Oxley

Artist: Cecil Taylor , Bill Dixon , and Tony Oxley
Label: Victo
Category: Music

Average customer rating:

Media: Audio CD
Number Of Discs: 1

UPC: 777405008220
EAN: 0777405008220
ASIN: B00006IK45

Release Date: 2002-08-07

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To complete your master pianist Cecil Taylor collection

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Customer Reviews:

Landmarks and Disasters.......2003-02-14

Just a quick note from someone who was AT this performance, to put other reviews in perspective. First, Bill Dixon played on ONE of Cecil Taylor's records: Conquistador. He has performed and recorded with many musicians, not all of whom are his students. (William Parker and Jimmy Garrison come to mind)...
As for those who pine for "loud and fast" playing, do some homework: Taylor has been quiet in the past (Garden vols 1 & 2) and Oxley is KNOWN for quietness! As for Dixon's "indifference to line and form": lines become circles, which become spheres, etc. And form is a verb.And dialogue isn't the only form of communication: sound is another realm entirely!
While I wouldn't label this a "Landmark" (the music doesn't NEED my endorsement as a listener OR as a student of Dixon), I wouldn't dismiss it by citing complaints (expectations) I'd heard second hand--I would listen instead to the MUSIC iteself, and hope to come to terms with some of the INTENT within.

a landmark recording.......2002-11-19

Sometimes I think the audience for this music is as conservative in their tastes and expectations as the audience for, say, the current Rolling Stones tour. Those who complain that Cecil Taylor isn't playing "fast and loud" on this disc are no different than those at a Stones concert who would complain that they didn't play "Satisfaction."

This particular concert was widely criticized by those who prefer to approach Free Jazz and Free Improvisation as genres with sharply defined boundaries; and by those who seem to have a personal vendetta against Bill Dixon. Despite what the 1-star review may imply, neither Dixon's ego nor his "cult of admiring students" are audible on this disc.

The music on this disc is as challenging to the sensibilities of those familiar with Cecil Taylor's music as it is to those unfamiliar with it. I would not presume to know what Taylor or Dixon or Oxley are "supposed" to do, and they defy expectations at every turn. Cecil uses tension and space in a way he's never displayed on record before (except possibly on "Student Studies"); Dixon's use of delay and reverb is simultaneously frightening and engaging; Oxley, for his part, still plays overtly WITH Taylor at times ("catching" things and repeating some of Taylor's phrases), a long-outdated approach frustratingly still siezed-upon by multitudes of "free-improv" musicians. However, it should be noted that Oxley does spend a fair amount of time working against the grain. Dixon's refusal to play what has already been firmly established as standard trumpet vocabulary produces incredibly vibrant music, filled with a great deal of tension. I guarantee you have never heard these sounds come out of a trumpet before. It's not an easy listen, but nothing this rewarding ever is.

I highly recommend this disc for those who are tired of the standard-issue "Free Jazz" and "Free Improvisation" phrasing and approach. Reading the criticisms of this concert, I was reminded of something Nat Hentoff once said:

"Critics are sometimes extraordinarily obtuse. They claim to want to hear new things, but new things bother them because they can't categorize them."

A disaster, caught on tape.......2002-09-11

I skipped this year at the Victoriaville festival, but have heard plenty of feedback about this concert--all of it very negative, often angry. Sometimes controversial concerts at Victo are actually the most interesting ones--the John Butcher/Axel Dorner/Xavier Charles gig the previous year for instance instantly polarized audiences. But listening to this gig on disc, I'm sorry to say that the folks I talked to were right: this is a disaster. Bill Dixon was on some of Taylor's albums in the 1960s but since then has retreated into his own little world, surrounding himself with a cult of admiring students. (One jazz magazine editor I know recently received multiple unsolicited glowing review submissions of Dixon's 6-CD meisterwerk _Odyssey_....all from Dixon's students.) Dixon has a healthy ego, & as the _JazzTimes_ reported, Dixon took the opportunity of the press conference to conduct a "seething rant" about not being invited to play in Canada in previous years.

But the real problem is that he can't play for toffee: through the disc all he manages is gassy exhalations, passed through an echo device. Taylor & Oxley could easily have simply ignored him & played loud & fast; instead, they actually try to work with Dixon. This is surely the slowest & quietest Taylor on record. That has some curiosity value, but frankly this is a dialogue of the deaf, on which the best thing is the one-minute Taylor solo at the end (which doubtless didn't do much to soothe an irate crowd, who were kept waiting an hour past starting time & who were given a concert that, not counting applause, came out to about 47 minutes' of music for what was one of the most expensive tickets at the festival). There's something peculiarly infantile about Dixon's flatulent sound, his indifference to line or form, & his inability to participate in musical dialogue.

Victo presumably has released this disc purely due to the cachet of the names of the performers. It is nonetheless a far from distinguished addition to the discographies of all three of the principals. Avoid.

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