Results for "anthony braxton"

Anthony Braxton

To his list of achievements and awards, Anthony Braxton may now add the 1994 MacArthur Fellowship: the so-called "genius" grant of (in his case) $300,000, awarded to individuals nominated for outstanding and original contributions to their field. The timing of this crowning achievement couldn't be better for Braxton's most recent professional goals: he is the founding Artistic Director of the newly incorporated Tri-Centric Foundation, Inc., a New York-based not-for-profit corporation including an ensemble of some 38 musicians, four to eight vocalists, and computer-graphic video artists assembled to perform his compositions. The ensemble's debut at New York's The Kitchen sold out the last and most of the first two of three nights, through the press excitement it generated; the reviews—in Down Beat and the Chicago Tribune (John Corbett), the Village Voice (Kevin Whitehead), and the New York Times (Jon Pareles)—ranged from positive to ecstatic. Most importantly, the musical success of the event inspired Braxton to pursue the "three-day and -night" program concept for this ensemble, including lectures/informances, and splinter chamber performances, around the world. The second New York event, indeed, expanded on the concept: The Knitting Factory presented six nights of Anthony Braxton and his music, in all the variety of its vision

Cory Smythe: Accelerate Every Voice

By KARL ACKERMANN

Pianist/electronics artist/composer Cory Smythe's Pyroclastic Records debut Circulate Susanna (2018) was a tongue-in-cheek attribution to the inspiration of a fictional event. He returns to the Kris Davis run label with the intriguing, socially-conscious and genre-less Accelerate Every Voice. Inspired by an assortment of sources: Andrew Hill's Lift Every Voice (Blue Note, 1970), the work of Harlem ...

Matthew Shipp: Poetic Connection

By SETON HAWKINS

It is difficult to describe the impact of pianist and composer Matthew Shipp without descending into hyperbole. A core figure in the now-legendary David S. Ware Quartet, a bandleader with a staggering recording output, a groundbreaking curator for the influential Blues Series of Thirsty Ear Records, Matthew Shipp has also more recently broken new ...

AACM: Together We Are Stronger

By CHRIS MAY

With the passing in 2017 of the pianist Muhal Richard Abrams and trumpeter Phil Cohran, the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, formed in Chicago in 1965, lost the last two of the four musicians who organised its inaugural meeting. But with two succeeding generations of standard bearers stepping up to the plate, the AACM ...

Tomeka Reid Quartet: Old New

By IAN PATTERSON

Tomeka Reid cut her teeth in Chicago, recording with Anthony Braxton, Roscoe Mitchell and Nicole Mitchell, but the cellist's 2016 move to New York seems to have fired her creative juices even more. The prolific Reid has appeared on nearly twenty recordings in that time, notably including the Art Ensemble of Chicago's We Are On The ...

Mario Pavone: Philosophy

By GIUSEPPE SEGALA

Ci sono musicisti che percorrono con discrezione il proprio itinerario artistico e, pur senza collocarsi nel novero dei protagonisti, si ritagliano un ruolo importante di connettori, di tenaci tessitori delle trame che rendono vitale e significativo un periodo artistico. Il contrabbassista Mario Pavone è senz'altro uno di questi. Un musicista prezioso, prodigo di iniziativa. Lo abbiamo ...

Brilliant Corners 2020

By IAN PATTERSON

Brilliant Corners 2020 Various Venues jny:Belfast, N. Ireland February 27 to March 7, 2020 Maybe it's global warming, for just as the first bloom of spring in these strange times appears in February, so too, Brilliant Corners starts ever earlier. From its first, modest edition over three days ...

Taylor Ho Bynum 9-tette: The Ambiguity Manifesto

By GIUSEPPE SEGALA

All'interno della generazione di musicisti che si sono formati con Anthony Braxton negli anni Novanta, studiando presso di lui alla Wesleyan University e collaborando ai suoi lavori di quel periodo, Taylor Ho Bynum spicca insieme a Mary Halvorson per versatilità dinamica e dovizia progettuale. Bynum, nel periodo in cui ha diretto la Tri-Centric Foundation, dal 2010-2018, ...

Chris Pitsiokos: Speak In Tongues And Hope For The Gift Of Interpretation

By MARK CORROTO

Saxophonist Chris Pitsiokos, it might be said, was standing on the shoulders of giants when he recorded this solo alto saxophone concert in January of 2019. Indeed, these six tributes take into account the accomplishments of the esteemed masters and, from their shoulders, Pitsiokos enters some rarefied air. His Speak In Tongues And Hope For The ...

Avant-Retro or Retro-Avant? Part II

By LUDOVICO GRANVASSU

Anthony Braxton playing standards? Don Byron and Phillip Johnston playing the music of Raymond Scott? Nothing to be suprised about... as musicians have a more open mind than critics like to recognize. So here's the second part of this week's show focusing on retro-sounding jazz performed by forward-leaning musicians -a bit like the jazz equivalent of ...