Sounds of the Circle is a tribute to the places and relationships in North Philadelphia that inspired Odean Pope’s artistic vision. In this video musician, composer, and improviser Jason Moran shares his own reflections on the relationship between “place” and music——-the influence of his upbringing in Houston, and living and studying in New York, on the ways he makes and experiences music. This Artforum Video supports Moran’s solo exhibition at New York’s Whitney Museum of American Art, running through January 5, 2020.
Herman Beavers is Professor of English and Africana Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, where he teaches African American literature and poetry writing. He is the author (or co-editor) of six books, the latest of which is The Vernell Poems (Moonstone Press). He lives in New Jersey with his wife and two children.
1
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
piety, a curious juxtaposition,
recollections in shallow depth of field
photograph: glissando of a smile
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
the two of uspoised in belated grace
the clamorous pull of brightness
dragged round the moon’s dark side
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
chords bruising the air, men cutting stone
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
2
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
chords bruising the air, men cutting stone
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
the clamorous pull of brightness
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
recollections in shallow depth of field
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
piety, a curious juxtaposition
photograph: glissando of a smile
the two of us poised in belated grace
dragged round the moon’s dark side
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
3
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
the clamorous pull of brightness
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
recollections in shallow depth of field
dragged round the moon’s dark side
photograph: glissando of a smile
chords bruising the air, men cutting stone
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
piety, a curious juxtaposition
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
the two of us poised in belated grace
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
4
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
the clamorous pull of brightness
recollections in shallow depth of field
dragged round the moon’s dark side
piety, a curious juxtaposition
photograph: glissando of a smile
the two of us poised in belated grace
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
chords bruising the air, men cutting stone
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
5
piety, a curious juxtaposition
photograph: glissando of a smile
the two of us poised in belated grace
dragged round the moon’s dark side
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
chords bruising the air, men cutting stone
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
the clamorous pull of brightness
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
recollections in shallow depth of field
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
6
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
dragged round the moon’s dark side
the two of us poised in belated grace
photograph: glissando of a smile
piety: a curious juxtaposition
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
recollections in shallow depth of field
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
the clamorous pull of brightness
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
chords bruising the air, men cutting stone
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
7
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
the clamorous pull of brightness
dragged round the moon’s dark side
the two of us poised in belated grace
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
recollections in shallow depth of field
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
chords bruising the air, men cutting stone
photograph: glissando of a smile
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
piety, a curious juxtaposition
8
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
piety, a curious juxtaposition,
photograph: glissando of a smile
dragged round the moon’s dark side
recollections in shallow depth of field
the two of us poised in belated grace
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
the clamorous pull of brightness
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
chords bruising the air, men cutting stone
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
9
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
recollections in shallow depth of field
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
the clamorous pull of brightness
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
chords bruising the air, men cutting stone
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
dragged round the moon’s dark side
the two of us poised in belated grace
photograph: glissando of a smile
piety, a curious juxtaposition
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
10
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
piety, a curious juxtaposition
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
recollections in shallow depth of field
chords bruising the air, men cutting stone
photograph: glissando of a smile
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
the two of us poised in belated grace
dragged round the moon’s dark side
the clamorous pull of brightness
11
the clamorous pull of brightness
the two of us poised in belated grace
dragged round the moon’s dark side
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
photograph: glissando of a smile
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
chords bruising the air, men cutting stone
recollections in shallow depth of field
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
piety, a curious juxtaposition
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
12
the clamorous pull of brightness
the two of us poised in belated grace
chords bruise the air, men cutting stone
recollections in shallow depth of field
heartbreak penciled in the sky’s tacit fakebook
thrill’s nomadic light, caricature of the spy
eyes cast up Front Street, murmuring a tune
photograph: glissando of a smile
blue throb of mo(u)rning, a vast telling
dragged round the moon’s dark side
handing ice to angels, one ache at a time
shedding sad names, together we go ghost
piety, a curious juxtaposition
one man, his saxophone; persuasion—
the circle’s lustrous brass
for Odean Pope
Reading time: 5 min
FEBRUARY 8, 2013 | BY ROB ARMSTRONG | VANTAGE | COLTRANE HOUSE, HISTORIC PRESERVATION, JOHN COLTRANE, NORTH PHILADELPHIA, PHILADELPHIA MUSIC HISTORY, PRESERVATION ALLIANCE, STRAWBERRY MANSION
Editor’s Note: John Coltrane is a Philadelphia legend, but how does the city account for his time here and the influence of the city on his work and his work on the city? Most of the jazz world he inhabited, which Rob Armstrong has so lovingly revealed in this article below, is gone. As a preservation issue, restoring and celebrating Coltrane and Philly’s jazz golden age is a challenge. The Preservation Alliance for Greater Philadelphia has begun thinking about that issue, convening a planning process to imagine uses for the Coltrane house in Strawberry Mansion. They’ve lined up two events in March: a Coltrane community workshop open to the public on Saturday, March 9th from 11AM to 2PM, for neighbors to share memories of Coltrane and ideas for revitalizing the house and a planning charrette later that month. For our part, we’ve launched another media partnership, this with the internationally acclaimed website All About Jazz, to explore Coltrane and Philly’s jazz legacy as it relates to the city of today–and tomorrow. This article and the others we feature will be published here and on All About Jazz, where you can find a new forum to share your Coltrane memories and ideas for repurposing his house.
When 18 year old John Coltrane moved to Philadelphia, in 1943 the nation’s third largest city, he entered a fundamentally different world from his hometown of High Point, N.C. Like many African-Americans who migrated to major cities of the North, Coltrane joined older family members and friends already settled there. They lived in an apartment at 1450 N. 12th Street between Jefferson and Master Streets in an area since demolished for the Yorktown Urban Renewal project.
John Coltrane House is at left, 1511 N. 33rd Street | Photo: Peter Woodall
What Coltrane, already a studious musician even in high school, encountered here was a vibrant and intense nightlife scene almost completely centered on live jazz. Trane entrenched himself among a large group of highly skilled musicians and took advantage of the affordable, serious musical education available, all of which would have been inconceivable in the small town Jim Crow South. According to saxophonist Odean Pope, Philadelphia was the “institution” that fostered great talents like Coltrane, pianist McCoy Tyner, saxophonist Jimmy Heath, organist Jimmy Smith, trumpeter Lee Morgan, drummer “Philly” Joe Jones, saxophonist Benny Golson, bassist Reggie Workman, and Pope himself.
Pope makes the case that with New York relying on talent from other cities but not entirely fostering its own brand of jazz, Philly was the greatest jazz scene in the United States between World War II and the mid-1960s. New York, headquarters of the top labels and largest venues, was where you went when you made it big. Instead, Philadelphia was the proving ground for jazz artists, and its working-class people fostered the talent by packing rooms every week from Tuesday to Saturday nights. The sheer number of clubs, musicians’ culture of sharing, strong instruction available at both the Ornstein School of Music, located at 19th and Spruce Streets, and the Granoff Studios, located at 2118 Spruce Street, and the discipline and practice regimen of key musicians in the scene, gave young men like Coltrane a true Philly jazz education.
“There was no end to the music,” says Pope, who would regularly practice with Coltrane and pianist Hasaan Ibn Ali, a Philly legend who Pope claims was the most advanced player to ever develop in the city. Pope lived on Colorado Street in North Philly, near Hasaan’s residence on Gratz Street. Together, they’d walk the few blocks to Trane’s house on N. 33rd Street, once the saxophonist took up residence there in 1952, and have long jam sessions, trading ideas, practicing scales and showing each other the harmonic possibilities of their instruments. Hasaan’s ideas were very advanced and Trane “practiced, practiced, practiced.” Unfortunately, there is only one recording session available featuring Hasaan Ibn Ali: “The Max Roach Trio Featuring the Legendary Hasaan,” from 1964 on Atlantic.
Pope argues that it’s possible to draw a direct line from the technique that Hasaan taught Trane to the harmony Trane developed later on tunes like “Giant Steps.” “Hasaan was the clue to all of that, to the system that Trane uses. Hasaan was the great influence on Trane’s melodic concept,” he says.
The Web Bar, 2006 (demolished) | Photo: Peter Woodall
At the Granoff Studios, Coltrane studied under music theorist Dennis Sandole, who is credited with providing Coltrane with the thorough knowledge of the theory and philosophy of the complicated rhythmic, harmonic and melodic structures necessary to create, compose and play his highly sophisticated brand of jazz.
For all their practicing, education and discipline, Coltrane and his fellow jazz contemporaries could count on playing to packed houses every night during the late 1940s and 1950s. Much of the action was on Columbia Avenue (now Cecil B. Moore Avenue), in a world almost entirely eviscerated by Urban Renewal–the building of Yorktown and the expansion of Temple University’s campus–and by the race riot of 1964 and its aftereffects of intensifying disinvestment and poverty: the 820 Club at 8th and Columbia, Café Society on Columbia between 12th and 13th Streets, and further west, the Crystal Ball on Columbia between 15th and 16th Streets, the Web Bar on Columbia between 16th and 17th Streets, and The Northwestern and The Point on 23rd and Columbia. Nearby was Café Holiday at 13th and Diamond, the Sun Ray at 16th and Susquehanna and North Philly’s largest nightclub in the 1950s, the Blue Note, at 15th Street and Ridge Avenue.
However, the best jazz “institution” of the era was the Woodbine Club, located at 12th and Master, for it was here that jazz musicians would gather at 2AM when their gigs ended. During these sessions, says Pope, musicians learned new ideas and showed younger players techniques that would then be incorporated back into the repertoires and sounds coming out of Philly, all adding to the vibrancy of the institution in this most musical of cities.
Playing consistently, night after night, in clubs allowed Trane and others to develop their unique sound. By the time he left Philadelphia for New York in 1958, “all of the information he had acquired in Philadelphia gave him the opportunity to open up all his ideas and concepts,” says Pope. This knowledge was based not just on touring regularly with Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, and other major jazz greats, but also in the uniqueness of the tight knit scene developing here and the way Trane would share his ideas with other musicians he knew and trusted in Philadelphia, gathering insight into his own methods in the process.
Reading time: 5 min
Sounds of the Circle harks back to a time when North Philadelphia was a mecca of jazz performance—- to a time when Ridge Avenue and Columbia Avenue (renamed Cecil B. Moore Avenue) were lined with jazz venues where local musicians could see their musical heroes and hone their own musical chops. Today, landmarks of those venues are almost nonexistent.
Thanks to Faye Anderson and All That Philly Jazz for tracking down the histories of the venues and recalling their significance to the artistic, cultural, social, and economic life of North Philadelphia. Check out some posts from All That Philly Jazz, as well as an article from HiddenCity Philadelphia, to get a sense of the environment that stimulated the creative energy of the “inspired circle”.
During Philadelphia’s golden age of jazz, there were jazz clubs in every neighborhood. There were so many that folks in North Philly didn’t go to joints in South Philly and vice versa. There were a handful of clubs that reached legendary status and attracted patrons from all over the city. The Blue Note at 15th Street and Ridge Avenue was “the town’s swankiest jazz emporium.”
From 15th Street to Columbia Avenue (later renamed Cecil B. Moore Avenue), Ridge Avenue was a jazz corridor where legends-in-the-making roamed.
Ridge Avenue’s last standing jazz club
Today it’s the last building standing on a lonely stretch of Ridge Avenue in Sharswood, a vacant-eyed skeleton that looks as if it might crumble any second. But back in the day, this emaciated Victorian knew how to party. Operating as the Checker Cafe (later, the Checker Club), it was part of a bustling African American entertainment district where jazz performers like Pearl Bailey, Cab Calloway, and Bessie Smith honed their craft.
It’s a bit ironic that the Checker is the only one of those Ridge Avenue joints to survive. It wasn’t the biggest or best known of the venues that lined the avenue during North Philadelphia’s jazz heyday in the mid-20th century. That distinction was probably held by the Pearl Theater on the next block, where Bailey and her sister Jura worked as ushers, and brother Bill tended the candy counter.
The Web Bar – 1964 Race Riot
WEB BAR
The Web Bar was located on Columbia Avenue (renamed Cecil B. Moore Avenue) between 16th and 17th Streets. Like all the jazz spots along the “Golden Strip,” the Web fell victim to the 1964 race riot.
The building was demolished in 2006.
THE GOLDEN STRIP
The biggest concentration of bars and clubs frequented by blacks and offering Jazz was along Columbia Avenue (later renamed Cecil B. Moore Avenue). Among what as upwards of fifteen different venues were the Crystal Ball, 820 Club, Spider Kelly’s, Watts Zanzibar — one of the few black owned venues—and the North West Club. [Lee] Morgan played at many of these with groups made up of his peers. The trumpeter Cullen Knight remembered seeing Morgan at the North West, leading a band consisting of tenor saxophonist Odean Pope and a rhythm section of McCoy Tyner, Reggie Workman and Ronald Tucker.
Both the Zanzibar and North West were private clubs, and these were often keener to employ, under-age musicians than other venues; in addition, removed from some off the commercial concerns of the regular bars, they were thought of as sites for some degree of experiment among young musicians, as ‘hardcore’ bebop clubs where players could cultivate their jazz improvisation without needing to make concessions to dancers or casual listeners. Private venues would often pay the musicians a decent nightly fee, often around $10.
In Whisper Not: The Autobiography of Benny Golson, the NEA Jazz Master recalled his days on the Golden Strip with John Coltrane:
On jam days—Saturday afternoons between four and seven—John and I started at one end of Columbia Avenue, where most of the clubs were located, and proceeded toward the other end. We played at each club for an hour, then moved to the next. If we didn’t get to a particular club, we started there the following week. These clubs were small, on the ground floor of apartment houses or in storefront slots, long and narrow.
Reading time: 3 min