YouTube videos all at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arBJ_W4nKis&feature=youtu.be
YouTube ROOTS to SHOOTS, SEPT. 5, 2025 shoot by Maurice Papi and Andrew Gurian, mix/master Jon Rosenberg: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRMgTxCnvOc
MMOSS YouTube channel: https://studio.youtube.com/video/ssLrIthLmJ0/edit
Vimeo: ROOTS to SHOOTS at Westbeth Oct. 4, 2024: video: Ted Timreck, audio: Maurice Papi. https://vimeo.com/1021248010?share=copy#t=0
The Old One: https://vimeo.com/user96137480/download/462341692/2d90c38aeb
Throne of Gold—spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/6J6uAgSJBzds94JfvNAlcl?si=1183bba349f34d19
https://open.spotify.com/track/0kok85Idh7G9LRW5JzuSV4
C# or Bb: See Sharp of Be Flat—spotify
https://open.spotify.com/track/0kok85Idh7G9LRW5JzuSV4?si=79642a545c2949cc
6.29.19 AO AT SCHOLES ST. STUDIO: C# or Bb: See Sharp or Be Flat
VIMEO: https://vimeo.com/user96137480
NYFQ @BUSHWICK IMPROVISATIONAL SERIES 11.5.18
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3X7k2D_Zsvo
5.18.18 ACCIDENTAL ORCHESTRA CD RELEASE PARTY ENTIRE:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgzHVpuotXM&feature=youtu.be
Kether-5.18.18: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YU8Am8KSj4U
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgzHVpuotXM&feature=youtu.be
of CD Release Party 5.18.18 by Andrew Gurian. Entire gig.
YESOD
AO CD RELEASE PARTY, MAY 18, 2018: https://youtu.be/c_nrOhF6j0E
NYFQ: Conjunction–ShapeShifter Lab 1.15.15
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOrRoknhAYA&feature=youtu.be
NYFQ: Inspired NYFQ at Bridge Street Cabaret 8.6.15
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arBJ_W4nKis&feature=youtu.be
NYFQ at Bridge Street Cabaret: Pyramid 8.6.15
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpKgQJzGeYI
NYFQ at Bridge Street Cabaret Mirror 8.6.15
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMVohVEvugw
Billy Stein (g) & Michael art Moss (Bb clarinet).mov Riverside After Dark
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xga36tTVmPs
PYRAMID Youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qlWMGg7lBwA
Larry Roland/Michael Moss/Chuck Fertal-Children’s Magical Garden—Arts for Art-Sept. 24, 2016: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fExyi4d_xA&feature=em-share_video_user
Thank you John Pietaro for this fab review in the New York City Jazz Record! THE NEW YORK CITY JAZZ RECORD | October 2025–Michael Moss @ Westbeth Center
For many Downtown musicians, the place woodwinds specialist Michael Moss holds within jazz extends well beyond the bell of his horns. Coming of age in the ’60s, Moss was a witness to Coltrane’s musical and spiritual expansion and the visions of liberation unique to that time. As a saxophonist with numerous doubles, as well as composer, conceptualist and producer, he was heard with many free jazz veterans. The Westbeth Center hosted a project (Sep. 5) that Moss planned for years, initially sidelined by the COVID-19 lock-down: Roots and Shoots. With the further passage of time, and losses incurred, this all-star ensemble and its retrospective “new thing” served a much greater role than initially conceived. Joining him was celebrated percussionist Warren Smith (now 91), playing vibraphone, and another historic figure, drummer Jackson Krall, whose 20+ years with Cecil Taylor resonates loudly. Very. While pianist Alexis Marcelo and bassist Adam Lane are of later vintage, these two master musicians have vital histories of their own. Opening the concert with Eric Dolphy’s moving “Left Alone”, the leader’s flute rang over vibraphone, piano and cymbals. Coltrane’s “Afro Blue” and “Equinox” (Lane a Paganini of the bass) flanked Bill Evans’ “T.T.T. (Twelve Tone Tune)”, all cranking overdrive. The latter (Evans’ attempt to write Schoenberg) as played in every manner, including retrograde and expansion by immediate composition. The band also took on two Moss originals, closing with the necessary radical strains of his “March On.” Here’s where today’s avant becomes the garde of tomorrow. — John Pietaro
MICHAEL MOSS–FLAGRANT MUSIC LIBERATION
BY JOHN PIETARO
Within NYC’s Downtown jazz annals, the name Michael Moss—reeds master, pianist, composer, producer—holds importance not only as part of the Loft era scene, but as one who has since extended his influence in avant garde iterations, particularly in what has become known as “Fourth Stream.” Coming of age in the ’60s, he was forever changed by the musical, spiritual and revolutionary expansion of John Coltrane, guided too, by the music of Eric Dolphy and Max Roach. A tenacious conceptualist, Moss has traversed musical barriers on countless stages in the company of Sam Rivers, Paul Bley, Badal Roy, Gunter Hampel, Jeanne Lee, Rashid Bakr (Charles Downs) and others within periods of formidable transition.
Born March 24, 1944, in the Chicago suburb of Highland Park, IL, his family home flowed with creativity: Moss’ mother was a pianist and accomplished visual artist, and his father a concert pianist schooled at Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY, and NYC’s famed Juilliard School. The elder Moss served as the younger’s piano instructor, with expansive tutelage through the works of Bach and Rachmaninov; but a major turn occurred when he began playing B-flat clarinet. At the age of ten, young Moss, with the help of his father, formed a quintet that performed at children’s parties. And while his father was a classical artist, he introduced his son to improvisation, with Rodgers and Hart’s “Blue Moon” as the jazz Petri dish.
At the University of Wisconsin he majored in. Clinical Psychology, in which he went on to earn a Ph.D. Simultaneously, Moss began writing music arrangements, leading to prolific endeavors into composition. Joining an ensemble led by pianist Ben Sidran, Moss became an in-demand player while also creating long-form works featuring high levels of improvisation. “I followed bebop, hard bop, free bop, all the way into the beginning of free jazz, as people were scrambling to name it different things,” Moss recalls. “Once the bonds of 32-bar solos were smashed, we were ALL going out.” With the sonic universe widely expanding, possibilities were endless. “Jazz for me was becoming another form of folk music, especially when I heard both Trane and The Beatles copping licks from East Indian music.” Moss made a temporary foray into Manhattan for several graduate classes at New York University, a journey that also offered an immersion into the developing Lower East Side free jazz scene. Following graduation from the University of Wisconsin, a return to NYC saw the saxophonist blossom within the avant circle while pursuing doctoral studies at The New School. “The times influenced the music in so many ways,” he recalls. “And the anger in free jazz was fueled by the (Vietnam) war, the Civil Rights Movement and the rise of Black Power.” In NYC, Moss’ cultural fire blazed through historic concerts he attended, including one of Coltrane’s last at the Olatunji Center of African Culture in East Harlem. By 1970, at the behest of Dave Liebman, Moss joined the musicians’ cooperative Free Life Communications, whose reach was far, with a link to the jazz lofts of the day. Moss’ own band, Four Rivers, played Sam Rivers’ Studio RivBea, and the leader was asked to join Rivers’ all-reed ensemble, the Winds of Manhattan. Concurrently, Moss began composing for extended ensembles of woods, brass, strings and rhythm, crossing into the “Third Stream” (the launch-point for “Fourth Stream,” Moss’ integration of folk and world music into jazz), while embracing improvisation at its most emotive.
Moss founded the Fourth Stream record label and ERG Publishing in 1972 to produce and release the vast array of experimental East Village music. Paul Bley arranged distribution via the Jazz Composers Orchestra Association’s New Music Distribution Service. “JCOA also commissioned a new work in which I conducted 100 stellar musicians at NYU,” says Moss. “For this I developed my own technique of composition, a technique similar to latter day composers, but 40 years before them. I soon led a similar group of incredible free jazz musicians that was commissioned by WBAI-FM and broadcast live out of their studios.” In 1974 Moss traveled to Pakistan, India and Sri Lanka with his wife, dancer Judith Moss, on a Dan Wagoner Company State Department tour. He not only performed on radio with Sri Lanka’s premiere violinist, vocalist and composer W. D. Amaradeva, but expanded his world music vision, inspired by Coltrane’s own. Polyrhythmic explorations followed, with wildly augmented improvisation. In the ensuing years, he not only incorporated South Asian forms, but concepts from African traditions. Among his most important global allies was celebrated tabla player Badal Roy. Their collaboration began with Moss’ first album in 1976, and was maintained over the next four decades. Moss’ career also led to Richie Beirach (who passed away this January), as well as Michael Urbaniak, Dave Burrell, Ra Kalam Bob Moses, Jackson Krall, Larry Roland, William Parker and Bakr (Downs), with whom Moss performed at the now legendary downtown iteration of the Knitting Factory, really the stuff of legend. Downs recruited Moss into his band Centipede and Krall is currently in the driver’s seat of Moss’ ROOTS to SHOOTS band.
Roland (who died in 2023) was another colleague holding lasting impact. Moss recalls: “Larry and I started playing together when pianist Steve Cohn and I organized the New York Free Quartet, with Chuck Fertal on drums. We put out four albums and played many venues together. Larry invited me into Vision Festival gigs with drummer-percussionist Michael Wimberly and trumpeter Waldron Mahdi Ricks. He had that old school style and was a big influence on ROOTS to SHOOTS’ performances of Coltrane’s A Love Supreme. We really miss him.”
Though it’s easy to see the loss of vital comrades deeply moves him, Moss is a survivor and fittingly, he’s now preparing to release a boxed set of live recordings by ROOTS to SHOOTS, Ensemble Bows and Quantum Butterfly, a spectacular electro-acoustic volume. The selections almost combust in trying to contain such flagrant liberation.
For more info visit michaelmoss.bandcamp.com and www.m2-theory.com.
Recommended Listening:
Annette Peacock—I’m The One (RCA Victor, 1972); Michael Moss Four Rivers—Cross Current (Fourth Stream, 1978); Collective 4tet—Dreamcatcher (Stork Music, 1992); New York Free Quartet (Michael Moss, Steve Cohn, Larry Roland, Chuck Fertal)—Dream Time (Fourth Stream, 2016); Michael Moss Accidental Orchestra—Helix (Fourth Stream, 2016); Michael Moss—Quantum Butterfly (Fourth Stream, 2022-25)
4th Stream Records released FREE PLAY, a New York Free Quartet CD in 2015 http://www.michaelmoss.bandcamp.com. FREE PLAY was recorded live at a New York Free Quartet performance on July 29, 2014 at ShapeShifter Lab in Brooklyn. A YouTube video of the performance of Conjunction, a piece by Michael Moss, may be found at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOrRoknhAYA&feature=youtu.be
Members of the New York Free Quartet have an extensive history documenting their work. Following is a summary of each member’s contribution to the overall scope of the group.
Michael Moss formed 4th Stream Records, an independent record label, and ERG Publishing, an independent publishing company in 1972 On 4th Stream Records Moss released Intervals ( 2013, featuring Billy Stein); Death And Transmigration Of Souls and Qaballa/Entanglement; (2008 with PRO VISO featuring Ralph Denzer, Louisa Bieler, Dan Scholnick); The Imitations Great Hall Concert 1965 (released in 2008, featuring vocalists Tracy Nelson, Chuck Matthews, and Irma Routen, and musicians Mel Nusbaum, Ben Sidran, Gary Karp, Dick Drake, George Haberichter, Hart McNee, Kip Maercklein, Myron Cohen); Double Vision (2007, with PRO VISO featuring Ralph Denzer, Louisa Bieler, Dan Scholnick); PROVISiOns, (2005 with PRO VISO featuring Ralph Denzer, Louisa Bieler, Dan Scholnick); The Vessel (2003, featuring John Shea and Nick DelGreco); Pyramid (1983, featuring Mikko Mikkola, John Shea); Live At ACIA (1979, featuring Bob Stern, Mike Mahaffay, John Shea); Cross Current (1978, featuring Greg Kogan, Bob Stern, John Shea, Muruga Sharma, Armen Halburian, Mike Mahaffay, Laurence Cook); and Upstream (1976, featuring Greg Kogan, John Shea, Mike Mahaffay). Moss also appears on New York And Me (2013, featuring storyteller Regina Ress) which received The 2014 Storytelling World Resource Award; Natural (2013, Michael Mahaffay Archives) with the Willamette River Pirates (featuring leader Mike Mahaffay, John Jensen, Michael Lastra, Lisa Lipton, Scott Steele, Enrique Ugalde); Music to Lift the Soul (2014, featuring leader Chazzen Michael Kasper with a large ensemble); Ether-Real (2004 featuring leader Jack Bowers, Bob Stern, Donald Alston, Tom Bockhold); Dreamcatcher and Bindu, (1993 with the Collective 4tet featuring Mark Hennen, William Parker, Hans Geisser, Stork Music); Weltwunder Der Kinematographie, Angel Prologue, (2001, on Film History Auf DVD, Ralph Denzer, composer, Polzer Verlog, Potsdam, Germany); Benny & The Wildachayas (1996, featuring leader Ben Laden and ensemble); Fourth World (1993, featuring leader Chazzen Jack Kessler and ensemble); and I’m The One (1972, featuring leader Annette Peacock and Paul Bley and ensemble, RCA).
A selected discography of the work of Steve Cohn contains the following LPs and CDs: Sufi Dancers (1983), White Cow Records (featuring Larry Hancock, Warren Gale, David Shrader, John Donnely); Arts &Crafts (1984), White Cow Records (featuring Jay Elfenbein & Chuck Fertal); Shapes, Sounds, Theories (1984), Cadence Jazz Records (featuring Reggie Workman, Chuck Fertal); Ittekimasu, LP (1989), White Cow Records *reissued CD 1991 by ITM Pacific (featuring Fred Hopkins & Thurman Barker); Beggar and The Robot in Diamonds (1996), ITM Pacific (featuring Fred Hopkins, Jason Hwang, Tom Varner, Frank Lowe, Bob Stewart, William Parker, Karl Berger, Zen Matsuura); Bridge Over the X-Stream (2000), Leo Records (featuring Reggie Workman, Jason Hwang, Tom Varner); Blair Recordings (2002), Leo Records (featuring Blair Hardman & Johnny DeRobertis); Wire (2007), Konnex Records (featuring: Adam Lane, Ray Sage, Blaise Siwula & Motoko Shimizu); Iro Iro” (2008), Red Toucan Label (featuring: Masahiko Kono, Thomas Ulrich, Kevin Norton). CDs released in 2011-2012 include We,(featuring: William Parker and Tom Tedesco); Round the World,(Solo Piano); Cowboy Film School, (featuring Bruce Ditmas, Tony Decicco, Chris Kelsey ); No Lunch in Hackensack, (featuring Jimmy Bennington), all on Unseen Rain Records Label through Meyefi Media; in addition to Electric Jazz Opus, (2012), Cause Attention Records, (produced by and in collaboration with Doc Holiday).
Larry Roland has appeared on The History of Jazz in Boston (1997), Perseverance with Nick Goumas, Beginning of a New Birth with Worlds/Jamyll Jones, Do Nothing is to Move Backwards (Worlds/Jamyll Jones), Sirens, Bells and Whistles (Raphe Malik Quartet), 21st Century Text (Raphe Malik Quartet), Looking East (Raphe Malik Quartet), 21st Century Decisions (Larry Roland Urge Quartet), Streets (Charles Gayle Trio), and As Time Flows On (Larry Roland solo bass and poetry).
Chuck Fertal composed the music for an independent movie, The River Runs Red, Arts and Crafts (Steve Cohn, Jay Elfenbein) and Sounds, Shapes, Theories (Reggie Workman, Steve Cohn). He was in a documentary entitled Drummers Row (Michael Kelly, Director) about drummers Max Roach, Elvin Jones, Barry Altschul, Paul Motian, Mike Clark and Mr. Fertal who all lived on Central Park West in New York City’s west side between 100th and 107th Street.
