I've just listened to the programme... quite interesting that Brian Morton and/or Alyn Shipton decided the way they'd deal with the huge discography would be to examine a few putative "turning-points" in the development of AB's music, thus placing an emphasis on recordings I'd never really thought of in that way (eg. the trio with Evan Parker and Paul Rutherford) and putting in some that I hadn't heard before (like the duo with Richard Teitelbaum, which was more to my taste than their work together on the Open Aspects '82 album). If only the programme had been two or more hours long instead of one: they could have made more of a feature of the "Ghost Trance Music" instead of just a couple of minutes from Iridium. Brian at one point mentions the importance within AB's output of New York Fall 1974 but they didn't actually play any of it.

I'd hope that the innocent listener would at least have been intrigued by such a first encounter with the music, and the, er, guilty listener like me would have heard a couple of unfamiliar things as well as Brian M's interesting comments. It would have been nice to follow up with a whole programme of say one of the gigs in the 1985 UK quartet tour followed by one of the Iridium sets I think.

A note for potential 'consumers'. Braxton's discography currently runs to over 200 albums, some of them more valuable in terms of use value (exchange value is another matter) Therefore 'Jazz library' was a useful introduction to the world of his music. But maybe no more than seeing a postcard of a place you're thinking of visiting. Once you've visited the place the place the postcard takes on quite a different perspective.
One poster on the radio 3 messageboard has a blog devoted entirely to Braxton, as they didn't want R3's board to be 'taken over'. This is worth visiting, even on the occasional basis for non-specialists. Links can be found on the R3 bored.
Some of the least indispensable Braxton, for me, has to be his albums of standards. Earleir on he would sprinkle the odd standard in albums of his own work, but later it became a case of whole albums of standards. Apart from the much maligned 'In the tradition' (1974) & the album of Monk numbers, I find the later standards albums very uneven, they add little to the understanding of Braxton's music, nor the music he's interpreting.His own music is far more interesting I think. Live material from the 1970s or 80s quartets is particularly to be recommended & is probably jazz or thereabouts. His compositions aren't anodyne, nor are they meant to be. If they were I wouldn't wouldn't have been listening to them for the last 30 years or so.

No. If I had been, maybe I'd be more enlightened now.[/color]

Here it is.

Sounds good, and I'd like to know which piece(s) it is. I wonder if any recordings from his visit to the '85 Huddersfield festival exist (I think Composition 100 was played)?

The good news is that Mosaic will be issuing a multi CD box of Braxton's Arista recordings, towards the end of this year. Long overdue (although I must admit I prefer his more recent music to his earlier work). It would be good, albeit unlikely, to see some of his orchestral efforts revived, with appropriate commitment behind both playing and funding. He did say somewhere that he was effectively refused admission to IRCAM because of its institutional racism. I don't think much has changed in the last 20 odd years - modern classical music is afflicted by the same problem, and is essentially a white man's preserve, despite the professed political leanings of many of its practitioners.

I cannot read yellow KK....

Thanks Ron....<ok>cheers