What unites this ruminative line--of which Milton is the ancestor; Wordsworth the great revisionist; Keats and Wallace Stevens, among others, the dependent heirs--is an honest acceptance of an actual dualism as opposed to the fierce desire to overcome all dualism, a desire that dominates the visionary and prophetic line from the relatively mildness of Spencer's temperament down through the various fiercenesses of Blake, Shelley, Browning, Whitman, and Yeats.

This is the authentic voice of the ruminative line, the (improvisation) of loss, and the voice also of the strong (improvisers) accepting his task, rallying what remains:

Farewell happy fields
Where joy for ever dwells; Hail horrors, hail
Infernal world, and thou profoundest Hell
Receive thy new Possessor: One who brings
A mind not to be chang'd by Place or Time,
The mind is its own place, and in it self
Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n
What matter where, if I be still the same . . . ?

These lines, to the C. S. Lewis or Angelic School, represent moral idiocy, and are to be met with laughter, if we have remembered to start the day with our Good Morning's Hatred of Satan. If, however, we are not so morally sophisticated, we are likely to be very much moved by these lines. Not that Satan (the strong improviser) is not mistaken; of course he is. There is terrible pathos in his "if I be still the same," since he is not the same, and never will be again. Be he knows it. He is adopting an heroic dualism, in this conscious farewell to Joy, a dualism upon which almost all post-Miltonic poetic (post Coltrane improvisational) influence in the (music) founds it-self...

No modern (improviser) is unitary, whatever his stated beliefs. Modern (improvisers) are necessarily miserable dualists, because this misery, this poverty is the starting point of their art--Stevens speaks appropriately of the "profound (improvisation) of the poor and of the dead." (Improvisation) may or may not work out its own salvation in a man, but it comes only to those in dire imaginative need of it, though it may come then as terror. And this need is learned first through the young (improviser's) or ephebe's experience of another improviser, of the Other whose baleful greatness is enhanced by the ephebe's seeing him as a burning brightness against a framing darkness, rather as Blake's Bard of Experience sees the Tyger, or Job the Leviathan and Behemoth, or Ahab the White Whale or Ezekiel the Covering Cherub, for all these are visions of the Creation gone malevolent and entrapping, of a splendor menacing the Promethean Quester every ephebe (young improviser) is about to become.

For Collins, for Cowper, for many a Bard of Sensibility, Milton was the Tyger, the Covering Cherub blocking a new voice from entering the (improvisers) Paradise. The emblem of this discussion is the Covering Cherub. In Genesis he is God's Angel; in Ezekiel he is the Prince of Tyre...In this discussion he is a poor demon of many names...but I summon him first namelessly, as a final name is not yet devised by men for the anxiety that blocks their creativeness. He is that something that makes men victims and not improvisers...

Bloom, Anxiety of Influence, p. 32-35

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I have left the names of Poets in for this one. You can fill them in with your own names: "the great revisionist" and "the dependent heirs."

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"A fierce desire to overcome all dualism."

What that means is a fierce desire to be able to do work of significance and work of commercial/popular acclaim at the same time--either as a single musical creation, or as a professional musician (a corporate bopper for example) who does a little of the free thing on the side.

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Look out CEF. Look out that other many lettered abbreviation that no one really liked. Here's the nu-name for our nu-music: Ruminative Line Music. Makes sense right? You could call Dixon's lines ruminative--that wouldn't be a stupid thing to say. They make me ruminate any way. Same with Marco Eneidi and Charles Gayle. And isn't that the whole point? Who can play the most interesting, most squiggly, most thought provoking lines? Hasn't at least half of the development of CEF/This Music been about moving away from lines whose endings we already know, i.e., the creation of lines (sequences of notes) that make listener and creator alike (among many other things) think?

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"The improvisation of loss."

The Blues.

"Who feels it knows it."

The ability to feel--something that atrophies under circumstances of excessive success and wealth.

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"Rallying what remains."

What (or who) remains when the decision is made to practice 8 hours a day?

What remains when you've dedicated your life to art (as opposed to employment for the worlds 4th largest manufacturer of aluminum siding?)

Is it a happy feeling one gets when one dedicated a life to improvisation knowing ahead of time that it will be met only with scorn, poverty, humiliation and derision? How about when one does that knowing scorn, poverty, humiliation and derision are signs that the art is of substance?

Farewell Joy!

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"If we've remembered to say our Good Morning's Hatred of Satan"

Certainly you've all picked up on how Bloom refers to the strong poet (improviser) as "Satan." Morning radio (as well as afternoon and evening radio) is our "Good Morning's Hatred of Satan."

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"but it comes only to those in dire imaginative need of it, though it may come then as terror. And this need is learned first through the young improviser or ephebe's experience of another improviser, of the Other whose baleful greatness is enhanced by the ephebe's seeing him as a burning brightness against a framing darkness"

Marco Eneidi was in the Bennington area when I was in college there. Sometimes he would play with Bill Dixon's ensemble class, some times he would perform in a trio with Jackson Krall (who studied with Dixon at the University of Wisconsin) and John Blum. If memory serves correct, sometimes a bassist, Xtopher Farris, would play with them as well.

For many Bennington ephebes, Marco was that 'Other.' Musically, there was no lack of darkness when I was there. To put it mildly, the not-Bill-Dixon music division was not without its challenges or short commings. Student concerts were, for the most part, agonizing. Faculty concerts, rich in technique and cultivated sentiment begged the question "if this is what it all means, why not the trades." Behold a framing darkness.

Marco would practice in the "Barbara Ushkow Deane Carriage Barn." Once called the "Paul Robeson House" This is where Bill Dixon would teach his ensemble class, and where all the 'brightly burning' music of Bennington college was happening. (To this day I am unsure just who Barbara Ushkow Deane is in the musical Canon.)

When Marco would practice, terror was a common reaction. People (and by people I don't only mean me) wouldn't enter the building, but instead stood outside, meekly looking at their shoes, listening intently, taking their kicks, waiting for the frightening sound to stop--waiting for when it was safe to go in. Waiting to see if we were still ephebe improvisers or mere victims.

Hearing Marco it became immediately apparent that his was a sound that came only from total total dedication and subsequently, a life of "rallying what remains." Upon hearing Marco (and the same can be said for Dixon's performance at the Bennington faculty concert in 1989) it quickly came clear that I was not the same, nor would ever be the same again.

There is no 'un hearing' some music.

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I recently got me one of those Marco Eneidi Konfrontationen 2006 in Nickelsdorf: Ralphe Malik Tribute CD's they're talking about over at Freejazz.org. I haven't listened to it enough to give any 'valuable criticism' but I can say it sounds different than any Marco music I've heard. Mind you, I am a bit behind on his releases. I am yet to get a copy of Sound on Survival Live or Ghetto Calypso or American Roadwork. None of those, however, are large ensemble recordings, and to my knowledge, there isn't many recorded examples of Marco Eneidi playing with guitar, turntables or "electronics."

For what it is worth, my immediate, jaundiced impression of it was "the rock people who want to fuck around in this music would do well to get a copy of this" and as I listened, I was given to wonder what would have to happen in our society for concerts like this one to be commonplace at larger venues, like The Capitol for example, complete with state of the art sound reinforcement, lights and the adulation of thousands at a time?"

More refined criticism to follow.

Please do get a copy of it. This is as self released as self released can be. Let us support Marco so that more ephebe's may have the piss scared out of them.

copyright,  © 2007 Stanley Zappa

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