CHARLIE HADEN/LIBERATION MUSIC ORCHESTRA
Not In Our Name

Verve

In 1968 Charlie Haden and Carla Bley launched the Liberation Music Orchestra to express their feelings about the political and social issues that were gripping both the United States and much of the rest of the world. That recording featured Bley’s arrangements of such tunes as the Eastern European anthem “Song of the United Front,” Spanish Civil War themes, Haden’s own “Song for Che” and Ornette Coleman’s “War Orphans.” Now Haden and Bley have reunited with a version of the LMO that has toured Europe extensively over the past year. Not In Our Name presents a series of distinctly American musical themes that present a snapshot of the diverse people of this country as well as making Bley and Haden’s point that the devastation unleashed on the world by the current American political administration is not the work of the average American. In short, it is a program of music that both speaks of political outrage, just as the original LMO album did, as well as attempting to put a more friendly face on the United States by presenting its music and representing its people.

Neither Haden nor Bley are strangers to jazz/improvisational music as a political and/or social statement. After 9/11, Haden released the beautiful album American Dreams, a gesture aimed at offering healing and beauty to a world that was short on both. American Dreams was a gorgeous album on which Haden and his cohorts were joined by an orchestra on almost every track, a fact that some found objectionable. Bley has long used American themes, particularly the national anthem, as a framework on which to hang politically incisive arrangements. For example, while touring Europe, Bley, on hearing that Ronald Reagan had been elected to the U.S. presidency, arranged a minor key version of the “Star Spangled Banner,” with which her group opened their concert that evening.

The band leads off with Haden’s composition “Not In Our Name,” a haunting theme. Of particular interest on this track are Miguel Zenon’s soaring, clear alto sax solo and some nice piano work by Bley. Steve Cardenas’ acoustic guitar work is also lovely, contributing a Latin American slant to this minor key anthem. The piece concludes with the horn players, in turn, trading solos over the orchestra’s chord blocks. The second track is a rendition of the Pat Metheny/Lionel Mays/David Bowie collaboration “This Is Not America.” Bley’s opening statement of the melody, before the horns enter, is minimal, using primarily the right hand only, but shows how well she understands that music is a combination of both the melodic and the rhythmic.

Bley’s “Blue Anthem” uses bits and pieces of many patriotic themes, including martial cadences and “La Marseillaise.” The centerpiece of the album is an arrangement of “America the Beautiful” into the middle of which Bley includes “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” long known as ‘the black national anthem,’ and Ornette Coleman’s orchestral work “Skies of America.” With its sense of uneasiness and often chaotic passages, Coleman’s work seems perfect for the time and perfect for this disc. The concluding section of the CD is no less impressive. There is a seven-plus minute version of “Amazing Grace” that never tries to be cute or stray from the song’s gospel roots, demonstrating Bley’s wisdom as an arranger and her respect for the musical sources she mines. Next is Dvorak’s “Goin’ Home” theme from the largo movement of the New World Symphony. The arrangement centers around gorgeous trumpet work and is lifted to a more hopeful, less melancholy dimension by Zenon’s ending alto solo. Then comes Bill Frisell’s “Throughout,” a song recorded by Haden’s daughter Petra and Frisell on the album True North. The disc concludes with a very straightforward arrangement of Samuel Barber’s “Adagio” from Adagio for Strings. The somber theme is, again, in keeping with the mood of loss and the uncertainty.

Not In Our Name is, ultimately, a recording of American composers and musicians looking at, and talking about, America and the experience of being an American. That’s a strong musical premise on which to base a recording, and Haden and Bley pull it off very well.