Maurice McIntyre - Humility In The Light Of Creator 1970

In the 1960s, bop snobs who condemned avant-garde jazz made comments that were not only uninformed and narrow-minded, but sometimes, their attacks on jazz's "new thing" (a term that was used to describe free jazz and Chicago AACM jazz as well as a lot of modal post-bop) were even mean-spirited and hateful. Such bop snobs loved to ridicule and mock the spirituality that characterized a lot of modal and avant-garde jazz; they treated it like a joke and a fad. But spirituality in music is hardly faddish; when explorers like John Coltrane, Archie Shepp, Pharoah Sanders, and Yusef Lateef were influenced by traditional Hindu, Islamic, or Jewish music, they were drawing on musical traditions that had been around for centuries. Spirituality is a big part of Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre's Humility in the Light of the Creator, a superb inside/outside date that is arguably his finest, most essential album. Recorded in 1969, this AACM classic owes a lot to the spiritual music of the Middle East, Asia, and Africa, and there are times when the Chicago saxophonist also blends avant-garde jazz with Native American elements. When singer George Hines is featured in three pieces, his wordless vocals show an awareness of the music used in traditional Native American religious ceremonies. Humility, McIntyre's first album as a leader, is a perfect example of the AACM approach to avant-garde jazz; while the blistering free jazz of Albert Ayler, Cecil Taylor, and late-period Coltrane favors density, McIntyre and his fellow AACM explorers use space and silence to their creative advantage. As a result, Humility is often dissonant without ever being claustrophobic. (Not that claustrophobic is a bad thing: Coltrane's ferocious, claustrophobic Om is a gem, although it's a gem that isn't for everyone). McIntyre has a lot to be proud of, but if you were limited to owning only one of his albums, Humility would be the best choice. AMG.

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