Cecil Taylor - 1962
‘Lena’ is from Cecil Taylor’s 1962 album ‘Nefertiti, The Beautiful One Has Come’. It was recorded at the Cafe Montmartre in Copenhagen, Denmark.
When we talked about “Collective Forms” (Link) we pointed out how important Repetition, Motifs and Imitation are to this style. All three are present in ‘Lena’. Bar 1 sets the main motif while bars 2 and 3 are an answer to the motif (Call and Response).
The other obvious feature is the nearly exclusive use of the Perfect Group (octaves, fourths and fifths) and step-wise movement.
The second section, beginning at bar 9, has melodic material that begins on ’a’ and ends on ‘c’. The melody uses a tonal palette similar to Db Major or Bb minor (Example 1). There is a kind of symmetry to the palette (red labels).
If you are new to the music of Cecil Taylor, I would recommend these five albums as accessible introductions. (1) “Fly, Fly, Fly, Fly, Fly” from 1980 (2) ”Indent” from 1973. (3) “Momentum in Space” from 1998. (4) “One too Many Salty Swift and Not Goodbye” from 1978 and (5) his first album from 1956 “Jazz Advance“.
The motifs used as a springboard to improvisation in the First Layer of ‘Indent’ (1973) also use a form of Call and Response Imitation.
‘Astar’ from “Fly, Fly, Fly…” again demonstrates Taylor’s declarative form of Call an Response.
Cecil Taylor’s amazing improvised expansions of these relatively simple motivic “heads” use a highly refined language that was developed over his 65 year career.
We highlight here just a few of the many fascinating techniques Taylor employed:
(1) With the near total absence of Period in Taylor’s music, it becomes a master class in Pulse-Pattern rhythm (Link).
(2) Example 2 again demonstrates Taylor’s use of Call and Response and Octave Displacement.
(3) Example 3 highlights his use of ‘Clusters’ – chords built on major and minor seconds. Taylor uses these for both colour accents and as a rhythmic device.
(4) Contrary Motion: Our final example is, to say the least, challenging. If we take a little phrase built on Major 2nds (bars 1 and 2 of Example 4); displace them by an octave (bars 3 & 4); run the notes in Contrary Motion (bars 5 & 6) we get something like bar 7.
Note: Some of the short examples above are from Taylor’s piece ‘Life As…’ from the album “Momentum in Space”. Kaja Draksler did a complete transcription of this improvisation (Link).