Coon Bid'ness

1975 studio album by Julius Hemphill

Coon Bid'ness

Studio album by

Julius Hemphill

Released

1975

Recorded

January 29, 1975; C.I. Studios, New York City except "The Hard Blues" February 1972

Genre

Jazz, avant-garde jazz

Length

42:36

Label

Arista

Producer

Michael Cuscuna

Julius Hemphill chronology

Dogon A.D.
(1972)

Coon Bid'ness
(1975)

Blue Boyé
(1977)

Coon Bid'ness is an album released by Julius Hemphill in 1975 on Arista featuring performances by Hemphill, Baikida Carroll, Abdul Wadud, Phillip Wilson, Arthur Blythe, Barry Altschul and Daniel Zebulon. The final track, "The Hard Blues," was recorded at the same recording session as Hemphill's debut album Dogon A.D.. After Hemphill's death in 1995, Freedom Records re-released the album as a CD under the name Reflections.^[1]^[2]

Regarding the album title, Hemphill recalled: "This was '75, and the title is a reference to minstrel shows. That's a reference to music and an era in which blacks had flowered a little bit. They used to call them coon shows, and stuff. And so I was just getting in some bicentennial licks."^[3]

In 2011, writer Greg Tate and musician LaTasha N. Nevada Diggs launched a print on demand magazine titled Coon Bidness, named after the Hemphill album.^[4]^[5]

Reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	^[6]
The Rolling Stone Jazz & Blues Album Guide	^[7]
The Virgin Encyclopedia of Jazz	^[8]

The editors of AllMusic awarded the album 4½ stars, and reviewer Scott Yanow wrote: "The music throughout is quite avant-garde but differs from the high-energy jams of the 1960s due to its emphasis on building improvisations as a logical outgrowth from advanced compositions. It's well worth several listens.".^[6]

Writer Richard Williams stated that, on "The Hard Blues," "Hemphill seemed to have fused the harsh, elemental sound of John Lee Hooker, the warmth and colour of an Ellington small group and the collective exuberance of a Mingus ensemble into something that pointed a way to the future."^[9]

Critic Gary Giddins also praised "The Hard Blues," commenting: "How startlingly fresh that music remains: the sinuous, sensuous, riveting directness of his blues is at once fiercely elemental and engagingly modern."^[10]

Musician Henry Kuntz noted that the first four tracks (Side A of the LP) function "as a single composition," and suggested that "Hemphill... likes to work with several layers of sound, to slowly take them apart – to the point of near dissolution – then to put them back together again (though not necessarily the same as they were before)." He remarked: "In the U.S., it seems, the Seventies have been more a period of consolidation rather than of innovation (as if the advances of the last decade had to be justified before being built upon)... Hemphill's album offers music of this sort, and it's recommended."^[11]

Track listing

All tracks by Julius Hemphill

"Reflections" – 2:30
"Lyric" – 7:24
"Skin, No. 1" – 10:07
"Skin, No. 2" – 2:28
"The Hard Blues" – 20:07

Personnel

Tracks 1-4:

Julius Hemphill – alto saxophone, flute
Arthur Blythe – alto saxophone
Hamiet Bluiett - baritone saxophone
Abdul Wadud – cello
Barry Altschul – drums
Daniel Zebulon – congas

Track 5:

Julius Hemphill – alto saxophone, flute
Baikida Carroll – trumpet
Hamiet Bluiett - baritone saxophone
Abdul Wadud – cello
Phillip Wilson - drums

References

^ "Julius Hemphill - Coon Bid'ness". Jazz Music Archives. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
^ Lane, Joslyn. "Julius Hemphill: Reflections". AllMusic. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
^ McElfresh, Suzanne (January 1, 1994). "Julius Hemphill Interview". Bomb Magazine. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
^ "Greg Tate Launches Print On Demand Magazine Coon Bidness". The Wire. April 27, 2011. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
^ "Coon Bidness". MagCloud. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
^ ^a ^b Yanow, S. Allmusic Review accessed July 12, 2011
^ Swenson, John, ed. (1999). The Rolling Stone Jazz & Blues Album Guide. Random House. p. 302.
^ Larkin, Colin, ed. (2004). The Virgin Encyclopedia of Jazz. Virgin Books. p. 400.
^ Williams, Richard (March 28, 2021). "Hemphill bid'ness". The Blue Moment. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
^ Giddins, Gary (1998). Visions of Jazz: The First Century. Oxford University Press. p. 550.
^ Kuntz, Henry (1975). "julius hemphill: coon bid'ness". Bells. Retrieved June 9, 2023.