A Beautiful Mystery: David Liebman Group (July 19)

As some of you may know, in addition to my work as the Press & Marketing Manager at the Center for the Arts, I am also a drummer/percussionist, composer and bandleader. Several of my projects are improvisational ensembles that feature the crossing of genre borderlines, including jazz, funk/fusion, and rock. I am always excited when Wesleyan features jazz artists—from Charles Lloyd (who was one of David Liebman’s teachers), Kenny Barron, Sherrie Maricle, Anthony Braxton, and Jay Hoggard, to Lionel Loueke, Taylor Ho Bynum and Noah Baerman—so I was happy when I heard that the summer programming committee had selected Mr. Liebman’s group as one of the evening performances this month, at the suggestion of Gene Bozzi. Mr. Liebman’s group has explored a wide variety of contemporary styles, ranging from bebop and free jazz to fusion and Brazilian.

At Wesleyan, Mr. Bozzi is a Private Lessons Teacher for percussion/drums, and the Music Department Chair at the Center for Creative Youth, a summer residential arts program here on campus. He is also the principal timpanist with the Hartford Symphony Orchestra (one of my previous employers). Over the weekend, Gene shared with me a bit about his work as a jazz sideman:

“I met Dave Liebman in the late 1970’s, when I was playing drums in a local Hartford group called Jazz Icarus. We were just out of college, and trying to get our ‘jazz chops’ together, but fortunate enough to score one night a week at Mad Murphy’s on Union Place. We would bring Dave in as our guest artist and give him all the money for the gig. It was like on the job training for us, we learned a lot. He would talk about his gigs with Miles Davis and Elvin Jones. I am thrilled that the Center of the Arts is bringing in artists of this caliber to perform and interact with our Center for Creative Youth students.”

David Liebman, Miles Davis, and Michael Henderson in 1973.

I first remember hearing David Liebman’s sax playing during the spring of my junior year of college in 1998. I was studying music at Syracuse University, and graduate student/saxophonist Chris Mannigan put Panthalassa: The Music of Miles Davis 1969–1974 – a Miles Davis remix album by producer/bassist Bill Laswell – on the stereo at a party. I soon sought out the original albums On the Corner (1972) and Get Up With It (1974). Mr. Liebman also appears on Miles’ live album Dark Magus, recorded at Carnegie Hall in 1974.

Writer Alan Bisbort talked to David Liebman this past Saturday morning, following Mr. Liebman’s return from a tour that had stops in Austria, Finland, Switzerland, and Italy:

Liebman thinks what makes a “classic” recording is something of a beautiful mystery.

“Look at [John Coltrane]. He recorded his Giant Steps and then played on Miles’ Kind of Blue within a month of each other. Both are totally different, both are now musical milestones. And yet, if he thought about how they’d be received he probably never would have gotten out of bed in the morning,” says Liebman laughing. “There was a lot of traffic for musicians back then. Each session was a musical challenge, but you are also making a living.”

Liebman promises a “variety of things” at the Wesleyan gig.

“It really depends on the audience, the vibe, the size and even the sound of the room. I don’t really know until I see all this,” said Liebman. “I’ll have my martini, then check out the crowd from backstage and draw up a set list. I can quote from a huge repertoire, everything from Ornette [Coleman] to [Antonio Carlos] Jobim to Cole Porter.”

You can read the rest of Alan’s article in the print edition of the Advocate on July 19 (or online here), and then head to Crowell Concert Hall that night to hear David Liebman’s group, which features guitarist Vic Juris, bassist Tony Marino and drummer Marko Marcinko.

David Liebman Group
Thursday, July 19, 2012 at 8pm

Crowell Concert Hall
$22 general public; $19 seniors, Wesleyan faculty & staff; $10 students

Brian Brooks Endures at the CFA (July 12 & 13)

Pamela Tatge, Director of the Center for the Arts, talks to choreographer Brian Brooks about the works that will be performed by his dance company at Wesleyan (July 12 & 13).

Brian Brooks Moving Company performs "Big City" (2012). Photo by David Bazemore.

Center for the Arts staff members and I sat down recently with Brian Brooks, choreographer for Brian Brooks Moving Company, to hear him talk about his upcoming performances in the CFA Theater on Thursday, July 12 and Friday, July 13.

The Brian Brooks Moving Company will perform four pieces at Wesleyan as part of a ten-city tour that will take them straight from Middletown to the American Dance Festival in Durham, North Carolina. We are thrilled to invite Brian back to Wesleyan; he has been a dear friend of the CFA for many years. We gave the Brian Brooks Moving Company their first engagement outside of New York City as a part of the Breaking Ground Dance Series back in November 2002, and since then, Brian has made special trips to Wesleyan in March to teach Master Classes during DanceMasters Weekend.

As Brian explained to us, the four works he will present at Wesleyan are his most recent works – all created in the last three or four years. The collection will give audiences a strong sense of where Brian Brooks as an artist is in 2012. A common theme among the pieces is endurance – of the mind, of the body, of the artist.

The evening will start with I’m Going to Explode (2007), Mr. Brooks’ signature solo piece. Mr. Brooks has performed this piece — which he describes as “an entry point to who [Brian Brooks] might be” — more often than any other piece he has created.

Mr. Brooks describes the next piece, a group piece titled Descent (2011),  as “otherworldly,” “off balance,” “water-like” and “dense.” As the name suggests, the piece deals with a state of perpetual fall. Although the dancers constantly fall, they also support one another. This particular piece is designed, too, to showcase the partnering of the dancers in the piece. The dancers move in pairs and navigate the watery, dreamlike world together.

Next, we’ll be treated to the duet from Motor (2010), which was inspired by Mr. Brooks’ experience as a runner and racer. This work premiered in August 2010 at the Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival in New York City, and is a testament to the endurance and athleticism of dancers.

And finally, after intermission, we’ll see the New England premiere of the company’s newest piece, Big City (2012), a 44 minute work for seven dancers. Mr. Brooks describes this last piece as “overwhelming” and “lavish – but not frivolous.” The scale is large and the audience will watch as hundreds of pieces of metal literally unfold throughout the piece, altering the landscape of the theater and the way the dancers interact with it and within it. But the piece is also cyclical and as we watch the construction of a “big city,” we marvel at our resilience and at our capacity to rebuild against all odds. We hope you’ll join us!

Brian Brooks Moving Company
Thursday, July 12 & Friday, July 13, 2012 at 8pm

CFA Theater

$22 general public; $19 seniors, Wesleyan faculty & staff; $10 students