2 The distance from ragtime to ragatime sounds astronomical: but it might be argued that jazz musicians always did incorporate the sounds of other cultures In their improvisations, as much as pleased their ear at the moment (did not Jelly Roll Morton borrow the tango? as did. In fact, the second published blues, St. Louis Blues' middle strain, in 1914). For classic-jazz people, the pulse is an essential element-I own to being in that sense an incurable beatnik (It Don't Mean A Thing If It Ain't Got That Swing, as one period ditty put it). But some terribly authentic jazarnen-Arm. strong. Waller, Tatum among others-were fond of ad lib intros and interjections. How long an unpulsed passage you're prepared to call jape is utterly a matter of taste: but. ultimately, what Isn't? In any case. when, as happens hero. five highly gifted swingers elect to attack anything, their attack can hardly lack a very recognizable Ian flavoring. A more crucial question is, Does it communicate a mood and a message? No doubt. Let's lust say Life Force (the track not the album) is Pittsburgh's answer to Ravi Shenker-and let it go at that. (Mr. Shenker could not be reached for comment.) Side El opens with Bud Shank's thoughtful Noctumo. Over a quiet (posse nova rhythm base, dominated by Pat's harmonious guitar. Eric wails this one alone, on alto (Jimmy stays out of this). once more revealing en affinity for unabashed lyricism, liberally Salted. however, with jazz accents and bluesy smeared notes. He builds to a plaintive climax, then drifts out as Martino follows with an Intense, closely reasoned solo of his own: then Erie's final restatement "dissolves out" in misty iterations ... Martino bites right Into Sonny Rollins' rollicking calypso St. Thomas, over the shuffle-beat of Alan and Ben. with a stinging twonoto figure, fullichorded; then Jimmy an trumpet, and Eric on tenor, blow the 16-bar theme. twice around, in double-tongue. tongue'incheek Style. Jimmy then soars out on a flying carpet of stabbing. hightegister fantasy for a few choruses (dig his loose- jointed, half scornful final two notes as he bows out): and. In perfect rapport. Eric slugs in with a punning reference to Donkey's Serenade, exactly setting the mood for the rest of his solo (his second chorus Is launched by another pun, this time on the -Things g0 better with Coke" jingle). a romp all the way, which explodes, midway in his 5th chorus, into a sequence of mad trip-lets, way outside the chords and shot through with extreme Inter-vals that are like lightning flashes in a murky sky: this propels him into his last two choruses on a swinging. potent reference to the old Charlie Chnstlan/Benny Goodman Crushes, Seven Canna Eleven, and several other rooty figures torn from the good earth of classic jazz. Pat takes 3 alter him balancing between Inventive single-noting and pretty block.chording, then they all ride out the theme behind the two horns. Still another ethnic bag, or bagpipe, is the inspiration for the last track. My Heart Is In The Highlands (no relation to the 1939 Broadway play by Saroyan). Dawson raps out a smart Scottish march figure on snare drum, Ben and Pat drone dutifully behind Eric's folksy jangle. played unison by alto and fluegelhorn, then by guitar, after a brief modal highlandish wail by Enc. the beat shifts tea= behind his first solo, a free improvisation of no determinate length, over a twochord pattern. This whole structure-drone, free stretch-out-is repeated, first with Jimmy, then with Pat, and then the drone wraps it UP. Much of this music is unconventional, avant-garde by the Stand. ards of anyone reared in the structural tradition of 12'bar blues, 16. and 32-bar pop standards, and infinite variations thereon. Here, other structures and idioms are freely borrowed and ex-plored. and the listener can never be sure what avenue the boys will ramble down next. But experiment, tree experiment, has ever been the soul of jazz (as of the Life Force itself, according to its admirers). At 18. Erie Kloss is a worthy representative of both con-<options. and a welcome newcomer to the ranks of those select pros who can usually be counted on for something fresh and ex-citing In almost any vein they cheese. Notes: Ralph Berton (Jan, 1968) Recording: Richard Alderson Produced by DON SCHLITTEN
1 month ago | 0
diegodobini2
Eric Kloss – Life Force (1968)
https://youtu.be/HDsd2kyKtJg
Original Liner Notes:
"II we could only realize that though the Life Foes sup. plies us with its own purpose it has no other brains to work with than those it has so painfully and Imperfectly evolved in our heads, the peoples of the earth would take some pay on their gods: and we should have • religion that would not be contradicted at every turn by the Thing. Thaws giving thew, to the ThingThavOught.Tote." (George Bernard Stow. preface to The Irrational Knee. 1905)
Shaw believed in a Life Force, which he called "the enlightened man's name for what used to be called The Will of God". So did Henri Bergson, a Frenchborn Irish Jew who knew a lot about nearly everything-he was France's 1st delegate to the League of Nations. and e Nobel-Prize winner for literature: he called it elan vital, and founded upon it a new religious philosophy. So does Eric Klass. the young saxophonist who pays the honest and grace. ful music you'll hear on this record. It is tempting to speculate on how Shaw might have described the Life Forces maneuvenngs in the case of Eric Kloss. Eric was born, a little too soon, on April 3rd, 1949, in a quiet little college town 70 miles north of Pittsburgh. (Or as Shaw might have said: "The Life Force was apparently in such a hurry for this particular specimen to are the light-cruelly ironic phrase-that it overplayed its hand: the birth was 12 days premature.") In his incubator. the hospital ignorantly gave him too much oxygen. permanently destroying the optic nerves, thereby blinding the little boy for life. (Let our imaginary Shaw tell the sequel: "Having made the colossal blunder. the Life Force now did its best to make up for it Its choice of medical care had been disastrously bad: but Its choice of a father turned out to be the best possible: a man who cheerfully-and that is the word-dedicated the rest of his lie to mitigating the consequences.") In short. Dr. Alton Kloss. who was then Dean of Admissions at Thiel College, methodically set to work to learn all there was to learn about care of the blind, quickly became an authority, resigned his deanship, and was made superintendent of the Western Pennsylvania School for Blind Children. Eric matriculated there at age four. ("Plainly resolved to do things up Prawn. our Life Force now saw to it that this one plant should grow more beautifully, more sensitively, an the dark than most of us manage to in the as blind as that Force itsell, but surging with the mysterious and marvelous gift called Music-) Fortunately, music was intimately interwoven with the School's curriculum, and Eric was a signally rewarding pupil. The staff included Bobby Koshan, a local jazz pianist, and Henry Marconi. a reed man. but. most essential of all, doubtless, was Eric's dad, himself a pianist, who saw to It that his son got to hear. in person, every worthwhile musician who can* anywhere near Pittsburgh. At 10. Eric switched from piano to sax-with Marconi-and speedily distanced his teachers. His progress was incredible.
Within a year or so he was being invited onto the stand at spots like the Crawford Grill, with musicians like Lennie Tristano and Sonny Shit at 12. Bobby Negri asked him to join has trio at the Playhouse Stagedoor Club in Pittsburgh. The young pro became their featured soloist, in 1962 he played with the group at the Three Rivers Festival and tore everybody up. The season ing and sharpening process went on. with club dates not only around Pittsburgh but in Cincinnati, Atlantic City, and New York, with Charles Boll's Trio, and sitting in with idols like Stitt. Eric Dolphy. Horace Silver, Art Farmer. Terry Gibbs. And always at his side, his familiar shadow-Kloss Senior-guiding, assisting. unobtrusively placing a chair, handing an Instrument, adjusting a mike. In 1965, 15-yearold Eric was • rave et the Civic Arena's Jazz Festival; Down Beat and other an periodicals joined the chorus, es did many well known musicians who made the event. He was a guest on the Mike Douglas snow, WIIC produced a documentary film on Eric Kloss' life & times. He cut his first Prestige album a year later. By fall of '67 ho had cut 5 more. The title Life Force was a natural. Far from brooding over his cruel fate. Eric Kloss has chosen to face the world he would never see with a joyous affirmation of everything beautiful in it-not In a spirit of mawkish sentimentality but. so to speak, lust the opposite: easily, unceremoniously, humorously-in a word, swinging. That world has given him much love-and the fact shows; young Eric is as beautiful to look at as to hear. "I want to be always learning and growing." he says he's currently taking a Liberal Arts course at Duquesne). ". .. I'm looking to find a new emotional spectrum. let's say-In which the basic element is Love." Teamed here with Eric are four of the many fine musicians he enjoys: Jimmy Owens, brilliant young trumpet star, voted No. 1 last year in Down Beat's International Critics' Poll; Pat Martino. 23.year-old guitar sensation from Philadelphia who broke it up at the 1967 Newport Festival. working with John Handys group (his own Prestige album, String:0PR 7547. is lust out): Ben Tucker. one of the an world's most wanted bass players: and of course Alan Davison, who played such exciting (Hums on a previous Kloss LP First Class Kress, PR 7520). This album begins with Soul Daddy, a tune contributed by a friend of Ben's, tenorrnan Charles Austin. who teaches school in Florida. Its a kind of subdued, insistent vamp in Btlat minor, that moves along in the leisurely manner of an escalator, each soloist stepping aboard for a couple of choruses. as if thinking aloud. then stepping off again, as the steadily moving conveyor continues on its way, and out of our ken.... The structure Is deceptive, with a 9-bar theme-the "extra" bar seems unobtrusively natural as it stretches out the vamp In an ascending cadence that ends it. But (as is often the way In jazz themes of irregular length), this reverts to the normal 8 in the improvised solos: habit is strong. Eric takes 3 on tenor, a sober lament: then Jimmy takes 2: then they explore the theme again in free obbligati until the fade. In the somewhat up tune You're Turning My Dreams Around, Eric. after the initial statement, gets right down to business with a letting B.natural entering note that is the quintessence of oblique jazz "commentary" (the key is Ellen). then bounces along for an-other 64 bars, before Owens casually drifts into focus with a nice matching jaunt. Next we hear Pat Martincis clean gutter. solidly backed up by Alan Dawson's sharp, driving beat and Ben Tucker's dry, clipped bass line. The title track is an 11-minute.andA6-second American version of an Indian raga, that starts with a tempoless ad lib 'vocalise" by Eric's tenor and wanders over its whole range, complete with quarter-tones and a creditable imitation of the sitar's subtle sigh, while the rhythm collectively improvise behind him. Then, shifting Into a beat Martino utters a succession of 3 ascending chords over Tucker's organpoint that seem to spur Klass to more intense strop Inge. The pulse ceases again, and now it's Owens' turn to wail (literally) on fluegelhorn, at first unaccompanied, then once more against a pulse; then Martino and Tucker improvise a duet-first without then with • pulse, and this leads toe gradually building ensemble of all five Instruments, collectively ad bribing on the
unchanging 3-chord pattern. The track ends as it began, in a tempo-less void suggestive of cosmic chaos and Old Night. Now to evaluate such an offering? Is it good jazz? Is it jazz at all? ---->
1 month ago | [YT] | 18