"Cecil Percival Taylor (March 25, 1929 - April 5, 2018) was an American pianist and poet. Classically trained, Taylor is generally acknowledged as having been one of the pioneers of free jazz. His music is characterized by an extremely energetic, physical approach, producing complex improvised sounds, frequently involving tone clusters and intricate polyrhythms. His piano technique has been likened to percussion, for example described as "eighty-eight tuned drums" (referring to the number of keys on a standard piano). He has also been described as "like Art Tatum with contemporary-classical leanings".

Taylor was raised in the Corona, Queens neighborhood of New York City. As an only child to a middle-class family, Taylor's mother encouraged him to play music at an early age. He began playing piano at age six and went on to study at the New York College of Music and New England Conservatory. At the New England Conservatory, Taylor majored in composition and arranging. During his time there, he also became familiar with contemporary European art music. Bartok and Stockhausen notably influenced his music.

In 1955, Taylor moved from Boston to New York City. He formed a quartet with soprano saxophonist, Steve Lacy, the bassist Buell Neidlinger, and drummer Dennis Charles.

Taylor's first recording, Jazz Advance, featured Lacy and was released in 1956. It is described by Cook and Morton in the Penguin Guide to Jazz: "While there are still many nods to conventional post-bop form in this set, it already points to the freedoms in which the pianist would later immerse himself." Taylor's Quartet featuring Lacy also appeared at the 1957 Newport Jazz Festival which went on to be made into the album At Newport. He collaborated with saxophonist John Coltrane in 1958 (Stereo Drive, currently available as Coltrane Time).

1950s and 1960s

Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, Taylor's music grew more complex and moved away from existing jazz styles. Gigs were often hard to come by, and club owners found Taylor's approach to performance (long pieces) unhelpful in conducting business. His 1959 LP Looking Ahead!, showcased his innovation as a creator in comparison to the jazz mainstream. Unlike others at the time, Taylor utilized virtuosic techniques and made swift stylistic shifts from phrase to phrase. These qualities, among others, still remain notable distinctions of Taylor's music today.

Landmark recordings, like Unit Structures (1966), also appeared. With 'the Unit', musicians developed often volcanic new forms of conversational interplay. In the early 1960s, an uncredited Albert Ayler worked for a time with Taylor, jamming and appearing on at least one recording, Four, unreleased until 2004.

By 1961, Taylor was working regularly with alto saxophonist Jimmy Lyons, one of his most important and consistent collaborators. Taylor, Lyons and drummer Sunny Murray (and later Andrew Cyrille) formed the core personnel of The Unit, Taylor's primary group effort until Lyons's premature death in 1986. Lyons's playing, strongly influenced by jazz icon Charlie Parker, retained a strong blues sensibility and helped keep Taylor's increasingly avant garde music tethered to the jazz tradition.

Solo concerts

Taylor began to perform solo concerts in the second half of the sixties. The first known recorded solo performance (by Dutch radio) was 'Carmen With Rings' (59 min.) in De Doelen concert hall in Rotterdam on July 1, 1967. Two days before Taylor had played the same composition in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw. Many of the later concerts were released on album and include Indent (1973), side one of Spring of Two Blue-J's (1973), Silent Tongues (1974), Garden (1982), For Olim (1987), Erzulie Maketh Scent (1989) and The Tree of Life (1998). He began to garner critical, if not popular, acclaim, playing for Jimmy Carter on the White House Lawn, lecturing as an in-residence artist at universities, and eventually being awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1973 and then a MacArthur Fellowship in 1991.

1990s and the Feel Trio

Following Lyons's death in 1986 Taylor formed the Feel Trio in the early 1990s with William Parker (bass) and Tony Oxley (drums); the group can be heard on Celebrated Blazons, Looking (Berlin Version) The Feel Trio and the 10-CD set 2 T's for a Lovely T. Compared to his prior small groups with Jimmy Lyons, the Feel Trio had a more abstract approach, tethered less to jazz tradition and more aligned with the ethos of European free improvisation. He also performed with larger ensembles and big-band projects. His extended residence in Berlin in 1988 was extensively documented by the German label FMP, resulting in a massive boxed set of performances in duet and trio with a who's who of European free improvisors, including Oxley, Derek Bailey, Evan Parker, Han Bennink, Tristan Honsinger, Louis Moholo, Paul Lovens, and others. Most of his latter day recordings have been put out on European labels, with the exception of Momentum Space (a meeting with Dewey Redman and Elvin Jones) on Verve/Gitanes. The classical label Bridge released his 1998 Library of Congress performance Algonquin, a duet with violinist Mat Maneri. Taylor continued to perform for capacity audiences around the world with live concerts, usually played on his favored instrument, a Bösendorfer piano that features nine extra lower-register keys. A documentary entitled All the Notes, was released on DVD in 2006 by director Chris Felver. Taylor was also featured in an earlier documentary film Imagine the Sound (1981), in which he discusses and performs his music, poetry and dance.

2000s

At Moers Festival 2008

Taylor recorded sparingly in the 2000s, but continued to perform with his own ensembles (the Cecil Taylor Ensemble and the Cecil Taylor Big Band) as well as with other musicians such as Joe Locke, Max Roach, and the poet Amiri Baraka. In 2004, the Cecil Taylor Big Band at the Iridium 2005 was nominated a best performance of 2004 by All About Jazz, and the same in 2009 for the Cecil Taylor Trio at the Highline Ballroom in 2009. The trio consisted of Taylor, Albey Balgochian, and Jackson Krall. At time of Taylor's death in 2018A an autobiography, further concerts, and other projects were in the works. In 2010, Triple Point Records released a deluxe limited edition double LP titled Ailanthus/Altissima: Bilateral Dimensions of Two Root Songs, a set of duos with long-time collaborator Tony Oxley that was recorded live at the Village Vanguard in New York City.

In 2013, he was awarded the Kyoto Prize for Music. In 2014, his career and 85th birthday were honored at the Painted Bride Art Center in Philadelphia with the tribute concert event "Celebrating Cecil". In 2016 he received a retrospective at the Whitney Museum of American Art entitled Open Plan: Cecil Taylor.

Taylor, along with dancer Min Tanaka was the subject of Amiel Courtin-Wilson's 2016 documentary film "The Silent Eye".

Ballet and dance

In addition to piano, Taylor was always interested in ballet and dance. His mother, who died while he was still young, was a dancer and also played the piano and violin. Taylor once said: "I try to imitate on the piano the leaps in space a dancer makes." He collaborated with dancer Dianne McIntyre in the late 70s and early 80s. In 1979 he also composed and played the music for a twelve-minute ballet "Tetra Stomp: Eatin' Rain in Space", featuring Mikhail Baryshnikov and Heather Watts.

Poetry

Taylor was a poet, citing Robert Duncan, Charles Olson and Amiri Baraka as major influences. He often integrated his poems into his musical performances, and they frequently appear in the liner notes of his albums. The CD Chinampas, released by Leo Records in 1987, is a recording of Taylor reciting several of his poems, accompanying himself on percussion.

Influence and musical style

According to Steven Block, free jazz originated with the performances of Cecil Taylor at the Five Spot Cafe in 1957 and Ornette Coleman in 1959. In 1964, Taylor co-founded the Jazz Composers Guild to enhance the working possibilities of avant-garde jazz musicians.

Taylor's style and methods have been described as 'constructivist'. Despite Scott Yanow's warning regarding Taylor's "forbidding music":

Suffice it to say that Cecil Taylor's music is not for everyone

he goes on to praise Taylor's "remarkable technique and endurance," and his "advanced", "radical", "original", and uncompromising "musical vision."

This vision is one of Taylor's greatest influences upon others:

Playing with Taylor I began to be liberated from thinking about chords. I'd been imitating John Coltrane unsuccessfully and because of that I was really chord conscious.

- Archie Shepp, quoted in LeRoi Jones, album liner notes for Four for Trane (Impulse A-71, 1964).

Personal life

In 1982, jazz critic Stanley Crouch outed Taylor as being gay, prompting an angry response. However, Taylor never denied it. In 1991, Taylor told a New York Times reporter "[s]omeone once asked me if I was gay. I said, 'Do you think a three-letter word defines the complexity of my humanity?' I avoid the trap of easy definition."

Taylor moved to Fort Greene, Brooklyn in 1983.

Death

Taylor died on April 5. 2018 at tbe age of 89."

"Ove Volquartz is a player, improviser and composer in the fields of jazz and improvised music since the 70's. He originates from the German free jazz scene but developed to the more open field of improvised music. The treatment of musical timbre and the advanced techniques on deep clarinets, have become the distinguishing features of his style.

He worked with many important musicians like Cecil Taylor, Roscoe Mitchell, Peter Kowald, Gunter Hampel, Barre Phillips, Sabu Toyozumi, Perry Robinson, Peeter Uuskyla, Gianni Mimmo, Gianni Lenoci, among others.

On the other hand he works with pipe organ player Peer Schlechta and contemporary composers like Daniel Ott. Furthermore he more and more works in interaction projects with dancers like Tadashi Endo, painters, poetry or films. Volquartz played at many festivals like Moers, Leipzig, Leverkusen etc.

He toured as far as to Africa where he worked with drummer Kojo Samuels in Liberia. He recorded with Annexus Quam, Gunter Hampel, TAG Trio, Second Exit, and Cecil Taylor among others.

As a musicologist he worked about flow experiences in improvisation."

"Harald Kimmig (born October 9, 1956 in Offenburg ) is a German violinist of free improvisational music and composer.

Kimmig had violin lessons from 1966 to 1974, and from 1975 to 1982 he studied philosophy, sociology and art history. He took classes at Leszek Zadlo, Muneer Abdul Fataah, John Tchicai and Cecil Taylor. From 1984 he was active as a professional musician, initially with soloists and as a member of the First Improvising String Orchestra. He played in the trio with Georg Wolf and Lukas Lindenmaier (CD rif-rif 1990) and is co-leader of F-Orkestra, who worked with musicians such as Buddy Collette or Peter Kowald. He also played with the ensemble of Cecil Taylor (CDs "Legba Crossing", "Corona"), John Tchicai, Vladimir Chekassin, Doug Hammond, Lee Konitz, Tony Oxley, Gabriele Hasler, Sirone and J�rgen Wuchner. He works in the trio with Carl Ludwig H�bsch and L� Quan Ninh. He is also a member of the ensembles of Angelika Sheridan, G�raldine Keller and Hideto Heshiki. Together with Norbert Rodenkirchen he composed the Aura Christinae in 2004, which repeatedly performed in Stommeln (u. A. With Maria Jonas and Albrecht Maurer ). Kimmig also writes string quartets and major orchestral works ('The Course of Light and Darkness', Oratorio, 1999) as well as film music."

"Born in Wuppertal, he studied sculpture at the academy of fine arts in Stuttgart and at the same time classical Doublebass with Reinald Schwarz, soloist of Stuttgart Philharmonics. Having encountered experimental music in his youth, beside classical playing he soon ventured into free improvisation as well as working with graphic notations in the ensemble of composer Klaus Fessmann, who holds a professorship at Salzburg Mozarteum. After having met Günter Christmann in the early 90s, who became a close friend over the years, a grant offered the possibility to go to London, where he finally was able to explode into a most intense period of sessions, collaborations, concerts and recording sessions, this all with help by John Russell, Chris Burn and John Butcher. Back in Stuttgart he was asked to teach experimental music at the academy of fine arts Stuttgart, which he did for a period of ten years and which led him to extended sound and performance explorations in collaboration with his students. He continued to organize the festival concepts of doing - Interaktion Tanz Musik (1992 - 2003) and, after an intense trip through many european countries meeting dancers for free improvisations and an invitation to the 5th Composers Choreographers Exchange (Southbank Center London), he was co-founding the production center for dance and performance Stuttgart. Being the head of this association for three years and after the festival of concepts of doing 2003, he pushed these structures aside for regaining breath and new freedom and inner engagement in life and arts. At the same time this moment was accompanied by his last days in ensemble zeitkratzer, which he was member of since its beginning in 1997 (performances of famous MMM by and with Lou Reed as well as music by alva noto, Merzbow, Lee Ronaldo, Elliott Sharp, DJ's a.o.).

2005 saw him establishing himself in a space in Berlin to seek new projects. Since then he has recorded three cds, created the music for the experimental film "Lupinen löschen" by Sabine Schöbel, which was shown at the Berlinale 2007, and started to work with analog electronics on the acoustic double bass as well as on an electric one, introducing this to his collaborations with dance.

He played in groups... trio with Jim Denley and Steve Noble; duo with Phil Durrant (cd); quintet with Evan Parker, Phil Wachsman, Thomas Lehn, Roger Turner; duo with Günter Christmann (cd); "Ein Quartett" with Bieler-Wendt, Kolkowski, Zimmerlin; trio with Chris Burn and Axel Dörner.

Projects with Günter Christmann: Sextett Vario 34 (cd) und "con moto" (music, dance, sound poetry, film) with David Zambrano, Urs Leimgruber, Fine Kwiatkofski, Elke Schipper (dvd).

Concerts with... Paul Lovens, John Butcher, Phil Minton, Derek Bailey, Sven-Ake Johannson, David Moss, John Russell, Johannes Bauer, LeQuan Ninh, Dietmar Diesner, LaDonna Smith, Malcolm Goldstein, Fred Frith, Vinko Globokar, Barry Guy, Torsten Müller, Carlos Zingaro, Fred van Hove, Urs Leimgruber, Mats Gustafsson, Dorothea Schürch, Herb Robertson, Alberto Braida, Michael Griener, Yumiko Tanaka a.o.

Intense work with dancers in diverse performing and rehearsing situations.

Collaborations with Julyen Hamilton, Vera Mantero, Benoit Lachambre, Ingo Reulecke, Josè Luis Sultàn, Mark Tompkins, Junko Wada, Fine Kwiatkofski, Regina Baumgart, David Zambrano, Sasha Waltz, Katie Duck, Joachim Schlömer, Thomas McManus, Nigel Charnock, Xavier Le Roy, Frans Poelstra, Virpi Pakhinen, Russell Maliphant, Anzu Furukawa, Pal Frenak, Anna Huber, Andreas Müller, Astrid Endruweit, Jennifer Lacey, Lin Yuang Shang.

concepts of doing. Between 1992 and 2003 he organized the festival "concepts of doing - Interaktion Tanz Musik" which became an important european plattform for the exchange of the arts inviting many notable artists for free collaborations during 4 days. (Please see: www.concepts-of-doing.de). cd: "screen. Festival concepts of doing 1999" mit Yoshihide, Turner, Leimgruber, Schürch, Parkins, Newton, Frangenheim.

Critics: "mikrotonale Edelsteine" (Markus Müller, Jazzthetik), "deliciously subversive" (Cadence), "music straight from the dynamo" (The Wire), "Frangenheim uses extended string techniques Gidon Cremer supplied for Luigi Nono" (The Wire).

Lives in Berlin since 2005. In preparation for creative space for 2009, which will allow him to continue his work with dance and other media.

Projects: trio with Chris Burn and Axel Dörner; quartet with Thomas Lehn, Le Quan Ninh, Frederic Blondy; duo with Günter Christmann /as well as other formations; trio with Floros Floridis and Ray Kaczynski; cds in prep: quartet with Moss/Bauer/Tanaka, quartet with Turner/Wachsman/Pat Thomas. performance project "streugut" together with Clausen, Reulecke, Rudstrom, Simon."