Latest / The Piano Maven with Jed Distler / The Unique Cecil Taylor

Transcript

The Unique Cecil Taylor · The Piano Maven with Jed Distler

• 0:07
  This is Jed Disler, and welcome to The Piano
• 0:11
  Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano recordings.
• 0:15
  Please consider taking out a paid subscription
• 0:17
  to The Piano Maven, and paid subscribers get
• 0:21
  a free download at the beginning of each month.
• 0:24
  I have not done a jazz episode in a while, although
• 0:28
  the pianist I will be talking about totally transcends
• 0:32
  jazz and transcends any style. He was a unique
• 0:37
  and totally original and totally unclassifiable
• 0:41
  artist. I'm talking about Cecil Taylor, and he's
• 0:47
  usually linked with the avant -garde jazz movement
• 0:50
  in the 1950s and 60s and beyond. But as a pianist,
• 0:56
  nobody sounds like him. Nobody ever sounded like
• 1:00
  him before, and nobody ever will sound like him,
• 1:04
  try as they might. Superficially... You think
• 1:09
  that anyone who can run one's hands or knuckles
• 1:12
  or even their elbows up and down the keyboard
• 1:16
  playing dissonant clusters in frantic flight
• 1:19
  can sound exactly like Cecil Taylor, but that's
• 1:23
  not quite true. I mean, you do get a lot of those
• 1:26
  qualities in Cecil Taylor's work. but you also
• 1:30
  get vocally inflected phrases in both hands,
• 1:34
  often playing the same patterns in contrary motion.
• 1:38
  And you get... oddly affecting lyrical passages
• 1:42
  too. There's a lot of percussiveness to Cecil
• 1:46
  Taylor's approach, but also a lot of orchestral
• 1:49
  thinking in terms of sonority, and much more
• 1:53
  color and nuance and dynamic variety than you
• 1:57
  would expect. Cecil Taylor's many ensemble recordings
• 2:01
  combine great freedom with a sense of rigor in
• 2:06
  terms of ensemble listening and interaction but
• 2:10
  you know my words cannot begin to describe the
• 2:14
  sheer experience of hearing any of cecil taylor's
• 2:19
  lengthy ensemble performances or to hear any
• 2:23
  of his solo piano recordings or live performances
• 2:26
  on recordings he actually was my favorite living
• 2:32
  pianist that was up until he died in 2018 at
• 2:37
  the age of 89. So I guess all I can really do
• 2:41
  is guide you to Cecil Taylor recordings that
• 2:45
  I think represent him very well. His first recordings...
• 2:50
  from the mid -1950s through the end of that decade,
• 2:54
  tend to use standard rhythm sections, against
• 2:58
  which Cecil Taylor alludes to the themes of the
• 3:02
  popular songs that he's playing, but he mostly
• 3:05
  inflects these melodies with elusive and angular
• 3:09
  jabs, so to speak. Eventually, he started getting
• 3:15
  into longer, continuous pieces that you hear
• 3:19
  on his 1962 live recordings from the Café Momonta
• 3:24
  in Copenhagen, which give hints of the more fully
• 3:28
  realized ensemble recordings that he would be
• 3:32
  making for Blue Note in the mid -60s. The albums
• 3:36
  that are... titled Unit Structures and Conquistador,
• 3:40
  and these albums still sound really fresh and
• 3:44
  vibrant, especially Conquistador. For the Cecil
• 3:49
  Taylor experience with ensembles and extended,
• 3:53
  uninterrupted performances, I would recommend
• 3:57
  Akisa Kila. which was recorded live in Japan
• 4:01
  in 1973. And it features his trio with alto saxophonist
• 4:08
  Jimmy Lyons and percussionist Andrew Cyril. That
• 4:12
  was his basic working group for many years. Also,
• 4:16
  check out the studio album Three Phases, which
• 4:21
  is from 1978 on the New World label. but I probably
• 4:26
  would start with his solo albums. There is Indent
• 4:30
  from 1973, and there is also the highly acclaimed
• 4:36
  Silent Tongues from 1974, recorded live at the
• 4:42
  Montreux Jazz Festival. That is well worth hearing,
• 4:45
  although the quality of the piano is not the
• 4:48
  greatest, and the out -of -tune notes kind of
• 4:52
  bother me. On the Hat Art label, we have a live
• 4:58
  performance from 1981 entitled Garden. This is
• 5:02
  beautiful. Actually, this was several releases.
• 5:05
  It was in two volumes on two CDs, I think. And
• 5:10
  here, Cecil Taylor benefits from excellent engineering
• 5:14
  and a really well -regulated Bersendorfer grand
• 5:17
  piano. Also, the solo portion of his 1973 Town
• 5:23
  Hall concert This is called Spring of Two Blue
• 5:28
  Jays. This is just a 16 -minute long solo piano
• 5:32
  segment, but this is a great starting point for
• 5:35
  those who have not yet encountered Cecil Taylor's
• 5:39
  solo piano playing. You get the torrential side
• 5:42
  of his pianism here, along with great lyric beauty
• 5:46
  as well. I bought this on LP, actually, when
• 5:50
  it came out back in 1974, maybe. And now, that
• 5:55
  entire town hall concert is available for a digital
• 5:59
  download. In 1988, Cecil Taylor undertook this
• 6:04
  extended residency in Berlin that resulted in
• 6:08
  numerous albums, primarily duo collaborations
• 6:12
  with various musicians. And in the late 1980s
• 6:16
  and early 1990s, you have the Feel Trio, F -E
• 6:21
  -E -L Trio. with bassist William Parker and the
• 6:26
  percussionist Tony Oxley. And if you can find
• 6:30
  their limited edition 10 -disc release called
• 6:34
  From Live Performances from Ronnie Scott's Jazz
• 6:38
  Club in London in 1990, it's really, really well
• 6:42
  worth investigating. posted the Cecil Taylor
• 6:47
  links in our episode description so that will
• 6:51
  help you get going if you haven't yet discovered
• 6:54
  this extraordinary musician's unique sound world.
• 6:59
  I saw Cecil Taylor perform live in concert and
• 7:03
  in clubs on numerous occasions, but the very
• 7:07
  first time that I ever heard him live still stands
• 7:11
  out in my memory. It was on July 2nd, 1972 at
• 7:17
  Carnegie Hall, and it was part of a concert with
• 7:20
  other people on the bill, the JPJ Quartet with
• 7:24
  Bud Johnson, the Mary Lou Williams Trio, and
• 7:27
  Rosson Rolling Kirk and his group. But Cecil
• 7:31
  Taylor played a solo piano set on this concert.
• 7:35
  I had no idea what to expect because I really
• 7:39
  did not know his music. I was totally stunned.
• 7:44
  I'll never forget it. I mean, his technique in
• 7:48
  his presence and his projection and concentration
• 7:52
  and his utter commitment to being in the moment.
• 7:57
  This all hit me like a ton of bricks. And I was
• 8:02
  only 15 years old, but... It made such an impression
• 8:06
  on me, and I actually got a fever after his segment
• 8:10
  was over. Probably the fever was already brewing,
• 8:13
  but I would like to think that Cecil's solo playing
• 8:17
  caused my fever. But the impact on me at 15 years
• 8:22
  old of this concert, it still kind of resonates
• 8:26
  in my 69 -year -old body. You know, there was
• 8:30
  this story. I think it was Gunther Schuller who
• 8:33
  told the story about how he was playing horn
• 8:36
  in the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra under Fritz
• 8:39
  Reiner. They were rehearsing Wagner's Die Meistersinger.
• 8:43
  And I think that Gunther Schuller made a small
• 8:46
  error and Fritz Reiner glared at him or he criticized
• 8:50
  him. And Gunther Schuller said, I'm sorry, maestro,
• 8:54
  forgive me, but this is my first time playing
• 8:56
  Die Meistersinger. And then Fritz Reiner... thought
• 9:00
  for a moment, and he said something to the effect
• 9:04
  of, I will give anything to hear Die Meistersinger
• 9:07
  again for the first time. Let us continue. So
• 9:12
  in a similar vein, I would give anything to hear
• 9:16
  Cecil Taylor again for the first time. This is
• 9:20
  Jed Disler, and you've been listening to The
• 9:22
  Piano Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano
• 9:26
  recordings. I look forward to being with you
• 9:28
  for our next episode. Take good care.