Volunteered Slavery

We bring our all-too-brief series on Rahsaan Roland Kirk’s music to a conclusion today—but it is a rousing conclusion!

This video shows Kirk in peak form, playing sax, a conch shell, a gong, police whistle, & eventually using a wood chair as a percussion instrument, destroying it in the process! The energy level is at maximum level, & also includes a great piano solo by Ron Burton, while Kirk wanders through the audience at the Montreaux Jazz Festival, led by his percussionist & sidekick, Joe Habao Texidor.

“Volunteered Slavery” is the title track of a 1969 Kirk album issued on Atlantic. He also played it as a coda to “The Old Rugged Cross” on his masterful 1972 release, Blacknuss (& I very much regret I wasn’t able to fit a cut from that album into this overview).

I hope you enjoyed these selections, & if you’re new to Kirk’s music, I hope this spurs you to explore his work further. Stay tuned next month for more Sunday music!

Image links to its source on Wiki Commons:

“Roland Kirk playing at Lanchester Polytechnic in Coventry UK, January 1972.” Photo by Kentrethewey [link provided on Wiki Commons is empty], who makes it available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International license. 

Bright Moments

It’s Sunday—& that means more Rahsaan Roland Kirk!

I don’t tend to think in terms of “favorites” when it comes to creative work—no “favorite” poet, musician, song, poem, etc. What speaks most directly to me at one point in my life is bound to change as time passes &, with that passage of time, my consciousness changes. But having said that, today’s song means a great deal to me & has for many years. I first heard it played at the Vermont Jazz Festival in the 1970s, a dark time in my life, a time very much in need of “bright moments”—there’s something about this music that speaks to me on the deepest level.

This performance is from Kirk’s Bright Moments album, recorded live at San Francisco’s Keystone Korner & released on the Atlantic label in 1973. Indeed, the record is a great introduction to Kirk’s music, as it covers a wide array of styles—from the transcedent post-bop flute playing of the title track to his tenor sax take on Fats Waller’s “Jitterbug Waltz”, & a whole lot of greatness in between.

Enjoy!

Image links to its source on Wiki Commons:

"Roland Kirk at Ronnie Scott's Club" by Del de la Haye (Flickr name:del) who makes it available under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.

Serenade to a Cuckoo

We continue our series on the music of Rahsaan Roland Kirk with a live performance of his wonderful composition, “Serenade to a Cuckoo”.  This piece first appeared on Kirk’s all flute album, I Talk With theSpirits, released on Limelight in 1964. Although this album was later re-issued on CD, it’s currently out-of-print, which is absolutely criminal. If you can find a used copy at your local music store, I’d encourage you to pick it up—great music.

Indeed, while Kirk is most renowned for his reed playing, he was also one of the best jazz flutists, as inventive on that instrument as he was on the sax. This is a beautiful rendition of the song, & also features a brief concluding interlude on nose flute—& no feature on Rahsaan Roland Kirk would be complete without the nose flute making an appearance.

Hope you enjoy it!

Image links to its source at Wiki Commons:

“Roland Kirk playing at Lanchester Polytechnic in Coventry UK, January 1972, with Henry Pete Pearson (bass), Rahn (Ron) Burton (piano), Joe Habao Texidor (percussion), and unidentified drummer.” Photo by Kentrethewey [link provided on Wiki Commons is empty], who makes it available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.

The Inflated Tear

This week’s Sunday Music post is late indeed, as it’s well into Monday afternoon out here in Portland, Oregon. But while today’s post is both late & shorter than I'd have liked, I didn’t want to miss a week, & am really excited about this month’s featured artist.

In fact, in June I’ll be featuring music from one of my all-time favorite musicians, an artist I was privileged to see perform live twice way back when—Rahsaan Roland Kirk.

If you love jazz, if you love great music, if you love singular & powerful expressions of the artistic spirit, then Rahsaan Roland Kirk’s music is for you. Kirk played with passion, virtuosity, & almost unreal inventiveness. A master on reed instruments, a talented composer, & indeed, a visionary in his ability to connect popular music of his day with the most up-to-date currents in jazz (as for instance on his Motown-inspired 1971 album Blacknuss), Kirk brought a complex musical vision to bear throughout his work.

Of course Kirk was known for his ability to play multiple reed instruments at once, as well as his incredible ability to use circular breathing in his playing. But it’s important to stress that these techniques went far beyond showmanship, & were integral to the symphonic imagination found in his playing & composition.

A truly great artist. As was the case with Arvo Pärt, such a short series is only going to give the most bare bones introduction to his music, but if you aren’t familiar with Kirk, I do hope these posts inspire you to seek out more of his music. & if you already know his work, I know you’re going to enjoy them & be moved by them!

Here Kirk plays his composition “The Inflated Tear” live around the time the piece was written.

Note: No post tomorrow (Tuesday 6/6/17) to give this post a full day plus to “headline” the blog.

Image links to its source on Wiki Commons:

Roland Kirk, "Rahsan Roland Kirk" Live im Großen Sedesaal des NDR Hamburg, 1972. Photo by Heinrich Klaffs [also here], who makes this image available under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Genericlicense.