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I
Berlin (West), June/July'88, "Kongresshalle" - an auditorium
for public events, set apart, at the edge of the Tiergarten. The Spree
right behind it, canalized, a straight flow. A hackneyed motif for postcards
- built in the fifties, collapsed, rebuilt: architecture that failed.
About twenty years ago, also the site of the "Berliner Jazztage",
usually for 'low acts'. Since then, hardly any reason to enter this concrete
relic.
Mental reservations are deep seated. Inferior halls and unsuccessful
presentations are brought to mind. Not a good omen. In front of the main
entrance a rectangular flat pool of water. Just inside the building, a
few stairs take you up, then two or three steps further the same number
of stairs take you down again. Would have been an illusion that failed
- if it weren't for the surprising discovery of a large, spacious room
- in dim grey light -, that in its silence, its depth, gives the impression
of being in the belly of a ship. Cool, objective.
In front a platform (grey) extends across the entire width of the room.
On it, the only hard accent in the room: a black concert grand, brilliant
in the light. An optical-aesthetic arrangement, like the India ink sketch
of a bull before the fight.
II
Muffled acoustics. Or is it eager expectation that keeps the audience
from getting loud? More and more and different people come to every concert.
Word gets around. Some have come from far away, have flown thousands of
kilometres to take part.
They soon know each other. The same expectations and mild tension before
it begins. Exchange about the last concert, the one before it, and the
one before that. The music lingers still, is present here before being
covered over again, it is engraved in the head and the gut, and there
where music has its effect; that's why we all keep coming here.
III
Cecil Taylor- heard and seen again and again for a quarter of a century.
In different places - alone and with other musicians (often with Jimmy
Lyons). Musicians who all come on like conspirators, and always know what
has to be done to teach you, the listener, that here there is no getting
off easy. That right now you have a hard nut to crack, but they don't
tell you how to do it. So they give you two to four hours time to try,
then leave you in a state of exhaustion sitting in your armchair/chair
or on the floor - and are gone again as quickly as an impression in a
dream you carry around with you for days, until some provocation causes
it to resurface.
June/July 1988: There were evenings when the sounds wouldn't disappear.
Hours full of imagination and all the senses activated to the highest.
You take part in the constant extrapolation of a work that belongs in
its entirety to Cecil Taylor, and, free from all influences, is completely
singular; in music that is not easy to understand. Music that has nothing
to do with what you hear every day that is meant for other ears, music
which reaches a place where pure fantasy reigns, unclouded by what has
been.
Beauty that cannot be described. In concert after concert, defined and
designed in ever new dynamic forms. On the one hand a fully open form
of playing but a completely self-contained composition. Everything is
simultaneous, the horizontal as well as vertical evolving, micro- and
macrostructure. Oscillating images between not yet and no longer. Vibrations
of emerging - passing in the fastest of rhythms.
And constantly present: instantaneously, the most fleetingly struck tone
has an intensity that demands everything, that wants to achieve everything,
that contains everything and - is opened out toward the future. Tones
constantly being added fall into a system of relationship that changes
continually.
IV
Twelve public concerts, ten days of rehearsal with the "European
Orchestra", direction of a master class in piano and of an ensemble-workshop;
a body work for more than only four weeks. Not a single presentation that
was the same and at the same time not of the highest quality. In each
one, Cecil Taylor presented his work for examination. He disclosed it
to his partners, incorporated them in it and called upon them to add to
it their own music and their skills. A call which, because of the intricacy
of his musical system, and the physical demands it makes, requires the
musicians to give their all.
Each of the meetings, always exciting, full of experiences of the moment,
of exchange. The language of the drums and the tone of the strings. Wood
and metal. Body language, shamanistic ritual. A sound chamber full of
vibrations.
Eleven wind instrument players, vibraphone, cello, two bass players,
piano, drums: Seventeen individualists made up a body of sound (named
Big Band), which took off with enormous drive right after the first bars,
and after a long/much too short hour made a hard but successful landing
back on the floor of the stage.
V
Relief, ease, and the wish that this/every evening would never end. Tomorrow,
just once more. Meeting again…. Continuing in "Abraxas":
soul, funk, jazz-disco, open daily from 10 p.m. to 6 o'clock in the morning.
It's over. The end. Even the final closing came to an end.
What is left?
Sounds, long, long resounding, no longer a fleeting dream needing provocation.
Captured hours, lived and experienced. Returning memories/impressions
while re-listening to the music.
So it's not over after all.
Translation: Barbara Fußmann
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