Leroy Jenkins 1932-2007

[from otherminds.org]

Born in Chicago, composer and violinist Leroy Jenkins was one of the most important musicians to emerge from the AACM (Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians), the legendary collective of which he was a member until his death in 2007. Like many of the Association's members, Jenkins studied under the legendary Walter Dyett at DuSable High School, where he learned the alto saxophone.

He received a music degree (in violin) from Florida A&M University, where he studied composition and the classical masters of the violin. Subsequently, he taught music both in Mobile, Alabama (1961-5) and in the Chicago schools (1965-9). During the latter period, Jenkins joined the AACM. He made his first recording with Muhal Richard Abrams, Anthony Braxton, and Leo Smith in the sixties before achieving international acclaim in Paris along with Braxton, Smith, and the Art Ensemble of Chicago. In 1970 Jenkins moved to New York, where he founded the Revolutionary Ensemble, the critically acclaimed ensemble which recorded 7 albums and toured North America and Europe.

When many of the AACM musicians left during 1969, Jenkins went to Europe with Anthony Braxton & Leo Smith. There, with drummer Steve McCall, they were called the Creative Construction Company. He also played with Ornette Coleman, whose house he & Braxton stayed at when they subsequently moved to New York City.

Playing with Taylor (1970) and Braxton (1969-72), he also worked with Albert Ayler, Cal Massey, Alice Coltrane, Archie Shepp & Rahsaan Roland Kirk. Between 1971-7, he played in his Revolutionary Ensemble, a trio featuring Sirone (Norris Jones) on bass & trombone, and drummer/pianist Jerome Cooper. Thereafter, he toured the US & Europe, led the Mixed Quintet (Jenkins and 4 woodwind players), a blues-based band called Sting, and again played with Cecil Taylor.

Jenkins continually reinvented his own language in music. His was an extraordinary bonding of a variety of sounds associated with the black music tradition, while simultaneously bridging with European styles. His intermeshing of jazz and classical influences left critics wondering at his musical identity; however, as one San Francisco Chronicle critic said, "Jenkins is a master who cuts across all categories."

Jenkins received a number of major commissions and was in demand for experimental and theater-based work. Mother of Three Sons, a dance-opera collaboration with Bill T. Jones, premiered in Aachaen, Germany and had ten performances. The Rockefeller Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, Meet the Composer, and Mutable Music awarded him numerous commissioning funds and grants to support several new theater works. Among them are Fresh Faust (a jazz-rap opera), which was performed in workshops in Boston at the Institute of Contemporary Arts; The Negro Burial Ground (a cantata), performed at The Kitchen, New York City; and The Three Willies (a multimedia opera), performed at the Painted Bride, Philadelphia. He was also commissioned to create new works for the Brooklyn Philharmonic, the Cleveland Symphony Orchestra, the Albany Symphony, the Lincoln Center Out of Doors, and the Kronos Quartet.

Among his recordings are 3 Compositions of New Jazz (1968; Delmark); Lifelong Ambitions (1977; Black Saint; with Muhal Richard Abrams); Space Minds, New Worlds, Survival America (1978; Tomato); Live (1992, Black Saint); Carla Bley's Escalator Over The Hill and Braxton's Three Compositions Of New Jazz.

Leroy Jenkins died on February 24, 2007, in Brooklyn, NY.

the unofficial velvet underground

once again bill has bestowed upon me a musical treasure trove, this time in the form of 12 CDs of "unofficial" velvet underground recordings. of course there is a lot of inessential material here, but i've begun going through it and can now report my initial findings. my suspicion is that the essentials can be sweated down to 2, maybe 3 CDs worth of stuff (depending, for example, on how many 20+ minute live versions of "sister ray" you need...) details on each of the following sets can be found at olivier landemaine's webpage.

in general i would say that the stuff breaks down as follows:

1. live versions of officially released songs -- these naturally vary a great deal depending on performance and recording quality, and should be measured against officially released live material such as that on the live albums and the quine tapes;
   
2. live material not otherwise officially available -- these vary quite a bit as well, but some of it (such as "the nothing song," see below) immediately strike me as being essential listening;
   
3. demos and rehearsals -- much of this stuff has since been released on the 5CD peel slowly and see box set, but again some has not and is quite essential (see "loop" below);
   
4. live, studio or radio broadcast performances of post-VU material -- lou reed solo, velvets reunions, etc. -- that is generally not essential;
   
5. interviews -- some of this stuff is interesting but not necessarily worth listening to more than once; some producers of these unofficial releases have mixed interviews in with live performances in a way that does not make them very interesting or accessible.

NOTE: i've not gone through ALL this stuff yet, so there may be some live performances from category 1) above that i've not yet discovered, but otherwise here's the report.

searchin' for my mainline is a 3CD set that contains the following essentials. "loop" is a fantastic feedback drone/phase piece that was recorded and released in 1966 as the locked-groove b-side of a flexi-disc that came with the magazine aspen #3. of course, ubu.com has the file here (scroll down). this recording is crucial to the history of feedback, far moreso than the beatles' "in my life" and perhaps second only to the "fontana mix - feed" of max neuhaus (also 1966). disc 1 also features an acoustic version of "heroin" credited to "rehearsal, paris 1/25/72" and is unlike any version i've heard before. disc 2 contains live versions of "what goes on" and "run run run" from the hilltop rock festival, rindge, new hampshire, august 2, 1969 (my second birthday!) that are absolutely smoking: "run run run" in particular contains some of reed's most blistering feedback-drenched guitar soloing ever, second only to his work on "i heard her call my name" which is of course one of if not the greatest rock guitar solos ever.

the two middle discs of the caught between the twisted stars 4 CD set are most noteworthy. disc 2 features "the nothing song," a nearly 30-minute mid-tempo trance-jam soundtrack recorded at an exploding plastic inevitable show at the valleydale ballroom, columbus ohio, november 4, 1966. essentially during a typical EPI performance of the time, the VU would provide live instrumental accompaniment to the multiple andy warhol films that would be projected simultaneously before doing their own set (which of course also involved film projections, often of the band members' faces for example). like "loop," "the nothing song" taps into the lamonte young drone minimalism that john cale helped bring into the band's sound, in this case also featuring processed vocals from nico that float hauntingly over the proceedings and give the piece an eastern feel. disc 3 also goes in for extended jams, clocking in not only with a 25-minute "sister ray" but also with a 39-minute version of something called "sweet sister ray" which, as the title suggests, was performed as a mellower and (if i recall correctly) largely instrumental prelude to "sister ray" proper. all essential listening for a full appreciation of the VU's music.

finally, a walk with the velvet underground runs 5 CDs. this set features what i believe are pop songs lou reed wrote for the pickwick label that were recorded by other bands before the VU formed, as well as the infamous songs "sneaky pete" and "(do) the ostrich" recorded by the primitives, an early reed-cale proto-VU. there is also a more complete (6:49) version of "loop" (still a shorter run time than the version on ubu but i've not compared the two). there are a lot of demos and mono mixes here that are either inessential or otherwise available. there are also recordings from EPI performances and warhol movies that, unlike "the nothing song," aren't recorded very well and have all the film dialogue mixed into the track as well, which makes for rather muddied and/or pointless listening. there are some nice versions of "loaded" material identified as "robinson's apartment sessions" as well as some post-VU live recordings, at bataclan (29/1/72) and fondation cartier (paris 15/6/90) but i don't know enough about these (except that the latter is obviously a reunion tour).

more to come...

in memory of emmett williams (1925-2007)

readers are encourage to begin with the ubu.com williams page for a full sampling of his work in a variety of media. what i've collected below is a sampling of his verbal-visual work from across the internet.


"meditation no.1" (from rita raley at UCSB)


from artpool.hu


"light sculptures" courtesy of the emerson gallery (berlin)


"Nine Times Jimmy and Emi Suzuki" (1971) courtesy of steven wolf fine arts (san francisco)


Part scores of "Four-directional song of doubt for five voices" (1957) courtesy of virtualitas fine arts online



variation 7, "13 Variations on 6 Words of Gertrude Stein" (1958) courtesy of virtualitas fine arts online

moderate mccain and giuliani

from tmorange
to mallen@politico.com
date Feb 16, 2007 11:29 AM
subject "GOP Hopes to Catch a Wave in California"

Dear Mr. Allen,

Your piece in yesterday's Politico, "GOP Hopes to Catch a Wave in California," offers some nice spin but very little in the way of challenges to conventional wisdom or evaluations of counter-evidence -- you know, actual reporting.

You assert that "Giuliani and McCain are pro-business candidates with moderate images in the mold of Schwarzenegger" but never offer any evidence to support your assertion or any counter-evidence that would give your readers the opportunity to judge whether these "images" of Giuliani and McCain are accurate.

So let me do some of this work for you. You could, for example, have cited an August 2006 survey by the Rasmussen Reports that finds 36% of 1,000 people surveyed believe Giuliani to be a moderate. (The number goes to 43% among Republicans, 46% of whom also view McCain as a moderate.) Unfortunately this evidence is not terrible convincing given, for example, Giuliani's recent tack to the Right of the political mainstream with respect to judicial appointments and abortion. As the New York Times has reported, last week in South Carolina and on Fox News Giuliani embraced the judicial philosophy of "strict constructionists" espoused by the likes of Antonin Scalia, Samuel Alito and John Roberts. Many voters understand "strict constructionism" as code for what essentially amounts to conservative judicial activism that aspires to rewrite this country's legal code along strict conservative Christian moralistic lines.

Naturally, "California voters' overwhelmingly [sic] support for abortion rights," as you have it, will work against Giuliani's candidacy. But your "reporting" is too blind to its own internal contradictions to point this out.

[NB: glenn greenwald makes a much more realistic case for the success of giuliani's candidacy.]

Esto / sucedio...

       This
happened between two eyelids; I quivered
in my pod, furious, alkaline,
pulled up at the lubricated equinox,
at foot of the cold blaze in which I fizzle out.

       Alkaline slik-up I keep saying,
nearer than garlic, over the syrup sense,
deeper in, very more, the rusts,
on going the water and on coming the wave.
Alkaline slip-up
too, a wild one, in the colossal staging of the sky.

       What curses and harpoons I'll hurl if I die
in my pod; I'll offer up in sacred banana leaves
my five subaltern little bones,
and in the glance, the glance itself!
(They say that in sighs one builds
then bony tactile accordions;
they say that when those who fizzle out die thus
aie! they die outside the clock, hand
clutching a single shoe.)

       Getting it and all, cyma
and all, in the crying sense of this voice,
I make myself suffer, I extract sadly
at night my fingernails;
then I have nothing and talk alone,
I revise my half-years
and in order to stuff my vertebra, touch.


--César Vallejo, "Esto / sucedió..." (23 September 1937)
tr. Clayton Eshleman

La paz, la avispa

       Peace, wasp, wad, rivercourse,
corpse, deciliters, owl,
sites, ringworm, sarcophagi, waterglass, brunettes,
ignorance, pot, altarboy,
drops, forgetfulness,
potentate, cousins, archangels, needle,
vicars, ebony, spite,
part, type, stupor, soul...

       Ductile, saffroned, external, clear,
portable, old, thirteen, bloodsmeared,
they're photographed, ready, tumescent,
they're linked, long, bedecked, perfidious...

       Burning, comparing,
living, getting infuriated,
striking, analyzing, hearing, shuddering,
dying, holding on, locating, weeping...

       After, these, here,
after, overhead,
perhaps, while, behind, so much, so never,
beneath, maybe, far,
always, that one, tomorrow, how much,
how much!...

       What is horrible, sumptuous, slowest,
what is august, fruitless,
what is ominous, twitching, wet, fatal,
what is all, purest, lugubrious,
what is tart, satanic, tactile, profound...


--César Vallejo, "La paz, la avispa..." (25 September 1937)
tr. Clayton Eshleman

Escarnecido, aclimatado...

       Mocked, acclimatized to good, morbid, urent,
I double the carnal cable and play cups,
where the destinies end up in flies,
where I ate and drank what's cleaning me out.

       Monumental dram,
numeral bier, those of my debt,
those of my debt, when I fall exceedingly,
loudly, smackedpurply.

       At bottom, then,
it's time to moan with all my ax
and it's then year of the sob,
day of the ankle,
night of the rib, century of pained breath.
Sterile qualities, monotonous satans,
leap from the side,
from the flank of my sitting-in mare;
but, where I ate, how much I thought!
but, how much I drank, where I wept!

       Well that's life, life
being what it is, way over there, behind
the infinite; thus, spontaneously
before the legislative temple.

       Thus the string lies buried at the violin's base
when they spoke of the air, shouting, when
very leisurely they spoke of lightning.
The wrong cause thus doubles, we go
three by three to unity, thus
one plays cups
and those who fold match my bet,
the destinies end up in bacteria
and one owes all to all.


--César Vallejo, "Escarnecido, aclimatado..." (7 October 1937)
tr. Clayton Eshleman

frank-aid

ca conrad has put out this call for all who know frank sherlock to help him through his medical and financial hard times.

linda russo's mirth

linda russo's first perfect-bound book mirth arrived in the mail yesterday. those of us who've known her and followed her work over the six or seven years in which these poems were written have been looking very forward to this. and though i would never have denied the possibility, a first read-through proves that the book far exceeds even my own high expectations. i will certainly have more to say about this book at some point somewhere, but for now i can simply say that these poems have the smarts, the sass and the dissidence that distinguishes the recent books i love most, from alice notley's disobedience to bernadette mayer's scarlet tanager, from jean donnelly's anthem to lisa robertson's the men.

from e to i

for a while there was the absurd ubiquity of the prefix "e-" to denote all things electronic. in one study, christian de cock et al. collected and analyzed the contents of 133 print ads appearing in the financial times between february and december 2000 that were related to the "new economy." they wrote:

One of the most prevalent discursive devices running throughout the sample of advertisements is the generic use of the prefix 'e-'. There are a total of 230 terms in this category, including 92 references to 'e-business' or 'ebusiness', 32 references ro 'e-commerce' and 12 references to 'e-marketplaces'. In addition to these common terms, many of the advertisements apply the signification prefix 'e-' to a set of business-related terms common in business discourses more generally, such as 'e-services', 'e-tax', 'e-procurement', 'e-customer', 'e-cash', 'e-profit', e-intelligence', 'e-strategist' and 'e-infrastructure'. Although this prefix does, or did, have the term 'electronic' as specific connotation, it subsequently evolved into a generic signifier for the New Economy more universally. As a second order signifier with only loose referentiality, the 'e-' prefix can be added to almost any activity or institution without apparent ambiguity or contradiction, thus greating a range of what [Steve] Woolgear [in Virtual Society?: Technology, Cyberbole, Reality (Oxford UP 2002)] called 'epithetized' phenomena: 'While it is often unclear from these labels exactly how the application of the epithet actually modifies the activity/institution in question, a claim to novelty is usually central. . . . The implication is that something new, different and (usually) better is happening'. (Christian De Cock, James Fitchett, and Christina Volkmann, "Constructing the New Economy: A Discursive Perspective," British Journal of Management 16.1 (March 2005), page 42)

make it new indeed! last week at a staff meeting, as the director of housing was briefing us on our university's new "iHousing" program, it struck me that, unless it'd already happened and i simply missed it, the prefix "i-" was destined to be the next ubiquitous signifer -- and one with an even greater degree of meaningless. that is, where "e-" clearly stood for "electronic," at least initially, "i-" is shot through with ambiguity from the beginning. (internet? intelligent? i me my mine?)

fortunately, thanks to the language police at apple, we need not worry too much. apple has cornered the market on all things "i" -- not content with mere offerings like iPod and iTunes, and deeming cicso's lawsuit over the trademark iPhone (which cisco registered back in 2000) "silly" and "tenuous at best." of course, what have they to fear when you have the audacity to offer iLife? it's a form of vertical integration and aspiration for bio-control as insidious as patenting the human genome. iHousing, beware.

conrad and notley

fascinating conversation ca conrad had over email with alice notley, at phillysound.

jasper johns at the NGA

the jasper johns show that went up on sunday at the national gallery offers a lot of food for thought about the nature of art, objects and representation. not a retrospective, this is a focused, formalist look at four specific motifs johns worked through over just the first ten years of his career: the target, the mechanical device used in his painting process, stenciled color names, and the body. the subtitle of the show, "an allegory of painting," suggests, if we are to take it literally, that each of these motifs enables johns to essentially tell a story about painting.

i'll have to give this some more thought, which i'm doing along with a reading of his interviews and sketchbook notes published in conjunction with the 1996 johns retrospective at the MOMA. but i'm not sure that each of these motifs offers an equally compelling "allegory of painting." clearly the targets and the stenciled color names are fascinating to the degree that they are (and are not) what they depict. johns is playing "signification games" that owe a lot to wittgenstein (whom as it turns out he was reading at the time); these devices seem to me like tools that johns uses to explore certain ideas and issues and then, like wittgenstein's ladder, disposes of when they are no longer of use i.e. have helped him reach a place that he needed to get to. blake gopnik literally gushes about johns in this sunday's washington post arts section, something he is rarely given to do in my infrequent readings of him. (i found it a pleasant coincidence his assertion of johns' "pictorial intellegence" relative to my recent listenings for "poetic intelligence.") i'm not sure, for example, how much johns really adds to, rather than simply reiterates (perhaps in a new context), the essential moves of duchamp. gopnik ultimately wants to make johns a comic genius along the lines of buster keaton; certainly this element is there, but it doesn't strike me as being of the essence. just in the targets alone, that body of work, i find a serial insistence that is methodically working through some serious issues. if it was just "giddy inventiveness" that compelled you to run versions of the same "joke" over and over, the work to me would get tired pretty quickly.

note: this show close at the end of april 2007 and goes from there to the kunstmuseum basel. (susana!) also, what look to be some interesting concerts and film screenings in conjunction with this show. performances of what appear to be violin sonatas by elliott carter and roger sessions (feb 18); piano music cage, feldman, ives and nancarrow (february 25); and ensemble music by cage (march 4). films related to johns and his milieu -- cunningham, cage, rauschenberg, brakhage, leslie (march 10) -- and documentaries on cage and carter (march 24).