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Okuden Quartet: Mat Walerian/Matthew Shipp/William Parker/Hamid Drake: Every Dog Has His Day But It Doesn't Matter Because Fat Cat Is Getting Fatter

by Karl Ackermann
A student of eastern philosophy and Japanese culture, reed player/composer Mat Walerian coined the Okuden series name from a Japanese word meaning inner teachings." Walerian had studied piano at six and taught himself saxophone while in his teens. He expanded his self-taught regime to include clarinet and flute in 2008-9. Walerian has sporadically taken lessons from Matthew Shipp. His musical interests are broad and he had earlier played classical Japanese music, heavy metal, psychedelic, funk, and jazz. Walerian's original music ...
Continue ReadingKaruna Trio: Imaginary Archipelago

by Mark Sullivan
Percussionists Adam Rudolph and Hamid Drake, and saxophonist/multi-instrumentalist Ralph Miles Jones play together as the Karuna Trio. These spontaneous compositions were built on a deep foundation of shared experience, dating back to their teen years, for Rudolph and Drake; Rudolph and Jones later played together in the Eternal Wind quintet. The concept here is that the music they were making is from a fantastical place: an imaginary archipelago. Each of the eleven tracks is named for an island in the ...
Continue ReadingEdward 'Kidd' Jordan, Joel Futterman, William Parker, Hamid Drake: A Tribute to Alvin Fielder - Live at Vision Festival XXIV

by Troy Dostert
When the free jazz world lost drummer Alvin Fielder in 2019, it lamented the passing of someone who had in many ways worked to expand the reach of avant-garde jazz, to widen its accessibility to fans and students alike. His well-known status as a founding member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) and Black Arts Music Society, not to mention his participation on seminal recordings like Roscoe Mitchell's Sound (Delmark, 1966), should not overshadow his presence ...
Continue ReadingAdam Rudolph / Ralph M. Jones / Hamid Drake: Imaginary Archipelago

by Mark Corroto
Often the music of Adam Rudolph can be a bit intimidating. An authority in Afro-Cuban, Indian, West Africa musics and jazz, Rudolph's performances remind budding ethnomusicologists and jazz critics their knowledge inhabits a very provincial realm. Luckily that intimidation is reserved to academics and writers. The remaining listening audience is free to enjoy these sounds associated with world music. The second release from Rudolph's Karuna Trio with percussionist Hamid Drake and saxophonist/multi-instrumentalist Ralph M. Jones, Imaginary Archipelago, might ...
Continue ReadingIt Takes Two to Jazz: Part II

by Ludovico Granvassu
Second part of this week's exploration of the duo format with a special emphasis on duos featuring saxophonists as well as drummers. For the first part of this show click here PlaylistBen Allison Mondo Jazz Theme (feat. Ted Nash & Pyeng Threadgill)" 0:00 Vincent Peirani, Emile Parisien Egyptian Fantasy" Belle Époque (ACT) 0:16 Host talks 4:56 Lionel Martin, Sangoma Everett Hobo Flats" Afrique (Revisiting Afrique of Count Basie & Olivier Nelson) (Cristal) 6:03 TOTM -Tivoli ...
Continue ReadingLiebman, Rudolph & Drake: Chi

by John Ephland
Chi is another trio outing with saxophonist Dave Liebman and percussionist Adam Rudolph, the third leg on this stool being drummer Hamid Drake. It is a kind of follow-up to 2018's alternately serene and propulsive The Unknowable (RareNoise), on which Liebman and Rudolph were joined by percussionist Tatsuya Nakatani. Unlike The Unknowable, Chi was recorded in front of a live audience, at New York City's Stone in 2018. You'd never guess, though, given the superb acoustics and extremely ...
Continue ReadingDave Liebman, Adam Rudolph, Hamid Drake: Chi

by Don Phipps
Recorded live at John Zorn's New York City experimental jazz club The Stone in May of 2018, the trio of saxophonist extraordinaire Dave Liebman and multi-instrumentalists/percussionists Hamid Drake and Adam Rudolph use their album Chi to present amazing tone poems and dynamic musical explorations. Liebman's full-throated saxophone voicings juxtapose with Drake and Rudolph's rolling drums and percussion instruments, which splatter and bounce like great waves hitting the rocks off Maui. The interaction is driven by the percussionists, and, ...
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