Eric Dolphy ‘PROPHET' OF FREEDOM BY PHILLIP LUTZ PHOTO BY JEAN-PIERRE LELOIR Whether he was wielding his alto saxophone, flute or bass clarinet, Eric Dolphy was a godsend to the cadre of musicians who were on a mission to expand the language of jazz. 'e was like an angel,” Richard Davis, Dolphy's longtime bassist, said in October. “He was my Tanswer to wanting to play a certain way-free.” In his short life—Dolphy died in 1964 at age 36—he embraced chromatic post-bop, contemporary classical and (what later would be called) world music on their own terms. At the same time, he was moving toward a synthesis of those forms, pre- saging the modern global sensibility. But he was working at a time when cultural purists often prevailed over pluralists, and, among too many crit- ics and club owners, his expansive aesthetic marked him as an unwelcome outlier. Struggling to find work leader, the reedist decided that after a 1964 tour as 31–32 of 116 © DON SCHLITTEN = ‘ "Dolphy is one of my mentors, even from the grave.' —Bennie Maupin Recordings that make up Musical Prophet: The three-LP version (out Nov. 23 for Record Store Expanded 1963 New York Studio Sessions satin a Long Island home, untouched, for decades. Day's Black Friday event). There also will be a three-CD version and a digital edition (both out Jan. 25). By the time Dolphy went into the studio for these sessions-on July 1 and 3, 1963—he had recorded with dozens of artists. Prominent among them was John Coltrane. Dolphy spent long hours practicing with Coltrane in the latter's home in St. Albans, Queens, according to bassist Reggie Workman, who worked with both musi- cians on Impulse classics like Africa/Brass and Live! At The Village Vanguard. "They were very close,” he said. "They respected one another highly.” On the bandstand or in the studio, Workman recalled, the two operated as equals. No mat- ter what Coltrane’s imagination yielded, he said, “Eric would step forward and produce something of the same nature. He always held his own. John expected you to believe in the music and know the terrain, and Eric was happy to be part of it. He always brought his own voice to the music.” That voice, using a full range of instruments to express limitless emotion, was amply expressed as well with Mingus. The two musi- cians' relationship, which began in Dolphy's native Los Angeles, had reached an early peak with albums like Mingus At Antibes (Atlantic) and The Complete Town Hall Concert (Blue Note). Despite its ups and downs, the musical bond was so strong that Mingus repeatedly hired Dolphy, right up until his death. While his reputation as a sideman grew, Dolphy built his own catalog as a leader. By the early '60s, it already included two records of live performances at the Five Spot and three studio gems on Prestige's New Jazz imprint: Outward Bound, Out There and Far Cry—the last record- ed on Dec. 21, 1960, the same day he laid down accompanying bassist Charles Mingus, he would together hurriedly to benefit Dolphy's parents. tracks for Ornette Coleman's singular Free Jazz remain in Europe. Dolphy settled in Berlin, After that, Newton returned the material he (Atlantic). where his diabetes went untreated, leading to his had used to the Smiths' home, where it remained Even as the New Jazz dates employed con- tragic death on June 29. until Hale's death, when Newton became custo- ventional song structures, they hinted at a sub- "When I heard it, I didn't want to believe it," dian of the entire cache. At that point, he under- versive streak. By 1963, that streak had become said Davis, 88. took a more intensive exploration of the music, more pronounced, and clearer still on 1964's Out That sense of denial summed up the reaction gradually coming to understand that it filled To Lunch!, recorded with Davis, Freddie Hubbard of others close to Dolphy-not least his com- out the picture of a genius' life cut short. When (trumpet), Bobby Hutcherson (vibraphone) and position mentor, Hale Smith (1925-2009), and Resonance Records got wind of the tapes and Tony Williams (drums). Posthumously released, Smith's wife, Juanita. Smith, 91, explained that proposed a project, Newton was game. that album widely is considered Dolphy's most the pain was so deep that, for many years, her “I started to think that this music had to definitive; the new collection, with Hutcherson husband refrained from digging into the boxes come out,” he said. and Davis among the personnel, documents a Dolphy had left at their Long Island home before The result is Musical Prophet: The Expanded moment of transition leading to it. the saxophonist departed for what would be his 1963 New York Studio Sessions. From seven-and- "You're hearing changes, you're hearing final tour. a-half hours of tapes, Newton, working with swing, but you're also hearing this approach that “It was sort of a raw thing,” she said. Resonance Co-President Zev Feldman at the really gives you a lot of room to express who you But finally, in 1978, the Smiths contacted label's studio in Beverly Hills, culled 74 min- are as an individual," Newton said. flutist and scholar James Newton, who flew out utes of music, which had been released in the For Dolphy—who was voted into the from California to take a look. What he found '60s as the albums Conversations and Iron Man, DownBeat Hall of Fame by readers in 1964– was a multitude of scores and recordings, many plus 85 minutes of previously unreleased mate- individual expression was paramount. Offstage, ready to be mined. Nine years later, he produced rial. Co-produced by Newton and Feldman, the Smith said, he was an omnivorous consumer of Other Aspects (Blue Note), a 41-minute, five collection, which includes extensive liner notes knowledge and an assertive participant in semi- track collection that, by his own account, was put and photos, will be available in a limited-edition nar-like sessions her husband and Dolphy held in 32 DOWNBEAT JANUARY 2019 32–33 of 116 JOE LOCKE AND THOMAS MARRIOTT One looking outward to worldly the Smiths' residences, first in Harlem's Flanders Hotel and, later, in their Long Island home. Onstage, Davis recalled, Dolphy rarely offered direc- tion, preferring to give musicians full rein to shape their sound. “There was never any discussion of the music,” he said. “We just played.” That kind of trust, Davis said, reflected a closeness forged in the cru- cible of New York—at the Five Spot in a pressurized two-week residen- cy, at Philharmonic Hall performing Gunther Schuller's “Journey Into Jazz” under Leonard Bernstein's watchful eye, at Town Hall contributing music between poet Ree Dragonette's searing disquisitions on race. All of which proved powerful bonding agents. In the 1963 sessions, that bond also was a morale-booster as Dolphy and Davis squeezed into a single day a series of sonorous duos built on a diverse set of vehicles: the Arthur Schwartz-Howard Dietz ballad "Alone Together,” Duke Ellington's "Come Sunday" and, in two previously unreleased takes, Roland Hanna's elegiac “Muses For Richard Davis.” Though Dolphy was no stranger to duos with bassists—two duos new Origin Records releases by with Ron Carter, for example, appear on an acetate disc produced at Esoteric Sound Studios—the interplay in the '63 sessions has a quality of restraint that reflects a level of intimacy with Davis. The restraint is con- spicuously unforced, particularly when Davis' bow meets Dolphy's bass clarinet-prompting the bassist, when asked what most stands out about the sessions 55 years after the fact, to cite Dolphy's unique expressivity on that instrument. “Nobody else played it like that,” Davis said. “Some good players would not even attempt to play it." The impact of the Dolphy-Davis colloquies on Newton was evident. "They bring tears to my eyes, how they understood each other as art- ists and human beings,” he said, adding that he was so taken by “Muses” that, for purposes of analysis, he devised a system for juxtaposing the two themes; the other inward to the takes by simultaneously playing the improvisations-one on his main computer and the other on his laptop. His conclusion? “Each time it's like they had a thousand different ways of approaching how the improvisation could unfold.” Beyond the duos, all of which were recorded on July 1, Musical from these two creative artists. Prophet offers a variety of settings that shed light on the various dimen- sions of Dolphy's art. A quintet with Hutcherson, Woody Shaw (trum- pet), J.C. Moses (drums) and Davis alternating with Eddie Khan on bass interprets two Dolphy originals, “Iron Man” and “Mandrake,” as well as Fats Waller's “Jitterbug Waltz”—a loping head-solos-head exercise whose conservative form belies the flickering of microtonality in Dolphy's bird- like flute. “Birds have notes in between our notes—you try to imitate some- JOE LOCKE thing they do and, like, maybe it's between F and F#, and you'll have to go up or come down on the pitch,” Dolphy said in “John Coltrane and SUBTLE DISGUISE Eric Dolphy Answer the Jazz Critics,” an article by Don DeMicheal that featuring Raul Midón ran in the April 12, 1962, edition of DownBeat. “It's really something. ... JOE LOCKE SUBTLE DISGUISE order at joelocke.com Indian music has something of the same quality—different scales and quarter tones. I don't know how you label it, but it's pretty.” A sextet with Davis, Prince Lasha on flute, Sonny Simmons on alto saxophone, Clifford Jordan on soprano saxophone and Charles Moffett on drums provides the setting for some soulful multiphonics on “Music Matador.” Composed by Lasha and Simmons, the tune traffics in the THOMAS MARRIOTT kind of avant-Latin groove with which Dolphy, a Spanish-speaking ROMANCE LANGUAGE THOMAS MARRIOTT Panamanian-American, was comfortable. ROMANCE LANGUAGE "It's one of the least understood aspects of his language,” Newton said. The largest complement of musicians—10 in all, with the addition of produced by Joe Locke Garvin Bushell on bassoon and the replacement of Moffett by Moses—is and Ryan Cohan enlisted on “Burning Spear.” The song is named for Jomo Kenyatta, who order at thomasmarriott.net acquired that moniker for his militant role in Kenya's fight for indepen- dence and served as his country's first prime minister and first president. The tune, a raucous celebration led by Dolphy's exclamatory bass clari- ORIGIN nad net, is one of two in the collection that have an explicitly political edge. 32–33 of 116 t.com Distributed by Oy Halfecords / New Arts international iTunes Store human heart. Both perspectives resulting in sublime new music works COLI amazon © LEE TANNER III topped the Flute category in the DownBeat Critics Poll 23 times, acknowledges the debt on his album Romance And Revolution (Blue Note). The album was released in 1987—as was Other Aspects—and Dolphy was clearly on his mind. Newton's soaring solo version of the Walter Gross-Jack Lawrence ballad "Tenderly” was, he said, “highly influenced by Eric,” who had done the piece solo on alto saxophone on Far Cry. “A lot of [Romance And Revolution] was.” Newton's friend and colleague Bennie Maupin, known for his horn work on albums by Miles Davis (Bitches Brew) and Herbie Hancock (Head Hunters and Mwandishi), similarly was taken by Dolphy's work. His fascination began with an encounter with Dolphy at the Minor Key lounge in Detroit. Following a particularly ferocious set, the youngster got up the nerve to engage Dolphy. "I told him what I was doing,” Maupin recalled. “He was just standing there, holding a flute, and said, 'Play something for me.” Maupin did, and an impromptu lesson ensued in which Dolphy spent 45 minutes explaining how to hold the instrument, improve one's embouchure and the like. “They were key things only some- body who really knew the instrument could have shown me. He was very patient and very kind.” Inspired by that experience, Maupin bought a bass clarinet, which he ultimately used on dates with both Davis and Hancock. After Maupin moved from his native Detroit to California, he began using the instrument in gigs with Newton. And when Newton came into possession of the Dolphy sheet music, Maupin used the instru- ment in a band, Dolphyana, created to play that music. The group was short-lived, but it brought Maupin and Newton together for a concert at the 2008 Healdsburg Jazz Festival in California. The band covered a variety of material from Out To Lunch!, Outward Bound and Last Date—the last represented by “The Madrig Speaks, The Panther Walks,” which, appearing on Musical Prophet as “Mandrake,” serves as a platform for Dolphy's At the time of his death, Dolphy is said to have been working on music for a string quartet. alto at its most agitated. “It was definitely a challenge,” Maupin said. The other is a 15-minute track titled “A release-provisionally titled it “Jim Crow.” "We worked through the music measure by mea- Personal Statement.” Recorded on March 2, 1964, Still another side of Dolphy is offered in the sure to see what kind of blend we could get. at a radio station in Ann Arbor, Michigan, single solo outing—three takes, actually—of the “Dolphy's music speaks for itself. He was where the composer, pianist Bob James, was an Ned Washington-Victor Young tune “Love Me.” involved in making things sound beautiful. He adventurous student—the piece is the collection's Those tracks, the shortest in the collection at less was always trying to be himself. A lot of people longest. It's also the most wide-ranging sonically, than four minutes each, find Dolphy in full flight, compare me to him. He's one of my mentors, with each of Dolphy's three instruments assum- pushing his alto saxophone to the limit and even from the grave.” ing a distinct profile amid a shifting soundscape beyond. In its risk-taking, Newton said, Dolphy Dolphy's influence was felt beyond wind of woodblock accents, pianistic clusters and nods to piano titans—Thelonious Monk (for his players. The late pianist Geri Allen analyzed ensemble passages in a kind of fractured waltz counterintuitive leaps) and Art Tatum (for his Dolphy's music for a master's thesis, incorporat- time—all framed by a classically rendered libret- harmonic and technical range). ing what she learned into her writing, in tunes to centered on a vocal line: “Jim Crow might one "He went to the edge of the cliff and he like “Dolphy's Dance.” Another pianist, Diane day be gone.” jumped off,” Newton said of Dolphy. “He was Moser, drew on Dolphy's predilection for winged A version of the piece also appears on Other falling and he had to fly." creatures—he was said to transcribe the chirping Aspects, on which Newton-uncertain of its Dolphy's artistic courage has had a profound of birds—with her “Birdsongs For Eric,” which name or composer at the time of that album's impact on other players, too. Newton, who has had its premiere in 2014 at a commemoration of 34 DOWNBEAT JANUARY 2019 34-35 of 116