Jon Gibson: Criss X Cross

Jon [4] Gibson (Composer), Jon Gibson (Performer) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Performer: Jon Gibson
• Composer: Jon [4] Gibson
• Audio CD (January 24, 2006)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Tzadik
• ASIN: B000CC4W9Q
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #362,606 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars La Monte Young meets Paul Desmond...?, May 12, 2006

By 

svf - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jon Gibson: Criss X Cross (Audio CD)

Jon Gibson must have learned the hard way to include the following disclaimer on his website:

"Please note that this is the Jon Gibson known primarily to the world at large as a composer and multi-wind instrumentalist, who has also been affiliated with Philip Glass for many years - and not the other musical Jon Gibson of Christian music fame."

Now that we've cleared THAT up... this particular Jon Gibson is the only person who has performed in the world premieres of Terry Riley's In C, Steve Reich's Drumming, and Einstein on the Beach by Philip Glass -- the "Big Three" minimalist trifecta, if you will. Many may not realize that Mr. Gibson is also a composer (and visual artist) in his own right. I've always been curious to hear Gibson's own music, but his few recordings have always been notoriously out of print and/or impossible to find.

I first heard a tantalizing sample of Gibson's music when Criss X Cross #3 was included on the amazing collection, From the Kitchen Archives Vol. 1: New Music, New York 1979. Now, John Zorn's alternately brilliant and maddening (but still a national treasure) Tzadik record label has issued a live concert (recorded at a cathedral in Paris in 1979) documenting a more substantial chunk of Gibson's solo work. Criss X Cross #3 is there, along with #1 and #4, which are all performed on solo soprano saxophone. While the notes played are apparently derived from numerical systems (represented by that cool image on the cover of the CD, also by Jon Gibson), there is nothing mathematical or clinical sounding about this music. In fact, Criss X Cross sounds a little like a La Monte Young/Paul Desmond-ish hybrid with its jazzy intervals and loose improvisational rhythmic feel.

Also included is Equal Distribution #1 for "flute with harmonizer", and while at first it's fun to hear the solo flute melody transformed into chords by this machine, it gets kind of old after awhile (unfortunately long before the 20 minute piece ends.)

For me, the highlight of this concert is the opening track, Call, for solo alto flute (a sadly neglected instrument). This serene, organic, incantory piece is mysteriously captivating, weaving a hypnotic thread of melody that has an almost Native American character.

Uncovering the long lost music of Jon Gibson reminds us that there was more to the musical revolution now labeled as "minimalism" than the higher-profile works of Glass, Reich, Riley, and John Adams, and also how far most of these composers have drifted away from the stripped-down aesthetic of the movement's early years. Jon Gibson's subtle yet remarkable music reveals a searching, unique talent that blends composition and improvisation, electric and organic, rigid structure and freedom of choice, visual and audio, mathematics and spirituality (no, not THAT kind of "spirituality"... that's the other Jon Gibson, remember?)

This is genuine, unaffected, beautiful music ripe for rediscovery... seek it out.

[Also check out Gibson's Visitations I & II and Two Solo Pieces...]

4.0 out of 5 stars Realy minimalist, May 3, 2006

By 

F. Bonenfant (Laval, Québec Canada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Jon Gibson: Criss X Cross (Audio CD)

Gibson is a pioner of american minimal music that worked on early musics of La Monte Young, Terry Riley and Steve reich.

This music is realy minimalist.All pieces are for solo instrument

(SOPRANO SAX,FLUTE WITH HAMONIZER AND FLUTE) and was part of a recording from a concert in Universit? de la Sorbone in 1979.All intruments a played by Gibson itself.Compositions are repetitive

and minimalist.Player always play de same melody but improvise at the same time by the mathematical permutation technic.

The piece I prefer is number 4.The flute with hamonizer is very strange, mistic and poetic.