Cecil Taylor Music

This is one of many great duets pairing Cecil with a drummer, during his extended residence in Berlin in 1988 and captured on the famous 'black' FMP discs. In this case, the drummer is Han Bennink, and while this concert seems to garner less praise than the dates with Tony Oxley or Louis Moholo, I don't know why -- it's really a fantastic set.

The music starts with Bennink rattling his sticks (on the wall?) and then adding sudden cymbal crashes. Cecil makes a gradual entrance, offering up his usual vocalisms, shouts, and a chuckle before starting at the keyboard in a spare, explorative fashion. But soon enough it's off the races and we're into dense and rapid pianistics -- classic Cecil territory. Bennink is something of a traditionalist -- he uses a very basic drum kit and casts himself in a supporting role, but that is probably why I like this recording so much -- Cecil stays in the forefront, while Bennink offers up snare, tom-tom, and cymbal rhythms underneath. The playing does get reigned-in in spots, with Cecil resting at times with sparse phrases and ultimately retreating into far-off vocalisms near the end, so it's not all break-neck, but Cecil definitely maintains the energy of any of his best solo work throughout this 74-minute concert.

In July 1988, Cecil Taylor recorded ten (!) albums while performing live at a festival celebrating his music in Berlin. The discs, including the classics "Pleistozaen Mit Wasser" with Derek Bailey, "Leaf Palm Hand" with Tony Oxley, "Remembrance" with Louis Moholo, and this one, "Spots, Circles And Fantasy" with Han Bennink, are only available as imports on the FMP label. They may be a bit expensive, but for fans of avant-garde jazz and European improvised music, they are must purchases. While not quite on par with "Leaf Palm Hand," "Spots, Circles And Fantasy" is a complex, intricate, textured, weaving rhythmic journey between Taylor's piano and Bennink's drums. "Spots, Circles And Fantasy" features only one track (of the same name) but it is an extended improvisation of over an hour, so you also get a lot of music for your money.

Amazon (and Tower too) have labeled this recording with the wrong title. As you can see from the picture, the name of this recording is "Student Studies", not "Social Studies". This is a remastering of a previous recording- also called "Student Studies". Don't know how this error crept in to both Amazon and Tower websites. Otherwise the music is great; I mean we are talking about Cecil Taylor here- a force of nature on the piano! Also, this guy was obviously no "student" at this point (not with Andrew Cyrille on drums).

This is a very dark and sinister record, but never the less my personal all time favorite. Everything about the record is amazing. From the begining of "Student Studies Part 1" Jimmy Lyons frist echo call and response lines sets the mood, and it's dark very dark. Cecil Taylors playing is hard and intense, at times with furious attack, with unsurpassed control of his instrument. Alan Silva adds much color to the ensemble, he bows his doublebass at length and adds to the sinister flavor.

Andrew Cyrille is Cecils match on the drums. Everything about this record is great! Five stars is minimum, I think it deserves the old Crown :0)

This is a superb live recording of Cecil Taylor, recorded on November 30, 1966 in Paris. He performs with a quartet of Jimmy Lyons on alto, Andrew Cyrille on percussion and Alan Silva on bass. Track 3, called "Amplitude," features Andrew Cyrille, who I consider to be the best of Cecil's percussionists. The previous spring UNIT STRUCTURES had been released on Blue Note, and the music of this concert is, like that record, more contemplative than some of Cecil's later work -- AKISAKILA, for instance, a live recording from Japan in 1973 with Lyons and Cyrille, is much more explosive. But this is powerful and essential, not to be missed among Cecil's many recordings.

Do not be misled by AMG -- contrary to Jurek's review, this is not the first CD release of this concert. It was previously released in 1994 on the Black Lion label, and called THE GREAT PARIS CONCERT. AMG mistakenly dates the disc with that name to 1964. (I cannot comment on the sound quality of the Varese Records remastering as I have the 1994 Black Lion version.)

Amazon (and Tower too) have labeled this recording with the wrong title. As you can see from the picture, the name of this recording is "Student Studies", not "Social Studies". This is a remastering of a previous recording- also called "Student Studies". Don't know how this error crept in to both Amazon and Tower websites. Otherwise the music is great; I mean we are talking about Cecil Taylor here- a force of nature on the piano! Also, this guy was obviously no "student" at this point (not with Andrew Cyrille on drums).

This is a very dark and sinister record, but never the less my personal all time favorite. Everything about the record is amazing. From the begining of "Student Studies Part 1" Jimmy Lyons frist echo call and response lines sets the mood, and it's dark very dark. Cecil Taylors playing is hard and intense, at times with furious attack, with unsurpassed control of his instrument. Alan Silva adds much color to the ensemble, he bows his doublebass at length and adds to the sinister flavor.

Andrew Cyrille is Cecils match on the drums. Everything about this record is great! Five stars is minimum, I think it deserves the old Crown :0)

This is a superb live recording of Cecil Taylor, recorded on November 30, 1966 in Paris. He performs with a quartet of Jimmy Lyons on alto, Andrew Cyrille on percussion and Alan Silva on bass. Track 3, called "Amplitude," features Andrew Cyrille, who I consider to be the best of Cecil's percussionists. The previous spring UNIT STRUCTURES had been released on Blue Note, and the music of this concert is, like that record, more contemplative than some of Cecil's later work -- AKISAKILA, for instance, a live recording from Japan in 1973 with Lyons and Cyrille, is much more explosive. But this is powerful and essential, not to be missed among Cecil's many recordings.

Do not be misled by AMG -- contrary to Jurek's review, this is not the first CD release of this concert. It was previously released in 1994 on the Black Lion label, and called THE GREAT PARIS CONCERT. AMG mistakenly dates the disc with that name to 1964. (I cannot comment on the sound quality of the Varese Records remastering as I have the 1994 Black Lion version.)

"Great, great music. But why buy this old release when you can get the same music with extra material & better sound on _Nefertiti, the Beautiful One Has Come_?"

well, because its a lot cheaper. 'nefertiti . .' is perhaps a 5 star collection, so i deduct a star off of 'trance' for not covering as much ground. nonetheless, this is first rate cecil taylor material - hard to find music from his post-blue note golden period. jimmy lyons on sax, sonny murray on drums, and the man himself on the piano.

Great, great music. But why buy this old release when you can get the same music with extra material & better sound on _Nefertiti, the Beautiful One Has Come_?

"Tree of Life" is a live solo outing, recorded in Berlin in 1991, just a few years following Cecil's landmark residence there in 1988 that spawned the famous FMP boxed set. Solo Cecil is the way to start if you're a neophyte to his music and this disc is an excellent and classic display of the full palate of CT's artistry. The first track starts with some rattling of hand cymbals and then some guttural chanting that CT often favors at the start of performances, as he enters the stage and approaches the piano. Unfortunately, he's rarely well miked when he does this, and so you have to strain to hear him or crank up the volume, but his utterances are more about the sound than the actual logical word meaning anyway, in this way paralleling his piano playing. After this one-minute intro, track 2 starts in explorative fashion with some light touch and abbreviated phrases. These become increasingly complex, interwoven, loud, and chaotic after the 10-minute mark as CT constructs, or maybe decontructs, the music. There are lots of thundering 10-finger mirror chords throughout the 45 minute section, while still allowing for considerable space, unlike some other CT recordings (and this is reason to start with the solo music). With track 3, CT returns to some brief drumming and chanting somewhere on stage (was this an extended encore?), but soon enough sits back at the Bosendorfer and returns with a 20-minute revisitation of his trademark cluster attacks, chordal slams, and rumbling-low register to trinkling-high register two-handed runs. Tracks 4 and 5 are shorter encores that again typify Cecil's concert format, restating and re-exploring musical themes, but in a rather more restrained fashion, ultimately bringing the concert length to over 70 minutes.

As an owner of some 40+ CT recordings, many of them landmark solo works, this concert strikes me as something of a greatest hits album in that he's used many of the phrases, attacks, and themes heard here elsewhere. Of course, you can't hum any detectable melody, but you can recognize signature motifs from various other recordings. There isn't as much furious, break-neck stuff here, but there is plenty of emotion, fury, and chord-slamming along with some more gentle explorations. This recording is therefore a great place to start as a very representative work, but as a CT veteran who collects his solo work, I'd rank it below the Garden, Willisau, For Olim, or East Berlin solo concerts -- mostly because I've heard it before. Don't get me wrong though, if you don't have those other concerts (or even if you do), you can't go wrong here -- it's classic Cecil and features a little bit of everything.