Hearing Voices

Continuum: Finding Voice
October 12, 2012
The Music Gallery
Toronto, Ontario

Christopher Butterfield: Music for Klein and Beuys (1987)
Anne Thompson: bass recorder
Carol Lynn Fujino: violin
Paul Rogers: bass
Laurent Philippe: melodica
Rob MacDonald: banjitar
Sanya Eng: harp
Ryan Scott: percussion

Nikolai Korndorf: Cazone Triste (1999)
Sanya Eng: harp

Linda C. Smith: Brush Line (2004)
Anne Thompson: flute
Max Christie: clarinet
Carol Lynn Fujino: violin
Paul Widner: cello
Laurent Philippe: piano
Ryan Scott: percussion
Marion Newman: mezzo-soprano
Brian Current: conductor

Martijn Voorvelt: Frederick's Doctor (2012)
Christopher Mayell: tenor
Anne Thompson: flute
Max Christie: clarinet
Carol Lynn Fujino: violin
Paul Widner: cello
Rob MacDonald: guitar
Sanya Eng: synthesizer

Martijn Voorvelt: Petit Air II / Fredrich's Tagebuch (1998)
Marion Newman: mezzo-soprano
Anne Thompson: flute
Rob MacDonald: guitar
Adrian Gross: mandolin
Sanya Eng: harp

The Continuum Contemporary Music ensemble started off their 2012 season with a strong voice.  Or at least a collection of strong voices that balanced out a program of music carving out a wide path of expressive territory.  Each piece was exquisitely well rehearsed and presented in a manner that allowed the ears to hear all the way inside the music.  Even as the subject material would switch from haunting beauty to complete madness.

The second half of the concert consisted of the Martijn Voorvelt pieces, presented as a continuous work of musical theater.  Continuum had spent the last week working directly with the composer to realize the drama Frederick's Doctor and their dedication to the macabre absurdity made for a flawless production of material that was often challenging and brittle.  The setting of Doctor Morell Mackenzie's often graphic accounts of the botched diagnosis and surgery upon German emperor Frederick III's laryngeal cancer were occasionally a bit hard to take. Especially given Christopher Mayell's incredible dead-pan delivery.  The sense of madness in his text could nearly be tasted in the back of my throat.  As this gave way to Marion Newman's performance of a voice robbed of its ability to communicate, the balance of humor and despair was simply delicious.  Having the flute player and mezzo-soprano delivering text in rhythmic unison was a particularly striking sonic effect.  Especially as the performance transitioned to the vocalist lip-syncing to Anne Thompson whispering through her instrument.  It was a brilliant set of pieces that won over my normal aversion to theatrics.

To my ears, the most stunning work on the program was Linda C. Smith's Brush Line.  An achingly beautiful work built out of luminous, horizontal strokes of warm sounds along a cold landscape of silence.  The constant reference to colors in the text added to the sense of sound painting with their vibrato-less delivery.

Cazone Triste is a virtuosic solo harp piece that gently gives way to song.  Sanya Eng's voice eventually shifting into the foreground as she plays to reveal a beautiful sound.  The simplicity of her voice balanced well against the confidence of her playing.

The opening work, Music for Klein and Beuys by Christopher Butterfield, set the whimsical-yet-serious tone that anticipated the Martijn Voorvelt experience of the second half.  The combination of bass recorder, melodica and banjitar with a percussion part the often consisted of tearing and wadding up newsprint never took on a sense of gimmick as the musical textures proved to be substantive.  Written as a memorial to Yves Klein and Josef Beuys, it is a wonderfully unpretentious and warm piece of art music.

Overall, there aren't enough superlatives to lavish upon an evening such as this.  An inspired sequence of great pieces of music performed well.  Continuum has set high expectations for the season that follows this concert.

HurdAudio Rotation: The Long View

Annie Gosfield: Flying Sparks and Heavy Machinery. 2001. Tzadik: TZ 7069.

EWA7 (1999)

Annie Gosfield: sampling keyboard
Roger Kleier: electric guitar
Ikue Mori: electronics
Jim Pugliese: drums, percussion
Sim Cain: drums, percussion
Hans-Gunter Brodmann: metal factory percussion
Matthias Rosenbauer: metal factory percussion

Flying Sparks and Heavy Machinery (2000)

Flux Quartet
Tom Chiu: violin
Cornelius Dufallo: violin
Kenji Bunch: viola
Darrett: Adkins: cello

Talujon Percussion Quartet
Michael Lipsey: percussion
Dominic Donato: percussion
Tom Kolor: percussion
Jim Pugliese: percussion

Annie Gosfield has a stylistic sensibility that cannot be described without sounding like less than the stunning results she achieves through her music.  As a composer who collects samples to build a big part of her sonic pallet (performing many of these samples herself as part of the ensemble) she is hardly treading into revolutionary territory.  Yet the musicality of her pieces is astonishing and way ahead of so many who have worked with similar materials.  Her craft is the kind of music that these ears have craved.  Realizing the potential rarely found by so many armed with samplers and an idea for integrating real world sounds into music.  Her pieces are music first, never outstripped by their concept, execution and intention.

Both of the pieces on this disc focus on the sonic matter of factory sounds.  Steering clear of the theme of "dehumanization" of factory work and machinery, it instead brings a wide open ear to the beauty inherent in the sonic materials of industrial scale mechanics.  Sounds that reveal a deeper humanity within sonic materials revealed by percussionists and recordists alike.  EWA 7 builds upon a shifting symbiotic relationship between sampled materials and live players with an all-encompassing sense of groove and texture.  All of which makes excellent use of the materials and the players at hand in its realization.  Flying Sparks and Heavy Machinery then takes this same textural and inspirational content and applies it to composed music.  Peeling away a layer of abstraction just below the sampled textures found in EWA 7.  Taken together, these two pieces form two halves a singular sonic vision and a startling sense of what is possible when wide open ears and blistering intelligence are brought to bear upon the tools of sampling technology and compositional prowess.  Highly recommended.

Fantastic Merlins: Look Around. 2007. Innova: 670.

Nathan Hanson: tenor saxophone, electronics
Jacqueline Ferrier-Ultan: cello, electronics
Brian Roessler: bass
Federico Ughi: drums

The music of the Fantastic Merlins is informed by many influences and sources.  My ears can hear the gentle tug of fellow Minnesota resident George Cartwright's angular compositions and early Curlew sounds.  Much of this is reinforced by the cello and saxophone arrangements.  But there are also passing references to a full body of jazz history and grounded feeling for a world of musics.  The slower tempo tracks finding expressive force through long phrases that exhale through harmonic terrain.  Faster tempos touching briefly upon ostinato patterns and groove before dissolving into a sophisticated sense of texture.  One can even hear the bitter cold winters of Minneapolis and the undercurrents found in the music of The Bad Plus.  Not every shifting passage leaves a lasting impression, but it does leave an itch to hear Look Around again.  

Marty Ehrlich: The Long View. 2002. Enja: 9452-2.

Marty Ehrlich: alto saxophone, tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone, flute, bass clarinet
Sam Furnace: alto saxophone, flute
Ned Rothenberg: alto saxophone, bass clarinet
Robert Debellis: tenor saxophone, clarinet
JD Parran: tenor saxophone, contrabass clarinet
Andy Laster: baritone saxophone, clarinet
Eddie Allen: trumpet
James Zollar: trumpet
John Clark: french horn
Clark Gayton: trombone
Marcus Rojas: tuba
Mark Dresser: bass
Michael Sarin: drums
Mark Helias: conductor, bass
Mark Feldman: violin
Ralph Farris: viola
Erik Friedlander: cello
Eddie Bobe: bongos, cowbell
Bobby Previte: drums, bass drum, tambourine
Wayne Horvitz: piano
Ray Anderson: trombone
Pheeroan AkLaff: drums

This disc was a "must have" just on the strength of the personnel included in these sessions.  The fact that this is a multi-movement work for shifting ensembles composed by Marty Ehrlich and realized by this all-star ensemble makes this one a long-running favorite in the rotation.  The fourth movement in particular is pure bliss with its Wayne Horvitz introduction leading into a brilliant quartet performance from Ehrlich, Horvitz, Dresser and Previte.  The rockin' Marcus Rojas tuba introduction for the fifth movement is another highlight. As is the Eddie Allen trumpet solo in the first and the soprano saxophone plus strings, drums and percussion second movement.  It's a "must hear."  Long form jazz compositions rarely get such aggressively solid realizations as this and the musical material gives these players plenty to dig into.

HurdAudio Rotation: To Say Your Name

Ornette Coleman: Beauty is a Rare Thing [disc 2]. 1993. Atlantic Recording Corp: 1-56826-275-2.

Ornette Coleman: alto saxophone
Don Cherry: pocket trumpet
Charlie Haden: bass
Billy Higgins: drums
Ed Blackwell: drums

One of the main things this box set gets right is the music.  The electricity between these players still leaps out from the speakers through the decades providing more than enough substance to inspire the free improviser.  Beyond the obvious chemistry is the incredible balance between individuals of remarkably equal force.  Disc 2 opens with "The Face of the Bass" with its intoxicating exposure of Charlie Haden's brilliant bass work.  Followed up by moments of awe for Don Cherry and Ornette Coleman.  Billy Higgins remains a harmolodic obsession, hearing how he carves through the same loose grooves traveled by his musical conspirators.

As an additional dimension to this music (that continues to be "The Shape of Jazz to Come") are these Ornette Coleman heads.  Compositions that have grown into familiar entities that have inspired other versions performed by various players in my personal collection.  "Ramblin'" has taken on a life of its own and the reason for that is abundantly clear on this take.  "I Heard It Over The Radio," a track previously unreleased before this complete Atlantic Recordings collection, has been given an inspired interpretation by Paul Plimley.  And so many other tunes that have become companions in my head (I often hear "Kaleidoscope" or "The Tribes of New York" in my head while commuting to the day job).  Beauty is no rare thing on any disc from this set, and today's disc is a jolt from a deeply creative period from one of Jazz's greats.

Thomas Chapin: Alive [disc 1] - Third Force. 1999. Knitting Factory Records: 35828 02482 2.

Thomas Chapin: saxophones
Mario Pavone: bass
Steve Johns: drums

The spark that catches and sets a sound aflame through Thomas Chapin's preferred medium of the trio is clearly audible on this set.  The kinetic energy realized by a saxophonist with a deep grasp of jazz roots applying his trade to a deft balance of groove, jam and melodic inventiveness.  The explosive quality of these live takes of pieces that would come to define the fleeting Knitting Factory scene of the 1990s.  And not lost on these ears is the forceful quality of his flute playing.  This cat could jam hard, rock out and still navigate his way through linear, melodic development.  Being a multi-instrumentalist with this much talent is almost showing off.

Sadly, Chapin falls on the unfortunate list of jazzmen lost far too soon, leaving behind the agonizing questions about how much the course of improvised music would have been altered had his career followed along the trajectory left behind on recording such as these.  There is also the real celebration of the vibrations captured for posterity.  This is a music that retains so much of its edge and pieces like "Ahab's Leg" or "Iddly" are hard to forget when they've been experienced like this.  Alive is a significant documentation of something significant that the ears seek to hold on to.

Wayne Horvitz Gravitas Quartet: One Dance Alone. 2008. Songlines: SA1571-2.

Wayne Horvitz: piano
Peggy Lee: cello
Ron Miles: cornet
Sara Schoenbeck: bassoon

This one is the second of two releases featuring the understated, detail-rich chamber jazz compositions of Wayne Horvitz.  The brush strokes of these restrained gems colored both by the instrumentation and the improvisation-friendly personalities brought into this project.  Making Gravitas Quartet one of the rare blends of jazz and classical traditions that soars without giving short shift to either side of the equation.  One Dance Alone is held together by interspersing the three movements of "July" (in reverse order) between contrasting compositions.  "July" being a deliciously abstract study in sparse textures that reveal the layer of Horvtiz pathos that exists at the core of his compositional output.  The remaining tracks feature a waltz, a focus on melodic material and brilliant textures (particularly for Ron Miles to play over) that make a strong case for Wayne Horvitz's ability to realize compact, song-like forms by getting all the individual elements of his ideas polished to a pristine shine.

HurdAudio Rotation: Jam Session for the End of Time

Wayne Horvitz Gravitas Quartet: Way Out East. 2006. Songlines Recordings: SA 1558-2.

Wayne Horvitz: piano, electronics
Peggy Lee: cello
Ron Miles: trumpet
Sara Schoenbeck: bassoon

This recording is quietly successful on many different levels.  Offering up a collection of jazz chamber works that balance the taut, textural beauty of Wayne Horvitz's compositions against the restrained improvisational prowess of four strong musical personalities.  The first impression left by this music is the inspired instrumentation of piano, cello, trumpet and bassoon.  This soon gives way to the voices lurking behind each of those instruments.  Ron Miles bringing sour notes into a placid texture that miraculously work their way into an essential part of the sound.  Peggy Lee lending her lyrical prowess at multiple points along the cello's register.  And Sara Schoenbeck deftly weaving the bassoon between the worlds of chamber music and improvised jazz while making a strong case for the timbral addition of the double reed instrument.  But at the heart of this music is Wayne Horvitz's compositions and his deft arrangements for this ensemble.  This is what gives this disc lasting power.  The calm, and often delicately dissonant-to-consonant textures find form and take deep root with this collection.  This one is well worth multiple listens.

Olivier Messiaen: Messiaen Edition [disc 4]. 1963, 1956, 1966, 1968, 1970, 1971, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1988, 1996, 2000. Teldec Classics/Warner Classics: 2564 62162-2.

Quatuor pour la fin du Temps (1940-41)
Huguette Fernandez: violin
Guy Deplus: clarinet
Jacques Nielz: cello
Marie-Madeleine Petit: piano

Cinq Rechants (1948)
pour 12 parties vocales reelles

Solistes des choeurs de l'ORTF
Marcel Couraud: conductor

Listening to this disc is an interesting exercise in hearing both the familiar and the unfamiliar.  The Quartet for the End of Time is a deeply familiar work to these ears and yet this particular performance is new to me.  While the Cinq Rechants is something unfamiliar altogether (and composed for a capella performers, also unfamiliar terrain relative to instrumental chamber music).

The Quartet for the End of Time is an enormously significant work emanating from the darkness of the Second World War and literally composed from within the depths of despair within a Nazi prisoner of war camp.  Having heard multiple performances, it should not be surprising that the substance of this piece manifests itself in so many different ways.  And yet it is.  This particular take gives a much harder edge to the transitions within these movements than I'm used to hearing.  And while this isn't the most transcendent performance of this piece I've heard, the fifth ("Louange A l'Eternite De Jesus") and eighth ("Louange A L'immortalite De Jesus") movements come close to being the best interpretations I've yet come across.  The temptation to speed up the slow tempos on the cello and violin feature movements is resisted nicely, allowing the material to soar to the staggering heights that makes this piece so enduring.

The Cinq Rechants is a different beast altogether.  My non-French ears hear everything as sound and texture even as my mind understands that the language is an expression of faith.  The unapologetic use of twentieth century techniques and rapid changes through virtuosic passages makes for an expression of faith I can appreciate.  The depth of Messiaen's expressive and technical prowess makes for a towering presence along with a body of music that must be heard.

Miles Davis: The Complete On The Corner Sessions [disc 3]. 2007. Sony BMG Music Entertainment: 88697 06239 2.

Miles Davis: trumpet, organ
Carlos Garnett: soprano saxophone
Cedric Lawson: organ
Reggie Lucas: guitar
Khalil Balakrishna: electric sitar
Michael Henderson: electric bass
Al Foster: drums
Badal Roy: tablas
Mtume: congas
Dave Liebman: soprano saxophone, flute
Pete Cosey: guitar

There is a free flowing density to much of these sets and outtakes that makes for a big, sloppy, funky mess.  But it happens to make for a delicious, sloppy mess.  And with this third disc we come upon the session tapes for "Peace" and "Mr. Foster" where Miles Davis has carved out some introspective moments that open up the density and allow one to hear into the way individual performers explore this groove-heavy terrain.  In many ways, this box set is a glimpse into a jam session populated by serious musicians.  Long forms give way to an endless expanse.  When one steps back to take in the whole of this massive sound an attractive mood and texture takes shape as it seemingly expands toward an infinite expanse.  Individual solo lines take on an equal urgency with the pulse of this music.  The long trumpet solo on "Mir. Foster" drives home the fact that Miles Davis was still in full command of his improvisational abilities at this stage of his recording career even as he churned out reams of music that remain to be understood on levels not yet realized.

HurdAudio Rotation: Greater than Human Scale

Dirty Projectors: Bitte Orca. 2009. Domino Recordings: DN0217CD.

David Longstreth: vocals, guitar, musical direction
Amber Coffman: vocals, guitar
Angel Deradoorian: vocals, guitar
Brian Mcomber: drums
Nat Baldwin: bass
Jordan Dykstra: viola
Caleb Russell: violin
Andrew Todd: violin
Anna Fritz: cello

Since this disc last appeared in the HurdAudio Rotation this band has blown up big.  And deservedly so.  Also, I realize that they're now promoting a more recent recording that deserves inclusion in the rotation as well.  But the HurdAudio Rotation has never been about focusing on the latest, hippest thing and only occasionally finds itself ahead of the curve on that front.  This is a listening journal that attempts to forget nothing that vibrates these ear drums even with a ravenous appetite for new sounds.

That said, Bitte Orca is a stunning work of art rock that continues to leave a deep impression and give the ears plenty to discover over several listenings.  The sequence of songs is inspired.  The songs themselves offer up such unforced, fresh forms that reaffirm the potential of song in the twenty-first century.  And buried in the middle of this set is the exquisite "Two Doves" that will one day take on a life of its own once people realize the potential for reinterpreting its melodic angles.  The poetry of the words stands along side the inventive vocal parts that prove that voice has more timbral potential than merely being the focal point.  It's the fluid movement of instrumental parts and voice that carries the ears along the journey that Bitte Orca presents.  David Longstreth proves that smart can give music long shelf life.

David Byrne: Grown Backwards. 2004. Nonesuch: 79826-2.

David Byrne: vocals, nylon-string guitar, electric guitar, dobro, rhodes
Mauro Refosco: marimba, percussion
Jane Scarpantoni: cello
David Hilliard: high hat
Paul Frazier: bass
The Tosca Strings:
Leigh Mahoney: violin
Tracy Seeger: violin
Jamie Desautels: violin
Ames Asbell: viola
Sara Nelson: cello
Douglas Harvey: cello
John Mills: clarinet, bass clarinet, flute
Freddie Mendoza: trombone, euphonium
Mike Maddox: accordion
Elaine Barber: harp
Rufus Wainwright: vocals
Pamelia Kurstin: theremin
Stephen Barber: prepared piano
Tom Burritt: marimba, tympani
Karen Mantler: organ
Steve Swallow: bass
Vincent Herring: alto saxophone
Alex Foster: tenor saxophone
Gary Smulyan: baritone saxophone
Earl Gardner: trumpet
Lew Soloff: trumpet
Ray Anderson: trombone
Keith O'Quinn: trombone
Bob Routch: french horn
Bob Stewart: tuba
Barry Burns: spacey guitar, rhodes
Lisa Aferiat: violin
Greg Lawson: violin
Fiona Stephen: violin
Donald Gillan: viola
Robert Irvine: viola
Una McGlone: bass
Johnny Quinn: drums
Andy Waterworth: bass
Ross Godfrey: keyboards
Paul Godfrey: sequencing
Jon Blondell: trombone
John Mills: baritone saxophone
Steve Williams: drums
Kenny Wollesen: drums
John Linnell: accordion
Jon Vercesi: rhodes
Sandra Park: violin
Sharon Yamada: violin
Soo Hyun Kwon: violin
Katherine Fong: violin
Dawn Hannay: viola
David Creswell: viola
Alan Stpansky: cello
Jeremy Turner: cello
Shelley Woodworth: oboe, english horn
Mark Nuccio: clarinet
Philip Myers: french horn
John Patitucci: bass
Patrick Dillett: background vocals
Steve Williams: drum triggers

David Byrne's career has careened through any number of unpredictable avenues that have managed to drag one foot through accessibility and the other along an artistic fringe that have earned him a body of music that deserves respect, and more than a certain degree of love if one listens to it with the same degree of honesty that went into its realization.  Byrne has been a constant presence for these ears that have aged along the span of his creative output.  So it's a little unusual to arrive so late to Grown Backwards, taking it in a number of years after its release.  Such is the nature of musical abundance that delay is inevitable even when catching up with the musicians one has grown up listening to.

The most striking thing about Grown Backwards is that it is a relatively traditional oriented set of songs bearing the unmistakable impression of Byrne's well developed language.  It is more acoustic than the thickly (and well) produced sets found on Feelings or Look Into the Eyeball.  But it is acoustic arrangements presented with the same ear for production details found on those releases.  The quality of the Carla Bley arrangement is hardly lost on these ears.  Hearing Byrne's poetry and vocals within a bed of acoustic instruments isn't new ground for anyone who remembers Rei Momo or his brass arrangements on Knee Plays.  But this is a set of songs that darts in radically different directions.  The inclusion of opera music by Bizet and Verdi is startling.  More so for the seamlessness of its inclusion than as novelty.  The opera selections are most startling for the lack of "quirkiness" that has essentially been the hallmark of so much of Byrne's career.  It is now the sound of a proven artist with his heart well invested in his craft.  Like the rest of David Byrne's solo oeuvre, it manages to exceed already high expectations with a sound that invites a healthy range of the serious and the fun.

Iannis Xenakis: Orchestral Works - Vol II. 2001. Timpani: 1C1062.

Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg
Arturo Tamayo: conductor

Jonchaies (1977)
Shaar (1983)
Lichens (1983)
Antikhthon (1971)

These are pieces for large orchestras.  Jonchaies is scored for 109 musicians, Shaar for "large string orchestra," Lichens for 96 players and Antikhthon calls for 86 or 60.  This massing of humanity is called into the service of realizing an aesthetic that calls to mind massive forces that act upon an inner logic with indifference to human scale.  The liner notes reference the shaping of continents along geological time and the formulation of ancient languages from individual phonemes.  At times I hear the individual sounds as electrons interacting at a microscopic scale beyond the grasp of human observation forming an electrified whole.  An orchestral medium being treated as a means for realizing acoustic musique concrete.  The sweeping result is awe inspiring and one that inspires while leaving the single listener feeling small within these enormous textures.

Having a recording of this music, produced at a high quality and performed brilliantly by such a large mass of humanity is a gift that is nothing short of a miracle.  It serves as a forceful reminder of the range of expression composed for orchestra is far larger than the average season schedule would lead one to believe.  That unabashed adherence to algorithmic means and blistering dissonance has produced exhilarating gems such as these.  This is music that should inspire uncompromising composers to push toward expansive horizons in all media.  And push audiences to consider that music can be more than programmatic when taking on expressions of elemental magnificence.  This is music that is the mountains, rather than just about the mountains.  Masses of sound that speak to the austere beauty of an expanding universe from within the limited frequency range of human hearing.  Four pieces that display the kind of lasting mark Iannis Xenakis achieved in the 20th century.

Those who have followed this blog from the beginning have seen it track my movements from Seattle to Los Angeles to Baltimore to San Francisco to Chicago...

Well, I've moved again.  And it's taken a lot longer to ramp up to full blogging power with all the complexities of stacking on an additional move, immigration, new job and other life events.  But the speakers are finally plugged in and the concentrated listening/composing space is finally reassembled.  This longer-than-expected hiatus is about to end.

International Ornette Coleman Day 2012

What I find inspiring about Ornette is his genuine creative impulse. He arrived on the scene with a fully formed concept that was innovative and completely honest, playing the way he did because that was just how he heard music. The integrity of that approach, let alone the nature of the content of his art, is something I think all creative people aspire towards in some way. I'm influenced by Ornette as a saxophone player and an improviser coming from the jazz tradition, but I'm not really interested in sounding just like him or recreating what he's already done. The truth Ornette's sound and concept represents to me has helped me to identify what's true within myself. If my music bears some resemblance to Ornette's for some people, I think it can be attributed to my working through these external truths that have validated and unlocked some internal ones that are distinctly mine. As time goes on, I hear myself developing my own style, and the process of working on music like this is a lifelong pursuit.

 - Nick Mazzarella

Ornette Coleman turns 82 today.  His music continues to shape the sound of jazz yet to come.  A substantial creative and spiritual force that reverberates as strong now as when he burst onto the scene in 1959 with that amazing quartet with Don Cherry, Charlie Haden and Billy Higgins.  I hear harmony different today because of Ornette Coleman.  I hear rhythm different today because of Ornette Coleman.  I understand improvisation different today because of Ornette Coleman.  And beyond the sum of all of those parts one finds the incredible melodic sensibility of Ornette Coleman.  Those melodies are striking.  A near perfect balance of lyrical and emotive as notes bleed into cries of joy and anguish.  The free jazz movement that ignited from his spark continues to burn today and is particularly strong in Chicago, where it was my privilege to hear the next generation of musicians inspired by his harmolodics this past year and a half.

A figure worthy of his own holiday.  Happy International Ornette Coleman Day.