Label:
Composers Collective – 721
Format:
Vinyl, LP / Country: US / Released: 1974
Style:
Free Jazz
Recorded at
Stereo Sound Studio, NYC, 1974 / All compositions 1969.
Engineer
– Jerry Newman
Composed
By – John Fischer
Whitecage
credited as playing chanter on "Poum!"
A1
- Sinfonia .............................................................................
6:46
A2
- Apollo's Ragtime Journey ................................................. 9:06
A3
- t-e-s-t
.................................................................................
2:02
B1
- Moon Walk ........................................................................
4:13
B2
- Poum!
................................................................................
5:55
B3
- Earthlings
......................................................................... 10:48
John Fischer (lider) – piano, voice
Mark
Whitecage – tenor sax, alto sax, flute
Perry
Robinson – clarinet
Mario
Pavone – bass
Laurence
Cook – drums, percussion
This
album was released 1974 on the label Composers Collective (catalog number 721)
John
Fischer (born 1930 in Antwerp, Brussels) is a pianist, composer and visual
artist. He is also a pioneer in the field of computer art. In the 1970s, during
the loft jazz era in New York City, Fischer ran a performance loft and gallery
known as Environ. He is leader of the group INTERface and he performed with
among others: Perry Robinson, Mark Whitecage, Arthur Blythe, Rick Kilburn and
Lester Bowie...
To
be sure, the genre would never again be so closely implicated with social
upheaval: between the civil rights movement, black nationalism, the black arts
movement, protests against the Vietnam war, and the alternately revelatory and
sinister sides of the “hippie dream,” free jazz’s supposed halcyon days
reflected back onto the listener the turbulent, uncertain times they were
living. For some, the deaths of two of the music’s pioneers, John Coltrane (in
July 1967, of liver cancer) and Albert Ayler (in November 1970, a suspected
suicide) gave pause to the music’s most elemental, fiery stage.
Certainly,
support for the music dried up in the USA during this period, and many of the
artists moved to Europe, often to France, where their music found greater support
and acceptance (and in the BYG/Actuel label, an imprint that would help them
realise their musical visions, at least for a short period of time).
But
to say the music was over, and that the ‘70s was a largely fallow period for
the music, now seems seriously misguided. Looking at the relative explosion of
private press and artist label free jazz albums from across the ‘70s, coupled
with the NYC loft jazz movement, the music was as strong as ever – still
questing and still exploring. As both major and independent labels turned their
backs on the music, the artists turned toward self-actualisation and DIY
practices to get their music documented and out there. Of course, there were
precursors for this – perhaps the most significant being Sun Ra and his Saturn
label, where he released bucketloads of beguiling, sublime, fantastical
Afrofuturist documents from his Arkestra.
If
the loft jazz scene was contained in NYC, private press records were turning up
from all over America – there are representatives in this list from Missouri,
Ohio, Michigan and beyond. But somehow, loft jazz – a scene in NYC where
performances of free jazz took place mostly in artist-run loft spaces –
parallels the imperatives of the private press world, and you’ll find that a
number of the albums detailed in that list are loft classics...
"The
Jazz Composers Collective is a virtual study of the positive effects that the
DIY (do it yourself) ethic can bring about. They are, in an unassuming way,
producing some of the most vital improvised and composed music coming out of
New York today. Playing on each other's projects, helping to organize concerts,
pooling efforts to produce the smart, informative newsletter that detail their
activities - everyone helps out for the massed good of the members and
audience."
Born
in Belgium, artist, pianist and composer John Fischer, early seventies, lives
in New York and here we find the beginning of his early works. Sometime later
(very significant and important period) formed "INTERface" in
company, which is achieved in cooperation with loft-jazz musicians...
"Poum!"
is a series of compositions (variations, also appear on the albums INTERface),
in which, how J.F. himself says, exploring sound using voice and body, and
therefore "Composers Collective" is not a collective improvisation,
then work is strictly composer's ideas and, as such, conducted according to the instructions, but
in no way confining a certain freedom of expression themselves musicians...
"Sinfonia",
adorns a spirited voice performance developed from the beginning, that was the
axis to explosive free jazz, will continue to rush from spiritual intro to
featuring beautiful piano a profound by turn, to the free part to move around
bustling in "Apollo's Ragtime Journey", while short "t-e-s-t
" goes to the abrupt expansion also gives off a strong impact.
"Moon
Walk" is moist and free improvisation which leads us with lazy piano in
the puzzle night, and slowly come to the absurd "Poum!", she
featuring the voice performance filled with grotesque repeated without
pronounced pause context. And finally, "Earthlings" closes the album,
each player starts somewhere humorous theme (do you feel perhaps jazz roots),
as moving to a very high track of tension that comes through is somewhere fun
atmosphere.
Truly
an amazing rare album, essential. Highly recommended.
Parts
of the text taken from:
"20
essential records from the 70s underground"
(written
by JON DALE)
If you find it, buy
this album!
