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I was introduced to free jazz around the age of eighteen, and as an improvising pianist I was struck by the rhythmic sophistication of Cecil Taylor. Occasionally I would find his albums at record stores, or a library cleaning up its archive of LPs nobody listened to. For Olim must have been the first one I bought. The percussive articulation and skewed rhythms certainly had some influence on my own playing. As I found more albums, I also became aware of the stylistic closed-mindedness, or cohesion if you will, of Taylor's music. There are a number of elements and patterns that recur, such as the rapid arabesques of small clusters, the symmetrical melodic shapes mirrored in left and right hand, and a texture of arpeggiated chords reminiscent of a Chopin C minor study. The rhetoric and formal layout often remain recognisable. At worst, it may appear as a lack of creativity. Although the style is unique, it's not inimitable, as Marilyn Crispell has demonstrated in a few of her early recordings.
Cecil Taylor's stubbornness can also be heard whenever he performs with other musicians. The groundbreaking albums such as Unit Structures (1966) and Conquistador already feature Taylor's mature style, but his fellow musicians seem to hang on to a comparatively outdated jazz idiom. The contrast is even more stark in his very first recordings, on Jazz Advance (1956) where he actually plays some jazz standards, such as Thelonious Monk's Bemsha Swing. There's absolutely nothing remarkable about the bass and drum accompaniment, but Taylor stretches and pushes against the metric boundaries as if he'd want to do away with the common pulse. This was free jazz a few years before Ornette Coleman coined the term.
Later on, when Taylor found more congenial musicians to play with, it was always as if they had to adapt to him, and never the other way around. There is a remarkable double album with Max Roach, a surprising collaboration indeed given this drummer's solid background in bebop and more traditional jazz idioms. Nevertheless, there is a stunning moment when Roach picks up percussion instruments such as a flexatone or claves, and makes a very articulate and well thought out contrasting statement to Cecil Taylor's sprawling textures. It's as if Roach gradually picks up and learns Taylor's stylistic elements, because in the last part there is a mindblowing drum solo where he imitates Taylor's phrasing and articulation _almost_ as accurately as anyone could possibly do. Almost, since the micro-adjustments so characteristic of Taylor are omitted in Roach's rhythmically straight, more "quantised" rendition.
My latest acquisition of free jazz on record included a CD with a collection of the first three recordings, and a more recent duet with Tony Oxley on drums. The early recordings are interesting in light of the more mature style, and because their more explorative attitude, still open to a multitude of musical ideas, and because of the interesting mismatch between Cecil Taylor and his fellow musicians.
All these things can be heard on a radio show recorded on December 12, 2022, and available online for about five more weeks.