(((Don Cherry)))---(((1978)))

Don Cherry is mainly known as one of the pioneers of free jazz from the trail blazing Ornette Coleman Quartet.  Images of him playing some variation of the trumpet (pocket trumpet, cornet, etc...) come to mind.  However, much of his musical career involved him traveling the four corners of the earth and participating in musical forms that sometimes had no resemblence to jazz.  In time he became a seasoned multi-instrumentalist of a wide variety.  He was a true student and explorer.  Initially, this seems to have been a personal journey into his African heritage, but it clearly struck an inspired nerve in him that never went away.  His experimentation with world music can be heard as early as 1968 on Eternal Rhythm, a live recording from the Berlin jazz festival.  Other stellar examples of this progression would include his Mu sessions recorded for BYG Actuel in 69 as well as Actions (co-led by Kryzstof Penderecki) and Blue Lake from 71.  Over the remainder of his career he covered a lot of territory.  As I researched this, 1978 seems to have been an especially rich year for him in this regard.  If you were to listen to the following recordings in their entirety, you might find some things you don't like, or at least I did.  Some tunes border too closely to a new age sound that I'm not entirely comfortable with.  However, there is a great deal to glean here as evidenced (i hope) by the following selections.  Please dig in.  I hope this inspires new pathes of interest and research.  Cheers!

((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((        

Recorded At Studio Davout, Paris, France, June 1978.

Original LP release 1982 (Europa Records JP2009).

Sangam - Don Cherry / Latif Khan

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CODONA (ECM 1132)
Recorded September 1978 at Tonstudio Bauer, Ludwigsburg

Mumakata - Codona

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Flying Fish - 1978

Sounds from the Bush - Mandingo Griot Society

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Another sideman session also done in 1978, but less suited toward this post can be found here.

Below is a short documentary filmed in Sweden the same year and broadcast on Swedish television. 
It was the thing that originally inspired this post.  Enjoy.

{cold horizons}-{seven}

{utopia & visions} - {don cherry}

{{{seven}}}

when you rise up, quietly sing the humming wordless song that lights you - strum strum for the dancing curtains of the wintry morning - for if we’re to live for all of eternity - wheels that keep turning - pulling us further & further until they’re worn into nothing but a vanishing memory of time - than we should say so

go out - walk the treeline - feel the sun - cast your shadows – mutter afresh the story and listen – for if this day you can walk as you do - flannel flag flying free in the pink edges of an orange sky that is pink edgedly orange in just this way, never to be repeated - then you should say so

and if i – today - can tow with ease this chain of glinting thoughts & sounds as they unravel from me endlessly in just this way - churning & bobbing within my dome only - here & gone as quick as they came – than i should say so

for if we are immortal as we sleep in our tangled dreams & cotton sheets - if we are fixed in the sky of God’s good pleasure - a fixture of His golden gaze - set free to shine in ceaseless stardusting reverie - if we are loved - not merely tolerated beneath a pact of unspeakable bloodshed (holy & worthy of perpetual praise) but actually & truly befriended – invited – pursued – embraced – wanted – then strum strum - ring the bells - and let us say so!