Читать книгу The Mojo Collection - Various Mojo Magazine - Страница 47

Record label: Blue Note

Produced: Alfred Lion

Recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey; February 25, 1964

Released: 1964

Chart peaks: None (UK) None (US)

Personnel: Eric Dolphy (as, flute, bass clarinet); Freddie Hubbard (t); Bobby Hutcherson (vibes); Richard Davis (b); Anthony Williams (d)

Track listing: Hat And Beard; Something Sweet, Something Tender; Gazzelloni; Out To Lunch; Straight Up And Down

Running time: 42.18

Current CD: CDP7465242

Further listening: Far Cry (1960); Conversations (1963)

Further reading: Eric Dolphy (Vladimir Simosko, 1979); http://adale.org/Eric.html

Download: iTunes

When Eric Dolphy first arrived in New York in the late ’50s with Chico Hamilton’s West Coast group, AJ Spellman noted that he ‘played nice – pretty and all’. The same writer noted that it was a different Dolphy who returned a year later with Charles Mingus: ‘This one was wild and woolly, played all kinds of unmentionable things you wouldn’t say in front of your mother.’

Stylistically, Eric Dolphy was somewhere between the slithery melodicism of Charlie Parker and the boundary-busting disorder of Ornette Coleman, of whom Dolphy said, ‘He taught me a direction.’ He had the energy and anarchy of a New Thing player but there was an instrumental virtuosity, melodic intelligence and tonal refinement that somehow set him apart from the centre of the avant-garde. Here, on his acknowledged masterpiece, Dolphy is majestic on bass clarinet on Hat And Beard (a witty nod to Monk in 9/4) and Something Sweet Something Tender (a gorgeous, Mingus-like semi-abstract reverie); lyrical and visceral by turns – sometimes within the same phrase – but always thoughtful and engaging.

‘I play notes that would not ordinarily be said to be in a given key, but I hear them as “proper”,’ Dolphy once explained. ‘I don’t think I “leave the changes” as the expression goes; every note I play has some reference to the chords of the piece.’

While the chords on Out To Lunch are often not an issue (the quintet go ‘free’ on several occasions), there is pulse and rhythmic momentum throughout, though the rhythm section – especially vibist Hutcherson – are employed as equal contributors rather than time and harmony keepers.

‘Everyone’s a leader on this session,’ commented Dolphy, and how well they all lead; the lingering impression of this challenging, often beautiful work is far from the dense, cluttered argument that characterises much New Thing music, but is rather one of aerated, witty conversation. Leaving America soon after this date (‘If you try and do anything different in this country, people put you down for it’), Dolphy died in Europe three months later of undiagnosed diabetes, aged 36. This tragedy, his musical boldness and reputed personal charm have elevated his standing to nothing short of jazz saint.