RAHSAAN ROLAND KIRK
The Man Who Cried Fire (Hyena)
Reviewed by Shaun Dale

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Another re-release of the legendary original Night Records albums, The Man Who Cried Fire offers a look at some of the multiple dimensions of the late, great Rahsaan Roland Kirk. It's impossible to capture the man's range in ninety cuts, let alone nine, but the nine live tracks here reflect some of the less appreciated facets of his generally under-appreciated musical genius.

Six of the tracks are drawn from tapes of shows at San Francisco's Keystone Korner in the mid-seventies, along with one each from a New Orleans session with the Olympia Brass Band ("New Orleans Fantasy"), LA's It Club ("You Did It, You Did It") and from Kirk's last Paris concert in 1977 ("A Visit From The Blues"). The tracks include rare recorded performances on clarinet and patented multi-horn marvels, but perhaps most impressive is his work as a straight tenor-man, a vastly underrated element of his talents. Whether on the track identified only as "Unidentified Tenor Selection" or his honking R&B take on "Night Train," this is proof enough once and for all to dismiss any remaining doubts about Rahsaan Roland Kirk's status as one of the premier reed players in jazz. Was he occasionally guilty of gimmickry? Well, sure, but not really for its own sake. He had more to say than conventional modes of expression provided for, but when he wanted to, he could say more in that conventional voice than most.

"New Orleans Fantasy" provides one of the disc's brightest moments, matching Kirk with the Olympia Brass Band, fulfilling a longtime dream for Kirk. While he was one of the most personally creative and inventive players on the scene, he held enormous respect for New Orleans as the cradle of Black Classical Music, a term he preferred to jazz for the music he created. While blowing wild and free was the way he became best known, his work in a purely traditional mode on "The Black And Crazy Blues" shows off an emotional element of Kirk's music that must be heard to have anything approaching a complete picture of his talent and range.

Producer Joel Dorn has elected to kick off his new label, Hyena Records, by resurrecting the four classics from his first label, Night Records. The fact that that decision makes this album widely available for the first time in years is proof positive of Dorn's taste and wisdom.

Track List:

Slow Blues * Bye Bye Blackbird * Multi-Horn Variations * Unidentified Tenor Selection * You Did It You Did It * New Orleans Fantasy: Part I - Traditional New Orleans Piece, Part II - The Black And Crazy Blues * Night Train * Mr. P.C. * A Visit From The Blues

© 2002 - Shaun Dale