The Low Down on Frank Lowe

Frank Lowe didn’t like the studio system much and so didn’t leave behind the kind of legacy that he deserved.  He was an avant garde jazzman to his core but, as is often the case, there were deep streaks of tradition in his locks.  I have been listening today to a new acquisition: Decision in Paradise (1985).  All the comments on the recording I have read describe it as “conservative”.  It is in fact a genuine exploration of the bop sentiment.  In many ways, this is my favorite kind of jazz recording: an avant garde revolutionary trying out the old whiskey. 

I chose the album mostly for the band.  Don Cherry on trumpet suggests wild, but the suggestion goes wide of the mark.  Grachan Moncur III on trombone also misleads.  But I am a big fan of Moncur.  Geri Allen on piano, well, what’s not to like?  Charnette Moffett plays bass and Charles Moffett beats the skins. 

I am playing the title cut and ‘You Dig!’  This is one album that you will dig.  It’s available from Amazon for about $5.  Get it and dig it. 

I am also playing a cut from The Flam (1976), a more characteristic Lowe recording, I suspect, and a flamboyant avant garde document.  Joseph Bowie plays a spitting trumpet, Leo Smith draws from a quiver of horns, Alex Blake is on bass and Charles Bobo Shaw is on drums.  Lowe’s tenor is squelching and screechy, in a Charles Gaye sort of way.  Let it run. 

Dewey Redman

I play a lot of avant garde on my Live365 station.  I worry that I don’t play enough hard bop, which I love and want to encourage.  I find special satisfaction in coherent bop played by avant garde jazzmen.  I come back again and again to Anthony Braxton’s Six Monk Compositions.  Listening to it is a little like finding out for sure that an abstract painter can draw a recognizable human face.  I also enjoy albums that have a mix of challenging AG compositions along with more accessible standards. 

Tenor Sax player Dewey Redman was very good at that kind of mix.  Redman, who passed away in 2006, is best known for his work with Ornette Coleman. 

Mr. Redman missed the ascension of his old friend Ornette Coleman, moving to New York to join the band only in 1967. His performances with Mr. Coleman over the next seven years, on albums like “New York Is Now!,” “Love Call” and “Science Fiction,” on which his tenor saxophone meshes with Mr. Coleman’s alto, are good ways to understand some of the great jazz of the period, intuitively finding a third way between general conceptions of the jazz tradition and the avant-garde.

Today I purchased a couple of Redman’s recordings: Living on the Edge, and In London, both for under five bucks from eMusic.  These are wonderful documents.  Living cost me about three dollars.  This is how to move moving music.  Here is the lineup from the former:

• ·         Alto Saxophone, Tenor Saxophone – Dewey Redman
• ·         Bass – Cameron Brown
• ·         Drums – Eddie Moore
• ·         Piano – Geri Allen

I am playing ‘Pt. 1 Blues or J.a.m.’, and ‘Boo Boodoop’.  The former is a straight ahead, juke joint blues.  The latter is all avant to the garde.  Geri Allen is wonderful and, if the Penguin Guide is to be believed, she keeps Redman in the bounds of earthly logic. 

I am playing ‘The Very Thought of You’ from In London. 

• ·         Arranged By, Tenor Saxophone – Dewey Redman
• ·         Bass – Cameron Brown
• ·         Drums – Matt Wilson
• ·         Piano – Rita Marcotulli

This is a compelling standard.  Finally, I am playing ‘Boody’ from the very adventurous album The Ear of the Behearer.  This is a bloody good grasp of the heart of American music. 

• ·         Bass, Flute [Wood] – Sirone
• ·         Cello – Jane Robertson
• ·         Drums, Saw, Timpani [Tympani], Gong – Eddie Moore
• ·         Percussion – Danny Johnson (10)
• ·         Tenor Saxophone, Alto Saxophone, Bagpipes [Musette], Composed By – Dewey Redman
• ·         Trumpet, Bugle [Moroccan] – Ted Daniel

All three albums are great items for your collection.  The last is going to give you quite a ride. 

Trio 3 is killer jazz

I am a big fan of jazz drummer Andrew Cyrille, bass player Reggie Workman, and horn master Oliver Lake, so I can’t help buying up the recordings of the Trio 3.  This week I got Open Ideas.  It’s a pretty good example of avant garde on the more accessible end.  I am playing ‘Casino,’ which features some vocal chants.  I don’t know who is chanting, but I love the slow blues.  I am also playing ‘Hooray for Herbie’. 

So I might as well add more.  I am playing ‘Crooked Blues’, a splendid number that will appeal to hard bop fans.  It is from the album Encounter.  Lake’s horn is lavish and seductive.  Workman rides over Cyrille’s beat like he knows more than you know about the heart.  Finally, I added a number from At This Time, by The Trio 3 Plus Geri Allen. 

All three albums are superb.  Nail ‘em down.