Escalator over the Hill
| Escalator Over the Hill | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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| Studio album by Carla Bley and Paul Haines | |||||
| Released | 1971 | ||||
| Recorded | 1968–1971 | ||||
| Genre | Avant-garde jazz, post-bop, folk opera | ||||
| Length | 103:35 | ||||
| Label |
JCOA Records (LP) WATT (CD) |
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| Producer | Michael Mantler | ||||
| Jazz Composer's Orchestra chronology | |||||
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| Carla Bley chronology | |||||
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| Professional ratings | |
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| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| All About Jazz | (favorable) |
| Allmusic |   |
| Stylus | (favorable) |
| The Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide | |
Escalator Over the Hill (or EOTH) is mostly referred to as a jazz opera, but it was released as a "chronotransduction" with "words by Paul Haines, adaptation and music by Carla Bley, production and coordination by Michael Mantler", performed by the Jazz Composer's Orchestra.
Escalator Over the Hill is more than two hours long and was recorded over three years (1968 to 1971). It was originally released as a triple LP box which also contained a booklet with lyrics, photos and profiles of the musicians. Side six of the original LPs ended in a locked groove, the final track "...And It's Again" continuing infinitely on manual record players. (For the CD reissue, the hum is allowed to play for almost 20 minutes before slowly fading out.)
In 1997, a live version of Escalator Over the Hill, re-orchestrated by Jeff Friedman, was performed for the first time in Cologne, Germany. In 1998, "Escalator" toured Europe. Another live performance took place in May 2006 in Essen, Germany.
The musicians involved in the original recording play in various combinations, covering a wide range of musical genres, from Kurt Weill's theater music, to free jazz, rock and Indian music. Writer Stuart Broomer considers this to be a summing up "much of the creative energy that was loose between 1968 and 1972".
Viva acts as narrator. Jack Bruce also appears on bass and vocals (due to the album's long production, he also appeared on Frank Zappa's album Apostrophe, playing bass on the title track). Among the vocalists is a young (and still relatively unknown) Linda Ronstadt, in addition to Jeanne Lee, Paul Jones, Carla Bley, Don Preston, Sheila Jordan, and Bley's and Mantler's then-4-year-old daughter Karen Mantler.
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Wikipedia