LPH 008 - Paul Haines - Lyrics Set to Music (1970-2003)

[Lucky Psychic Hut, 2009; #008]


tracklist:

1. Testing testing (4)
music: Tim Wright
Tim Haines - voice (tape)
Avery Haines - voice (tape)
Tim Wright - guitars, bass
Mary Ann Livchak - accordion, trap drums
New Delhi 1970, New York 1986

2. Breakfast (5)
music: George Cartwright
Curlew:
Paul Haines - voice (tape) on intro
Amy Denio - voice
George Cartwright - tenor saxophone
Davey Williams - guitar
Tom Cora - cello
Ann Rupel - bass
Pippin Barnett - drums
Hoboken, NY 1993

3. Threats that matter (4)
music: Paul Bley
Paul Bley - piano
New York, USA 1989

4. Don't complicate the life (3)
music: Ti'Plume Ricardo Franck, Kip Hanrahan, Jean Claude Desgrottes, Tico Harry Sylvain
Ti'Plume Ricardo Franck - voice, electric guitar
Elysee Pyroneeau - electric guitar, voice
Steve Swallow - electric bass
Jamaladeen Tacuma - electric bass
Tico Harry Sylvain - trap drums
Puntilla Orlando Rios - congas, percussion
Milton Cardona - congas, chekere
Jerry Gonzalez - congas, percussion
Olufemi Claudette Mitchell - checkere
Kip Hanrahan - voice, percussion
Jack Bruce - voice
Molly Farley - voice
Arto Lindsay - voice
New York, USA 1982-83

5. On the way to elsewhere and here (4)
music: Mary Margaret O'Hara
Mary Margaret O'Hara - voice
Gary Lucas - dobro
Steve Swallow - bass
Robbie Ameen - trap drums
New York, USA 1992

6. Third World Two Medley: She was showing me / Boint liver (4)
music: Gary Lucas
Gary Lucas - guitars
Mary Margaret O'Hara - voice
Fernando Saunders - electric bass
New York, USA 1990 + 1992

7. Curtsy (4)
music: Robert Wyatt
Robert Wyatt - keyboards, percussion, voice
Evan Parker - soprano saxophone
London, UK 1986

8. Indonesian dock sucking supreme (to Peking Widow) (2)
music: Carla Bley
Julie Tippetts - voice
Carla Bley - piano, keyboards, percussion
Gato Barbieri - tenor saxophone
Howard Johnson - voice, baritone saxophone, tubas
Michael Mantler - trumpet
Toni Marcus - violin, viola
David Holland - cello, bass, bass guitar
Paul Motian - drums, percussion
New York, USA 1973-74, J. Tippetts London, UK 1973

9. Peking widow (5)
music: George Cartwright
Curlew:
Amy Denio - voice
George Cartwright - tenor saxophone
Davey Williams - guitar
Tom Cora - cello
Ann Rupel - bass
Pippin Barnett - drums
Hoboken, NY 1993

10. The Prince (6)
music: Tom Cora
Roof:
Phil Minton - voice
Tom Cora - cello
Luc Ex - bass
Michael Vatcher - drums
Purmerland, Netherlands 1996

11. Snow variations on Darn it! (4)
music: Michael Snow
Michael Snow - piano
Toronto, Canada 1987

12. Art in heaven (4)
music: Derek Bailey
Derek Bailey - voice, guitar
London 1986

13. Not all olives have pits - An underfunded sense of wonderment (7)
music: 4Walls
4Walls:
Phil Minton - vocals
Veryan Weston - piano
Luc Ex - bass
Michael Vatcher - drums
Weesp, Netherlands 2003

14. Darn it! (4)
music: Kip Hanrahan
Fernando Saunders - bass, voice
George Cartwright - tenor saxophone
Alex Chilton - guitar
Wayne Horvitz - piano
Peter Scherer - Yamaha DX-7 synthesizer
David Hofstra - bass
Bobby Previte - trap drums
New York, USA 1986

15. Sticks in the mud (4)
music: Gregory Tate
Alva Rogers - voice
Lewis Barnes - trumpet
Mike Veal - saxophone
Jesse Henry - guitar
Jay Stringer - bass
Marque Gilmore - drums
Ben Nitza - percussion
New York, USA 1986

16. Why (1)
music: Carla Bley
Linda Ronstadt - voice
Charlie Haden - voice
Orchestra:
Roswell Rudd - trombone
Michael Mantler - trumpet
Sharon Freeman - French horn
Sam Burtis - trombone
Jack Jeffers - bass trombone
John Buckingham - tuba
Charlie Haden - bass
Paul Motian - drums

17. Doctor Why (1)
music: Carla Bley
Linda Ronstadt - voice
Charlie Haden - voice
Orchestra:
Michael Mantler - trumpet
Sharon Freeman - French horn
Roswell Rudd - trombone
Jack Jeffers - bass trombone
John Buckingham - tuba
Perry Robinson - clarinet
Jimmy Lyons - alto saxophone
Gato Barbieri - tenor saxophone
Chris Woods - baritone saxophone
John McLaughlin - electric guitar
Carla Bley - piano
Charlie Haden - bass
Paul Motian - drums
New York, USA 1971

18. What is this dance, anyway? (3)
music: Nemours JN-Baptiste, Kip Hanrahan, Frisner Augustin, arr. Hanrahan + Alberto Bengolea
Jack Bruce - voice, electric bass
Hannibal Peterson - trumpet
Jerry Gonzalez - trumpet
Teo Macero - alto saxophone
Ricky Ford - tenor saxophone
John Stubblefield - tenor saxophone
Mario Rivera - baritone saxophone
Elysee Pyronneau - electric guitar
Jean Claude Jean - electric guitar
Frisner Augustin - tambou
Milton Cardona - congas
Puntilla Orlando Rios - congas
Gene Golden - congas
Molly Farley - voice
New York, USA 1982-83

19. Airport insecurity (7)
music: 4Walls
4Walls:
Phil Minton - vocals
Veryan Weston - piano
Luc Ex - bass
Michael Vatcher - drums
Weesp, Netherlands 2003

20. Funnybird Song (to Swallow) (2)
music: Carla Bley
Julie Tippetts: voice
Karen Mantler: voice
Carla Bley: piano
Howard Johnson: voice, flute
Gato Barbieri: flute
David Holland: bass
Paul Motian: drums
credits like on track 8 omit reeds, keyboards,
New York, USA 1973-74, J. Tippetts London, UK 1973

21. C'etait dans la nuit (4)
music: Roswell Rudd
Paul Haines - voice
Roswell Rudd - trombone, voice
New York, USA 1993


total time: 78'20

All lyrics by Paul Haines.


CD-sources:
(1) Carla Bley/Paul Haines - Escalator over the Hill (1968-71, JCOA)
(2) Carla Bley/Paul Haines - Tropic Appetites (1973-74, WATT)
(3) Kip Hanrahan - Desire Develops an Edge (1982-83, American Clavé)
(4) Paul Haines - Darn it! (1986-93, American Clavé)
(5) Curlew with Amy Denio - A Beautiful Western Saddle (1993, Cuneiform)
(6) Roof - The Untraceable Cigar (1996, Red Note)
(7) 4Walls - Which Side Are You On? (2003, Red Note)

Set by Lucky.

***

"The below text was originally posted by Cuneiform records on February 3. (Yes, it's LONG. And deserves to be, obv.) It's being reposted here was prompted by Marcello's remark, "...no obituaries anywhere else..."


Dear Cuneiform friends and associates;

My apologies for breaking this news to you in an impersonal email.

One of the most beloved members of the world of avant jazz, Paul Haines, died of a massive heart attack on Wednesday, January 21, 2003. He died in Ontario, Canada, his home for many years, where he leaves behind his wife, Jo, and children.

This is neither an obituary of Paul, nor a comprehensive compilation of his works. This is merely a notice to those we know in the music community of his passing. Paul's impact on the avant jazz world was wide-ranging, and I'm ill equipped to give justice to his achievements. I leave that to those of you who are professional journalists and music historians.

In brief, Paul Haines was a writer (of poems) and a video artist, who both documented (in prose + poetic writing, as well as film and video) and inspired (his poems transformed into music) the jazz musicians around him. Over the years he lived in New York City, New Mexico, India (8 yrs), Paris, Kensington, MD (a town near DC, for 1 yr.), and finally Canada, where he lived for years in Ontario province, far outside Toronto.

In 1995, the Toronto periodical *Sub Rosa* published a special issue devoted to the work of Paul Haines. The opening essay, written by Tom Sekowski, focused on Paul's poems. In Tom's words: "Where do you begin in capturing Paul Haines' life? On paper? On film? On Vinyl? The answer is all three. My job, however, is to present the Paul Haines that I'm most familiar with - the... central Ontarian, musicologist-extraordinaire, poem writer with steel balls like no other. ...for starters, he makes it clear (beyond any reasonable doubt), that he does not write poetry. He writes poems. No more, no less, gorgeous little vignettes of life as he sees it at any given point in time, wherever he might be.... Anything that can look itself in the mirror and honestly say, I am I, is a poem of Paul's. ...Paul speaks the truth as he sees it."

Paul's poems have appeared in tradional printed formats: in books and periodicals. In 1981, a collection his poems, called *Third World Two*, was published by Alliance Press. (Another chapbook was to be published in Canada in the 1990s.) His poems have been published in magazines in the US (magazines such as First Person and Genesis West/San Francisco), Canada (Evidence, MusicWorks, Only Paper Today, Sub Rosa Parachute/Montreal); in New Delhi, India; and in France (on the cover of *Improjazz* !).

But Paul is best known for his written works that have appeared in non-traditional/non-literary settings, and especially in his numerous collaborations with jazz musicians. Samples of his poetry and prose have been printed on the covers or sleeves of jazz albums by Albert Ayler, Paul Bley, Evan Parker, Derek Bailey, Larry Durbin, and Jazz Composer's Orchestra. In turn, he has documented jazz musicians within his poetry, as well as recording them on tape; biographers note that he was the recording engineer of such significant 1960 works as *Spiritual Unity*, *School Days* (1961-63 Steve Lacy Quartet) and *New York Eye and Ear Control*...

Above all, Paul is known as the poet whose writings were set to music by some of the late 20th C's most forward-looking jazz musicians, songs which formed the core of some of the most seminal, significant avant-jazz releases of the 20th Century. His first such collaboration with jazz musicians was *Escalator Over The Hill*, a jazz-opera created with Carla Bley and released in 1971 (JCOA 1971; ECM/BMG). *Escalator Over the Hill* is a landmark work; it broke down the boundaries between artistic disciplines, between musical genres, between "high" and "low" art. In its brochure for Company Week 92, the London Arts Board called Paul: "..a serious but not solemn artist [who]... has considerably expanded the traditional role of the poet. His longstanding artistic involvement with music has produced some extraordinary rethinking of the relationship between the word and sound and one of the most revelatory collaborations in contemporary recording. Escalator Over the Hill, created with composer Carla Bley, is widely considered the seminal work of the new music of the 1970's". Paul's second work of poems set to music, also done in collaboration with Carla Bley, was *Tropic Appetities*, released in 1974 (Watt/1).

We at Cuneiform met Paul through composer and saxophonist George Cartwright, who set Paul's poems to music for his band Curlew's performance with vocalist Amy Denio at 1989's New Music America, then the premiere showcase of avant music in the US. Paul made a video of their performance at the Knitting Factory (see below for more on his videos).

Several years later, in 1993, Cuneiform released *A Beautiful Western Saddle*, a CD featuring music by Curlew (each Curlew member composed a piece for the CD, with George contributing the rest), vocals by Amy Denio, and lyrics by Paul Haines. The CD remains one of my personal favorites of all times. It was the first Curlew CD that Cuneiform released that was not purely instrumental, the first Curlew CD with words. Paul would do that to musicians - his work inspired them to try things they had not done before, to explore alternative paths, unexpected juxtapositions.....

*A Beautiful Western Saddle" received an astounding amount of critical acclaim, from publications such as the *New York Times*, *Down Beat*, *Cadence*, *Coda*, *Boston Rock*, *Exclaim!* (Canada), *Musiche* (Italy), *Esculpiendo Milagros* (Argentina), *Beat* (Norway), and *Opscene* (Netherlands), among many others. *Down Beat* would later name this CD one of the best CDs of the 1990s, in its issue at the end of the millennium. Quite simply, the collaboration - like every such venture that Paul partook in - uniquely worked. Stuart Broomer (*Coda*) noted that "Curlew articulates the edge of Haines' work, the precision of his verbal outline. Their settings.... feed off the ever increasing resilience of Haines' poems. Haines has proceeded through the years to boil his poems down to less, until they are crystalline flashes in which image and meaning merge, sometimes as comic shards of the true light....miracles subtly contaminated with reality."

George Cartwright had originally met Paul Haines through Kip Hanrahan in the 1970s, when Paul was setting poems to music for a video. (George would also contribute some music to the video.) In 1995, Kip Hanrahan's American Clave label released *Darn It*, a double CD that had been over 6 years in the making. It was the 4th release to feature Paul's poems set to music. A tribute to Paul's work, *Darn It!* featured 33 songs by Robert Wyatt, Paul and Carla Bley, Derek Bailey, John Oswald, Michael Snow, Roswell Rudd, Bornean Drummers, Evan Parker, Andrew Cyrille, Mary Margaret O'Hara, Jack Bruce, George Cartwright, and numerous others... Like *Saddle*, the CD received wide critical acclaim. In the words of one critic: "So what makes *Darn It!* so damn special? I could go on an on about its stellar line up.... The flow is never once broken, even though the songs seem to break abruptly from blues, to jazz, to rock, to improvised fields. And it works. The record is musically second to none, while lyrically it's a crafty gem, dying to be found amongst the desert of (most of) the crap that's out there in the record stores." [Tom Sekowski, *The Newspaper*, Toronto.]

Following his *Beautiful Western Saddle* release with Curlew, George Cartwright continued to incorporate Paul's poetry into two solo recordings he released on Cuneiform: *Dot* (1994) and *The Memphis Years* (2000). *Dot* featured Paul's lyrics in a single song, "Raw Bird", sung by vocalist (and Curlew bassist) Ann Rupel. In George's second solo release, he collaborated once again with Paul Haines and Amy Denio. A tribute to George's 5-year involvement in Memphis' music scene, *The Memphis Years* also featured some of that city's finest musicians. The resulting CD was a blending of strictly composed songs sung by Denio, with lyrics from Paul Haines, and composed and semi-improvisational jazz-oriented instrumentals. George's admiration for Paul's work is underlined in his *Memphis* liner notes, which I excerpt here:

"You can't really see it or touch it, you can taste it from time to time and, when blessed, you can hear it and it ain't going away tho you got to look closely to not be fooled... In fact *It Came From Memphis*... I believe you can hear a little bit of it here maybe not all maybe occasionally but always in some stream or layer or veil of the truly undefinable it is there. ...It's also in Seattle with Amy and up in Canada with Paul. Great singer, great writer. ...Just listen and not particularly idiommatic crushed amalgam of bits and pieces laid out and slapped back to a whole... post Ornette (...really more likely pre-Ornette musics...) ...and what did I say about Paul? Maybe the best we got folks. Hey see if ya can find any of his books... So much with so little so check out *Third World 2*. Check out *Escalator Over the Hill* and *Tropic Appetites* and and and *A Beautiful Western Saddle.* Ha!"

Paul was a joy to work with and a pleasure to know. We began communicating while doing promotion for the Cuneiform *Saddle* CD, first via letter, then fax, and finally by email. As our communications became less formal, Paul unveiled his priceless humor. (Supposedly Jean-Paul Sartre claimed that Haines was the only person who could pun in French and make Sartre laugh.) I received xerox and fax objets d'art, surrealist images and newspaper collages, on letterheads from the Council of Pet Ball Amnesty with return addresses from Craig Stephen Stew Jr., Wardell Windeggs, Nausea Phil and others.... These were followed by a suspect *Down Beat* poll listing Jean-Paul Sarte as the #2 top male vocalist, and a cassette described by Paul as "easy-listening gaslight" music....

In a serious moment, on my request, he sent me a page of info on himself. It included two press quotes:

from the *Boston Globe*, Fernando Gonzales, Dec 7, 1991:
"Actively associated with some of the most progressive musicians in jazz for almost 30 years, Haines' writing moves in quirky, unpredicatable rhythms, with a love for sound, surprise, and tart, understated humor."

and from *MusicWorks* #34:
"Paul Haines is a poet who writes about music. He has been for several years a harbinger listener, someone who is always listening to the musicians everyone someday will talk about. In recent years he has produced several videos which read hearing, pictorially."

In addition to being a writer (and recording jazz musicians such as Albert Ayler, Steve Lacy and Roswell Rudd), Paul was an active video artist. He told me that his videos had been shown in London (Company Week, The Vortex Theatre, and Canada House), Toronto (The Music Gallery; This Ain't the Rosedale Library); Edmonton (Latitude 53 Gallery); New York City (49th Parallel); Amsterdam (The Holland Festival); Banff (Banff Centre) and Peterborough, Ontario (Arts Space).

He also sent me an annotated list of his video productions. I quote his descriptioms directly from his 1993 fax to me:

JUBILEE (1992 21 mins)
"Using as a shooting script an article on sound I wrote for Musicworks, [The Canadian Journal of Sound Exploration), JUBILEE features a visual chorus to the Carol Taylor narrative and spoken or played contributions of Robert Wyatt, Evan Parker, and Derek Bailey."

OUR RUDD'S GOLDEN CURTAIN (1992 19 mins)
"Shot at Sharon Temple, Ontario and Woodstock, New York, the composition, trombone, voice, feet and wardrobe of legendary trombonist Roswell Rudd are featured."

LEARNING TO COPE WITH HOPE (1992 3 mins)
"From the Sri Cud novel."

AN ALL-ETHNIC ELECTRIC PROGRAM (1992 transfer from 1966 16mm., 25 mins)
"Perhaps the first 'absolute' sound film. A curious but very beautiful work."
-- David Curtis, Experimental Film
"Those who stayed to the end liked it." -- Michael Snow

CURLEW: Paul Haines Set to Music (1989 44 mins)
New Music America Festival, with Amy Denio vocals, The Knitting Factory, New York City
"A cycle of songs as a setting for the oblique, witty poems of Paul Haines.
CURLEW performs at its peak -- which is phenomenally high." -- The Nation

RICE SCENTED IN OUR ABSCENCE (1983 33 mins)
"Premiere performance of the agfa maria. (This instrument's appearance of capacities is conceived in part as respectful parody of Harry Partch's chromelodeon. Physically resembling a glass harmonica, its three rows of authentically-wired bottles creates (1) conventional musical notes, (2) prepared sounds, and (3) prepared visuals.) A music for more than ears.
Improvisation is deregulated."

THIRD WORLD TWO (1981 50mins)
"50 poems (French and English) read or sung by an all-star cast, with original music by Carla Bley, Derek Bailey, Steve Swallow and Sheila Jordan."

UNDERSTANDING AN INTERRUPTION; 16 MUSICS (1981 60 mins)
"20 years of collaborations, opening on the scoreboard of the Olympia Stadium, Montreal. Paul Bley, Rudd-Lacy, Albert Ayler, Mike Mantler, Gary Burton, Evan Parker, Derek Bailey, Larry Dubin-CCMC, Carla Bley, Monica Zetterland, Stuart Broomer, and Kip Hanrahan."

Paul and I remained in touch but communicated less frequently in the busy years post *Saddle* and *Darn It!*. Then, in the spring of 2002, I opened my snail mail and smiled with surprise: there was Paul and one of his poems staring at me from the cover of the French jazz magazine, *Improjazz*. Paul always had a habit of putting things in unexpected contexts, creating juxtapositions that surprised and jolted like an electroshock to the brain while revealing the truth. Now here he was, in a context I would have never expected but which made complete sense.... We began communicating via email, far easier than our past mail and fax communiques.... Paul's emails ranged from serious commentary on the sorry state of American politics post elections and post 9/11, to his distinctive oblique, insightful and humourous texts. He talked of visiting DC with his wife in the winter, to see the Pierre Bonnard exhibition, and possibly visiting with us. We moved our offices into a building we were not embarrased to have friends see, and looked forward to hearing from them. And then we received a phone call from George Cartwright, Paul's very close friend, telling us of the bad news....

Perhaps we should read Sekowski's comments on Paul's CDs in the context of Paul's passing, substituting "life" for "music": "When all the music is played, there's always Paul's poems. Honest, trying, sometimes hilarious, but always dependable. Like an old friend, they'll forever be there when your brain needs a meal."

But I'm sure I speak for many when I say that our hearts that will starve in Paul's absence.

---
For those who want to read about Paul's work, here's a partial bio:
*SUB ROSA* [Peterborough, Ontario, Canada], vol. 5 No. 1, Spring 1995 issue devoted entirely to "Paul Haines: Poetry/ Video/ Jazz", by Tom Sekowski, Stuart Broomer, Roswell Rudd and Michel Contat.
"Paul Haines" by Andrew Jones, *JAZZIZ*, November 1995
"Paul Haines / Now Can You Tell Me: An Article by Stuart Bloomer: Words and Music: A Beautiful Western Saddle", *CODA MAGAZINE*, July/Aug 1995
"Paul Haines - The Musical Psychic", by Tom Sekowski. *EXCLAIM!* [Canada], March 1995
"Paul Haines - Man with a Future Vision", by Tom Sekowski, THE NEWSPAPER [Toronto, Canada], 11/23/94
For info on Haines' poetic collaborations with Curlew, there are numerous articles/ reviews, including:
"Bird on a Wire," Gene Santoro, *The Nation*, March 22, 1993

---
2/3/03
Joyce Nalewajk
Director of Publicity + Promotion
Cuneiform Records"

(posted by t\'\'t, 2003 @ the I Love Music forum)