Singularity Codex: Matthew Shipp on RogueArt
Paris: RogueArt, 2023 (available from June 2023)
207 pages, illustrated
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This is my first book, and it's been a long time coming. In the course of over 200 pages Singularity Codex presents the work of Shipp and his numerous collaborators within the broader jazz and free music continuum, and covers in detail the pianist's 25 current/forthcoming albums for RogueArt (and one book with poet Steve Dalachinsky). Neither a strict biography nor a discography, this volume includes numerous interviews, photographs, and aesthetic meditations that frame the music, its connections, and surrounding philosophy and history. Whether or not you are familiar with Shipp and his work, this book is a fascinating read.
Singularity Codex is available directly from RogueArt as well as through your favorite book/record store.
Shipp himself has this to say:
“What I find so fascinating about this book is even though it is about my work, it touches on so many tangents of issues related to modern jazz — the modern art world — the metaphysics of jazz language — the sociology of all this — the revivification of jazz avant-garde language that started happening in the Lower East Side before I moved to NYC, etc. etc. etc. etc. This book goes way beyond me. That I can be a conduit for this makes me proud.
That Clifford Allen is a great writer who can bring the nexus of all this together makes me feel fortunate.”
Errata:
P. 23: Errol Parker performed and recorded on drum kit, hand percussion, piano, flute, and synthesizer; perhaps he is better thought of as a multi-instrumentalist, though all of his work has a very percussive and rhythmic approach. Saheb Sarbib is a bit of a mystery man. Recently it came to light that his father lived in Portugal (where Sarbib ended up in the 1980s), though my digging had traced his lineage as French and Algerian. He first appeared on the French free music scene at the very beginning of the ‘70s, and was notoriously coy about his background in later interviews (and part of that was tied to political activities).
P. 165: “14 repartees” should read “12” though I probably wished there were two more on the disc.
Press:
The Wire, 474:78 — “Those [RogueArt] recordings, their place in Shipp’s larger discography, and the diverse forces which launched Shipp’s densely documented journey are the subject of Clifford Allen’s tome, which is based on a series of interviews he conducted with Shipp and his associates. … While Singularity Codex purports to focus on Shipp’s career, it makes clear how he is part of a larger community.”
https://burningambulance.com/2023/06/27/matthew-shipp-2/
https://www.allaboutjazz.com/singularity-codex-matthew-shipp-on-rogueart
https://themusicbookpodcast.buzzsprout.com/2120946/13380170-015-clifford-allen-on-matthew-shipp
https://www.jazzrightnow.com/review-singularity-codex-matthew-shipp-by-clifford-allen/