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Ben LaMar Gay
Natural Information Society: Since Time is Gravity
by Danen Jobe
The concept of trance is one of the oldest in the world. Many older music forms embraced trance for their rituals. One is the Gnawa musical tradition originating in Kano, Nigeria and Morocco, which uses double and triple notes repeated sometimes for hours to induce a religious state while the singer sings stories of spirits. It is played on a gimbri (aka sintir or hajhuj), a three stringed instrument featuring one short and two long goat gut strings over a ...
read moreFAUVES Festival 2022 in Rome
by Luciano Rossetti
A collection of photos from the FAUVES Festival in Rome from October 28, 2022 to October 30, 2022 featuring Ben Lamar Gay, Binker & Moses, Eric Chenaux, OY, Heliocentrics, Wu-Lu, Riccardo Marogna, Gabriele Mitelli and Antonio Raia-Renato Fiorito. ...
read moreBen Lamar Gay Ensemble a Firenze
by Neri Pollastri
Ben LaMar Gay Ensemble Firenze A Jazz Supreme Sala Vanni 11.11.2022 Appuntamento internazionale particolarmente atteso della stagione autunnale 2022 della rassegna A Jazz Supreme, venerdì 11 Novembre alla Sala Vanni di Firenze era in programma il quartetto di Ben LaMar Gay, cornettista, cantante ed eclettico polistrumentista, considerato uno dei più originali innovatori dell'attuale panorama jazzistico. Nato a Chicago e membro della AACM, Lamar Gay attinge a ogni genere musicale, da quelli più ...
read moreRedGreenBlue: The End And The Beginning
by Chris May
RedGreenBlue sound like they have emerged from the same synapse-snapping dope bunker that La Monte Young and Jon Hassell exited with their Theatre Of Eternal Music in the 1970s, whacked out on opium, hashish and mescaline, dazed but not confused. RedGreenBlue may or may not indulge in the same psychotropic self-medication as their Lower East Side ancestors, but their strange and beautiful debut album, The End And The Beginning, suggests they do, and that is what counts. ...
read moreDamon Locks Black Monument Ensemble: Now
by Chris May
Chicago-based collective Black Monument Ensemble's sophomore album was recorded in September 2020 at the intersection of various existential crises, as seen from a US perspective: the threat of Trump winning the presidential election, by fair means or foul; the rising tide of fascist ideology; extrajudicial murders of, in particular but not exclusively, black Americans; a galloping pandemic; economic chaos; and social isolation. Given the circumstances, it is no surprise that Now sounds apocalyptic. But it is also ...
read moreJeremy Cunningham: The Weather Up There
by Jakob Baekgaard
The complex landscape of human emotions is still vastly uncharted, but every true work of art adds a little piece to the puzzle. This can be done in many ways, but it is rare that an album connects emotion with complex layers of memory, interpersonal relations, politics and societal structures. Nevertheless, this is what drummer and composer Jeremy Cunningham's album does. In a statement, Cunningham explains the background: I wrote The Weather Up There to confront the ...
read moreGil Scott-Heron / Makaya McCraven: We're New Again
by Karl Ackermann
"All the dreams you show up in are not your own." With those words to an interviewer at The New Yorker, Gil Scott-Heron tried to explain a degree of detachment from I'm New Here (XL Recordings, 2011), his comeback" and the final studio album before his death that year. The project was initiated by the head of XL and was the first album Scott-Heron released in the sixteen years he struggled with addiction and two drug-related terms in prison. The ...
read moreStLJN Saturday Video Showcase: Spotlight on Ben LaMar Gay
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St. Louis Jazz Notes by Dean Minderman
This week, let's take a look at some videos featuring Chicago-based multi-instrumentalist Ben LaMar Gay, who's coming to St. Louis to perform in a concert presented by New Music Circle on Saturday, October 5 at Off Broadway. While Gay has been working in Chicago's busy improvised music scene for a while, he gained a new level of national recognition in 2018 with the release of Downtown Castles Can Never Block the Sun, his first official" album as a solo artist. ...
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