ALBERT AYLER - Holy Ghost : Rare & Unissued Recordings (1962-70) (2004) 10CD BOX | FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

After listening to Revenant's massive Albert Ayler box set, Holy Ghost: Rare & Unissued Recordings (1962-70), a pair of questions assert themselves in the uneasily settling silence that follows: who was Albert Ayler, and how did he come to be? At the time of this box set's release 26 years after the Cleveland native's mysterious death -- his lifeless body was found floating in New York's East River, without a suicide note -- those questions loom larger than ever. Revenant's amazing package certainly adds weight and heft to the argument for Ayler's true place in the jazz pantheon, not only as a practitioner of free jazz but as one of the music's true innovators. Ayler may have been deeply affected by the music of Ornette Coleman, but in turn he also profoundly influenced John Coltrane's late period.

The item itself is a deeply detailed 10" by 10" black faux-onyx "spirit box," cast from a hand-carved original. Inside are ten CDs in beautifully designed, individually colored rice paper sleeves. Seven are full-length music CDs, two contain interviews, and one is packaged as a replica of a recording tape box, containing two tracks from an Army band session Ayler participated in. Loose items include a Slug's Saloon handbill, an abridged facsimile of Amiri Baraka's journal Cricket from the mid-'60s containing a piece by Ayler, a replica of the booklet Paul Haines wrote for Ayler's Spiritual Unity album, a note Ayler scrawled on hotel stationery in Europe, a rumpled photograph of the saxophonist as a boy, and a dogwood flower. Finally, there is a hardbound 209-page book. It contains a truncated version of Val Wilmer's historic chapter on Ayler from As Serious As Your Life, a new essay by Baraka, and biographical and musicological essays by Ben Young, Marc Chaloin, and Daniel Caux. In addition, there are testimonies by many collaborators, full biographical essays of all sidemen, detailed track information on the contents, and dozens of photographs.

Almost all this material has been, until now, commercially unavailable. Qualitatively, the music here varies, both artistically and mechanically. Some was taken from broadcast and tape sources that have deteriorated or were dubious to begin with, but their massive historical significance far outweighs minor fidelity problems. Chronologically organized, the adventure begins with Ayler's earliest performances in Europe fronting a thoroughly confounded rhythm section that was tied to conventional time signatures and chord changes. Ayler, seemingly oblivious, was trying out his new thing in earnest -- to the consternation of audiences and bandmates alike. How did a guy who played like this even get a gig in such a conservative jazz environment? Fumbling as this music is, it proves beyond any doubt Ayler's knowledge and mastery of the saxophone tradition from Lester Young to Sonny Rollins. Ayler's huge tone and his amazing, masterfully controlled use of both vibrato and the tenor's high register are already in evidence here. Following these, there is finally recorded evidence to support Ayler playing with Cecil Taylor in Copenhagen in 1962. This is where he met drummer Sunny Murray who, along with bassist Gary Peacock, formed the original Ayler trio. Their 1964 performances at New York's Cellar Café are documented here to stunning effect. Following these are phenomenal broadcast performances from later that year that include Don Cherry on trumpet in France.

Other discs here document Ayler's sideman duties: with pianist Burton Greene's quintet in 1966 (with Rashied Ali), a Pharoah Sanders band with Sirone and Dave Burrell, a Town Hall concert with his brother Donald's sextet that also included Sam Rivers, and a quartet with Donald, drummer Milford Graves, and bassist Richard Davis playing at John Coltrane's funeral. These live sessions have much value historically as well as musically, but are, after all, blowing sessions -- though they still display Ayler as a willing and fiery collaborator who upped the ante with his presence. Though he arrived fully formed as a soloist, his manner of trying to adapt to other players and bring them into his sphere is fascinating, frustrating, and revealing.

Ayler's own music is showcased best when leading his own quartets and quintets, and there are almost four discs' worth of performances here. Much of this music is with the classical violinist Michel Sampson and trumpeter Donald Ayler with alternating rhythm sections. Indeed, the quintet gigs here with Sampson and Donald in the front line that used marching rhythms and traditional hymns as their root may not be as compelling sonically as the Village Vanguard stuff issued by Impulse!, but they are as satisfying musically. The various rhythm sections included drummers Ronald Shannon Jackson, Allen Blairman, Muhammad Ali, Beaver Harris, and Bernard Purdie, and bassists Bill Folwell, Steve Tintweiss, Clyde Shy (Mutawef Shaheed), pianist Call Cobbs, and tenor saxophonist Frank Wright. What is clearly evident is that the only drummer with whom Ayler truly connected with, the only one who could match his manner of playing out of time and stretching it immeasurably, was Murray, who literally played around the beat while moving the music through its dislocated center.

The late music remains controversial. Recorded live in 1968 and 1970 in New York and France, it illuminates the troublesome period on Ayler's Impulse! recordings, New Grass and Music Is the Healing Force of the Universe. In performance, struggling and ill-conceived rhythm sections try to comprehend and articulate the complex patchwork of colors, motivations, and adventurous attempts at musical integration with the blues, rock, poetry, and soul Ayler was engaging instrumentally and -- with companion Mary Parks -- vocally. Ayler's own playing remains unshakable and revelatory, stunning for its ability to bring to the surface hidden melodies, timbres, and overtones and, to a degree, make them accessible. His solos, full of passion, pathos, and the otherworldly, pull everything from his musical sound world into his being and send it out again, transformed, through the horn.

Ayler is credited with the set's title, in that he once said in an interview: "Trane was the father. Pharoah was the son. I was the Holy Ghost." While it can be dismissed as hyperbole, it should also be evaluated to underscore the aforementioned questions. Unlike Coltrane and Sanders whose musical developments followed a recorded trajectory, Ayler, who apparently had very conventional beginnings as a musician, somehow arrived on the New York and European scenes already on the outside, pushing ever harder at boundaries that other people hadn't yet even perceived let alone transgressed. Who he was in relation to all those who came after him is only answered partially, and how he came to find his margin and live there remains a complete cipher. What Revenant has accomplished is to shine light into the darkened corners of myth and apocrypha; the label has added flesh-and-bone documented history to the ghost of a giant. Ayler struggled musically and personally to find and hold onto the elusive musical/spiritual balance that grace kissed him with only a few times during his lifetime -- on tape anyway. But the quest for that prize, presented here, adds immeasurably to both the legend and the achievement.
-> This comment is posted on Allmusic by Thom Jurek, follower of our blog 'O Púbis da Rosa' <-
All Tracks & Credits

ALBERT AYLER - Live in Greenwich Village : The Complete Impulse Recordings (1998) 2CD | FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Live in Greenwich Village was Albert Ayler's first recording for Impulse, and is arguably his finest moment, not only for the label, but ever. This double-CD reissue combines both of the Village concerts -- documented only partially on previously released LPs -- recorded in 1965 and 1966 with two very different groups. The Village gigs reveal the mature Ayler whose music embodied bold contradictions: There are the sweet, childlike, singalong melodies contrasted with violent screaming peals of emotion, contrasted with the gospel and R&B shouts of jubilation, all moving into and through one another. On the 1965 date, which featured Ayler, his brother Donald on trumpet, Joel Freedman on cello, bassist Lewis Worrell, and the great Sunny Murray on drums, the sound is one of great urgency. Opening with "Holy Ghost," the Aylers come out stomping and Murray double times them to bring the bass and cello to ground level in order to anchor musical proceedings to their respective generated sounds. "Truth Is Marching In" casts a bleating, gospelized swirl against a backdrop of three- and four-note "sung" phrases that are constantly repeated, à la a carny band before kicking down all the doors and letting it rip for almost 13 minutes. On the 1967 date of the second disc, the Aylers are augmented with drummer Beaver Harris, violinist Michel Sampson, Bill Folwell and Alan Silva on basses, and trombonist George Steele on the closer, "Universal Thoughts." "For John Coltrane" opens the set with a sweltering abstraction of tonalities in the strings and horns. On "Change Has Come," the abstraction remains but the field of language is deeper, denser, more urgent. Only with "Spiritual Rebirth," which opens with a four-note theme, does one get the feeling that the band has been pacing itself for this moment, and that the concert has become an actual treatise on the emotion of "singing" as an ensemble in uncharted territories. Throughout the rest of the set, Ayler's band buoys him perfectly, following him up through every new cloud of unknowing into a sublime musical and emotional beyond which, at least on recordings, would never be realized again. This recording is what all the fuss is about when it comes to Ayler.
-> This comment is posted on Allmusic by Thom Jurek, follower of our blog 'O Púbis da Rosa' <-
Tracklist 1 :
1     Holy Ghost 7'41
Albert Ayler
2     The Truth Is Marching In 12'42
Albert Ayler
3     Our Prayer 4'45
Donald Ayler
4     Spirits Rejoice 16'22
Albert Ayler
5     Divine Peacemaker 12'37
Albert Ayler
6     Angels 9'53
Albert Ayler
Tracklist 2 :
1     For John Coltrane 13'40
Albert Ayler
2     Change Has Come 6'24
Albert Ayler
3    Light in Darkness 10'59
Albert Ayler
4     Heavenly Home 8'51
Albert Ayler
5     Spiritual Rebirth 4'26
Albert Ayler
6     Infinite Spirit 6'37
Albert Ayler
7     Omega Is the Alpha 10'46
Albert Ayler
8     Universal Thoughts 8'22
Albert Ayler
Credits :    
Bass – Alan Silva (tracks: 2-1 to 2-8), Bill Folwell (tracks: 1-2 to 1-5, 2-1 to 2-8), Henry Grimes (tracks: 1-2 to 1-5)
Cello – Joel Freedman (tracks: 1-1, 2-1 to 2-8)
Drums – Beaver Harris (tracks: 1-2 to 1-5, 2-2 to 2-8)
Tenor Saxophone, Alto Saxophone – Albert Ayler
Trumpet – Don Ayler (tracks: 1-1 to 1-5, 2-2 to 2-8)
Violin – Michel Sampson (tracks: 1-2 to 1-5, 2-1 to 2-8)

ALBERT AYLER – Stockholm, Berlin 1966 (2011) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Stockholm, November 10, 1966
1    Truth Is Marching In    9:15
Composed By Albert Ayler
2    Omega (Is The Alpha)    10:36
Composed By Albert Ayler
3    Our Prayer - Bells 7:51
Composed By [Our Prayer] – Donald Ayler
4    Infinite Spirit - Japan 3:53
Composed By [Japan] – Pharoah Sanders
Berlin, November 3, 1966    
5    Truth Is Marching In    7:25
Composed By Albert Ayler
6    Omega (Is The Alpha)    3:36
Composed By Albert Ayler
7    Our Prayer - Truth Is Marching In 5:06
Composed By [Our Prayer] – Donald Ayler
8    Ghosts - Bells    11:29
Composed By Albert Ayler
Credits :
Double Bass – William Folwell
Drums – Beaver Harris
Tenor Saxophone – Albert Ayler
Trumpet – Donald Ayler
Violin – Michel Samson

ALBERT AYLER - Live In Europe 1964-1966 (1991) Unofficial Release | FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Tracklist :
1    Mothers    7:36
 Composed By – Albert Ayler
2    Children    8:04
 Composed By – Albert Ayler
3    Holy Spirits    8:03
 Composed By – Albert Ayler
4    Our Prayer    4:24
 Composed By – Donald Ayler
5    Ghosts - Bells    11:11
 Composed By – Albert Ayler
6    Truth Is Marching In    7:06
 Composed By – Albert Ayler
7    Omega    3:40
 Composed By – Albert Ayler
Credits :
Bass – Bill Folwell (pistas: 4 to 7), Gary Peacock (pistas: 1 to 3)
Drums – Beaver Harris (pistas: 4 to 7), Sunny Murray (pistas: 1 to 3)
Tenor Saxophone [Tenor Sax] – Albert Ayler
Trumpet – Don Cherry (pistas: 1 to 3), Donald Ayler (pistas: 4 to 7)
Violin – Michael Sampson (pistas: 4 to 7)
Notas.
Tracks 1-3: Recorded live at Montmartre Jazzhus, Copenhagen (Denmark) on November 5, 1964
Tracks 4-7: Recorded live at Berlin Jazz Festival, Berlin (Germany) on November 3, 1966
However, tracks 1-3 were in fact recorded on September 3, 1964 (subsequently released as part of The Copenhagen Tapes).

ALBERT AYLER - Lörrach, Paris 1966 (1966-2002) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

The two concerts presented on this disc represent two of the finest dates of Albert Ayler's European tour of 1966. The band -- with brother, Don, on trumpet, violinist Michael Sampson, drummer Beaver Harris, and bassist William Folwell -- was in fantastic shape and performed beyond expectation on both evenings. What is most noticeable about these dates and how they fill in a part of the Ayler mystique as a performer was to hear how immediately he would dictate a marching rhythm, theme, or folk song melody, or even perhaps a child ballad. It was important to acknowledge, right from the beginning in these tunes for a European audience, where this music came from and what continuum he was part of. The opener is "Bells," and for the longest time a Sousa marching rhythm precedes an eight-note melody. Like Ornette Coleman, he uses Sampson's violin and Donald's trumpet to move that melody through the modulation of the rhythm section before taking off into something else, someplace where the saxophone can become a real and true extension of the human voice. The squealing and honking and wailing all become part of a choir of voices forgotten by history, yet inextricably tied to it as ciphers and ghosts. The theme of "Bells" and those of "Our Prayer," "Ghost," "Holy Ghost," and "Spirits" all come from the entryway of emotional clarity and parade churchlike through the band, transferring themselves out onto an audience that must have been staring in disbelief. The shock is how well Ayler moves through his harmonic inventions and involves the band without regard for their involvement. He knows they are there; that's enough, and so he speaks freely. His timbral modulations carry emotions directly from the heart through the horn onto the band, who fills them and sends them out, whether tenderly or terrifyingly, onto those in the seats. This is an amazing document, like the Hilversum sessions but better, because the sound is respectable here and matches the grandeur and shocking emotional immediacy of the performances.
-> This comment is posted on Allmusic by Thom Jurek, follower of our blog 'O Púbis da Rosa' <-
Tracklist :
1     Bells 13'30
Albert Ayler
2     Prophet 7'00
Albert Ayler
3     Our Prayer/Spirits Rejoice 6'25
Albert Ayler / Donald Ayler
4     Ghosts 3'26
Albert Ayler
5     Truth Is Marching In 11'24
Albert Ayler
6     Ghosts 7'43
Albert Ayler
7     Spiritual Rebirth/Light in Darkness/Infinite Spirit 11'05
Albert Ayler
8     All/Our Prayer/Holy Family 4'45
Albert Ayler / Donald Ayler
Credits :    
Bass – William Folwell
Drums – Beaver Harris
Tenor Saxophone – Albert Ayler
Trumpet – Don Ayler
Violin – Michel Sampson