Remembering Herbie Nichols

The Unheard herbie Nichols Volume 1 The Unheard herbie Nichols Volume 2 Roswell Rudd CIMP Records Spinning Song: Duck Baker Plays Herbie Nichols Duck Baker Avant Love Is Proximity Herbie Nichols Project Soul Note The Complete Herbie Nichols On Blue Note Herbie Nichols Project Blue Note Hip me Herbie! Perhaps the most wry composer Jazz has yet produced, 1997 was, unoffically, Herbie's year. It saw the re-release of the pianist's essential Blue Note trio sides and three sets with revelatory interpretations by trombonist Rudd and solo acoustic guitarist Baker. Since it sometimes seems that the minimum standard for interpretation is comprehension, it's welcome to hear what's accomplished when the interpeters move their sympathies into deeper waters. Both Rudd and Baker get inside of Nichol's sophisticated music and help the listener understand how it was such sophistication unlocked sublime simplicity and pleasure from out of these remarkable compositions. The Herbie Nichols Project doesn't quite obtain the level of interpretive transcendence of Rudd or Baker; still, it is a record full of witty takes on Nichols. While the instrumentation on the Rudd discs joins his trombone with just guitar and drums, and Baker’s essays are entirely on the acoustic guitar, the resulting music isn't austere. If anything, both Rudd and Baker sense Nichols was a romantic and both work in inspired ways to cast off the disrespectful casting of Nichols as a tragic figure. For both Rudd and Baker, a high order of insight joins with affectionate effervescence so that the great melodies act as gateways into the depths of both the music and interpretations. Nichols stands at the center of Rudd's art. (It was Rudd who wrote the notes to the Blue Note reissue of the orginal 10 inch sides, "The Third World".) He spent a great deal of time with Nichols and transcribed, learned, and played with the composer much of his music. (Some of which get its first public airing on the two CIMP volumes.) Besides this experience, Rudd served as the witness to Nichol's oral history and so it is that Rudd is inside this music, swimming in the wellspring so-to-speak...and it sounds like it. I'll pick out one highlight from each volume. There is a very short waltz with an odd catch, "Valse Macabre" on volume one which is both a miniature and expansively melodic, capturing the listener's attention like a wink from a pretty stranger. The longest piece on either volume is the 16 minute "Tee Dum Tee Dee" on volume two which may well stand as one of Rudd's two or three greatest eruptions on record; volcanic, twisted blues. These are very important recordings keyed by Rudd's closeness to the source and his and his bandmates' (Greg Millar on guitar, John Bacon Jr. on drums,) virtuosity. Baker is a unique artist, who has produced edgy, folkish improvs over a long career but none of his earlier work would have suggested a masterpiece like Spinning Song was in the works. Using strummed chords to nail both the changes and percussive order of the songs, Baker's marvelous and intricate finger picking is used to suggest an entire ensemble confidantly at work. Take "134th Street" with it's walking bass, finger picked 'pianistic' trace of the head, and strummed drums; masterful. Anybody with the slightest taste for unique improvisatory soundings should find Baker's take on Nichols compelling, and all serious finger pickers will find it essential. Pianist Frank Kimbrough leads the Herbie Nichols Project in a similarly respectful and upbeat tour but trades off daring views in favor of a revealing classicism, especially given the conventional instrumentation on the date featuring alto sax, trumpet and rhythm trio. Since Nichols never had the chance to arrange his music for a standard ensemble what keys this date are the arrangements including rareties never before heard in band versions. There are many highlights including a magnificent extended arrangements of "Wildflower" and the title track. The soloing is strong with trumpeter Ron Horton impressing me the most. Blue Note underlines all this activity with a reissue of the complete Nichols dates. I haven’t put out the pennies for this essential set yet, but, from the long playing incarnations which are committed to memory (!) I can assert all of this loving memory is for naught if you don’t check out the source at the Nichols wellspring. All the master takes and known alternates are here in a deluxe box set. I did say essential, didn’t I? Herbie's year arrived, finally. Hip hip herbiehooray!