Tag Archives: free jazz

Peter Brötzmann (1941 – 2023)

Niemand is onsterfelijk. Dat is waar. De dood is de grote gelijkmaker. Dat is dan weer iets minder waar. Dat weten wij hier in dit niemandsland maar al te goed. In Dodenstad gelden in principe dezelfde regels als in het rijk der levenden. Net zoals bij de levenden zijn sommige doden toch minder gelijk dan anderen.

Machine Gun (1968) van het Peter Brötzmann octet.

Sommige doden ontvangen namelijk bezoek van vreemden. Ik bedoel, niet van naasten. We noemen hen graftoeristen. Of tombetoeristen. Mensen die per se in de buurt willen komen van de held die ze bij leven zo bewonderden. Of iemand die al lang dood is maar die ze toch nog een eerste of laatste groet willen brengen.

Is Peter Brötzmann dan zo iemand?

Continue reading →

RIP Henry Grimes and Giuseppi Logan (1935 – 2020)

Sonny’s Time Now (1965) on which Grimes played bass. That record is in the Top Ten Free Jazz Underground (1995) list.

Henry Grimes was an American jazz musician working in the free jazz idiom.

Giuseppi Logan American jazz musician working in the free jazz idiom.

Also, both were tortured artists.

Giuseppi Logan Quartet (1965, ESP-Disk-1007)

I’ve always had a fascination with free jazz which veers from awe to disbelief to a mild form of even scorn.

It’s as if free jazz is the locus of strife between my need for entertainment and intellectualism.

This love–hate relationship appears to be my variety of the wild orchids and Trotsky.

But jazz itself was also that locus of strife.

Because it was somewhere in the 1940s that jazz begot bebop, and the road that had been jazz permanently forked.

One side continued its entertainment course.

Another side explored the realm of high art.

So as jazz became less popular, it became more highbrow.

Behind the scenes, rock and roll and R&B had been waiting impatiently to fill this entertainment void.