The Music of One Man

by Steve Starger - Hartford Advocate - February 12, 1998

Cheney Hall has seen sellout crowds before, but never one quite like this before. Friends, colleagues and family of Thomas Chapin packed the Manchester Hall to pay tribute to this locally raised alto saxophonist, flautist and composer. It goes beyond cliché to say there was a lot of love in that room.

Musicians with whom Chapin has performed over the years took the stage in various combinations, playing his compositions with an extra level of urgency and passion. Midway through the concert, Chapin himself appeared to a thunderous standing ovation.

Wearing a saffron scarf and white tunic, Chapin took his accolades modestly, then unlimbered his flute. Accompanied by his longtime bandmates, bassist Mario Pavone and drummer Mike Sarin, Chapin played one of his own compositions, an angular ballad suffused with dark poetry. The crowd roared for more.

Such approbation is not unusual for a musician on Chapin's level of excellence. At age 40, he can look back on a musically uncompromising and critically acclaimed career that began in the mid-'70s at Hartt School of Music under the tutelage of Jackie McLean and Paul Jeffreys, and has taken him to the far reaches of the planet. Today Chapin is considered by peers and critics to be one of the most innovative players of his generation.

But the sense of urgency at Cheney Hall that night was all too real for Chapin. Just a couple of months shy of his 41st birthday, at a time when his career seems poised to make a long-overdue jump to higher visibility, Chapin personally faces a scary and uncertain future.

He was diagnosed last year with leukemia. His brief appearance at Cheney Hall marked the first time Chapin has played, in public or private, since last August. He has been physically unable to perform, partly because of the disease itself and partly because of the debilitating effects of chemotherapy treatments.

"I go day to day," Chapin says over the phone from his home in Queens, NY. "One day, I just put my hands on my sax case and cried."

Chapin first suspected something was wrong on a visit to Zanzibar early last year. He had no particular agenda for the trip except to shake up his world a bit. "I just wanted to go, so I upped and went," he says.

Chapin hooked up with a musicologist friend in Zanzibar and also connected with musicians in Uganda. One day at his hotel in Zanzibar, Chapin began to feel weak. ""I had trouble climbing stairs,"" he says. ""I went to swim with some dolphins, and I thought I was going to drown.""

The feeling persisted, so Chapin went for a blood test at a local hospital. The results showed an abnormally high blood count. Chapin thought he had chronic fatigue syndrome or mononucleosis. He cut his trip short by a week.

Back in New York, Chapin went to his own doctor. That's when he learned he had leukemia. With that diagnosis, Chapin's life changed dramatically.

Initially, Chapin says, ""I didn't know what it was."" He soon found out. He was admitted to a hospital for a month of chemotherapy, after which his symptoms went into remission. Last summer, Chapin felt well enough to perform at the JVC Jazz Festival in New York City and at the Litchfield Jazz Festival in western Connecticut.

Chapin's doctor opted to perform a relatively new treatment involving stem cell and bone marrow transplants using Chapin's own marrow. But when doctors harvested stem cells and bone marrow from Chapin's hips, they found the leukemia had returned.

By the end of last summer, Chapin was back in the hospital undergoing aggressive chemo treatments. ""They thought they would lick it, but they didn't,"" he says. ""I went through hell.""

Chapin admits he's ""scared shitless,"" but adds ""partly, that's ego. You can only be so scared for so long. I'm very optimistic about living."" Indeed, through it all, Chapin has managed to hold on to the infectious optimism that has permeated his music from the beginning. He and his wife, Terri, were married in Chapin's hospital room last October, at the start of his second chemotherapy treatment.

""You become very close through adversity,"" Chapin says. ""Your life changes, and the things you might have put off become more urgent. It was a good thing for us to do.""

Chapin decided to stop the chemotherapy and at this point is ""aggressively pursuing"" alternative treatments, he says. He has been seen by the Dalai Lama's doctor, has changed his diet and is taking Tibetan herbs four times a day. He is also in psychotherapy and is practicing Ki, a Japanese healing regimen involving breathing techniques.

Has all of that made a difference? ""At this moment, it's better,"" Chapin says. ""It's moment to moment.""

As news of Chapin's condition became known, friends and colleagues responded by staging a benefit concert for him last November at New York's Knitting Factory, where Chapin has been a regular performer. The all-star show, which raised about $5,000 to help cover Chapin's expenses, featured such luminaries as Kenny Barron, Anthony Braxton and John Zorn.

Buoyed by the New York concert's success, Chapin's musician friends in Connecticut felt they needed to mount a similar benefit closer to home. Chapin did, after all, hone his chops in Hartford area clubs in the late 1970s and 1980s. And what better venue than a hall in Chapin's home town?

""After the New York concert, there was this demand from a lot of quarters to do something in Hartford,"" Pavone says. ""It's the first time I've seen virtually all of the organizations cooperating. I hope it'll be something that will carry on in the Hartford area.""

Performers who donated their time included the Thomas Chapin Trio Plus Brass (which Chapin formed in 1989); pianist Peter Madsen's trio; Paradigm Shift, featuring drummer Pheeroan Ak Laff; pianist Don DePalma's group; poet Vernon Frazer and mandolinist Bill Walach. All of them have performed or recorded with Chapin in the past.

The band Motation reunited for the occasion, front-loading its repertoire with Chapin originals in honor of its former member. And the Trio Plus Brass ensemble closed its set with a furious and funny extravaganza that was equal parts Mingus and Zappa but, finally, all Chapin. It ably demonstrated the breadth of Chapin's musical references and his infectious, Dadaist humor.

Pavone calls Chapin ""a hell of a swinging player. His spirit is just phenomenal. He has been a gigantic influence on me and now he's teaching me still, with his courage in fighting his latest battle.""

Chuck Obuchowski, a jazz radio announcer and spokesman for the Connecticut Jazz Confederation (one of the event's many sponsors) observes that ""technique aside, [Chapin] has an extra special quality that few musicians have. He's of the generation that went the academic route, but unlike some of his peers, he has something that gives his music a unique stamp. I think he's in the forefront of the new music.""

After graduating from Rutgers University (in the late '70s, Hartt had no degree program in jazz), Chapin landed a gig as music director for Lionel Hampton's orchestra and toured internationally for about six years. In the mid-'80s he joined drummer Chico Hamilton.

Pavone met Chapin in 1980, performing in a tribute concert to Charles Mingus in Bushnell Park. ""Every time Tom soloed, it knocked everybody out,"" Pavone says. Chapin's first CD, The Bell of the Heart was released on Pavone's Alacra label. Six CDs later--the latest, Sky Piece, is scheduled to be released Feb. 15--the Thomas Chapin Trio has proven itself to be one of the most fiercely individual groups on the scene, experimental without losing that all-important ability to swing.

The Cheney Hall concert outdid the Knitting Factory event, raising more than $7,000 for Chapin. That's good news for Chapin, but, at this point, he says, ""I don't know what God has planned for me.""

If God's plan remains a mystery to him, those who know Chapin and admire him and his music are making it very clear how they feel.

Reprinted with permission from the Hartford Advocate

%(small)Photo by Stuart Feldman%

The Liberating Legacy of Thomas Chapin

By Larry Blumenfeld - Jazziz, July 1998

"Marty Ehrlich recalls a note that Jackie McLean once sent to Thomas Chapin. ""You're the best student I've ever learned from,"" it said. In his life and career, Chapin had a way of turning things around – in every context, and for the better. He seemed less interested in assumed roles, more in pure and open communion.

That barely touches on the many ways in which the jazz world will miss Chapin, who died on February 13th at age 39 after a year-long bout with leukemia. As a saxophonist, flutist, composer and bandleader, Chapin was tireless in his passions, seemingly effortless in his mastery, and never without a provocative point of view. He's remembered right now as a powerful musical force cut short in his prime. He will be remembered for the ages as one whose focus and spirit changed the nature of the music and the musicians around him.

Chapin began his music studies with McLean; other formative teachers included saxophonist Paul Jeffrey, and pianist Kenny Barron. After directing Lionel Hampton's orchestra for six years and playing in Chico Hamilton's band, he formed a trio with bassist Mario Pavone, and drummer Steve Johns (Johns was succeeded by Michael Sarin). Chapin often augmented the trio with horns, strings, percussionists, and other instrumentation. He also worked regularly with many of jazz's more ascendant and adventurous artists, including John Zorn, Ned Rothenberg, Marty Ehrlich, Ray Drummond, Peggy Stern, Tom Harrell, and Anthony Braxton.

Chapin is commonly pointed to as one who helped the downtown scene connect with a larger audience. He was the first artist signed to the Knitting Factory record label.* Others credit Chapin with lending a more experimental edge to jazz's mainstream. Really, he transcended such analysis.

Like one of his main musical inspirations, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Chapin approached live performances with an extroverted sense of theater. Also, like Kirk, Chapin's mastery of his instruments, particularly alto saxophone and flutes, were provocative on their own terms. He was a monstrous saxophonist, and certainly one of this generation's flute masters.

""There was a sense of this incredibly broad palette of expressive elements in his playing,"" said Ehrlich, ""and he used them with a lot of panache and vigor and exuberance. So I felt inspired as a co-conspirator."" Bassist Pavone shared an especially close relationship with Chapin, and found it hard to pick up his instrument after Chapin's death. ""I'll miss the music I'll never get to hear,"" he said. ""As Thomas told me, the plane was just gaining altitude.""

That's true. And what sent Chapin's music and his career soaring was more than technical mastery. It was a purposeful spirituality, fueled by Chapin's appetite for folk musics from around the world. ""Plenty of artists could push art forward,"" commented Sam Kaufman, Chapin's friend and manager for the last year of his life. ""But Thomas could be in front of any audience and hone in on what would touch them. He really was one of the great communicators in music. That's our biggest loss.""

That sense came across during several stirring benefits held for Chapin in his last months and maybe most forcefully at a memorial in St. Peter's Church in New York. His widow, Terri Castillo Chapin, spoke of how Thomas shared even his final struggle – of healing circles, of a ""team"" that united Western and alternative medical practitioners just as Chapin's music united players from various musical camps. Musicians played, revealing the depth of Chapin's influence, as well as his own rich body of compositions. And in the room's center was a blown-up photo of Chapin, hat in hand over his heart after a performance, projecting humility, seeming to say that all of this flows from, and to, a greater place.

%(small)Reprinted with permission from the author and Jazziz Magazine, July 1998%

%(small)*All albums previously released on Knitting Factory Records are now the sole property of and available through Akasha, Inc.%"

The Abiding Glow of Thomas Chapin’s Light

"That Gene Seymour Blog March 20th, 2013 — jazz reviews

The first time I heard him play was sometime in 1988 on an LP (ask your parents, kids, because I hear they may be coming back) entitled, The Sex Queen of the Berlin Turnpike, a jazz-and-poetry mix written and produced by a central Connecticut crony of mine named Vernon Frazer, novelist, raconteur, boxing aficionado and bass player who’d provided musical accompaniment to his readings here and, in years to come, at such venues as the Nuyorican Café and the Knitting Factory. As I listened, I became acutely aware of this flute coiling around Vern’s incantations and bass lines in lucid, deceptively simple patterns. As I grew up a flautist manqué, however reluctantly, I paid attention when people did unexpected things with the instrument, especially in jazz. And whoever was playing had nailed down a lyrical, probing style that refused to lean heavily on the flute’s naturally pretty tone. (The tone wasn’t pretty. It was beautiful, rich and – was it possible? – evenly layered.) And then I heard the alto sax solos. They could burn like scalding water. But they also soared; sometimes like jets, other times like gliders. More than anything, it was the relentless invention, the let’s-try-anything ingenuity that knew how to swing, bop and blow the blues in the grandest manner, but could step “outside” conventional changes with a nonchalance that seemed highly evolved even for the greyest of beards. I checked the name on the cover: Thomas Chapin. Hadn’t heard of him before that point and was chagrined at myself for not paying attention. I’d assumed he was this lesser-known veteran of the black music wars who likely spent the previous decade-and-a-half trolling through lofts along the eastern seaboard. “Who is this Thomas Chapin cat?” I wrote Vern, who in turn told me he was this barely-thirty-something white guy from Manchester, Connecticut. Manchester? Really? I’d spent part of my early newspaper years writing about that east-of-the-river suburb and, whatever its myriad virtues and defects, the next-to-last thing I’d have expected was someone who could wail like this. When I played this record to another colleague from those long-ago Hartford Courant days, his head swiveled as sharply as mine had to the sound of Chapin’s alto. When I told him who was playing and where he was from, my friend shook his head. “Shit, man,” he said. “Nobody from Manchester ever blew like that!”

It’s been fifteen years since Thomas Chapin died at just 40 years old and I still find myself wondering what he’s been up to. I keep thinking he’s got to be on some club’s weekend schedule, leading a trio or quartet in support of a new disc or performing yet another homage to his idol Rahsaan Roland Kirk. No matter where Tom would be, he would be turning heads, winning friends, encouraging people to come over to his side, no matter how forbidding or unconventional the setting. That’s what he always did, on- or off-stage. That’s why we miss him.

He was a member in good standing of the crowd of cutting-edge dynamos who waved the progressive-jazz banner throughout the eighties and nineties in downtown New York (a scene whose central HQ was that aforementioned Knitting Factory). Yet he also turned heads among more-traditional-minded listeners as a distinctive and highly accomplished post-bop player with a bright, lightly jagged tone and a prodigious, often-stunning range of expression. As with generations of musicians who had apprenticed under Lionel Hampton (in whose big band he’d worked for five years), Chapin carried “Gates’s” lessons of brash showmanship in his own trick-bag. But he never pandered to or shortchanged expectations, whether swinging from the core of a hard-bop standard or generating torrents of chromatic density off a simple riff.

The straight-ahead side blooms like fireworks on Never Let Me Go (Playscape), a recently-released triple-CD of Chapin leading quartets at two New York venues. The first two discs are from a November, 1995 show at Flushing Town Hall with pianist Peter Madsen, bassist Kiyoto Fujiwara and drummer Reggie Nicholson. The third disc teams Chapin and Madsen with the bass-drum tandem of Scott Colley and Matt Wilson at the Knitting Factory on December 19, 1996 – Chapin’s last live date in New York City. (He’d been diagnosed with leukemia the following year.) Though Chapin’s last studio recording, 1997’s Sky Piece, remains the one true gateway to his life’s work, Never Let Me Go evokes the warmth of Tom’s personality and the exhilaration he could communicate even to those who may not have fully appreciated his chosen idiom.

Ecstasy leaps from the first track, “I’ve Got Your Number,” whose chord changes provide a gauntlet for Chapin’s breakaway speed and power. There was never anything tentative about his attack; not even when, on the silky “Moon Ray,” the tempo gears down to stealth mode and Tom summarily shifts to shrewder thematic tactics. Along with his many other gifts, Chapin easily complied with Lester Young’s directive to “sing a song” when he played – which meant, as Prez suggested by example, to find the songs within the song that needed to come out. More than most of his downtown confreres, Chapin always exercised this prerogative, even on songs that weren’t part of the classic-pop canon as exhibited here on both “You Don’t Know Me” and “Wichita Lineman,” whose melodies Chapin irradiates with such conviction that you get the feeling he could have, in time, single-handedly embedded them both in the traditionalist fake-book.

His own compositions become occasions for Chapin’s more imaginative dramas of harmony and rhythm doing their approach-avoidance ritual. These are most prominent on the Knitting Factory gig; it must be noted that Matt Wilson, whose own embraceable style and personality are mirror images of Chapin’s, opens wider terrain for both Madsen and Chapin to lunge at the edges of time and space. On such pieces as “Big Maybe” and “Flip Side,” whatever ambiguities, discordances and incongruities play their way through each solo do so from a solid core, which Wilson tends with inviolate calm, but also with a gentle persistence of vision. Madsen makes his presence even more pronounced on the latter set; he builds his own model airplanes to fly as eccentrically, yet as emphatically as Chapin’s own. Together, this group could have helped make the cutting-edge a place where all would be welcome, exalted and, eventually, transformed. It’s nice to think so anyway.

When someone dies as prematurely as Chapin, there usually comes in his wake several voices inspired by his example to fill the void. (Think of all those bright, hot horns who picked up where Clifford Brown left off. Or all those actors who are still filling in the blanks left behind by James Dean’s car crash.) In the decade-and-a-half since Chapin’s death, those examples are harder to find, especially his ability, or more accurately, his impulse, to bridge the gap between progressive and traditional jazz music – or to, at the very least, extend what critic Jim Macnie characterized as the “dialogue” between two wary, warring factions. As jazz kept shifting shape at the close of the century, bending and twisting itself into new forms while struggling with how much of its past forms it should retain (or shed), Thomas Chapin offered a model for the music’s future by making his own art pliant, inquisitive and open enough to accept whatever the times demanded. I don’t know whether the “amalgam of freedom and discipline” described in Chapin’s Allmusic.com biography could have slowed down or even stopped jazz’s free-fall in a music marketplace that became even more mercurial after his death. But I’m far from alone in wishing he’d had more time to try."

Gene Seymour, arts and music writer; former music writer at NY Newsday

Suddenly, Life's Rhythms Shift For Jazz Wiz

By OWEN McNALLY; Courant Jazz Critic
January 31, 1998

All the world was Thomas Chapin's oyster last January as the globe-trotting, 39- year-old jazz saxophonist, flutist and composer was happily touring Uganda and Tanzania.

The Manchester native, who honed his formidable skills in Hartford jazz spots as a kid, served his national apprenticeship as a wunderkind musical director for jazz legend Lionel Hampton's big band from 1981 to 1986 and a swinging sideman for drummer Chico Hamilton in the late '80s.

In recent years, Chapin moved from such coveted mainstream employment to make his mark on the cutting-edge jazz scene with his acclaimed series of almost a dozen recordings on the Arabesque and Knitting Factory Works labels. The New York Times has hailed him as ""a virtuoso. . .one of the more schooled musicians in jazz, both technically and historically.'' National critics felt he was a star on the rise, poised to land a contract with a major record label.

But suddenly, in Africa, Chapin, the perpetual picture of health and a robust improviser, became stricken with a mysterious fever and loss of strength. Returning quickly to the United States, he was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia, a disease in which malignant cancer cells are found in the blood and bone marrow. Since then he's been in and out of the hospital, and undergone chemotherapy and blood transfusions. He's also tapped into such nontraditional care as herbal diet, acupuncture and consultation with a Tibetan healer.

Chapin has been too ill to work since his last gig in August at the Knitting Factory, the noted avant-garde bastion in lower Manhattan. Meanwhile, his ""massive medical expenses have busted'' his insurance coverage, says his good friend and longtime collaborator, bassist Mario Pavone.

To help out, many of Chapin's friends and colleagues will perform in a benefit concert for him Sunday at 5 p.m. at Cheney Hall, in his hometown of Manchester.

Dozens of musicians have donated their services for the marathon called ""In Harmony: A Vision Shared.'' The lineup includes The Thomas Chapin Trio & Brass (with Marty Ehrlich subbing for Chapin), the Peter Madsen Trio, the Don DePalma Group, Motation and Paradigm Shift.

"This response is just so amazingly beautiful. If I'm physically able, I'll be there," Chapin says by phone from his Manhattan apartment.

"I was supposed to be in Africa for five weeks last January. But I got sick, came home and found out it was this nasty thing. Not in a million years would you dream you would get some horrible thing like this. It just happens quickly. Usually people discover it just in a routine blood test, or when they start bruising," he says.

Chapin turned 40 last March, just two days after entering the hospital, gravely ill. Musician friends gave him a birthday party in his room and stayed by his bedside on half-day shifts.

In a more recent hospital stay, Chapin married his longtime sweetheart, Terri Castillo, an editor/filmmaker, who has had to take time off from work to care for him for several months.

"Things were really poppin' for us before Thomas became ill," says Pavone, a collaborator in Chapin's trio recordings.

Performances at leading jazz festivals and other gigs had to be shelved. A new release by the trio, "Sky Piece," will be released soon. Pavone believes it is their best ever, an artistic breakthrough. But Chapin's battle with leukemia has put everything on hold from day to day.

Sax of Life: Saxophonist Thomas Chapin expands his sonic consciousness

by Bob D’Aprile, Hartford Advocate, July 9, 1990

"Tom Chapin sits in his Queens apartment, surrounded by the music and art that shape his life. Instruments and recordings fill the room where this eclectic musician originates his ever-changing and ever-growing musical persona.

Since his formative days as a musician, Chapin’s artistic eyes have opened wider and wider with each passing day. And he fulfills his yearning for expansion of his sonic consciousness with a variety of projects in jazz, Latino and improvisational music.

""Even though I’m involved with a lot of projects, you try and give yourself to each one,"" says Chapin, 33, who was born in Manchester. ""I don’t know if I’ll ever arrive at a point where I’ll stop growing.""

Chapin, who will be playing in Hartford at both the Real Art Ways jazz fest and the 880 Club this summer, spent more than five years touring the world as musical director and lead saxophonist/flutist with the Lionel Hampton Orchestra. He’s currently involved with five other projects, ranging from the pure improvisation of his part time group Machine Gun (Which has released two ""live"" albums) to his own Thomas Chapin Trio and the five-piece Motation, both of which perform combined melodies and improvised composition. He also plays along with the Latin influenced sounds of Alborada Latina, a chamber music ensemble for Latin American music, and Flamenco Latina, a vocal and acoustic group which blends flamenco and Latin rhythms.

His latest solo album, Spirits Rebellious, recorded in 1989 and released on Alacra Records, ventures into the area of World music with a compliment of both traditional and improvised material.

Chapin has been developing musically since graduating from college 10 years ago. During the past three or four years, he’s been highly visible, with concert appearances at notable New York venues such as the Blue Note, the Knitting Factory and the Gas Station, and abroad as a featured artist in Venezuela and Panama.

Though he has been playing and writing music since he was a young boy in Manchester, Chapin began by playing the piano in imitation of an older brother. He soon dropped that instrument for the flute, and while away at Andover Academy picked up the saxophone as well. ""One of the guys was a saxophone player, so he let me borrow his soprano,"" he says.

Chapin remembers it was easy to transfer what he knew from the flute to the saxophone, and he concentrated on both instruments in college. Initially enchanted by the sound of the instruments, he was later introduced to the exhilarating creativity of jazz.

Chapin said he didn’t even hear the music of the great saxophonist Charles Parker until he was in college. Back in high school, he was listening to a sampling of rock music of the ‘70s – mainly groups such as Traffic, King Crimson and Jethro Tull, all with very strong jazz influences.

""All of those bands had saxophone and flute players,"" he says. ""I didn’t care about any of the rest of it that didn’t have the saxophone or flute. That was my attraction. I think my first jazz records: Roland Kirk; Sun Ra, the older recordings; Charles Lloyd; the old Chick Corea group, the Brazilian thing that they were doing; and I suppose I’d have to include Herbie Mann in there, plus the infamous Kind O’Blue album.""

At Hartt College (with Jackie McLean), Chapin says he was given essential training in the modern jazz masters, ""which is extremely beautiful and powerful music.""

After graduating, Chapin met Mario Pavone, later recording his first album, The Bell of the Heart in ‘81 for Pavone’s label.

The two have continued their musical collaboration. Currently, the Thomas Chapin Trio includes Chapin on tenor sax, with Pavone on bass and either Pheeroan ak Laff or Steve Johns on drums. The Trio’s only recording to date is included on Live at the Knitting Factory, Vol. 3, released in May ’90 on A&M Records.

""We’re working towards a real strong trio album,"" Chapin says. ""I like the openness of this kind of trio."" The group recently performed at the Newport Jazz Festival in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., and also taped a program for a Public Television series in Spain.

Chapin’s approach with the trio blends written and spontaneously composed music. The members use a sparse instrumental combination, exploring the tonal and timbral possibilities of saxophone, bass and drum combinations.

Improvisation, instead, is used to a maximum with Chapin’s other group, Machine Gun. The group, with two albums on the Manhattan-based MU record label, gets together once or twice a year for a live appearance. Chapin says he values that element of improvisation in his music.

""If I look at my life, it’s improvised in a way,"" he says. ""All my art is improvised so I try to find a less deliberate way of doing things. I do a certain amount of work. When I play, I want to play. I don’t want to play anything contrived.""

Reprinted with permission from the Hartford Advocate

%(small)All albums previously released on Knitting Factory Records are now the sole property of and available through Akasha, Inc.%"

Ridin’ The Reeds With Tom Chapin

by Gene Santoro, Daily News, January 26, 1994

"If you ride with reedman Thomas Chapin around jazz’ roomy sonic map, getting there is much more than half the fun. It’s the point.

He can play so hard it sometimes seems like his alto sax will either catch fire or leap out of his hands. Then he’ll turn around and unreel a gorgeous, glowing melody.

""There are a lot of different ways to structure your life and your music,"" says Chapin. ""Some people need to define what they are. I don’t. For me, it’s not a matter of negating things. It’s about accepting all that’s out there and selecting.

""One day last week,"" he explains, ""I worked with Mario Bauza’s Afro-Cuban Orchestra, recorded a demo tape of flamenco with a chamber ensemble for a Spanish dance company, and played Brazilian jazz with Avantango at the Nuyorican Poets Café.""

So it’s natural that this restless musical explorer is taking off in two different, if complementary, musical directions over the next few days. Tonight, he leads an edge-city trio – bassist Mario Pavone and drummer Michael Sarin – at the Knitting Factory. Next week at the Village Gate, he fronts a mainstream quartet, with pianist Allan Farnham or Pete Madsen (on different nights), bassist Kyoto Fujiwara and drummer Reggie Nicholson.

Chapin has the background to give his adventurousness real substance. After playing everything from classical and country music to R & B and rock, he got hooked on jazz as a teenager, when he heard the formidable multi-reedman Roland Kirk.

Armed with a degree in composition from Rutgers and training at the prestigious Hartt School of Music, Chapin first spread his wings with Lionel Hampton’s band, where he was music director from 1981 to 1986.

Leaving Hamp to tour with Chico Hamilton, Chapin began focusing on his own musical ideas and leading his own groups consistently in the late 1980s.

Of the trio, which began in 1989, he says: ""The situation there is very freely harmonic. It’s the place where I give my imagination free rein.""

At the Gate, his quartet will mix material from its recent fine release, ""I’ve Got Your Number"" (Arabesque Jazz), with other straightahead stuff.

""We all have multiple aspects,"" he says, ""and for me they come out in what I play."""

Thomas Chapin - Night Bird Song

By Paul Acquaro
Freejazzblog.org

A few weeks ago I had a chance to catch a screening of this new documentary on saxophonist/composer Thomas Chapin. It was an early cut of the film, and about two and half hours long. Not knowing a tremendous amount about Chapin, I went in thinking that 2.5 hours on a sunny Sunday afternoon is quite a commitment ... yet as the film neared its end, I was not ready to leave, I wanted to -no, needed to - see and hear more about this tremendous musician.

Stephanie Castillo, the filmmaker, is the sister-in-law of the late Chapin, who passed away from leukemia in 1998. She turned her eye towards making a documentary on Chapin a few years ago, after not really know him when he was alive (she explained in a Q&A that she lived in Hawaii, while her sister Terri lived in New York with Chapin). What she uncovers is a rich and focused life that comes into sharp relief in light of his untimely death.

The film, using footage, photos, documents and interviews, presents Chapin's life in two parts: the first a rather chronological log of his life growing up in Connecticut, his family, his growing musical interests, and his studies at Rutger's in the early days of its renowned jazz program. The film moves on to his work as music director of the Lionel Hampton big band, the fury of his group Machine Gun, and finally the creation of the Thomas Chapin Trio with bassist Mario Pavone and drummers Steve Johns and Michael Sarin. In watching the arc of Chapin’s foreshortened career, you cannot help but see how his ambition and focus were always underscored by his humanity and genuine curiosity. It can be humbling to watch.

The second half delves into some darker topics. There is mention of a brief period of alcoholism, followed by Chapin's spiritual discovery and his creation of the group "Sprits Rebellious" - a deep dive into Latin music which is still as fresh and enjoyable today, as evidenced by the performance by guitarist Saul Rubin and bassist Arthur Kell at the film’s screening. This coincides with the success of the Thomas Chapin Trio and the brilliant string of albums on the Knitting Factory label and is explored through conversations with people who knew and worked with Chapin, including Knitting Factory Label founder Michael Dorf, Downtown Music Gallery owner Bruce Lee Gallanter, bassist Mario Pavone, guitarist Saul Rubin, Terri Castillo Chapin, and many others.

In the final stretch of the film, we are confronted by Chapin's illness, which manifests during an extensive trip to Africa. It’s hard not to be swept with emotion as you watch this man who put so much energy into his music and had so much his lust for life, be taken by cancer.

My one complaint is that I wish there was more and higher resolution video footage of Chapin at work. I suspect that when he was working at his prime in the mid-80s through the mid-90s, it was just harder and a bit more costly to do video - not everyone walked around with HD video cameras like they do now, just rampantly documenting!

Needless for me to say at this point, Night Bird Song is a moving film that will hopefully present Chapin's small but brilliant body of work to a new set of appreciative listeners.

Night Bird Song: Tracing Thomas Chapin’s Flight Patterns Through Film

by Larry Blumenthal,
jazz writer-historian @ http://blogs.artinfo.com/blunotes/

BLU NOTES: Larry Blumenfeld on jazz and other sounds FEBRUARY 19, 2013

The papers and memorabilia of a late and great musician provide windows through which we glimpse the inner world that gave rise to the music. While rooting around in the archives of the late saxophonist Thomas Chapin, Stephanie J. Castillo—Chapin’s sister-in-law, and an accomplished documentary filmmaker—found a folder of sheet music that was on Chapin’s stand when he died, and a draft of a letter from Chapin to the Banff Center for the Arts, concerning a position as Artistic Head of Jazz (a handwritten excerpt is above). Castillo is working on “Night Bird Song,” a documentary about Chapin’s life and legacy; there’s a Kickstarter page to support that film, which features wonderful video and audio clips.

In his letter to Banff, Chapin writes of “jazz musicians as creators of our own careers because the channels that exist are limited,” and he stresses “flexibility” and “openness.” These were not necessarily the pillars of a nascent jazz-education movement in the late 1990s. But Chapin was always ahead of the curve, not to mention above the fray. As I wrote in a recent Wall Street Journal piece on Chapin:

The standard bird’s-eye view of New York’s jazz scene in the 1980s and ’90s depicts a mainstream revival of 1960s tradition, a wild and woolly downtown, and nothing in between. The truth on the ground was more fluid. There were musicians—some experienced, others on the rise—whose deep knowledge of tradition, engaging manner, exalted skills and adventurous spirit naturally bridged such divides.

Thomas Chapin fit that bill.

But Chapin died of leukemia on Feb. 13, 1998, three weeks shy of his 41st birthday. We’ll never know quite where his music was headed. As I wrote in the Journal, the recently released three-disc set, “Never Let Me Go” (Playscape Recordings), provided telling clues—drawn from a 1995 concert at Flushing Town Hall in Queens, N.Y., and from Chapin’s final New York performance, at The Knitting Factory in December 1996. Chapin translated the essence of his celebrated trio to quartet settings. There were ambitious original compositions played in public for the first time. The final song—Rahsaan Roland Kirk’s “Lovellevelloqui”—was one of those on Chapin’s music stand at his death, according to Castillo.

There is no such thing as a typical story for a jazz musician; the music is too personal, it’s context too mutable. Even so, Chapin’s story is notably distinct. He grew up in suburban Connecticut; attended Phillips Academy, in Andover, Mass.; served as Lionel Hampton’s music director for six years; and was among the first and most original of the musicians around whom promoter Michael Dorf built a record label and touring franchise from his Lower East Side club, The Knitting Factory. The many musicians who were touched, directly and indirectly, by Chapin’s innovative stance and enveloping spirit will determine where his legacy leads. Castillo’s film promises to root out more about from whence it came.

The title of Castillo’s film, “Night Bird Song,” is drawn from a signature Thomas Chapin Trio tune, composed and arranged by Chapin and his longtime bassist, Mario Pavone. While on a midnight walk, Chapin was inspired by the striking melodic turns in a bird’s song. Castillo reminded me of something I’d written for the liner notes of Chapin’s album named for that tune (which was released shortly after his death): “the arc of his career corresponded less to common categories of ‘downtown,’ ‘mainstream’ and more to the flight paths of birds Chapin seemed to favor in song titles. With grace and individuality, Chapin took us to places—lofty and striking and sometimes dangerous—that forced a change of perspective.”

“Night Bird Song”—the film—says Castillo, will take us to some of these places and linger long enough to find meaning.

New Stars

by George Lane

While all of the articles and most of the reviews I’ve done here focus on the 1920s through the 1960s, I’d like to delve into the artists I’ve heard over the past decade who, in this writer’s opinion, have held to the principles that have made Jazz such a great and special art form. In no way is this meant to be a comprehensive listing or even a real overview. It’s simply one man’s reaction to what has crossed his path in the past ten years.

One artist, who stands out as a musician who could have been one of the greatest had he not succumbed to another of Jazz’ long-standing traditions - the early departure from this planet - was the extraordinary multi-reedman/flautist/composer Thomas Chapin. I had the privilege of being friends with the man; and to know him was to love him. Not only did Thomas embody every important element of Jazz artistry - commitment, intensity, innovation, urgency, spirituality, virtuosity and vision - but his warmth, depth, intelligence, gentility and humanity made all who came in contact with him feel better about everything.

With a singular, contemporary and joyous musical vision, Thomas left behind an incredible legacy of work done over less than ten years. Whether working with his excellent trio (with bassist Mario Pavone and drummer Michael Sarin) or with his phenomenal augmented ensembles - as on the string album Haywire and the brass album Insomnia - every one of his CDs is magical and eminently worthwhile. The 8-CD box set Alive on Knitting Factory Records is an epic testimony to this very special man who succumbed to leukemia at 40 years old. Over the years, as with Booker Little, Clifford Brown and Eric Dolphy - three more gentle souls and brilliant musicians who left us much too soon - Thomas’ importance will continue to grow in his absence.

For some reason, the alto sax seems to be one of the richest veins of present-day treasure. Not only are veterans like Sonny Fortune, Gary Bartz, Jackie McLean, Oliver Lake and Roscoe Mitchell making some of today’s best music, but there’s a wealth of recent newcomers as well. Kenny Garrett has been one of the most individual and inventive soloists ever since he came to prominence in Miles Davis’ final bands. With a bold and powerful sound that seems equally influenced by Fortune and R&B great Maceo Parker, Kenny is always immensely satisfying, whether knee deep in funk or exploring the heavenly realms of the magnificent John Coltrane, as he did on his Pursuance CD.

Eric Person is another altoist who clearly adheres to the Coltrane tradition; adventurous, full-bodied and focused. In the more straight-ahead mold, Antonio Hart, Greg Abate and Abraham Burton (who I’ve heard is switching to tenor) have all impressed.

Speaking of the tenor, there has been quite a vacuum in the heavyweight horn’s history over the past thirty years, but there are signs of recovery.

Charles Gayle, a totally unpretentious, passionate and brain-scorching improviser, has been giving younger fans a taste of what the ‘60s avant-garde was really about with his big wobbling tone and passionate set-long improvisations that create a trance-like metaphysical aura of spiritual expression in the Albert Ayler/late Coltrane style. He also is an extremely interesting pianist. Ravi Coltrane is not only developing into a player of serious weight and potential, but must also be recognized for the staunch courage of taking on the instrument that his father wielded with such unprecedented power and spirit - and for sidestepping the obvious ""clone-like"" approach to pursue his own sound.

The young Cuban tenorman Tony Martinez’ CD with his group The Cuban Power, Maferefun, showed an evocative style combined with powerful rhythms and a deeply serious musical vision, and much the same can be said for the fine Puerto Rico-born saxophonist David Sanchez whose work with McCoy Tyner, Dizzy Gillespie and his own fine group shows a true commitment to the higher reaches.

Staying in the Caribbean mode, two recently popular pianists have managed to blend the rich textures and rhythms of their Afro/Latin heritages with a pure Jazz sensibility like no one before. Cuban Chucho Valdés is hardly a newcomer, having made his name initially with Irakere. However, he has recently taken the world of Jazz piano by storm. Hurricane might be a better word as his constant reminders that the piano is a percussion instrument produces blistering assaults on the keyboard. On his recent Blue Note recording, Live at the Village Vanguard, Chucho’s two-fisted playing probably should have required a piano tuner not only every day, but between tunes as well. Panamanian-born Danilo Perez has a gentler, but no less edifying approach to the piano. His tremendous Monk tribute Panamonk prompted Sonny Fortune, upon hearing that he was appearing in my hometown, to instruct ""Tell that bad boy if he gets any badder I may just have to slap him!"" When I passed the message on to Danilo, he showed the currently rare quality of humility and respect by ingenuously turning to his bass player truly stunned, saying ""Man! Sonny Fortune thinks I’m bad!"" And bad, he is.

The Sixties avant-garde tradition of pianists like Cecil Taylor, Andrew Hill and Don Pullen is being kept alive in the works of fine musicians like Andrew Bemke, Matthew Shipp and Myra Melford, and for some reason female Japanese pianists have been displaying a rather uniquely rhythmic approach, exemplified by Misako Kano and Junko Onishi, and I’ve been very impressed by a tiny powerhouse emerging from the rich music education houses of Boston (including the very special ""university"" known as George Russell), Chiharu Yamanaka.

As for the trumpet, another fine Japanese musician, Tiger Okoshi also cut his adult teeth with the legendary Russell, and Graham Haynes, son of drum master Roy, also worked in a rare small group tour with the under-recognized and profoundly influential composer/philosopher/educator/theoretician. Haynes first made a powerful impact on me over ten years ago with a stunning brass arrangement of a Hendrix tune in a concert tribute to the peerless guitar genius.

The great Philadelphia musical family, the Eubanks, have recently unleashed another excellent musician. Duane, a thoughtful and serious young man with a warm and personal sound, recognized the importance of the big band experience for trumpet excellence, has played with orchestras led by such diverse artists as Oliver Lake and Illinois Jacquet.

Duane’s older brother Robin is one of the best trombonists on the scene today. His electronic trombone experiments are not contrived simply for effect, but rather a real extension of the instrument’s tradition set forth by his personal idol and the father of modern Jazz trombone, the great J.J. Johnson. Taking a more multi-cultural approach to the instrument (along with the exotically evocative use of conch shells), Steve Turre’s music includes all of his wide range of experience with very special artists like three departed giants, Dizzy Gillespie, Lester Bowie and Tito Puente.

A virtuoso who stands above all recent players of his chosen instrument is clarinetist Don Byron. While sometimes his musical diversity may stretch a bit too thin or too far, his versatility and seemingly endless creativity evidences a link between the entirety of rich Jazz traditions and the ""downtown"" experiments of the interesting and talented composer/conceptualist/saxophonist John Zorn. Each of his live groups and recordings have a unique character and design, reflecting the eclectic tastes of their leader.

I’d be the first to admit that I am not a lover of Jazz guitar. In fact, the amount of time between the first plink of most Jazz guitar on my car radio and my pushing of another station button is even shorter than the fabled green-light horn honk of a New York cabdriver. While I love the chicken scratch funky guitar from basic James Brown or Fela Kuti to the more complex rhythms of Gary Shider and Blackbyrd McKnight with P-Funk, along with the brilliant work of Ali Farka Toure or the incomparable Jimi, the soft, compressed sound that characterizes so much Jazz guitar leaves me cold. However, the extraordinary playing of the long under-recognized Jean-Paul Bourelly is wondrous indeed. Whether stretching out on hard-blowing Jazz as he did early in his career with Elvin Jones or digging into raw blues, smoking funk or startling hip-hop, Jean-Paul is a monster. Why this extremely good looking, affable and audience thrilling musician is not a superstar is one of the more perplexing mysteries of the music business.

I also must admit to enjoying some of the work of Bill Frisell, Charlie Hunter and Mark Whitfield, especially when they‘re pushing the envelope.

Wrapping up this list is a man who I’ve only heard live once, but was impressed even more by his overall concept than by his fine playing is bassist Avishai Cohen, whose frequent focus on Middle-Eastern modalities just hits me the right way.

While I often find myself dwelling a bit on the glorious memories of the amazing New York scene of the Sixties, those who believe that Jazz is on a desperate decline would do themselves a favor to check out any of the artists mentioned above.

CD’s Recommended in the Article:

Thomas Chapin: Haywire and Insomnia (Knitting Factory Works) Tony Martinez & The Cuban Power: Maferefun (Blue Jackel) Danilo Perez: Panamonk - Impulse Chucho Valdés: Live at the Village Vanguard - Blue Note Kenny Garrett: Pursuance: The Music of John Coltrane - Warner Bros.

Other Recommended CDs:

Greg Abate: Bop Lives! (Blue Chip Jazz) Abraham Burton: The Magician (Enja) Don Byron: Music For Six Musicians (Nonesuch) Avishai Cohen: Devotion (Stretch ) Jean-Paul Bourelly: Saints & Sinners (DIW) Ravi Coltrane: Moving Pictures (RCA) Bill Frisell: Good Dog, Happy Man (Nonesuch) Charles Gayle: Consecration (Black Saint) Antonio Hart: Here I Stand (Impulse) Graham Haynes: Tones For the 21st Century (Verve) Charlie Hunter: Natty Dread (Blue Note) Myra Melford: Above Blue - The Same River, Twice (Arabesque) Junko Onishi: Fragile (Blue Note) David Sanchez: Obsession (Columbia) Matthew Shipp/Roscoe Mitchell: 2-Z (2 13 61) Steve Turre: Lotus Flower (Verve) Mark Whitfield: 7th Ave. Stroll (Verve)

Monument for the Ecstasy

by Rudie Kagie, Vrij Nederland, translated by Ineke van Doorn

"Who is familiar with the context is inclined to hear the call of death in the sizeable audio-monument in memory of sax and flute player Thomas Chapin. In his case the combination of talent, originality and an unbridled drive led to the best result of the scene surrounding the New York music lab 'The Knitting Factory.' This club acted as a starting point for an international career, but when Chapin, 40 years old, in February 1998 died from leukemia, only a relatively small group was convinced of his magnificence. He was not yet finished at all.

His fame stuck in the shadow of two jazz hero's whom he named as his most important influences. They didn't grew old either: Eric Dolphy turned thirty six, Rashaan Ronald Kirk died when he was forty-one. The three multi-instrumentalists who died too young, had more in common than an interest in different kinds of saxes and flutes. They chose free improvisation, but at the same time they stayed aware of the jazz tradition. The abstractions never became so diffuse that the listener quit in confusion. Wild outbursts usually were followed by a happy note which kept seriousness and humor in balance. This sense of perspective was typical for the contrastful character of the compositions. Musical intelligence never turned into dry intellectualism. Even when ecstasy shoot up like a missile out of the heart, the head stayed with it.

Chapin learned how music can excite an audience one year after he had finished conservatory, when he was in the big band of Lionel Hampton for six years as first alto player, flute player and musical director. ""Looking back to Hampton I see that his point is mainly the pleasure with which he communicates,"" Chapin would declare afterwards. When he left Hampton in 1989, he translated the stamping excitement which a big orchestra is able to cause into the minimal line-up of a his own trio. And he succeeded! Bassplayer Mario Pavone turned out to be a creative pal who fully understood what Chapin was after. Steven John on drums was replaced by Michael Sarin.

The group worked already well from the debut Third Force in 1992, but would gradually develop into an exceptional tight formation. The development til 1996 is easy to follow on the seven cd's which were released by the Knitting Factory. The reissue of the whole collection is completed by an eighth cd with two bonus tracks with a previous unreleased live performance from 1992 (at UC Davis, CA.)and a video of a performance at the JVC festival in 1995.

Sometimes he enriched the trio with strings, horns, the poet Vernon Frazer, or alto player John Zorn who played an important role in the history of the Knitting Factory. ""I want to give you the opposite of what you expect--maybe,"" Chapin wrote as liner notes for the compositions on the cd Haywire, some of which were influenced by cartoon music.

Widow Terri Castillo-Chapin points out in the cd booklet that few people truly knew her husband. ""He had many faces and held many contradictions in himself.... Restless, always searching."" Besides the work with the trio he developed other activities, like two conventional mainstream cds for the Arabesque label. One of those was ""You Don't Know Me,"" a title which could be interpreted as a message from Chapin to his audience.

After his death in 1998, a notice in 'De Volkskrant' showed that he had also friends in The Netherlands. Guitarist Marc van Vugt and singer Ineke van Doorn recalled the sax player who in 1996 only needed one phone call to spontaneously take a plane. He gladly wanted to cooperate in the recordings of their cd ""President for Life."" Later he came back for a tour with the quartet of van Vugt and van Doorn. ""He was more appreciated in Europe than in the U.S. where modern jazz is hard to sell,"" Ineke van Doorn says. ""Just when he was about to break through, he became ill.... When he heard that I write my own lyrics he sent me some of his compositions. Maybe I could do something with it, I had to decide for myself he said. On our newest cd his piece Hush-a-Bird is performed with a string quartet. Shortly before he died, he read my lyrics. As to his judgement about our interpretation, I will always guess."""

Monument For Miniature Big Band

by Frank van Herk, De Volkskrant, June 8, 2000

"When he was forty, sax and flute player Thomas Chapin died. His recordings for Knitting Factory have now been collected on eight cd’s. With pounding rock, Asian scales en scorching outbursts by the Thomas Chapin Trio.

An early death has seldom been more tragic than that of the American sax and flute player Thomas Chapin, who succumbed to leukemia in February 1998, forty years old. The tragedy lies not only in the fact that Chapin – just like for instance Eric Dolphy, who also passed away prematurely – was a clean living, modest and amiable man, but also in the realization that he, again just like Dolphy, had just made one of the most beautiful records of his career. Chapin was still passionately developing his music. How far he had already progressed can be heard on the recordings he made for the Knitting Factory label; they have been collected in an eight-cd box set with the rather wry but, when it comes to his music, also fitting title Alive.

There are more similarities with Dolphy. Both of them played a wide range of instruments with impressive craftsmanship, not with the intent to show off, but in the service of spirituality. Both players also had a sharp ear for the music in nature and the environment; Chapin as well as Dolphy were fascinated by birdsong.

But the main connection between them was their ability to work both within and without the conventions of jazz. They were both familiar with the tradition, the blues and bebop changes, and they were both able to leave the beaten track without shaking off the listener. No matter how abstractly they sometimes played, you could always follow them, and thereby share in a blissful freedom.

The gate to jazz was opened for Chapin by flautist-saxophonist Roland Kirk, another musician who could play anything he heard, and another undogmatic spirit. Kirk heard the beauty in historic jazz, in experiments that explored the boundaries of tonality, as well as in popular dance music and exotic sounds. Just like Kirk, Chapin made room in his music for high as well as low art. He wasn’t above performing a boogie like Iddly, steaming ahead with exhilirated cries, on Third Force, the first cd in this collection. When he inserted a number like that, he knew what he was doing. After all, for six years he’d been first alto and musical director for Lionel Hampton, who could drive an audience crazy with joy with his red hot mixture of swing and rhythm & blues.

All influences, including that of Hampton, came together in his main group: the trio with Mario Pavone on double bass and initially Steve Johns and then Michael Sarin on drums, that can be heard on all of Alive’s discs. In the seven years they were together it developed into the smallest big band in jazz, with three sections operating on equal levels, that could provoke and spur each other on with riffs, countermelodies and contrasting effects. Their ego’s blended into a whole that intuitively chose the right timing and phrasing – in the exuberant swingers, the solemn, chamber music-like ballads, the capers through space when they played ‘outside’. Pavone’s ever purposeful, expressive plucking and bowing and the richly textured hues and timbres of Sarin’s percussion worked together with the creamy, robust but mellifluous sax and flute of the leader to keep things moving in every area: rhythmically, harmonically and melodically.

Not that everything depended on intuition: Chapin guided even the most reckless improvisations with memorable, richly contrasted compositions. They also provided room for anything that had moved him, such as pounding rock, African grooves, Asian scales, or the flamenco rhythm in Night Bird Song, one of his strongest and most characteristic pieces.

On two of the cd’s that have now been rereleased, he augmented the trio with brass (on Insomnia) and string players (Haywire). The arrangements he wrote for them show once again how effectively he used his material: the larger line-ups brought a wider variety of color, stronger rhythmic excitement, deeper harmonic layers and an even greater wealth of beautifully sculpted melodies. A third project, the trio with added woodwinds, had to be abandoned because of his illness.

The last studio recordings of the Thomas Chapin Trio are preserved on Sky Piece, a heartwarming document and an artistic highlight. The integration of the three voices and different styles is practically perfect. In spite of the wide range of moods, from scorching altosax outbursts to serene flute meditations, everything is well-balanced. That control, even in the midst of a musical hurricane, also typifies the live-recordings that have been added to this release as a considerable bonus, along with a a video of the trio performing Night Bird Song at the Newport Jazz festival. For fifty minutes joy, passion, creative exultation and humor come bursting out of the speakers. The spirit of Thomas Chapin is still alive."

Monday, March 9, 2015 Thomas Chapin's Birthday!

An email remembrance to friends and fans of the 58th anniversary of Thomas Chapin's birthday on March 9, 1957. We all still miss him so much!

"Hello Friends:

Temperature's are warming up in the East this week and it's a great day to warm to a great friend and Force in music, my late musician-husband, alto saxophonist-flautist-composer Thomas Chapin. It's the anniversary of his 58th birthday today, Monday, March 9th. Let's take him into our hearts and offer gratitude for all he gave us, including pushing us to the edge with his music and inviting us to ""FLY""!

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LETTING THOMAS SPEAK

Here are some random sayings from 'In His Own Words,"" at the website www.thomaschapin.com:

“Playing, for me, is about changing my state of mind, moving out of my ordinary self. I’ve noticed that when I play, it’s almost like a different person takes over, someone who I don’t deal with in my day to day life, but who is inside me. I try to let this creative force take over. I try not to get too much into my conscious thought. It’s more a matter of setting up conditions—gaining mastery of my instrument, mapping out structures, that kind of thing—that will allow the conduit to open. And when the conduits do open, when that other person takes over, I just sit back and watch the show, and see what comes out. To me, that’s what’s divine about all of this. That’s why I love to play.”

“Compositions are a balance. It’s like saying, ‘for every poison there’s an antidote‘—if a composition gets too sweet, you have to mess it up, on purpose.”

“Once in a while I like to listen to polkas—that’s no sin.”

“All my ideas are influenced by my work in Lionel Hampton’s big band, but it doesn’t encompass the whole range of what I do now.”

“If I’m really going to be a ‘free’ musician, I should be free to do whatever I want to do. I should be able to step in and out with equal facility. If I want to play it all inside and it feels good, then why not?”

“You need opposition, friction. Without friction there is no heat, no energy, no life. You strive towards higher things, but you also have a body that wants to swing, that has erotic desires, that has to eat. Those are the devils, good and bad, that you should remain on good terms with. Sounds that are nothing but sweet end up not being sweet at all; it’s when they’re bittersweet that they become beautiful… “

In a way the disease kind of presents an opportunity. You’re alive. It’s something you’re going through. It’s something that’s very difficult, but it’s not something that is purely wasted. It’s something that can be transformational as well. You’ve got to make what you can out of what there is. It’s a rough lesson because it’s never what we want. Our mission sometimes does not go the way we want to go. But, nonetheless, we are in life for some kind of purpose in all things that you might come across, or might come across you.”

“I love my life… I’ve had a great life!” – spoken in his year of illness. “I’m at peace… because [I played] on Sunday.” – spoken ten days before his passing on Feb. 13, 1998.

“When you die…the melody remains. It’s the song of your life.”

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LISTEN NOW

""NYC's late-great avant jazz master Thomas Chapin, alto sax, and his Trio w/Mario Pavone, bass and Michael Sarin, drums, took this Beatle's tune, Ticket to Ride, out, out, out, speeded it up and did a punk-version takeoff of the classic, beating it to a pulp.""

Hint at 6.00 minutes, Chapin ""beats it to a pulp""!

Click Here: ""Ticket to Ride""://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rx_GsBg1ofw

Ticket to Ride w/Thomas Chapin Trio - Tondela Arts Fair, Portugal 1995

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FILM UPDATE

It's being edited now! An early 45-minute version will be shown this August, 2015 at The Litchfield Jazz Fest (CT) where a big band will play Thomas' music and the TRIO w/Mario Pavone and Mike Sarin and guest artist/s will play augmented with Strings or Brass. Be there!!!

MAKE A DONATION TODAY:

From filmmaker of Night Bird Song: The Thomas Chapin Story, slated for release in Fall, 2015:

""I posted this on Facebook today on the film's fan page. We have 604 fans now. Here's the post I wrote:""

Friends, Thomas's birthday is Monday, March 9. Have you supported this film yet? Donations are MUCH needed to pay for the things that must get paid at this time -- transcribers, editing equipment and software, fees for rights and permissions. Make a gift in his name to this film and be part of the kind donors who are making THOMAS CHAPIN, NIGHT BIRD SONG possible, who are keeping us going. If you've already given, won't you please consider giving again. Go to ""Donate""://www.thomaschapin.com/donate. Tax deductible. Small or large, we welcome any donation. Thanks!!

Warm regards, Stephanie Castillo filmmaker, Thomas Chapin, Night Bird Song Watch my film's trailer +1-808-383-7393

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Think of Thomas, smile, and have a beautiful day, everyone!

Best and love, Terri Chapin"

Hat and Shoes: The Thomas Chapin Piece

by Gary Parker Chapin - Coda Magazine, 1992

_Sunday afternoon at the Knitting Factory. For the month of December, Thomas Chapin is using this venue and time slot to record what will become his second trio record, Anima. The current tune being laid down by the trio (Chapin, alto sax and flute; Mario Pavone, bass; Steve Johns, drums) is a lengthy stomper called "Hat and Shoes"._

Thomas explains that the tune is about up and down, Heaven and Earth, Heaven and Hell, Angels and the Devil – in other words, hats and shoes. And, despite having to choke down the heavy metaphysics, that makes both structural and thematic sense. The first half of the A Section, for example, is a flighty, upper-register line, jangly, but reminiscent of someone's pastel-pleasant idea of the Great Beyond. Suddenly, with the second half, the mood reddens. Thomas hits the lower register and you hear the Devil stomping around below, popping and squealing and having a good time with it all. Soon, he's out of the A Section, into the B, and the trio is virtually rocking on a four/four vamp that funks out, building tension expertly and launching the group into the first round of improvisations.

It's a revealing piece, saying as much about Thomas Chapin's musical background as it does about his attitude towards hats and shoes. The trio's solos, like the structure of the tune, flirt with out-ness, but always make sense melodically and thematically. If Thomas' alto rips the plaster off the ceiling, then you can be sure it was perfectly appropriate to the tune that the plaster be brought down.

Actually, though, terms like 'in' and 'out' as applied to music have always struck Chapin as being little more than useless, prescriptive annoyances. This makes sense when you consider that his first important influence was Rahsaan Roland Kirk.

Chapin explains, "Roland Kirk was really important to me in terms of how I came into jazz – how I heard jazz. He's a person who is neither in or out, who is both. Also, the term doesn't apply. He's so deeply rooted in tradition and yet the spectrum in which he operated was total. And I hadn't heard much jazz before that. I wasn't raised on jazz, so I was just finding this stuff out for myself. It's the way the man thinks. There's a great deal of variety in his music. A great deal of span and range, in his music and in his sonic palette, which is very large.

"Also when you start listening you don't think of things like in and out. You like it or you don't like it. I listened to Charlie Parker and Sun Ra. And Sun Ra is rooted. Everything is rooted somewhere. Ornette Coleman is rooted in Texas and blues and bebop. All those guys are. They may have taken a different branch than other guys, but it's all part of the same tree. It can't be otherwise. It seems so obvious to me."

In terms of his own immediate roots, Chapin started on the piano at the age of three, picked up the flute at ten, and then the saxophone at sixteen. Although he has played tenor and soprano, and spends time exploring a vast array of world instruments, Thomas landed on the alto simply because, "That's my voice." After high school Thomas packed up his horn and took it to Rutgers University, studied up on their jazz curriculum, played frequently ("For me, Rutgers was one long rehearsal"), and got his degree. After this brush with academia Chapin quickly built himself a wide and varied resume: serving five years as lead alto and musical director for Lionel Hampton's band, working with the Chico Hamilton Quartet, playing with various collectives such as Motation, Zasis, and the freely improvisational Machine Gun. At the same time he worked in a number of Latin contexts, and engaged in a bunch of mixed-media experiments with percussionist Brian Johnson and Poets John Richie and Vernon Frazer. All of this while leading various bands of his own through performances and recordings for labels like Mu and Alacra.

At one point Thomas saw himself playing in so many dramatically different contexts that he thought he would give himself a different name – and personality – for each one. The only one that caught on was "Rage", which he uses when playing with Machine Gun ("It seems like that's what I do with that band.") But before he could dub himself again Chapin began working with the current trio.

Says Chapin about his cohorts: "Mario is one of the most energetic, inventive players I know. And Steve…when he locks onto a groove it's like a bulldog grabbing a postman. More importantly, though, they've each got very personal and particular strengths which make the music what it is. Somebody who has a personal sound on their instrument, to me, is ideal, because this is what I strive for in myself – my own voice."
There are many aspects of Chapin's own voice to discuss, both regarding his playing and composing. One aspect common to both of these things is the element of search – he never stops looking for new areas to explore musically.

When asked how he approaches the flute differently from the saxophone, he replies "It depends on the piece, the demands of the music. Sometimes I approach the saxophone differently from the saxophone. Often I try to play the instrument in a way that I don't know how to play it, and I don't know if that's a good idea. Sometimes I try to play it from a different angle within myself. A feeling will come over me, and I'll just strive for some different sound, like some different personality that wants to say something. It's very interesting to watch." Similar sentiments show themselves on the compositional front. For Chapin composition is a logical extension of the continual quest that is improvisation. It seems that the reverse should be true. Within jazz, wouldn't improvisation follow the composition? "I don't think so. I've spent a lot of time in free improv situations, and I've found that the forms arise very naturally."

"Whether that was our conditioning from playing written music or hearing it, how our minds formulated it…well, it wasn't a conscious thing. I'll just be improvising and out will come an idea that will strike me, and I'll say, 'hmmm, here's a point for further exploration.' That's where the writing process starts for me. It's very inspiration oriented."

This approach also seems to prevent 'concept' from intruding too heavily into Chapin's compositions.
He agrees, "There are ways of contriving things and there are ways that you can contrive to spur yourself on to do things that you wouldn't normally do – and you have to do that, it's required of you – but sometimes you hear the contrivance in the music, and sometimes you don't hear the contrivance. I prefer not to. In other words, the concept is merely the vehicle for an emotion – though I don't mean sentimentally emotional – I mean very direct communication."

One way in which Chapin's approach has changed recently – a way that allows for more direct execution and communication - is that, whereas he used to compose almost exclusively on the piano, he now works directly on the alto. How has this changed his music?

"Composing on the alto puts a heavy emphasis on melody and counterpoint, as opposed to the harmonic things that you tend to get into on the piano. Also, when you write on your instrument, the ideas that will come out will be formed differently. They'll fit that instrument well. We were talking about Hat and Shoes, and during the second part of the A Section, the devil part, I'm leaping around the low register. This gives it a certain kind of pop because it's articulated in a certain way. That wouldn't have happened on the piano. On the piano I don't think I would have done it like that. On the other hand, I wrote this bass line with no idea of what the bass could do technically. And what I had originally written was pretty much impossible, but Mario came up with a variation that worked out very well. If I were a bass player I wouldn't have written that line. So what you write is definitely affected by what instrument you write on."

Aside from these technical concerns, Chapin's search for a compositional voice involves drawing in information and putting it out in some holistic fashion. This impulse used to manifest itself in Chapin's tendency to place himself within as many musical contexts as possible. Today, it's more a case of bringing those contexts into the trio.

"The trio seems to best describe where I exist musically. It encompasses a lot of different material, but we remain ourselves. I think the more you embrace the more you become whole. This is true musically, and I'm not just talking about playing different styles. Compositions are a balance. It's like the saying, 'for every poison there's an antidote' – if a composition gets too sweet you have to mess it up, on purpose."

"And if this creates some feelings of ambiguity in the listener than it's a job well done. Ambiguity is one of the key points of the Tao. Ambiguity allows for maximum interpretation and experience. That's what I want."

Obviously, for Chapin, the voice encompasses much more than notes, song structures, and influences. Like the tune Hat and Shoes, everything Chapin puts out has some other musical dimension that reflects a poetic/spiritual world view. For example, the name of his upcoming trio record is _Anima_.

"The dictionary definition of anima is 'life spirit'. The psychological definition is, 'the feminine component of the male psyche.' In Italian the word means 'soul'. It represents to me the mysterious feminine – the creative force. That's the well that I am trying to drink from. And for me, the truly great musicians are the ones who draw from that well. I've always liked the shamans, the medicine men of the music. Roland Kirk, for example, he dipped heavily into the dream world. And Sun Ra, he just lives in that magic kingdom place."

The word shaman evokes powerful, universal images of the lonely mystic; apart from society, yet the creative, spiritual centre and healing force of that society. In jazz the shamans might be Monk, Coltrane, Ornette, Cecil, and a good number of others. The other aspects of this analogy which seems to apply to Chapin is the shamanic practice – documented from Siberia to the Great Plains – of purposefully inducing an altered state of consciousness in order to make the journey inward.

"Playing, for me, is about changing my state of mind, moving out of my ordinary self. I've noticed that when I play, it's almost like a different person takes over, someone who I don't deal with in my day to day life, but who is inside me. I try to let this creative voice take over. I try not to get too much into my conscious thought. It's more a matter of setting up conditions – gaining mastery of my instrument, mapping out structures, that kind of thing – that will allow the conduits to open. And when the conduits do open, when that other person does take over, I just sit back, watch the show, and see what comes out. To me, that's what's divine about all of this. That's why I love to play."

%(small)* All albums previously released on Knitting Factory Records are now the sole property of and available through Akasha, Inc.%

Free Jazz: A Subjective History

by Chris Kelsey

Web Note: A look into the context in which Thomas Chapin grew musically and grew free....Chapin is mentioned in the 80s-90s period.

Of the many musical sub-species that have emerged and diverged from Jazz's evolutionary track, none has inspired such controversy as Free Jazz. Free Jazz represented a final break with the music's roots as a popular art form, casting it in an alternative role as an experimental art music, along the lines of the European ""classical"" avant-garde. The Free players were the first jazz musicians (early-beboppers and Duke Ellington notwithstanding) to focus almost exclusively on a furtherance of the music's creative possibilities, at the expense of being understood by a lay audience. Their emphasis on jazz's primarily expressive properties--and consequent de-emphasis of its harmonic and rhythmic customs-challenged listeners and disturbed mainstream players, who saw in Free Jazz an art form dominated by a totally unfamiliar set of musical values.

Free Jazz was originally erected on a foundation of late '40s and early '50s bebop. The first Free Jazz recordings were made by the pianist Lennie Tristano for Capitol in 1949. Tristano was one of jazz's legion of unjustly-neglected geniuses; his heady, harmonically sophisticated and melodically intricate post-bop extended the innovations of Charlie Parker. Tristano and his circle, which included most prominently the tenor saxophonist Warne Marsh and altoist Lee Konitz, paid great heed to the use of counterpoint in jazz composition and improvisation--a throwback, in a sense, to the earlybazz collectivism of New Orleans.

A concern with jazz's contrapuntal properties distinguishes Tristano's first attempts at free-form improvisation. Those initial two Free Jazz sides--titled appropriately, Intuition, and Digression--were an outgrowth of experiments Tristano had conducted in private and, occasionally, in his nightclub sets. The free music recorded by Tristano's ensemble (Konitz, Marsh, guitarist Billy Bauer and bassist Arnold Fishkin) had no preordained themes or harmonies, no distinct formal structure or tonality. While tentative and somewhat unsatisfying to modern ears (due in part to a certain rhythmic stasis characteristic in general of Tristano), these tracks were without precedent in recorded jazz. Unfortunately, the music went unissued by Capitol for several years; it's uncertain just how influential Tristano was to the first wave of Free players. His music more directly affected the ""cool school"" of the 1950s. Certainly, freedom was ""in the air"", though it would be some time before it would spark a revolution.

That had to wait almost another decade. The years directly following Tristano's discoveries yielded intimations of the coming ""New Thing"", but it wasn't until 1958, when a young Texas-born and California-based alto saxophonist Ornette Coleman recorded his first album, ""Something Else!"", that the Free Jazz movement, as we know it, began. Coleman reached his first level of musical maturity in his home town of Fort Worth, playing alto in a style derived from Charlie Parker. In the early '50s, Coleman moved to Los Angeles and worked at a non-musical day job, studying music theory books and developing his own ideas of how jazz could be played. After suffering through repeated rejections by members of the local jazz elite, Coleman was befriended by the established bassist Red Mitchell, whose influence reportedly gained Coleman his first recording session for the Contemporary label. ""Something Else!"", the resulting LP, was a qualified success; the music was representative of his work mostly to the extent that it highlighted his compositions and the rapport he shared with Don Cherry. Coleman's next album, ""Tomorrow is the Question"", was more fully-realized, the band stripped of the piano that had cluttered up the first session. On 1959's ""The Shape of Jazz to Come"", his first album for the Atlantic label, Coleman brought together for the first time in the studio several of the musicians with whom he was to make his most enduring statements--Cherry, bassist Charlie Haden and drummer Billy Higgins. In the decade of the '60s, with this quartet and other groups featuring such soon-to-be Free Jazz icons as drummers Charles Moffett and Ed Blackwell, tenor saxophonist Dewey Redman, and bassists Scott LaFaro, Jimmy Garrison, and David Izenzon, Coleman would make a series of albums for Atlantic and Blue Note that permanently altered the face of jazz. These included such seminal documents as ""Change of the Century"", ""At the Golden Circle, Volumes 1 and 2"", and ""Free Jazz""--the album that was to lend its name to the movement it epitomized.

Much of what Coleman did had ample precedent: his music swung in a relatively conventional sense; he used a traditional instrumentation (bard saxophonist Gerry Mulligan was only the most prominent of Coleman's predecessors to have recently dispensed with the piano); his lines--both improvised and composed--clearly reflected the rhythmic contours of bebop. It was Coleman's manipulation of jazz's basic elements that was unusual. First and most obvious was the manner in which he dealt with tonality. Coleman's tunes were, essentially, very creative and quirky bebop ""heads"", melodically conceived, with simple harmonic underpinnings of secondary importance. Early Coleman tunes like ""Chronology"" or ""Bird Food"" were straight 4/4 swingers taken at a fast tempo, with tonal (or modal) harmonies implied in both the melody and the bass. The structures of these compositions were fairly ordinary; the way they were played was not. Coleman played bebop alto like a Rhythm & Blues shouter. His solos were vocalized to an extent unheard of in the self-possessed world of modern jazz. Drummer Shelly Manne said that when Coleman played, ""he sounds like a person crying...or a person laughing."" Coleman's phrases were chromatic in the extreme. The utter simplification of his harmonic accompaniment allowed him maximum freedom in his improvisations. Liberated from the need to ""make the changes"", Coleman's creative choices were unencumbered by the exigencies of functional harmony's consonant/dissonant relationship. His improvisational strategies were built, not on the composition's prescribed harmonies, but on its melody and the contingencies of performance. After the head was stated, his forms grew organically out of the interaction between the musicians. This shift in improvisational emphasis, from an adherence to a predetermined structure to the spontaneous interchange of ideas among the players, was the most revolutionary aspect of Coleman's music.

Following Coleman's innovations, a growing number of musicians turned to Free Jazz, excited by the seemingly unlimited possibilities of this new music. While Coleman worked in the foreground of the public consciousness, most of these other players practiced their art in relative obscurity. Pianist Cecil Taylor studied classical music at the New England Conservatory in the early '50s, before devoting himself to jazz later in the decade. Initially influenced by straight-ahead pianists like Horace Silver and Thelonious Monk, Taylor eventually developed a concept that did away with tempo and functional harmony. Possessed of perhaps the most astounding technique of any jazz pianist ever, Taylor's mature music was a highly-energized tempest of freely improvised atonality. He continued to be a catalytic presence into the late '90s. Many of the players who passed through the early Taylor ensembles--soprano saxophonist Steve Lacy, drummer Sunny Murray, alto saxophonist Jimmy Lyons, and tenor saxophonist Archie Shepp--became forces on the scene. In 1964, Shepp's collaborator, the trumpeter Bill Dixon, organized a series of Free Jazz concerts at a New York cafe called ""The October Revolution in Jazz"", which presented many of the artists who would determine the direction of Free Jazz in the '60s and '70s--players like the trombonist Roswell Rudd, drummer Milford Graves, pianist/band-leader Sun Ra. The event went far in establishing Free Jazz as a movement, and led later that year to the founding of The Jazz Composers Guild, an ephemeral yet influential performance collective that counted Taylor, the pianist Paul Bley, and composer Carla Bley among its members.

While these early Free players worked mostly underground, the music's second major figure carried out his experiments in full view of the jazz public. Unlike Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane came up through the ranks of the jazz mainstream, spending time in the bands of Dizzy Gillespie, Earl Bostic, and, most notably, Miles Davis, as a member of the latter's first great quintet. By the time Ornette had first attracted the jazz public's attention in the late '50s, Coltrane was already well-known as one of the most far-sighted hard-bop tenor saxophonists. Up to that point, Coltrane's greatest contribution had been his expansion of the jazz vocabulary; with each successive recording, one can hear him chafing at the bounds of tradition through the use of ever-more sophisticated harmonic, rhythmic, and melodic techniques in his improvisations. Where Coleman bypassed the theoretical implications of common jazz practice-largely by inventing his own system--Coltrane delved deeper into jazz's conventional harmony and rhythm than anyone before him. In the same year (1959) that Coleman defined his art by reducing jazz's tonal base to its bare essence, Coltrane increased the complexity of jazz harmony many times over with the recording of his epochal ""Giant Steps"". That album's and title cut remains the quintessence of jazz harmonic intricacy.

After ""Giant Steps"", Coltrane seemed to recognize the need for a greater contextual simplicity. Always an emotional player, Coltrane looked for ways in which he might obtain greater freedom to express his personal spirituality. In 1960, inspired by his experiences with Miles Davis, Coltrane began an extended exploration of modal jazz. The wealth of melodic choices given a soloist within such a system (a system somewhat like that which Ornette Coleman had simultaneously, yet independently, developed) appealed to Coltrane, and he began using it to his own ends. Over the next several years he recorded a series of modally-inclined albums that culminated in the late-1964 recording of his studio masterwork, ""A Love Supreme"", a heartfelt offering to God which featured the saxophonist's great quartet with pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Jimmy Garrison, and drummer Elvin Jones.

It was at this point that Coltrane began to embrace Free Jazz in earnest. The year 1965 saw Coltrane recording a series of albums that became progressively more free in content, beginning with ""John Coltrane Quartet Plays..."", and including ""Transition"", ""Kulu se Mama"", ""Om"", ""Meditations"", and ""Ascension""--Coltrane's large-group parallel to Ornette Coleman's ""Free Jazz"". Until his tragically premature death in 1967 at the age of 40, Coltrane continued to work in the realm of Free Jazz, experimenting with a variety of instrumentations and structures for improvisation.

It's interesting that, over the years, Coltrane's saxophone playing did not change nearly so drastically as did the background provided by his accompanists. Though he did alternately expand and contract his phrasing a bit in his later work, Coltrane's manner of improvising remained essentially the same; his searing intensity and extraordinary facility never waned. What changed was his musical surroundings. A literal sense of swing was ever-present in Coltrane's early-'60s music; Elvin Jones played with a great deal of rhythmic flexibility, but was always grounded by a sense of pulse. Jones' successor, Rashied Ali, loosened time to a significant degree. While he still ""swung"", Ali's tempt fluctuated by design. His concept was altogether more coloristic; he would often drive the ensemble with waves of free rhythm. By 1966, Coltrane had replaced the explicit muscularity of pianist McCoy Tyner with the more ambiguous textures of his wife Alice Coltrane. Also added to the mix was the tenor saxophonist Pharoah Sanders, whose screaming multiphonic attack ignored the horn's basic tenets of sound production. This later music was raw and asymmetrical: intelligent, to be sure, but almost totally at the service of emotion and physicality. In his last years Coltrane transcended jazz, looking to create a more universal music by incorporating non-Western devices and instruments; no musician did more to expand the definition of jazz than he.

Coleman and Coltrane were of monolithic importance in the development of Free Jazz, but that's not to say that there weren't others who, in those formative times, made major contributions. Los Angeles born multi-reedist Eric Dolphy's first high profile gig came as a member of drummer Chico Hamilton's band in 1958. The next year he moved to New York and became a member of Charles Mingus' piano-less quartet, where he formed a front line with the trumpeter Ted Curson. His fleet and harmonically unpredictable style on flute, bass clarinet, and alto sax was, in it's way, as radical as Coleman's, only Dolphy worked--in the beginning, at least--within jazz's customary frameworks. Dolphy was briefly a member of Coltrane's classic band, before striking out on his own, recording a series of modal/free albums of an increasingly high quality that peaked with the remarkable ""Out to Lunch"" in February 1964. Dolphy's untimely death four months later robbed the music of a dogged visionary.

Tenor saxophonist Albert Ayler fomented a revolution of sorts by virtue of his near-total indifference to the jazz that came before him. Ayler was born in Cleveland, where he was taught the basics of music by his saxophone-playing father. Some of his earliest performances took place in church; aspects of the African-American sanctified worship service characterized Ayler's mature style, with its ecstatic and cathartic whoops and screams. Reputedly, the young Ayler was conversant with bebop, though there is no convincing recorded evidence to support this thesis. Indeed, Ayler's music avoided the values of modern jazz; his art was, instead, a personal type of abstract expressionism made possible by the new aesthetic. His group concept was extremely free--Ayler used simple, hymn-like melodic materials played out-of-time and developed collectively. His saxophone technique was derived from the instrument's capacity for speed and tonal flexibility. Ayler's high-energy approach influenced Free Jazz saxophonists of his own time, and the generations to follow; John Coltrane took note of and was influenced by Ayler, who played at the former's funeral in 1967. Ayler himself died in 1970 at the age of 34--like so many of the greatest jazz musicians, well before his time.

The hyper-dense free improvisation of late-Coltrane and Ayler was the music's dominant strain in the late '60; at the same time, however, another group of players had begun working along very different lines. The musicians of the Coleman/Coltrane axis lived and worked mostly in New York City; this new movement was located in Chicago, and its priorities were considerably different.

The Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) was an outgrowth of the Chicago pianist/composer Muhal Richard Abrams' Experimental Band, an early '60s ensemble dedicated to finding new methods of jazz composition and performance. Members of the AACM included the saxophonists Anthony Braxton, Joseph Jarman, and Roscoe Mitchell, violinist Leroy Jenkins, drummer Steve McCall, and trumpeter Lester Bowie. Music of the various AACM players was characterized in the main by a concern for the use of textural contrast and compositional structure. Their early albums, such as Mitchell's ""Sound"" and Jarman's ""Song For"" defined a new, restrained concept that placed a premium on the use of unadorned space in the process of free improvisation. The Chicagoans' preoccupation with structure and silence was a logical reaction to the no-holds-barred energy music preferred by the New York musicians.

By the end of the '70s, the AACM sensibility had gained ascendance. Members and associates like Braxton, saxophonist Henry Threadgill, and drummer Jack DeJohnette led important bands; Mitchell, Jarman, Bowie, bassist Malachi Favors, and drummer Don Moye formed the Art Ensemble of Chicago, the decade's preeminent Free Jazz group. In St. Louis, an AACM-like organization, the Black Artists Group (BAG), produced saxophonists Oliver Lake, Julius Hemphill, and Hamiet Bluiett--three-fourths of the World Saxophone Quartet, which in the '80s would become perhaps the most commercially-successful of all Free Jazz ensembles.

The '70s and '80s saw a greater awareness of Free Jazz in Europe; in England, the saxophonist Evan Parker developed an extraordinary method of improvisation that relied upon the technique known as circular-breathing. Parker was able to play the most complex lines without pause and at the most incredible speed. Also British, the guitarist Derek Bailey pioneered the use of alternative tunings and unusual effects; he also wrote a notable text on various aspects of musical improvisation. In the Soviet Union, the trio of pianist Vyacheslav Ganelin, percussionist Vladimir Tarasov, and saxophonist Vladimir Checkasin played a vital form of Free Jazz that combined elements of their own national musical tradition with the American high-energy aesthetic. In Norway, the saxophonist Jan Garbarek played a Iyrical, folkish music reminiscent of Coltrane at his most tuneful. The German tenor saxophonist Peter Brotzman was a force of nature, playing a music reminiscent of Ayler, yet informed by the European art music continuum. In the '70s and '80s, Free Jazz truly became an international music, its many European practitioners by and large as accomplished and as critically acclaimed as their American counterparts.

The '80s and '90s were a period of both consolidation and fragmentation for Free Jazz. Innovation, where it existed, occurred in smaller increments. The older generation of musicians continued producing. Anthony Braxton continued his melding of jazz and contemporary classical music; Cecil Taylor refined his prodigious pianistic technique; Don Cherry, Charlie Haden, Dewey Redman and Ed Blackwell formed the quartet ""Old and New Dreams"", in tribute to their old boss, Ornette Coleman. As for Ornette, he reasserted his influence by adapting his concept of free polyphony (which he came to call ""harmolodics"") to funk music. Sun Ra, the mystic keyboardist/composer/philosopher, reached his greatest level of prominence. He led his long-lived ""Arkestra"" until his death in 1993; his group's highly theatrical performance style and the leader's eccentric personality drew attention away from a rather erratic and not always successful stylistic melange.

Younger musicians appeared, the most influential of whom was probably the tenor saxophonist David Murray. Murray came on the scene in the mid-'70s; he initially played tenor in a Free Expressionist style similar to that of Albert Ayler, except Murray displayed a greater interest in the whole of jazz's development. As the fourth member of the World Saxophone Quartet, Murray became that group's most volatile soloist and composer. With his own groups, Murray showed a consisent growth, bringing the opposing realms of masinstream and Free Jazz ever closer. By the late '90s, he had arguably become jazz's most conceptually well-rounded musician.

Other musicians who came on the scene in the '80s and '90s are too numerous to list; a few include the phenomenally dextrous pianist Borah Bergman, the timbrally-prescient saxophonist/trumpeter Joe McPhee, the powerful Free/Funk drummer Ronald Shannon Jackson, and the texturally inspired pianist Marilyn Crispell. In 1986, the Knitting Factory, a new night club on New York's Lower East Side, opened, and quickly became the center of Free Jazz activity in the city. A great many of the most prominent Free players of the late '90s became inextricably linked to the club, including the influential conceptualist composer/alto saxophonist John Zorn, the jaggedly lyrical trumpeter Dave Douglas, and the explosively Ayler-esque tenor saxophonist Charles Gayle. Other players making their mark by the end of the decade included pianists Myra Melford and Matthew Shipp, guitarist Joe Morris, saxophonists Tim Berne, Thomas Chapin, Ken Vandermark, Joe Maneri, and David S. Ware, bassist William Parker, trumpeter Herb Robertson, and drummers Joey Baron and Bobby Previte.

The radical self-consciousness possessed by the Free players has led to the creation of some extraordinarily original and ultimately influential music. It sprung from the font of modern jazz, yet very quickly became quite a different thing, something very apart from the populist forms of the music that, even today, define jazz in the public's perception. Free Jazz is, however, a stubborn and resourceful art form, and while it will not (and probably should not) supplant the existing mainstream, it will certainly continue to thrive in its own iconoclastic way.

www.allmusic.com/explore/essay/free-jazz-a-subjective-history-t764

Excerpt THE JAZZ FLUTE by Stefano Benini (Italy)

Excerpt THE JAZZ FLUTE by Stefano Benini (Italy)

At the end of the 80’s, American (Manchester, CT) musician Thomas Chapin (1957-1998) was in the spotlight. These years represented one of the prominent figures of the downtown New York scene and with his recordings and concerts, Thomas Chapin left an indelible imprint in a decade rich in ferment and development of improvisational music. He made his first recording, [website editor: BELLE OF THE HEART in 1981] and SPIRITS REBELLIOUS, in 1988 and made another fifteen of them as leader: all very interesting works, projecting in experimentation, in searching, and in freedom, essential components of the New York avant garde. Chapin also has to his credit various collaborations with other musicians among which, is the album with the guitarist Michael Musillami, in the ambience of which his flute playing stands out in all its bravura. If we review Chapin’s discography, we can divide it into three periods. The first period: the previous releases prior to the trio formation, with the use of a flute idiom which was tied to tradition, with the two disks SPIRITS REBELLIOUS (1988) and RADIUS (1991). I’VE GOT YOUR NUMBER (1993) with the quintet, and YOU DON’T KNOW ME (1995), also with the quintet with Tom Harrell on trumpet. The second period – with the trio, which was more congenial for him because it provides a lot of room for invention, and because it was less tied to the traditional canon. THIRD FORCE (1991), was the first CD in the trio format, followed by ANIMA in 1992, which saw the addition of brass, INSOMNIA in 1993, followed by MENAGERIE DREAMS in 1994, and HAYWIRE in 1996, with the addition of strings, and SKY PIECE in 1998. NIGHT BIRD SONG in 1998 [website editor: LIVE! ON TOUR in 1999] and RIDE (2006) are posthumous releases. The third period: in the duo format with pianist Borah Bergman includes two disks: the first in 1992, INVERSION, and TORONTO in 1997, which was recorded live, and was the last one performed by the great musician. Two great works, but very challenging, in which searching, improvisation, and interplay base themselves in a single moment. Here are two examples of his musical language in the first period, in which, among other things, are clear references to Bobby Jaspar’s sonority.

from IL FLAUTO JAZZ (LA STORIA, I PROTAGONISTI, IL REPERTORIO, IL METODO) (The Jazz Flute: History, Protagonists, Repertory, Method), p. 53-54.

AUTHOR: STEFANO BENINI. Publishing House:
EDIZIONI CURCI

© Copyright 2010 by Edizioni Curci S.r.l. - Milano
EC 11649 (www.edizionicurci.it) Translated by Sheila Solari

Excerpt Interview with Mario Pavone on Thomas Chapin

By ALLEN HUOTARI, Published: January 22, 2007

from An AAJ Interview with Mario Pavone: on Thomas Chapin ...

AAJ: How did you come to meet Thomas Chapin?

MP: In the summer of 1980—a friend suggested that I attend a concert at Bushnell Park in Hartford, CT—To hear this remarkable saxophonist. (The concert was a tribute to Charles Mingus and was directed and conducted by former Mingus sideman—Saxophonist Paul Jeffreys) the band was filled with notables such as Junior Cook, Ray Copeland, Bill Hardman, Joseph Celli, Kenny Barron, etc. It was an exciting concert—but the level was jacked up several notches every time Thomas stood up to solo—it really knocked me out! I met him after the concert—we became friends—and began an 18-year musical relationship—where we played in each other's groups and exchanged ideas and concepts.

AAJ: What have you learned from working with Thomas Chapin that you believe has made (or will continue to make) the most impact upon your musical philosophy?

MP: Thomas was a consummate professional—a stern task master—a virtuoso saxophonist and flautist—who always pushed himself and the group further—adding new challenges. He possessed a huge spirit. During the 80's & 90's we evolved along similar paths—sharing and exchanging concepts. His defining group—the trio—(with drummer Michael Sarin and myself) existed from 1990 to 1997, we had a great ride. I always thought he wrote big band music for trio (He was musical director of the Lionel Hampton Orchestra in the 1980's). He could play in or out with great command of the languages of each genre.

All of this has had a large impact on my music—and I still play several of his compositions in my trio performances.

AAJ: What musicians that you have never worked with before would you like to work with?

MP: Joe Lovano, Jason Moran, Ellery Eskelin, and Ornette.

AAJ: Although this next question is like asking a father to name his favorite child, which recording(s) would you most recommend to someone unacquainted with your work? Why?

MP: I would recommend Song for (Septet) (New World/Counter Currents, 1995) as a good starting place for someone unacquainted with my work. The brilliant arrangements by Marty Ehrlich and the late Thomas Chapin, as well as the instrumentation (vibes, clarinet, flutes) offer a rich pallet of attractive colors and textures. It's a very singing cd.

...

AAJ: What's the funniest or most embarrassing thing that's happened to you while performing or recording?

MP: Well, while I was touring with the Thomas Chapin Trio in 1992—and had to leave the tour bus—pick-up my own car—drive to NYC to sign a recording contract and then hook up with the tour in another city—I was late and drove for hours—got to the gig and noticed I had a flat tire—I played the set and went out and changed the tire. After the second set the trio (with Mike Sarin) came outside went to my parked car and as we approached it I exclaimed ""My God—I have another flat tire!""—well, it turned out that in my rushing I had changed the wrong tire—a perfectly good one—it was a good laugh for all of us—and shortly thereafter Thomas wrote a new composition—entitled ""Changes 2 Tires."" (which appears on a Thomas Chapin cd called ""Sky Piece."" (Knitting Factory))

...

AAJ: Thank you, good sir, for spending time with All About Jazz.

MP: In closing, I would like to add an acknowledgment and thanks to those artists who, so generously, passed on to me their gift for creativity: Paul Bley, Bill Dixon, Anthony Braxton, Leo Smith, Dewey Redman, Marty Ehrlich, and of course the late Thomas Chapin...among many others. Thank you.

For the entire interview, go to: http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/article.php?id=24493&pg=4

Mario Pavone Selected Discography

as leader Digit (Alacra, 1979) Shodo (Alacra, 1981) Sharpeville (Alacra, 1988; reissued Playscape, 2000) Toulon Days (New World/Countercurrents, 1992) Song for (Septet) (New World/Countercurrents, 1995) Dancer's Tales (Knitting Factory, 1997) Remembering Thomas (Knitting Factory, 1999) Totem Blues (Knitting Factory, 2001) Mythos (Playscape, 2002)

as co-leader with Michael Musillami Op-Ed (Playscape, 2000) Motion Poetry (Playscape, 2001) Pivot (Playscape, 2002)

as co-leader with Anthony Braxton Nine Duets (Music and Arts, 1993) Seven Standards (Knitting Factory, 1994)

with Thomas Chapin Third Force (Knitting Factory, 1990) Insomnia (Knitting Factory, 1991) Anima (Knitting Factory, 1992) Menagerie Dreams (Knitting Factory, 1994) Haywire (Knitting Factory, 1996) Sky Piece (Knitting Factory, 1998) Nightbird Song (Knitting Factory, 1999) Alive (8 cd set) (Knitting Factory, 1999) note: this set is the 7 cds listed above plus one live cd, titled ""Live on Tour!"" at UC Davis, '95

with Bill Dixon November 1981 (Soul Note, 1981) Thoughts (Soul Note, 1985) Son of Sisyphus (Soul Note, 1988)

with Paul Bley Canada (Radio Canada, 1968)

with Paul Bley and Annette Peacock Dual Unity (Tokuma, 1971)

with Michael Pavone Trio (Playscape, 2001)

with Creative Improvisers Orchestra The Sky Cries the Blues (CMIF, 1982)

with Samm Bennett Knitting Factory Tours Europe 1991 (Knitting Factory, 1991)

with Vernon Frazer Sex Queen of the Berlin Turnpike (Woodcrest, 1988)

with Motation Live At Hillside (Alacra, 1988)

with Don Rose Close Opposites (Alacra, 1979)"

Downtown Standout: Thomas Chapin Leads An Innovative Trio

By Bob Blumenthal - Perugia, Italy - September 6, 1996

"I'm constantly amazed that we can play anything, with no restrictions, and people always seem to relate to it," Thomas Chapin marveled; and those lucky enough to hear Chapin's trio in Italy this summer shared his amazement. For 10 nights in July, during the run of Umbria Jazz '96 in Perugia, the alto saxophonist, bassist Mario Pavone and drummer Michael Sarin had soared through two sets a night at the subterranean Club Il Pozzo, dispensing loose but lucid, coherently combustible jazz that left exhilarated listeners demanding more.

"Were always rooted," explained Chapin, whose trio will work similar magic at Scullers on Thursday. "And if you can begin with something that people relate to and take them a little further, it's like show-and-tell. That's what I'm supposed to be doing."

During a lengthy afternoon conversation on a terrace with one of Perugia's most commanding views, Chapin left no doubt that what he is supposed to be doing is music. "It was a state of being, it was never a consideration," he says of his career choice. "I've never taken a day gig. I've always supported myself playing music. And the music I play is what I need to do. If I was playing weddings, I'd die spiritually. There is a drawing power of the spirit, and if you're lucky, you get aligned with it."

Yet Chapin is not content to be pigeonholed. While he is a mainstay of the Knitting Factory Works label and a primary figure in New York's downtown scene, his alto (plus sopranino sax and flute) sounds just as convincing in the more straight-ahead settings of his Arabesque Jazz albums. Chapin got his first major professional exposure as lead alto sax and musical director for Lionel Hampton's big band in the early '80s, and even his wildest forays make room for touching hallowed jazz bases – as in one tumultuous improvisation on his original "Iddly" at Il Pozzo, which flashed references to "Freedom Jazz Dance," "Chameleon," "Syeeda's Song Flute," "Tickle Toe" and "Volunteered Slavery" along the way.

Chapin is not part of the famous musical family with the same surname. "I'm someone from Manchester, Connecticut, who attended Phillips Academy in Andover and happened on jazz. I remember listening to a Boston radio station that began a jazz show with a Coltrane invocation each morning; then someone gave me a Roland Kirk record by chance that changed everything. Before that, I used to dance and jump around to music as a little kid, and I took some piano lessons like everyone at the time. You get into things like music dirty, and then the rest of it is a process of purifying and getting down to essentials. Underneath is this ball of magnetism you're trying to polish and refine."

When he entered college, Chapin was playing the saxophone and pursuing musical studies seriously. "I began at the University of Miami, but bailed out real fast," he recalled; then I went to Hartt College [of Music, in Connecticut] and Rutgers. [Saxophonist/educator] Paul Jeffrey at Rutgers, really taught me the be-bop catechism; and we played gigs rather than concerts. I never took the time to transcribe solos and cop other players. I've always preferred to grab a bit of this and a bit of that," he stressed, kneading his hands, "and make my own mud pies."

His five years with Hampton brought further lessons. "I think of Lionel Hampton, who I spent so much time with, and that joy he communicates is what he's about," said one of the few younger players who gave signs of enjoying an equally good time in front of an audience. As the '80s progressed, Chapin moved more totally into personal areas, which he does not see as a deliberate change of direction. "It was never a transformation, because the trick when you're in a situation like a big band is to know in your own mind that you're on your own path. Jazz is essence expressing itself through personality, and I just started feeling that Thomas Chapin thing happening."

At decade's end, he discovered a means to that expression through his trio. "A friend asked me to put something together for a mini-festival in the summer of '89," he recalled. "I had a sextet at the time, and thought a trio would be a little different. Mario and I had already played together for eight years, and Mario introduced me to Pheeroan ak Laff, our first drummer. The same friend hooked me up with the Knitting Factory, which recorded our first gig – with Steve Johns on drums – in December '89 and put it on Volume 3 of their anthology series. They started Knitting Factory Works soon after that, when Mike Sarin joined the trio. We were the label's third signing, which gave us the forum."

While KFW has recorded five trio CDs and allowed Chapin to craft special projects where the group is augmented by brass and (on the new album "Haywire") strings, he has explored standards and more symmetrical originals on two Arabesque recordings. "I hate to define things in these terms" he said, "but I have this mainstream side to me. So I made a tape with musicians I had known for years, Ronnie Matthews and Ray Drummond." This led to "I've Got Your Number," which was followed by the even more impressive "You Don't Know Me," a memorable quintet date featuring Tom Harrell that is built around the five-part "Safari Notebook" suite Chapin wrote after a trip to Cape Town and Namibia. Because he has proven his "inside" mettle, and because his trio communicates on such a visceral level, conservative jazz fans and even jazz neophytes have begun warming to Chapin's working band and more limit-testing music.

"It's hard, it's very hard to create music," he stressed; "it's a clean slate every night. Yet somehow I'm here, playing music in paradise. Our appearance at Newport last summer was a milestone for the trio, and while I didn't realize it would be, this festival is, too. I've gotten into a very intuitive area, particularly with this group, where I don't really know what I'm doing. I don't want to know, because it's a better area."

Reprinted with permission from Bob Blumenthal

BAKER’S BIOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARY OF MUSICIANS

Transcription by Lito Vega

Centennial Edition
VOLUME 1
AALT – CONE

Author: NICOLAS SLONIMSKY AND LAURA KUHN
Editor Emeritus & Baker’s Series Advisory Editor

Publisher:
SCHIRMER BOOKS
© 2001
An Imprint of the Gale Group

PAGE NO. 616 - 617

CHAPIN, THOMAS, American Saxophonist b. Manchester, Conn., March 9, 1957, d. Providence, R.I., Feb.13, 1998. Though leukemia tragically ended his life when he was only 40 years old, he spent nearly a decade working as a leader and left behind a legacy of many excellent albums and performances and reputation as a versatile musician’s musician who was unfailingly gentlemanly. He moved freely between the dual (and sometimes dueling) N.Y.C. factions of the avant-garde downtown scene and was respected in both. Though in his trio work he would sometimes play outside time, unlike some avant-gardists he often played metered music even in non-mainstream settings. His natural exuberance made him an expressive showman, yet there was never the slightest sense that he compromised his musicality in any context; he was able to communicate directly and unassumingly in even the most challenging sonic contexts.

He attended the Hart School of Music at the Univ. of Hartford and later went to Rutgers Univ., studying with Jackie McLean, Paul Jeffrey, Ted Dunbar, and Kenny Barron. Starting in 1981 he spent six years as the musical director for Lionel Hampton’s big band; he also worked in Chico Hamilton’s group for a while. In the late 1980’s he formed his own groups and soon made a name for himself. When downtown N.Y.C. club The Knitting Factory started a record label, he was the first artist it signed. Bassist Mario Pavone was a frequent collaborator, and they worked closely in Chapin’s Trio and in Pavone’s own bands. His versatility made him a popular addition to many groups, from obscure avant-garde big bands in which he was sometimes the most famous player (Walter Thompson Big Band, Joe Gallant’s Illuminati) and improvisors on the fringes of jazz (John McCracken, Machine Gun) to such notables as John Zorn, Ned Rothenberg and Anthony Braxton.

His final album was recorded in 1996 but delayed until he could work on its production during a period of remission from his illness. It came out the same week he died. The Chapin-penned poem in the CD booklet, called Sky Piece, captures its mood perfectly: “So much sky/in the space of desert/my soul/rises/from a mournful Earth/into clarity/above Time./While Time is/it is best to be/in both worlds/Music/as the bridge.

Disc.: Radius (1990); Knitting Factory Tours Europe (1991); Third Force (1991); Inversions (1992); Insomnia (1992); Anima (1992); I’ve Got Your Number (1993); Menagerie Dreams (1994); Song for (Septet) (1994); You Don’t Know Me (1995); What Is Jazz? 1996 (1996); Haywire (1996); Dancers Tales (1997); Seven Standards 1996 (1997); Sky Piece (1998).-SH

ALL MUSIC GUIDE TO JAZZ: The Definitive Guide to Jazz Music

edited by Vladimir Bogdanov, Chris Woodstra, Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Thomas Chapin

d. Feb. 16, 1998, Providence, R

Sax (alto). Flute / Avant-Garde jazz, Free Jazz, Post-Bop, Modern Creative

Pages 215-216

The death of Thomas Chapin from leukemia at age 40 was one of those very cruel twists of fate that periodically mark the history of jazz. Unlike the many fine players to die of self-abuse before their time – Charlie Parker and Bix Beiderbecke come to mind – Chapin lived what was, by all accounts, an exemplary life. The fact that he was stricken in his late thirties by a disease that usually targets children is nearly inexplicable as it is tragic. Fortunately, Chapin left behind an artistically significant and reasonably large body of work. Alto sax and flute were Chapin’s principal instruments. He played alto with a huge, golden sound that sounded as if it had been burnished with fine-grained sandpaper. On flute, he had an edgy, near-classical sound that cut through his energetic rhythm sections like a knitting needle through pudding. Chapin was first attracted to jazz through the work of Earl Bostic and Rahsaan Roland Kirk. He attended college at Rutgers, where he studied with tenor saxophonist Paul Jeffrey and pianist Kenny Barron. After graduating, he then studied with alto saxophonist Jackie McLean at Connecticut’s Hartt College of Music. In 1981, he went on the road with vibist Lionel Hampton’s big band. He served Hampton for five years as lead alto and musical director. When the downtown New York club the Knitting Factory opened in 1986, Chapin was one of its first acts. When the club started its own record label, Knitting Factory Works, Chapin was the first artist signed. He formed a trio with bassist Mario Pavone and drummer Steve Johns in 1989. That outfit, with Michael Sarin replacing Johns, would form the core of his most adventurous projects until he died. At the end of his life in early 1998, he was just beginning to receive attention outside the realm of experimental jazz. Indeed, had he lived, it’s not inconceivable that Chapin’s amalgam of freedom and discipline might have become a force in the jazz mainstream. – Chris Kelsey

Third Force / Nov. 3, 1990-Jan. 19, 1991 / Enemy♦♦♦

Alive / Nov. 3, 1990-Jul. 1996 / Knitting Factory♦♦♦♦♦

Anima / Oct. 22, 1991-Dec. 1991 / Knitting Factory♦♦♦♦

Inversions / Mar. 30, 1992 / Mu Works♦♦♦♦

Nightbird Song / Aug. 28, 1992+Sept. 29, 1992 / Knitting Factory♦♦♦♦

Recorded in 1992, Night Bird Song remained in the can for seven years before Knitting Factory released it in 1999. Thomas Chapin had met an untimely death from leukemia in February 1998(he was only 40), and this posthumous release was greeted with great enthusiasm by those who were hip to the saxman/flutist’s music. It’s regrettable that this avante-garde/post-bop recording went unreleased for so long, for Chapin’s trio (which included bassist Mario Pavone and drummer Michael Sarin) is inspired, unpredictable, and cohesive throughout the album. Sticking to his own compositions, Chapin favors an inside/outside approach and fluctuates between moments of quiet, AACM-influenced reflection and intensely emotional playing.

Chapin’s pieces tend to be cerebral and angular and don’t go out their way to be accessible, but they’re well worth exploring because the expressive improviser had a lot to say. Whether he’s playing the alto sax, sopranino sax, flute or alto flute, Chapin’s restless spirit serves him well throughout Nightbird Song. – Alex Henderson

Insomnia / Dec. 1992 / Knitting Factory♦♦♦♦♦

Thomas Chapin, who had fairly distinctive tones on alto and flute, is a versatile improviser capable of playing anything from swing to free jazz. His regular trio (with bassist Mario Pavone and drummer Michael Sarin) is joined by a brass quintet (two trumpets, two trombones and the tuba of Marcus Rojas) for a set of adventurous and unpredictable but generally very logical improvisations, often building off simple ideas. Well worth a few close listens. – Scott Yanow

I’ve Got Your Number / Jan. 11, 1993 / Arabesque♦♦♦♦

Although this essentially a modern bop session, it is obvious that altoist Thomas Chapin was open to more explorative music. Chapin and his quintet (with pianist Ronnie Matthews) interpret three lesser-known standards and five of his own diverse originals. Chapin’s tone at times recall aspects of Phil Woods and Jackie McLean but is largely original, and his style is a bit unpredictable. He also takes inventive flute solos on two pieces (including Bud Powell;s “Time Waits”). The overall results are quite pleasing and often exciting within the modern mainstream of jazz. – Scott Yanow

Menagerie Dreams / Jul. 1994 / Knitting Factory♦♦♦

You Don’t Know Me / Aug. 23 1994+Aug. 24,1994 / Arabesque♦♦♦♦

Throughout this well-rounded CD, Thomas Chapin (who switches between alto, soprano and flute) is in superb form, whether doing a humorous impression of Eric Dolphy on “Izzit.” featuring his flute on “Namibian Sunset.” jamming on the chord changes of “Goodbye” (which is usually taken much slower) or putting plenty of feeling into the blues ballad “You Don’t Know Me”. Trumpeter Tom Harrell helps out on a few selections and pianist Peter Madsen has some outstanding solos but the album is recommended primarily for the exuberant and consistently creative playing of Chapin, a rapidly emerging talent who deserves much more recognition. – Scott Yanow

Haywire / Jan. 24, 1996+Jan.27, 1996 / Knitting Factory♦♦♦

Sky Piece / 1997 / Knitting Factory♦♦♦

Recorded a little over a year and a half before his untimely death at 40. Sky Piece is arguably Thomas Chapin’s best work and a fine example of both his instrumental facility and his strong musical conception. Nominally associated with avant-garde, Chapin actually tends to be relatively traditional and decidedly melodic player. The title piece here, with Chapin on bass flute, is a gorgeous, melancholy composition reminiscent of Norris Turney with Duke Ellington that few listeners could remain unaffected by. One is also reminded of the sound of Henry Threadgill and Air in both the deep melodic content as well as the liberties taken with it. On the album’s best pieces, including “Night Bird Song” – again with Chapin on flute as well as simultaneous alto and sopranino saxophones – and “Changes 2 Tyres,” one hears some of best post-AACM trio work on record; nothing contained herein is less than solid. Bassist Mario Pavone, a stalwart of several. Anthony Braxton ensembles, provides supple and imaginative support throughout. Sky Piece might be the best introduction to Chapin’s music and will be enjoyed in general by admirers of the more traditional wing of the ‘70s avant-garde such as Arthur Blythe. Recommended. – Brian Olewnick

All About Thomas Chapin

by Chris Kelsey, All Music Guide
2/28/2010

The death of Thomas Chapin from leukemia at age 40 was one of those very cruel twists of fate that periodically mark the history of jazz. Unlike the many fine players to die of self-abuse before their time -- Charlie Parker and Bix Beiderbecke come to mind -- Chapin lived what was, by all accounts, an exemplary life. The fact that he was stricken in his late thirties by a disease that usually targets children is nearly as inexplicable as it is tragic. Fortunately, Chapin left behind an artistically significant and reasonably large body of work. Alto sax and flute were Chapin's principal instruments. He played alto with a huge, golden sound that sounded as if it had been burnished with fine-grained sandpaper. On flute, he got an edgy, near-classical sound that cut through his energetic rhythm sections like a knitting needle through pudding. Chapin's style on all his instruments was utterly personal. Although he drew from influences like Rahsaan Roland Kirk and Jackie McLean, Chapin's voice was his own. His lines combined the linearity of classic bebop with the outward-bound, serial-like tendencies of much late-'90s free improvisation; his composition for small ensembles reflected the same traits.

Chapin was first attracted to jazz through the work of Earl Bostic and Rahsaan Roland Kirk. He attended college at Rutgers, the state university of New Jersey. There he studied with tenor saxophonist Paul Jeffrey and pianist Kenny Barron. After receiving his B.A. in music from Rutgers, he attended Hartt College of Music in Connecticut, where he studied with alto saxophonist Jackie McLean (whose bright tone and quicksilver articulation left a mark on Chapin's later work). In 1981, he went on the road with vibist Lionel Hampton's big band. He served Hampton for five years as lead alto and musical director. He later worked with drummer Chico Hamilton's quartet. In the late '80s, he began associations with fellow altoist Ned Rothenberg and the metal/free jazz outfit Machine Gun. He also began performing more often as a leader around this time. When the downtown New York club the Knitting Factory opened in 1986, Chapin was one of their first acts. When the club started their own record label, Knitting Factory Works, Chapin was the first artist signed. He formed a trio with bassist Mario Pavone and drummer Steve Johns in 1989. That outfit, with Michael Sarin replacing Johns, would form the core of his most adventurous projects until the end of his life. Chapin recorded a number of well-received albums, adding to his trio such guests as alto saxophonist John Zorn and violinist Mark Feldman. Chapin also recorded with a small string section and a brass section. These discs evidenced an even greater talent for arrangement and composition than had been previously apparent. In 1993, he led a date for Arabesque that showcased his more straight-ahead style; I've Got Your Number featured a rhythm section of the bop-oriented pianist Ronnie Matthews and bassist Ray Drummond, along with drummer Johns. The next year, he again recorded a fairly conventional jazz album for Arabesque, featuring trumpeter Tom Harrell and pianist Peter Madsen. Chapin also evinced an interest in world music. In person, he would frequently play various small hand percussion instruments and wood flutes, combining various traditions in an affectionate and non-exploitive way.

Chapin never deserted his avant-garde-ish roots, continuing to record excellent post-bop albums on the Knitting Factory house label. One of the last was Sky Piece, a trio with Sarin and Pavone, recorded in 1996 but finished and released just before his death in early 1998. Chapin was a player of great generosity and authentic spirituality. He played with rare humor, passion, and intelligence. At the end of his life, he was just beginning to receive attention outside the realm of experimental jazz. Indeed, had he lived, it's not inconceivable that Chapin's amalgam of freedom and discipline might have become a force in the jazz mainstream. ~