RIFFING ON A THEME

The End is Near
photo by Danny O'Bryan

Ennui

We are born into mystery
Never lose the magic
Always be astounded by
Life and you will
Never be
Bored

Danny O'Bryan
2/25/11

"Whatever I may do in this world, disturbing it, transforming it, or
rather imagining I've transformed it - whatever use I may make of the world,
even if I venture into the planets - it is always what it is. And what is it?
Nothing can surpass my astonishment at its being what it is, at its being and
at me being here. If I could succeed in opening every door, there would still
be the unopenable door of astonishment."

Eugene Ionesco

Yardhog's Journals
2/10/99

"Kathy Acker loved Miles Davis and like Miles didn't give a fuck - except
about the things she gave a fuck about."

"Who ever controls the words controls our thoughts."

"Reality is a fucked up place to live and we can do a lot better."

"Well I think writing is basically about time and rhythm. Like with jazz, you
have your basic melody and you riff off it. And the riffs are about timing,
and about sex."

Kathy Acker

"The reduction of nearly every man to the partial social function of the
specialist has produced a society of ennuchs..."

Batalille

Pianist Billy Taylor in Louisville

Pianist Billy Taylor educates a full house of jazz enthusiasts

In an interview before his concert last night at Bellarmine College’s new Wyatt Theater Recital Hall, jazz pianist Billy Taylor, said that he considered himself a musical missionary.

Since the 1950s, Taylor who holds a combined masters and doctorate degree in music education from the University of Massachusetts, has been one of the most articulate spokesman for jazz in the United States.

Through his lectures, books and appearances on radio and television -
He was host of National Public Radio’s “Jazz Alive” series for six years and won an Emmy for a segment on CBS television’s “Sunday Morning with Charles Kuralt” - Taylor spends most of his time winning new converts for jazz.

But the full house at the Wyatt last night got to see another side of Taylor’s manifold personality, that of the musician. At 63, Taylor is a masterful jazz pianist who cut his teeth playing with the likes of Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie and Ben Webster.

He began the concert with a Latin flavored song entitled “You Tempt Me,” lightly tickling the piano keyboard for the first few bars of the tune. Taylor set up the rhythm before being joined by bassist Victor Gaskin and drummer Curtis Boyd, who added the percussive effects with his high hat cymbal.

Like fellow pianist Ahmad Jamal, Taylor has a penchant for Latin rhythms and it shows through much of his playing.

Taylor shares another thing with Jamal; he likes to refer to jazz as America’s classical music. He said during the interview, “Jazz is America’s classical music because for over 100 years it has taken all the elements of our society and put them in a musical perspective which represents more accurately than any other musical form who we are and what we are about.”





He told the audience pretty much the same thing during last night’s concert. Then he proved his point by playing “Make a Joyful Noise,” his own six-part, sacred composition, which contains nearly every mood that can be conveyed by music.

During “Rejoice,” the third movement of this work, drummer Boyd put down his sticks and began to play his drum set with his bare hands, stopping at times to rest an elbow on his snare drum to produce a desired effect. The audience loved it and gave him loud applause.

On “Prayer,” the fourth movement, Taylor reached inside his piano and strummed the strings before setting up the haunting theme. The final movement “Walking in the Light,” featured the trio swinging together furiously.

At one point during the concert Taylor took time out to commend local jazz educator and musician Jamey Aebersold, who was in the audience.

“Jamey has had a tremendous effect on musicians all over the world with his jazz clinics, books, and play along records. We should honor a person when they are alive, not wait until they are dead,” he said. The audience then gave Aebersold a round of applause.

Taylor ended the concert by playing another original composition of his, “I Wish I Knew How it Would Feel to be Free.”

He said the song had been named one of the most important songs of 1960s by the New York Times and he was playing it to commemorate the 20th Anniversary of Martin Luther King’s freedom march to Selma, Ala.

Danny O’Bryan
The Louisville Times
March 4, 1985

From the up-coming book “Derby City Jazz.”

Yardhog's Journal 1999

Trumpeter Ansyn Banks at Ear-xtacy concert.
photo by Danny O'Bryan

"I don't see how people can do anything at all without writing or painting or
something of the like, some excessive splash against the darkness. It's just
too damned dumb to sit and take it straight like most of them do. No wonder
people look, act, are do awful, awful, awful.."

Charles BuKowski


"Unless a man is continuously occupied in the creation of a form
material or intellectual modeled after the immaterial eternal form which he
either creates or perceives in his own soul...he cannot live alive, he's just
a dead object floating in space."


Allen Ginsberg's Journals

Yardhog's Journals 1999

Friday night I went to Bobby J's. I was sitting at the bar when a
young blond woman sat down next to me. We talked for a short while the band
played. All of a sudden there was a great deal of commotion in front of the
stage. An elderly man dropped like a dead raccoon in front of the band. A
woman started screaming. The bartender was trying to call 911 but all the
lines were busy. Soon, EMS arrived but the man had already gotten up and left
the room.

The blond left but not before inviting me to join her and her girl
friends in a booth in the front room but I declined wanting to watch the
action from my perch at the bar. All of a sudden there is a loud scream and
down the stairs by the bar comes a man and woman yelling at one another.
Throughout this madness the alto player in he band is wailing his ass off.
Two or three people jump in to break up the spat and the blond and a couple
of her friends return and start dancing in front of the bandstand.

I walked up to the blond and we started dancing, in her case jumping
up and down. Her girl friend introduced herself as Carol Yeager, a painter
who lives in Lexington. We had a nice conversation about California. She
lived there several years as a hippy.

Saturday night I went to the Sextacy Ball at Club X on Main St. Very
strange scene in the former home Murphy's Bar Complex. Upstairs are two large
rooms. One area was blocked off by yellow "Caution" tape. Behind stood
several domminatixes dressed in short black costumes, black nylons and high
heels. They all had an attitude. Nobody was smiling. This was serious
business. Soon the slaves were led into the room. Several not very attractive
men who were shirtless and dressed in leather shorts.

There were several wood crosses and stocks set up in the room and the
doms spent a lot of time tying their slaves to them. Mistress A was there
with a female slave, or so I thought. The she/he had long blond hair, nice
legs and a shapely ass, which the Mistress caressed liberally before applying
her paddle. I learned quickly that night I don't enjoy looking at men in
bondage. Nothing at all stimulating about it, at least for me. But young
shapely women being tied and flogged is quite another matter. Mistress A's
slave looked very appealing until she turned around and I realized she was a
trans-sexual or something like that. Definitely not a female.

I sat and watched this scene for an hour or two and could only think
of one word to describe it, dispassion. Despite the whips, the leather, the
semi-nudity and loud Xtreme music the word for it wsa dispassion. Neither the
Doms aor the slaves being punished showed any emotion. These were indeed some
strange sights. One young man was tied shirtless to a cross while a Dom
whipped his nipples, later attaching clothes pins. One of the women who was
anything but attractive, wearing a long shapeless dress was led into the room
by a male Master. He tied her to a cross and raised her skirt and used a
leather paddle to redden her back side.

Everyone in the room was dressed in black, including me in my black
suit, but I felt totally ignored, like a ghost, invisible. One fellow who
looked a little like Ron Whitehead, was dressed in an outfit that included a
top hat and a long coat. He had a large prosthesis of some sort on one hand
and was carrying a cane.

In one room they were giving bondage and s & m demonstrations. One
very attractive young girl in a very revealing outfit was all trussed up with
knotted ropes. Some kind of elaborate breast bondage.

When the Doms applied their whips they started out with light,
innocuous strokes, almost caressing their slaves with the leather. But
suddenly the rhythm and intensity of their strokes increased until the whips
landed with a solid SLAP! that elicited oohs and aahs from the crowd. The
next night I could still hear the sound in my ears.

Yardhog's Journal
9/20/99

Monk's Main Man Plays Louisville

Saxophonist Charlie Rouse Delivers Some Hot Jazz

The weather was frigid last night, but during tenor saxophonist Charlie Rouse’s concert at Downstairs at Actors it was Le Jazz Hot.

The concert put Rouse, best know for the years he spent from 1959 to 1970 as a member of the legendary jazz pianist Thelonius Monk’s Quartet, together with a rhythm section composed of some of this area’s finest jazz musicians. It’s hard to say who played better, Rouse or the local boys.

One of the problems that besets traveling jazz solo acts is they must depend on local musicians to accompany them. Sometimes the musicians or good, and sometimes they’re bad. Last night’s players - pianist Ray Johnson, bassist Mark McCulloch and drummer Jonathan Higgins were more than good they were excellent.

Johnson, who spent 20 years as a jazz pianist in New York City before returning to his hometown of Louisville a few years ago, got things going with a driving rendition of Charlie Parker’s “Billies Bounce.” McCulloch held things together with a solid bass line and drummer Higgins poured on the steam.

When Rouse came on stage for the first number, “What is this Thing Called Love,” the air was already charged with excitement he added even more by rushing through the song’s chord changes and interjecting his own unique musical ideas. Johnson came up from behind playing like a mad man on several smoking choruses, McCulloch and Higgins followed with good solos.

And it went on like that throughout the concert on a string of Monk standards like “Bolivar Blues,” “Light Blue” and “Straight No Chaser.” Rouse would state the theme, play the first couple of choruses and then turn it over to Johnson, who would take the song apart and put it back together, being careful to throw in a few Monk-like licks of his own.

Only once, on a standard “Lover Man,” did Rouse fail to deliver. On this song the tenor star had some intonation problems that caused him to play sharp through most of the piece.

But he made up for this infraction with a fireball version of “Straight No Chaser” that showcased his jagged phrasing and gruff tone. Johnson was particularly exciting on this song, bouncing up and down as his fingers raced along the keyboard. Bassist McCulloch also played a fine solo on this tune, which gained a laugh of recognition from leader Rouse and a round of applause from the audience.

After an intermission, Rouse and the band came back with an imaginative jazz line based on the chord changes of the standard “Out of Nowhere.” By this time the saxophonist was really getting loose, biting off huge chunks of changes and molding them to fit his peculiar taste and style.

The only problem with last night’s concert was that Rouse is the third saxophonist in less than a year to be featured in concert by the Louisville Jazz Society. It would be nice to see the society bring in some jazz vocalists like Sheila Jordan, Ben Sidran or Mark Murphy. After all, diversity is what jazz is all about.

Danny O’Bryan
The Louisville Times
January 28, 1986

From the up-coming book “Derby City Jazz.”

Jazz Great Charlie Rouse

Jazz Great Charlie Rouse to play Louisville

In the summer of 1964 I attended the Ohio Valley Jazz Festival at Crosley Field in Cincinnati, Ohio. The performers that night included the legendary pianist Thelonious Monk and his quartet.

Monk was in a fickle mood during the concert, occasionally jumping up from the piano and dancing around the stage while his saxophonist played with the bass and drums.

Monk’s saxophonist, Charlie Rouse was in great form, blowing chorus after chorus of strong angular jazz. Rouse’s tenor sax was a perfect complement to Monk’s unorthodox piano style. Some critics said he sounded like Monk playing saxophone.

Monday at 5:30 p.m. Louisville jazz fans will get a chance to see Rouse when he performs with the local rhythm section of pianist Ray Johnson, bassist Mark McCulloch and drummer Jonathan Higgins at the Louisville Jazz Society’s Jazz Party at Downstairs at Actors, 316 W. Main St.

Rouse, 61, was born in Washington, D.C. In 1943, he joined Billy Eckstine’s orchestra, which was one of the greatest all-star big bands in jazz history. It included such luminaries as singer Sarah Vaughn, alto saxophonist Charlie Parker and trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie.

In a telephone interview, Rouse talked about those days.

“When I was growing up there were so many places to play and there was a wealth of jazz talent. Everyone has their own individual styles and all the great jazz artists were working back then,” Rouse said.

Saxophonist Ben Webster was the first established jazz musician to befriend Rouse. Later he would be Webster’s replacement in the Duke Ellington Orchestra. But the new sounds of bebop that were being created by musicians like Parker, Gillespie and Monk were to be Rouse’s major influence.

After leaving Eckstine, Rouse joined Gillespie’s band.
“Dizzy left Eckstine about the same time I did. He formed the big band, and we did a tour down south. After that I joined a group headed by pianist Tadd Dameron featuring trumpeter Fats Navarro,” he said.

Rouse also worked with trombonist Benny Green, saxophonist and vocalist Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson and a small band led by Count Basie. But he’s probably best known for the years, from 1959 to 1970, that he spent with Monk.

“Monk was a genius. He was one of the great American composers and jazz pianists. He could get a sound out of a piano that no one else had,”
Rouse said.

He said his best years with Monk’s quartet was from 1960 to around 1968. During that time the group recorded numerous albums for Columbia Records and toured Europe on a yearly basis.

“Playing with Monk was a real challenge because you never knew what tunes he was going to do on any given night,” Rouse said.

In recent years, Rouse has been playing with Sphere, a quartet that specializes in Monk’s music.

“I’ll be playing a concert with Sphere at Purdue University the day before I perform in Louisville,” he said.

Danny O’Bryan
The Louisville Times
January 25, 1986

From the up-coming book “Derby City Jazz.”