Performing or playing a session interactively with friends–no
structure, concept, or notion of what would be good music. Only the relation
between us is involved. And I know I am at the height when I start laughing
in the middle of playing.
The need to enter into total enjoyment of what they are doing,
whether the audience “gets it” or not. But if playing free is their way of
having fun, then people almost always join in. Incidentally, that is why
free playing is not avant-garde—it is too much fun, so it is a strange kind
of seriousness.
Iannis Xenakis
I would not do that to them; they have given us a gift for us
to build upon as we choose.
Ever since I stopped trying to be accepted as a professional
musician, thirty years ago, I have not thought in terms of achievement. It
was a great emancipation that I would recommend. To truly live one’s life
takes the place of achieving anything. If what I and my friends do is art,
then it reaches no goals and achieves nothing.
you particularly like?
Yes, but the artists are mostly unknown, or they don’t call
themselves artists, or I don’t care about the names. Anyway, there’s no
ranking of them: non-western village music, sixties R and B, Soul, Rock, and
early Punk, and today, Playboi Carti comes to mind—playful and always fresh.
I just don’t think that way. I guess I like myself and
sometimes get upset but get past it. There’s no point in trying to be a
better person; there is no such thing as “better.”
I’m not proud
of anything I have done musically. Or ashamed either!
Once an album of yours is released, do you still listen to it? And how
often?
I record most sessions and performances in order to make
judgments, and often enjoy, but the recording quality must be high. I only
“release” for the purpose of touring, to give people a chance to decide
whether to come, or to persuade promoters to book a gig. Free playing is a
performance music; the recordings might lead you to want to hear the
musicians perform, but only those who are hungry for experience will come.
Others who come leave quickly. Recorded music is so available today that
hardly anyone actually needs it.
Which album (from any musician) have you listened to the most in your
life?
Maybe Eric Dolphy, but this is a quantitative question. You can
hear someone once and that can be a total experience that changes your life.
For me, that was a certain moment in Coltrane’s Love Supreme. I fell on the
floor at that moment, 1974, I think.
I pretty much
only listen to other people’s music when I’m in the car on tour in the US,
and I’m not there now! But also I listen to other sets when I’m performing.
Mr. Nobody, whose
art is beyond expression. “They” are outside the outside.
Special Note: Jack Wright is be in Greece to talk about his
book “The Free Musics”, which was recently translated to Greek by Free Jazz
Blog writer Fotis Nikolakopoulos.