Customer Reviews

At The Golden Circle Vol. 2

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It seems to me that Blue Note put the more challenging music of the Golden Circle engagement on Volume 2. (Which is still far more accessible than, say, Cecil Taylor's Unit Structures or John Coltrane's Meditations -- don't be frightened away!) "The Riddle" is a frantic freebopper with some of Ornette's best playing on these recordings and "Morning Song" is a dark, beautiful ballad. "Antiques" is a nice, medium tempo exploration with Moffett's occasional martial beats. And while all three of those tracks feature Ornette on alto, "Snowflakes and Sunshine" showcases his trumpet and violin playing. His trumpet playing is primitive and his violin playing is sub-primitive, which may disgust some listeners. But even if you don't like that track, there's still more than an hour of phenomenal saxophone playing here.

The new RVG reissue has great sound and almost doubles the playing time of the original with alternate tracks of "Morning Song", "The Riddle", and "Antiques". "Doughnuts", the previously unreleased track, is actually on the more accessible Volume One. Both Volumes are among the high points of 60s avant-garde jazz.

Since I suppose, that you will buy this one together with "Volume 1", which I also reviewed, just let's say something about the things happening only here, namely Coleman's violin- and trumpetplaying on "Snowflakes and Sunshine", the first tune: Ornette's playing on those instruments has often been written off by the critics as lacking of technique or just sounding terrible, but I think it would be to easy explaining things that way: Listening to that tune, you will notice a really surprising "call and response" thing between Ornette's violin-excursions and Izenzon's arco playing on the bass. The same thing happens during the interaction between the leader's trumpet playing and Moffett's drumming. By the way, one cannot understand, why this great drummer didn't get more publicity, he is really exiting. Like on "Vol.1", we have another beautiful ballad (Morning Song), and some astonishing tempo changes at "The Riddle". As for the bonus tracks, "Doughnuts" really knocked me out as being the only tune, that's not just an alternate take of one of the originally material, but a hereto completely unknown composition from that date. It is really a great up-tempo thing, similar to the stuff on "Ornette!", the exiting '61 album from the Atlantic Label.

Usually I don't replace my old Blue Note CDs with the new remasters from the RVG series, unless there is something truly special about the reissue/album in question. Well, Ornette's "Golden Circle" Volumes were certainly worth the upgrade! The sound is noticeably improved (this session wasn't originally recorded by Rudy), and most importantly there are three previously unreleased alternate takes. The rest of the disc is the same classic stuff, and I've included my review for the original CD release of this title below:

Both volumes of the Ornette Coleman Trio at the "Golden Circle" Stockholm are classic 60s avant-garde jazz albums. After his groundbreaking recordings with Atlantic, Coleman re-emerges with Blue Note in 1965 with these live sessions. On Volume 1, Ornette sticks to his native alto-sax, but on Volume 2 he branches out to violin and trumpet as well. The results of this multi-instrumentation are mixed, but is at the very least an interesting look into how a master composer and improviser tries to expand his methods for musical communication. Overall, any Ornette fan would be remiss to have this CD absent from his/her collection.

Listening to this music it is almost impossible to recall the WWII days of Ellington and Basie when jazz was, quite literally, the most popular music in America. Jazz was dance hall music, party music, and back porch spooning music, it defined an entire era. Even more than the so called "jazz age" of flappers and bathtub gin, the big bands with their glistening horn sections, tight orchestrations, and flamboyant front men were the very soul of every event worth attending, whether in Harlem or the Hamptons. Jazz was almost unique in its ability to cut across cultural (read racial) and socio-economic divides.

Today, jazz is still vital, though fragmented, and profoundly unpopular, residing somewhere between personal responsibility and moral integrity on the mass appeal spectrum. The molten Velveeta cheese pumped through pipes throughout the nation referred to as "smooth jazz" bears as much resemblance to actual jazz as a lightning bug resembles lightning. This is music for people too cheap to buy opium. On the other extreme is music so avante garde (a phrase which assumes the garde will eventually catch up, which may not occur in this case) as to thoroughly alienate the jazz diehards who swung with Cab Calloway and hoped that jazz would evolve in a comforting way.

Ornette Coleman was not single-handedly responsible for this schism, but it would be hard to find a practitioner who reveled more enthusiastically in driving a stake through the heart of jazz that was "safe, comfortable, and predictable." Even fans who had bravely hung in there with Bird, and even Trane, found Coleman simply too annoying to be worth the trouble. Instead of retreating, Coleman took possession of this neighborhood, gleefully embracing it. In earlier efforts, like The Shape Of Jazz To Come, Coleman showcased his virtuosity in a way that was simultaneously elegant and challenging. In Stockholm he seems intent on offending, being weird, and always going left when every street sign points to the right. (His violin playing alone tells this story emphatically.)

Coleman is a truly great artist, and great art has many responsibilities. One is to be beautiful. One is to be true. One is to inspire. One is to challenge. In the process of challenging, great art frequently offends. (Many lesser practitioners believe that to offend is to be great, which is ludicrous. Much of what is called art is merely vacuously offensive.) This CD, and its companion, conveniently entitled Volume 1, are horses of a very different stripe, or zebras of a very different color.

By kicking the piano out of the family and abandoning any semblance of traditional "song" structure, Coleman created his own musical universe. This is fearless, uncompromising, demented music that makes absolutely no attempt to be accessible. Even among jazz aficionados it was marginalized, if not condemned. When you accept that every note Coleman plays he plays on purpose, and that he has an adventurous spirit Lewis and Clark might have admired, you will find this music fascinating and richly satisfying. The moment it starts to grate on your nerves, imagine how much poorer we would all be if we lived in a world where there was no one intrepid enough to imagine and perform it.

... about Ornette Coleman's place in my musical pantheon in my review of "At the Golden Circle Vol. 1". Go read that, if you care.

Volume 2 continues the alternation of Volume 1, between:
A. Extreme jitters and jags, the sort of Coleman sound that alienates most casual listeners for understandable reasons. On this CD, the first track "Snowflakes and Sunshine" is the only example of such frenzy, and Ornette makes matters worse by playing trumpet, badly, and violin, revoltingly.
B. Solid bebop, worthy of Dizzy or Charlie, with Ornette on his real instrument, the alto sax, and laying down melodic licks that splatter with excitement but flow with harmonic logic. "The Riddle" is such.
C. Surprisingly lyrical ballads, dark and sensuous, showing that Ornette had listened to the old masters of melodic jazz - Lester, Dexter, Wardell - and absorbed their sensibilities also. "Morning Song" is as close as Ornette ever came to lush romanticism. "Antiques" is more up tempo but equally melodic.

One of the attractions of this remastered CD, aside from the far cleaner sound, is that alternate tracks of The Riddle, Dawn, and Antiques are included, each track being 10-12 minutes long. There are enough differences between the alternates to prove the uncanned, improvisatory nature of Coleman's jazz, and to be exciting listening each in itself. But there are also such fundamental similarities between the alternate takes of the same 'composition' that a skeptic, a person who hears only initial chaos in such music, will have to recognize, however begrudgingly, that Coleman wasn't just tootling frenetically, that solid compositional ideas and structures underlie his apparent 'freedom.'

This is the second Golden Circle CD (the first being At the "Golden Circle" in Stockholm, Vol. 1), and the best thing I can say about it is that Ornette really shows off his musicianship, putting away the sax and trading it in for a violin and trumpet, along with a triangle and whatnot. Unfortunately the "songs" are the same old Coleman: long-winded, meandering, mindless series of vaguely themed notes and confused passages. Using different instruments has a great effect, though, so I find the music in this volume a little easier to take than volume one. Ornette's energy never wanes, which helps him and his bass player get through their few flubs. (I thought the drumming was especially sharp on this compared to volume one.) The music is good enough, but you won't be humming any of it when you are done listening to this CD. As with volume one, the Van Gelder remastering makes this a clear, crisp, technologically perfect recording, especially given the limitations of recording jazz live. I'm sure most jazz fans will agree Ornette is the bee's knees and this is a superb CD, but I just can't take too much of Ornette for too long without taking a nap. He does try to foster an appreciation of alternative jazz, so, I guess that's not bad. (And his hat is way cool!)