Articles by Marcus O'Dair
Ornette Coleman's Reflections on "This Is Our Music"
by Marcus O'Dair
Ornette Coleman Royal Festival Hall London June 21, 2009
Like the equally successful All Tomorrow's Parties festivals, London's Meltdown--now in its 16th year--leaves the artist selection process in the hands of a guest curator. Though past candidates have included such phenomenally original artists as Massive Attack and David Bowie, asking Ornette Coleman to oversee the 2009 event must still qualify as one of the festival's braver choices. And the line-up was appropriately impressive, from ...
Continue ReadingMarc Ribot / Evan Parker / Han Bennink at Queen Elizabeth Hall, London, June 14th
by Marcus O'Dair
Marc Ribot / Evan Parker / Han Bennink Queen Elizabeth Hall London, England June 14, 2009
The Moment's Energy, a new ECM release from Evan Parker, may be a slight disappointment from an artist who has been acclaimed by some as the heir apparent to John Coltrane. Yet this appearance, part of London's Ornette Coleman-curated Meltdown festival, saw the sixty-something tenor and soprano player in first-rate form, particularly during an unaccompanied solo on the ...
Continue ReadingCODONA: The CODONA Trilogy
by Marcus O'Dair
The three musicians who comprised CODONA are relatively well known, trumpeter Don Cherry in particular. Yet the group he formed with sitar and tabla player Collin Walcott and percussionist Nana Vasconcelos--hence CODONA--has been mysteriously neglected. Despite recording three superb albums for ECM between 1978 and 1982, CODONA remains perhaps one of the label's most underrated acts.
If there's any justice in the world, this three-CD box set will help put the record straight. Building on foundations already laid by the ...
Continue ReadingArt Ensemble Of Chicago: Les Stances A Sophie
by Marcus O'Dair
They formed, of course, in the American city that constitutes part of their band moniker. But this 1970 album by the Art Ensemble Of Chicago, re-released on Soul Jazz, was in fact recorded in Paris, the four main AEOC members having formed part of the late '60s exodus that also brought to France Archie Shepp, Don Cherry and Anthony Braxton.
The location is significant because Les Stances A Sophie--a soundtrack for a 1971 New Wave film of the same title, ...
Continue ReadingPunkt (Day 3) at London Jazz Festival
by Marcus O'Dair
A London Jazz Festival 2008Punkt King's Place, London November 22, 2008
Listen to Norway's Sidsel Endresen on record and one assumes all manner of studio trickery: surely her voice is being cut up, reversed, electronically warped? Yet as made clear by the bare stage show that opens tonight's proceedings, her extraordinary vocal could not be more organic.
At one point she plays thumb piano, at another she sings over ...
Continue ReadingMopomoso featuring Evan Parker Trio at The Vortex in London
by Marcus O'Dair
Evan Parker TrioThe Vortex Jazz clubLondon, EnglandNovember 16, 2008
Fair enough, it's billed as “Mopomoso featuring Evan Parker Trio." But still, a five-hour bill culminating in less than twenty minutes from the man himself would try the stamina of all but the most committed free improv devotees.
Thankfully, with the reputation of the Mopomoso (apparently standing--and I don't think it's a joke-- for “MOdernism POst MOdernism SO what?") night firmly established after nearly ...
Continue ReadingBugge Wesseltoft at the London Jazz Festival 2008
by Marcus O'Dair
Bugge WesseltoftLondon Jazz Festival 2008King's PlaceLondon, EnglandNovember 15, 2008
Having attended the Peter Brotzmann gig earlier the same night, I arrived at Bugge Wesseltoft's show a little late. It's a surprise to see the Norwegian--best known for the embrace of electronics in so-called nu-jazz, or what he terms his New Conception Of Jazz--playing solo piano. It's even more of a surprise when he launches into that most hackneyed of jazz standards, Paul Desmond's ...
Continue ReadingPeter Brotzmann at the London Jazz Festival 2008
by Marcus O'Dair
Peter BrotzmannLondon Jazz Festival 2008Purcell RoomLondon, EnglandNovember 15, 2008
Peter Brotzmann must have one of the most undeviatingly linear careers in modern jazz. A full 40 years after his landmark Machine Gun album and fast approaching 70 years of age, the German multi- reedist is still best known for a take on improv rarely matched in its unremitting ferocity.
Certainly, tonight's set had its moments of brutalist, berserker onslaught--particularly compared to ...
Continue ReadingArve Henriksen with Orchestra at London Jazz Festival 2008
by Marcus O'Dair
Arve HenriksenLondon Jazz Festival 2008Kings Place, LondonNovember 14, 2008The solo violin piece from Charles Mutter and the improvised duet between trumpeter Arve Henriksen and live samplist Jan Bang both have their moments, while John Orford's (intentionally?) hilarious distorted bassoon solo wins almost the biggest cheer of the night. Yet the highlights of this opening night of the London Jazz Festival's Scene Norway program were without doubt the ensembles, teaming Henriksen, Bang and fellow Norwegian Thomas ...
Continue ReadingChristine Tobin: Slotting into Place
by Marcus O'Dair
She may have won this year's BBC Jazz Award for best vocalist, yet Christine Tobin was not, ostensibly at least, the main attraction in Radioplay, which just completed its October, 2008 run at London's Lyric theatre following an earlier incarnation at the Vortex last year. Rather, with guitarist Phil Robson and bassist Dave Whitford, her job was to provide a live soundtrack to a frequently surreal one-man show from a gentleman named Ed Gaughan.
“It's a ...
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