maurice mcintryre

maurice mcintyre - humility in the light of creator (1969)

Humility may have been McInytre?s first session as a leader, but the music and musicianship yield the mark of a completely mature player from the outset. Adding to the indispensability of the date is a who?s who of AACM heavyweights on hand to lend their talents to the already boiling creative pool. The record conveniently divides into two programmatic halves. The first ?Suite: Ensemble Love? includes the haunting title piece a tune of almost tone poem dimensions that encapsulates an incredible depth of emotive urgency into it?s scant running time. It is arguably McIntyre?s finest recorded moment as his full-toned tenor expounds around bowed bass and malleted drums. On several other pieces within the suite Jones gruff vocalizations reference Native American chant forms by way of Chicago?s South Side. Upon repeated listens his contributions which at first sound churlish and haphazard begin to make sense within the context of the other instruments, particularly McIntyre?s concentrated saxophonics.?Suite: Ensemble Fate? swells the group to octet size. Solo and ensemble passages unfurl as McInytre switches between his reeds. Structured passages of melodic and harmonic certainty alternate with emancipated sections of free form blowing. The AACM penchant for ?little instruments? colorations and textures are also incorporated into the wide-open sound canvas. Favors? bass serves as a rhythmic lightning rod in tandem with Uba drawing in the twining traps of Barker and Ajaramu along with the rest of the electrically charged ensemble. McIntyre woodsy tenor solos assuredly above building an exposition of fiery sonorities before Smith and eventually Stubblefield chime in behind him. Throughout, the very essence of ecstatic energy discourse is uncorked and imbibed from freely. Midway mood eventually dampens through a somber statement from Myers and an somber interplay between drums and bass, but the coda to the composition regains steam in a final blowout.

Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre, uno de los primeros integrantes de la Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) que Muhal Richard Abrams fundó a principios de los sesenta, tiene en su primer album como líder: Maurice McIntyre (saxo tenor, clarinete, campanas, pandereta, bocina); Leon Smith (trompeta, fliscorno); John Stubblefield (saxo soprano); Claudine Myers (piano); Malcahi Favors (bajo); Mchaka Uba (bajo); Thurman Barker and Ajaramu (batería); George Hines (vocales), una espiritual y aventurera obra que eclipsa lo demás de su escasa discografía. Avant y free-jazz en la búsqueda de las tradiciones nativas de África y Oriente Medio tras la senda de otros grandes viajeros: Archie Shepp, Yusef Lateef o Roscoe Mitchell. Aquí el espíritu y la libertad abrazan por completo a la obra, entre disonancias y percusiones la voz de George Hines evoca a ceremonias religiosas en lo alto de una montaña ('Ensemble Love, Kcab Emoh'), a un trance en el que te ves atrapado a través de una borágine de estímulos ('Ensemble Love, Life Force') o al apacible sosiego que es la libertad en sí misma ('Ensemble Love, Humility in the Light of the Creator').