Sun Ra at 100

[PUSB]

There are some quite good programmes on NPR celebrating his centenary - eg http://www.npr.org/blogs/ablogsuprem...piano-to-disco

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

There are some quite good programmes on NPR celebrating his centenary - eg http://www.npr.org/blogs/ablogsuprem...piano-to-disco

- thanks for this PUSB. I first encountered Sun-Ra's Music (and, indeed, his name ) at a musikFabric concert at the Huddersfield Festival a few years ago (when it was coupled with works by Stockhausen - excellent programming). YouTube subsequently confirmed that this is Music I want to get to know better - this nudge will get me actually doing something about it!

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

Is that 100 Earth years or Saturn ones?

BN.


When he was asked why he and the band were so late arriving at one of the Brecon festivals, to some concern of the organisers, he said, "Delays around Mars."

[PUSB]

When he was asked why he and the band were so late arriving at one of the Brecon festivals, to some concern of the organisers, he said, "Delays around Mars."

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

There is a lovely story of whem Ra and the band played the Montmartre in Copenhagen with Sun et al preaching peace and love to the universe and ringing prayer bells and chimes etc, he weaved over to Alan Bates, the record producer, and shouted, "Where's my M.F. royalties!"

BN.

[Serial_Apologist]

When I started sussing out this district as a possible for settling in, back in 2004, I found myself walking down a Sunray Avenue. Somebody had stuck a bit of paper over the letter y, which I took to be the good omen it turned out to be. All thanks to Mr Blount.

[Ian Thumwood]

I've never been convinced by Sun Ra. Of the earlier performances I've heard, the music is good but very much in the typical mode of big band writing in the 1950's with the warmth of writing mirroring anything from Shorty Rogers or even the Jimmy Heath recording I've had on in the car today. The later stuff seems a bit hit and miss with the weaker material being truly woeful. I can't say that I don't like he music and there are numerous recordings I've poured over on Youtube that I really like. That said, the space travel stuff is pure nonsense and seems to make the band seem more eccentric than truly avant garde. Compare his recordings with the likes of Ornette, Miles, Colrane, etc and it seems quite weak and nowhere near as adventurous as claimed. There is also the problem that some of the ensembles aren't too great and the album of Disney stuff is truly woeful. I think Bluesnik made the comment on this board once before that if Woody Herman had played this bad, he would probably have been bottled by the audience - a strong reaction but perhaps a true reflection that there were plenty of other better bands out there who may have been more orthodox but who were musically superior.

I would also have to comment that Sun Ra as a soloist is a bit of a mystery. I don't mind his piano playing but it does seem heavily rooted in other styles and when you learn that he initially worked with the likes of musicians such as Clarence Williams and Fletcher Henderson who had been significant figures in the 1920's the veneer of modernism wears thin. Ra does seem like a pre-bop pianist to me in many respects. I have heard Craig Taborn rave about his piano playing in a Q & A session before a gig and this still didn't make me hear his playing in a different context. He can't be compared with Cecil Taylor , for examples, even if I can see parallels with Duke Ellington.

So, whilst I can enjoy some Sun Ra music, I'm also wary that he produced an enormous volume of rubbish. Take away the space suits and the faux Ancient Egyptian stuff and there is nothing that great about poorly performed Fletcher Henderson charts. It is incredible that he garnered such a devout following and a degree of coltishness that goes beyond jazz whereas as someone like Muhal Richard Abrams has probably been producing jazz of higher quality and inspired numerous high calibre students who are currently shaping jazz yet remains relatively unknown. To quote the "X files" (not a particular fan) , I want to believe but common sense is telling me that Sun Ra is probably more compatible with the likes of Willem Breuker who could similarly mash up vintage styles of music (including popular influences ~ swap Kurt Weill for doo-wop ) with free jazz. Perhaps we should be looking at Breuker's band for comparison as opposed to lauding Sun Ra ? I don't hear fans venerating the Dutch bandleader as much as Ra's even though his repertoire was, if anything, broader and the break-neck, manic performances achieved by the Kollectief are much sharper than the lugubrious efforts that the Arkestra could sometimes churn out. I grant you that Sun Ra was fun but I feel he was probably one of the most over-rated characters in the history of jazz. Celebrate his music for the eccentricity by all means but I don't feel his music was a genuinely adventurous as some of the greats of innovative music. The comparison with the equally ridiculous Stockhausen is very telling.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

The comparison with the equally ridiculous Stockhausen is very telling.

I'm not sure that there has been a "comparison" as such here, Ian; I'm the only Forumista to have mentioned him, and my "excellent programming" comment wasn't meant as a comparison - a London Sinfonietta concert with works by Ligeti and Messiaen I went to was also "excellent programming", but no "comparison" between the two composers is intended by this comment. Programming Music by Sun-Ra and Stockhausen in the same concert is, indeed, "telling" - but what it "tells" whom (and about what it tells them) will probably differ with each listener. The concert I attended told me that they were both composers who inspired performances of the very highest standards from Musicians who respond positively to it, and that both composers were worthy of the most serious attention from listeners - attention that was amply rewarded.

[Serial_Apologist]

Herbie Hancock tells how he was spellbound when first confronted by Sun Ra's music - his own Septet (1970-72) having been strongly influenced by it. And I don't think a saxophone player of the calibre of John Gilmore, to name just one, would have spent most of his creative musical life in the Ra collective, had the music merely been admirable for its eccentricities, whether one likes some or all of it, or not.

I love the bit in the documentary about the Arckestra when Sonny is being dissed by black teenagers in a youth centre, and taking it all in his stride and telling them about the situation of black people in the US elicits their respect.

"I'm sure he's serious about it", Carla Bley told me when I asked her about Sun Ra's proclamations as to his Saturnine origins.

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

"Hundreds of musicians came
through the Arkestra over the
years, some lasting only a few gigs
and some, like saxophonist John
Gilmore, lasting decades. But being
in the Arkestra was a difficult way
of life. The band members never
made much money, and Ra
demanded discipline and hard
work. He banned drugs, alcohol,
and women, and band members
had to be available for practice
around-the-clock.

Despite these inconveniences and
Ra's many idiosyncrasies, virtually
all of the musicians who came
through Sun Ra's Arkestra attest to
how much they learned from him.
When asked why he stayed with
Sun Ra for forty years, John Gilmore
remarked, "He was the first one to
introduce me to the higher forms of
music, past what Bird and Monk
were doing. It's unbelievable that
anyone could write meaner
intervals than those guys, but he
did. When I realized that, I said,
'Well, I guess I'll make this the
stop.'"

Gilmore almost left Sun Ra in the
'50s but changed his mind. "I
learned more from Sun Ra in my
first nine months with him than I
had my whole life, not only in
music but in philosophy and life in
general. He elevated my whole
scene. He changed my life."


BN.

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

"In tomorrow's world, men will not
need artificial instruments such as
jets and space ships. In the world of
tomorrow, the new man will 'think'
the place he wants to go, then his
mind will take him there." -- Sun Ra,
1956

Handy to know if UKIP ever look like forming a Government.

BN.

[Ian Thumwood]

Bluesnik

I agree with your comments and don't doubt that Ra managed to retain some hugely impressive soloists. I believe that he was writing interesting music and can appreciate that he may have inspired to take the music beyond Parker. However, how many other musicians in jazz were looking beyond Parker once the 1950's hit their stride. You could easily replace Ra's name with Mingus, George Russell, Tristano, Schuller, etc, etc all of whom seemed to be influential and had, if you want, their own coterie of follows. You could also argue that Breuker also had members who stayed loyal and remained with the band. This has been a common factor with "original thinkers" since Ellington recruited the likes of Carney, Hodge and Williams in the 1920's. My point is that , as good as his best work might have been, Sun Ra also produced a considerable body of dross. I don't doubt that Herbie Hancock was influenced by the Arkestra as someone like him will have checked out everything. There are elements of Ra's music that I do enjoy and appreciate yet the Saturn stuff , like the nonsense Stockhausen used to spout, does detract from the music or make it less serious. For me, there is a degree of credibility in name checking Ra that exists beyond jazz. However, I do think he does detract from composers who are genially writing "modern music" which struggles to find an audience. The example of Messaien is a good one - a composer whose work I love but who was genuinely pushing the music forward without resorting to gimmicks / eccentricities. Some of Ra's music is so bad it is difficult to defend - not something you could charge the list of 1950's musicians I listed about with. I grant you, the music he produced could be good fun but if you wanted to make a notional list of the top 30-40 jazz composers / writers, I would struggle to make space for Ra amongst that pantheon even if you accept that levity has a role in jazz whether you are talking about Breuker or Fats Waller.

[Serial_Apologist]

Bluesnik

I agree with your comments and don't doubt that Ra managed to retain some hugely impressive soloists. I believe that he was writing interesting music and can appreciate that he may have inspired to take the music beyond Parker. However, how many other musicians in jazz were looking beyond Parker once the 1950's hit their stride. You could easily replace Ra's name with Mingus, George Russell, Tristano, Schuller, etc, etc all of whom seemed to be influential and had, if you want, their own coterie of follows. You could also argue that Breuker also had members who stayed loyal and remained with the band. This has been a common factor with "original thinkers" since Ellington recruited the likes of Carney, Hodge and Williams in the 1920's. My point is that , as good as his best work might have been, Sun Ra also produced a considerable body of dross. I don't doubt that Herbie Hancock was influenced by the Arkestra as someone like him will have checked out everything. There are elements of Ra's music that I do enjoy and appreciate yet the Saturn stuff , like the nonsense Stockhausen used to spout, does detract from the music or make it less serious. For me, there is a degree of credibility in name checking Ra that exists beyond jazz. However, I do think he does detract from composers who are genially writing "modern music" which struggles to find an audience. The example of Messaien is a good one - a composer whose work I love but who was genuinely pushing the music forward without resorting to gimmicks / eccentricities. Some of Ra's music is so bad it is difficult to defend - not something you could charge the list of 1950's musicians I listed about with. I grant you, the music he produced could be good fun but if you wanted to make a notional list of the top 30-40 jazz composers / writers, I would struggle to make space for Ra amongst that pantheon even if you accept that levity has a role in jazz whether you are talking about Breuker or Fats Waller.

This had me thinking about some of the "cocktail jazz" Sun Ra did, and its equivalence in some of Messiaen's works, particularly from the 1940s: the awful banal theme from the "Vingt Regards sur L'Enfant Jesus" which, fortunately enough, is subject to methods of dismemberment that make its unrecogniseability interesting, and the cringeworthy ondes martenot "Theme of Love" from "Turangalila". There are other artists one can think of whose paucity of self-criticism has left us with sheer brilliance and utter dross, some of them still living, so, although I would never be without them, I'll mention no names.

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

This had me thinking about some of the "cocktail jazz" Sun Ra did, and its equivalence in some of Messiaen's works, particularly from the 1940s: the awful banal theme from the "Vingt Regards sur L'Enfant Jesus" which, fortunately enough, is subject to methods of dismemberment that make its unrecogniseability interesting, and the cringeworthy ondes martenot "Theme of Love" from "Turangalila". There are other artists one can think of whose paucity of self-criticism has left us with sheer brilliance and utter dross, some of them still living, so, although I would never be without them, I'll mention no names.

It needs to be rembered that Ra produced a vast amount of "product" over a great many years so yes, it is highly variable. Some of it to me is inventive, driving, joyful and a delight....some of it is glorified lift muzak. But then I feel that latter about Carla Bley and Steve Swallow.

I would rather be stuck in a lift with Gilmore and The Spaceman.

BN.

Strange that Ra used hotel lifts when he could travel thro space?

[Serial_Apologist]

It needs to be rembered that Ra produced a vast amount of "product" over a great many years so yes, it is highly variable. Some of it to me is inventive, driving, joyful and a delight....some of it is glorified lift muzak. But then I feel that latter about Carla Bley and Steve Swallow.

I would rather be stuck in a lift with Gilmore and The Spaceman.

BN.

Strange that Ra used hotel lifts when he could travel thro space?

No discrimination there, then, either!

"Eh lad, d'you want a lift?"
"Naw thanks, ah live in a boongalaw".