Roscoe Mitchell / Sandy Ewen / Damon Smith / Weasel Walter - A Railroad Spike Forms The Voice (May 2021 Balance Point Acoustics)

“Don’t follow.”

That’s the admonition saxophonist and composer Roscoe Mitchell (b. 1940) was known to give his students at Oakland’s Mills College in one-on-one sessions. In musical communication and creation, not following or directly responding to others is central to Mitchell’s philosophy and approach. As he said to me in a recent conversation, “I just let things develop with my intent, with my work, and I’ve never been a person that went around looking for people to play with. I mostly just work on my music and let things unfold, being that I’m a true believer in that you set your own environment and then you let it unwind on its own. I think the main thing is to concentrate on your music and the various ways that you develop it.” Building on a decades-long tenure as one of creative music’s leading minds, Mitchell began teaching at Mills in Fall 2007 and retired in 2019. He also taught at CalArts, the University of Wisconsin in Madison (where he now lives), and the University of Illinois. Spurred by artist-educators like Mitchell, Mills’ graduate program in Performance and Literature, which includes Improvisation as a core tenet, has been a key component of the Bay Area music community.

Mitchell is unflaggingly focused on his own practice as a soloist and composer, the latter often including large-scale works for orchestra. His predilection for collaborators that he can regularly practice or study with results in fewer one-off meetings that could shake things loose. That said, he is adamant about “always learning” and the importance of constant reflection and growth cannot be understated. Therefore, this collaboration with the working trio of guitarist Sandy Ewen, bassist Damon Smith, and drummer Weasel Walter is among the more intriguing meetings to emerge in his discography. It presents a situation that is both new and an example of each musician’s devotion to their art, spurred on by curiosity and conviction. A Railroad Spike Forms the Voice (its title drawn from a poem by late and longtime Mitchell collaborator Joseph Jarman) was recorded in April 2014 at Oakland’s Duende, a restaurant and venue run by free music connoisseur and chef Paul Canales. Smith and Walter had been part of a workshop performance Mitchell directed at Mills (though neither attended the school). The saxophonist reconnected with Smith and was introduced to Ewen’s music at a 2012 workshop in Houston. As the bassist relates, “Roscoe criticized everyone there except for Sandy. She was doing her thing, and he said to a saxophone player ‘why don’t you play like her? I can listen to what she’s doing for hours, this is great.’ When he asked what Weasel and I were up to, I told him that we just made a trio record with Sandy and he said he’d like to hear it.” According to Ewen, Mitchell played their first trio album (ugEXPLODE ug53) for Mills students as an example of quality improvised music, and that sowed further seeds for an eventual meeting.

The Ewen/Smith/Walter trio came about in 2011; Smith had relocated to Houston and linked up in a duo with Ewen, subsequently bringing Weasel to Texas for a series of concerts from which the trio concept would take root. Since that time they have recorded three CDs (two eponymously titled albums on ugEXPLODE and Live in Texas, a split release on Chiastic Society and Balance Point Acoustics) and performed live on numerous occasions, including expanded lineups with trumpeter Peter Evans, trombonist Jeb Bishop, or saxophonist Jim Sauter, as well as with Mitchell. As a result of this work, their identity as a unit has become quite singular if somewhat fluid within its circumstances. As Ewen tells it, “I can’t tell if it’s evolved or if it’s the fact that when we record it’s always going to be different. I don’t know if the group is actually shifting or if it’s just random snippets of what we sound like on any particular day.” Walter opines that “it’s interesting to think that there would be an expectation of what our trio sounds like – it’s kind of terrifying to me. I think part of our mutual interest in playing with each other is that each person has a very distinctive musical personality, and that individuality and the counterpoint that results is really important to us.”

The environment around the Duende concert was positive – Smith and Walter were in the Bay Area recording with guitarists Henry Kaiser and Ray Russell while Ewen had gigs nearby, and as the bassist puts it, “we were all in a good mood and it was a fun trip. We were excited to play with Roscoe and even Weasel, when the prospect of playing with him came up, was excited – and he doesn’t get excited very easily!” The concert itself was very well attended, in part because the combination of musicians was somewhat unexpected. Guitarist/composer Karl Evangelista, who studied with Mitchell at Mills and attended the performance, recalled that “you had two people who were really deep in the free jazz vernacular and they knew what Roscoe did, which is that Roscoe just plays, and Sandy’s also kind of solipsistic – not in a negative sense but she’s also not going to trade free jazz licks either. That was the interaction or the potential that I think everyone was fascinated by.” The set consisted of one long piece without breaks or interruptions and no encore, introspective and churning through events, actions, and inquiries.

Though on paper A Railroad Spike Forms the Voice might look like a guest soloist with free improvisation rhythm section, the session does not operate that way, either on disc or as an event. Significant space is given to solos, duos, and trios, and the piece is as much about, as Smith says, the fact that “we felt obligated to give him our music, which is a little bit different than a meeting with an old master in that sense.” It is a collective sharing of information and approaches, responses and diversions that spiral off into alternate paths or worlds, with silence just as valid an interpretation as sparks that fly. Known for his wide palette of horns, Mitchell here favors sopranino, soprano, and alto saxophones and exalts in closely valued hues and narrowly demarked areas, further accentuating the isolation or apartness of his music. One focus of his instrumental research is Baroque and early music, its crotchety intonation and perceived stasis an unsurprising affinity.

This is a recording that is monumental in scope, singular but also parsable. There are sections that hark back to the disjunctive spars of early Art Ensemble of Chicago recordings – at 26 minutes in, Smith walks alongside laconic, acrid alto saxophone tendrils, their movements punctuated by kit jabs and gradual guitar creep. Unhurriedness is not something one expects with Smith and Walter, and it’s not deference either. Their ears put the proceedings into a state of mindful creation and allow any ensuing fireworks a sense of necessity and logic. As Mitchell untethers long soprano lines and puckered subtones, a froth of allover patter and meaty scribble emerges underneath and around him, but one can parse the latticework of activity into numerous converging (or parallel) threads and components. A tug-of-war between low bass gurgle, crinkling guitar strings, and high-pitched, hoarse sopranino cries acts as both one and three organisms in gloriously present interaction, nodding at one another but tending a greater fire. Not only do Ewen, Smith, and Walter not follow or ping-pong off of Mitchell, but they don’t do this with one another, either. A Railroad Spike Forms the Voice is a sprawling essay on communication and connection, its title apt: these four creative minds have set forth on a unified steely path, punctuated by decisive beauty and realness. We’re lucky to be able to participate from our vantage point. Clifford Allen, Brooklyn, March 2021 

1. A Railroad Spike Forms The Voice 01:12:23

Roscoe Mitchell (saxophones)

Sandy Ewen (guitar)

Damon Smith (double bass)

Weasel Walter (drums)

Recorded at Duende in Oakland, California on April 11, 2014

Mixed by Weasel Walter

Published by Art Ensemble of Chicago Publishing Co. (ASCAP) / Sedition Dog Music (BMI)

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Roscoe Mitchell & Mike Reed - the Ritual and the Dance (February 2021 Astral Spirits)

The free jazz genre is graced by the dynamic duo of multireedist Roscoe Mitchell, an unapologetic nonconformist, and drummer Mike Reed, an artisan of the rhythm. The sophomore release of these AACM artists is called The Ritual and the Dance and was recorded live in 2015 during their European tour. It consists of a nearly 37-minute uninterrupted storytelling with no idle moments.

The high-pitched soprano laments delivered by Mitchell take the form of piercing indigenous chants blown vertiginously with circular breathing and patterned stimuli. The dry rat-a-tat of the snare drum makes a beautiful tonal contrast with the deep bass drum kicks, establishing an intense, sedulous workout routine that will put you in a state of bemused fascination.

The impressive versatility of Reed surfaces not only when he seats behind the drumset, but also when he operates electronics with subtle sensitivity. At some point, his adept pulses are transformed into droning backgrounds, whose dark tones allow the saxophone to reflect brightly. Reed then resumes the stomping cadence but keeps changing its colors. 

The turbulent environment is refrained at the minute 20, when Mitchell switches to tenor, seeking folk melodies and exploring some long notes that oscillate in pitch. His beefy, occasionally raucous tone is unadorned, if slower, here, but he switches horns again for a stimulating final stretch.

Adventurous jazz listeners will be struck by the force of this music, certainly wishing that Mitchell and Reed can collaborate again soon.

1. the Ritual and the Dance 36:43

2. the Dance SAMPLE 16:08

Roscoe Mitchell: reeds

Mike Reed: drums, electronics

Recorded by Michael Huon at the Oorstof concert series

Zuiderpershuis, Antwerp, Belgium, October 22, 2015

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Roscoe Mitchell - Splatter (i dischi di angelica 2020)

 Internationally renowned musician and composer Roscoe Mitchell, since his debut with Sound in 1966, has defined his style through an innovative approach towards composition in what is traditionally an improvised music genre, pre-empting the development of jazz and its relationship with contemporary music in the following decades.

Splatter, drawn from two concerts held at the AngelicA festival in Bologna in 2017, presents the most recent developments of this research, with two examples from his cycle Conversations for large orchestra. Started in 2016, it is based on the transcription and subsequent orchestration of what originated as his improvisations with the trio including Craig Taborn and Kikanju Baku, for the album Conversations I and II which was released in 2014.

From the evening with the Orchestra del Teatro Comunale di Bologna directed by Tonino Battista, the CD includes the Italian premiere of Splatter and the word premiere of Distant Radio Transmission, a work which further broadens the reflections on the relationship between composition and improvisation, incorporating the contribution of two improvisers (Thomas Buckner and Mitchell himself) in response to, and counterbalancing, the “improvised/transcribed/composed” material.

The lion’s share of the CD is represented by a duet, the fruit of a proposal by the Festival, a concert with a musician that Mitchell met for the first time on the same day: Francesco Filidei. Filidei, from Pisa, is an organist and former assistant of Jean Guillou at Saint-Eustache’s Church in Paris, as well as a composer whose music has been performed at the most significant contemporary music festivals by orchestras like Itinéraire, Nouvel Ensemble Modern, Ensemble intercontemporain, Percussions de Strasbourg, Quartetto Prometeo and Klangforum Wien.

Breath and Pipes, recorded at the Basilica di Santa Maria dei Servi in Bologna, is a testament to this encounter: as Joshua Marshall writes in the CD liner notes, it is “an improvisatory tour de force, demonstrating the uncanny sort of electrokinetic thrill which emerges out of the capacity of two brilliant improvisers to truly surprise one another”.

Premiere recording

Roscoe Mitchell alto, soprano, sopranino saxophone

Orchestra del Teatro Comunale di Bologna

Tonino Battista conductor

Thomas Buckner baritone voice

Francesco Filidei organ

1 - SPLATTER for orchestra

Music by Roscoe Mitchell, Craig Taborn, Kikanju Baku

Transcription and orchestration by Christopher Mega Luna

2 - DISTANT RADIO TRANSMISSION for improvisers and orchestra

Music by Roscoe Mitchell, Craig Taborn, Kikanju Baku

Transcription by Stephen P. Harvey

Transcription and orchestration of air sounds for strings by John Ivers

Orchestration by Roscoe Mitchell

3 - BREATH AND PIPES

Music by Roscoe Mitchell, Francesco Filidei

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Roscoe Mitchell / Brus Trio - After Fallen Leaves (SILKHEART RECORDS 2018)

"If, like yours truly, you are more familiar with multi-reedman Michell's more extroverted contributions to countless dates with the Art Ensemble of Chicago, you will find After Fallen Leaves a considerably more pensive (though no less entrancing) display of his compositional and interpretive talents... This is a beautiful way to spend one's musical listening time." 

Reuben Jackson, Jazz Times, April 1993

 "After Fallen Leaves": A journey to Sweden by the major American composer-saxophonist-multiple woodwind improviser, Roscoe Mitchell, in the autumn of 1989. There he rehearsed with the Sweden-based Brus Trio, gifted, versatile free jazz artists who quickly became proficient in his unique musics; as a quartet they played concerts in Stockholm and in northern Sweden, then at the end of October returned to Stockholm to record this remarkable disc. The nights were long and the season was changing, with "some good days and some not so good, though it wasn't really hitter yet," says Mitchell. Like the unpredictable season, the quartet's music also offers highly diverse, changing dispositions – pastoral peace, humor, severity, detachment and attachment, and so on – a variety that's certainly increasingly characteristic of Mitchell's art.

It's important that these are not simply the time-honored traveling-soloist-plus-pickup-accompaniment performances, but true quartet performances. "That was a good thing to have happen," Mitchell says. "I like people who can perform in several idioms, and deal with the reeds and stuff, and be up on a certain level technically for certain types of compositions – people who really want to be in full control of their concentrated power, to project what they're doing. These are interesting musicians – they study that kind of thing." In fact, Mitchell has not always had the advantage of such confident, accomplished players to perform his works, so Brus Trio's responsiveness is especially welcome.

The threesome's control, concentration, projection, and mastery of idioms has been earned through years of working and setting challenges together. Producer Keith Knox, who brought Mitchell and the trio together, offers biographical information about these artists. Gilbert Matthews (born 1943) was an established guitarist in his home city, Capetown, South Africa, when a clubowner asked him to take the place of an absent drummer; Matthews did, and a successful, wholly new career in music began. Like some others of that country's finest musicians before him, Matthews wearied of attempting to create music amidst apartheid's official harrassment, and left in 1974, settling in Sweden; Abdullah lbrahim, Chris McGregor, Archie Shepp, Sarah Vaughan and Ray Charles are among those with whom he's subsequently drummed.

Meanwhile, pianist Arne Forsen (born 1960, Umeå, Sweden) and bassist Ulf Åkerhielm (born 1962, Sundsvall, Sweden) were growing up with jazz, playing it in their youth – Åkerhielm was a tenor sax "boy wonder" at three Pori (Finland) Jazz Festivals – and they met when both were studying classical music at Kapellsburg music school in Härnösand, Sweden. By 1979 they were appearing as a duo, startling audiences with their "outside" jazz, and scuffling for engagements in Stockholm, Two years later, Matthews heard them in a club and played with them informally; the experience was so stimulating to all that they began Brus Trio. 

Usually original compositions, most often Forsén's, provide the takeoff for the trio's free flights, though in two earlier recordings they joined with lyrical saxophonists John Tchicai and Charles Tyler. Clearly, Brus Trio's eight years' experience in freely improvising together has brought vigor and sensitivity to MitchelI's compositions. For instance, Mr. Freddie is in a perfect, medium-up tempo for swinging – what Von Freeman has called "the Chicago tempo" – and the tense, eager, ahead-of-the-beat bass of Åkerhielm provides irresistible propulsion. Forsén's superb development of ideas in his piano solo results in a hard-edged line moving with a radical sense of drama, before Matthews, who is truly a "listening" drummer, at last breaks loose, enthusiastic assertion balanced by strong formal instincts. All of this is extension and complement to Mitchell's happy theme and wonderful alto solo. As the great bassist Wilbur Ware used to say, "Let's play this music together." 

The trio's dynamic and linear sensitivity to Mitchell's ideas is the subtle feature that makes this music flow, a sensitivity that's crucial to Sing. The music's constituent elements – color, harmony, rhythm, melody – are a step removed from conventional associations, as the work evolves to Mitchell's long-toned alto sax melody.

While Forsén's piano solo develops largely in rhythmic terms, to the complex, dancing accompaniment of Åkerhielm and Matthews, the composition's essential innocence is never violated. And in many ways Brus Trio's most impressive work on this disc is its freedom within the medium of free space as they interpret Mitchell's most unique works, presenting the interaction of sounds amid silence with uncommon clarity and responsiveness. The flowing quality of these performances, then, is their most pleasing feature.

Before meeting Brus Trio, Mitchell had heard them on record and knew they could meet his music's demands. The new kind of ensemble that he had brought to jazz in the 1960s, which eventually became the Art Ensemble of Chicago, thoroughly refreshed the art form by drawing on all of its resources, past, present, and future. Subsequently, he began isolating and investigating the fundamental elements of music, especially sound and its properties, and critic Larry Kart's comments on Mitchell's LRG/The Maze/S II Examples (Chief CD) could apply to much of Mitchell's 1970s works: "Harmony is nonexistent, as are melody and rhythm in the sense of variations from any norm outside the world of the piece. Instead, we hear timbre and the shape of phrases in space, with the space between each shape always clearly defined... he is discovering that when music is truly broken down into its component parts, a new order can emerge.

While Roscoe Mitchell continued to explore along these lines in the 1980s, his interests expanded in other directions also. The lyrical, melodic, swinging works that appear here are also typical of his present work, and a special advantage of the extended time available to compact discs is the opportunity to hear a wider variety of Mitchell musics than was hitherto possible in a single document. Apart from his works with his Sound, Space, and Chamber Ensembles, and his concert adventures with Cecil Taylor, Muhal Richard Abrams, and Steve Lacy, among others, his 1980s Quartet calls for special mention. The sad passing of his longtime associate, drummer Steve McCall, concluded the Quartet's efforts, but its explorations (note Mitchell's 1986 Black Saint album The Flow Of Things) were to blossom forth into the musics that the Mitchell-Brus Trio quartet presents here. 

To look at the performances in order, then:

Sing first appeared in the 1981 Mitchell Sound Ensemble release Snurdy McGurdy and her Dancin' Shoes (Nessa LP); in this colorful, highly decorated new version, Mitchell appears first on flute, then on alto sax.

The 55th Street point of Lake Michigan, in the heart of Chicago, is a magnet for swimmers, sunbathers, picnickers, and others. "I thought of sitting there on a nice warm day, and usually the drummers were playing and a lot of people were throwing balls or sitting and watching the lake – a lot of gaiety," says Mitchell. The isolated tones of his soprano sax and the other, distant, instruments here, all played very softly, present a detached individual's mood, with the faintest hint of sly expectancy on A Lovely Day at the Point.

From such soft, spaced sounds to the wild freakout of The Reverend Frank Wright is a long step indeed. Mitchell recalls meeting Wright in 1968, when the bold tenor saxman was in Cecil Taylor's band, which shared a California concert with the Mitchell-Lester Bowie-Malachi Favors trio – "We were out there just barnstorming, the way we usually did."

Amid the dense ferocity here, note how Mitchell's low, blatted, repeated tenor sax figure is the cell motive for a thorny solo. 

And Then There Was Peace is not exactly serene – the quartet's reflections include dark shadings. The work dates from 1962, when Mitchell led a pianoless quartet in Chicago. "Studying some of the stuff that we were doing back then is just a wealth of information."

Mitchell says that Everett Sloane is a fictional character but The Two Faces of Everett Sloane is not really a Dr Jekyll-Mr. Hyde shocker. Rather, one face is portrayed in near cubist fashion with broken sounds, and the other face is portrayed in an incredibly long, many noted, involved soprano sax phrase.

After Fallen Leaves is "improvised off certain theme lines," with the players creating in separate, independent parts that nevertheless share a pastoral mood; Mitchell is heard first on flute, then in a long-noted tenor sax melody.

And then, wham! A big, powerful alto sax tone over roiling accompaniment introduces Mr Freddie, which has no links to the early blues standard of that title by Freddie Shayne. Rather, this 1962 song honors Mitchell's trumpeter of those days, Fred Berry; Mitchell's wondrously melodic solo recalls his links to early Ornette Coleman, however, bathed in the chemicals of Mitchell's own intensity and cruel humor.

Come Gather Some Things and Play With The Whistler are improvised to a "formula" that uses space and many sounds: "It's supposed to sound like a composition. In improvisation on a high level, you're completely aware of every part, including yourself." It recalls his sound collages of LRG and The Maze, with a series of events from a few seconds to a couple of minutes long, which add a piano to the free motions of multi-wood-wind-string-percussion sounds in space. Forsén, who ranges from percussive to almost melodic in his brief not-phrases, often proves a humanizing element as he lends irregular degrees of harmony to the others' ever-changing sonorities: a sensitive, responsive improvising quartet indeed.

Since these recording sessions, Mitchell has continued to tour and record widely with the Art Ensemble of Chicago, including sessions with South African musicians, Cecil Taylor, and Lester Bowie's Brass Fantasy. He's also composed for pianist Joseph Kubera and for his own several groups, and is planning collaborations with Henry Threadgill and performances with Douglas Ewart's Clarinet Choir.

He continues to teach at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, his home city, where he plans to start a large repertory ensemble to perform music of "contemporary composers, like Ornette Coleman, Muhal Richards Abrams, Anthony Braxton, Leo Smith, Leroy Jenkins, Henry Threadgill, and on and on." Hopefully, there will be future collaborations with the Brus Trio, too, for the stimulating success of After Fallen Leaves, its vitality; flow, and abundantly shared feelings, surely call for more. 

John Litweiler

1. Sing 15:23

2. A Lovely Day at the Point 04:41

3. The Reverend Frank Wright 07:06

4. And Then There Was Peace 04:51

5. The Two Faces of Everett Sloane 03:30

6. After Fallen Leaves 08:01

7. Mr Freddie 04:34

8. Come Gather Some Things 11:58

9. Play with the Whistler 07:25

Roscoe Mitchell flute, alto sax, tenor sax, soprano sax

Arne Forsén piano

Ulf Åkerhielm bass

Gilbert Matthews drums, gongs, chimes, percussion

Roscoe Mitchell and Montreal-Toronto Art Orchestra - Ride The Wind (NESSA RECORDS 2018)

Steve Lacy once posited that the difference between an improviser and a composer is that the latter has abundant time to decide what to communicate musically with ten seconds whereas the former simply has ten seconds. It remains a pithy rejoinder to a strawman conundrum that’s dogged the intersection between the two idioms for decades. But what of the scenarios where improvisation actually serves as the basis for composition? Roscoe Mitchell explores that compelling overlap on Ride the Wind, a second document of investigations following last year’s at once similar and yet wholly separate Discussions on the Wide Hive label.

For the previous project Mitchell balanced orchestral transcriptions of earlier improvisations with new collective improvisations for the assembled large ensemble. The results revealed a captivating merger of the forms, although his own incendiary playing was limited to just several of the contexts leaving flautist Wilfrido Terrazas the welcome latitude to almost steal the show. Here, he exercises even more restraint on the playing end, appearing only in an extended, frenzied sopranino salvo on “They Rode for Them – Part Two” and leaving the disc’s remaining six pieces to the nineteen-piece Montreal-Toronto Art Orchestra. The deference is another indication of how seriously he takes the ensemble focus of the work.

Essayist Stuart Broomer drafts an edifying accounting of the session details in the accompanying notes and it’s immediately apparent that Mitchell’s canvas is different even though it pulls primarily from the same provenance as its predecessor, the series of recorded improvisations he engaged in with pianist Craig Taborn and percussionist Kikanju Baku from 2013 and later transcribed by a cadre of close colleagues. Mitchell handles the majority of orchestrations himself starting with swelling fugue-like waves of “They Rode for Them” that give way to an feathery improvisation by altoist Yves Charuest over shimmer color field conjured by the orchestra in sections.

“Splatter” builds from forceful collisions between percussion, strings, reeds and brass, which roil and swirl together in a textured centripetal spin. The title piece erupts with fanfare expansiveness before receding and dispersing into a succession of individual voices. Flimsy idiomatic descriptors like jazz, classical and the like are irrelevant to the proceedings, replaced by the umbrella adjectival phrase of organized and energized sound. The arboreal murmurings of “RUB” recall the Art Ensemble’s expeditions with “little instruments” while “Shards and Lemons” brings a delightful measure of dry humor in the timbre juxtaposition of disparate orchestral constituencies.

The disc caps with a quartet arrangement of the pivotal “Nonaah”, a piece Mitchell first performed nearly forty-five years ago. It’s one of the anchors of his oeuvre and the assembled team of three reedists and single bassist makes the rondo theme at the piece’s center both sing and shout before switching tacks to layered legato drones and icy overtones. As is the Nessa label hallmark, accompanying packaging and content is top-notch with copious session photos and the aforementioned deep dive annotations. Temporal considerations both immediate and indefinite converge to make this set another memorable entry in Mitchell’s copious catalog of momentous achievements.

Derek Taylor / Dusted Magazine

01 They Rode For Them - part 1 [12:51]

02 Splatter [04:34]

03 Ride The Wind [07:12]

04 They Rode For Them - part 2 [06:02]

05 Rub [07:06]

06 Shards And Lemons [12:34]

07 Nonaah [05:27]

NESSA RECORDS

Roscoe Mitchell & Matthew Shipp - Accelerated Projection (ROGUEART 2018)

Roscoe Mitchell, member of AACM from its early stage and founding member of Art Ensemble of Chicago is a living legend, a national treasure, involved in whether it as a solo, a duet, an ensemble or a classical music situation. Matthew Shipp, definitely a legend in his own right as well, play in many configurations witnessing his impressively brilliant creative devolvement. The experience seeing these musicians play live is equivalent to seeing/hearing Bach, Beethoven and Chopin play live if such a thing were still possible.

Here we are holding the gift of a recording of them playing together in duet. And what a gift it is! -Yuko Otomo, excerpt from the liner notes.

Accelerated Projection I (4:37)

Accelerated Projection II (2:22)

Accelerated Projection III (3:14)

Accelerated Projection IV (6:59)

Accelerated Projection V (6:16)

Accelerated Projection VI (13:33)

Accelerated Projection VII (8:56)

Roscoe Mitchell: alto & soprano saxophones, flute

Matthew Shipp: piano

Roscoe Mitchell - Bells for the South Side (2 CD) ECM 2017

Roscoe Mitchell contrasts and for the first time - combines the sounds and distinctive characters of his four trios in an exhilarating double album recorded at Chicago's Museum of Contemporary Art. Multi-instrumentalist and composer Mitchell had been invited to premiere new music at the museum, in the context of the exhibition The Freedom Principle, which celebrated the directions in music and art set in motion by the AACM on Chicago's South Side.

He offers what amounts to a composer self-portrait in continually changing colors and textures, reflecting on his own history while looking toward the future. Two pieces including the title composition draw upon the full percussion instrumentarium of the Art Ensemble of Chicago a panorama of gongs, bells, rattles, sirens, hand drums and more. Along the way there are remarkable contributions by all participants, among them a lyrical bass guitar feature for Jaribu Shahid on EP 7849, a heart-dilating solo by Tani Tabbal on Cards for Drums, an extended trumpet feature for Hugh Ragin on the title track, evocative and atmospheric electronics from Craig Taborn and James Fei on Red Moon in the Sky, and plenty of Mitchell's powerhouse saxophones throughout, from the piercing sopranino down to the mighty bass sax. The performance is concluded with Odwalla, the Mitchell-composed theme song of the Art Ensemble.

CD 1

1. Spatial Aspects Of The Sound  12:14

2. Panoply  7:37

3. Prelude To A Rose  12:45

4. Dancing In The Canyon  10:24

5. EP 7849  8:14

6. Bells For The South Side  12:36

CD 2

1. Prelude To The Card Game Cards For Drums And The Final Hand  16:03

2. The Last Chord  12:27

3. Six Gongs And Two Woodblocks  7:50

4. R509A Twenty B  1:34

5. Red Moon In The Sky / Odwalla  25:49

Roscoe Mitchell sopranino, soprano, alto and bass saxophones, flute, piccolo, bass recorder, percussion

James Fei sopranino and alto saxophones, contra-alto clarinet, electronics

Hugh Ragin trumpet, piccolo trumpet

Tyshawn Sorey trombone, piano, drums, percussion

Craig Taborn piano, organ, electronics

Jaribu Shahid double bass, bass guitar, percussion

Tani Tabbal drums, percussion

Kikanju Baku drums, percussion

William Winant percussion, tubular bells, glockenspiel, vibraphone, marimba, roto toms, cymbals, bass drum, woodblocks, timpani

Pauline Oliveros + Roscoe Mitchell + John Tilbury + Wadada Leo Smith - Nessuno (2016) I Dischi di Angelica

The unexpected and open-minded quartet of Pauline Oliveros, Roscoe Mitchell, John Tilbury and Wadada Leo Smith performing live in Italy at the Angelika Festival in 2011, presenting the three part improvised work "Nessuno"; delicate, virtuosic, rewarding music from 4 masters.

Pauline Oliveros, accordion

Roscoe Mitchell, alto saxophone, soprano saxophone, flute

John Tilbury, piano

Wadada Leo Smith, trumpet

01. Part I 30:41

02. Part II 39:44

03. Part III (Encore) 05:24

Label I Dischi Di Angelica [IDA 035]

Released May 2016

Recorded May 08, 2011, Centro Di Ricerca Musicale, Teatro San Leonardo, Bologna

Engineer Roberto Monari

Mixed Massimo Carli, BH Audio Post Production Studio, January 2015, San Giuseppe, Ferrara, Italy 

Mastered Bob Drake, Studio Midi-Pyrénéés, January 2016, La Borde Basse, Caudeval, France

Producer Massimo Simonini

Executive Producer Massimo Simonini

Design Concetta Nasone, Massimo Golfieri

Photography Massimo Golfieri, Massimo Simonini

Liner Notes Massimo Simonini