Album Information:
Originally released in 1966 on Blue Note Records
Recorded May 19, 1966
1973 Reissue
Format: LP
Personnel:
Cecil Taylor – Piano
Alan Silva – Upright Bass
Henry Grimes – Upright Bass
Andrew Cyrille – Drums
Jimmy Lyons – Alto Saxophone
Eddy Gale Stevens, Jr. – Trumpet
Ken McIntyre – Alto Saxophone, Oboe, Bass Clarinet
Track Notes
All compositions by Cecil Taylor
A1 – Steps (10:15)
Descriptors: Dense, Chaotic, Energetic, Busy, Polyphonic, Dissonant
- Horns lead, everything else tumbles after it
- Instruments very conversational
- Stop and start drums in right channel
- Basses switch between plucked (pizzicato) and bowed (arco)
- Horns drop out near end for high-energy piano solo (backed by free-wheelin rhythm section)
*A2 – Enter, Evening (Soft Line Structure) (11:00)
Descriptors: Sparse, Spacious, Minimal, Nocturnal
- Minimal drums
- melodies seem to grow out of each other, as if the instruments are finishing each other’s sentences
- feels like lurking down the street at night
- a lot of bowed (arco) bass)
- muted trumpets over somewhat walking bass, every musician free to go on tangents
*B1 – Unit Structures / As of a Now / Section (16:45)
Descriptors: Progressive Structure, Thematic Improvisation,
- Droney Intro with rumbling tom drums, transient piano sounds, deep horns, and bowed upright bass
- Energy rises and falls
- Solo piano fragment cues a new movement with more energy and rhythm, loose descending melodies with stop & start drums and staccato piano
- plays with the spectrum of density and sparsity
- Instruments drop out to silence, horns and clarinet enter for windy melodies
- Flowing sax enters with drums, Cecil responds and shadows sax
- muted trumpet over free swing
- stops again and goes into horn arpeggios
- horns and piano playful with each other
- a lot of stopping and starting where a bunch of instruments join in to comp whoever’s leading and then drop out
- Mood gets a little more ominous, dissonant pianos and dark horn theme
- Intensity builds into deep sax solo over hectic, spidery piano and drums until another flowing sax line enters with bass
- short screechy arco bass & piano duet
- other instruments join in short, low-intensity bursts
- Fire Cecil solo backed by drums and minimal bass, until everything drops out
- horns come in together with loose theme followed by other instruments, until song ends shortly after
B2 – Tales (8 Whisps)
“Whisps are intersections uniting uninterrupted game continuum”
- Whisp 1: piano solo (L) w/ drum shadowing (R)
- spidery piano (weird staccato rhythms in quick bursts with notes moving together and apart like spider legs)
- stopping and starting
- pause
- Whisp 2
- solo piano, slow dissonant chords
- squeaky horns tentatively join. whispery
- eerie, cautious vibe
- scratchy archo bass creeps in, starting shadowing the piano during quick energy bursts
- Whisp 3
- energetic pulsing piano solo, almost like distorted bebop
- piano gains in intensity, dissonant chord staccatos indicate end of whisp
- Whisp 4
- pulsing piano and bass duet
- joined by shadowing, energetic drums
- avalanches of piano notes
- pulsing bass underneath piano solo and wild swinging drums
- back to piano arpeggios to end whisp
- Whisp 5
- relatively melodic piano solo with dashes of dissonance
- ends with pretty chords
