GEORGIA STRAIGHT • SEPTEMBER6 - 13, 1985
in other parts of the world.
sonality found full expres"Even if there are cultural
sion in a band format.
and political and economic
Concerts
by the Paul
Pllmley Octet have left very ,differences, perhaps there ls
.mat or our post-bebop format
something fundamental
in
satisfied listeners
making
or our lounge format or our comparisons with E111ngton, music that unites us as
funk format, and either you Evans, and Mingus: heady
human beings. I don't find
fall somewhere into one of company! Like those pio- that at all an idealistic,
those marketable categories
neers, Plimley has learned to highfalutin', cosmic notion:
or else we don't want you.' " write for the strengths of his
there's a reality to it. If
And so he's hoping to find bandmates without sacrificnothing
else,
music
a more receptive audience
ing the individuality of his
demonstrates
an incredible
elsewhere. I think he'll get it, vision, and one of his major
depth of language and exfor the music that the Paul achievements
must be the
Pllmley Octet has been mak- way in which he can spark
ing for the last few months
assertive, personalized solos
has been world-class: not from players schooled in the
your usual trained-musibland
and conservative
cian's smorgasbord of pre- values of West Coast jazz
digested influences but a education.
quietly radical, very per"Once
the musicians
sonal music that reflects
understan!f the ground rules
powers as diverse as Cecil that the music is dealing
Taylor and Bach, Debussy
with, then they're usually
,
and Zappa, but that has happy to do some exploring,
more to do with Plimley's
on their own and collectiveown growth as a musician
ly. It sometimes takes a bit of
and as an individual, a pro- time, but I think that's
cess that has not always
understandable.
The notion
been smooth, but that is now of players
wanting
to
starting to pay dividends.
emulate past models is a
It's a theme that Plimley
useful practice, but it can
keeps returning to in converalso reinforce that sense of
sation. "One of the timeless
self-doubt that keeps us from
functions that music allows
not being afraid of exploring
us to experience is the sense
new territory, that keeps us
•of really 'being there' in the from saying, Tm going to let
music, the sense of feeling
this music be.' Just taking
fully alive, and not necessaririsks, and saying, 'I don't
ly saying, 'Well, gee, I hope really care if my music
this will communicate with
doesn't sound like 'Trane, or
the people,' but just being
Bird, or Herbie Hancock, or
yourself on that level. And whoever,' just paying attenthat in itself will always
tion to one's own rhythmic
touch any people who are framework, the way that one
really interested
in being
moves, the way that one
open to a strong musical ex- talks, the way that one
perience.
naturally
has a kind of
"I toss around questions of physical, gestural repartee
originality,
and the uniwith one's instrument.
queness of the social context
"Things like that are just
that one belongs to, and I natural to playing, and I
think that these things tend
think that that is something
to emerge in the music simpthat a lot of players don't pay
ly by one just wanting to be attention to because they're
oneself. What I'm feeling
very responsive
to peer
more strongly these days, is pressure, to media, to people
that while these areas are who have very clear productvery interesing - and one oriented lines on what music
can be very absorbed in is supposed to be.
them - the bottom line is
"But I'm interested
in
simply to express what one playing music where there's
feels about life, the energy
a real sense of vitality, and
that that pertains to, the
where the music is really
kinds of melodic or pitchsaying
something.
Not
oriented or rhythmic or tim- something that we can put in
bral kinds of sounds that one an analogue sense to somenaturally has a gravitation
thing literary, or verbal, or
to."
social,
necessarily,
but
Paul Plimley's ability to something that people who
find his own musical voice care to can really respond to
has been audible for some
emotionally.
So that the
years - check out his com- music goes beyond passive
position Deltcate Chestnut
consumerism.
And so that
Roll on the New Orchestra
we as musicians can deepen
Quintet's 1979 LP Up 'til
the values of the kind of lives
Now - but only in the last that we're living in North
few months has that per- America and Europe, or even

Off Beat

FROM PAGE 10

pression: the kinds of sonic
landscapes that we can be
exposed to and feel something for are endless.''
A pause, and a sigh.
"It's so difficult to express
all that you want to say
about music, and do so in a
verbal fashion which us
understandable and yet also
complete to your own intentions. If I could express all of
those things
verbally,
I

might be a poet. Or whatever."
On the available evidence,
•Paul Pllmley
is a poet
anyway: a poet of sounds
and emotions manipulated
with easy grace and probing
insight.
The Paul Plimley Octet
(which currently
includes
saxophonists
Graham Ord,
Coat Cook, and Gordon Bertram, trumpeter Kevin Lee,

25

trombonist
Ralph Eppel.
acoustic bassist Paul Blaney,
and drummer Buff Allen)
will be doing one more concert before the leader's continental drift: at the newlyo·pened Granville
Island
Room,
1502 Duranleau
Street (Granville Island) this
Friday, September 6th at 9
pm. Advance tickets are
$6.00, at Highlife, Black
Swan, and Revolutions.