In response to someone's question about Victoriaville - some of the best shows
for me (keep in mind I missed Fred Frith) were (in no particular order) - the
Hamid Drake/Gerry Hemingway Duo, William Parker/Peter Kowald Duo, The Necks,
Melt-Banana, Annie Gosfield, and Keith Tippet Orchestra.
The biggest (and actually only) disapointment by far was the Cecil Taylor/Bill
Dixon/Tony Oxley show. I primarily went to the festival to see this and was
expecting it to be my number one show, hands down. Unfortunately, something
just wasn't right on this night (started feeling a weird vibe when the show
was 50 minutes late which is rare for Victoriaville). I'm a huge fan of Bill
Dixon, but he just did not seem like he was willing to try and engage with
Cecil and just kept breathing/softly blowing/making what I would call
'prolonged ambient trumpet fart sounds' without considering what was going on
around him. Unfortunatley, it appeared that Cecil's attempts to
communicate/make things happen with Bill, actually lessened his own playing,
there was certainly no magic in the air.
By no means a bad show, and I suppose someone could say it was a "different"
kind of Cecil Taylor gig, but judging from the lukewarm audience response at
the end (and believe me everyone was very stoked for the show) I'm not the
only one to walk away with this impression. One of the best parts of the show
was the approximately 1 1/2 minute solo Cecil did at the very end, and the
other good tidbits (where you really felt like something was starting to
happen) were when just Cecil and Tony were playing. I think a Cecil/Tony Duo
concert and then Bill Dixon solo concert (he did get some great sounds out of
his trumpet) afterward would have been a much more enjoyable evening.
mike.
