Jon Hassell

There was a period in the ’90s when Jon Hassell was the doyen of premiere new music magazine The Wire. Such regard was primarily attributable to David Toop’s admiration. David Keenan’s summarily dismissive review of Fascinoma (?) signalled the end of this though. My own, positive, review of its successor, Maarifa Street, only momentarily broke the silence. This year sees him celebrate his seventieth birthday. In case you’re unfamiliar with Hassell’s work, this serves as a decent enough introduction (the rest can be found on his site):

COMPOSER/TRUMPETER Jon Hassell is the visionary creator of a style of music he describes as Fourth World, a mysterious, unique hybrid of music both ancient and digital, composed and improvised, Eastern and Western. After composition studies and university degrees in the USA, he went to Europe to study electronic and serial music with Karlheinz Stockhausen. Several years later, he returned to New York where his first recordings were made with minimalist masters LaMonte Young and Terry Riley, through whom he met the Hindustani raga master, Pandit Pran Nath, and embarked on a lifelong quest to transmute his teacher’s Kirana vocal mastery into a new trumpet sound and style. In the last two decades, he has recorded 11 [actually 13] highly influential, category-defying solo albums which have, over the years, become so widely appropriated that many of their innovations have become woven anonymously into the texture of contemporary music high and low.

Hyperbole aside, I’ve been listening to Hassell’s music for more than half my life. There is very little that is derivative about his work. He has taken a unique path in his preparedness to assimilate and successfully reconcile a diverse set of influences, both musical and technological. His approach to improvisation is striking, influenced equally by the Minimalists and Pandit Pran Nath referred to above, as well as Miles Davis. His sound is that of the sirocco blowing across the desert. It’s the sound of spirits drifting and calling. I don’t think there’s anybody else of his stature and unique approach around. Perhaps Arve Henriksen – whose sound is clearly influenced by Hassell – will prove a worthy successor in the slender thread of trumpeters that stretches from Louis Armstrong to Miles Davis and thence to Hassell. Henriksen however, appears more at home as an ensemble player (particularly Supersilent) than as a leader. Having said that, his three solo releases to date have been captivating and strikingly diverse and he’s still young, so who knows.

Not all of Hassell’s 13 albums are essential, but even the least engaging is more interesting than many others’ best work. Here are my recommendations for mining a unique oeuvre:

1. Possible Musics Vol.1 (1980), City: Works of Fiction (1990)
2. Aka-Darbari-Java/Magic Realism (1983), Dressing for Pleasure (1994), Fascinoma (1999)
3. Maarifa Street/Magic Realism 2 (2005)
4. Dream Theory In Malaya, Possible Musics Vol.2 (1981), Flash of the Spirit (1988)
5. Power Spot (1986), The Surgeon of the Nightsky Restores Dead Things by the Power of Sound (1987)
6. Vernal Equinox (1977), Earthquake Island (1978)
7. Sulla Strada (1981)

Links: Jon Hassell’s website, Echoes Radio 70th birthday show, Altered States: Fourth World by David Toop.