffre - "Free Fall"
Daniel Carter / Rueben Radding - "Luminescence"

― Usual Channels, Sunday, 2 March 2008 21:59 (seventeen years ago)

http://www.soulstrut.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/badassbuddy_com-slowburner.gif

― deej, Sunday, 2 March 2008 22:02 (seventeen years ago)

two years pass...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/video/2010/sep/13/kalaparusha-maurice-mcintyre-horn-starvation-box

― (+) (+ +), Monday, 13 September 2010 14:12 (fifteen years ago)

probably like 'damn'

― (+) (+ +), Monday, 13 September 2010 14:14 (fifteen years ago)

weirdly, i was listening to Humility... just yesterday. sad, really.

― (+) (+ +), Monday, 13 September 2010 14:19 (fifteen years ago)

didn't miles boot maurice mcintyre off-stage cos the dude was overblowing/playing too much for ole mr minimal's liking?

think byard lancaster gigs as a street musician...and does charles gayle still play on the streets of nyc?

― Ward Fowler, Monday, 13 September 2010 14:21 (fifteen years ago)

not sure. is that out of destitution, or a Tom Bruno type thing?

― (+) (+ +), Monday, 13 September 2010 14:27 (fifteen years ago)

ah. i see.

― (+) (+ +), Monday, 13 September 2010 14:36 (fifteen years ago)

Sam Rivers - Crystals

― I brake for breaks (lpz), Monday, 13 September 2010 18:56 (fifteen years ago)

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