Talkin' Trash
by John Corbett
reprinted from Down Beat, Sept. 1995
When Ellery Eskelin named his adventurous new CD "Jazz Trash", he knew he would catch
some flak. "It's not meant to be taken so seriously as to be insulting," says Eskelin.
"But the title does have an edge to it that I endorse. An overly reverent attitude has a negative effect on the music today, so if I can come out in today's climate
with this title, it says we can lighten up and still be serious."
Eskelin, 36, grew up on a steady diet of jazz. His mom was a professional Hammond
B3 organist, and his 1988 debut was a set of reworked standards. He's a member of
drummer Joey Baron's Baron Down, Joint Venture with trumpeter Paul Smoker and he's
on Gebhard Ullmann's new album, "Basement Research". "Jazz is my first love; my earliest musical
memories come from hearing jazz and standards," admits the New York based tenor saxophonist.
"But I'm not all that compelled by what jazz is or isn't. All I know is that I'm so influenced by jazz that I don't think that I could get away from it if I
wanted to, and it would be disingenuous to claim that "Jazz Trash" isn't jazz.
"There's too much inbreeding in terms of influence these days. There are musicains
who are knowledgable about the minutia of jazz recordings, but it's so narrow it's
only about jazz. All through the history of the music, there have been influences
from outside the music itself, so this really isn't different." In name and substance alike,
"Jazz Trash" puts some of the music's unspoken rules in the dumpster. First, there's
the lineup: tenor; Jim Black's wide ranging drums and percussion; and Andrea Parkins' accordion and sampler. Hardly a standard issue jazz trio. The music asks penetrating
questions about structure and content, rarely falling into the traditional head/solos/head
formula. Pieces like "Jargon" and "Interfaith" use static drones, slow ostinato counterlines and other devices to interupt the music's flow and recontextualize the
material that follows, throwing it into a bold new light.
"I was looking for some alternatives to the motion in free improvisation where it
builds energy, peaks and then dies down. That shape is pretty typical, and so I wanted
to incorporate the feel from pieces that don't move that same way, to give each piece
a unique shape." To help articulate this new sound, Eskelin also turned to contemporary
classical composers like Morton Feldman, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Mauricio Kagel,
and he wrote "Untitled One" with the traditional Laotion mouthorgan (called the khaen) in mind. Lately, Eskelin's been listening to the recordings of his father, Rodd Keith
Eskelin, a studio musician whom he barely knew and who composed strange, adventurous
pieces for an amateur songwriters service. "There's a lot of music that I love, and
frankly I don't care where it comes from. Given the instrumentaion of this band and
where we come from, anything we do is gonna be a little different."
As radical and questioning as elements of Jazz Trash are, the disc is imbued with
jazz life. Eskelin's personal compostional vision, his supple phrasing and gorgeous
tenor sound all qualify him as a major player in today's creative music. "There's
so much history that I do not want to avoid in the name of keeping the music forward looking,"
he explains. "In the past, people tried to break with past. Now, I think there's
a recognition that you don't have to avoid history. You can make a fresh personal
statement, move ahead in terms of the instrument or band, and still admit your influences."
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