Born in Tokyo in 1950, Kifu Mitsuhashi studied Kinko-school shakuhachi with Sofu Sasaki and the classical honkyoku repertoire of the Fuke school with Chikugai Okamoto.
He was awarded the Prize for Excellence by the Agency for Cultural Affairs for his first recital (1980) and the Arts Festival Prize by the same agency for his 1989 solo recital. He was awarded the Osaka Cultural Festival Prize in 1981, the 10th Nakajima Kenzo Music Prize in 1992, the Arts Festival Works Prize for his CD of works by Makoto Moroi, Chikurin Kitan, and the Yokohama Cultural Encouragement Award.
He traveled to Europe as a soloist with the Tokyo Philharmonia in 1994, gaining high acclaim for performances in venues such as the London Festival Hall.
He has also become active as a producer, organising events at the Serbia Expo and Festival Asia. He has given 77 recitals to date overseas, and twenty in Tokyo alone. He holds the qualification of shihan (master) in the Kinko school, and runs his own group for shakuhachi performance, the Kifu Kai.
Japanese folk meets psychedelic jazz ! And the use of the bamboo flute (or shakuhachi) puts me in trance
Kifu Mitsuhashi is playing the shakuhachi, and you’ve got some tasty, heavy breaks too ! And keep in mind that it’s very very rare, even in Japan.
A Japanese jazz composer, band leader born in Tokyo. (March 29, 1932 - July 9, 2002) In 1953 He joined 高浜哲郎とエスカイヤ・キャッツ (Tetsurou Takahama And Eskyer Cats) and 山本広道とシャンペン・セレナード (Hiromichi Yamamoto And Champagne Serenade) and 鍋島靖起とリズムメイツ (Yasuoki Nabeshima And Rhythm Mates). In 1953 he formed his band Fine Dandies. In 1955 he renamed the band to Four Acen. Soon the band broke up and in 1957-1960 he worked as a baritone saxophone player at The Sharps and Flats. After he left the band, he provided many composes and arrangements to big bands such as The Sharps and Flats and recorded. In April 1959, he formed "Modern Jazz Three Association" with 前田憲男 (Norio Maeda) and 三保敬太郎(Keitaro Miho), which contributed to the improvement of the level of Japanese jazz composition and arrangement. In the summer of 1965, he served as a leader of the Tokyo Union for about a year. In 1965 he received Japan Record Award 's Arrangement Award.
三橋貴風 / Kifu Mitsuhashi:
Studied with Soufu Sasaki of Kinko-style shakuhachi in 1968. Became a member of Pro Musica Nipponia and participated in many concerts both in Japan and overseas after completing from the NHK Hougaku Training Program in 1972. Studied with Chikugai Okamoto of the shakuhachi fukesyu meian souryuukai in 1974. Awarded as top soloist of the 1st Pan Music Festival in 1976. Awarded the Arts Festival Superior Prize from the Agency for Cultural Affairs in1980. After that played with various Orchestras through overseas performances. Awarded the Arts Festival Prize from the Agency for Cultural Affairs for "the Shakuhachi recital of Kifu Mitsuhashi" in 1989. Awarded Arts Pieces Prize from the Agency for Cultural Affairs for the CD solo album "Makoto Moroi Chikurin Kitan" and the Music Prize from Kenzo Nakajima in 1992.
Active in the Philadelphia of the early ‘70s, Sounds ofLiberation released their sole LP, New Horizons, on the collective self-production vehicle Dogtown Records, named after a section of the Germantown area, northwest of the city.
Working with the musicians, Philadelphia record store Brewerytown Beats has resurrected the imprint for Unreleased, 30 minutes of unheard material from a 1973 Columbia University studio session (multiple versions are being issued, including a Corbett vs. Dempsey CD).
Khan Jamal and Byard Lancaster are the most well-known band members. Their names ring avant garde bells (notably for their work with drummer Sunny Murray), but the group’s approach here is firmly centered on the groove. Dense rhythmic layers are provided throughout by electric bassist Billy Mills, continuously remarkable guitarist Monnette Sudler and the three-man percussive team of Dwight James, Omar Hill and Rashid Salim, primarily on hand drums. After an opening Sudler original, “Thoughts”, the music is mostly a vehicle for Jamal’s vibraphone and Lancaster’s flute and saxophone. The pair pen two compositions each. Saxophonist and engineer Marzette Watts once recalled—in an interview with Chris Flicker and Thierry Trombert—his November 1973 work on an album left unfinished after the adversity faced in the United States prompted Lancaster’s departure for Paris. Mention of an unreleased Lancaster album for the Muse label titled The Back Streets of Heaven appeared soon after in the columns of the French Jazz magazine. Those two bits of information quite possibly tie back to the music presented here.
The engineering is indeed reminiscent of Watts’ work on Ju Ju’s first Strata-East album, A Message from Mozambique, but whatever further investigations might reveal, Unreleased’s detailed mix is another strong point of interest, adding a second layer of listening beyond the groove’s immediacy. The engineering actively shapes the music through strategic uses of reverb or overdubbing. Most interestingly, it not only positions the musicians spatially but also inside the layers of the groove: solos are not automatically brought to the forefront, rather often wrapped inside the rhythmic foundation, nurturing it. The final number, possibly intended as the title track, is a vocal version of the New Horizons theme already featured twice on the eponymous LP. This new take shows the versatility of the band. Unreleased finds the Sounds of Liberation at their most compact and provides a much welcome occasion to look back at the group.
In the years following saxophonist John Coltrane's death and the related dearth of opportunities to perform and record the New Music stateside, a significant body of musicians relocated to Europe, to ply their art in a more receptive atmosphere. Reedman Byard Lancaster was one of the second wave of American free jazz musicians to relocate to Paris in the late 1960s, recording and gigging as part of drummer Sunny Murray's Acoustical Swing Unit and leading his own ensembles with musicians like pianist Francois Tusques, conguero Keino Speller and Congolese guitarist Francois Nyombo. But Lancaster always maintained a connection to his hometown of Philadelphia, as well as a staunch commitment to playing music that was both avant-garde and decidedly "for the people"—hence his oft-repeated tagline "From A Love Supreme to the Sex Machine."
Lancaster and vibraphonist Khan Jamal were the artists primarily represented on the Philly free-soul label Dogtown, which released three titles before disappearing into the record collecting ether. The Sounds of Liberation was a collective ostensibly creditable to both Jamal and Lancaster; joining the proceedings are bassist Billy Mills, guitarist Monnette Sudler, drummer Dwight James and percussionists Rashid Salim and Omar Hill. Sudler, Mills and James also appeared on Jamal's excellent psychedelic free-funk fantasia, Drum Dance to the Motherland (Dogtown, 1972, reissued on Eremite). Sounds of Liberation's sole LP, New Horizons, is the rarest of the Dogtown series; the only copies to appear for sale in recent years were a battered vinyl with no cover and a worn cover minus the wax, so this reissue is lent an extra sense of gravitas. The band appeared on the scene long enough to play opposite Kool and the Gang at the 1974 Miss Black America pageant, before petering out by the late 1970s.
Lancaster's alternately syrupy and feral alto saxophone is at its best when supported by a tight ensemble situation, composed or otherwise—even while lifted up by Murray's multi-directional sound carpet, his playing in the more structured units of pianist Burton Greene and trumpeter Bill Dixon is utterly sublime. The Sounds of Liberation is a decidedly loose outfit, but reliant on massive and relentless vamps that at their most open offer the kind of support that gives compulsion to the squall. Abraham Howard, Jr.'s "Happy Tuesday" opens the set, a 20-minute scorcher that encapsulates what this group is all about. Following a lilting and intense conga solo from Salim, the rhythm section erupts in a variety of shades—electric bass, drums and chekere holding down a knotty foot-tap as Sudler colors the scene with flinty electric murk. Digging into the horn's bowels and coming up with shrill, barking tongue-speak as though captivated by the Holy Spirit, it's hard to imagine Lancaster's approach being the stuff of a funk ensemble, but that's where the Sounds of Liberation come into play.
A multiplicity of rhythms cascade and bounce off one another, shaken, pounded, thrown and snaking their way through the airwaves. Bass, guitar and three percussionists give this music a hell of a lot of drive. Jamal follows suit with glassy, rattling architecture; his solo is short, but shifts moods from vibrato-heavy plasticity to jet-setting funk, to blinding Afro-psychedelic waterfalls. Sudler rises from the deep with Sonny Sharrock-like droning strums and mild, cottony feedback before settling into plaintive, wiry blues that stop the ear with sheer poetics. Alto and vibes return with the front line wailing its way out over a vamp, which has held fast throughout.
It's hard to believe that the original side as programmed could follow such a tour-de-force with anything, but it does in the smooth, up-tempo "New Horizons II." The tune's arrangement could easily fit as a plugged-in variant on the vibraphonist Bobby Hutcherson-saxophonist Harold Land aesthetic. Where works like Drum Dance to the Motherland or Lancaster's Live at Macalester College (Dogtown, 1972, also reissued by Porter) are charmingly rough-hewn, the Sounds of Liberation exhibit an undeniable slickness, which isn't a bad thing. Warm vibraphone and saccharine alto, coupled with a just-left-of-hyperactive backbeat collectively make for an uplifting slice of soul jazz (though the rhythm breakdown midway through is a little abrupt and bent). It's easy to imagine tunes like "Billie One" and "New Life" being the two sides of a 45rpm single—each is under three minutes and features hard-funk drums backing concise solos by Sudler and Jamal, with a particularly nice drum break on the latter.
A longer and slightly rawer take of "New Horizons," here appended "I" (Dogtown releases were nothing if not inconsistent in their credits), is preceded by the lone free-form piece on the date, "We'll Tell You Later," which provides an example of the more unhinged side of these musicians' art. A slashing drum workout opens the piece, but it's Lancaster's unaccompanied saxophone that offers the most intrigue—his lines jump from piquant bubbling and soft caresses to fiery Albert Ayler-esque screams in a few measures. Sudler pecks at Lancaster by sliding grungy shards around his blasts, as bass and percussion fold in to create a dense, otherworldly lather. A shouted count-off comes from nowhere, and the group launches into a damaged funk-rock jam with Lancaster's R&B honking out front. Clearly, New Horizons wouldn't have been a Dogtown release without some level of indescribable weirdness. The holy grail(s) of record collecting rarely live up to the hype that surrounds their existence, but the Sounds of Liberation go well beyond anything that could have been hoped for. This is an absolutely wonderful slice of border-trouncing improvised music from the Philly jazz heyday.
Then - 1979 01. Miss Nikki 4:36 02. In Lovingkindness 5:20 03. Dogtown 3:05 04. Hoodoo 4:33 05. Brotherman 3:48 06. What A Friend We Have In Jesus 1:44 07. Marianne And Alicia 2:06 08. Brian 2:12 09. Mind Exercise 2:44
Now - 2007 10. Prayer Cry 3:50 11. Tribalize Lancaster 3:10 12. Afro - Ville 5:19 13. Free Mumia 4:07 14. Global Key 6:58 15. Loving You 5:04
Recorded At – Morningstar Studios
Originally circulated on Byard Lancaster’s Concert Artists label in an extremely finite pressing, this 1979 solo manifesto is among the rarer Philly ‘free jazz’ artifacts. Filing it under that loose genre heading feels slightly suspect as jazz is only one of the stylistic kegs tapped in its creation. Lancaster folds in African, Asian and Native American elements as well as healthy of blues and soul. The Porter records reissue adds six tracks to the original vinyl nine, the new pieces having been cut in 2007 and sitting well with their antecedents. Lancaster hedges a bit on the album’s solo credentials, regularly employing overdubbing to couple and layer instruments from his arsenal. The plaintive “Miss Nikki” sounds more like a Terry Callier song with its cascading piano chords and soulfully sung entreaties. “In Lovingkindness” and “Dogtown” are the first of several flute numbers, the former piece adopting a meditative cast through twining trills while the latter aims for velocity and vigor via aerial acrobatics nearly on par with those of Rashaan Roland Kirk.
Accentuating the personal parameters of the project, each piece carries a postscript providing brief clues to its import and origins. “Brotherman” blends breathy bass clarinets. “Hoodoo” for alto and “What Friend We Have in Jesus” for soprano draw immediate comparisons to Joe McPhee in their spiritual mellifluousness. The two reeds voice in tandem on the lush ballad “Marianne and Alicia” while “Mind Exercise” pares back down to alto in a barrage of harsh upper register shrieks. Fast forwarding nearly two decades, the ’07 pieces find Lancaster expanding his palette and engaging in a curious avuncular commentary. “Prayer Cry” and “Tribalize Lancaster” play to the directives of their titles, mixing playful vocal effects, chanting and piquant flute with what Lancaster terms “percussion spiriting”. The first even weaves in sampled African tribal field recordings to explicate its case.
“Afro-Ville” and “Free Mumia” bring the afrocentric funk through further convergences of jousting flutes and recitations. Keyboard explorations power “Global Key” and “Loving You”, the former moving from modest beginnings to a full-scale piano and percussion avalanche while the latter threads in pliant flute. Heard as a chapbook of snapshots and musings, the disc delivers a great deal of listening pleasure. Lancaster isn’t preoccupied with chops and instead directs his energies toward sketching aural moods and pictures with digressions intact. Through the conveyance of such intensely personal cartography the veracity of the project’s title holds fast.
Recorded at the first annual WXPN Jazz Awards Concert in Philadelphia on April 16, 1977, except 'Exodus' recorded at the WXPN-FM Studios in Philadelphia on May 4, 1977.
Lanncaster made his mark playing with Sun Ra and McCoy Tyner, along with such free jazz luminaries as Bill Dixon, Sunny Murray, and Marzette Watts. He was a longtime staple of the Philadelphia jazz scene, forming Sounds of Liberation with Khan Jamal. The influences of Albert Ayler and especially John Coltrane loomed large on his saxophone playing, but he also had a passion for funk, soul, and straight ahead jazz. His personal motto and business card imprint: “From a Love Supreme to the Sex Machine.”
Recorded at the first annual WXPN Jazz Awards concert in Philly in 1977, Exodus is a brilliant showcase for Byard Lancaster’s soulful and keening tone, his skill as a bandleader, and his adventurous abilities as an arranger and composer. It’s focused, fiery, and frequently playful. The album opens with “Something Children Can Do,” which Lancaster describes as “a piece that should express to everyone that music can be fun. Wood flutes, bells, and things. The essence is of the spirit. Join in and produce music. Hum along if you care to.”
The blazing cover of John Coltrane’s “Mr. P.C.” sees Lancaster and Co. paying tribute to the tradition and putting their own stamp upon a classic tune. Lancaster says: “Respecting the Prophets, Seers, Dreamers, Workers, Warriors, and Poets that have gone before us.” The album closes with “Philly Jazz,” an homage to the city and namesake of the record label, and “brings into the open a World Renaissance in Jazz Music. The sound, pitch, and warmth shall increase daily.” The piece begins as a solo sax recital, but then Parnell and Smith sift into the mix and build the tune to a remarkably intense crescendo. You might hear echoes of Albert Ayler, but the execution is pure Byard.
Recorded at Palm Studio, Paris, 1 February and 18 May 1974.
The cover lists the missing Palm Records PALM 14 catalogue number release as being "Lovingkindness, issued in November 1974". This is presumably Funny Funky Rib Crib, with the track "Loving Kindness"; released in 1974 with a Palm/Disques Vendémiaire catalogue number.
Spiritual and laid-back French session by sax player Byard Lancaster playing reeds and flute, accompanied by Keno Speller on percussions. Released on French beloved Jazz label Palm (Jef Gilson).
Lancaster was born in Philadelphia on Aug. 6, 1942, to Wilbert C. and Minerva Ann Lancaster. A graduate of Germantown High School, he played in the school orchestra and also studied at Settlement Music School. He attended Shaw University in Raleigh, N.C., Berklee College of Music in Boston, and the Boston Conservatory.
As a child he studied piano, and, about age 7, began playing saxophone and flute, said his sister, a music teacher and ethnomusicologist.
"I knew Byard was going to be a musician when he was 3 years old," she said, recalling that at a family gathering, the boy got everyone's attention, "then sang 'Back in the Saddle Again,' that old Gene Autry song. I said, 'Oh, he is such a show-off.' "
Mr. Lancaster was a longtime resident of East Mount Airy. Lancaster Tyler said the bassist Stanley Clarke, who lived two doors away, was one of several young Philadelphia musicians her brother influenced.
"Stanley Clarke would run in and out of our house to practice on our piano and just work with Byard. He just came by any time he wanted to be with Byard." She said Mr. Lancaster would "walk around with his flute like it was an appendage, and he loved walking through the streets, playing for children."
State Rep. Dwight Evans called Mr. Lancaster "one of the best musicians I have ever met," noting that he often performed at the now-defunct West Oak Lane Jazz Festival. "He played all up and down Ogontz Avenue and he was worldwide."
In Februar 2012, City Council cited Mr. Lancaster for "his many years of loyalty and dedication to the music industry," and noted that "he fought publicly for the rights of Philadelphia's street musicians."
Originally released in 1974 via Jef Gilson's Palm Recordings, Funny Funky Rib Grib may be something of an obscurity, but it's most deserving of its reissuing by Dutch label Kindred Spirits. You'd have a job categorising this one. While ostensibly it's a jazz record, Lancaster and his ensemble are hardly ones to
fixate on a single genre, and so in addition to encountering the straight up swing and flailing funk of 'Dogtown' there's a quality to 'Loving Kindness' that's at once suggestive of George Gershwin and old-time spirituals. Also, there are some truly mindblowing guitar licks on 'Work And Pray' - a real technical tour de force accompanying a contrapuntally languid, bluesy vocal.
A collaboration of many great jazz artists such as cult pianist Francois Tusques (Le Nouveau Jazz), African guitarist Francois Nyombo (Lafayette Afro Rock Band) + Jef Gilson � disciples Del Rabenja, Sylvain Marc and Zizi Japhet.
Born and raised in Germantown, Philidelphia, Byard Lancaster played piano until age five, when his mother bought him his first alto saxophone: he wanted to play saxophone originally, because there was this junkie across the street who sat on his porch high and played every day.
During his childhood, Byards uncle had a music club, which the young Lancaster used to frequent regularly. His ears were immersed in R&B and dance-floor jazz (live & recorded) from his earliest memory. Living in Philly also meant Byard was heavily exposed to the music and philosophy of John Coltrane. Which inspired him to listen to Coltrane as much as he could and played with him on a few occasions – introducing him to Pharoah Sanders with whom he formed band in New York during the early 60s.
When Byard met Jef Gilson in Paris at the beginning of the 70s, he had already recorded and played with Sunny Murray, Bill Dixon, Sun Ra or Larry Young and recorded one album as a leader for Atlantic with his friends Eric Gravatt and Sonny Sharrock. This relationship though, helped him like no other before in shaping his musical ideas. 9 Albums were created during his stay in Paris, among others the beautiful Funny Funky Rib Crib, which is now reissued on Kindred Spirits. This album is the most accomplished of all of them � his major influences (Gospel, Coltrane, Funk, etc.) are fused into one highly emotional and danceable idiom.
Byard Lancaster most definitely established himself as one of the leading figures in the Free Jazz movement, which happily surprised many of his fans with more funky orientated grooves on the Funny Funky Rib Crib.
A2, B1, B2 were recorded in 1972 at MacAlester College, St. Paul, Minnesota.
Winter Park, FL's Porter Records is the imprint that reintroduced America to Finnish jazz great Heikki Sarmanto. The label does it again with this gorgeous deluxe reissue of Byard Lancaster's long-gone classic Live at Macalester College, which was originally released on his tiny Dogtown label in 1972. This set is making its first appearance CD and contains an extra 25 minutes of music recorded in Boston in 1973 by the J.R. Mitchell Experimental Unit. The late Mitchell was a drummer and educator at various institutions, including Temple University. He and Lancaster had been close friends and collaborators since the 1950s; he is the drummer on all the music here. This is an incredible document of post-Coltrane free jazz that contains music from three performances with three different bands over three years. The opener, "1324," was recorded in Boston in 1970; it features Lancaster on soprano sax and trumpet (!), Mitchell, upright bassistCalvin Hill, electric bassist Paul Morrison, and conguero Lester Lumley. It's a 16-minute workout where Lancaster uses the same visionary improvisational abilities he displayed with Sunny Murray in 1966, but developed to an instinctual level. His soloing is pure snaky delight, moving through Near and Far Eastern scales, modal jazz, and free blowing. Mitchell's drumming flows like lava, offering harsh rim-shot accents, rolling tom-toms, and chant-like bass drum steadiness, allowing Lancaster and both bassists an open center for interplay.
The Macalster College performance from 1971 features Lancaster and Mitchell with pianist Sid Simmons and bassist Jerome Hunter; the gig comprises the next three selections. Given the concert setting, the recording quality isn't quite pristine, but it's fine. The set begins with the brief and haunting ballad "Last Summer," with Lancaster playing flute amid bowed basslines and taut, whispering snare drums. Simmons uses a painterly approach on the fringes. This is message music, where an expressionistic spirituality is articulated modally as the deep-listening collective comes to a multivalent thought. This breaks loose when Mitchell's drum solo introduces "War World," a six-plus-minute improvisation. Mitchell's playing here is dynamite: he charges the kit and then tames it, making it dance before the rest of the band enters. Lancaster's tenor jumps in like a frenetic opponent -- he pushes against those crystalline yet ever-insistent flurries of snare, cymbals, and double toms. Hunter doesn't enter until two-thirds of the way through (little to no piano here) when the battle between sax and drums is at critical mass. The deep bowed textures of his bass add warmth and depth to the fury; he is the bridge, finding a locking step where the trio becomes one. The set ends with the ten-minute "Live at Macalester," a wildly swinging modal number that weaves free improv to Eastern harmonies and soul-jazz. Check Simmons' beautiful large chords against that bowed upright and the interplay between saxophone and drums. It's a knockout. The bonus material has Hill in the bass chair, with an unknown pianist and two other saxophonists and an electric guitarist -- all unknown. These two cuts, "World in Me" and "Thought," are among the most compelling live statements in Lancaster's catalog. In both the former and the latter, the attention to detail in the composed frames is simply stunning, as is the taut yet dramatic way they move toward group improv, both as musical communication and inspiration. This release includes a terrific liner essay by Lancaster and rare photos as well. This is a triumphant date; thanks to Porter for unearthing such gems and resurrecting them on CD.
When John Coltrane succumbed to cancer in 1967, free jazz/fire music was sucked into a giant vacuum along with him. A patron of music and patron saint to so many of its players, there was a crossroads left in his wake. Electric instrumentation was slowly seeping in from one side, and with it, its rockist and studio-manipulated pleasures. Miles Davis employed electric keyboards, punched in solos and seamlessly edited tracks in this era, and is an obvious example, as are folks like Eddie Harris and Charles Lloyd, who were similarly amplifying and opening for rock groups at the Fillmore West. The other route was to take the music even further out into the cosmos, as Albert Ayler did with his inner-being blues holler or the Art Ensemble of Chicago, with their Pan-African extrapolations into the primal unknown. Few attempts were made to find a middle ground though, that could mingle jazz with rock, or free-playing in a more palatable pop manner without falling victim to the later Fusion craze. Or at least so I thought, until coming across this Byard Lancaster reissue of his debut recording as band leader.
What strikes me first is the overall melodic sensibility of each of the players. Lancaster, on alto sax and flute, would go on to play with outsider luminaries like Sun Ra, Bill Dixon, and Fred Hopkins. Sharrock's violently strummed strings on Black Woman and Monkey Pockie-Boo led to the vortices of Sonic Youth, Fugazi, and pretty much all future physical guitarists. Eric Gravatt would soon join an early version of Weather Report, yet everyone defers their skronkier, unrestrained abilities to the overall structure of each tune. This gives the Anglo folk base of some of Lancaster's compositions plenty room to be heard and hummed. Even moodier pieces like "Last Summer" move smoothly as panther haunches, Sharrock's playing clean and lissome over the slowly bowed, bassy sinews of Jerome Hunter as the band tenses and glides about the flute line.
"John's Children"-- an overt reference to their own state as post-Coltrane players-- has the undulating modal walk of a Jimmy Garrison bassline, incessantly prying open the infinite portal as Byard cries down into the void. The horn's palpable "space" is coated by producer Joel Dorn with enough reverb as to make his alto sound as if its emitted from the recesses of a cave, the guitar, congas, and cymbals a dizzying whirlwind of bats about him. Lancaster trills along with Sonny's humming bumblebee blurs and stinging single-string tones in their homage to Ayler, "Mr. A.A." The chord progressions are the most rock-sounding I've cmoe across from this era of jazz, and the pan-pipe flits that the flute elicits echo not only Henry "Ragtime" Thomas but the contemporary Canned Heat update "Goin' Up Country".
The flute that tweets over the stomp of "Dogtown" recollects those weird Herbie Mann records that had Sharrock on them and its conga-clapped coda is a real sign of the studio's presence, as the tape speeds the hits into a blur, dropping us into the stunning rendition of "Over the Rainbow". Lancaster's take would be noteworthy enough, but it's the way certain notes are bandied about, held in space by Dorn over the deep bass gurgle, that creates dozens of little whirls within the song, the melody expanded but the fabric never shredded. After such a poignant solo turn, it seems the nine-minute closer has him there in presence only, and it's just the guitar-bass-drum trio that fully imbibes this dynamic, heavily breathing dark music, heaving like tides in the deepest night. Not surprisingly, it's entitled "Satan", an unsettling way to end this singular jazz session.
Originally released in 1968 on the Vortex Label, this eight-track gem was Lancaster's debut as a leader. Lancaster is a very important musical entity and also very unspoken - his work with Sun Ra, Philly Joe Jones, Sunny Murray, Larry Young and Fred Hopkins didn't exactly make him a superstar (he would often perform on Philadelphian street corners). Lancaster, influenced by children's songs, folk music, Beethoven and James Brown, writes, teaches and plays flute, clarinet, alto, tenor and soprano saxophones. Lancaster's "new jazz" movement, with the help of Sonny Sharrock on guitar, paved a way through the embrace of rock, folk and classical during the '70s. Like his business card says: "From Love Supreme to Sex Machine" - Lancaster can do it all.
Leading off, on the album's title track, where Lancaster makes good use of the flute, but more impressive is the underlying syncopation of drums and congas. On "Last Summer," the flute remains Lancaster's instrument of choice, and the guitar, bass and drums fly free. Erroll Garner's "Misty" gets a good revamping, followed by Sharrock's "John's Children" - he viewed himself as a spiritual heir to John Coltrane - which proves to be the standout track on this album. "John's Children" has a very sincere, spiritually elevated feeling to it, with moments of thunderous exaltation and a consistency of steadfast expression. All the power of a revival meeting in just six minutes.
"Mr. A.A." and "Dogtown" are two Lancaster originals, both with an English folk tone and impressive drumming by Eric Gravatt. Ending the album is the nine-minute "Satan", showcasing Sharrock's advanced strumming and technical ability.
Trombone – El Sayeed Dahroug, Mahmoud Ayoub, Sadeek Basyouny
Trumpet – Ibrahim Wagby, Khalifa El Samman, Mohammed Abdoe, Zaky Osman
Drummer and multi-instrumentalist Salah Ragab was a central figure in the history of jazz in Egypt. A sometime collaborator with Sun Ra, Ragab founded the Cairo Jazz Band in 1968, the same year that he became the head of the Egyptian Military Music Department. The Cairo Jazz Band was Egypt's first big band, mixing American jazz with North African music, combining jazz instrumentation and musical style with indigenous melodies and instruments, like the nay (bamboo flute) and the baza (ramadan drum). Such musical cross-fertilization was not unusual in itself; American musicians from Sun Ra to Yusef Lateef had long been fascinated by the music of Islam and North Africa, incorporating both the instruments and musical forms of the Fertile Crescent into their work. But Salah Ragab's music presents a topsy-turvied perspective,
More importantly, however, The Cairo Jazz Band seriously swings. While there have been some tantalizing tidbits from Ragab available in the past, such as the Sun Ra Arkestra Meets Salah Ragab in Egypt release on Leo Records, this reissue is the first time such a wide variety of Salah Ragab and the Cairo Jazz Band's music has been made available outside Egypt. Collecting material from 1968-73, Egyptian Jazz is published by the UK imprint Art Yard, who have hitherto exclusively released an outstanding series of vinyl-only Sun Ra recordings. It's no surprise, then, that there's much here to appeal to Sun Ra aficionados, but with songs like the swaggeringly cocksure “Egyptian Strut” and blow-outs like the scorching “Ramadan in Space Time” and the ultra-groovy “Neveen,” this record more than stands on its own. As head of the Egyptian Military Music Department, Ragab had access to some of Egypt's finest instrumentalists, and he drew deep from this pool of musical talent. The ensemble playing is top-notch throughout and there are stand-out solos on flute, sax, and keyboards, notably on the percussion-heavy "Neveen."
The CD version, which is the first such release by Art Yard, contains four bonus tracks, none of which, save perhaps the alternate take of "Kleopatra," smack remotely of filler. Indeed, one of the most enjoyable and idiosyncratic Ragab pieces here, the mysterious, multi-part serpentine stomper, "A Farewell Theme," is available only on the CD version. It's a fantastic release from beginning to end, capturing a particularly fruitful moment of musical cross-pollination.
Compositions and arrangements by Salah Ragab. Recorded in Heliopolis Egypt.
"One of the most unique and dramatic albums in all of global jazz music.”
Francis Gooding, The Wire
Inspired by a concert in Cairo by Randy Weston in 1967 encouraging Pan-African unity, drummer Ragab, Eduard “Edu” Vizvari, a Czech jazz musician, and Hartmut Geerken of Goethe Institut vowed to create Egypt’s first jazz big band. Following the Arab-Israeli war, Ragab became a Major in the Egyptian army and had unparalleled access to the military’s 3000 musicians spanning Upper and Lower Egypt, along with a wide range of instruments. Part of the barracks were christened the Jazz House and, following a crash course in jazz history by Geerken, the Cairo Jazz Band was born, playing their first concert at Ewart Memorial Hall at the American University in 1969.
Further inspired by Sun Ra & His Arkestra’s first visit to Egypt in 1971, Ragab recorded an album for the Egyptian Ministry Of Culture a year later, entitled ‘Egyptian Jazz’, later released as ‘Egypt Strut’, a perfect fusion of jazz with Arabic modes with tracks referencing Islamic festivals, Egyptian landmarks and friends and family dear to Ragab. The Wire’s Francis Gooding summarises the album as “esoteric African American Egyptianism and radically spiritualised modal jazz taken up by Ragab as the tool for a form of mystical Egyptian nationalism – a triumphalist military jazz, angled in Ra-like fashion towards the Gods of the New Kingdom.”
This expanded version of the album features eight extra tracks recorded during associated sessions. It is released in its original Prism Music Unit artwork for the first time and is packaged with the original house bag designs, an original mini-booklet describing the tracks and an 8pp over-sized booklet featuring rare photos and extensive new liner notes by Francis Gooding.
In 1968, while he was also the leader of the Military Music Departments in Heliopolis, Salah Ragab formed the first jazz big band in Egypt, The Cairo Jazz Band. Some of the best musicians in Egypt of that time were members – Zaki Osman (trumpet), Saied Salama (tenor sax), Khamis El-Kholy (piano) and Ala Mostafa (piano).
On these recordings The Band consists of five saxophones, four trumpets, four trombones, piano, bass, drums and percussion and various other oriental instruments. The opening concert of The Cairo Jazz Band was in Ewart Memorial Hall at The American University 23/02/1969 followed by many other concerts in various prestigious places such as the Old Opera House, The University of Alexandria and appearances on Egyptian TV Jazz Club Weekly.
Salah Ragab studied jazz theory and improvisation with the jazz musician and composer from Kansas City, USA, Osman Kareem, with whom he formed the first Jazz Quintet in Cairo in 1963 recording with the Radio Service of Cairo. He accompanied the great bandleader and composer Sun Ra on a tour in Egypt, Greece, France and Spain in 1984.
These recordings present Salah Ragab and The Cairo Jazz Band’s definitive work, recorded in Heliopolis Egypt between 1968 and 1973. Western jazz musicians have been fascinated with the world of Islam for many years, for religious, spiritual, musical and sociological reasons. It was therefore inevitable that musicians of the Arabian North African area would play a part in the interaction of these two musical cultures.
The compositions correspond to the cross-over of musical styles at the time of the recording 6000 miles away across the Mediterranean and Atlantic in New York with releases on Moodsville by Yusef Lateef and RCA by Ahmed Abdul-Malik. This record represents the Cairo Jazz Band responding to the American jazz scene in the 60’s and 70’s with influences from Mongo Santamaria to Randy Weston to Sun Ra. These tracks (apart from “Egypt Strut”) were first presented by the Ministry Of Culture in Cairo as a Prism Music Unit Production.
A really rare slice of work from Sun Ra's 80s output. A live set that reunites the Arkestra with drummer Salah Ragab, one of the group's key supporters in Egypt. These CDs are all previously unreleased recordings, sourced from Salah Ragab's master tapes. It was previously only available for sale by contacting Salah Ragab personally and ordering it through the mail. Very interesting recordings that could originally be purchased directly from Salah Ragab.
This important reissue should be greeted joyfully by Sun Ra aficionados, as it fills a hole in his discography, but it is neither stellar Ra nor great jazz. The beautifully packaged CD collects less than forty minutes of the Archestra performing in Egypt with legendary percussionist Salah Ragab, and adds two selections from The Cairo Jazz Band, a short piece by an Egyptian sextet, and an interesting track from The Cairo Free Jazz Ensemble. The music from the Egyptians offers a fascinating peek at an attempt to integrate jazz improvisation with Arab culture. The CD leaflet documents some of the difficulties in bringing the concerts to fruition. On its own, the music should have relatively limited appeal, but as a novelty item, it should whet some appetites.
Bassoon, Percussion, Drums [Egyptian Infinity] – James Jacson (tracks: 1 to 3)
Congas, Drums – Salah Ragab (tracks: 1 to 3)
Drums – Chris Henderson (5) (tracks: 1, 2), Claude Broche (tracks: 1, 2), Eric Walker (tracks: 1, 2)
Keyboards, Organ, Melodica [Hohner] – Sun Ra (tracks: 1 to 3)
Tenor Saxophone, Percussion – John Gilmore (tracks: 1 to 3)
Trombone – Tyrone Hill (tracks: 1, 2)
Tracks 1 & 2 recorded at El Nahar Studio, Cairo/Heliopolis, May 1983.
Track 3 recorded at Il Capo Jazz Club, Cairo/Zamalek, January 13, 1984.
Tracks 4 & 6 recorded between 1972 and 1974. Track 5 recorded 1974/75.
Track 7 recorded at Nile Hall, Cairo, February 14, 1971.
Originally released in 1983 by the import Praxis label, album has 7 tracks featuring the Cairo Jazz Band & the Cairo Free Jazz Ensemble, including two never before released bonus cuts.
The real gems of this prized reissue from Leo Records's Golden Years vault imprint are two previously unreleased tracks. The first features Sun Ra and his Arkestra on an 18-minute "Watusa" from 1984, and the second features a 13-minute piece by Saleh Ragab's Cairo Free Jazz Ensemble, "Music for Angela Davis," from 1971. It's no surprise Sun Ra loved going to Egypt, what with all the astro-mythology he used in the Arkestra. This love shows brightly on "Egypt Strut" and "Dawn," two Ragab tunes played by Ra's band with the Egyptian percussionist sitting in. The early 1980s were a creatively thriving time for Sun Ra, and the band sounds tight, with a weave of percussion backing their every move. "Watusa" sounds like a bootleg, thin in audio but thrilling in execution. It's an unvarnished beauty. As for "Music for Angela Davis," it departs from the other Ragab pieces (there are three others on the CD) in that it's furiously triggered, full of heavy percussion, voices rambling over the top in spots, and tearing horns. For Sun Ra fans, this is a must. --Andrew Bartlett
Sun Ra enthusiasts take note: there are 36 minutes of the Man from Saturn and his Arkestra on this disc - the length of a good LP in the old days. Plus, how can any Saturnian resist the lure of a Ra disc recorded in the shadow of the Sphinx herself, right in Cairo? Top it off with 33 more minutes of Salah Ragab and the Cairo Jazz Band, and you've got a real treat.
This is Ra in 1983 and 1984, sounding surprisingly close to the tight Ra band of the Fifties, rather than to the later, looser ensembles. To be sure, there isn't a lot of intricate ensemble work on these three Ra tracks, but the heads do have a bit of a throwback bop feel. Plus, "Egypt Strut" and "Dawn" both feature John Gilmore solos of terrific architectonic coherence and passion, and Marshall Allen chimes in on flute just as mellifluously. The Sun himself contributes a keyboard solo of ringing power on "Egypt Strut." "Watusa," meanwhile, is a feast of percussion in the grand Ra fashion.
The Cairo jazz ensembles, which range from 21 members ("Ramadan") to five ("Oriental Mood,") hold up their end of the disc wonderfully. This is energetic and deeply sincere jazz with a marvelous Middle Eastern feel, complete with chanting on "Ramadan." All the instrumentalists are first-rate, especially pianist Khamis El Khouly, especially on "A Farewell Theme."
Alto Saxophone, Soprano Saxophone, Flute, Goblet Drum [Darabukka], Voice, Bells, Bendir [Egyptian], Piano – John Tchicai
Piano [Piano Strings], Piano [Prepared Piano], Thumb Piano, Percussion, Bandura [Sun Harp], Gong [Peking Opera], Performer [Tibetan Tchinkas], Electronics [Short Wave Receiver] - Hartmut Geerken
Tabla – Ustad Mohammed Aref* (tracks: 1, 4)
Recorded recorded on May 22, 1977 in Kabul, Afghanistan except tracks 3 and 6 recorded on May 5, 1977 in Teheran, Iran
The Qbico label from Italy is always interesting. Whether you like the music on there or not it's always undeniably interesting. Here's another undeniably interesting record from Hartmut Geerken and John Tchicai called The Kabul And Teheran Tapes. Called that because that's where the album was recorded. It looks and sounds like they're using some instruments native to these countries to make their experimental noodlings. It's weirdly quite coherent at times. For what seems like edited jams there is some structure to the music which seems to be largely constructed of piano and percussion. If I was being cynical I'd say it just sounds like 2 people arsing about. But I'm not on this occasion as it sounds like 2 people who know they're onions trying to do something really interesting. I've not mentioned it was recorded 30 years ago which makes all the difference in my book. I'm all for this one. Yeah I like it. Sorry about the price though... you can blame the cocking euro for that!
New York free jazz journeyman Tchicai travelled to Kabul in 1977 to join German artist, philosopher and musician Geerken while he lived there in the mid-70s; Geerken is truly on a different wavelength (at the time studying ethnomycology in rural Afghanistan) and the two together go off the deep end into mystical tripper jazz embarking on journey long explorations of roomfuls of musical artifacts, all sorts of toys to jump around and lose themselves and each other in heady subconscious voyages to heightened realms of hyper realities. tribal space drones throughout but bringing a soulful, joyful praise to the frame; letting the spirits of ancient civilizations permeate through their very psyche, closing the recordings with a couple of rhythm and blues roundabouts to really wrap up the trip. a couple of truly under-appreciated geniuses of their time basking in the radiance of each other’s auras, lose yourself in their presence.
