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Cecil Taylor: Mixed to Unit Structures Revisited
by Giuseppe Segala
La pubblicazione di Mixed To Unit Structures, nella meritevole collana Revisited Series della Ezz-thetics, sotto-etichetta della svizzera Hat Hut, riunisce due date di registrazione importanti nella vicenda di Cecil Taylor, distribuite tra l'ottobre 1961 e il maggio 1966. La prima, composta dai tre brani “Pots," “Bulbs" e “Mixed," era stata pubblicata dall'etichetta Impulse! nel disco Into the Hot, a nome di Gil Evans. I successivi quattro pezzi costituivano il disco Unit Structures, siglato originariamente da Blue Note. ...
Continue ReadingCecil Taylor: Mixed To Unit Structures Revisited
by Mark Corroto
A listener could make it their life's work to absorb and appreciate the music the music of Cecil Taylor. One could possibly approach it as a scholar and musician through notation and transcription—not the recommended approach. Such a task would be similar to the process of systematizing a DNA sequence. Taylor's music, and pardon this analogy, might be best grasped as one might attend to the oxymoronic genre noise music. If you are still reading, allow an explanation. ...
Continue ReadingBurton Greene - Alan Silva: Parallel Worlds
by AAJ Italy Staff
Erano gli anni '60 e la rivoluzione del free a New York coinvolgeva pure due giovani musicisti come il pianista Burton Greene ed il contrabbassista Alan Silva. Siamo ora nel 2012, il free esiste ancora e ogni tanto i due artisti, oggi residenti in Europa, sono ancora attivi su quel fronte ma fanno anche molto altro, rivendicando una libertà creativa che li ha portati a suonare ed incidere un pò di tutto. Per questo disco hanno lasciato gli strumenti tradizionali, ...
Continue ReadingAlan Silva & William Parker: A Hero
by Michael McCaw
Alan Silva and William Parker collectively inform much of the role and possibilities of the acoustic bass that have been developed since the 1970s. From participating in Cecil Taylor-led ensembles and loft scenes to recording and performing some of the most challenging and rewarding music over the past thirty-some odd years, they have a storied and interwoven history. Consequently, an album of Parker/Silva duets could potentially be a historic moment. And while the results documented on A Hero's Welcome: Pieces ...
Continue ReadingAlan Silva: Alan Silva & the Sound Visions Orchestra
by Derek Taylor
As the inaugural group for the 1999 Vision Festival, following closely on the heels of Joseph Jarman’s vocal invocation, Alan Silva’s Sound Visions Orchestra seemed the ideal vehicle to usher in the ten celebratory days of community-empowering creative music. Employing many of many of the festival’s performers and signaling the triumphant culmination of Silva’s ambitious plans for large-scale improvisatory interplay the group promised monumental music. Sadly a succession of sobering setbacks beset the band once they took the stage. First, ...
Continue ReadingAlan Silva & Oluyemi Thomas: Transmissions
by Derek Taylor
The practice of harping long and loud on the lack of public notoriety or understanding afforded creative improvising musicians has become an almost customary tack in reportage of the music. A “resignation to obscurity” mindset prevails among many producers, listeners and even musicians that this is orphic status is simply their lot in life. Still the musicians survive exercising their talents behind the veil of popular ignorance doing the only thing they must- nurturing and elevating their art beyond the ...
Continue ReadingAlan Silva and Oluyemi Thomas: Transmissions
by AAJ Staff
Having come full circle, bassist Alan Silva returns to his roots on Transmissions. Silva's experience with seminal improvisers since the '60s has earned him a resume that reads like an international who's who of free improvisation. (Ironically, however, he has not received recognition proportional to his work.) Silva discovered electronics in the '90s and seized the opportunity to experiment with synthesized music. But in the '99 live concert documented on Transmissions, he's back at the acoustic bass, playing in the ...
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