Search - Roscoe Mitchell :: Nonaah

ONE OF THE BEST JAZZ ALBUMS EVER

David Keymer | Modesto CA | 12/13/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"In an online exchange on amazon, I listed my top five jazz albums of all time. The Louis Armstrong Hot Five and Hot Seven albums had to be first, both for the quality of the music (Louis is phenomenal!) and their importance in the history of jazz. I listed as second John Coltrane's Ascension --an absolutely stunning album and, I feel, one of great importance in shaping the path of free jazz after it appeared.



Third, I listed Roscoe Mitchell's stunningly beautiful and excitingly confrontational album, Nonaah, which, praise be!, is at last available once more. Here's what I wrote about it:Roscoe Mitchell's double album, Nonaah, was issued by Nessa Records in the early or mid-seventies. It has now --finally-- been released in CD format and four additional solo concert cuts have been included. I don't think this album was ever that influential but Mitchell was and is. Multi-reedplayer Mitchell is the most inventive and musical of all the five members of the Art Ensemble of Chicago, the longest living and arguably most influential of AACM groups, and this album shows him, both as performer and composer, at the peak of his considerable creative powers. There are several takes of "Nonaah," one of his best known tunes (the Art Ensemble also plays it on the Atlantic recording, Fanfare for the Warrior). The most arresting is a LONG solo rendition, but there is a shorter solo version and an arrangement for four saxes, that is arresting and of the highest musical quality. More of the album is solo but on various pieces, such AACM luminaries as George Lewis on trombone, Anthony Braxton on sopranino sax, Malachi Favors on bass and Muhal Richard Abrams on piano also solo. Henry Threadgill is one of he four altos on the quartet version of "Nonaah."



This is what jazz is supposed to be like, and it is a shame that this original and powerful album is not better known. (Just as it's a shame that David Murray's Ming is no longer available in CD.)"

A big one

Joel Rafi Zabor | Brooklyn, NY United States | 03/14/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This album, especially the first, solo-saxophone in-concert cut, is at once confrontational and utterly matter-of-fact, one of the great deal-with-it masterpieces. So many hyphens. I wonder why that is. This remarkable music has been out of print for far too long. A round of applause to Chuck Nessa for laboring it back into circulation. One of the seminal recordings of the post-60s avant-garde is back. Bravo."