Mark Weiss wrote:

> Very tasty, I'm sure, tho I don't know who they are.
>
> I'm not sure that it makes any sense to group me and Ken as The 
> Opposition--I think we diverge considerably.
>
> Steve V. mentioned Ornette Coleman's Free Jazz. A freedom resulting 
> from absolute mastery of the discipline, however acquired.
>
> In his own day Bach was far better known as an improvisor at the organ 
> than as a composer. He had his chops. Not so very different.

Sweet Jesus Christ Awfriday, I sat here happily deleting emails, 
including my own, anything with the Blah header.  Then I got sucked 
in--one email.  Now I must ask: is there some party line I missed here?  
Frick vs. Frack?  God vs. The Dibble?  Ken the Opposition?  Fine.  You 
got it.  Welcome to the land where Groucho Marx enters the thrown or 
throne room: Heidegger or a potty?

Yeah, Coleman could (can?) play.  I happen not to like the sound any 
more than I enjoy the sound of Sun Ra, Archie Shepp, or Albert Ayler. 
See, I tried, I really did, but I felt like the Victorian bride losing 
her virginity in perpetuity: it never stopped hurting.  Thanks to Mr. 
Weiss I learned to hear Ives several years ago, but y'know?--vita 
brevis.  Back to Paul Bowles: happiness is not having to experience what 
you don't like.  So I am not buying into the Cultural Legacy or Literacy 
deal where if I don't "appreciate" something, something is disordered 
about me.  I can answer to that.  There are limits to my ability to 
philosophize what I'm expected to hear.  John Cage long since surpassed 
those limits.  He was a pioneer--no doubt and no lie.  I have heard some 
of his  music.  It draws me from me a single response: WTF, dude?  
Nobody has yet been able to reply.  Vita brevis?  I am not willing to 
expend the time to overcome my discomfort and sense of being hurt simply 
because anyone is reputed to be It or even part of It.

"However acquired" is right.  Conservatory, back room of News Orleans 
bordello, Sonny Rollins reacquiring his craft on the Brooklyn Bridge, 
Miles going to find Bird because he was tired of Juilliard where all 
they taught were white guys (but he was talented enough to get into the 
school in the first place), etc., etc., blah-blah.  I suppose it 
mattereth not.

Free Jazz?  Uh...isn't that like Free Love?  Ain't no such animules in 
the universe.  There is discipline and/or there is a price.  Coleman I 
am sure knew this.  Anyone who got into a Free Love Sixties "fling" 
learned this.  I've heard Coleman came to dislike the term but he reaped 
what he sowed.  He worked with Dolphy?  Cool.  I play bass clarinet: my 
move from "soprano" to bass happened in 1999.  Dolphy is sometimes one 
of my gods.  Not the Dolphy who sounds like he broke a reed and was 
playing with a brick tied to the mouthpiece.  Dolphy whose version of 
"God Bless The Child" exploits sound, fingers, the instrument itself.  I 
contradict myself?  So.  Free Lunch is a great album.  "God Bless..." is 
on Eric Dolphy in Europe.  Eric Dolphy should have seen a doctor now and 
then.

I'll bet Bach ripped up the joint when he improvised. No irony, no 
kidding, no joke.  I'd love to have walked into whatever church it was 
where he might have practice on Saturdays and heard the sounds.  Yike.

Have none of you who have/had academic careers ever run into the writing 
student who decided nothing worth a damn was said before he came along, 
so that he has nothing to learn from any school of old farts?

Now maybe someone will tell me what it really IS that I'm in opposition 
to so I can get real good at it.

Ken