At the time,
Escalator Over the Hill was probably the longest jazz-generated work in existence (its length was later exceeded by pieces like
Wynton Marsalis'
Blood on the Fields), a massive, messy, all-encompassing all-star ego trip that nevertheless gave
Carla Bley an immense cachet of good will among the avant-garde.
Bley and librettist
Paul Haines called it a "chronotransduction," a term left undefined;
Haines called it essentially "an opera"' and jazz writers called it "jazz opera."
Escalator is, however, very much of its time, a late-'60s attempt to let a thousand flowers bloom and indulge in every trendy influence that
Bley could conceive. There is rock music, early synthesizer and ring modulator experiments, the obligatory Indian section, and repeated outbreaks of Weimar Republic cabaret in 3/4 time that both mock and revere European tradition. The incomprehensible libretto and a good deal of the writing for big band amount to a textbook of avant-garde pretension. At times, however, this unwieldy hash pulls itself together: in the woolly, somber sectional "Hotel Overture" with avant-squeal solos from clarinetist
Perry Robinson and the young
Gato Barbieri in all his "Wild Bull of the Pampas" glory; the clear voice of
Linda Ronstadt brightening up a song called "Why";
Don Cherry's clarion trumpet work; and the power trio of
John McLaughlin,
Jack Bruce, and
Paul Motian rumbling energetically away amidst the Indian structures of "Rawalpindi Blues." Originally released on three LPs, an almost unheard-of extravagance in 1971, the hard-to-find LP version does have an advantage: the work concludes with an infinite windy drone via a locked run-out groove; on the CD version, the drone continues for about 20 minutes before fading out. ~ Richard S. Ginell
