Classic Recordings,
Roland Kirk - Volunteered Slavery
Was there ever a more singular figure in jazz than Rahsaan Roland Kirk? Standing on stage, multiple saxophones hanging off him, all being blown and played at the same time, plus assorted bells, whistles and nose flutes, in a well-slick suit, and always wearing shades (Kirk was blind from the age of two, he argued due to medical negligence), witnessing Kirk live must have been quite a spectacle. But beyond the novelty factor, Roland Kirk made some of the most jubilant, life affirming jazz of the sixties and seventies. He never quite fitted in with any particular scene, preferring to work with his own groups rather than serve as a sideman. There are some notable exceptions though, not least his appearance on Oh Yeah, surely the strangest album Charles Mingus ever cut, thanks in no small part to Kirk’s madcap energy. And he also performed the main flute theme on the Quincy Jones tune Soul Bossanova, as heard on the Austin Powers soundtrack and numerous TV programmes and adverts.
Born Ronald Theodore Kirk in Columbus, Ohio in 1935, he later felt compelled by a dream to switch the L and N to make Roland, and then in 1970 another dream instructed him to prefix Rahsaan. A musical prodigy, learning the bugle, trumpet, clarinet and C-melody sax as a child, Kirk was playing professionally in local R&B bands by the age of fifteen. Hank Crawford, a band mate at the time recalled that ‘he was this 14-year-old blind kid playing two horns at once. They would bring him out and he would tear the joint up.’ He also had a penchant for more esoteric instruments, adding the manzello, a version of the saxello, and the stritch, which looks like a cross between a modified straight E flat alto sax and an alpine horn, into his armoury, whilst also becoming a mean flautist. And years before Anthony Braxton and Evan Parker he had developed his own circular breathing technique, allowing him to switch between instruments at will, or play all at the same time. Clips like this probably sum him up the best…
In some quarters Kirk was branded a sideshow act, wilfully ignoring the sheer technique on display, and his ability to draw upon the entire history of jazz within a solo, combining the earliest New Orleans licks, through bebop and up to the avant-garde innovations of Coltrane. Perhaps what his critics objected to most was Kirk’s desire to entertain the audience (and himself and his band), snootily writing off his jokes and clowning about as mere schtick. It was the era when the ‘new thing’ in jazz was aligning itself with the black power movement, and to many the notion of black musicians playing the fool and presenting themselves as entertainers was considered regressive. Aside from it all being a natural extension of his personality, Kirk’s open-minded nature and grounding in R&B kept him alive to other currents in music, particularly the contemporary soul and funk scenes. His onstage antics were no more outrageous than those of James Brown, George Clinton or Sly Stone, all of whom similarly used their over-the-top stage personas as a double-edged sword of celebration and an act of defiance.
All of Kirk’s albums are worth checking out, but I have a particular softspot for Volunteered Slavery as a good friend included the track One Ton on a cassette compilation he made for me back in the nineties. This friend was confined to a wheelchair and lived in sheltered accommodation on a somewhat less than desirable council estate, and jazz was his main route to spiritual emancipation. After his musical god, John Coltrane, Roland Kirk was probably next in command, and in retrospect I can see the connections – both had disabilities and found release through music, and both passed away far too young, in their early forties. Volunteered Slavery is an album of two halves, with the first side being taken up by a suite recorded in the studio. It’s Kirk’s first major attempt to fuse jazz, gospel, soul and pop, with an over-arching message of peace and unity holding it together. The short track Search for the Reason Why gets to the nub of this, with a choir singing ‘Music that makes us cry, love that money can’t buy, let’s all search for the reason why’. It has an infectious, ragged, community centre vibe that works perfectly, with Kirk leading and singing from the front. The band then dive into a raucous medley based around Bacharach and David’s I Say a Little Prayer, which in 1968 would have been on everywhere on the airwaves in Aretha Franklin’s famous version.
The second half of the album is a recording of Kirk live at Newport in the same year and has a madcap energy of its own. One Ton, the track I mentioned above, opens with an insistent staccato 12 bar blues from the band, whilst Kirk quickly works through his arsenal of flute, stritch, marzello, tenor sax and nose flute, before the band drops out and Kirk delivers a bravura solo, complete with yelps and manic flutter tonguing, before a slide whistle signals the band to snap back in. This is followed by a moving tribute to Coltrane, and the album closes with the blistering Three for the Festival.
Kirk cracks a joke at one point, which I’d wager he trotted out for audiences on numerous occasions as it sounds well-honed, but it encapsulates something of his self-deprecating and enduring charm. ‘Thank you ladies and gentlemen for your kind attention…. we admit we started off to a slow start because ah… I wasn’t looking at my piano player, and ah… I been smoking a little too much… I was totally blind when I came on here.’
Alternatively, Volunteered Slavery is included on this box set which is solid gold throughout. Kirk never recorded a boring album. The Inflated Tear is another landmark album, and more focused on pure jazz. Kirk never recorded a boring album, and each of these is its own little universe.
Matt Groom - Head of Jazz
