Search - Cecil Taylor, Louis Moholo :: Remembrance

Cecil Taylor-Louis Moholo

Joe Pierre | Los Angeles, CA United States | 01/15/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"During his month-long residence in Berlin in the summer of '88, Cecil Taylor played and recorded six different piano-drum duets with Tony Oxley, Paul Lovens, Han Bennink, Gunter Sommer (x2), and, here on "Remembrance," Louis Moholo. Each of these dates is outstanding, and each differs from the next by the drummer's style and its effect on Cecil's playing.



Much has been made of Moholo's South African origins in describing this pairing, but don't get the wrong idea -- Moholo uses a conventional drum kit, relying mostly on straight-ahead snare and cymbals throughout this date. This first track, "Remembrance," opens without the usual Tayloresque ritual (CT dispenses with any chanting or poetry on this disc) and within seconds the two are well into things, with CT favoring his sprinting, two-handed, jack-hammer runs up and down the keyboard over the course of this concert. Moholo keeps pace, but doesn't compete for space, and often his accompaniment consists of relatively quiet, though complex and multi-layered, snare-cymbal rhythms. They both pause for air from time to time, and Moholo even gets out the brushes during some of these periods, allowing for CT to space out a bit. But much of the date has Cecil hammering away furiously with Moholo's propulsive snare-cymbal shots and breakers, and on the 20-minute track 2, "The Great Bear," things get pretty heated. There's a single minute-long encore, "Stone" that has Cecil playing some slow phrases and Moholo softly hitting a tom-tom so that it almost sounds like he's plucking on a bass string.



Overall, a pretty enjoyable date with just over an hour of music, and as usual for discs from the FMP Berlin '88 Boxed Set, excellently recorded and essential. If you're a Cecil fan, you should own all of these.



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