[Dixielandjazz] Where is the music going?

[Steve barbone]

It ain't only Jazz and pop music that are going in "odd" directions. Check
out the below review, snipped for brevity.

Hmmmmmm. Turn on the hum of an electric light, use Band in a Box to
accompany your Alto, rattle some keys, and play avant-garde classical.

The only thing missing is hitting the keyboard with a dead fish. But I guess
that's already been done so the above is evolutionary progress. :-) VBG.

Yessir, Presentation rules!! Imagine this opposite 4:33 on a program. Hey,
maybe the Boondockers could play the intermission? Bob, this would make a
terrific act for the Sacto Jubilee, adding some class. :-) VBG

Cheers,
Steve Barbone

MUSIC REVIEW | BRIAN SACAWA - NY TIMES - By ALLAN KOZINN

Harmonizing With a Lamp and Some Rattling Keys

start of snip..... you don't run into classical saxophonists often.

Brian Sacawa, in his late 20's, is intent on following that path, however,
and at his New York debut recital on Thursday night at the Miller Theater,
he demonstrated one way it can be done. His solution was to focus on
contemporary American composers - some resolutely formal, others
self-consciously avant-garde, but just about all invitingly quirky.

Certainly the most idiosyncratic was Alvin Lucier, whose "Spira Mirabilis"
(1994) is for baritone saxophone and an amplified electric light. The light
- actually a desk lamp at one corner of the stage - produced a
120-cycle-per-second hum, which was the work's dominant sound. Beginning in
the wings, Mr. Sacawa walked slowly across the stage, playing a pianissimo
descending figure that accelerated as he approached the lamp. The piece
ended when he switched off the light and, consequently, the hum.

Several of the scores required Mr. Sacawa to play against the backdrop of an
electronic tape. In Martin Bresnick's "Tent of Miracles" (1984), the tape
presented three baritone saxophone lines, to which Mr. Sacawa added a fourth
live. Some of the work's chunky chordal figures called to mind the
late-1990's rock band Morphine, which also relied heavily on baritone saxes.
But Mr. Bresnick composed his work long before Morphine came and went, and
he moves in other directions as well. Kaleidoscopic bursts, multiphonics,
vocalizations and a lengthy section in which the sound of rattling keys
creates a hypnotic rhythm keep this changeable work fresh and surprising.

A similar spirit, but very different textures, drove Derek Hurst's
"Bacchanalia Skiapodorum" (2004), in which Mr. Sacawa's alto saxophone
blended seamlessly with more traditional electronic sounds (that is, of the
beep and squeak variety). And Philip Glass was represented by an early
rarity, "Piece in the Shape of a Square" (1968), originally for two flutes.
Mr. Sacawa transcribed it for alto saxophones, playing one line on tape and
the other live. .....end snip