Harmolodics

Tuesday 1/7/2019 Show: Winter Jazz Fest/James Blood Ulmer

Photo:  James Blood Ulmer at the 19th Annual Vision Festival | Credit: Joyce Jones/Sugabowl Photography.

Program note: We’re back on air for our final show on WBAI Radio!

The next show will air on Tuesday January 7, 2019 from 10:00 PM – 12 Midnight Eastern Standard Time on WBAI, 99.5 FM in the NYC metro area or streaming online at wbai.org. This broadcast will feature a 2016 rebroadcast of an interview with composer, guitarist and Harmolodic Blues man James Blood Ulmer, who is one of the artists lined up to be featured during the 2020 Winter Jazz Festival on January 11 along with the super ensemble Harriet Tubman. This will be our FINAL Suga’ broadcast over WBAI-FM.

James “Blood” Ulmer is one of the few exceptions — an outside guitarist who has forged a style based largely on the traditions of African-American vernacular music. Ulmer is an adherent of saxophonist/composer Ornette Coleman’s vaguely defined Harmolodic theory, which essentially subverts jazz’s harmonic component in favor of freely improvised, non-tonal, or quasi-modal counterpoint. Ulmer plays with a stuttering, vocalic attack; his lines are frequently texturally and chordally based, inflected with the accent of a soul-jazz tenor saxophonist. That’s not to say his sound is untouched by the rock tradition — the influence of Jimi Hendrix on Ulmer is strong — but it’s mixed with blues, funk, and free jazz elements. The resultant music is an expressive, hard-edged, loudly amplified hybrid that is, at its best, on a level with the finest of the Harmolodic school.

Ulmer began his career playing in funk bands, first in Pittsburgh (1959-1964) and later around Columbus, OH (1964-1967). Ulmer spent four years in Detroit before moving to New York in 1971. He landed a nine-month gig at the famed birthplace of bop, Minton’s Playhouse, and played very briefly with Art Blakey. In 1973, he recorded with the ex-John Coltrane drummer Rashied Ali and his Quintet on the Survival label. That same year, he hooked up with Ornette Coleman, whose concept affected Ulmer’s music thereafter. The guitarist’s recordings from the late ’70s and early ’80s exhibit a unique take on his mentor’s aesthetic. His blues and rock-tinged art was, if anything, more raw and aggressive than Coleman’s free jazz and funk-derived music (a reflection, no doubt, of Ulmer’s chosen instrument), but no less compelling from either an intellectual or an emotional standpoint. In 1981, Ulmer led the first of three record dates for Columbia, which helped to expose his music to a wider public. Around this time Ulmer began an association with tenor saxophonist David Murray, bassist Amin Ali, and drummer Ronald Shannon Jackson. As the Music Revelation Ensemble, this intermittent assemblage (with various other members added and subtracted) would produce a number of intense, free-blowing albums over a span of almost two decades.

Ulmer’s work has varied in quality over the years. In 1987, with the cooperative group Phalanx (George Adams, tenor sax; Sirone, bass; and Rashied Ali, drums), Ulmer drew successfully on the free jazz expressionism that made his name. His ’90s recordings with the Music Revelation Ensemble showed him still capable of playing convincingly in that vein.

Blood dug deeply into an investigation of the blues as the century turned. First he recorded Memphis Blood: The Sun Sessions with guitarist Veron Reid both performing and producing. The album also starred veteran Ulmer sideman Charles Burnham on violin. In 2003, Ulmer issued No Escape From the Blues, recorded at Electric Lady studio. A thoroughly psychedlic funky take on the genre, Reid and Burnham were present in the same roles once more, and old friend Olu Dara stopped in to contribute as well. In 2005, Blood released Birthright, on Joel Dorn’s Hyena label. It is easily his most intimate recording. Completely solo in the studio (Reid once again produced), it contains ten orignals and two covers of classic reportoire and takes Blood’s blues journey to an entirely new level.

(Bio adapted from Allmusic.)

James Blood Ulmer will take the stage at the Winter Jazz Festival on Saturday, January 11, with doors opening at 7:00 p.m. at the Sultan Room, 234 Starr Street, Brooklyn. Follow our blog for a preview and additional Winter Jazz Fest coverage.

This program is hosted, engineered, produced, and edited 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.

Web Extra:

Watch Ulmer in this 2019 live performance with bassist Bill Laswell!

Sunday 8/19/2018 Show: Jamaladeen Tacuma

Photo: Jamaaladeen Tacuma @ NYC Winter Jazz Festival | © Joyce Jones/ Suga Bowl Photography. Some Rights Reserved. Creative Commons CC-NC-BY-ND. Used with Permission.

The next show will air on August 19, 2018 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 broadcast features an interview with bassist and composer Jamaaladeen Tacuma.

Few musicians leave their audiences with a feeling that they have truly witnessed something amazing. Artist/Producer/Performer/Arranger/Innovator and Bassist Jamaaladeen Tacuma does just that. This native Philadelphian has always stretched the old mold of what and how a bassist is supposed to play. Tacuma has simply re-defined his instrument’s artistic potential. In the mid 70’s, his creatively free approach to the bass caught the eye and ear of the legendary saxophonist Ornette Coleman. Tacuma became a member of Coleman’s electric band, Prime Time, he toured with the group and played on some of Coleman’s historic recordings such as: Dancing In Your Head, Body Meta, and Of Human Feelings. As a soloist, Tacuma continued to press the musical envelope with his debut album in 1983 entitled simply, Showstopper. Several records followed, some of which include: Renaissance Man (1984), Music World (1987) and JukeBox (1989), Cosmetic, Boss of The Bass, which confirmed his ability to flip between various musical genres. Even the critics have had high praise for Tacuma’s musicianship and artistry. One year he received the highest number of votes ever for an electric bassist in the “Talent Deserving Wider Recognition” category of the Down Beat critics’ poll.

Tacuma has performed and recorded and collaborated with musicians on nearly every continent such as Japan, Korea, Europe and the Middle East. In September 2007, Jamaaladeen released a new recording entitled The Flavors Of Thelonious Monk Reloaded paying musical homage to the great pianist composer Thelonious Monk and also releasing a new recording in October 2007 with “Free Form Funky Freqs,” a trio with guitarist Vernon Reid (Living Color), and G. Calvin Weston (John Laurie, Medeski, Martin & Wood) on drums entitled Urban Mythology on Thirsty Ear Records. He has also played and produced for many American and European Jazz/Funk musicians. Furthermore, the release Mirakles by Derrick Bailey, G. Calvin Weston & Tacuma was cited as one of the “most important recordings of year 2000” by All Music Guide. He also recently completed a recording entitled Dust with Bauhaus member Peter Murphy on the Metropolis label. He is also featured as writer and co-producer on the new 2006 release of the World Saxophone Quartet’s album on Justin Time Records entitled Political Blues with a song by Jamaaladeen entitled “Blue Diamond” Tacuma has collaborated with a diverse and talented roster of artists: Guitarists Jeff Beck, Carlos Santana, Marc Ribot, James Blood Ulmer, Jean Paul Bourelly and Derek Bailey.

He has performed and recorded with saxophonist Pharoah Sanders, Grover Washington Jr., David Murray, Odean Pope, Wolfgang Puschnig and James Carter. He has worked with orchestras led by Anthony Davis at Carnegie Hall, to recording and performing with the Hip Hop rap group The Roots, DJ King Britt and DJ Logic. Tacuma has shared the stage with the great comedian and philanthropist Bill Cosby at the JVC Jazz Festival, on the David Letterman Show where Tacuma was Band Director for the night. He has even written music for the hit TV show, The Cosby Show. He has worked with poets Jayne Cortez, Quincy Troupe, Amiri Baraka and co-wrote and co-produced a song entitled “Women First” with the R&B Neo Soul group from Philadelphia, KINDRED (the family soul) on their new CD recording In This Life Together on the Hidden Beach/Motown label (2006). Jamaaladeen has recently explored the music of legendary saxophonist, composer John Coltrane with a preview recording and an extended European tour which featured the British saxophonist and BBC award recipient Tony Kofi. Jamaaladeen’s For The Love Of Ornette, released 2010 on his own label, was a monumental recording made in honor of his mentor Ornette Coleman. In 2013 Jamaaladeen released Bon Vivant his 2nd studio recording with Free Form Funky Freqs trio with G. Calvin Weston and Guitarist Vernon Reid on his newly formed recording label Jam All Productions.

In recent years Jamaaladeen has been gaining recognition from some of the Unites States most prestigious artist foundations, 2011 Jamaaladeen received the Pew Arts & Heritage Award, The Marcus Garvey Foundation Award, Uptown Theater Hall of Fame Award 2014. Jamaaladeen has received composer’s residencies at the prestigious MacDowell Colony , Headlands Center for the Arts, and Civitella Rainier Italy, where he composed a new project he will be presenting in 2015. Staying true to his artistic and experimental approach to music, Tacuma is consistently bringing musical happiness to fans World Wide.

(Bio adapted from Tacuma’s website.)

This program is hosted, engineered, produced, and edited 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.

Web Extras:

Watch Tacuma play with the Free Form Funky Freqs in this live 2011 clip.

Hank Williams is assistant producer for Suga’ in My Bowl and produces the weekly “On the Bandstand” segment as well as running the show’s website and blog, where he has reviewed several jazz festivals. His writing has also appeared in Left Turn magazine and American Music Review. He teaches at Lehman College in the City University of New York system.

January 10, 2016 Show: James Blood Ulmer

Photo: James “Blood” Ulmer at the 2014 Vision Festival. | Joyce Jones. Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 2.0, Some Rights Reserved.
 
The next show will air on Sunday, January 10, 2015 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 broadcast will feature an interview with composer, guitarist and Blues man James Blood Ulmer, who is one of the artists lined up to be featured during the 2016 Winter Jazz Festival. This program will close out our series focusing on the festival, which starts on January 13.
 

 
James “Blood” Ulmer is one of the few exceptions — an outside guitarist who has forged a style based largely on the traditions of African-American vernacular music. Ulmer is an adherent of saxophonist/composer Ornette Coleman’s vaguely defined Harmolodic theory, which essentially subverts jazz’s harmonic component in favor of freely improvised, non-tonal, or quasi-modal counterpoint. Ulmer plays with a stuttering, vocalic attack; his lines are frequently texturally and chordally based, inflected with the accent of a soul-jazz tenor saxophonist. That’s not to say his sound is untouched by the rock tradition — the influence of Jimi Hendrix on Ulmer is strong — but it’s mixed with blues, funk, and free jazz elements. The resultant music is an expressive, hard-edged, loudly amplified hybrid that is, at its best, on a level with the finest of the Harmolodic school.
 
Ulmer began his career playing in funk bands, first in Pittsburgh (1959-1964) and later around Columbus, OH (1964-1967). Ulmer spent four years in Detroit before moving to New York in 1971. He landed a nine-month gig at the famed birthplace of bop, Minton’s Playhouse, and played very briefly with Art Blakey. In 1973, he recorded with the ex-John Coltrane drummer Rashied Ali and his Quintet on the Survival label. That same year, he hooked up with Ornette Coleman, whose concept affected Ulmer’s music thereafter. The guitarist’s recordings from the late ’70s and early ’80s exhibit a unique take on his mentor’s aesthetic. His blues and rock-tinged art was, if anything, more raw and aggressive than Coleman’s free jazz and funk-derived music (a reflection, no doubt, of Ulmer’s chosen instrument), but no less compelling from either an intellectual or an emotional standpoint. In 1981, Ulmer led the first of three record dates for Columbia, which helped to expose his music to a wider public. Around this time Ulmer began an association with tenor saxophonist David Murray, bassist Amin Ali, and drummer Ronald Shannon Jackson. As the Music Revelation Ensemble, this intermittent assemblage (with various other members added and subtracted) would produce a number of intense, free-blowing albums over a span of almost two decades.
 
Ulmer’s work has varied in quality over the years. In 1987, with the cooperative group Phalanx (George Adams, tenor sax; Sirone, bass; and Rashied Ali, drums), Ulmer drew successfully on the free jazz expressionism that made his name. His ’90s recordings with the Music Revelation Ensemble showed him still capable of playing convincingly in that vein.
 
Ulmer dug deeply into an investigation of the blues as the century turned. First he recorded Memphis Blood: The Sun Sessions with guitarist Veron Reid both performing and producing. The album also starred veteran Ulmer sideman Charles Burnham on violin. In 2003, Ulmer issued No Escape From the Blues, recorded at Electric Lady studio. A thoroughly psychedlic funky take on the genre, Reid and Burnham were present in the same roles once more, and old friend Olu Dara stopped in to contribute as well. In 2005, Blood released Birthright, on Joel Dorn’s Hyena label. It is easily his most intimate recording. Completely solo in the studio (Reid once again produced), it contains ten orignals and two covers of classic reportoire and takes Blood’s blues journey to an entirely new level.
 
Bio adapted from Allmusic.
 
Ulmer will take the stage during the first of the marathon nights at the Winter Jazz Festival on Friday, January 15, 9:00 p.m. at the New School Auditorium, 66 West 12 Street.
 
This program is engineered, produced, hosted and edited 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.
 
The 2016 Winter Jazz Fest runs from January 13-17 at several locations in Greenwich Village. See the full schedule and artist lineup at their website. Head on over to our blog for previews, our annual cheat sheet to selected acts, and a full review when it wraps up.
 
Web Extras
 
Watch Ulmer perform live at the 2015 Skopje Jazz Festival.
 

 
Watch Ulmer perform “Are you Glad to be in America” live.
 

 
Hank Williams is assistant producer for Suga’ in My Bowl and produces the weekly “On the Bandstand” segment as well as running the show’s website and blog, where he has reviewed several jazz festivals. His writing has also appeared in Left Turn magazine and American Music Review. He teaches at Lehman and Hunter colleges in the City University of New York system.