BYARD LANCASTER - HORNS (1-6)
J. R. MITCHELL - PERCUSSION (1-6)
CALVIN HILL - BASS (1, 5-6)
PAUL MORRISON - ELECTRIC BASS (1)
LESTER LUMLEY - PERCUSSION (5-6)
SID SIMMONS - PIANO (2-4)
JEROME HUNTER - BASS (2-4)
The 1972 release of Byard Lancaster's Live at Macalester College on Dogtown Records (owned by Lancaster himself) was the building of a bridge. On one side, a spiritual, robust free jazz spawned from the likes of Ornette and Coltrane and on the other, the startlingly new idea of jazz-funk. The jazz-funk era was slowly being heralded, Joe McPhee's Nation Time would came in 1971, Davis' On the Corner the following year, and Hancock's Head Hunters one more. But it was Byard's blending of these two styles which he was exploring on the 1966 debut, It's Not Up to Us and can be heard on Macalester.
Lancaster is a Philadelphian multi-instrumentalist who attended Berklee and feels both comfortable on the reeds or brass. He is also comfortable fronting a funky beat laden with toms or congas, or a seemingly relentless free-jazz assault, provided here by drummer JR Mitchell. Opener 1234 provides these aspects, with Lancaster beginning on sax, and then putting it down at the 13 minute mark, and inducting a sprawling, but similar trumpet line. It was recorded in Boston in 1970, and features, in an uncannily fitting way, both an upright bassist (Calvin Hill) and an electric bassist (Paul Morrison).
The official 1971 concert begins with Last Summer, a marked change of pace from 1234, inviting flute and pianist Sid Simmons to trade off in a erie ballad which is accented by a bowed bass background, provided here by Jerome Hunter. War World is a more familiar Lancaster tune, featuring Mitchell's drum floes, which roll about in as he changes from tom, to rim shot, to sharp, full ride attacks. For a minute and a half, he inducts Lancaster, who comes barreling in on alto and blazes along with Mitchell. The bass is invited for the conclusion, and the piano non existent. On the final official concert track, titled Live at Macalester, Lancaster, Simmons, and Hunter all attack the head, and settle into a hard bop straight-shooter. The Lancaster solo is truly explored here, 4:30 into the tune somber Far-Eastern Scales can be heard, and the track takes off from 52nd Street and lands on a rainy, oriental mountainside. Mitchell is also noticeably more roped in, keeping his punchy rim shots to a minimum. This track is very cinematic and third-stream in quality, provided mostly Lancaster utilizing the energy of his sax versus the melancholia of flute and Hunter provide barge-like bass sounds where needed.
Lancaster recorded the last two tracks on the album in 2008. They feature Calvin Hill on bass and Lancaster on a horn arsenal. Both tracks' other players are unknown. World in Me is a daunting wall of free-sound. Trumpets, piano, saxophones, electric guitar, and flutes are ground up and take turns emulating screaming people. Again, they are patchworks of several different styles, with Lancaster heralding his percussive forces to tour styles of soul, funk, free, and oriental musics.
This reissue provides a cross-section of Byard Lancaster's criminally unknown, but diverse career.
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