See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/321137914

EXPERIMENT AND EXPERIENCE ON THE MUSIC OF STEVE LACY EDIT RITA DE

VUYST

Experiment Findings · November 2017

CITATIONS READS

0 138

1 author:

Rita De Vuyst
Afkikker/Klimop
28 PUBLICATIONS   0 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

Certificate of participation View project

Departament of «LITERATURE» (17) of International Mariinskaya Academy named after Maria Dmitrievna Shapovalenko View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Rita De Vuyst on 17 November 2017.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

EXPERIMENT AND EXPERIENCE
ON THE MUSIC OF STEVE LACY
EDIT RITA DE VUYST

1
We don’t determine music
The music determines us
We only follow it
To the end of our life
Then it goes on without us

Steve Lacy
If I must die
Let it be autumn
Ere
The dew is dry

Ozaki Koyo

From CD November

1934-2004

2
CONCERTS IN AFKIKKER

BONE A TRIBUTE TO STEVE LACY

DECEMBER 30 2016
JANUARY 20 2017
FEBRUARY 17 2017
MARCH 10 2017

Nieuwsbrieven Afkikker/Klimop

Van Oud naar Nieuw 30 december 2017

2016 kunnen we niet zomaar laten voorbijgaan zonder het feestelijk

te vieren!

Met de steun van de Nationale Loterij is het ons mogelijk om enkele zeer interessante
evenementen te organiseren, we kiezen resoluut om klassiek en jazz samen te brengen met het
oeuvre van Steve Lacy als mijlpaal. We danken eveneens Stad Gent voor de steun aan onze
projecten.

Op 30 december stellen we een klassiek programma voor met Mikhail Bezverkhni, winnaar
koningin Elisabeth wedstrijd viool, Kristof Bastiaensen, piano en Laurent Tomme, gitaar.
Het jazz luik wordt ingevuld door Andy Declerck, sax, Stan Callewaert, bas en Geert Hendrickx,
gitaar.

Enkele composities van Lacy gaan zowel klassiek als jazz uitgevoerd worden.
Naar volgend jaar toe willen we onze activiteiten verder zetten omtrent filosofie, wetenschap en
kunst. Muziek zal ons steeds weten te bekoren en archiefstukken zullen regelmatig voorgesteld
worden, we denken hier vooral aan de film ‘De Trein der Traagheid’ naar de novelle van Johan
Daisne.

We hebben verscheidene filmopnamen van Steve Lacy en Mal Waldron van Yves Opstaele in
de kast liggen en ook de concerten van 2016 kunnen we nog eens herzien met Timur Sergeyenia.

Iedereen is vriendelijk uitgenodigd op onze receptie vanaf 19 uur, het klassieke luik begint om
20 uur en de jazz mogen we verwachten na de pauze om 21.30 uur.

3
Aan iedereen een gelukkig en voorspoedig Nieuwjaar gewenst 2017!

Beschouwingen na het concert van 30 december 2016.

JAZZ GOES CLASSIC!

Vele kleine lichtjes die de stemming onderhielden, veel lekkers op de grote ovale tafel. Het
publiek wist dat er iets moois kon gebeuren en met een glaasje cava, of sapje werden de
muzikanten opgewacht.
Mikhail zette de toon in met pianist Kristof Bastiaensen, ze speelden Schindler’s List, muziek van
John Williams. Daarna volgde van Jules Massenet Méditation de Thaïs. Kristof speelde verder
nog muziekstukjes van Mendelssohn, Lied zonder woorden en Liebesleid van Kreisler-
Rachmaninoff.
Als overgangsfase speelde Mikhail Bezverkhni muziek van Monk, Mal Waldron en Steve Lacy.
Na de pauze was het de beurt aan Andy Declerck, vergezeld door Stan Callewaert op contrabas
en Geert Hendrickx op gitaar, ook zij speelden muziek van Monk, Mal Waldron en Steve Lacy.

4
We mogen zeggen dat 2016 voor Klimop een vruchtbaar jaar is geweest; zowel klassieke muziek
als jazz kwam aan bod. Met Steve Lacy’s muziek kunnen we verder, de wijde wereld in:
experiment and experience.
Intussen zijn er nieuwe banden gesmeed; een gloednieuwe band BONE A TRIBUTE TO
STEVE LACY is in wording met Andy Declerck sax, Mikhail Bezverkhni viool, Stijn Engels
piano. De première gaat door in Afkikker op 20 januari 2017 om 20 uur, deuren 19 uur en 10
euro inkom.
Dankzij de steun van de Nationale Loterij kunnen we dit project nu verder uitwerken op 17
februari en 10 maart.

Nathalie Loriers met Sam Gerstmans mogen we verwachten op 31 maart 2017

Voor alle info Rita De Vuyst 0475313997

20 januari, 17 februari, 10 maart telkens om 20 uur

Trio Bone, a Tribute to Steve Lacy
Mikhail Bezverkhni, viool
Andy Declerck, sax
Stijn Engels, piano
Rita De Vuyst, gedichten

5
CONCERT BONE A TRIBUTE TO STEVE LACY
AFKIKKER, 20.01.2017

Mikhail Bezverkhni: Albinoni, Schubert, Paganini

Trio Andy Declerck, Mikhail Bezverkhni, Stijn Engels
Bach, Andante
Ravel, Trois beaux oiseaux du paradis
Lacy, Bone, words by Lao Tzu
Pauze
Trio: Lacy: Mother Goose, words by Kenneth Rexroth
Duo: Andy Declerck en Stijn Engels:
Monk: Evidence
Mal Waldron: All Alone
Trio: Lacy, Art words by Herman Melville, Monk, Round Midnight

6
7
WHAT’S THE MEANING OF LACY’S MUSIC IN THE CONTEXT OF THE
EVOLUTION OF MODERN JAZZ
Steve lacy’s music may be the core and the inspiration for the next century.
Lacy was one of jazz’s greatest improvisers and musical minds, his compositions just start to be
discovered. He is also a composer, he composed about 500 tunes mostly based on a selection
of poetry from all over the world. The jazz media often forgot about this but Lacy gave it wings
and the words in combination with the music is what will survive.

In New York there is a band IDEAL BREAD playing a patchwork of Lacy’s music and the
WHAMMIES who demonstrate the appealing malleability of these compositions. The music of
lacy is usually clear in line and direct in melody, qualities that allow for significant interpretational
latitude. But we must be aware that an interpretation has nearly nothing to do with the organic
alchemic reactions lacy was performing in his laboratory of lit-sound.
Although Lacy did some interesting interpretations on Monk’s music, he went his own way which
was totally different. But he learned a lot of Monk and his music playing with Monk’s band for
16 weeks in New York.

The rich legacy left by Steve Lacy has been the source of numerous tributes since his untimely
passing in 2004. In Ghent, Mikhail Bezverkhni, one of his last musical partners often played in
Afkikker, Belgium an homage to Steve and now recently we got the formation of a band baptized
in Afkikker as BONE a tribute to Steve Lacy with Andy Declerck on sax, Stijn Engels on piano
and on violin Mikhail Bezverkhni, born in Saint-Petersburg and settled in Ghent, Belgium, after
winning the prestigious prize of Queen Elisabeth Concours in Brussels.
At this moment another devoted interpreter of Lacy’s music is SAM NEWSOME from New
York.

8
The first concert of the BONE project, is about 3 poems set on music by Lacy: Bone by Lao
Tzu, Art by Herman Melville and Mother Goose by Kenneth Rexroth.
Poetry was very important to Steve, his music comes from the words, the meaning, the rhythm,
the history.
Once Steve asked me to bring all the poetry together for which he composed the music. It is a
lot, I started but lost the track. Now with this project I could focus on the poems I knew, specially
Mother (Goose) which was dedicated to me. The poem is from Kenneth Rexroth. With this tune
Lacy projected on me the mother of his oeuvre. It is not an easy command in this world of rather
a horizontal lifestyle. The mother and the father culminated in the cd Mother (Goose solo @
afkikker, with the apotheosis of the orgasm at the end in Revenue.

The Trio Bone interprets Lacy’s compositions without taking in consideration the meaning of
the words, that’s why I intend to work in future on the poetry and poets in their historical context.
As I wrote a lot of poetry to Steve myself, we came on the same wavelength, now my letters are
waiting in an unknown archive to see the light. (probably 2034) Lacy thanked me many times for
all I did and should do in the future. With this carte blanche I make our future together.

Playing the music of Lacy is much more than just a tribute to an acknowledged master of
improvised music, it is bringing his testament to the open.

A lesson of Monk: Don’t play what the public wants. You play what you want and let the public
pick up on what you’re doing, even if it does take them 15, 20 years.

The Trio Bone, rehearsal for the concert in Afkikker, some more
tunes on poetry Mother Goose, Art, Bone, Blues for Aida, Herbe de
l’oublie.

9
Bone based on the text of the father of Taoism, Lao Tzu, who lived a 500 years BC.

Art the essence of the life of an artist about the meeting and the mating of opposites, the words
are by Herman Melville. This stands for a higher consciousness.

Mother Goose is a selection of lines by the godfather of the Beat Poets, Kenneth Rexroth. This
poem Steve Lacy dedicated to Afkikker, as the CD registered in Afkikker in 2001 was called
Mother (Goose) solo @ afkikker. This CD is produced by our label, Naked Music and is the
only CD of Lacy that could be published together with a book. The book and CD can be
ordered in Afkikker.

Blues for Aida & Herbe de l’oublie are two poems by Manyô-shû, Japanese poetry from the 10th
century.

It’s a long story how Mikhail Bezverkhni came in contact with Lacy, but I succeeded to find a
new partner for him in the classical world. As Bezverkhny was a winner of the prestigious
concours Queen Elisabeth, I was quiet sure Lacy would invite him in Paris. Michail went twice to
Paris but never invited me to join him. When I was invited by Lacy for an interview together with
Olivier Braet, at the beginning of 2002, Lacy told me already about his farewell to Europe. Soon
he would leave Paris to settle in Boston, where he was invited to give lessons at the New England
Conservatory.

This way I could order directly 2 of the 10 concerts, for his farewell in Belgium, that small country
with such a high concentration of friends. Lacy gave his leaving the name ‘Blossoms’. The 2
concerts I organized were a duo with Mikhail Bezverkhni and a duo with the Japanese dancer
Shiro Daimon.

As nobody had interest to produce the farewell concerts, at the end, I could do it with some
subsidy of the Flemish Community. The concerts were recorded and processed by Michel Huon.
The whole album of 5 cd’s and 1 dvd can be ordered at Afkikker. The dvd with Daimon was not
professionally recorded but it gives a realistic idea of the atmosphere and the spirit that was
evoked. Here the duo had touched one of the deepest unconscious layers, far beyond the
emotions.

The concert with Shiro Daimon, was like a meeting with the spirits of our ancestors. All the
concerts had a depth, nearly never reached in music, it was dramatic but not sentimental, it was
as the tune Lacy wrote for us ‘Cross Purposes’ meeting and parting at once. Very intense but
never stressed, the very last tune Lacy played with Frederic Rzewski in Antwerp was Deadline.
In Mons he recited the poem Art, about the meeting and the mating of love and hate. With Joelle
Léandre the tune Just Once More was very touching.

But the very last time I met Lacy was in the summer of 2003, in Germany at the hotel ‘Mon
Repos’ in Germany where he was invited by a private club for the opening of an art exhibition.

10
At the end of the concert we were drinking red wine and it became clear that this would be the
very last time as Lacy said to me ‘they are calling me’; I could see that he had lost weight and this
was very frightening. Steve said I think it is the Spleen, his very last words to me, as we were at
the same hotel, were: I have a long flight and so he was gone to heaven, as a black angel; I lost
my friend and lover.

In the poem I gave him, I had written: I step out of the circle, later I heard from Irene, that this
was his moto too. I also wrote in my letter we meet in both directions along the spiral AISURA.
Also this came out as we met in the hall of the hotel; I came from the garden en Lacy came from
the long corridor of the hotel. We met exactly at the door of the hall where a woman of the
organization was waiting for him. And so it was that I sometimes had only the time to give him
my poetry. Very rarely I was accepted by the organizers as a fiend.

I expect that Steve has written music on some words of my letters, the most purified love cycle.
On the first card in 1999 was written: A Thing of Beauty is a Joy Forever (Keats) And if I don’t
hear it in my life time, it will be food for the next generation. Music doesn’t die and words are the
best conservation.

When Lacy came to Ghent for the cycle Traces after his leaving, I was banned because of the
singer. But ‘Traces’ Lacy played for us in Afkikker and I’m very grateful for everything that I
could do and still can do. The band Bone gives a lot of satisfaction because of the poetry I could
recite; the organic truth represented in these lines of naked words and rhythm.

The farewell concerts took place in Belgium, July 2002.

11
Poetry from the program Bone

12
13
14
15
16
17
18
3 more concerts with Bone, a Tribute to Steve Lacy, in another
formation
May 20
June 23
July 23, the birthday of Lacy

With a subsidy from the Province East-Flanders, we could organize 3 more concerts
on the music of Steve Lacy and first of all we invited Chris Culpo, who played with
Lacy once in Brussels. The concert made a deep impression on me, at least 5 times I
invited Culpo for a concert, among others, the wonderful concert with singer Nicholas
Isherwood. This art-video was very well registered by Yves Opstaele and we show it
often in Afkikker as an archive treasure.

Andy Declerck prepared a few more Lacy tunes for his first collaboration with Culpo,
May 20, 2017 - the result was magic.

Christopher Culpo is an American composer and pianist, who has been living in Paris since
1991. As a performer and composer, Culpo lies at the confluence of contemporary classical
music, jazz, and free improvisation. He has written chamber and symphonic music, vocal and
opera, for the dance and the theatre, and has composed and improvised music for silent films.
He has been commissioned by Radio France.
Culpo has earned degrees in composition from Boston University and The Juilliard School,
where he studied amongst others with Milton Babbit and David del Tredici. He also studied
piano and improvisation with Charles Banacos. Following his studies at Juilliard Mr. Culpo was
personal assistant to Aaron Copland and an active Teaching Artist for the Lincoln Center
Institute. Since receiving a Fulbright scholarship to work with Tristan Muril in Paris in 1991,
Mr. Culpo has lived and worked in Europe.

19
20
Andy Declerck en Chris Culpo

21
23 juni 2017 Funky Bone

Met Funky Bone, - een trio met Andy Declerck, sax, Stijn Engels, piano en bassist Jouni
Isoherrenen - gaan we aantonen dat de muziek van Steve Lacy ook een funky noot best
verdragen kan. Het is de muziek van Lacy die alle talen spreekt en zich leent voor een
creatieve improvisatie. Voor Jouni wordt het alvast een inwijding.

22
July 23, on the birthday of Lacy, Andy Declerck invited drummer Stijn Demuynck,
The entrance was free and Afkikker offered a drink, a toast on the music and poetry.

23
Soon after the birthday of Lacy, we had to remember another birthday of someone still alive
and in top form, Mikhail Bezverkhni, he celebrated his 70 springs with an impressive solo
concert in Afkikker. The day after he left for America.

24
Other poetry Lacy has set on music

THE OWL GUILLAUME APPOLINAIRE

Mon pauvre cœur est un hibou

Qu’on cloue, qu’on décloue, qu’on recloue
De sang, d’ardeur, il est à bout
Tous ceux qui m’aiment, je les loue

25
TORMENTS GASTON CHAISSAC

Torment éphémère
Silence formulaire
Cascade autoritaire
Tous cela ne ferait rien
Mais hélas je suis
Bientôt prodigieusement lasse
De tant d’islotes désespérants
Et la beauté glapissant des mers
Est trop néfaste à ma bonté
La vie m’en est amère

26
TRACKS MARIO MERZ

Intervento su intonaco
Eseguito con sgorbia
Segni a forma di tracce
Di volatile
Il bianco è vuoto
Intonaco è sotto cimento
Il cimento è
Individuato

27
DOME KURT SCHWITTERS

Saägen knien regen welken tage

Sanften fromme tiefe sanfte hände
Tropfen wunde nächte nächtelang
Wunden sanfte riesen wölben dom

28
 Somebody special Brion Gysin

I want somebody somebody special

Somebody special to live with
Somebody special to look after me
I’ll look after somebody somebody special
If that somebody somebody special
Looks after me
I got the hands and the heart
To give with I’m not all that hard
Hard to live with

Who can this somebody somebody special

Possible be?
May be this somebody somebody special can only be
Me me me

29
 JACK’S BLUES ROBERT GREELEY

I’m going to roll up a monkey and smoke it,

Put an elephant in the pot, I’m going out
And never come back
What’s better that that, laying on your back flat
On your back with your eyes to the view
Oh the view is blue, I saw that too, yesterday and you
Red eyes and blue, funked
I’m going to roll up a rug and smoke it,
Put the car in the garage and I’m gone
Like a sad old candle

30
 HEAVEN ROBERT CREELEY

If life were easy and it all worked out

What could this sadness be about

If it was happy day after day

What would happen anyway

TRAIN GOING BY ROBERT CREELEY

When I was a kid I wanted to get educated

And to college go to learn how to know

Now old I’ve found train going by

Will take me along but I still don’t know why

Not just for money not for love

Not for anything thought for nothing I’ve done

It’s go to be luck keeps the world going round

Myself moving on, on that train going by

31
CD’s of Steve Lacy in our archive

1. Ten of Dukes
2. One More Time
3. Steve Lacy in Monreal
4. Gil Evans and Ten
5. Miles Davis Quiet Nights
6. New Jazz meeting Baden Baden
7. November
8. Steve Lacy Leaves Blossoms
9. Evidence
10.The Brion Gyson Songs
11.The Beat Poets
12.Hooky
13.The Gap
14.Steve Lacy and Frederic Rzewski 1977
15.Helen Merrill and Steve Lacy
16.Steve Lacy and Irene Aebi Afkikker 1999
17.5 x Monk, 5 x Lacy
18.Communications with Mal Waldron
19.Rushes 10 songs from Russia
20.Mother Goose solo @ afkikker
21.Guelp
22.Gil Evans and Steve Lacy
23.Japan Dream with Mal Waldron
24.Three Blokes, Lacy, Coxhill, Evan Parker
25.Steve Lacy Octet
26.Scratching the Seventies
27.Work
28.One Fell Swoop, Steve Lacy Quartet
29.Live at Dreher Paris 1981 with Mal Waldron
30.Live at Sweet Basis, Sextet
31.Soprano Sax 1957
32.Reflections, with Mal Waldron
33.Live in Budapest
34.Packet with poetry of Judith Maline
35.Steve lacy Five, The Way
36.Staples

32
37.Trio Baden Baden, 2002
38.Highlights from solo concerts 1972-1974
39.Steve Lacy and John Heward
40.Itinerary 1990
41.The Sun
42.Steve Lacy meets Riccardo Fassi
43.The Cry
44.Bye- ya
45.Clinkers
46.Steve Lacy leaves Blossoms 2002, farewell concerts
47.Sunset 1988
48.Gravensteen 1971, Ghent
49.Lost in June
50.Homage to Steve Lacy, Bezverkhni violin
51.Weal and Woe
52.Monk’s Dream
53.NY Capers and Quirks
54.The Door
55.Jazz Advance with Cecil Taylor
56.The Gleam sextet
57.Only Monk
58.The Straight Horn of Steve Lacy
59.School Days
60.Hard Talk met Mal Waldron
61.Morning Joy
62.Five Facings
63.Mal Waldron and Steve Lacy
64.MEV with Frederic Rzewski
65.Sempre Amore with Mal Waldron
66.Steve Lacy and Mal Waldron at Berlin 1984
67.One Upmanship with Mal Waldron Quintet
68.Monk big Band with Steve Lacy
69.More Monk
70.Steve Lacy and Evan Parker
71.Revenue, quartet
72.The Condor, sextet
73.Steve Lacy
74.Blues for Aida, solo at Egg Farm
75.The Holy La

33
76.The Complete Whitey Mitchell Sessions
77.Helen Merill, Stéphane Grappelli, Steve Lacy
78.The Best of Miles Davis and Gil Evans
79.Gil Evans the complete pacific jazz sessions
80.Somebody Special with Tiziano Ghiglioni
81.Steve Lacy with Cecil Taylor
82.Esteem with Mal Waldron
83.The Jean Miro Foundation concert with Irene Aebi
84.Sortie
85.Futurities
86.Mother Goose solo @ afkikker, withing book Bone
87.Blossoms album, 5 cd’s 1 dvd farewell concerts to Europe
88.Blossoms cd, compilation cd of the farewell concerts
89.Steve Lacy Quintet Last Tour
90.November
91.Lost in June

34
LP’s of Steve Lacy in our archive

1. Call Notes, Lacy with Walter Zubes Armstrong 2x

2. Sidelines with Michail Smidt
3. Stamps
4. Monk in concert
5. Company 5
6. Steve Lacy Quintet live in Berlin
7. Moon
8. The Crust
9. Troubles
10.Staples
11.Wordless
12.The Forest and the Zoo
13.Axième
14.Brion Gyson album
15.Steve Lacy and don Cherry 2x
16.Points
17.Deadline
18.Ballets
19.Steve Lacy plays Monk
20.Hocus Pocus
21.Concert Theâtre du Chêne Noir
22.Dreams
23.Evidence
24.Reflections
25.Snake- out with Mal Waldron
26.That’s the Way I Feel Now
27.The complete Jaguar sessions
28.Steve Lacy Three with Dennis Charles and Ronnie Boykins
29.Steve Lacy with Andrea Centazzo and Kent Carter
30.Mal Waldron with Steve Lacy quintet
31.Company 4
32.Amorcord

35
BIO STEVE LACY, for English see our book Bone, a tribute to S. Lacy
Geboren op 23 juli 1934 in New York, gestorven in Boston op 4 juni
2004
1934 was midden de grote crisis van een uitzichtbare ellende in de Verenigde Staten
en de stille hoop op een New Deal. Lacy zijn ouders waren als jonge kinderen van Kiev
naar New York geëmigreerd waarschijnlijk omdat ze gevlucht waren voor de pogroms.
Na hun huwelijk hadden ze een handel in klederen opgestart en ze woonden in
Brooklyn dichtbij het huis van Thelonius Monk. Lacy zijn echte naam is Steven Norman
Lakritz.
Zijn naam is veramerikaniseerd evenals deze van Stan Getz, Bill Evans en Gershwin
zodat de joods-russische wortels niet meer kenbaar waren. Lacy kreeg zijn naam van
Rex Stewart met wie de jonge Lacy zijn eerste optredens maakte.
Lacy maakte zijn debuut met klassieke jazz muzikanten en zelfs veteranen. Hij drong
in de jazz wereld binnen als fotograaf en maakte foto’s van bekende solisten, hij
verkocht zijn foto’s aan de ingang van de concertzalen.
Hij volgde eerst klarinetlessen bij Cecil Scott. Begin jaren 50 onderscheidt hij zich
tevens op sopraansaxofoon. Hij speelt bij de aller grootsten o.a. met Pops Foster, Zutty
Singleton, Willie The Lion Smith, Henry Red Allen, Pee Wee Russell, Max Kaminsky,
Buck Clayton, Dickie Wells, Hot lips Page, Rex Stewart….
Lacy ontmoet Cecil Taylor en participeert gedurende een vijftal jaren aan diens
experimentele zoektochten. Op korte tijd ruilt Lacy traditie in voor avant-garde. Dit
betekent echter niet dat hij een kameleon is, het getuigt veeleer van een anti-
dogmatische ingesteldheid, van een stijl van musiceren die wars is van vastliggende
codes en een wezenlijke, inherente openheid vertoont.
Het onvoorspelbare is doorheen zijn gehele carrière een rode draad gebleven. Na
jaren de wateren van de free jazz doorzwommen te hebben en het experimentele
territorium tot in zijn kleinste uithoeken te hebben geëxploreerd zou hij van tijd tot tijd
toch weer contact opnemen met traditionele jazzspelers. Uit opnamen met Bobby
Hackett (1964) en Kenny Davern (1978) blijkt dat hij zich nog steeds even goed thuis
voelde in hun entourage als in zijn debuutjaren.
Parallel met de samenwerking met Taylor bleef hij trouwens nog geruime tijd actief in
combo’s die een jazz speelden die het midden hield tussen dixieland en swing.

36
Tegelijkertijd nemen de muzikale studies van Lacy in die periode een meer
systematische wending, hij studeerde aan de Schillinger School in Boston en de
Manhatton School of Music.
Lacy koos uitsluitend voor de sopraansax, een uiterst moeilijk instrument om in toon te
houden. Voordien was Sidney Bechet de enige die van de sopraansax zijn
voornaamste instrument had gemaakt. Lacy leerde elke noot beheersen en bijsturen
en voegde nog een paar tientallen noten aan toe. Belangrijk is ook dat hij in grote mate
de waaier aan expressieve vermogens van het instrument verruimde. Hij kon zich goed
kwaad maken, gekke geluiden maken, maar zich vooral zeer lyrisch uitdrukken.
In 1957 nam Lacy Soprano Sax op. In 1958 neemt hij met Mal Waldron muziek op
van Thelonious Monk, Reflections.
Lacy participeert tevens aan verschillende albums onder leiding van Gil Evans en Miles
Davis. Met Gil Evans zou een levenslange samenwerking tot stand komen. Hij speelt
ook werkelijk in de band van Thelonious Monk.
De passie voor Monk’s music zal ook levenslang duren en van Monk speelt hij het
ganse repertoire.
Lacy’s zoektocht kende nooit rust en hij werkte ook aan de muziek van Anton Webern’s
vocale muziek die hij transponeerde voor sopraansax.
Al deze grootmeesters waren voor Lacy een uitdaging, geen comfort maar een
aanhoudende stimulans om zijn eigen grenzen te verleggen.
Tussen 1963 en 1966 bleef lacy in de kringen van avant-gardemusici met o.m. Paul
Bley, Steve Swallow, Mike Mantler, Carla Bley. In Italië speelt Lacy met Enrico Rava
en Giorgio Gaslini. Rava maakte deel uit van zijn kwartet waarmee hij in Argentinië
strandde.
Lacy verbleef in Rome van 1968 tot 1970. Hij schrijft muziek voor de film van Fillini,
Roma, uitgegeven op de LP Amarcord. In Rome leert hij de zangeres Irene Aebi
kennen. Vandaar verhuist hij met haar naar Parijs en in 1971 maakt hij zijn
debuutconcert in het Gravensteen te Gent.
In Parijs stelt hij zijn Sextet samen met Steve Potts als tweede saxofonist, dit sextet
zal 25 jaar stand houden.
Lacy heeft de onbegeleide solo-prestatie tot een volwaardige formule uitgewerkt, deze
beantwoordt perfect aan de uitdaging om de uiterste limieten van de sopraansax af te
tasten, terwijl de luisteraar de afwezigheid van een ritme-sectie op geen enkel ogenblik
als een manco ervaart.
Het eigen compositiewerk van lacy is met de jaren belangrijker geworden. In zijn
werken is er een evenwicht tussen de vrije improvisatie en compositorische vormen.

37
Het voorbereide kan echter op een onvoorbereide manier gespeeld worden. Alles staat
in dienst van het zoeken naar meer vrijheid en creativiteit en wederzijdse
betrokkenheid van de musici en het publiek.
Lacy heeft een 400 liederen geschreven die meestal door Aebi gezongen werden. De
teksten zijn van belangrijke dichters en schrijvers, ook van wetenschappers als
Feynman.
Dit betekende een terugkeer naar de vocale essentie en wortels van de jazz.
Echte jazzmusici streven ernaar hun instrument te gebruiken als een stem, goede
voorbeelden zijn Dexter Gordon en Lester Young. De stem was daar niet zo belangrijk.
Lacy heeft de dichters op de voorgrond geplaatst; de samenwerking met de dichter
Brion Gysin is op plaat gezet en op de cd The Beat Suite komen veel gedichten aan
bod van de Beat Poets die bevriend waren met Lacy.
Maar Lacy wou meer, hij streef naar een Gesamtspektakel waarbij muziek, dans,
choreografie, toneel, film, schilder-en beeldhouwwerk innig met elkaar vervlochten
raken.
Lacy heeft zoals elke eminente jazzmusicus een onnavolgbare en onmiddellijk
herkenbare stijl. Een belangrijk aspect daarvan is het element stilte in zijn muziek. Dit
betekent dat enkel het belangrijke een plaats krijgt, het wezenlijke. Lacy combineert
de kunst van de langzame aftastende exploratie met een logica die in haar besluiten
uiterst zuiver is. Zijn muziek is bijwijlen ascetisch en naar binnen gekeerd als een
meditatie, maar dat betekent niet dat ze van gedrevenheid of emoties gespeend is.
Het is een minimalisme van de overvloed.
Lacy is een unieke stillist maar heeft geen school gemaakt. Hij heeft een onnavolgbare
stem weten te creëren. Zijn invloed op andere musici is vooral van indirecte aard
geweest. Alles speelt zich af op het niveau van de inspiratie, hij incarneert voor
anderen een les in veeleisendheid. Zijn school kan slechts wortel schieten via de
filosofie en de draagkracht van het bewustzijn. De werking van het brein stond centraal
en wat hij er mee kon bereiken om zijn publiek te raken in de diepste groeven. Want
iedereen die erdoor geraakt is, zet de wetenschap van het inzicht verder en dit is
mogelijk op elk terrein dat tot expressie en actie leidt. Uiteindelijk komen alle filosofen,
kunstenaars en wetenschappers samen die de verlichting in zich dragen.

38
 Oh Ghent, with your bending bridges
Expressive faces of houses
Mirrored in historical waters
You look beautiful and sweet
But under your skill something is moving
As sunset shimmers
Your dark waters sparkle and hold still
The night falls in your bosom

39
And a black veil covers your dreaming eyes
Souls are meeting
Down the stoned stairs of the Reserva pub
At the very centre
On a black piano the Seasons of Tchaikovsky
Lyrical, creative, multidimensional
Transcending terrestrial ordering
Giving wings to unspoken regions
Breaking down old neuron connections
To clear the way
Entangled particles leading the dance
Under the magic hands of Timur Sergeyenia
The freezing of space-time
Super synchronicity
Pure delight and deep emotion
Feeling everything at once
Heaven and earth
Happiness loneliness
Summer and winter
The top of the mountain
The horizon
The rising Sun

40
MORE POETRY LACY HAS SET ON MUSIC
Russian Poetry from the album Rushes of Steve Lacy

I Know the Truth by Marina Tsvetaeva

I know the truth — give up all other truths!

No need for people anywhere on earth to struggle.
Look — it is

evening, look, it is nearly night:

what do you speak of, poets, lovers, generals?

The wind is level now, the earth is wet with dew,

the storm of stars in the sky will turn to quiet.
And soon all of us will sleep under the earth, we
who never let each other sleep above it.

41
 SKETCH OSIP MANDELSTAM

Un corps me fut donné – pour quelles fins ?

Ce corps qui est un seul, tellement mien
Ce bonheur serein, vivre et respire
Qui, dites-moi, dois-je en remercier ?
Je suis le jardinier, la fleur aussi
Au cachot du monde point seul ne suis
Mon souffle, ma chaleur ont embué
Déjà la vitre de l’éternité
Si du dessin s’y incrussent les traits
L’instants d’après nul ne les reconnait
Que de l’instant s’écoule la buée
La chère esquisse n’en sera brouillé

SEQUEL OSIP MANDELSTAM

Mounds of human heads are wandering into the distance

I dwindle among them, nobody sees me
But in books much loved, and in children’s games I shall rise
From the dead to say
The sun is shining!

42
 THE CUCKOO ANNA AKHMATOVA

I live like a cuckoo in a clock

I don’t envy the birds of a flock
They wind me up and I cuckoo
A fate like this – sad but true –
I can only wish, and do
On an enemy or two

THE SMILE ANNA AKHMATOVA

J’ai un sourire à peine perceptible

Rien, un simple mouvement de lèvre
Ce sourire, je le garde pour toi
Car il m’a donné par l’amour
Peu importe que tu sois insolent et méchant
Peu importe que tu en aimes d’autres
L’or de l’autel est toujours devant moi
Auprès de moi les yeux gris de mon époux

43
Poetry was food for Lakritz as a composer, he was an orator, the essence was speech
and communication. He used all kind of texts also scientific words of Richard Feynman,
the quantum physicist.
Lacy’s style is on the edge of jazz, classic and avant-garde.

A poem of Roykan, Lakritz has set on music.

Unless you get lost on purpose

You would never get this far

Time passes there is no way we can hold it back

Why then, do thoughts linger on long after everything else is gone?
I’m so aware that it’s all unreal:
One by one the things of this world pass on
But why do I still grieve?
Suddenly I thought of an old friend
Separated from me by miles of mountains and rivers
Will we ever meet again?
I gaze towards the sky,

We meet only to part

Coming and going like white clouds
Leaving traces so faint only a soul notices

44
 In the Pocket Anne Waldon, Andrew Schelling

Your mood the moon in a mellow tone

Licorice stick- unused song titles adrift in cones of incense
The piano comes in
&Art Pepper stands up the hour overblowing
You’d be so nice
To come home to
Listen to the piano
Clear pine-moon notes
While in the blue pine evening
Moon roaring up
Off piano azalea ivories
Oh America
Your music we could love you
Low sweet chords
Ageless couples
Touch each other in the
Deep guitar ribs
It’s as the say ‘in the pocket’.

Woorden zijn verdichte klanken die nog vibreren

Maar trager en zachter langs elkander glijden
Met ruimte voor stilte en herinnering

There is a spacetime that holds us tight

45
 Theatre Julian Beck

I work in the theatre to open doors to the granary

I sharpen awareness, I cut the curtains, the curtains of deception,
beautiful
So that we can go through together where no one can go through
alone

46
 Joy Judith Malina

I said to Joy
What is your meaning
Since we are doomed to death & every end is sad?

Joy answered Me: my name is death’s delay

So I embraced her and I bade her Stay

The Hour is Late Judith Malina

The hour is late, the day is almost over

I shall sit here and dream of god
The while god dreams of me
But when god dreams the holy one creates
And when I dream I waken

47
 First and Last Pain Judith Malina

They say the first pain is drawn with the first breath
When the unaccustomed in rush fills us with a harsher nutriment

They say that the last pain is unlearning the breath

When the accustomed nutriment fails us

But they say so many things that we have seen to be untrue

That I wonder at this insistence on the inevitability of pain
And in spite of all appearances
Even of death

Love and Politics Judith Malina

While off the Isle of Cyprus in a boat, I saw the head of Aphrodite
afloat
And told her I’m an anarchist and do not vote
She answered ‘That’s alright’

I said ‘O figment of the classic mind, there are some crucial

concepts to which you are blind’
She only nodded so as not to be unkind
And said ‘Good night’.

‘Oh, stay’ I cried ‘There are so many things we should discuss: the
power of unnecessary kings, the sexual oppression of which
Sappho sings…But she sank out of sight.

I Heard the Indian Sage Judith Malina

I heard the Indian sage say that there was no time

But I believe the ungraven image that my mirror shows me
As I see my mother’ face emerge from my aging features
And my grandmother’s heavy lids
As my eyes grow smaller and smaller
There is time because we are mortal
There is death because we are nothing
There is love because we are crazy and want to be happy forever

48
 Do Not Judge Me Lightly Judith Malina

Do not judge me lightly

Even the hunted hare deserves better
And the hunting hound
Do not pretend to forgive
Do not wash me whitely
When I say that the crime is enough
To punish the crimes commiter
I do not mean the blame
Or regret, or fear, or shame, or guilt, or any such name
I mean that the doing is hard and the having done is bitter
It is hard but then, nothing is easy
No not finding a bed, nor falling asleep, nor walking again in the
morning
Nor growing the food from the ground
Nor swallowing it, nor keeping it down
It is simpler to preach about life than to live through a single day
It is hard to believe in god it is hard to pray

So be slow to judge me and let the judgement be weighty

For opinion and condemnation are fixed

As strict as the stone of time

To judge is, after all, itself a kind of crime

Judge by some standard that fails

Less surely than wrongly of rightly
But if you must judge at all
Do not judge lightly

49
 The True and the Contrary Judith Malina

What is true is also contrary

The basis recoils to the epitome
On the periphery there are signs of the center
Conditions allow limitations but create ingresses

Doubt has a melody of its own

What was previously created, can be transfigured- but no longer
demolished

We’ve stood enough of the insubstantial

Now we are sedentary
On the premise that what’s at bottom
Is bedrock

Sentience is holiness
And what contradicts, speaks
Against its own voice

The Melancholy Life of Woman Judith Malina

When first she learns that she is not a boy

And sooner or later it is borne upon her that she is a girl
She is sooner or later taught that this has excruciating advantages
And excruciating disadvantages and that she must fight
She more or less understands that the greatest of these is
submission and sooner or later she submits more or less
She uses with patience and prurience the excruciating alternatives
She is afraid and wants to become a woman and she becomes a
woman and she is afraid
Of being a woman
She more or less chooses but more often than not, is chosen by
one of her protectors, destroyers, husbands and lovers, who fulfill
for better or worse the degrees of whatever goes on between
woman and man

50
 Sometimes her body opens and lets out the child
Often her body is wracked with unavoidable pain
But more often than not it is wracked with avoidable pain
Barely or often or never or always a man
Enters her body for hundreds of motives
Than which hers are all different, except love
Which she more or less seeks and more or less finds
Then when she has suffered enough and bled and not bled
And birthed or aborted and cried or not cried
From bridal’s gown to widow’s weed she learns
That she is old
All of it sooner or later
Over too soon or over too late, and she learns
To submit to the life that an old woman more or less lives
In a world that despises old woman
She learns to submit to a more or less life
That she never deserves
Or else she dies young

51
 No author mentioned

I know too well that I'm just wasting precious time

In thinking such a thing could be
That you could ever care for me
I'm sure you

hate to hear
That I adore you, dear
But grant me

Just the same

I'm not entirely to blame
For love
You'd be so easy to love
So easy to idolize
All others above
So worth the yearning for
So well to keep every home fire burning for

We'd be so grand at the game

So carefree together
That it does seem a shame
That you can't see
Your future with me
Cause you'd be oh, so easy to love

52
Poetry from the CD The Beat Suite, which Lacy produced himself for
Somebody Special. He wrote: this is high valuable material, this is not for
everybody!

Wave lover by Jack Kerouac

What is this universe but a lot of waves

And the craving desire is a wave
Belonging to a wave in a world of waves
So why put any down wave?
Come on wave, WAVE
The heehaw’s dobbin spring hoho
Is a sad lonely yurk for your love
Wave lover

53
 Naked Lunch by William Burroughs

The river is served Sir

Naked Lunch is before you
The black wind-sock of Death undulates over the landing
pad
The checker-board is swept clear after a short game of
genocide
De planet drifts to a random doom insect doom
Thermodynamics has won at a crawl
Orgone balked at the post
Christ bled
Time ran out
Motel Motel Motel
Piece of moon smoke hangs in the china blue sky
The river is served Sir
Delauded deliver poor me!
What are you doing here?
Who are YOU?

54
 A Ring of Bone by Lew Welch

I saw myself a ring of bone

In the clear stream of all of it
And vowed always to be open to it
That all of it might flow through
And then heard ‘ring of bone’ where
Ring is what the bell does

55
 The Mad Yak by Gregory Corso

I am watching them churn the last milk they’ll ever get

from me
They are waiting for me to die
They want to make buttons out of my bones
Where are my sisters and brothers?
That tall monk there, loading my uncle, he has a new cap
And that idiot student of his – I never saw that muffler
before
Poor uncle, he lets them load him
How sad he is, how tired
I wonder what they’ll do with his bones?
And that beautiful tail
How many shoelaces will they make of that!

56
 Mother Goose by Kenneth Rexroth

Do not pick my rosemary, do not take my rue

I am saving up my sorrow, and I have none for you

I expect to meet a lover, who will break my heart

He will be a nobleman, his folks will make us part

When my heart is broken, I will jump in the sea

You can take the herbs of sorrow, and throw them after
me

57
 From cd The Sun,

The way of life by Lao Tzu

There is no need to run outside

For better seeing
Nor to peer from a window
Rather abide at the centre of your being
For the more you leave it, the less you learn
Search your heart and see
If he is wise to take each turn
The way to do is to be

Buckminsterfuller
Fuller said that he had experienced a profound incident which would provide direction and
purpose for his life. He felt as though he was suspended several feet above the ground enclosed
in a white sphere of light. A voice spoke directly to Fuller, and declared:
From now on you need never await temporal attestation to your thought. You think the truth. You
do not have the right to eliminate yourself. You do not belong to you. You belong to Universe.
Your significance will remain forever obscure to you, but you may assume that you are fulfilling
your role if you apply yourself to converting your experiences to the highest advantage of others

The Historical Attempt by Man to Convert His Evolution

from a Subjective to an Objective Process

58
 The Sun Buckminster Fuller
1.
The systematic growth
Of man’s intellectual augmented evolution
Is constructed within
A progressively improved
Scaffolding of assumptions

The integrity of the principle

Of intellectual assumptions
As bravely taken within the confines
Of residual facts of disillusioned experience
Is progressively persuasive

59
 For the new prospect of magnificent reality
Looms into ken
As the retrospective lure of abandoned illusion
First dwarfs then dissolves

Thereafter the temporary scaffolding

Advantaged by informed approximation
Of simplifying replaced by earned controls
Consisting of ever more exact degrees
Of measurement

Of the finitely interactive system

Of unique principles
Of energetic relationship
Of universe
Its inherent proclivities and articulations
That is its natural behaviour

The newly swollen growth

Of total interaction of discovered
Equated and valved- in principles
Floods silently to contain
The subconscious rational of the
Total individual – society

Consciously society is at first fascinated

By the novelties in technical manifestation
Of the omnidirectional advance
As comparisoned only to the residual plurality
Of fading traditional background illusions

Wherefore
Ultimate social awareness
Of total engulfment
By new orientation
To comprehensive principles of reality
Appears first as enormous apprehension
Of potential loss

60
 Of what?
Of things of vanities
Of self-proclaimed prestige?
Of the illusory values and
Transitory standards and prerogatives
Appropriate only to adjustments completed
In yesterday’s diminutive gains
By exceptional self?

2.
When man shall become preoccupied
With drawing off the progressive magnitudes
Of new potential
To establish constant worldwide
Advancement of living standards

Specifically through the systematic incorporation

Of scientific knowledge and technical advantage
In an earth embracing service industry
Of autonomous dwelling and intelligence

Facility and felicity

Insuring not only his progressive immunity
To annihilative factors of nature
But cohering his progressive appetite for truth

Then will subside

The subjective requirements
The negative motivations
The antipathetic surges
The concessions to survival mandated compromise
Promulgating the theory of
Advancement by political initiative
Whose expedient ways
Are progressive powered by the
Accumulating science and technology potential
To be tapped only for dubious war objectives

It will take many waves

61
 Of threatened self-destruction
By society
To convince and instruct and
Mobilize
An effectively articulate majority
Of humanity
In the synchronization of society
Towards an objective
Evolutionary volition

Inspired deeply acknowledged faith

In an omniscient wisdom and benevolence
Instructing through intellect
Intellect wrote E=mc²
Intellect may write every
Equation of physical behavior
But no physical or abstract
Equation will ever compass
Intellect or its self-starter secret

3.
Chen the objective evolution emerges
The intellectually architectured
House- of- tomorrow
Will be central to the emergence

62
 From the Way of Life by Lao Tzu

Those who would take over the earth

And shape it to their will
Never, I notice, succeed
The earth is like a vessel so sacred
That at the mere approach of the profane
It is marred
And when they reach out their fingers it is gone
For a time in the world some force themselves ahead
And some are left behind
For a time in the world some make a great noise
And some are held silent
For a time in the world some are puffed fat
And some are kept hungry
For a time in the world some push aboard
And some are tipped out
At no time in the world will a man who is sane
Over-reach himself
Over-spend himself
Over-rate himself
A realm is governed by ordinary acts
A battle is governed by extraordinary acts
The world is governed by no acts at all
And how do I know?
This is how I know
Act after act prohibits
Everything but poverty
Weapon after weapon conquers
Everything but chaos
Business after business provides
A craze of waste
Law after law breeds
A multitude of thieves
Therefore a sensible man says
If I keep from meddling with people, they take care of themselves

63
 If I keep from commanding people, they behaves themselves
If I keep from preaching at people, they improve themselves
If I keep from imposing on people, they become themselves

People starve
If taxes eat their grain
And the faults of starving people
Are the fault of their rulers
That is why people rebel
Men who have to fight for their living
And are not afraid to die for it
Are higher men than those who, stationed high
Are too fat to dare to die

A large country is the low level of interflowing rivers

It draws people to the sea-end of a valey
As the female draws the male
Receives it into absorbing depth
Because depth always absorbs
And so a large country, insofar as it is deeper than a small country
Absorbs the small
Or a small country, insofar as it is deeper than a large country
Absorbs the large
Some countries consciously seek depth into which to draw others
Some countries naturally have depth into which to draw others
A large country needs to admit
A small country needs to emit
And so each country can naturally have what it needs
If the large country submit

The handbook of the strategist has said

Do not invite the fight accept it instead
Better a foot behind than an inch too far ahead
Which means:
Look a man straight in the face and make no move
Roll up your sleeve and clench no fist

64
 Open your hand and show no weapon
Bare your breast and find no foe
But as long as there be a foe, value him
Respect him, measure him, be humble toward him
Let him not strip from you, however strong he be
Compassion, the one wealth which can afford him

One who would guide a leader of men in the uses of life

Will warn him against the use of arms for conquest
Weapons often turn upon the wielder
An army’s harvest is a waste of thorns
Conscription of a multitude of men
Drains the next year dry
A good general, daring to march, dares also to halt
Will never press his triumph beyond need
What he must do he does but not for glory
What he must do he does but not for show
What he must do he does but not for self
He has done it because it had to be done
Not from a hot head
Let life ripen and then fall
Force is not the way at all
Deny the way of life and you are dead

Even de finest arms are an instrument of evil

A spread of plague
And the way for a vital man to go is not the way of a soldier
But in time of war men civilized in peace
Turn from their higher to their lower nature
Arms are an instrument of evil
No measure for thoughtful men
Until there fail all other choice
But sad acceptance of it
Triumph is not beautiful

He who thinks triumph beautiful

65
 Is one with a will to kill
And one with a will to kill
Shall never prevail upon the world
It is a good sign when man’s higher nature comes forward
A bad sign when his lower nature comes forward
When retainers take charge
And the master stays back
As in the conduct of a funeral
The death of a multitude is cause for mourning
Conduct your triumph as a funeral

If terms to end a quarrel leave bad feeling

What good are they?
So a sensible man takes the poor end of the bargain
Without quibbling
It is sensible to make terms
Foolish to be a sticker
Though heaven prefer no man
A sensible man prefers heaven

The wake by Eugène Guillevic from Exécutoire 1947

On a pris ceux-là
Qui se trouvaient là

On les a mis là
Pour en faire un tas

On les a mis là
Et maintenant voir

Comme ils font le cri

Comme ils ont la gueule

66
 ITINERARY BY PATRICIA BEER ESTUARY

Autobiography
I sailed through many waters
Cold following warm because I moved though
Arctic and equator were steady

Harbors sank as I discarded them

Landmarks melted into the sky
When I needed them no longer

I left behind all weathers

I passed dolphins flying fish and seagulls
That are ships in their own stories

67
 SAMUEL BECKETT SANDS

Je suis ce cours de sable qui glisse

Entre le galet et la dune
La pluie d’été pleut sur ma vie
Sur moi ma vie qui me fuit me poursuit
Et finira le jour de son commencement

Cher instant je te vois

Dans ce Rideau de brume qui recule
Où je n’aurai plus à fouler ces longs seuils mouvants
Et vivrai le temps d’une porte
Qui s’ouvre et se referme

Que ferais-je sans ce monde sans visage sans questions

Où être ne dure qu’un instant où chaque instant
Verse dans le vide dans l’oubli d’avoir été
Sans cette onde où à la fin

68
 Corps et ombre ensemble s’engloutissent
Que ferais-je sans ce silence gouffre des murmures
Haletant furieux vers le secours vers l’amour
Sans ce ciel qui s’élève
Sur la poussière de ses lests

Que ferais-je je ferais comme hier comme aujourd’hui

Regardant par mon humblot si je ne suis pas seul
À errrer et à virer loin de toute vie
Dans un espace pantin
Sans voix parmi les voix
Enfermées avec moi

Je voudrais que mon amour meure

Qu’il pleuve sur le cimetière
Et les ruelles où je vais
Pleurant celle qui crut m’aimer

En face
Le pire
Jusqu’à ce
Qu’il fasse rire

Rentrer
À la nuit
Au logis
Allumer

Éteindre voir
La nuit voir
Collé à la vitre
Le visage

2.

69
 Gedichten vliegen uit de bocht
En zoeken ’t overleven
In tempels van het hemelsbrood
Waar men belooft ‘t eeuwig leven
Of van de bedelstaf om ’t even
Als ze maar kennis door kunnen geven
Gedichten willen verder leven
Waar en hoe is hen om ’t even

70
 Poems from Dewdrops On A Lotus Leaf by Ryôkan

We meet only to part

Coming and going like white clouds
Leaving traces so faint
Hardly a soul notices
Leave off your mad rush for gold and jewels
I’ve got something far more precious for you
A bright pearl that sparkles more brilliant than the sun and moon
And illuminates each and every eye
Lose it and you’ll wallow in a sea of pain
Find it and you’ll safely reach other shores
I’ freely present this treasure to anyone
But hardly anyone asks for it

71
 FROM THE ALBUM BYE-YA

Words by Tom Raworth at the funeral of Franco Beltrametti

Out of a sudden
The alphabet wonders
What it should do
Paper feels useless
Colors lose you
While all musical notes
Perform only in blue
A Lombardy poplar
Shadows the ground
Drifted with swansdown
Muffling the sound
At the tip of the lake
Of the road to the south
Above in the night sky
Scattered by chance
Stars cease their motion
Poppies don’t dance
In the grass standing still
By the path no-one walks

72
REGRET BY PAUL POTTS

My dreams
Watching me said
One to the other
This life has let us down

73
 LONGING BY FERNANDO PESSOA

Ah, it's my longing for whom I might have been that

distracts and torments me!

74
 FROM THE CD THE HOLY LA

INSIDE MY HEAD BY ROBERT CREELEY

Inside my head a common room,

A common place, a common tune,
A common wealth, a common doom

Inside my head. I close my eyes.

The horses run. Vast are the skies,
And blue my passing thoughts’ surprise

Inside my head. What is this space

Here found to be, what is this place
If only me? Inside my head, whose face?

75
WORDS BY THOMAS GAINSBOROUGH

J’en ai assez des potraits

Et je voudrais tant prendre ma vole de gambes
Et m’en aller vers quelque charmant village

Ou je pourrais peindre des paysages

Et savourer la fin de ma vie
Dans la tranquillité et l’insouciance

76
 POETRY ON THE CD VESPERS, OCTET

POETRY BY BLAGA DIMITROVA FROM THE DEA IS BLACK

To Miles Davis, Multidimensional

The world is multidimensional

And that gives us headaches
We want it to be monochrome
So it can be clear
We want it to be uniform
So it can be true
We want it to be limited
So we can grasp it, make it stay
But its dimensions are endless
The world keeps slipping away

77
To Corrado Costa, Unconsummated

If we come close
Enough to meet
Other beings
From other worlds-
As close as people
Come to people
On our planet- then
We’ll only come
To pass ourselves

To John Carter

I have no fear of being

Trodden down, like grass
The trampled ground is likeliest
To make a path

78
 To Keith Haring, Urgency

You wait for tomorrow

For still, for otherwise, for may
You wait for yourself

The blade of grass doesn’t wait

For the stone to be gone
It pushes in thee crack

And then to what has grown

So urgently alive
The stone gives way

79
To Charles Mingus, Across

From wing to wing

Spread out
A bird can mark
The whole horizon’s span

From arm to arm

Nailed down
The universe is measured
By a man

80
 To Stan Getz

I do not believe
In my disbelieve

That my life was time awake

Between two dreams

That I’ll return to the air

The breath took from air

That I’ll grasp the moment of death

When my whole life was a moment

81
 To Arshile Gorky

Thank you day for being gone

And thank you gift for being with me
And for the shade of thorn above
Its work of wood and innocence of leaf
For blue in all its shapes and shadows
Cloud of thunder, routed into rain
For pain, a love without a remedy
For breath, the words that may
Replace it and especially
Among the multitude of things
I thank you for not forcing me
To thank you on my knees

82
 FROM THE CD THE CONDOR

Morning Joy by Bob Kaufman

Piano buttons stitched on morning lights

Jazz wakes with the day
As I awaken with jazz, love lit the night
Eyes appear and disappear
To lead me once more, to a green moon
Streets paved with opal sadness
Lead me counterclockwise to pockets of joy
And jazz

83
 The Condor by Franco Beltrametti

Se non ti spiace mi sembra un condor

Gymnogyps californianus
Quasi estinto
(dice una quida d’ornitologia da campo
Un condor visto con occhio indiano
Uno di quella
Gente
Condor

84
Summerbird by Nanni Balestrini

Rimane poco
L’angolo e il braccio
Sguardo e azzurro
Net vetro veloce
Qualche passo
Verso nottuna
Calde salendo
Un po di vento
Sventola ovariopinta
La insieme
Istante
Nel riflesso
Distante

Sommerbird 2

Volando via
Separa lentamente
Non significa piu
E poi si getta
Un’altra volta lontano
Senza guardare
Perduta estate
Simile a niente
Solo le voce
Volante un istante
Brucia arancio
Eè
Sempre il che

85
 Your name
On the tip of my tongue
I swallow

Your eyes
On my blue sky
I digest

Your hands
Around my breast
I surrender

Als een schicht passeert het leven

Herinneringen jagen het achterna
Dromen verbleken
Alleen in bijzondere momenten vallen de mozaïeken samen
In het ritme van beelden die onze voorouders selecteerden
Orde en superorde daar kunnen we naar streven
Doch de mensheid heeft zoveel lessen vergeten
Zijn gevoelens zijn gekaapt
De wetenschap heeft de atrofie van het bewustzijn
In kaart gebracht
De strijd is nog niet beslecht
Na een knieënval staat kunst weer recht
Ze strekt haar krachten en klaart het wonder
Zoekt de scherven van het gescheiden goddelijk paar
En creëert de eenheid in een universum van tijdloze dromen
Voor hen die het kosmisch bewustzijn beogen

86
5 stukjes rond Steve Lacy door Bernlef uit zijn bundel : De Noodzakelijke Engel

1. Noodzakelijke engel

De engel is noodzakelijke en dus

Gevallen, vleugels als nagels in
Het vlees gegroeid. Hij gaat gebukt.

Droog en bijna sloom begint hij

Zijn dag met het vergeten van zijn instrument
Hij heeft een stem maar houdt hem tegen.

Eén noot, zo weet hij, en er is

Geen terugweg meer, het web
Weeft zich dan als vanzelf.

De verhalen over hem bekend

Zijn vals: ‘Geluid of geen geluid
Dat is alles wat je hebt.

Ik ben er niet, nog lang niet, nee –

De vonk, de afgrond en de sprong
Zij rusten diep in mij.

87
 Hij is niet onder ons om
Wonderen te verrichten maar
Ons de kale plekken voor te spelen

Eén
Voor
Eén

2. Sintels

Achter de plaatijzeren loods

De hoop zwarte sintels

Hij komt aangelopen door het armeluisgras;

Volwassen cherubijn.

Jarenlang keek hij zwijgend in spiegels

Naar een lege stoel op het balkon
Naar een gat in de zool van zijn schoen.

Hij kijkt om zich heen, knikt tevreden;

Het gras verwaaid onder het lage licht
De plaatijzeren loods bladderend onder zijn aandacht.

88
 ‘De melodie is er al,’ zegt hij, ‘altijd-
nu nog de juiste noten’ en raapt de
sintels op, één voor één.

Hij lacht als een kind dat weg wil

‘als in het sprookje’, zegt hij. Zo
sintels strooiend verlaat hij het terrein.

3. Zandkorrel

Hij keek zo lang tot de

Berg een kiezel werd en verder sleet
Tot korrel, één enkele zandkorrel nog

En op een splinter zat je net

Zo goed als op een stoel, vond hij
Houvast genoeg voor zijn gevoel

Al kon het minder, moest het

Beslist minder want daar
Zat de toekomst in.

89
 4. Koud vuur

Vuurvliegje dat de cape

Van het duister omsloeg en
Tussen kale takken lichtend verdween

Het schuilt in dorre struiken

In spleten van de schutting
In scheuren in de blinde muur.

Neerslaande rook maakt uitzicht onmogelijk

Met een stokje port hij in de as
‘net waren ze nog hier, de steen nog warm’.

Zoals gewoonlijk alles gevlogen

De geur, de glans, de oogopslag
Met een stokje port hij in de as

Tot tenslotte toch een vonk, de allerlaatste

Overslaat en hij leven maakt uit al bijna
Koud geworden resten; zijn flakkerende vorm.

90
 5. Stilte

De melodie op de mouwen versleten

Van de akkoorden alleen nog
Wat wapperende flarden

In lege schoenen stapt hij voort

Langs jerrycans en flats op weg
Naar braakliggend terrein.

Kaalslag maakt hem sterker

Hij dunt zijn kapsel uit tot op
De laatste haar waaraan hij zweeft

91
En toen stapte Lacy Afkikker binnen
Keerde telkens terug tot
De weg terug niet meer bestond

In this world we are ahead of time

Within our hands
The stories
We have to leave behind

92
Oh La Re Sol

No Si Mi

Do Fa

93
Ivory clouds against a blue sky

Moving slowly into the field

Of the violet eye of sun

The pale cool moon stops travelling

And becomes still

94
On an androgynous cord Of black and white

Flux reflux Red spots are dancing

We remember the future We long for the past

Right now everything is water Everything is gap

95
If words can’t find their
destiny
they start building
towers
Only instant
meaning
Can be
performed
But for the
yesterday of tomorrow
I’am
pouring down
this light spot

Into the groove

Of no-man’s-land

96
 In mal-entendu
In mal-entendu

In sous-entendu
In sous-entendu

The word is sound and colour

The word is sound and colour

It grows in a landscape
It grows in a landscape

Of con-text
Of con-text

97
The echo
of the word

That falls
into the hearts

In the far distance

Is heard through ages

If no one draws the line

It never can cast its shade

Each form brings rest

Each line searches
connection but never
links

98
When night
Falls

Dreams
Awake
The eye perceives

We are continually

inventing each other

The closer I come

Hurts me as much

As the joy I drink

99
As a shadow I retrieve when sun is high

And moon is telling storries

Of all the worlds to come

Music is life
Only a word

Can die in silence

100
All poets
Travel

In the Past

And Fish with

Their fish-nets

The Lost
Moments

101
Their was a
Time
Their was a
rhythm
Of happiness
And everything was bright
and clear
In an extreme
Coolness

102
Twee duizend jaar
Zwerfden onze gedachten
Zo ver van elkander
Nu tellen we in jaren
De tijd dat we samen waren

Er galmt in het leven

Het ritme van de dood
En de dood speelt
De melodie van
leven

103
Art creates and is creation
At once
It’s time and space
At once
A Divine Principle
Creating in each part the whole

Of the experimental soul

104
How many rooms enclosed you
With how many souls
you exchanged content
Your door stood always open
So we could change a word
Now you parted to heaven
Now we are still on earth
But in music all worlds are fusing
Living symbols
blinking in dust
Responding in visions
The colours
of a celestrial
Sound

105
Somewhere between now and then
here and there
The white light and the black absence
I’am exploring
the path
that becomes the way
From you to the others

We part to meet
We die to live

Resurrection

106
Rencontres avec l’insolite
25.07.04

‘ »La vérité saura frapper au coeur de celui qui

l’attend »’. Raymond bernard
Reading this book was the sign to write about the very
ephemeral details of my rendez vous with the music of
Steve Lacy and the composer himself.
The reason I start it only now is because, after all,
there is no reason at all. Stripped fom all purpose,
the reason is the inner voice.
As a member of a.m.o.r.c. in the seventies, the book of
Raymond Bernard, “Rencontres avec l’insolite” was
waiting all the time to open.
It’s about direct comprehension wihout even using the
words. The sessions of the “Haut conseil” develop in
silence and everyone understands as if the words are
spoken.
As I know that Lacy knew the organisation of Amorc I’ve
seen the relationship with Lacy and the “Haut Conseil”.
Only Lacy was composer-musician and for sure mysticus
as well.
At least 30 concerts I attended from 1999 on and it
started with Mal Waldron.
Mal Waldron, the great pianist who in the sixties,
escaped N.Y. for the racism agains black musicians.
Mal, first settled in Germany and later was living in
Brussels. He toured many times in Japan and was a guest
of the mostimportant jazz festivals in Europe. I never
heard him playing that good as in the Lincoln Center in
N.Y. May 2000 in duo with Steve Lacy.

107
Mal Waldron came to Afkikker Ghent October 1998 and
came back in Novermber the same year. In that time I
bought my first CD’s of Mal and One Upmanship was one
of them. From the very first moment, my attention was
focused on the soprano saxophone : I heard Steve Lacy
for the very first time and had the feeling that I had
found something precious.
From Mal I got Lacy’s telephone number.
When I presented myself as an organisor of a Mal Waldron
concert, the ice was quickly broken and we started to
make a date: february 10, 1999. Lacy proposed to come
with his partner in song Irene Aebi, as he presented
her in Afkikker.
It was a time when I had a computer but not e-mail yet
and neither internet.
The very last moment Lacy called me for the
tickets...there were only 2 days left; So for me it was
a test to see what I could do and I ordered 2 first
class tickets in the station of Ghent and sent them by
Fedex.
Yves Opstaele who had given me the adress of Mal
Waldron, was also present to film Lacy and Aebi, Gert
Torck was ready for recording the sound.
Around 6 p.m. at the station, Lacy asked me what kind
of café it was...I said before it was a funk café,
but then the funk was finished and ....well it was as
I was waiting for him to bring me something new.
The taxi brought us to the Ibis Hotel close to
Afkikker
I went to Afkikker to take the money 1.500 $ and came
back to the hotel.

108
The room was tiny so I had to sit on the bed for counting
the money.

At 8, they entered Afkikker. I intended to go with Lacy

and Aebi to the kitchen behind the bar. But the kitchen
was cold ...So I proposed to go upstairs to my room,
where I had an electric heating. I brought Irene some
teas ans Lacy some beers. All the while Irene was
sitting before my mirror and Lacy was sitting in my
alcove from where he had a view on all the photograghs
and posters.
At 9 we started, Paul (from Dambert) did the
introduction, in fact he was only reading the words
Lacy had written in his book Findings.
The video became a DVD and the music is on CD
One of the most purest pieces of art-songs with some
solo work of Monk’s music and Lacy his own compositions.

109
It was the première of the song Mother Goose that would
become a song in The Beat Suite CD.
Steven came back while the taxi was waiting to kiss me,
twice, and I gave him a postcard with the words:
A thing of beauty is a joy forever, Keats
Moither Goose turned out to be the center of a whole
story. As I came intothe picture while the tune was
written, it came out that the 3 parts of the poem, which
Lacy had constructed,before he had seen me, were
represented by 3 personages: Irene, me and Steve.16
years later I could for the first time, find the right
musicians to make a group Bone, who were able to play
the song. I performed the poetry. And the circle was
closed when Bone played it in Ghent for a public while
Irene was present. Misha presented me as well as Irene,
and at that moment the forces where equalized and the
problems solved.
Time passed, I didn’t forget the concert and kept my
feelings rather deep so they couln’t evaporate.
November (1999) came and Yves Opstaele (the filmmaker)
invited me to join him to a solo concert of Lacy in
loppem, November 1999.
The café had something of a familiar setting. A huge
fireplace just after the podium, mostly men with beards
drinking trappist of Westmalle.
I took place on a chair close to the podium. Lacy
started with some tunes of Ellington, he played in
several countries, for the 100th aniversary of Duke
Ellington. It were acrobatic tunes with a lot of noice
and funny technique, that was very new for me. It was
amusing.
After the pauze I took the same seat and the tone
shiffed to a deep unconscious source from where I

110
couldn’t escape; I was crying all the time. The tunes
were his own compositions and it touched the deepest
strings in me. Most of the tunes he played in my bar
with Irene, so I heard the words intertwining with the
music.
I was sitting paralysed.
The colours of my clothes were brown.
After the concert, I went on the stage to say hello to
Lacy, who was allready in some company drinking his
favorite whisky.. The flowers he got where breathing on
the table. I couldn’t restrain my suprise and said :
What were you doing? -A man said : Mr Lacy I preferred
the second part, yes he said and looking at me ....we
are playing together.
Some moments later I said : I follow you !
Now that I followed the path for 5 years, I know that
I have found my master. And still I am following the
music in all its directions and dimensions.
He said that Italy was numero uno for jazz, I answered
I am Italian, we are living in Italy. You have a husband
he asked me. Yes, I said and 2 friends. One friend has
an Etruscan museum in Italy.
With a kiss I wished Steve Lacy all the best, and I
asked him if he also played with a group, a band...Yes
he said a bit proudly : in January I play in Antwerp
with Mal Waldron (Oh I said) and with Enrico Rava ( yes
I know him, he plays very well, I saw him once in
Middelheim). So we got a future, a window with a view!
New Year came, I sent a postcard to Paris; It was a
postcard with a packet embroidered, with the words :
As the eyes of my father, the evening before he died
were a sea of silence, I’am not afraid to speak.

111
A couple of days afterwards the concert in Antwerp ‘De
Luchtbal’’ happened, it called Monk’s Dream’.
Yves Opstaele and Marc Roose came to pick me up. I was
dressed in a silk grey costuum and golden earings.
The concert was that good, the people and de musicians
were very happy.

Part 1 Tunes part 2 Longing

Epistrophy Straight, no chaser
Monk’s Dream In walked Bud
Mysterioso Round About Midnight
Evidence

After the concert, we went on the stage and found the

musicians in a glorious state.
First I greeted Mal Waldron who was playing a vidiogame,
then Lacy came in front of me and everything came true.
Recognition! We drank wine, had some toast and passed
Roswell Rudd who was sitting as a wax statue, then I
greeted Enrico Rava. Again I axchanged some words with
Lacy as “I’am too dagerous for you” what he answered
with “I like dangerous women I’am bulletfree” (concert
with Taslina Nasrim) I answered : “That was showing
off” !
I asked the address of Enrico Rava for a concert in
Afkikker and at once Lacy and Rava were singing at both
sides of me the same song...Rava was glad to be invited
and said “yes, before we are too old”.
So each step was a further confirmation of what allready
was, from the beginning.

112
Next stop would be New York for a duo concert with Mal
Waldron at the Lincoln Palace.
I prepared a book for Lacy, with photographs of the
work of Escher, wrote some poems and put also the poem
of the Tiger by William Blake. That tiger came back in
the form of a picture of Dürer in Germany.
I wrote a letter to Paris with the flightnumber in case
someone would pick me up from the airport. No, but
erverything was easy ... a shuttle drove me to the
hotel. I’ve found a donuts to eat, meanwhile Lacy had
called the hotel to give me his room number. I remember
it was the hotel Mayflower. The room wa huge.

That was the first time we met at the hotel. It was

natural and cool, the music of Mal was playing very
hard, I tried to dance, but this was not possible, then
it became quiet.
The next day was the concert and also the following day
at the Lincoln Palace. The tickets were reservated so
after a while I had found the locket and picked them
up. The concert was part of a serial of important duos.
So for Mal and Lacy it was kind of prestige,and also
the affirmation of their skills and love. The next duo
that evening was Misha Mengelbergh en Han Bennink. I

113
went back to the bar in the middle of their performance
as I couldn’t stand it, it was just too hard for me
after the wonderful music of Mal and Lacy. That was one
of the best concerts I ever was able to attend. I was
crying, I was shouting too. I was paralysed.
I was with Lacy at the bar after the concert but I had
cold and felt down, after a drink and some tears, all
the energy was out of us, Lacy helped me found a cap
and I left for my hotel around the 23rd street.
Next day I went to the Jewish museum and to some other
musea where I bought for Lacy a detail of Van Eyck :
Mother and child with view of Ghent.

After New York there was een concert in Paris June 2000
in La Villette dat ik reserveerde vanuit Gent. Een Ibis
hotel in de buurt aan de overkant van het water. Cecil
Tailor was ook aangekondigd in een grote zaal in grote
letters maar Lacy was op een eigenaardige manier
ingeschakeld. Hij moest Helen Merill ondersteunen die
op een eerdere kitcherige manier een grote volkstrekker
was. De arrangementen van de pianist en een paar

114
fluitjes zorgden voor de omkadering van een derderangs
schilderij.
De standards werden bovengehaald maar brachten geen
nieuwe ideeën bij.
Het maakte mij zenuwachtig en dat was ook de reactie
van Lacy na het concert. Met een glas champgne en mooie
kleren waren de storende factoren niet zomaar weg te
krijgen. Ik had mij zeer klein moeten maken om achter
de boxen te geraken. Maar Lacy ontvangde mij vol
vriendschap. Ik had een dublikaat van een gouden
Florijn bij, die ik gebruikte voor de opening van de
Gouden Florijn,het kleine broertje van de Afkikker.
Deze dublikaat zou ik later nog vervangen door een
origineel van de 13de eeuw van mijn vriend Tomasso
Farratini Pojani, eigenaar van het Etruskisch museum in
Castello di Romena. Deze originele florijn moest het
verhaal waarmaken van Mandelstam: “De gouden florijnen
zullen niet ratelen onder de schop van de archeoloog
maar gebruikt worden om de kunstenaar te betalen”.

Enkel een telefoontje volstond en Tommaso stuude de

gouden florijn per post op. Dit muntstuk moet dus nog
ergens in een archief aanwezig zijn, ik heb hem
opgestuurd samen met de album Blossoms naar Bostom.
Aangezien er niets van mij in de huisboedel van mevrouw
Aebi was achtergebleven, had ook zij vermoeden dat er
nog ergens een archief moest bestaan, vandaar de

115
terreur die ik 2 jaar heb ondergaan. De ganse inboedel
plus een kopij van alle composities was bij mij thuis
gestockeerd gedurende 2 jaar, de periode dat Aebi bij
mij introk, 3 maand in Lochristi en 2 jaar in De Gouden
Florijn in Gent,om zo controle te hebben op het gebeuren
in Gent. Het verzoek was gedaan door J.J. Avenel op
Nieuwjaarsavond. De meubelen werden in een schuur van
mijn ouders ondergebracht en de boeken poëzie op de
zolder van mijn ouders. Ik heb nooit iets van nabij
gezien, ik liet het gebeuren, kreeg door niemand steun
en werd zo geïsoleerd, wat de bedoeling moest geweest
zijn. Toen ik in Gent om de huur vroeg werd de Afkikker
tweemaal kort en klein geslagen. Dit alles bracht wel
2 mooie concerten op met Frederic Rzewski; de rekening
werd weer vereffend.
Het concert in Parijs met Helen Merill, eindigde als
zovelen, na een dranje werd Lacy afgehaald, ik kon enkel
nog mijn gedichten in een dikke omslag meegeven.
Helen Merill vertelde op het einde dat ze een
jeugdvriendin was van Lacy maar Lacy vond dit precies
niet zo leuk. En zo kon ik mij meer en meer een beeld
vormen van wat een artiest moet kunnen en aankunnen.
Maar één ideale avond compenseert veel. Daarom is
organisatie steeds een uitdaging en wanneer de kaarten
goed vallen is er pure magie ook al is het voor de
buitenwereld niet altijd zichtbaar.
Maar een goede luisteraar weet het….ook al zijn er geen
woorden voor om het uit te leggen.
Kort daarna moet het Colmar geweest zijn dat ik een
bezoek bracht voor een concert met kwartet (Betsch,
Avenel,Rudd en Lacy).
Het publiek was een zaal vol met juwelen geladen
burgers.

116
Mijn hotel was aan de rand van de stad en de concertzaal
was aan het andere eind. De wandeling met een bezoek
aan het Joodsmuseum bracht mij onder de indruk van de
geschiedenis tussen Franktrijk en Duidsland waarbij
België ook altijd in de brokken deelde.
Eerst was er een concert met pianist Parlan solo dat
vrij mooi was.
Het kwartet van Lacy bracht the Bath, Tina’s Tune, the
Rent, het liet een vermoeide Lacy zien, die achteraf
toe gaf dat hij zich niet helemaal goed voelde en een
jetlag had. De andere muzikanten vulden de leemten, en
het concert sloot goed af. Iedereen tevreden maar geen
hoge vluchten of diepe bespiegelingen.
Ik had een boek bij als geschenk van Fernandez en het
woordje van Le Petit Prince viel : ‘apprivoiser’. Toen
wist ik nog niet dat Lacy dichtbij het café ‘Le Petit
Prince’ woonde in Parijs. Er was een goede sfeer na het
concert er werd een glas gedronken en plots stond ik
midden in de nacht alleen. De stad was leeg en verlaten.
Ik was met geen taxi afgesproken dus stapte ik maar de
donkerte in. Bijna aan het hotel gekomen werd ik
omsingeld door minstens 10 jongeren. Ik begon te
roepen. Niemand kwam kijken en de jongeren liepen weg.
Het hotel vond ik niet meer terug en de politie bracht
mij aan de goede deur.

117
In juli is het altijd North Sea Festival in den Haag en
Lacy was uitgenodigd in een big band die de muziek van
Monk zou spelen. Lacy had rode sokken aan en een
artificiele glimlach na elk nummer. Plots werd er alarm
geslagen en was er ergens brand ontstaan, waar en hoe
werd niet verder bepaald. Het publiek ging kalm weg, de
muzikanten trokken zich ook terug, enkel Lacy kwam
terug naar de stage en daar stond ik met de woorden :
‘I stay with you’ en samen gingen we de ondergrondse
gangen door waar de andere muzikanten als versteend
stonden te wachten op nadere orders. Ik was volledig in
het wit gekleed en vond alles zielig. Na het tweede
deel van het concert ging ik terug naar beneden. De
sfeer was zo hectisch en vol van hamburgerlucht dat er
bijna geen muziek meer bij kon en het eigenlijk een
bijzaak geworden was. Lacy vroeg waar er kon gegeten
worden. De organisator wees in de richting van stukjes
koude broccoli en Lacy zei “shit”. Daarna werd er een
ingewikkeld parcour getoond waar hij het eventueel kon
proberen, hij gaf mij zijn flesje pils en ik vertrok
maar huiswaarts, 300 km in de nacht…
Misschien had ik niet de beste concerten uitgekozen
maar geen enkel kon het niveau van Lincoln Palace
evenaarden. Alles werd duidelijk dat de namen in jazz
gebruikt en misbruikt worden. Ik heb er veel tranen
voor gelaten en machteloos toegekeken. Iedereen kon het
zien en meemaken maar bijna niemand kwam uit
vriendschap. Ik heb weinig vrienden van Lacy ontmoet na
de concerten, veelal was ik alleen.

118
Ik herinner mij ook een concert in de Vooruit met Mal
Waldron en de ritme sectie van Mal. Toen hadden we
beiden dezelfde jas aan: geribde bruine velour. Deze
avond stelde lacy voor een solo concert in de Afkikker
te organiseren, dit had plaats op 30 oktober 2001.

De CD kreeg de naam Mother Goose, solo @ afkikker.

Achteraf gezien bleek dit één van de mooiste
liefdesverklaringen te zijn geweest: Stand, Naked,
Mother, Dad Weight, Ring, Traces, Revenue. Tijdens het
nummer Revenue als bis-nummer was er een orgasme op sax
ingevoegd, eigen aan de compositie maar nu in een andere
context gegoten. Het ganse verhaal was slechts

119
verstaanbaar achteraf toen ik de toelating kreeg voor
publicatie, al had ik het wel begrepen en het ook aan
Lacy duidelijk gemaakt. Had ik het niet begrepen, ik
had waarschijnlijk de toelating tot publicatie nooit
gekregen. (Zie email achterin) Deze email ontving ik op
het einde van zijn leven, toen hij in Boston woonde. Zo
gaf hij aan ieder wat voor hem verstaanbaar was en
heeft Lacy op mij het archetype van moeder
geprojecteerd waardoor ik eigenlijk ook als erfgename
ben aangesteld met een opdracht. De meeste fans zagen
in hem enkel een goed muzikant maar hij was dus veel
meer en het was deze brede context waarin ik zijn oeuvre
gevat hield dat mij in staat stelde mijn eigen leven
aan op te trekken en op mijn beurt te projecteren. Het
is een mythische wereld waar projecties een eigen leven
gaan leiden.
De dag voor 30 oktober, was er een solo concert in SMAK
dat ik samen met Jan Hoet had georganiseerd, en de dag
nadien, 31 oktober was er een solo concert in Brussel.
Op 29 oktober, na het concert in SMAK kwamen we samen
met enkele fans in De Gouden Florijn voor het avondmaal
en Lacy zou ook nog spelen.De Gouden Florijn was ons
zomercafé met een zeer intieme mooie tuin op
verschillende niveaus.
Achteraf kon dit geïnterpreteerd worden als Naked
Lunch; het gespek was diepgaand met weinig woorden.
Howing the garden to Lacy; ‘look’ I said while opening
the door and there she was : the full moon, which was
the symbol and the metaphore for pregnancy, the day
after everything got materialised.

120
The window of The Golden Florin, with the booktower of
Ghent.
October 31,there was a solo concert at café Central in
Brussels; the theme was all kind of blue. Mal was
present and I was dressed in all tones of blue.
Afterwards in the bar, I opened my bag and took out a
silk showl light blue with dark blue spots: my magic!
In my ghestbook Lacy thanked me for erverything I did
and should do in future. To keep his oeuvre alive will
be the most important task that I like to do as much as
possible. To produce the CD’s and DVD’s of the archive
and to bring the whole oeuvre on one stick is may be
the great drama but also the most symbolic way to
elaborate the music.

121
The first CD I presented in Afkikker is Rushes, it’s
about Russian poets played by the trio:
Lacy/Aebi/Rzewski. Irene gave we a copy of the original
CD. The CD was already out of print for a long time.
Along with the CD we gave our attention to the poets:
Marina Tzvetaeva, Osip Mandelstam en Anna Akhmatova on
whose words Lacy had written the music.
I also remember a concert in Tredozio, a small village
of 800 inhabitants in the middle of Italy. It was on
Lacy’s birthday so probably July 23, 2000. The concert
was called Concerto in Nero e Bianco, there were over
200 persons present. My friend Tomasso had brought me
and had given we a bottle of the best spumante, I had
my poetry and a flower.
I was dressed in white and black, white shoes, white
nail polish, white and black jacket. The people were
very kind to Steve, like they knew him very good and
asked for photographs. This was the moment to ask
someone to take a pictre of ‘us’.

122
When time is right, music incarnates
To wake up, to protect, to transfer
The most secret information
Of such a long history of mankind

123
Another important concert was in de Singel in Antwerp
with the dancers of Merce Cunningham, Merce himself was
sitting already in a wheelchair. There was music of
John Cage.

"Verbaas me!", zei Diaghilev tot Cocteau. Merce Cunningham, de nu tweeëntachtigjarige pionier van de
hedendaagse dans, stelt zijn leven in het teken van dit credo. Hijzelf noemt als scharniermomenten in
zijn artistieke loopbaan: zijn ontmoeting met John Cage, het werken met toevalsoperaties en later het
gebruik van video en computer. Merce Cunningham leerde Cage kennen in 1938. Zij bleven
onafscheidelijke artistieke bondgenoten tot de dood van de componist in 1992. Begin jaren vijftig
introduceerden zij radicale vormvernieuwingen. Terwijl dans en muziek voorheen een
gemeenschappelijke ritmische structuur hadden, stonden ze vanaf nu volledig op zichzelf, zonder enig
verband, behalve gelijktijdigheid. Door het gebruik van toevalsprocessen bij de keuze van de volgorde
van de bewegingen, ontstond een veelvoud aan 'centra' in tijd en ruimte, een concept afgeleid uit het
zenboeddhisme. The Merce Cunningham Dance Company werd opgericht in 1953 en leidde tien jaar
lang een nomadenbestaan in Amerika. Tot het gezelschap tijdens zijn eerste Europese tournee in 1964
onverwachte bijval genoot: een revolutie. Tijdens die fameuze tournee ontstond ook de eerste 'Event',
een ononderbroken choreografie aangepast aan een specifieke ruimte. Uitgevoerd in een
eenheidsdecor, zijn deze 'Events' uitgegroeid tot voorstellingen van anderhalf uur bestaande uit
integrale of gedeeltelijke repertoirestukken waaraan nieuwe danssequensen worden toegevoegd. Wij
vroegen Merce Cunningham zo een 'Event' voor deSingel samen te stellen, als bekroning van een
jarenlange samenwerking en vriendschap. Qua decor viel onze keuze op Jasper Johns' reproductie van
'Le Grand Verre' van Marcel Duchamp. Saxofonist Steve Lacy zal deze twee unieke, historische
dansavonden met zijn improviserende muziek ondersteunen. "Verbaas me!"

Nothing is said about the collors, but in fact half of

the darcers were dressed in orange and half in purple.

124
‘Surprise me’ was the theme, and I was dressed in orange
and purple: purple shoes, orange carf, orange pull,
purple trousers.
And so I lived from one consert to the other.
In Keulen, Germany, I remember a concert with a local
big band, which was not good but there were probably a
1000 people. After the concert we had a drink in a pub
and then we walked in the streets, I got his flowers.
At once I said ‘do you know the devil’? No, he said but
I know where to find him. We walked in the street arm
in arm but after a few streets Lacy disappeared, that
was his trick not to say farewell. The day after we
both stood at the train station of Keulen; Lacy had
sunglasses on in order not to be recognized. I say hello
and he said: ‘you can’t sit next to me I travel first
class’. Well I said and went back to change my ticket
in a first class to Brussels. But then I realized that
the tickets had a number and by surprise we both were
sitting on a single chair, I just in front of him. So
we could change our books and I could read his
newspaper. Strange, my book was ‘De Goddelijke
fantasie’ about the god and his was something with
demon, probably the book ‘The golden demon’ from Ozaki
Koyo, which texts he used for his music.
There was also a concert in the conservatory in Brussels
with Mal Waldron and Enrico Rava. There was another in
Paris in duo with Mal Waldron. They looked so beautiful
in each others eyes, just before the concert. The same
as Steve looked at me before the concert in Afkikker.
Eye contact is something what is still not very good
understood, neither this telepathy of collors.

125
Eyes were making contact, I loved their music.
I remember another concert in Italy, very romantic in
a small village with mothers and children. Evan Parker
was also present because he had to play the day after.
When we were sitting at the table after the concert I
heard the word America but didn’t understand the
context. At once I said ‘shop till you drop’, this was
in august and on September 7, the Twin Towers were
falling…
Another concert in Spoleta I remember the steps, many
steps and the trip by train.
In 2001,I went to visit the Eggfarm in Japan, where
Lacy played so often and where musicians as Mal Waldron,
Fred Van Hove, Joëlle Léandre also had played before.
First they played on the roof terrace of the house,
where still a drumset is standing with pictures. Then
the family has built a wonderful wooden concert hall,
that reminded me at a chapel of Ghent which I had chosen
for the concerts of Steven with Evan Parker and Shiro
Daimon. Steven was also invited for a concert but could
not come because of the visa, I wonder what was the
real reason.

126
And so it became 2002 and Lacy intended to go back to
America where he was invited to work at the conservatory
New England in Boston.

It was also an opportunity to prepare the farewell

concerts. Around May I visited Lacy for an interview
with Mr. Olivier Braet who had written the article about
the Beat Poets for the book Bone.
Lacy attended to give 10 concerts in 10 days, all of
them in Belgium. So I proposed to organise 2 of them,
one with the Japanese dancer Shiro Daimon, on Lacy’s
birthday July 23, and one with Mikhail Bezverkhni on
Misha’s birthday July 27. There was also a solo concert
in Mons, a concert in Brussels with Joëlle Léandre, one
close to Bruge and the cycle got closed with Deadline,
a duo with Frederic Rzewski in Antwerp. At that time I
was already in Italy.
The concert with Shiro was a magical evocation of
spirits. Something as incarnations. After that concert
it was the second night we met at the hotel.
To challenge the fate, Steven has changed the hotel
room which I had reservated for him at the Ibis, close
to Afkikker. But when I came around to say hello, I
just heard the number of his new room and so I came

127
back during the night and we had a wild farewell of the
bodies without any word to say. I gave the energy and
he said that is was good.
10 concerts in 10 days asks a lot of energy to give to
the hungry public, who clap their hands and go home
satisfied.
The concert with Misha was in balance, Misha entered
just the last moment and also the public was very late,
but at the end the Sint-Kwintens chapel got filled with
bodies and souls. Misha played first the study book ‘P’
solo, then Lacy played his masterpiece ‘The Way’ and
then they played together the ‘Precipitation Suite’.
Lacy had also a new composition for us ‘Cross Purposes’
this was my picture what nobody could understand. It
was a small videoclip; a joyess hello, a waltz and the
farewell.
It was all so real that indeed the farewell was
irreversible and we had celebrated our own fate and the
end of our relationship.
Being settled in Boston, with the lessons at the New
England conservatory, it was hard to come back. One of
the first countries to ask him was Germany. In 3 cities
he had to play within 3 kind of bands: jazz, classic
and avant-garde (with computer). I went to Freiburg, it
was the day of the cremation of Mal Waldron, which I
first intended. After the concert I was invited for
supper, rather tastful with white and red wine. I was
dressed with an old jacket of my father and also a man’s
shirt, my hair was black painted. First Lacy gave a
toast on ‘space’ because the computer didn’t stop the
moment he had to do his solo. He waited a few seconds
and the solo I remember was wonderful. The sphere was
not a kind of brotherhood, but I was there and we had
a good time. Steve said at once to me: ‘Dürer’!, Whow

128
I said and took a postcard that I had written for him
in Ghent out of my bag, with the Lion of Dürer. And so
once more we stepped in each other world without
understanding. We never spoke about that quantum
entanglement, otherwhile the magic would have been
stopped. This was our satisfaction, that we were as
close as humans ever could be. This was in December
2002.
Half a year later, in the summer of 2003, I went back
to Germany for the concert in ‘Mon Repos’, Ludwigsburg.
In my letter I had written: I step out of the circle.
And: the closer I come hurts me the same as the joy I
drink.
I felt that it was finished. I also wrote: we enter in
both directions along the spiral AISURA. Indeed, when
I met Steve after the concert at the terrace I saw
that he lost weight and I nearmy shouted of pain and
surprise. Lacy had cancer and on the way to the terrace
he said to me: they are calling me. It was the end. His
last words by telephone were: I have a long flight.

129
We were both undercooled, that means that the magic
works harder as when there is a flood of emotions. While
drinking a glass of red wine, in the garden with
schlager music, we both streched our arms wide open,
and a wind came up and the chair of lacy went down,
‘I’m falling’ he said but stood quickly up. This can
only be understood in the whole of the oeuvre, a hundred
times he played the tunes on the words of Beckett:
Stand, Jump and Fall. And so all the words he used got
realized.

I have a long flight…Steve Lacy

From then on, there were only a few conversations by
email. I was a bit afraid to disturb and said the

130
minimum of that what was necessary. About that time I
got the tape of Lacy’s Quintet in the Gravensteen,
Ghent, 1971, from a bass player, who helped to organize
that concert. With the big tape of radio BRT, I went to
a studio across Afkikker and the next day I got the CD
which I’ve sent to Boston (see email at the end)
I felt a bit strange as I got the gravestone in my
hands,this music still exist and is now part of the
oeuvre. Another permission I got to produce the solo
concert in Afkikker 2001, together with the book Bone,
a Tribute to Steve Lacy. This is the only CD which came
out together with a book. (see email at the end)
It started with ‘Stand’ from Beckett, then ‘Naked’ from
Naked Lunch, then ‘Mother’ from Mother Goose (Kenneth
Rexroth, then ‘Dad’ from Dead Weight, ‘Ring’ from ring
of Bone, (Lew Welch, ‘Traces’ from Ryôkan and
‘Revenue’with the final orgasm, incorporated in the
tune. With other words, it is the deepest love story
possible on earth. More was not possible, we have given
the all.
What stays is the reflection, the continuation, the
meditation and the action on different levels.
The tune ‘Stand’ is used in the movie: the train of
inerzia based on a novel of Johan Daisne.
And so we make circles and connections from one sphere
to the other, in order to bind all good vibes of
mankind, knowing what Mandelstam said: the sun is
shining.
The sphere of lacy is for me the most intense and
universal one, in which we meet all we need. And most
of all there was always quantum interaction.
I gave to Steven, my poetry each time we met, because
the time was short sometimes quasi nihil. Jazz People

131
didn’t accept me as a friend. Women have sometimes to
wait untill they rise out of their shell by the will of
nature.
Now that I know that we are the divine couple, acting
on daily life,I feel I am on the right way to do
something more, to enlarge the circle to the philosphy
of science.
The torch of energy of the mind,spread out its wings:
this is not the end.

132
Here we are standing along the borderline
No regret
Everything is done that could be done
Everything is said our soul could capture
Still, we are following you
In peace
Giving hands to all your friends
And close the circle
Around the fixed centre
All the souls you fused with
All the demons you dealt with
I cross this world
Inverse

133
 De overgang van slapen naar waken
Is een reflex van ogen
Wijd open
Voor brokstukken van klanken
Een smaak van zout
En kleuren die dansen
Onder de zoete dwang van vingertoppen
Steeds nieuwe vormen
Een sculptuur van
Impromuziek

134
 Titles of tunes of Steve Lacy

Barble-Chary-M’s Transport-There we were-

Qkaw-Sortie-Black Elk-Helmy-Fork New York
Living T. Blues-2-Fou-Forest-Zoo-Roba-Stations
Precipitation Suite-The Gap-Mouthfuls-
Existence-The Way-Bone-Name-The breath-
Prologue A Life On Its Way-The Highway-
Lapis-The Cryptosphere-Mar-Chips-moon-
Dreams-No Baby-Jump For Victor-Blue Wee
Esteen-La Motte-Piquet-The Thing-Josephine-
The New Duck-Weal-Name-The Wool-Flaps-

I have always known

that at last I would
Take this road, but yesterday
I did not know that it would be today
Narihira

135
Qu’est-ce que l’histoire de phosphore?
Agir, c’est-a-dire
Ecrire un livre, donc le suicide
(Musil)

136
 Je bent nog steeds
De spiegeltent van mijn gedachten
Die dansen
De oerstof van mijn dromen
De drijfveer van mijn zoeken eenheid en gebondenheid
Wij, toevallig bijeen gedreven wolken
Een eeuwig smachten
De zoete engel in 1000 en 1 nachten
Je steeg pijlrecht naar de zon
op vleugels van Icarus

en zie de berusting is nog niet gekomen

we creëren alsmaar irreële vormen
met het geloof en helder -ziend-vertrouwen
dat verloren gewaande dingen hun weg wel vinden
naar dat ene punt zero
tijdloos, bezitloos, roerloos, gedachteloos
De openbaring in ritmische tekens
De ontmoeting in golven
POIESIS



Rita De Vuyst
Gent, November 17, 2017
After 13 years, a reconstruction

137
138
139
 140

View publication stats