Rahsaan Roland Kirk (Aug 7, 1935 – Dec 5, 1977)

 

Born: Ronald Theodore Kirk,  born in Columbus, Ohio
He transposed the letters of his first name from Ronald to Roland, as a result of a dream, early in his career. Resulting from a further dream, he added Rahsaan to his title in 1970.

 

Roland Kirk jamming with Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention, 1969

“I met him backstage at the Boston Jazz Festival and asked him to play with us if he was interested in our music. Then, during our set, led by his attendant, he came up to the stage. As you know he’s blind, but his body understood all of our signals. At one point everybody in the band was supposed to get down on their back and kick their feet in the air while they still keep playing. As soon as we got on our back, he also got on his back. When we got up, he also got up. He grasped everything. He is an excellent musician. Three weeks later we played together again at the Florida Jazz Festival.”
— Frank Zappa, New Music Magazine interview, April 1976.

 

Kirk and Mingus

“Kirk was an exhilarating multi-reed playing jazz musician, sideman with Charles Mingus, and the leader of his own groups until suffering a stroke in 1975, after which he did play, but died of a second stroke in 1977. Arguably the most exciting saxophone soloist in jazz history, Kirk was a post-modernist before that term even existed.”

“Kirk was born with sight, but became blind at the age of two. Kirk’s ability to play more than one wind-instrument at a time gave his music a distinctively intuitive edge, as he was effectively able to accompany himself. His renowned circular breathing technique also enabled him to sustain notes for unusually long periods.”
http://wiki.killuglyradio.com/wiki/Roland_Kirk

 

“Flute, tenor sax, alto sax, soprano sax, baritone sax, manzello, stritch, clarinet, bugle, trumpet, various types of whistles(including the nose whistle), piccolo, oboe, percussion, harmonica, celeste, organ… These are only some of the instruments played, even mastered, by a single man during his lifetime. That’s not to mention the many bizarre instruments he invented or the fact that he could play three saxophones at the same time, hitting different notes. He also learned the technique of circular breathing so he could play without stopping for an obvious breath. Without being disrespectful to other greats, he was simply the most incredible flautist and exciting saxophonist a person could have the pleasure of hearing. On stage he was also a comedian. Losing his sight at age two didn’t stop him from becoming a Jazz legend. ” Rob Powell

“Whenever anyone would ask him what his religion was,” his third wife and widow Dorthaan recalled, “he would always say he was of the religion of dreams because this is the way a lot of important things happened in his life.”

“I wish we could just stay on the bandstand, it’s so peaceful up here.”

“When I’m reincarnated, I’m gonna come back as a musical note!”

“I didn’t ask my mother to buy me a trumpet or a violin. I started right on the water hose. My uncle used to come over to the house and play on the piano, and I’d get a water hose and play the melody with him.”

“I have no religion that you get out of books, I am not a Muslim. My whole religion has been in this dream religion. My life has been motivated by dreams.”

Thanks to dear friend, Steve Grosskopf, for some of the quotes and for introducing me to three of the videos.

 

 

Kirk was also an influential flautist, employing several techniques that he developed himself. One technique was to sing or hum into the flute at the same time as playing. Another was to play the standard transverse flute at the same time as a nose flute. Kirk was also a major exponent and practitioner of circular breathing. Using this technique, Kirk was not only able to sustain a single note for virtually any length of time; he could also play 16th-note runs of almost unlimited length, and at high speeds.

Some observers thought that Kirk’s bizarre onstage appearance and simultaneous multi-instrumentalism were just gimmicks, especially when coming from a blind man, but these opinions usually vanished when Kirk actually started playing. He used the multiple horns to play true chords, essentially functioning as a one-man saxophone section. Kirk insisted that he was only trying to emulate the sounds he heard in his mind.

Kirk’s unusual techniques were not adopted when he was an adult professional trying to find an edge in a competitive business but were taken up when he was a teenager trying to find his musical voice. They were not extraneous additions to his playing; they were at the core of his sound from the beginning.
https://rahsaanrolandkirk.jazzgiants.net/

Rahsaan Roland Kirk appeared on Ed Sullivan’s last show in 1971