Children of the Forest

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Of the many eye-opening moments in the 2018 documentary Milford Graves Full Mantis, one of the most illustrative happens in the context of a 1981 duo performance with Graves and avant-garde dancer Min Tanaka at a school for autistic children in Japan. While Graves is the only person in the room playing a musical instrument, he very much views the performance as a three-sided piece of improvisational communication between himself, Tanaka's movements, and the response of the children in the gymnasium. Before the show, Graves discusses how he would hope to put himself in the headspace of these children to imagine what they would expect and hope to take from his performance. The result, beautifully, is not a patronizing, toned-down bit of four-on-the-floor drumming, but instead a gleefully intense demonstration of Graves' polyrhythmic mastery.

In this setting, as in all settings, Graves brings his wide-ranging interests and abilities to bear, and delivers an astonishing (and well-received) performance that cuts right to the emotional and metaphysical quick. That approach is what the legendary free-jazz drummer also brought to the table in his many mid-'70s basement sessions that featured a panoply of musicians working in unusual configurations and on a surprising array of instruments. These three wild-eyed sessions from the winter of 1976 feature Graves alongside his frequent collaborator Hugh Glover and saxophonist Arthur Doyle; although this trio would record Graves' iconic Bäbi album during this same time period, these recordings are neither rehearsals for that performance nor are they open-ended jam sessions. Instead, Graves brings his sense of purposeful improvisation to the proceedings, acting as both spark and interlocutor throughout. While there are some moments—most notably in the second of the January 24 sessions—that explicitly highlight Graves' playing, his multiphonic and polyrhythmic percussion functions more as an anchor and engine, giving Doyle and Glover plenty of room to roam. And roam they do. Doyle's explosively heartfelt tenor playing is in prime form, bursting out of the speakers with gut-punching clarity and fiery soulfulness; even when he leans back and plays a little fife to accompany Glover's drill sergeant-style quacking on the vaccine, a one-note Haitian trumpet (one of several reed instruments he picks up during these sessions), it doesn't take long for him to strap back on his horn and re-enter the frame loudly and proudly. Yet, as easy as it is for fellow players to get lost in Doyle's tsunami of sound, Graves keeps everything moving and communicative, providing the frenetic and deeply human tempo that makes this work so richly rewarding. © Jason Ferguson/Qobuz