Time Zones

With Anthony Braxton' was a credit printed on this album's front and back cover in a typeface only a notch smaller than Richard Teitelbaum's name. Braxton is everywhere here, and has everything to do with this album. He plays in duo with Teitelbaum the electronics maestro on the entire album, and surely engineered the deal to make it possible for his buddy to release the record on Arista, which at that point held an exclusive contract with Braxton himself. It was also Braxton who basically promoted Teitelbaum within the confines of the avant-garde free jazz scene, talking him up in interviews and fitting pieces involving him into several different recording projects. There are tastes of the duos these artists have created splashed through the Braxton discography like ice cream stains on a rumpus room rug. This album combines a summer's evening live concert with a studio session cut the following fall, and is quite an accurate document of their work together in the '70s, complete with Braxton's usual dedications, this time to Roscoe Mitchell and Maryanne Amacher. This duo was one of the great instrumental combinations of the '70s, the reed arsenal of Braxton and seemingly unlimited sonic arsenal of Teitelbaum coming together like two great French chefs with a hall full of guests to feed. Each man never seems to stop listening, not only to each other but to a greater force as well, as if in complete understanding of the ramifications of each development. This album should satisfy a listener's desire to hear truly imaginative and successful improvisation involving both electronic and acoustic instruments.