Terry Riley - Shri Camel (Columbia, 1980)

This post is by Dan

Terry Riley (Yamaha electronic organ with digital delays)

Recorded 1980

It may seem curious, if not preposterous or perverse, to launch a jazz blog with an entry that is classifiable under many categories: e.g., new music, electronic, modern classical, minimalist, etc. My discovery of Shri Camel was through a review in Downbeat in 1980, the year it was released by Columbia on its Masterworks label. A performance by a solo organist over two sides of an LP may not immediately attract jazz listeners, but the music not only sounds improvised, it reveals layer upon layer of fascinating ideas and tonal ingenuity.  

Terry Riley is known for his albums In C, and A Rainbow in Curved Air, which also have an improvisatory feel to them. I place Shri Camel among my favorite jazz albums of the 1980s because all the pieces connect like a suite of probing, often meditative, aural images played without pretense or apology. It’s simply unique music of a high order that I have enjoyed for the past 40 years. It doesn’t fit into any neat progression of jazz, such as the movements from swing, through bebop, post bop, and free jazz. Somehow, it belongs as a statement that could only be made in the 80s and makes a point about the rising decade. The 1980s would be filled not only by resurgent traditional forms but also by new traditions. A postmodern smorgasbord, if you will.

The Shri Camel program is culminated by the final track, “Desert of Ice,” which displays wonderful dynamic tension and release over the course of 15 minutes. All the preceding tracks set up this climax to a brilliant album.

The liner notes specify that all selections were composed and performed live. If this isn’t jazz, it will have to do till the real thing comes along, as the song goes. It still sounds fresh to these ears.