{"title":"Marion Brown","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eMarion Brown grew up in Atlanta, the grandson of an escaped slave from Georgia's Sea Islands, and spent his life moving between that Southern inheritance and the furthest edges of the jazz avant-garde. He joined the Army in 1953, played clarinet in a band stationed on the Japanese island of Hokkaido, studied music at Clark College and then pre-law at Howard University, and arrived in New York in 1962. Archie Shepp introduced him to John Coltrane, and in June 1965 Brown was one of eleven musicians on the \"Ascension\" session, a forty-minute collective improvisation that remains one of the most radical recordings in jazz history. His own ESP-Disk sessions followed, and then his first Impulse! recording as a leader, \"Three for Shepp\" (1966), with Grachan Moncur III and Kenny Burrell. In 1967 he moved to Paris, where encounters with African music, Impressionist painting and the music of Erik Satie pulled his thinking in new directions. When he returned to the United States in 1970, the result was \"Afternoon of a Georgia Faun\" (ECM, 1970), recorded with Bennie Maupin, Chick Corea, Anthony Braxton and Jeanne Lee: an album that sounded nothing like the free jazz he had made in New York, built instead on gentle, layered textures and childhood memories of the Georgia landscape. Two further Impulse! albums completed what became known as the Georgia trilogy: \"Geechee Recollections\" (1973) and \"Sweet Earth Flying\" (1974), both drawing on the poetry of Jean Toomer. A later run of Baystate recordings made in Tokyo and New York documented him in smaller settings, including the Johnny Hodges tribute \"Passion Flower\" (1978) with Stanley Cowell, Reggie Workman and Roy Haynes. Brown died in Hollywood, Florida on 18 October 2010, aged 79.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"marion-brown-passion-flower-1978-japanese-baystate-vinyl-lp","title":"Marion Brown - Passion Flower (1978 Japanese Baystate Vinyl LP)","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMarion Brown - \u003cem\u003ePassion Flower\u003c\/em\u003e | Vinyl LP - 1978 Japanese Baystate (RVJ-6024, RVC Corporation)\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMarion Brown came out of the 1960s avant-garde. He played on John Coltrane's \u003cem\u003eAscension\u003c\/em\u003e (1965), recorded for ESP-Disk' and Impulse!, worked with Archie Shepp, and made abstract, texturally adventurous albums like \u003cem\u003eAfternoon of a Georgia Faun\u003c\/em\u003e for ECM. So an album of Ellington and Strayhorn ballads, played with warmth and restraint, is not what his reputation would lead you to expect. That's what makes \u003cem\u003ePassion Flower\u003c\/em\u003e interesting. Brown approaches this material as a melodist, letting the beauty of the tunes carry the performances rather than deconstructing them. His alto tone here is soft and vocal, closer to the lyrical tradition of Johnny Hodges (to whom the album is dedicated) than to the fractured phrasing of his free jazz work. \"Passion Flower,\" the Strayhorn composition that Hodges made famous, opens the album, Brown stating the melody with a tenderness that honours the original. \"Smada\" (Strayhorn's \"Adams\" spelled backwards) follows. \"Prelude to a Kiss\" is one of Ellington's most harmonically sophisticated ballads, and Brown navigates its chromatic melody with care.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe rhythm section is superb. Stanley Cowell, one of the most harmonically rich pianists of his generation (and a founder of the Strata-East label), provides sophisticated, supportive accompaniment. Reggie Workman, who played bass in Coltrane's group during the same period Brown was recording \u003cem\u003eAscension\u003c\/em\u003e, anchors the quartet with a deep, resonant tone. Roy Haynes, one of the most versatile drummers in jazz history, plays with the brushwork and sensitivity that ballad interpretation demands. Side B continues the tribute with \"Solitude,\" one of Ellington's most enduring compositions, and \"Day Dream,\" another Strayhorn piece associated with Hodges. This is one of a series of albums Brown recorded for the Japanese Baystate label in the late 1970s (\u003cem\u003eZenzile\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003ePassion Flower\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eSoul Eyes\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eNovember Cotton Flower\u003c\/em\u003e), part of the wave of Japanese labels documenting American jazz musicians who found more support in Japan than at home.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis is the 1978 Japanese release on Baystate RVJ-6024, manufactured by RVC Corporation.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Baystate","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43784692367419,"sku":null,"price":85.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0630\/3203\/3339\/files\/IMG_7723.jpg?v=1783992662"}],"url":"https:\/\/lushliferecords.com.au\/collections\/marion-brown.oembed","provider":"Lush Life Records","version":"1.0","type":"link"}