Skies Of America - Premium Travel & Adventure Gear for Outdoor Enthusiasts | Perfect for Hiking, Camping & Road Trips
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Product Description
Amazon.com Where others have seen musical boundaries, Ornette Coleman has always found possibilities--from his original conception of free jazz and the classic Atlantic recordings of 1959-61 to the use of electric guitars and funk rhythms in the later Prime Time. While the pure cry of the blues is an integral part of his music, he has also immersed himself in formal composition, writing for wind and string ensembles as well as large orchestra. Skies of America is his most ambitious work, a full-length symphony in one movement. This CD reissues the 1972 version performed by the London Symphony Orchestra with conductor David Meaghan, the work's only commercial recording. It was a performance fraught with problems. While the work was planned to include Coleman's quartet, British musicians' union regulations prevented their appearance. The time limits of the LP format required that the piece be slightly abridged, and for the original issue, Columbia decided to break up the immense single movement into 21 parts. Listening to it 28 years after the original release, however, you'll find that none of that matters. Instead, it's the breadth of Coleman's vision that emerges, as he shifts and combines the playful, the somber, and the chaotic, blurring any convenient notions of the simple and the complex. Some moments will suggest Charles Ives, and others hint at inspirations in Anton Bruckner and Béla Bártok, but the cumulative impact and the evolving musical language are Coleman's own. His use of two drummers playing contrary rhythms is a brilliant stroke, one that demonstrates the rewards of the improvisation laboratory. And Coleman's own alto saxophone soars on some key movements, such as "The Artist in America" and "The Men Who Live in the White House." This CD issue has removed the brief spaces that once separated the 21 parts, restoring the single-movement work that Coleman intended. Stuart Broomer
Customer Reviews
Back in the days immediately after the attacks of 9/11, National Public Radio began asking well known musical types what music they thought Americans should be listening to. They never got around to asking me, but this was my choice. It still is.Skies of America is a very moving, very poignant, powerful work for symphony orchestra with solo interludes on this recording from Ornette. The hustle and bustle of daily life in America, as portrayed by the winds and percussion, contrasted by the ethereal, eternal nature of the skies above, as portrayed by the strings, brings tears to my eyes every time I listen to this album. The work as a whole is broken down into titled sections. Those with titles like "The Military" or "The Silver Screen" can sound chaotic, aggressive and confounding. Other sections like "Birthdays and Funerals", "Love Life" or "Sunday in America" feature music for strings that is simply breathtaking in its beauty. I find it difficult not to be affected by music of such a strong, emotional character.It's a scandal that Ornette has never been recognized as a symphonic composer. Skies of America really belongs in modern classical repertoire. It eloquently speaks of a love for country far beyond the sort of militaristic nationalism we see all too often in public life.
