Ihre Musikbibliothek
JH, alto sx, flt; Baikida E. J. Carroll, tpt; Abdul Wadud, cello; Phillip Wilson, dr; Hamiett Bluiett, bari sx (on “The Hard Blues”)
Dogon is one of the classic early seventies modernist albums I’ve heard about for ages but never got to listen to. Now Arista has released it again. It’s not cheap but it’s not in the collectibles price range, so I bought it.
It’s as good as I was told it was. Hemphill was the principal composer and arranger for the World Saxophone Quartet until his illness and early death and on this album, as in the WSQ recordings, he shows a gift for inventive melody and unexpected harmonies. He was a very good saxophonist and one of the few truly good flute players in modern jazz –listen to him on “The Painter,” the third cut on this album. Both in tone and ideas, his solo work is a pleasure to listen to. This is essentially a quartet album, although baritonist Bluiett is added for color in the ensemble parts (but no solo) of the last piece, “The Hard Blues.” The other horn is trumpeter Baikida Carroll, an intelligent player who adds color in the ensembles, trades fours and twos with Hemphill on one cut (“Rites”) and delivers first-rate solos on the other three. The drummer is Philip Wilson, best known for his work with the Art Ensemble of Chicago and the Paul Butterfield Blues Band. Wilson never played a bad lick in his life: he could drum both modern and standard post-bop, and his drumming always had a kick to it, a bit like Hamid Drake among a younger generation. The fourth player in the quartet is cellist Abdul Wadud, who recorded any number of modernist legends in the 70s and 80s –among them, Leroy Jenkins, Frank Lowe, Muhal Richard Abrams, James Newton, Arthur Blythe, and Anthony Davis. Wadud doesn’t solo on this album but his contributions in support of Hemphill and Carroll are intelligent and subtle as he bows, plucks and strums his way through these four compositions.
This session came along at a time when many young musicians were jumping on the funk bandwagon. Energy and volume were valued more than dialogue and musical intelligence. But although this is avant garde music, the emphasis, rather than on sheer energy, is on the logic that ties the soloists’ improvisations to the initial musical structure of the composition.
(If I can find it, I have to buy Coon Bid’ness, Hemphill’s 1975 followup album with the same people plus a few others [including Arthur Blythe]).
Spitzenrezensionen aus anderen Ländern
David Keymer
AN ESSENTIAL ALBUM --INTELLIGENT, MUSICALLY CHALLENGING BUT EMINENTLY LISTENABLE
Rezension aus den Vereinigten Staaten vom 2. Dezember 2013
RADIO FREE CHIP
A Modern Jazz-Blues Classic, Finally on CD
Rezension aus den Vereinigten Staaten vom 24. Dezember 2011
Jazzrook
Julius Hemphill's passionate and gripping classic from 1972.
Rezension aus dem Vereinigten Königreich vom 27. Dezember 2012
SerenePDX
Exciting album, worth the time
Rezension aus den Vereinigten Staaten vom 31. Januar 2016
Alan Start
REVOLUTIONARY IN ITS TIME.....
Rezension aus dem Vereinigten Königreich vom 2. Dezember 2011