Blues for Falasha

Blues for Falasha

Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
Tenor saxophonist Glenn Spearman was familiar with the musical art of reaching plateaus. An acolyte of such unapologetically spirited improvisers as Albert Ayler, Frank Wright, and late-period John Coltrane, Spearman used his Double Trio to full-on free-jazz peak experience on Smokehouse, Fields, and Mystery Project. Here he takes the group into the realm of considering the oft-forgotten Ethiopian Falasha, a Jewish tribe that has lived separate from their nation's mainstream society to retain cultural integrity. The piece is full of long stretches that channel Larry Ochs, Chris Brown, Lisle Ellis, Donald Robinson, and William Winant into more slow-developing sound areas. Plenty of high-impact free improvising still crops up (and out), but on the whole this is music that has a wider-spread firmness, a blaze that spreads methodically rather than in flashes. The blues elements are mazed away by the interaction of twinned saxes, doubled drums, and the springing lunge of Ellis's bass and Brown's pianistic unleashings. Spearman is his usual scorched-range expert, ripping phrases open to study their roughest edges. Alas, Spearman's death in late 1998 stemmed a rising tide of creativity and energy all too soon. --Andrew Bartlett

From Jazziz
This powerful final recording by the Glenn Spearman Double Trio was the tenor saxophonist's first extended work on a unifying theme. His subject is the Falasha people, Ethiopian Jews who are culturally alienated from both black Africans and European Jews. Their lot is hardly cause for celebration, but neither is it cause for just despair; a dark, heavy sadness pervades the suite, but it is also full of strength and dignity. As Double Trio member Larry Ochs points out in the liner notes, Blues for Falasha indicated new directions for spearman (who died of cancer before the album's release), and he marshals the vast sonic resources of the group ingen- iously. His opening recitation over the taped intonations of the Falasha is followed by "Rituals," a solemn lamentation for the horns alone, and "Cold Water and Dirt," an austere percussion tone poem. Only on the concluding "Seed Sounds" does Spearman cut loose in a towering solo of simple melody, hoarse cries, and short, bitter bursts of sound. Pianist Chris Brown and bassist Lisle Ellis offer an oasis of contemplation in a telepathic duet before Ochs storms in with a tempestuous soprano solo. Percussionists Donald Robinson and William Wynant take the piece to a disquieting conclusion. Perhaps Spearman's own mixed parentage (white, Jewish mother and black, Christian father) helped him make a personal connection to the Falasha - he certainly plays with special passion on this beautiful and troubling work.

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