Dave
Burrell's Full Blown Duo
featuring
Andrew Cyrille
Saturday
May 7, 2016, 8pm
Sanders Hall, Christ Church Cathedral
1117 Texas Ave, HOUSTON,
TX 77002
Free parking will be available in Cathedral Parking Garage on San Jacinto between Texas and Prairie.
$13|$10 student
|FREE under 18
- Limited seating available -
Dave Burrell (Philadelphia, PA) -
piano
Andrew Cyrille
(Montclaire, NJ) - drums, percussion
In all of
its eras, American jazz has been nurtured by an integral relationship
between its historical roots and future visions. Veteran pianist and
composer
Dave Burrell masterfully
operates in a realm where rooted tradition and avant-garde freedoms
function as poles of a single vision. From the craftsmanship of rag
through free jazz’s radical peaks, his mastery and range through the
music’s vernacular and history is unforced. It’s almost as if he is
unaware these distinctions and categories, and by false designations of
“inside” and “outside” that limit the rest of us.
Burrell was a key collaborator to many of the revolutionary voices of
the 1960’s “New Thing” and appeared on some of the most important
recordings by the likes of Pharoah Sanders, Archie Shepp, Marion Brown,
Sonny Sharrock and Sunny Murray. His own work as a leader is equally
vital. He is a composer with a distinct and thorough vision. As free as
his improvisational spirit is, his work displays a determined intellect
that may be most explicit in his operas and research-based projects
made in collaboration with writer Monika Larsson.
In his previous Nameless Sound appearances (both solo sets), Burrell
led the audience through nearly epic tours of the history of jazz
piano. Jelly Roll Morton and Harlem stride segued into Duke Ellington,
which in turn morphed into energy and freedom, and then back to roots
again. This season, Nameless Sound presents Burrell for two nights in
two different partnerships. The first will feature Burrell’s Full Blown
Duo with percussion innovator
Andrew
Cyrille. The second, a duo with
the powerfully versatile trombonist
Steve
Swell, will feature a
performance of
Turning Point.
Turning Point
is the third in a series of
five suites, Burrell’s major work-in-progress commemorating the people
and events of the American Civil War.
Every major shift in the development of jazz depended on a handful of
important drummers. The stylistic advances of swing were steered-in by
Joe Jones and Chick Webb. The bebop revolution would not have happened
as it did without Kenny Clarke and Max Roach as its rhythmic
architects. Along with the likes of Sunny Murray, Andrew Cyrille is one
of the pioneering percussionists of the 1960’s who finally freed the
instrument of its timekeeping role, thus liberating the music from the
constraints of strict meter. Developing his craft at the Julliard and
Harnett schools of music, Andrew Cyrille studied with the great Philly
Joe Jones before finding work with Coleman Hawkins and Mary Lou
Williams. Joining iconoclastic pianist Cecil Taylor’s group in 1964 was
a key point that allowed his pan-metrical approach to the kit to truly
blossom and pave the way for a new kind of drummer. Behind the drum
kit, Cyrille is a total musician. Rhythm, color, melody, texture are
continuously shaping form; with a relaxed economy of physical gesture
that may belie the totality of music being crafted from behind the kit.
As composer-in-residence at the Rosenbach Historical Library, Burrell
has been collaborating with writer Monika Larsson on an ambitious
5-part research-based suite of compositions about the American Civil
War. The third part of this suite, Turning Point, features Burrell in
duo with trombonist Steve Swell. In the current era, Swell is one of
the trombone’s major players. Swell is technically and creatively wide
ranging. Most players would lean toward one end of the instrument’s
expressive range or the other, but Swell reconciles his free-braying
vocalizations with fluent technical mastery. Listen to a few of his
projects, and a serious case will be made for the trombone as the
severely underappreciated member of the jazz instrumental family. In
fact, in the hands of a master like Swell, a case can be made that the
trombone contains the widest range of expression of the jazz horns, and
may be the ultimate instrument to express the scope of the music’s
history. An important leader in his own right, a short list of Swell’s
work as a sideman is a testament to his versatility: from Lionel
Hampton to William Parker to Buddy Rich to Anthony Braxton.
Links:
Dave Burrell
http://www.daveburrell.com/
Andrew Cyrille
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Cyrille
http://jazztimes.com/articles/28900-andrew-cyrille-art-science-part-1