Chuck Israels on Coltrane

I might have posted this earlier, but I still find this fascinating. Chuck Israels is a bassist who is best known for playing on a few Bill Evans recordings in the 1960s.

From Cadence Magazine Vol 36 Jan/Feb/Mar 2010

"I think Coltrane played into the aesthetic of the '60s, and I have a lot of reasons to say that, and I think it's an interesting discussion and one that is probably important on some levels. [Basically], the repetitive whirling-dervish, mantra-like characteristic of his playing––one of the things for which he is most well-known––plays into a kind of listening that does not require a recognition of form or development. It's the psychedelic experience, the experience in which you are really not controlling your thinking, or directing your thinking, even."

"I think the best of Sonny Rollins is among the best music––it defines a certain kind of Jazz aesthetic for me. It has form and balance and contrast, the opposites, the pulling of opposites that I think is important in the way people experience things at the most interesting and highest levels. It's okay to experience something that washes over you, sort of this ecstatic, sort of hypnotic state. It's okay. I'm just not as interested in that as I am in… I'm a real western guy, you know, western in the sense of being interested in form and development and knowing where I am in the story, and having a sense of anticipation in order that I might be surprised. I have to have expectation."

This is obviously a huge oversimplification of what John Coltrane was attempting. However, I agree that this is probably a big part of his appeal to listeners.