Cage / Jarman 1965 collaboration...

Years ago, I posted a few short sentences about the John Cage / Joseph Jarm=
an collaboration that happened in Chicago in 1965. There wasn't much info i=
n the jazz book I had read. On the Artforum webpage today, the cover story =
was a memorial on Jarman written by composer Roscoe Mitchell in which he me=
ntioned the collaboration. That got me thinking, and since my long ago post=
, someone did the research for me, for us.

-Josh Ronsen
in Austin, Texas
http://ronsen.org


A Power Stronger Than Itself: The AACM and American Experimental Music
By George E. Lewis

Starting from page 128:

In late 1965, through the efforts of students and faculty at the University=
 of Chicago, a =E2=80=9CContemporary Music Society=E2=80=9D began organizin=
g concerts with AACM musicians in university concert halls and other campus=
 spaces, including the Reynolds Club, the university=E2=80=99s student unio=
n, which offered space for student events free of charge. Joseph Jarman was=
 helping the society to organize the concerts, as well as Friday-night jam =
sessions with people like Andrew Hill, Jack DeJohnette, Richard Abrams, and=
 Rafael Garrett. By this time, as Leonard Jones said in an interview, =E2=
=80=9Ca lot of black people lived in Hyde Park.=E2=80=9D =E2=80=9CThat was =
who we were trying to attract.=E2=80=9D In addition, the university connect=
ion led to larger audiences that were more diverse in terms of race, class,=
 age, and other demographic factors.

At the Harper Theater in Hyde Park on November 26 and 27, 1965, the society=
 organized a midnight concert collaboration between Joseph Jarman, several =
of the university students, and composer-performer John Cage. The concert w=
as controversial, to say the least, judging from Down Beat reviewer Pete We=
lding=E2=80=99s review of the event=E2=80=94the first major review of an AA=
CM musician to appear in a national publication. =E2=80=9CCage did a concer=
t at Mandel Hall,=E2=80=9D Jarman recalled, =E2=80=9Cand [the students] ask=
ed if he would be interested to collaborate with me, to do a concert at Har=
per Theater. I had read =E2=80=98Silence=E2=80=99 and I had collected his m=
usic. I liked it. So I felt really honored to do that.=E2=80=9D As the conc=
ert program announced, =E2=80=9CTo our knowledge, this is the first time th=
at Mr. Cage has performed a work with a group of jazz musicians.=E2=80=9D T=
he program affirmed Jarman=E2=80=99s =E2=80=9Cgreat artistic and conceptual=
 indebtedness=E2=80=9D to Cage, and recounted a meeting between Jarman and =
Cage at a festival of contemporary music at which Jarman asked the composer=
 if he would perform with the Jarman group.

At the concert, the Jarman Quintet performed first, with Fred Anderson, Bil=
l Brimfield, Charles Clark, and Arthur Reed, followed by the Cage-Jarman co=
llaboration, titled =E2=80=9CImperfections in a Given Space,=E2=80=9D which=
 featured Cage himself performing electronic sounds, Ellis Bishop on trumpe=
t, Bob Hodge on bass, and a young U of C graduate student, Doug Mitchell, o=
n percussion. According to the Down Beat reviewer, =E2=80=9CCage sent a var=
iety of electronic stimuli through a complex of electronic amplification eq=
uipment (the sound of an eraser on paper, ot of water being swallowed, when=
 amplified a thousand times, makes for an eerie listening experience indeed=
!), to which the Jarman group was to respond musically.

In our interview, Jarman=E2=80=99s account of Cage's demeanor was congruent=
 with other contemporaneous descriptions of the composer=E2=80=99s gentle w=
ay of interacting. =E2=80=9CHe just said [imitates], =E2=80=98I=E2=80=99m s=
etting up this=E2=80=A6 [pause] =E2=80=A6 Do as you feel.=E2=80=99 [Laughs.=
] And he just started playing. And because of my experience with the AACM c=
oncerts, I just started playing, and moved all over and blended horns.=E2=
=80=9D Cage=E2=80=99s own account of the encounter published years later in=
 an interview with frequent interlocutor Richard Kostelanetz, was considera=
bly different from Jarman=E2=80=99s. There, Cage framed himself as somethin=
g as a teacher for a group of unnamed =E2=80=9Cblack musicians.=E2=80=9D Mo=
reover, despite his professed lack of interest in improvisation (reiterated=
 later in the interview), Cage somehow managed to find ways to critique the=
 musicians=E2=80=99 performance practice=E2=80=94at their request. =E2=80=
=9CAnd I said to them that one of the troubles was that when they got loud,=
 they all got loud. And they said, =E2=80=98How could we change that?=E2=80=
=99 They were willing to change.=E2=80=9D

While one could well imagine that the AACM musicians were open to learning =
from Cage, the notion that these musicians would have learned about space a=
nd silence from him is at varience with the recorded evidence of AACM impro=
visations from the period. Moreover, asa Cage scholar Rebecca Y. Kim has no=
ted in an unpublished paper, the program notes for the Cage-Jarman event em=
ployed =E2=80=9Ca language of historical synchronicity, identifying two par=
allel movements in new music=E2=80=9D =E2=80=93 hardly an attitude that one=
 might attribute to a mentor-student relationship. In any event, the Down B=
eat review, which had no particular criticism of Cage=E2=80=99s work per se=
, criticized Jarman and his musicians for their supposed failure to respond=
 to Cage's sounds. The reviewer found that the group created =E2=80=9Clittl=
e in the way of actual interaction with what Cage was generating; it was as=
 though the group were merely sending into the air its own unrelated signal=
s at the same time as the electronic ones were being generated, with little=
 or no regard to ordering or organizing the combined sounds into something =
meaningful.=E2=80=9D Most of the rest of the review was given over to musin=
gs on how collective improvisation, while requiring true group empathy, was=
 unfortunately attracting =E2=80=9Cmore than its share of outright charlata=
ns.=E2=80=9D These evaluations aside, assuming the reviewer=E2=80=99s descr=
iptions reflected something of the reality of the event, the approach of th=
e Jarman group as it is described here seemed to represent well the Cageian=
 practice and aesthetic of indeterminacy.

For Jarman, =E2=80=9Cit was really beautiful, and I wish I had recorded it.=
 It was awesome.=E2=80=9D The reviewer=E2=80=99s take was considerably less=
 sanguine. Punning on the collective work=E2=80=99s title, he found that th=
e concert=E2=80=99s =E2=80=9Cmanifest imperfections and inconclusive nature=
 led to boredom and sterility,=E2=80=9D producing =E2=80=9Caridity and life=
lessness.=E2=80=9D Jarman recalls that at least one other very experienced =
listener shared the reviewer=E2=80=99s opinion to some extent. =E2=80=9CDow=
n Beat didn=E2=80=99t like it, and my mother didn=E2=80=99t like it either.=
 She said [imitates]: =E2=80=98Joseph, if you ever play with that man again=
, don=E2=80=99t tell me, please. I love you, I love your concerts, I come t=
o all of them, but if you=E2=80=99re going to play with him, don=E2=80=99t =
tell me,=E2=80=99 =E2=80=98Yes, ma=E2=80=99am.=E2=80=99

Leonard Jones came to the performance with something of the Zen beginner=E2=
=80=99s mind: =E2=80=9CAt the time, I had no idea of the musical importance=
 of John Cage. His name kept cropping up at that time in this area of avant=
-garde or experimental music. But Joseph has always been exotic, and Cage w=
as exotic just like the Japanese dancer that Joseph would have performances=
 with in the =E2=80=9860s. I remember that Cage sat on the stage next to a =
table, and he had a microphone attached to his throat. He sat there and he =
gargled water, and Joseph played the saxophone. That=E2=80=99s the one and =
only time that I=E2=80=99ve seen John Cage live. I remember Charles [Clark]=
 being there, but other than that I don=E2=80=99t remember anybody else. At=
 the time, it seemed to me that lot of it was conceptual, and I was pretty =
new to music: I didn=E2=80=99t start playing the bass until I was twenty ye=
ars old.=E2=80=9D

=E2=80=9CNobody liked it, and that made it even better,=E2=80=9D Jarman rec=
alled. =E2=80=9CRight after that, they actually invited me to go up to Ann =
Arbor to the ONCE Festival. That was a beautiful experience.=E2=80=9D