Kip Hanrahan | A thousand night and a night – (1- red nights | American Clavé

This disc (these nights?) are long and dense. It’s pretty much impossible to listen to the entire disc, intensely, in one’ pass, so a producer’s suggestion is to take a break (a nap?) at about the fifty something minute mark (after “Princess Dunya and Taj al-Muluk”) and resume listening with “Princess Dunya’s Nocturnal understanding.” The pieces and music on this disc needed to be here, in this night cycle, so as far as cutting is concerned, in this case, it doesn’t make sense to offer “less.” Anyway, nobody’s putting a knife to your neck and making you listen to everything. Listen to what you want of the offering. The stories on this disc were learned from the translations of the Arabian Nights by (the forty volume, unreadable) Burton (including Supplemental Nights). Dawood, Mardrus/Mathers, Pasolini, Borges, Zipes, and, (in ways the clearest) Haddawy and are told (sung) pretty much verbatim, as I understood them. There is no mercy, no justice, except in God, the Almighty, who created the Earth and all the Heavens, and all contained therein, including Evil, Pain and Suffering, with such exquisite Perfection.To the Pure, all Things are Pure. Continue reading

Kip Hanrahan | Tenderness | American Clavé

Song Cycle (at least sixteen folk songs from inside the city): 1. “… faith in the pants, not in the prick…” (Vallejo’s Folk Song) 2. “… when I lose myself in the darkness and pain of love, no, this love…” 3. “…she turned so that maybe a third of her face was in this fuckin’ beautiful half-light…” 4. “…at the same time, as the subway train was pulling out of the station…” 5. “…I told him ‘I don’t have to be beaten to be understood’…” 6.“…look, the moon…” (Diahnne’s) 7. “…half of sex is fear…” 8. Gillian’s Folk Song 9. History 10. “…there was something about his anger that was so…inaccessable to me…” 11. “…if I knew how to, if I knew what muscles to relax…” 12. “…you’re no pimp, and I’m certainly no whore…”[wp-audio mp3="http://theshop.free-jazz.net/files/Track137.mp3"] 13. Deep Summer 14. “…look, the moon…” (Carmen’s) 15. in place of an epilog: Lullabye for my Daughter 16. in place of a morale: Geography

All music and words written by Kip Hanrahan except “Gillian’s Folk Song” which was written by Kip Hanrahan and Leo Nocentelli Continue reading

Kip Hanrahan | Paul Haines | Darn It! | American Clavé

…Darn it! Strings together an outrageous number of artists performing one after another in a polyglot line that stretches from Paul Bley’s solo piano ‘Threats That Matter’ through funky dance numbers by Greg ‘Iron Man’ Tate to a duet by trombonist Roswell Rudd and Canadian poetry Paul Haines, ‘Etait Dans La Nuit.’ Even its beautiful package, designed by artist / film maker / musician Michael Snow (who also contributes a lovely piano piece) enforces the compilation’s linearity, unfolding into a long accordion of personnel and poetry… Darn it! Overcomes stylistic impediments successfully, reveling in the way Haines’ terse writing can endure so many different kinds of interpretation.” — John Corbett, Downbeat Continue reading

Kip Hanrahan | Days and Nights of blue luck inverted | American Clavé

Some records are there because there’s money that demands to be made, some records are there because there’s a career that demands to be realized, this is a record that’s here because there was (is?) a mood, understood or misunderstood as above, constantly succeeding itself, that demanded to be heard. “Love is like a cigarette” was written by Richard Jerome and Walter Kent, made beautiful by Duke Ellington with Ivey Anderson, and was arranged for this record by Kip Hanrahan with Alberto Bengolea. The rhythm and horn arrangements and the changes for “Gender” were written by Alien Toussaint and the words and melody were written by Kip Hanrahan. It is published by Warner Brothers/Coup de Tete (BMI). In the case of “Marriage,” the two lower mid range bass lines, which in some ways become the song, were composed by Jack Bruce. The words, melody, form and arrangement are by Kip Hanrahan. It’s published by Coup de Tete (BMI). Continue reading

Kip Hanrahan | All roads are made of the flesh | American Clavé

With it’s subtle evocations of the sexual melodrama of — go, subdued guaguanco rhythms, wisps of Haitian compas and passages of improvisational flair merging together (so that organist Don Pullen’s off-kilter keyboard runs heighten the pulse of the 3/2 clave used throughout), Hanrahan’s new album All Roads are Made of the Flesh is greater than the sum of its parts…. Where much of the new global fusion is rhythm as an intellectual exercise, the rhythms of Hanrahan’s music evoke the many textures of desire and sensuality…” – Peter Shapiro, Wire (London) Continue reading