I have been listening to these records for a couple of weeks now and I have come to the conclusion that somebody somewhere has got their definitions wrong. Freedom may be a fairly fluid word, but if I had to choose, I’d take Manfred Schoof’s rather broader vision of it over our President’s. Schoof, if you’ve somehow managed to avoid his recent multimedia publicity blitz, is a German cornet player who frequented the same drinking establishments favored by the other European free jazz bigwigs back in the sixties and seventies. His album, European Echoes, has all your favorite post-free players: Peter Brotzmann’s here, and so’s Evan Parker; Derek Bailey’s on guitar, and the godlike Fred van Hove is one of three pianists (!) in the mix. The album has two tracks that run for a total of thirty-one minutes; they were divided out of necessity on the original LP release but have been allowed to blend together in their new edition. |