Free Jazz

Ofamfa LP by Children of the Sun
Universal Justice Records, 1971

 My wife thrift shopped a remarkable record for me. Its title is Ofamfa and the name of the group listed is Children of the Sun. Searching in Google for Ofamfa doesn't yield many results. There's a new media company situated in the Netherlands in Nijmegen of all places (it's where I'm from), with ties to Africa and Asia. And then there's an African-centric twitter account with that name. Thirdly the very record I have in front of me appears on the first Google page. On the next pages these results are repeated before I finally stumble upon the meaning of the Ofamfa I'm looking for:

  Ofamfa is the Akan symbol of critical examination.

Children of the Sun on the other hand yields many results but (looking at Wikipedia) none refer to the group of jazz musicians (or muse/icians) that play on the record. The best known of these musicians is Oliver Lake who went on to have a distinguished solo career as a jazz saxophonist. Children of the Sun operate under the umbrella of B.A.G. (Black Artist Group), an organization of creative people of all disciplines from St, Louis, MO. The record is a raw example of free jazz with equal attention to poetry and jazz. The sound reminds me of the recordings by The Last Poets many years later.

The Joyfulaires

The Joyfulaires – In the Valley He Restoreth My Soul
Joyful Records LP: JS-73-1

05 (In the Valley) He Restoreth My Soul.m4a

'Tis the season for thrift stores to organize their records. Once a year the Christmas records are separated from the secular records. I enjoy this, it makes it easy, I only need to browse through a considerable smaller selection to try to find something I like than I do the rest of the year. So why did I browse through the Christmas bin the other day? God only knows. 

I picked up this LP by the Joyfulaires last Christmas when I was still living in Ohio. When there still was the potential for a white Christmas to look forward to. The Joyfulaires are from Albany, Ohio.

"Dianna is a young married student and has dedicated her talents to God. She was a neglected child, but God sent Mr. and Mrs. Pinney, wonderful christian parents, to adopt her as their own." (—The Joyfulaires, In the Valley He Restoreth My Soul)
Dianna plays piano in the group. Karen and Bonnie are young mothers who sing. Bonnie's phone number is listed on the LP (for bookings, I suppose) and it would be only a local call for me but I won't dial it (no, I'm not passing on that number either, it's 40 years old, for heaven's sake).

Unsere Heimat

Music of the Austrian Alps
Capitol of the World
Capitol Records, DT 10016

When I titled this week's musical thrift store treasure I had no idea it is also a title of a once popular patriotic song from East Germany that played an important part in the film Goodbye Lenin! I could have known, I could have guessed, it's just that the song hasn't shown up for me yet in a thrift store like Mother Russia or Dear Siberian Land (see post on Siberia) have. I'm not very proud of my Dutch musical heritage (but I do have a large collection), and I don't think many fellow music enthusiasts from Austria and Switzerland are proud of their traditional folk music either. They should be though. The proof is here. Their folk music is as exciting as their neighbors' with a folk tradition of much higher esteem (Italy, Hungary, Czech Republic). Both these records here are released by a major label (Capitol). The authentic serious academic field recording labels and musicologists (think Alan Lomax or Nonesuch Explorer Series) have remarkable little to say about the folk music of Switzerland and Austria (and Germany too for that matter.) The Alps are considered a very conservative region and their music far removed from ancient times, a tribal past, or pagan ritualistic rites. But  listen to these outtakes. Consider a true yodel, a real alphorn, or encountering a folk musician in a polar bear costume.

http://www.box.com/s/4u4olja04lsijyaaztia

01 Appenzeller Yodel.m4a 

http://www.box.com/s/6yhv7ys2soikcbcq81bz 

02 Tiroler Schuhplattler.m4a  

Swiss Mountain Music
Capitol of the World
Capitol Records, T 10161

Nobody

10 Something's Gotta Give.m4a

Ladies of Burlesque, LP
Sandy Hook Records, CT
S.H. 2019, 1979

This bawdy little record I found—a bit out of place, at a Goodwill store. A compilation of Hollywood's Burlesque variety show songs from the thirties through the sixties. B Movie outtakes by some of Hollywood's great actresses and some of the forgotten ones as well. "'There's Rita Hayworth', "No it isn't", 'Kim Novak', "No it isn't", "then who is it?" 'It's nobody!'" Joanne Woodward is our nobody, the song is called Something's Gotta Give from the film The Stripper (1963), easily the most exciting track on this bizarre collection of Americana. The atmosphere reminds me of Bollywood, just a sitar is missing. It was the debut of the prolific film music composer Jerry Goldsmith who went on the do the music for Planet of the Apes and The Boys from Brazil, among many others. The film also featured the legendary Burlesque striptease dancer Gypsy Rose Lee.

Lover's Lament

Two musicians from the Gagaku ensemble
Songs and Sounds of the Orient (cover)
A custom recording by Japanese Air Lines, JAL 5581-666

In the 1970s commercial use of the vinyl record was at its prime. It was the golden age of the recording industry. Sales were peaking and companies flooded the LP market with whatever they thought could earn them a profit. A handful of record companies issued immense amounts of commercial recordings and turned into billion dollar corporations. But the 1970s also saw many new record companies established while existing smaller labels were able to hold their own. According to my finds at thrift stores many companies that had nothing to do with the music industry whatsoever also wanted to take a bite out of the blooming record industry pie. I don't know how many of the world's air lines produced LPs but in a single day I came home with a record produced by the Italian Alitalia and the Japanese JAL. The Italian one is a football record with commentaries and interviews on and with the 1978 Italian world cup squad, beautifully adorned with the original owner tourist's ephemera such as snap shots, a signed photograph of the airplane pilot, and a picture of the pope. It's hard to listen to the record if you don't (and I don't) speak Italian. The Japanese record (from which I picked the musical example below) is as well documented as the best of the scholastic field recordings by say, the Smithsonian, biased however by the commercial interest of selling airplane tickets. The records has both sounds from places of tourist's interests and music, richly illustrated with pictures, stories, and a booklet full of information. Side A of the record deals with Japan while side B covers some of the countries visited by JAL. The track A-ri-rang that can be downloaded below is from side B. It's a lover's lament sung and recorded in Korea, believed to originate more than 300 years ago. "The song is a dialog between a heartbroken girl and her fickle lover. She pleads with him not to leave her, but his roving eyes have already found another."
01 Lover's Lament.m4a

The Soul of Mbira

01 Nyamoropa Yevana Vava Mushonga.m4a

The Soul of Mbira
cover by Donald Leake and Robert L. Heimall
Nonesuch Explorer Series, H-72054
Nonesuch Records, New York, 1973

Scholarly level musical recordings are not the type of records you would expect to show up at thrift stores. Half the records however, I own from labels such as the Nonesuch Explorer Series and the Ethnic Folkways Library, I have found for less than a dollar at thrift stores. The recordings on these records are not hard to come by, the Nonesuch records are mostly reissued on CD format while the Folkways recordings can be ordered as a download or as a CD from the Smithsonian Institute. The original vinyl copies is a different story though as you would pay a minimum of $25 on line for a used copy, if available at all. I'm excited when I find a record such as this The Soul of Mbira for 99 cents but I get a little sad too thinking who it could have belonged to. I imagine that records such as The Soul of Mbira belonged to people who were serious about the music they bought, I imagine that they were once part of a serious collection. The Soul of Mbira was published almost forty years ago and I wonder about the fate of the original owner. Did he (or she) pass away? Did their children come in the house after this happened and just picked up these "worthless, obsolete" vinyl records to drop them off at the nearest thrift store? If that's the case I think the previous owner will be pleased that his/her precious item found a home that truly appreciates all the aspects surrounding the album. Nyamoropa Yevana Vava Muchonga by Muchatera Mujuru was my favorite track when I first listened to the album back in 1991 when I borrowed it from the library, and now 20 years later it still is. With the purchase of the album I learn that Nyamoropa, according to Paul Berliner, is played on "one of the few remaining varieties of an older style 25-key Mbira Dza Vadaimu, having the lowest and most traditional tunings".

The Soul of Mbira: Traditions of the Shona People of Rhodesia was first released in 1973, when it was issued on CD in 2002, the title changed to reflect a new political name for Rhodesia: Zimbabwe: The Soul of Mbira, Traditions of the Shona People.

Rahsaan

05 Raouf.m4a
http://www.box.net/s/3ecy2ni2veshhuc910qx

Roland Kirk - Slightly Latin
(sleeve design by Daniel Czubak)
recorded 1965 at Capitol Studios
Monaural LM 82033, Limelight

Last week I meant to comment on records that you would never find at a thrift store. Those records that you would, without blinking your eye, pay 6 or 7 dollars for if you find a used copy somewhere, and even spent 12 dollars for a brand new release on CD. Records by musicians you esteem so high that it wouldn't even occur to you you'd find them for 50 cents at a Volunteers of America. Captain Beefheart, Pere Ubu, the Velvet Underground, and even Cat Power and Bob Dylan belong to this category. One of the names I included in this list—a rough draft I had already written—is Rahsaan Roland Kirk. By Jove, days later, at a Goodwill store on Route 41, Slightly Latin by Roland Kirk (from before he added the Rahsaan to his name) appeared. I never even saw this record before, I didn't even know it existed, but there it was, in mint shape, with all the colorful pages originally attached to the folding sleeve still intact. I chose the song Raouf for the following reasons:

1. Raouf was composed by Roland Kirk himself.
2. Raouf is the new, self assumed, African inspired, name of one of the singers on Raouf whose original name was Ruth Perkinson. I have the feeling that the photographic portrait on the sleeve, as well as all the other color photographs in the attached book, is of her. Kirk, as well as the photographer Daniel Czubak, must have been infatuated with her. The voices on the record are arranged by one Coleridge Perkinson by the way.
3. It's a great tune.

Slightly Latin is the seventh vinyl record I own of Kirk (I also have several cds) and the first one bought at a thrift store. It brings the Average Kirk price I paid for an album (including cds) to about 6 dollars.