Jeffrey Hayden Shurdut
Ayler Records announces SHURDUT as the first living artist to be celebrated with Box Set; 2007. Performances include: The Whitney Museum of American Art, Biennial; 2008. The University of Pennsylvania; 2006. Hampshire College; 2010. Awards include: Columbia University, Graduate School of Arts & Sciences, Installation; 1993/94. Documented by Cadence and NOLABELS! 2002-2005.
Jeffrey Hayden Shurdut (Am. b. 1967) is the founder of THIS IS THE MUSIC OF LIFE: A series featuring both inter-disciplinary and multi-instrumental artists who have a place in American History and emerging artists dedicated to documenting the essential connection between the visual, movement, music, and word in a living and creative space.
Shurdut is a "Visionary," Mike Szajewski (WNUR, Chicago); with "Talent and Vision to Spare," Steven Loewy (All Music Guide). "But listeners beware � when you first get started there is no way back, you are going to be hooked for life," says Henrik Kaldahl.
"...referencing everything from "from the wood rattling against the heater" to "the screams of the garbage trucks at 4 am" as Shurdut puts it, this trio has created an arresting urban sound picture. Just as the reality of big city life is expressed by yoking extended techniques to familiar jazz instruments, this CD defies metropolitan anomie with heartfelt sonic expressions that interconnect rather than alienate." -Ken Waxman (JAZZ WORD)
I'm blown away, Jeffery!!! Highly creative avant garde creation and beyond! I like your creative ideas... I think it's a stroke of genius. I think we stepped on the toes of the classical musicians as well. We must continue once more with this concept and your new concept of approach to the music in the 21st century.
Sonny Simmons 2005
Reviews:
Jeffrey Hayden Shurdut�s
�THIS IS THE MUSIC OF LIFE�
�This Music Lives Up To Its Name.�
-The Village Voice (2005)
�A luta continua� intense, astringent , multipoint,�engrossing level of improvisitory interaction� a viscerally thrilling ride.�
-Cadence Magazine
�Shurdut pledges allegiance to the spirit of ecstasy with a band of ebullient blow torches, including Sonny Simmons, and Blaise Siwula.� -Time Out NY (2005)
�Jeffrey Hayden Shurdut leads a sextet featuring legend Sonny Simmons.� -The New York Times (2005)
�Daniel Carter with Jeff Shurdut ...Haunting, Reflective, and Engaging.� -Downtown Music Gallery
�Jeff Shurdut�s THIS IS THE MUSIC OF LIFE with Marshall Allen and Sabir Mateen� Wynton Marsalis should get this group over to Lincoln Center.� -The Village Voice (2005)
�TOP NOTCH INCENDIARY FREE JAZZ
FROM JEFFREY SHURDUT'S COLLECTIVE.�
-TIME OUT NEW YORK. NOVEMBER 17-23, 2005
The Wire
By: Daniel Spicer
New York multi-instrumentalist Jeffrey Hayden Shurdut isn’t one to whisper when a shout will do. This third installment of his monumental download-only box set adds a further six CDs’ worth of live recordings, bringing it to around 20 hours. With Shurdut mostly playing a fire-spitting alto sax, the basic template is the explosive mass improvisation of Coltrane’s Ascension, but with the Afrocentric spiritual yearning replaced by nerve-jangling information overload. “Free Gravity†is a boiling scream, with Danny and Gene Moore’s guitars and electronics touching similar ground to uncle/brother Thurston’s Original Silence; “Indigenous Songs for Our People†features percussionist Lukas Ligeti; and “Middle Class Poverty†pits Sabir Mateen’s tenor against Shurdut’s piano pummeling. Almost overwhelming in scope and density, and gleefully sidestepping issues of subtlety or restraint, it’s not so much a joyful noise as an anguished shriek of existence.
Signal To Noise
By: Lawrence Cosentino
In the notes to his eight-part “digital box set†on Ayler Records, Jeffrey Hayden Shurdut calls himself a “moving portal,†a human receptor communicating “the all-out storm of the world.†From this and other basement-Buddha pronouncements, an ornery skeptic could make wild guesses about Shurdut’s life story: the one failed piano lesson, the uncommunicative youth, and finally, the burst of inspiration that led him to throw off the shackles of technique and realize that music isn’t created, but already out there, poised to rush on its own through a properly receptive “portal.†No, Shurdut doesn’t make it easy, but this collection tosses down an enormous gauntlet: listen to these astounding sonic cyclones, recorded guerilla-style in various venues around New York, and then brush him off – if you can.
The Digital Box is a daunting package, and the first order of business is to skip past Shurdut’s post-obvious poetry and philosophy (“everything is already in front of usâ€) and go straight to “Etuning,†the set's centerpiece.
“Etuning†presumably stands for “environmental tuning,†an evasive concept until you hear Shurdut and his colleagues draw shattering soundscapes out of everyday noises. Most of Shurdut's sessions feature two or three hair-onfire reedmen, maybe a trumpet, prominent percussion, and wild-card elements such as viola, laptop, or spoken word. (Shurdut’s philosophy is to let anyone play anything, whether it’s “their†instrument or not.) Shurdut
himself is usually under the waves, stirring up bottom murk on guitar, amp or piano. The first thing that hits you about this music is its hungry, amoeba-like cohesion. In “Etuning From the Shower Head,†everybody locks into thick, liquid pulsations, centered by Brian Osborne’s tremendous drum rolls. Reedman Blaise Siwula, an exciting and frequent collaborator on this set, sounds almost blithe, as if he’s singing in the shower. “Kitchen Sink†is full of stinging cymbals and high-hat splashes – is the water too hot? – and “Bathroom Tub†goes on a wild squeakathon, with Shurdut’s guitar sounding like a barnyard full of chickens. A bracing new sound combination is almost always around the corner. On “Siren to the Dishwasher Handle,†flutist Bonnie Kane adds a bizarre fairy dust of trills; on “Truck to the Wind Underneath My Door,†Daniel Carter’s huge tenor booms through dense layers of resistance and friction. The savage energy and palpable group spirit of Etuning is typical of the whole set. The longer tracks will challenge the patience of some, but the music's felicitous mix of random and precise processes, its organic integrity, makes it as hard to argue with as a wild forest, a busy street or a hunk of rock. The trick is not to follow this music, but to wander through it.
“Humanity,†for example, starts out like cave music, with piano tolling and cello slurs like a growling stomach. Welf Dorr’s alto sax spirals up through the dark like a silvery stalagmite. Most of the time, such comparisons fail, as when until the group stretches and strangles the music into a twisted rope of wet sound. The sheer power of most tracks will blow the scalp off your skull.
On “Emergency Broadcast System,†Siwula and tenor man Ras Moshe whip around like an unattended riot hose for a solid 20 minutes before starting to flag (though drummer Marc Edwards just keeps on going). They set the bar so high anything less than an all-out frenzy begins to sound like marking time, but Shurdut’s endings always rise to the occasion. Toward “Emergency’s†conclusion, Moshe takes a blazing solo, supported by low rumbles from Shurdut. Edwards skitters in with nervous brushwork, and then they’re off again, heading for a thunderous, drum-drenched climax.
“City Living†is among the least frantic, with Siwula and Ras Moshe on tenors and Marcus Cummins on soprano for the 42-minute anchor track, a study in the braiding and unbraiding of sax lines. Shurdut’s hand is lighter, in part because he’s on a background-mixed Fender Rhodes, so even the mass freakouts sound a bit like they’re happening inside a bottle. Shurdut’s inclusiveness works well here. For much of the duration, all three reedmen are playing at once, and their intelligently layered interplay, defying all odds, doesn’t get old.
On “This is the Music of Lifeâ€, Siwula and free-jazz legend Sonny Simmons sound great together, and it’s a thrill when Daniel Carter’s trumpet swoops in like a hawk, temporarily silencing them both. Of course, there are limitations to Shurdut’s approach. When the hornmen lay out and leave his piano out to dry for too long, he wears out his welcome. He’ll obsess over a cramped figure on piano or guitar for minutes on end, forcing the rest to make something out of it. Often they do, sometimes they don’t.
“Ayler Records Celebration†centers on Luther Thomas’ tribute to Charlie Parker, with disembodied Bird riffs and tired spokenword jazz worship that broke the Shurdut spell for me. But that was an exception.
Still, some people will call this set self-indulgent, and maybe it is. On balance, it’s a good thing surgeons and dentists don’t rediscover their instruments and channel their disciplines out of thin air, as Shurdut does with guitars and pianos. But we should all aspire to attune ourselves to kitchen sinks, windy doorways, and city sounds the way Shurdut does. Religion is about filling life’s empty bag, and etuning has more to do with religion than music. It requires a leap of faith, but if you’re game, etuning richly rewards elistening.
