Wednesday 5 August 2009

Freefalling ...

Ok. Collywobbles under control, and normal service resumed. The ninth issue of Your Heart Out had a bit of a jazz theme that was introduced via the great actress Ida Lupino which was the name of a Carla Bley composition beautifully recorded by Paul Bley on his Closer LP. Confessing that I'm not the world's leading authority on Carla Bley's work this led quite nicely onto Carla's work with Charlie Haden on the Liberation Music Orchestra record put out by Impulse at the end of the '60s.

It's a record I first came across as part of that life-changing series of Impulse reissues in the '90s. The Liberation Music Orchestra record is a particular favourite, capturing the protest or rebel tradition perfectly, veering from the austere beauty of Song For Che, which Robert Wyatt fans should be aware of, to the oh dare I say the wonderful cacophony of the suite of Spanish Civil War songs . Haden took the Spanish Civil War thing seriously during the recording, even inviting surviving members of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade to be present during the sessions.

This kind of led on to some thoughts about the nature of free jazz and improvisation, and the Jimmy Giuffre 3 LP Free Fall (featuring Paul Bley) which has developed into being one of my all-time favourites but it takes some getting used to but that's the beauty of it I guess. Anyway, by coincidence the other day scratching around for connections, following up leads, I came across this clip of an earlier incarnation of the Jimmy Giuffre 3 featuring the great Jim Hall on guitar. It's just so beautiful and you can lose yourself in it ...

1 comment: