''Live at the Bracknell Jazz Festival, 1986'' is a live album by trumpeter

Don Cherry Donald Stewart Cherry (born February 5, 1934) is a Canadian former ice hockey player, coach, and television commentator. He played one game in the National Hockey League (NHL) with the Boston Bruins. After concluding a playing career in the A ...

. It was recorded in July 1986 at the

Bracknell Jazz Festival The Bracknell Jazz Festival was a major showcase for British modern jazz in the 1980s. The festival was known for attracting a largish audience for free improvisation, modern jazz composition and all kinds of British modern jazz in general. H ...

in Bracknell, England, and was released on CD in 2002 by

BBC Worldwide BBC Worldwide Ltd. was the wholly owned commercial subsidiary of the BBC, formed out of a restructuring of its predecessor BBC Enterprises in January 1995. The company monetised BBC brands, selling BBC and other British programming for broadcas ...

as part of their Jazz Legends series. On the album, Cherry is joined by members of the group called Nu: saxophonist and flutist

Carlos Ward Carlos Ward (born May 1, 1940, in Ancón, Panama) is a funk and jazz alto saxophonist and flautist. He is best known as a member of the Funk and disco band BT Express as well as a jazz sideman. Biography Ward was raised in Panama City, and at a ...

, percussionist

Naná Vasconcelos Juvenal de Holanda Vasconcelos, known as Naná Vasconcelos (2 August 1944 – 9 March 2016), was a Brazilian percussionist, vocalist and berimbau player, notable for his work as a solo artist on over two dozen albums, and as a backing musician wi ...

, bassist

Mark Helias Mark Helias (born October 1, 1950) is an American double bass player and composer born in New Brunswick, New Jersey. He started playing the double bass at the age of 20, and studied with Homer Mensch at Rutgers University from 1971 to 1974, then ...

, and drummer

Ed Blackwell Edward Joseph Blackwell (October 10, 1929 – October 7, 1992) was an American jazz drummer, best known known for his work with saxophonist Ornette Coleman. Biography Blackwell was born in New Orleans on October 10, 1929. His career began ther ...

. Ward, Vasconcelos, and Blackwell would later appear together on Cherry's 1990 album ''

Multikulti Multikulti is a slogan of the multiculturalism public policy approach. Its etymological origin is with the German progressive movements of the 1970s and 1980s. It was popularised by the German Green Party and gained popularity throughout Europe ...

''.

Reception

The authors of ''

The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings ''The Penguin Guide to Jazz'' is a reference work containing an encyclopedic directory of jazz recordings on CD which were (at the time of publication) currently available in Europe or the United States. The first nine editions were compiled b ...

'' wrote: "Ward's reeling, bop-tinged solos... are a major feature, and so too is Vasconcelos's party-piece 'O Berimbau'. Don squeezes off tight notes and phrases and there is more trumpet-playing than on some occasions." In a review for ''

Jazz Times ''JazzTimes'' was an American print magazine devoted to jazz. Published 10 times a year, it was founded in Washington, D.C., in 1970 by Ira Sabin as the newsletter ''Radio Free Jazz'' to complement his record store. Coverage After a decade ...

'', Bill Shoemaker commented: "''Live at the Bracknell Jazz Festival, 1986'' confirms Nu to be an ensemble that vigorously and cogently articulated the various aspects of the multi-instrumentalist's multicultural aesthetic... this exceptional concert recording fills a significant gap in Cherry's discography... ''Live at Bracknell'' is a good indicator of why Cherry's influence on subsequent generations is unique and apart from Coleman's." Garry Booth of the ''

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

Music Magazine'' called the album "gripping stuff," and stated that Nu was interesting because "it combined several of Cherry's incarnations: drummer Ed Blackwell who he played alongside in Ornette Coleman's Fifties free groups; Panamanian altoist Carlos Ward, who provided the bridge between free and 'world music'; and Nana Vasconcelos, who helped him absorb Brazilian music. So this session... reveals all those different aspects of the avant-garde multi-instrumentalist."

Track listing

# "Lito" (Carlos Ward) – 23:29 # "Chopin Chopeen" (

Ornette Coleman Randolph Denard Ornette Coleman (March 9, 1930 – June 11, 2015) was an American jazz saxophonist, trumpeter, violinist, and composer. He is best known as a principal founder of the free jazz genre, a term derived from his 1960 album '' Free Ja ...

) – 9:01 # "Foolish Heart" (Carlos Ward) – 6:58 # "Traffic" (Ornette Coleman) – 6:39 # "O Berimbau" (Naná Vasconcelos) – 4:35 # "Untitled" (Carlos Ward) – 11:20 # "Limbo" (Mark Helias) – 8:37 # "Mopti" (Don Cherry) – 5:00

Personnel

– trumpet, doussn'gouni, piano, vocals *

– alto saxophone, flute *

– percussion, berimbau, vocals *

– bass *

– drums

References

{{Reflist 2002 live albums Don Cherry (trumpeter) live albums