The Sound of a Dream

Can You Imagine the Sound of a Dream

Adam Rudolph and Go: Organic Orchestra

Meta 014

I am happy to share the news that our work with Adam Rudolph over the past several years, building and developing an east coast version of Go: Organic Orchestra, has been documented in a new CD recording on Adam's Meta record label.  This is uncommon news, as my experience with creative orchestra work is that the music is almost never documented/shared in this manner, for a range of reasons.

One of the reasons or, at least, one of my primary reasons, that musicians engage in large ensemble work of this sort is community.  Gathering an orchestra (48 musicians here!) is a knitting of relationships, old and new.  As with Duke Ellington, the best leaders understand the magic that resides in this element/fellowship, and they use it as a essential tool in their compositional toolbox.  Adam Rudolph stands in that assembly, at once connecting tradition(s) with the present in a singular manner.

In April, we will return to Roulette in Brooklyn, NY for four Monday night concerts.  Shortly after that, we plan to bring the orchestra into the studio to record a new album of music. Click on the image below for (a larger version) a glimpse of the orchestra in motion.

 

Image of Adam Rudolph and Go: Organic Orchestra at Roulette by Judi Komala

Improvisations III: New Music at Real Art Ways

Improvisations III

December 4, 2011

Real Art Ways

Hartford, CT

One of the many things that I admire about Joe Morris is his teaching.  Not just the fact that he does it but, rather, how deeply (and, as with his music, innovatively) he enters the pedagogy and how giving he is to his students.   For some time now, Joe has been talking about a remarkable young violinist, Yasmine Azaiez.  Yasmine studies with Joe at the New England Conservatory of Music.

He invited Yasmine to join us last month. I immediately thought of tubaist Ben Stapp as a match.  We divided the evening into solos, duets and a quartet.  Yasmine played a composition she wrote, really a plan for improvisation, structured yet loose at the same time.  I had a ball in duet with Ben.  While I have often done this with bass, this was the first time for me with tuba.  Could be habit forming.  For me, the peak of the evening was the quartet.  Wonderful listening, instantaneous empathy and, best of all, plenty of surprises.

Image of Stephen Haynes by Byron Dean

Images of full group by Rob Miller