Jazz Articles about Wadada Leo Smith

Wadada Leo Smith/Susie Ibarra/John Zorn: 50th Birthday Celebration Volume 8

by Rex Butters
April 24, 2005

More live recordings from the Month of Zorn, a run of concerts celebrating the iconoclastic altoist's 50th birthday, this one encoding two very different sets. The first series features duets with percussion dakini Susie Ibarra. Ibarra abandons the more measured performances of recent Tzadik CDs and returns to the firestorm approach from her days with the David S. Ware Quartet. While the Wadada Leo Smith duets cool out Zorn with no loss of daring, they seem to invigorate Smith. Only ...

A Fireside Chat with Wadada Leo Smith

by AAJ Staff
September 20, 2004

I am reminded daily that perfection is an endless pursuit and that those who are in the arena often go unnoticed and unrewarded. But it is because of their artistic valor that creativity remains. Their innovative spirit keeps us from the abyss and for that we are beholden to them.

All About Jazz: What disciplines did you attain from your association with the AACM?

Wadada Leo Smith: One of the most important ones if that you really shape your own ...

Wadada Leo Smith: Kabell Years 1971-1979

by Rex Butters
June 11, 2004

Wadada Leo Smith Kabell Years 1971-1979 Tzadik 2004

John Zorn's Tzadik label continues to honor the genius of Wadada Leo Smith, this time with a crucial collection of material he recorded and released himself on his Kabell label in the seventies. This four-CD box set gathers Creative Music 1, Reflectativity, Song of Humanity, and Ahkreanvention, plus over two hours of unreleased material.

Creative Music 1 features Smith solo. Like his ...

Wadada Leo Smith: Kabell Years 1971-1979

by Rex Butters
June 8, 2004

John Zorn's Tzadik label continues to honor the genius of Wadada Leo Smith, this time with a crucial collection of material he recorded and released himself on his Kabell label in the seventies. This four-CD box set gathers Creative Music 1, Reflectativity, Song of Humanity, and Ahkreanvention, plus over two hours of unreleased material.

Creative Music 1 features Smith solo. Like his brother AACM members in the Art Ensemble of Chicago, Smith fills the performance frame with remarkably ...

A Fireside Chat With Wadada Leo Smith

by AAJ Staff
November 29, 2003

Free jazz denotes an idiom and has little to do with freedom. John Litweiler’s The Freedom Principle chronicles how Leo Smith, born in Leland, Mississippi, a hub for the blues, entered into the service (outspoken of racial conditions in the army), discovered Don Cherry, moved to Chicago, joined the AACM, and developed into a standard for lyrical contrasts and space. And although the word “jazz” has not aged well, perhaps there is hope in the masters like Smith (unedited and ...

Wadada Leo Smith: Luminous Axis

by Farrell Lowe
March 12, 2003

Wadada Leo Smith has been a leading proponent of the creation of a new world music since the late '60s, in confluence with Chicago's AACM (Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians). Much like Don Cherry, Smith draws from a broad palate of world musics, and he's a musical pioneer of the highest order.Luminous Axis features music for trumpet with electronics, flugelhorn, computer-driven electronics, and percussion. The music presented here is spacious, thoughtful, and imbued with an overall ...

Wadada Leo Smith's Golden Quartet: The Year of the Elephant

by Dan McClenaghan
October 5, 2002

Trumpeter/composer Wadada Leo Smith put out a CD entitled Yo Miles! a couple of years back, so his debt to the Dark Prince, Miles Davis, is no secret. On this, The Year of the Elephant, his second CD with his Golden Quartet, Mile's influence, especially the sound of the late sixties through late seventies, pervades. In a pared down way. Miles at that time was expanding his pallet. Gutars, bass clarinet, two drummers, sitars, tablas. Smith has simplified things: Trumpet/bass/piano/drum.