Hank Williams

Sunday 5/11/14 Show: Amiri Baraka Presente!

Photo Credit: Joyce Jones. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

The next show will air on Sunday, May 11, 2014 from 11:00 PM – 1:00 AM Monday Eastern Standard Time on WBAI, 99.5 FM in the NYC metro area or streaming online at wbai.org. During this membership/fund drive special, Suga’ In My Bowl will feature Amiri Baraka Presente. We will continue to remember New Jersey’s Poet Laureate with a presentation, which was conceived, produced and hosted by The Poetry Project at St. Mark’s Church on April 5, 2014. WBAI recorded the event with cooperation and permission of The Poetry Project.

“Amiri Baraka at the Poetry Project” was held at St. Mark’s Church on April 5, 2014 and featured tributes to Amiri and readings of his works by several poets and musicians. Among those performing were Toi Derricote, Ammiel Alcalay, Quincy Troupe, Basil King, Martha King, Cornelius Eady and Rough Magic, Greg Tate, Oliver Lake, Julie Patton, David Henderson, Bob Holman, Latasha N Nevada Diggs, Steve Dalachinsky and Matthew Shipp, Tracie Morris and Vijay Iyer, Anne Waldman and Ambrose Bye, Devin Waldman, and Steven Taylor.

We’ll be offering the poetry tribute as a 2-CD set along with a 2011 broadcast of a conversation between Amiri Baraka, Joyce Jones, Hank Williams and and Kazembe Balagun on 2-CDs . The entire 4-CD package is available as a thank you gift for a pledge to WBAI. So pledge for the CD set or simply just donate to WBAI (any amount over $5) if you can, but be sure to join us for what’s sure to be a great show!

Broadcast show produced, engineered, edited, and hosted by Joyce Jones. Listen for our On the Bandstand segment with NYC metro area appearances of Suga’ guests at the end of the first hour with Associate Producer Hank Williams.

Suga in My Bowl thanks The Poetry Project and individual artists for their generosity in allowing us to record the event and their commitment to supporting listener sponsored community radio in New York City. Special thanks goes to Poetry Project Director Stacy Szymaszek and Program Manager Simone White, whose attention to detail and logistical help made the collaboration possible!

Special note: Tuesday, May 13, 2014 is Election Day in Newark, NJ. Poet and Amiri’s son Ras Baraka, whose campaign Amiri dedicated some of his last days on earth working on, is running for mayor. Details are at his campaign website.

Sunday 5/4/14 Show: Sun Ra at 100

Photo Credit: Photo Credit: Sun Ra Arkestra. Used with permission.

The next show will air on Sunday, May 4, 2014 from 11:00 PM – 1:00 AM Monday Eastern Standard Time on WBAI, 99.5 FM in the NYC metro area or streaming online at wbai.org. During this installment, Suga’ in My Bowl will celebrate the Sun Ra centennial with former and present Arkestra members Marshall Allen, Danny Ray Thompson, Knoel Scott, Michael Ray, Dick Griffin, Craig Harris, Ahmed Abdullah, Vincent Chancey, Craig Holiday Haynes, Pharoah Sanders and James Spaulding.

He was born Herman Blount on May 22, 1914, in Birmingham, Alabama, as discovered by his biographer, John F. Szwed, and published in his 1998 book Space is the Place. The boy was named after the popular vaudeville stage magician Black Herman, who had deeply impressed his mother. He was nicknamed “Sonny” from his childhood, had an older sister and half-brother, and was doted upon by his mother and grandmother.

In the 1940’s Sun Ra became the house arranger for stage shows at the famous Chicago night spot, the Club DeLisa and played for the band led by Fletcher Henderson. Henderson was the arranger for the Benny Goodman Orquestra as well as his own and was a great inspiration to Ra who encouraged him to continue writing. In the early 50’s, Ra’s more radical compositions and arrangements found their way into his own groups which featured exotic costumes and unusual instruments.

By 1955 while in Chicago, Le Sony’r Ra had become “Le Sun Ra” or Sun Ra, leader of the Solar Arkestra which has also been known by many other names such as the Myth-Science Arkestra, the Solar Myth Arkestra, and the Omniverse Arkestra. In addition to saxophonists Gilmore and Allen, the band boasted a number of musicians who have contributed much to jazz, including bassist Richard Davis, trombonist Julian Priester, drummer Clifford Jarvis, and reedman James Spaulding. The Arkestra itself started as what was thought to be a hard-bop big band at the Grand Terrace and Birdland night clubs – a rare enough item – but soon was incorporating free improvisation. As such, it was a major influence on the emerging avant-garde jazz musicians in Chicago, such as Muhal Richard Abrams, Henry Threadgill, and the Art Ensemble of Chicago.

From its inception, the Arkestra’s music was infused with Sun Ra’s unique philosophy, an unexpected hybrid of space-age science fiction and ancient Egyptian cosmo religious trappings. This philosophy gained a visual manifestation in the colorful robes, mock-metallic capes, and space headgear worn by the band (it’s the only jazz orchestra that brings a tailor on tour), and in a stage presentation that usually features several dancers, a number of group chants (“We travel the spaceways/From planet to planet”), and at least one instance of the entire band juking its way, single-file, through the audience.

In 1960, Sun Ra moved his earthbound base of operations to New York, then in 1968 settled in Philadelphia. In both cities, as in Chicago, the band lived and worked as a sort of collective, with the hard-core nucleus sharing living quarters with the leader and assuming the role of cosmo-friends to the master. Throughout the 60’s Sun Ra continued to record for his own deliberately poorly distributed Saturn Records label, and also on various European labels, while touring widely and continuing to spread the fame of his live performances.

In early 1971, Sun Ra was appointed as artist-in-residence at University of California, Berkeley, teaching a course called “The Black Man In the Cosmos”. Few students enrolled, but his classes were often full of curious persons from the surrounding community. One half-hour of each class was devoted to a lecture (complete with handouts and homework assignments), the other half-hour to an Arkestra performance or Sun Ra keyboard solo. Reading lists included the works of Madame Blavatsky and Henry Dumas, the Tibetan Book of the Dead, Alexander Hislop’s The Two Babylons, The Book of Oahspe and assorted volumes concerning Egyptian hieroglyphs, African American folklore, and other topics.

In 1972, San Francisco public TV station KQED producer John Coney, producer Jim Newman, and screen writer Joshua Smith worked with Sun Ra to produce an 85-minute feature film, entitled Space Is the Place, with Sun Ra’s Arkestra and an ensemble of actors assembled by the production team. It was filmed in Oakland and San Francisco. On May 20, 1978, Sun Ra and the Arkestra appeared on the TV show, Saturday Night Live.

In the mid-1970s, the Arkestra sometimes played free Saturday afternoon concerts in a Germantown park near their home. At their mid-1970s shows in Philadelphia nightclubs, someone would stand at the back of the room, selling stacks of unmarked LPs in plain white sleeves, pressed from recordings of the band’s live performances (including one Halloween show where the salesman was dressed as a golden alien, and the LPs included an arrangement of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”).

In New York City in the fall of 1979, Sun Ra and the Arkestra played at the “house band” at the Squat Theatre on 23rd Street, which was notorious as the performance venue of the avant-garde Hungarian theater troupe. Janos, their manager, transformed the theater into a nightclub while most of the troupe was away that season performing in Europe. Debbie Harry, “The Velvet Underground”‘s John Cale and Nico (from Andy Warhol’s Factory days), John Lurie and ‘The Lounge Lizards,’ and other pop and avant-garde musicians were regulars.

Sun Ra was disciplined and drank only club soda at the gigs, but did not impose his strict code on his musicians. They deeply respected his genius, discipline and authority. Soft spoken and charismatic, Sun Ra turned Squat Theater into a universe of big band “space” jazz backed by a floor show of sexy Jupiterettes. He directed while playing three synthesizers at the same time. In those days, “Space Is The Place” was the space at Squat.

The Arkestra continued their touring and recording through the 1980s and into the 1990s. Sun Ra became a fixture in Philadelphia, appearing semi-regularly on WXPN radio, giving lectures to community groups, or haunting the city’s libraries.

He had a stroke in 1990, but kept composing, performing, and leading the Arkestra. Late in his career, Sun Ra opened a few concerts for the New York–based rock group Sonic Youth. When too ill to perform and tour, Sun Ra appointed Gilmore to lead the Arkestra. (Gilmore was frail from emphysema; after his death, Allen took over leadership of the Arkestra.)

Sun Ra returned to Birmingham to see his sister, whom he had rarely seen in nearly 40 years. He contracted pneumonia and died in Birmingham on May 30, 1993. He was buried at the Elmwood Cemetery. According to the hospital, he had also been affected by circulatory system problems and numerous strokes shortly before his death. The small footstone read “Herman Sonny Blount aka Le Sony’r Ra”

Produced, engineered, edited, and hosted by Joyce Jones. Listen for our On the Bandstand segment with NYC metro area appearances of Suga’ guests at the end of the first hour with Associate Producer Hank Williams.

Information and tour dates for the Arkestra directed by Marshall Allen are on their website.

Web Extras:

Watch the opening scene of the Space is the Place feature film starring Sun Ra.



Watch the 1 bour BBC documentary Brother from Another Planet on Sun Ra.

Watch Robert Mugge’s A Joyful Noise documentary on Sun Ra and the Arkestra. Features extensive performance footage.

Watch Phil Niblock’s experimental 1960s short film The Magic Sun with an Arkestra performance.

Sunday 4/20/14 Show: Jesus Papoleto Meléndez

Photo Credit: Photo Credit: Leslie Jean-Bart. Used with permission.

The next show will air on Sunday, April 20, 2014 from 11:00 PM – 1:00 AM Monday Eastern Standard Time on WBAI, 99.5 FM in the NYC metro area or streaming online at wbai.org. This week, “Suga’ In My Bowl” concludes its celebration of National Poetry and Jazz Appreciation Month by featuring New York-born Puerto Rican award-winning poet, playwright, teacher and activist Jesus Papoleto Meléndez. You can hear a short preview of the show below.



Jesus Papoleto Meléndez (Papo) is a proud Puerto Rican poet, playwright, educator and activist. His family migrated to this country from Puerto Rico and settled in El Barrio, East Harlem in the early 1950s. Papo was born and raised in New York City and became interested in the arts at an early age. By the time he was 19 years old, during the heyday of the Civil Rights and Black Arts Movement, he was already writing poetry. Papo published his first poem, “Message To Urban Sightseers” in Talkin’ About Us (1969), and in a short period of time he published three volumes of poetry: Casting Long Shadows (1970), Have You Seen Liberation (1971), and Street Poetry & Other Poems (1972), that largely reflected the social and political issues of the day. For as long as he can remember, Papo always saw poetry as this powerfully potent weapon that tells truths, and while he sometimes became uncomfortable being labeled a “political” or “social” poet, much of everything he wrote at that time, was really a recording of what was going on in the world. Papo ultimately explored playwriting, and his play, “The Junkies Stole The Clock,” was eventually produced by the New York Shakespeare Festival Public Theatre’s Nuyorican Playwright’s Unit in April, 1974.

Papo is often referred to as one of the “founders” of the Nuyorican Poets’ movement, but really it was about a group of Puerto Rican artists-activists coming together to make a difference in our communities, something of which Papo is very proud to have been a part of, but certainly does not wholly define himself as a poet. Around this time, Papo also began teaching workshops, first through the Teachers & Writers Collaborative, as a poetry-facilitator in the public schools, which is what he’s done for over 30-years.

By 1980, Papo grew disillusioned by the politics of the city, and he left for the “greener pastures” of California where he continued to write in peace, perform, teach, and eventually published the poetry collection, Concertos On Market Street (1993).

Over the years, Papo has performed at hundreds of venues, thousands of poetry readings, and he has appeared in film, television and radio programs. Papo has been published in numerous magazines, journals, anthologies, and textbooks and is proud to say that his work has also been taught in schools across the country. Through the offering of his creative writing workshops, Papo knows that he has inspired the lives of thousands of young people – some of whom currently call themselves poets.

His latest book is Hey Yo! Yo Soy! 40 Years of Nuyorican Street Poetry (2Leaf Press, 2012), a collected edition of Papo’s writing. It was adapted for the stage in 2014 by the Puerto Rican Traveling Theater.

You can find out more about Papo, his work and upcoming events at his website.

Listen for our On the Bandstand segment with NYC metro area appearances of Suga’ guests at the end of the first hour with Associate Producer Hank Williams.

Show engineered and produced by Joyce Jones. Hosted by Arts Producers Joyce Jones and Hank Williams.

Web Extras:

Watch Papo read his poem “Hey Yo! Yo Soy!” with the Welfare Poets live at the legendary Nuyorican Poets Café!

Watch Papo read his poem “It Was So Fly” live at the Bronx Documentary Center in 2013.

Watch a short (5 minute) documentary on Papo by Vagabond Beaumont.

Sunday 4/13/14 Show: Amiri Baraka

Photo Credit: Joyce Jones. Creative Commons licensed.

The next show will air on Sunday, April 13, 2014 from 11:00 PM – 1:00 AM Monday Eastern Standard Time on WBAI, 99.5 FM in the NYC metro area or streaming online at wbai.org. During this installment, Suga’ in My Bowl continues its celebration of National Poetry and Jazz Appreciation Month with a 2011 interview we did with the late poet, playwright and activist Amiri Baraka.



With influences on his work ranging from musical orishas such as Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane, Thelonius Monk, and Sun Ra to the Cuban Revolution, Malcolm X and world revolutionary movements, Baraka is renowned as a founder of the Black Arts Movement in Harlem in the 1960s that became, though short-lived, the virtual blueprint for a new American theater aesthetics. The movement and his published and performance work, such as the signature study on African-American music, Blues People (1963) and the play Dutchman (1963) practically seeded “the cultural corollary to black nationalism” of that revolutionary American milieu.

On Thursday, January 9, 2014, Amiri Baraka left this world, but his Blues People (1963), remains a landmark work on African-American music a half-century after its publication and in 2012 he was given a lifetime achievement award by the Jazz Journalists’ Association for his music writings. With influences on his work ranging from musical orishas such as Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane, Thelonius Monk, and Sun Ra to the Cuban Revolution, Malcolm X and world revolutionary movements, Baraka is renowned as one of the founders of the Black Arts Movement in Harlem in the 1960s that became, though short-lived, the virtual blueprint for a new American theater aesthetics. His Obie award-winning play Dutchman (1963) and The Slave (1964), helped solidify the revolutionary aesthetics of Black Arts and laid claim to the movement’s position as the cultural wing of the Black Power Movement.

Baraka’s Somebody Blew Up America & Other Poems includes the title poem that headlined him in the media in ways rare to poets and authors. The recital of the poem “that mattered” engaged the poet warrior in a battle royal with the very governor of New Jersey and with a legion of detractors demanding his resignation as the state’s Poet Laureate because of Somebody Blew Up America’s provocatively poetic inquiry (in a few lines of the poem) about who knew beforehand about the New York City World Trade Center bombings in 2001.

Baraka lived in Newark with his wife and author Amina Baraka; they have five children and led the word-music ensemble, Blue Ark: The Word Ship. Baraka was Professor Emeritus at the State University of New York at Stony Brook and his awards and honors included an Obie, the American Academy of Arts & Letters award, the James Weldon Johnson Medal for contributions to the arts, Rockefeller Foundation and National Endowment for the Arts grants, and Poet Laureate of New Jersey.

Listen for our On the Bandstand segment with NYC metro area appearances of Suga’ guests at the end of the first hour with Associate Producer Hank Williams.

Show engineered by Joyce Jones. Hosted by Arts Producers Joyce Jones, Hank Williams and contributor Kazembe Balagun.

In February 2014, we aired portions of a combination poetry tribute to Baraka and Jayne Cortez (who we interviewed in 2013). Both can be found in our audio archives.

Web Extra: Watch Baraka perform his classis “Whys/ Wise” with saxophonist Rob Brown.

Sunday 4/6/14 Show: The Jazz Poetry of Langston Hughees

The next show will air on Sunday, April 6, 2014 from 11:00 PM – 1:00 AM Monday Eastern Standard Time on WBAI, 99.5 FM in the NYC metro area or streaming online at wbai.org. During this installment, Suga’ in My Bowl sets off its celebration of National Poetry and Jazz Appreciation Month with a look at Langston Hughes. This week’s guest is Hughes biographer Arnold Rampersad. We will also take a quick look at a production of Hughes’ “Ask Your Mama” with Dr. Ron McCurdy, Professor of Music at the Thorton School of Music, University of Southern California.



Langston Hughes was born in Joplin, Missouri, in 1902. After graduation from high school, he spent a year in Mexico with his father, then a year studying at Columbia University. His first poem in a nationally known magazine was “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” which appeared in The Crisis magazine in 1921. In 1925, he was awarded the First Prize for Poetry of the magazine Opportunity, the winning poem being “The Weary Blues,” which gave its title to his first book of poems, published in 1926. As a result of his poetry, Mr. Hughes received a scholarship to the historically Black Lincoln University in Pennsylvania, where he earned his B.A. in 1929. In 1943, he was awarded an honorary Litt.D. by his alma mater; he has also been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship (1935), a Rosenwald Fellowship (1940), and an American Academy of Arts and Letters Grant (1947). From 1926 until his death in 1967, Langston Hughes devoted his time to writing and lecturing. He wrote poetry, short stories, autobiography, song lyrics, essays, humor, and plays. A cross section of his work was published in 1958 as The Langston Hughes Reader.

Dr. Rampersad’s 2-volume Hughes biography is considered the definitive work on the life and legacy of the great poet. Rampersad is an emeritus faculty member of Stanford University’s English Department and has written several critically acclaimed books, including biographical works on W.E.B. DuBois and Jackie Robinson.

Find out more information on Hughes on on the Langston Hughes Facebook page.

Listen for our On the Bandstand segment with NYC metro area appearances of Suga’ guests at the end of the first hour with Associate Producer Hank Williams.

Show produced, engineered, edited, and hosted by Joyce Jones.

Web Extras:

Read Langston Hughes’s 1926 essay “The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain”, calling for art that explicitly speaks to Black audiences and draws from cultural experiences and traditions. It was written in response to George Schuyler’s “The Negro Art Hokum”. The University of Illinois’s Langston Hughes page has lots more poems that can be read online.

Watch actor Malcolm Jamal Warner perform Hughes’s “12 Moods for Jazz” with the Ron McCurdy Jazz Quartet:



Watch the entire performance of Dr. Ron McCurdy’s multimedia Hughes show at Pasadena City College. Video is 73 minutes long.

Sunday, 3/23/14 Show: Jana Herzen of Motéma Records

The next show will air on Sunday, March 23rd, 2014 from 11:00 PM – 1:00 AM Monday Eastern Standard Time on WBAI, 99.5 FM in the NYC metro area or streaming online at wbai.org. During this installment, Suga’ in My Bowl covers the final of four women in different areas of this music during its four weeks of broadcasting in Women’s History Month. This week’s guest is president of Motema Records, guitarist and vocalist Jana Herzen.

Many jazz aficionados only know Jana Herzen as the founder and president of the acclaimed Motéma label. Under her stewardship, Motéma has advocated for visionaries Randy Weston, Monty Alexander, Gregory Porter, Geri Allen, Rene Marie and dozens of other dynamic and virtuosic composer/performers. What many may not realize, however, is that Ms. Herzen, whose initial professional life was in the theater, is a seasoned performer and instrumentalist with quite a talent for writing and performing.

Founded in San Francisco by Herzen in collaboration with arts patrons and industry professionals, Motéma Music now makes its home in Harlem, New York City. The label specializes in jazz and other creative music that spans genres, cultures and generations. The company’s varied international roster of releases has received Grammy® nominations in jazz, reggae and R&B. At a time when many of the big record labels have moved away from promoting jazz or are content to mine their vaults for recordings that can be re-issued as profitable box sets, Motéma is one of a handful of smaller labels that has signed on new artists and made it possible for established artists to release new material.

Herzen told The Forward in an interview that “the whole record label model is based on, ‘Let’s see if we can make a bunch of money off the backs of these artists.’” Herzen is attempting to follow a different model that focuses on the art itself and its creators and fans.

In this show, we’ll talk about all of that and more with Herzen. We’ll get into not only the difficulties of running a record label that releases jazz now, but also the opportunities that creates and what it means to be involved in this key area of the music. We’ll also talk to her about her own creative work as a musician.

Listen for our On the Bandstand segment with NYC metro area appearances of Suga’ guests at the end of the first hour with Associate Producer Hank Williams.

Show produced, engineered, edited, and hosted by Joyce Jones.

Sunday 3/16/14 Show: Village Vanguard’s Deborah Gordon

The next show will air on Sunday, March 16th, 2013 from 11:00 PM – 1:00 AM Monday Eastern Standard Time on WBAI, 99.5 FM in the NYC metro area or streaming online at wbai.org. During this installment, Suga’ in My Bowl covers the third of four women in different areas of this music during its four weeks of broadcasting in Women’s History Month. This week’s guest is Deborah Gordon, Village Vanguard owner and daughter of Lorraine and Max Gordon.

For almost 80 years, the Village Vanguard has swung in 4/4 time, marking the center of the known jazz universe to an international circle of musicians and music fans. To the uninitiated, the small club at the bottom of 15 well-trodden steps below street level may seem little more than a cramped, triangular-shaped room. But to a hip populace it’s where the ghosts of past jazz giants still play, where the best living jazz talent aspire to record, and where sound waves seem to reverberate in a manner unlike any other club, anywhere.

Max Gordon first opened the Vanguard in 1935 as a variety venue presenting sketch comedy, poetry and dinner. Since then, the club’s tradition of left-leaning politics and irreverence — Yiddish poets in the ’30s, absurdists like Professor Irwin Corey in the ’50s — is reflected in the progressive jazz it still presents.

The Vanguard owes much to a half-century’s worth of classic albums recorded in the basement room, which started in 1957 with Sonny Rollins’s three sessions.

Listen for our On the Bandstand segment with NYC metro area appearances of Suga’ guests at the end of the first hour with Associate Producer Hank Williams.

Show produced, engineered, edited, and hosted by Joyce Jones.

Web Extra:

Sunday, 3/9/14 Show: Catherine Russell

The next show will air on Sunday, March 9th, 2013 from 11:00 PM – 1:00 AM Monday Eastern Standard Time on WBAI, 99.5 FM in the NYC metro area or streaming online at wbai.org. During this installment, Suga’ in My Bowl covers the second of four women in different areas of this music during its four weeks of broadcasting in Women’s History Month. This week’s guest is vocalist, guitarist and mandolin player Catherine Russell.

Catherine Russell is a native New Yorker, born into musical royalty. Her father, the late Luis Russell, was born in Panama, emigrated to New Orleans and then New York City, becoming a legendary pianist/bandleader/arranger/composer, and Louis Armstrong’s long-time collaborator and musical director. Her mother, Carline Ray, was a pioneering bassist/guitarist/vocalist and holder of advanced degrees from Juilliard and Manhattan School of Music, who performed with International Sweethearts of Rhythm, Mary Lou Williams, and Ruth Brown. Not surprisingly considering her pedigree, Catherine Russell is a one of a kind musician and vocalist. A graduate of American Academy of Dramatic Arts, Catherine has toured the world, performing and recording with David Bowie, Steely Dan, Cyndi Lauper, Jackson Browne, Michael Feinstein, Levon Helm, Paul Simon, Rosanne Cash, Carrie Smith, and many others.

Since the 2006 release of her debut album, Cat, on Harmonia Mundi’s World Village label, Catherine Russell has been making new fans and friends.

Three acclaimed and chart topping albums have followed. Her sophomore release in 2008, Sentimental Streak, was helmed by Grammy winning producer/multi-instrumentalist Larry Campbell, winning a prestigious German Record Critics Award.

Her third album, Inside This Heart of Mine released in 2010, contains gems from the 1920’s through the Present, from the likes of Duke Ellington, Fats Waller, Louis Armstrong, Peggy Lee, Maxine Sullivan, Wynonie Harris, Howlin’ Wolf, Rachelle Garniez, and Catherine’s dad, Luis Russell. Inside This Heart of Mine showcases the ever-deepening interpretive wiles of Catherine Russell’s ripe, honey-dipped alto as she personifies the living heart and proud history of each song.

Strictly Romancin’, released in 2012, is a paean to natural attractions; to a lover, an art form, and to one’s family heritage. Our faithful heroine explores love’s foibles, failures, and bliss, from amorous to humorous, embodying the lost art of song savvy, inhabiting the lyric, and allowing each melody to shine. On this 14 song collection, this ever soulful jazz/blues vocalist takes us on a journey; from Harlem dance hall, to Parisian Café, to Store Front Church, to New Orleans Gin Joint, to Uptown Cabaret, blurring distinctions between the carnal and the eternal, in a musical tour de force.

Ms. Russell has performed on three continents, and been a hit on major Jazz Festivals including, Montreal, Monterey, Newport, North Sea, Bern International, Charlie Parker, JazzAscona, Rochester, Detroit International, Tanglewood, Lotus World Music, Panama, I Love Jazz – Brazil, and at sold out shows at premier venues like The Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., Sculler’s in Boston, The Dakota in Minneapolis, Yoshi’s in San Francisco, Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York City, and The Pasadena Pops in Los Angeles.

In 2012, she won a Grammy Award for her appearance as a featured artist on the soundtrack album for the HBO TV series Boardwalk Empire. In 2013, Russell was heard prominently on the soundtrack for the movie Kill Your Darlings, starring Daniel Radcliffe as a young Allen Ginsberg.

Catherine’s 5th album, Bring It Back was released on February 11, 2014 on the Jazz Village label, a new imprint from Harmonia Mundi. With her new album, Russell digs deeper into a rich vein of musical treasures. Mining collaborations between her legendary father, Luis Russell, and the great Louis Armstrong, Russell brings along the same team from her two previous chart-topping albums. Gems from the Jazz Age and Swing Era performed with new arrangements for 10 piece orchestra, blend seamlessly with reinventions sourced from Blues icons Esther Phillips, Al Hibbler, Wynonie Harris, and Little Willie John.

Listen for our On the Bandstand segment with NYC metro area appearances of Suga’ guests at the end of the first hour with Associate Producer Hank Williams.

Show produced, engineered, edited, and hosted by Joyce Jones.

Web Extras:

Information on the 1948 musicians’ strike is on Wikipedia and in a longer article in the Wall Street Journal (may require a WSJ subscription).

Sunday, 3/2/14 Show: Rhonda Hamilton Carvin

The next show will air on Sunday, February 16th, 2013 from 11:00 PM – 1:00 AM Monday Eastern Standard Time on WBAI, 99.5 FM in the NYC metro area or streaming online at wbai.org. During this membership/fund drive installment, Suga’ in My Bowl launches four weeks of Women’s History Month covering women in different areas of this music. We start with on-air radio host and producer Rhonda Hamilton Carvin.



Don’t forget the program is the premium, so please tune in and donate whatever you can to help us continue this listener-supported experiment.

Rhonda Hamilton, a native New Yorker, is the host and producer of Midday Jazz which airs weekdays, 10AM – 2PM on WBGO/Jazz 88.3 FM in Newark, NJ.

Ms. Hamilton is a graduate of Boston University’s College of Communication. She also studied at the Actor’s Studio in Boston. Her career in radio began in 1975 as a jazz announcer/producer at WBUR-FM, Boston. She later became the music director of WBUR.

Returning to the New York/New Jersey metropolitan area in March 1979, Ms. Hamilton came to WBGO at the station’s inception and has played a key role in making Jazz 88 one of the finest and most listened to jazz stations in the world. Ms. Hamilton also helped to inaugurate the jazz programming on Sirius Satellite Radio where she hosted a daily program from 2001 until April 2009. Since 1980, she has had a regular presence on National Public Radio as the voice of numerous nationally syndicated programs including JazzSet and NPR’s annual New Year’s Eve broadcast, Toast of the Nation-Coast to Coast. She’s been honored by the Jazz Journalists Association and has received 2 consecutive New York Jazz Awards for Best Jazz DJ “in appreciation of a major contribution to the cultural life of our region.” Ms. Hamilton is also a recipient of The Ladies in Jazz Award from the Mayor of NYC and the Harlem Chamber of Commerce. Other honors include recognition from the Spelman College Alumni Association and the Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity.

On-camera, Ms. Hamilton was a music reviewer and commentator on the public affairs program, Mzizi Roots on WBZ-TV in Boston and the host of a 36 program series on WNYC-TV called Brazil/New York which focused on various aspects of Brazilian culture. She was profiled on the Disney series Working and she’s been featured in interviews about jazz and WBGO for the New Jersey Public Television Network, WNBC, WNYW and WWOR in New York and NHK in Japan

Ms. Hamilton is also an accomplished voice-over artist with over three decades of experience in commercial and corporate voice-over.

Listen for our On the Bandstand segment with NYC metro area appearances of Suga’ guests at the end of the first hour with Associate Producer Hank Williams.

Show produced, engineered, edited, and hosted by Joyce Jones.

Sunday February 16th Show: Jayne Cortez and Amiri Baraka tribute

The next show will air on Sunday, February 16th, 2013 from 11:00 PM – 1:00 AM Monday Eastern Standard Time on WBAI, 99.5 FM in the NYC metro area or streaming online at wbai.org. During this membership/fund drive installment, Suga’ in My Bowl honors former Suga’ guests Jayne Cortez and Amiri Baraka to continue to not forget our cultural warriors as part of Black History Month. Join us as we celebrate their life work and influence with help from participants of a recent tribute hosted by the Institute of African American Affairs at New York University.

Don’t forget the program is the premium, so please tune in and donate whatever you can to help us continue this listener-supported experiment.



On Friday, December 28, 2012, Jayne Cortez left this world. Jayne Cortez was born in Arizona, grew up in California, and currently lives in New York City and Dakar, Senegal. She is the author of ten books of poems and performer of her poetry with music on nine recordings. Her voice is celebrated for its political, surrealistic, dynamic innovations in lyricism, and visceral sound. Cortez has presented her work and ideas at universities, museums, and festivals in Africa, Asia, Europe, South America, the Caribbean and the United States. Her poems have been translated into many languages and widely published in anthologies, journals, and magazines. She is the recipient of several awards including: Arts International, the National Endowment for the Arts, the International African Festival Award, The Langston Hughes Award, and the American Book Award. Her most recent books are The Beautiful Book (Bola Press, 2007), Jazz Fan Looks Back (Hanging Loose Press), and Somewhere In Advance of Nowhere (Serpent’s Tail Ltd). Her latest CD recordings with the Firespitter Band are Taking the Blues Back Home (Harmolodic and Verve Records); Borders of Disorderly Time and Find Your Own Voice (both by Bola Press). Cortez directed the film Yari Yari: Black Women Writers and the Future, and organized the “Slave Routes the Long Memory” and “Yari Yari Pamberi: Black Women Writer Dissecting Globalization” conferences. Both conferences were held at New York University. She was president of the Organization of Women Writers of Africa, Inc. and appeared on screen in the films: Women In Jazz and Poetry In Motion.

On Thursday, January 9, 2014, Amiri Baraka left this world. Baraka’s Blues People (1963), remains a landmark work on African-American music a half-century after its publication. With influences on his work ranging from musical orishas such as Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane, Thelonius Monk, and Sun Ra to the Cuban Revolution, Malcolm X and world revolutionary movements, Baraka is renowned as one of the founders of the Black Arts Movement in Harlem in the 1960s that became, though short-lived, the virtual blueprint for a new American theater aesthetics. His Obie award-winning play Dutchman (1963) and The Slave (1964), helped solidify the revolutionary aesthetics of Black Arts and laid claim to the movement’s position as the cultural wing of the Black Power Movement.

Baraka’s Somebody Blew Up America & Other Poems includes the title poem that headlined him in the media in ways rare to poets and authors. The recital of the poem “that mattered” engaged the poet warrior in a battle royal with the very governor of New Jersey and with a legion of detractors demanding his resignation as the state’s Poet Laureate because of Somebody Blew Up America’s provocatively poetic inquiry (in a few lines of the poem) about who knew beforehand about the New York City World Trade Center bombings in 2001.

Baraka lived in Newark with his wife and author Amina Baraka; they have five children and led the word-music ensemble, Blue Ark: The Word Ship. Baraka was Professor Emeritus at the State University of New York at Stony Brook and his awards and honors included an Obie, the American Academy of Arts & Letters award, the James Weldon Johnson Medal for contributions to the arts, Rockefeller Foundation and National Endowment for the Arts grants, and Poet Laureate of New Jersey.

Listen for our On the Bandstand segment with NYC metro area appearances of Suga’ guests at the end of the first hour with Associate Producer Hank Williams.

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Show produced, engineered, and hosted by Joyce Jones.

Both Baraka and Sanchez were profiled in previous full Suga’ in My Bowl shows, which can be found in our audio archives.