Anthony Braxton and cybernetic Jazz...no, he is not a Jazz man-machine yet I'm told and have believed for years of not listening to Braxton that he is a 'logical' composer but what, exactly, the logic is to his compositions remains a mystery to me, you (probably) and all but Physics Professors Jazz Club, of which there may even be one member.
Meanwhile, my CD collection gathers even more dust than it did before I turned to Spotify (free 3 month trial) for my musical fix. And whilst staring at the green symbol on the screen this morning I wondered who to explore. Don't ask why but 'Anthony Braxton' sprang to mind. If I have to find some logic to that choice it would look something like Abstract Jazz > Art accompaniment > Interesting-but-not-distracting > = Anthony Braxton but why him of all the abstract Jazz musicians, I don't know. Let's just say he's resided in the back of my mind (way back, barely visible, but there) for years.
What's in the front of Anthony Braxton's mind? He's 75 now. Does he contemplate death despite have immortalised himself via recordings? Does he still smoke a pipe as pictured on the album cover to New York/Fall 1974? I like to think he did whilst he was Professor of Music at Wesleyan University until retirement in 2013. It would be entirely in keeping with my image (old) of a professor. He doesn't seem to be thinking of retiring from music having made an album last year (Quartet (New Haven) ).
Is it Jazz? Really? Should the question even be asked? Probably not. Jazz instrumentation aside, because he's black, it may even be racist to automatically label his music 'Jazz'. But then we enter a tricky domain of defining Jazz. Wynton Marsalis thought Braxton's music was not Jazz. But then we know about Wynton's beef with the avant-garde, don't we? To him, it really don't mean a (Jazz) thing if it ain't got that swing.
I read that he conducted 'experiments in collage forms' which involved quartets performing different compositions simultaneously. Hmmm...that's interesting. I must find those, if I can work out where they are and if I'm actually listening to them or 'just' Free Jazz. Not that Braxton ever, as far as I know, engaged in 'Free' music. Collaged music is fitting for someone who makes 'art music'. Music, that is, which eschews traditional elements in favour of...what? Texture, tones, patterns? As befits a former professor, Braxton is fond of diagrams and graphic scores. I came across this one from 2004 and it's similarity to asemic writing was striking....
The idea of there being a 'cold' logic to Braxton's music is, in itself, problematic. As if, dare I say, all black composers should 'swing'. Damn, I find myself returning to notions of what Jazz should be in relation to race. Move on...
Braxton's 'logic', his 'art', seems to feature strict compositional forms in which players can, indeed, express themselves freely. One might say that's been the basis of Jazz since year zero if 'logic' and 'composition' are substituted with tune and melody. Like modern Classical music since Schoenberg (?) and the subsequent anti-Romantic modernists, Braxton's sounds demand only for us to open our ears and shove preconceptions aside; banish the baggage of what music is supposed to sound like. It's no coincidence that the approach which requires abandoning ideas of what Art should look like in order to appreciate Abstraction is needed for Braxton's music.
Art and music are constant bedfellows in my world. They frequently happen simultaneously. Like Braxton, I may be, in some sense, an 'outsider' as far as the mainstream goes, although to voluntarily position oneself is not advisable! After all, it's easy to claim Outsider status simply because Art is not a career. I don't make Conceptual art yet I'm fully aware of how 'difficult' it may be for some to 'understand' what I do sometimes. Well, as Miles Davis said, if you understood everything I said, you'd be me. Unlike Braxton, though, I cannot apply intellectual rigour to my 'compositions'...and I will never be a professor. Still, I find a strange, unfathomable kinship with the like of Braxton, Cecil Taylor and, yes, Miles Davis. It's purely imagined, of course. But please allow me to indulge in a fantastical relationship between my visual creations and their sonic ones. It may be beyond belief, but then so too is much of the music made by those who dare to dream.
Untitled, RTomens 2020
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