Spirits Calling – an Interview with Hamid Drake

Hamid Drake at Sant'Anna Arresi 2020. Photo by Petra Cvelbar

By David Cristol

Hamid Drake, who turns 70 on August 3, remains one of the busiest drummers on the improvised / free jazz scene, ever on the road and with album credits in excess of 500. Born in Louisiana and raised in Chicago, he has played with everyone from Akira Sakata to Thurston Moore, and recently payed tribute to trumpeter Don Cherry*, whom he encountered and lived with early on in his itinerary. Drake also put up a band together in celebration of Alice Coltrane, another major influence. The master percussionist has forged a unique path, with a deeply spiritual approach. His style is informed not only by US and European jazz but also by traditions from Africa, India, Persia and more. Hamid Drake can provide a monster groove, play abstract or meditative and still sound like himself.

Your first credited recording – as Hank Drake – is with the Fred Anderson Quintet, “Another Place” in 1978.

Hamid Drake – Yes, it was at the Moers Music festival, and the group also had George Lewis on trombone. I later changed my name to Hamid, for religious reasons. I grew up around Fred Anderson and his three sons, Kevin, Eugene and Michael. I would see Fred play his saxophone when I was very young.

Can you describe your first encounters with music and the years prior to becoming a professional musician?

Foday Musa Suso, Joe Thomas, Adam Rudolph
and Hamid Drake, 1977

My first encounter with music was probably in church. Although not from a family of musicians, there was always music around me, at home and outside. In school I joined the stage band. I had a snare drum and a bass drum. It wasn't a choice, I didn't want to play drums, I wanted to play trombone. Fortunately, there was a drum instructor who helped me develop a strong liking then love for the drums. Later my parents bought me a small drum set so I was able to shift to the drum set but in the stage band it was just practicing the snare drum and the big bass drums. We were doing marching music mostly, boom-kak, boom-kak, boom-kak, in the Chicago area. I never went to music school per se but in my first year of college I studied piano with one of the teachers for a while. I had private teachers and learned on my own. I was never a resident of an established music conservatory.

When did you first come to Europe?

That was with Fred Anderson at the Moers Festival where that first album was recorded. The second time was with [percussionist] Adam Rudolph. We moved to Sweden to live with Don Cherry. Don had come to Chicago to be on one of the first records I did, with Mandingo Griot Society [Flying Fish, 1978]. Adam had brought Don to Chicago to do the recording with us. After that, Don invited me and my family and Adam Rudolph to Sweden to stay with him and his family which was Moki Cherry, Neneh Cherry and Eagle-Eye Cherry. They had a place in the countryside in the Skåne region, an old schoolhouse that they converted into their home. A few months after he guested on our record, he just invited us. I borrowed some money from my mother for the plane tickets on Icelandic Air. It was a one-way ticket because we didn't know when we would return. We stayed there for about five months. It was an extraordinary experience, being with Don every day and with Moki, who’s a very important figure also. We were very young. Neneh was maybe 15 or 16 at the time and Eagle-Eye probably 12 years old.

In January 2025, you opened the Sons d’Hiver festival with a tribute to Don Cherry, bringing things full circle.

Yes. “Mu” First part and Second part [BYG-Actuel] are very important recordings for me. I used to have those LPs as part of my record collection. Those recordings are monumental because I was very much into Ed Blackwell. Fred Anderson was the one who turned me on to Blackwell. I liked how Ed combined the African rhythms with his approach to swing and jazz, his polyrhythms and how he used the cowbell. When he would take solos, he would incorporate the cowbell into his technique. I was also into Max Roach, Art Taylor and Elvin Jones, and a lot of funk, R&B and rock drummers too. But for the jazz world, I would say Ed Blackwell was my greatest influence. The Don Cherry tribute in Paris was with Moor Mother, the poet from the United States who's a member of Irreversible Entanglements, and my friend and associate Pasquale Mirra with whom we have a new duo album out [on the Italian label Parco della Musica] . Don is now one of the ancestors. We chose to pay tribute to him because of his music and because he's one of the people who can inspire and help us even though he's not in the physical life anymore. Spiritually he's still very much alive and active.

Speaking of spirituality, the album you made with Adam Rudolph and Pharoah Sanders is called “Spirits” [Meta, 2000].

I’m surprised that you know about that recording! That's from Montreal, and the three of us, Adam, Pharoah and myself, put the recording out ourselves. We each contributed a certain amount of money to have it done. When Pharoah listened to the recording of the concert, he wanted to release it. It features some of his best playing in my opinion. He plays continuously on it. The years I toured with Pharoah were a great learning experience. He was a gracious person and musician. I first met him through Bill Laswell, when Bill called me in to do the Pharoah album “Message from Home” in the mid-90s. When we did that record, Pharoah was easygoing, we immediately hit it off. I owe that to Bill, who brought us together.

Herbie Hancock guested on Mandingo’s 1984 album “Watto Sitta” and the next year you were on Hancock’s electro-global record “Sound System”.

Those things came about because Herbie and Suso had been doing duet concerts, piano and kora. That was all through Laswell because of his connection with Herbie Hancock. I have a story about Bill. We were in a taxi coming back from the studio or eating something, and Bill had this big shoulder bag on him and said, “man, you won't believe what I have here in this bag” – and he had the two-inch reels of Miles Davis’ music that he was getting ready to remix. It was like gold and platinum in his shoulder bag. I like the remixes he has done, Miles, Bob Marley and Alice Coltrane’s album with Santana. Bill fueled my further esteem of Alice Coltrane, because there were books she had written that I wasn't familiar with, and Bill gave me the complete collection. We were in the studio and he said “hey Hamid, I want you to have these” . It's a several volumes set of her writings. It's about her experiences through meditation, her teachings and everything. Alice had personally given these books to Bill.

You have worked with Bill Laswell a lot, live and in the studio.

The list of recordings and concerts that I've been involved with Bill is very long, I only realized that recently. A lot of those things escape you. You're doing things and then only later realize the extent of it. Laswell would call me and bring me from Chicago to New York to go into the studio, just Bill, myself and keyboard player Bernie Worrell from Parliament-Funkadelic, we would record a lot of rhythm tracks, make up all these grooves and Bill would use them on different recordings. He is very much like an alchemist. 

 

Aiyb Dieng, Bill Laswell, Hamid Drake in 2000. Photo by Ziga Koritnik.

Another key partnership is with Adam Rudolph.

My relationship with Adam goes back a long way. We met when we were 14 or 15 years old in a place called Frank's Drum Shop in Chicago. Adam was playing congas, and convinced me to buy a conga. I started studying congas with the teacher that he was studying with. We were playing with a lot of different musicians in and around Chicago and particularly with Fred Anderson. After he graduated from college he went to Ghana to study drumming with the Ewe people and there he met Foday Musa Suso, the kora player from Gambia, who was part of a project at the University of Accra. They were bringing young griots from different parts of Africa to teach. Suso wanted to come to the United States, so they decided to go back to Chicago and form a group together, playing traditional Mandingo music that would include rhythms and grooves from the United States and the Caribbean. On September 7^th, 1977, Suso and Adam arrived in Chicago. I remember the date somehow because I met Suso the day after they arrived. Adam and I had been writing to each other all the time, me being in Chicago, him in Ghana. That's when people were writing letters. We started Mandingo Griot Society. We began looking for a bass player and quickly found the one we wanted to be in the group, Joe Thomas. The relationship with Adam is one of my most important ones, it’s music and also discovery of books, friendship, tai-chi, all sorts of things. Our families knew each other, I knew his mom and dad and brothers, he knew my mother. I’ve learned a lot from him. He's a great composer and musician, teacher and writer too – not only music but of literature. He’s also a great organizer who brings musicians together to create and fulfill his vision.

How did you start playing the frame drum?

Photo by Petra Cvelbar

I first heard the frame drum with a record from the oud master from Nubia, Hamza El Din, “Escalay” [Nonesuch, 1971]. Side one was him playing oud and singing, and side two was him playing the frame drum and singing. When I first heard him playing the frame drum, I immediately fell in love with it. I had become friends with a musician who had moved back to Chicago, Raphael Donald Garrett. He played bass, but also saxophone and clarinet. He's featured on some of Coltrane's recordings. On those records his name is simply Donald Garrett. Later he changed it to Raphael Donald Garrett. We had a trio with Raphael, myself, and multi-reeds player Douglas Ewart. Raphael knew I was interested in the frame drum, so he gave me my first one, that he had purchased when living in Turkey. I was listening to recordings and just kind of messing around on it. But then I met Hamza El Din at the Bear Mountain World Folk Music Festival in upstate New York, and he showed me some of my first technique on the instrument. I also met two musicians from Turkey, saxophone player Ismet Siral and ney and oud player Haci Tekbilek. This was at the Creative Music Studios in Woodstock where I was with Mandingo Griot Society. Ismet and Haci showed me some further technique on the frame drum, and from there I started to practice, practice more and develop my own way. But a lot of style that I play comes out of Hamza El Din, and the Moroccan approach to bandir. What also contributed to my learning was being involved in a mystical Sufi order from Turkey called the Halveti-Jerrahi, as the frame drum was involved in the order’s ceremonies.

Did you spend time in Africa and study music there?

Sure, I went to Africa several times. I didn’t study with teachers per se, except for a few djembe players. I did study congas, that was more from the Afro-Cuban tradition. Adam Rudolph was always studying different drumming traditions, and we would listen to records of music from Africa and so forth. Just by listening and experimenting, that approach kind of came into my style of playing. I was around a lot of djembe players in Chicago because there was a lot of music there: African dance ensembles, most particularly one called Muntu. They were all African-Americans, and the drummers had studied djembe with master Ladji Camara from Senegal. I would listen to them a lot and listen to the phrasing. My style developed from that. I studied Indian tablas, that later contributed to my approach of rhythmic style and definition. The rhythm also comes from India. 

Alexander Hawkins & Hamid Drake. Photo by Petra Cvelbar.

 Are you aware that you have around 530 record credits to this day? 

Man, that's a lot of recordings. There's probably more because some guys who come to concerts always record like archivists and then trade amongst each other. Many of the records I did aren't available anymore. I have probably less than 100 of them. I used to collect my albums but moved around so much they ended up away from me. I'm sure somebody has them all! There was one recording I really wanted to get a copy of but the guy who did it, Leo Krumpholz, moved to England. He had a venue in Chicago called South End Music Works and he recorded it, that was a monumental concert with Don Cherry and Raphael Donald Garrett on bass. I'm not sure how to get a hold of Leo. Don also wanted a copy of that recording. It was in the late 80s, early 90s. Drummer Steve McCall had just moved back to Chicago and came to that concert. I was a little nervous because he was in the audience.

In 2022, you started a band to tour with in homage to Alice Coltrane.

I had long wanted to honor Alice Coltrane, Turiya. It was put together by Ludmilla Faccenda [Drake’s manager] and myself and we wanted to do it in a unique sort of way, not play the compositions as she played them on her records. We wanted to expand on her art and message. That's why we included dance and spoken word, with Ndoho Ange from Paris and originally from Guadeloupe, and Jan Bang, the electronic musician from Norway, Pasquale Mirra on vibraphone and Jamie Saft on piano, organ and Fender Rhodes. The first incarnation had Joshua Abrams on bass and Thomas de Pourquery on sax and vocals. We wanted to dig deep into the spirit of Alice Coltrane. We did some of her compositions in our own improvisational way. I don't know if I've ever mentioned this to Pasquale, but some of Alice Coltrane's early recordings are with a vibraphone player. We wanted to tap into what Turiya itself deals with, the Sanskrit word which represents the fourth dimension of consciousness. Having met her a few times, her spirit and vibration and musical outlook had a big impact on me, I liked her whole philosophy. There's a very good biography about her called “Translinear light”.

Will there be a recording of that project?

It's difficult to organize because there’s quite a few people involved. Ludmilla has done almost a miracle, just the number of concerts that we have done, bringing that many people on stage, some of them from the United States. It's a big expense moving around about seven people. We'll see what happens in the future. Turiya hasn't been put to sleep yet!

You used samples of John Coltrane's albums “Om” and “Cosmic Music” which are seldom spoken of by critics.

Totally seldom spoken of! I find them incredible. There's a segment on “Cosmic Music”, where Jan recorded the first vocal portion of John Coltrane reciting, «May there be peace and love and perfection throughout all creation, O God” . And then we felt it was really important that Jamie do his own rendition of the composition “The Sun”. The album “Cosmic Music”, was very influential for me, especially that piece, “The Sun”, because it featured Alice Coltrane in a whole other way. She's playing totally solo, but John Coltrane starts it off with this invocation. And Alice comes in with the solo playing. It's a beautiful composition. The way that Jamie handles that composition is profound and shows his extreme understanding of not only jazz but also Western classical music. Ludmilla was the one who coined the project “Honoring Alice Coltrane”. Something of the people you honor has come inside of you, and you want to express your gratitude. Before the Turiya tribute, there was Indigenous Mind, a trio with Josh Abrams on bass and Jason Adasiewicz on vibraphone. We did a few Alice Coltrane songs as a trio.

Another pianist you played with was Irène Schweizer. You took part in the series of duos with drummers that she did.

Irene Schweizer and Hamid Drake in Nickelsdorf 2019. Photo by Petra Cvelbar

Yes, I feel very honored by that. A few months ago, there was a tribute to Irène Schweizer in Zürich. I was invited along with some of the other drummers that she had recorded with. She was a drummer who moved to piano. You can really hear that in her playing. We played together a few times and one of the most memorable is probably the trio we had with Fred Anderson. I think it was at Willisau, and it got released. The last concert in Nickelsdorf was also really special. I spoke with her partner and she communicated to me how special that concert in Nickelsdorf was for Irène. She was starting to decline a little bit then, but once she got on stage she was fantastic. I'm very happy that it was released. The first time we met, she was one of the organizers of the Taktlos festival in Switzerland. 

But I have to say, a lot of the European musicians that I was able to meet and eventually play with, came through Peter Brötzmann. He's the one who introduced me to a lot of them. I was playing around Europe with him, William Parker and Kondo and then in a trio with William and in other settings, the Chicago Tentet and so on. Through Peter I had the opportunity to meet a lot of the European improvisers. There was a German festival which name slips my mind now, that Jost Gebers used to do, where Peter and I played almost every year. Our relationship started in late 1987, early ‘88. “The Dried Rat-Dog” recording happened after he had already been coming to Chicago for a couple of years. We were doing duet concerts. Bill Laswell and Peter were very close too. They did a lot of things together and had that group Last Exit with Sonny Sharrock and Ronald Shannon Jackson which I got to see once in Chicago.

You're an associate of some of the hardest blowing musicians, but the way you play has a warmth and benevolence to it.

In a way, that's true. Brötzmann, when we first played together, allowed me to play a lot of different ways, not just hard and strong. For me, that approach wouldn't have taken the music to other dimensions. The way he played was so open, he allowed me to bring the things that I had studied into the situation. Instead of me just playing free all the time, I could do grooves, I could swing, play reggae, play open, do many different things. And that also gave another bent to his playing because he had maybe a wider palette to work with. He was throwing a lot of different things my way. I could have played just hard all the time, but that's not what moved me. When you play with Peter and you really listen to him, there's a lot of subtlety to his playing. Sometimes when you first listen you think it's just really hard playing but no, there's a lot of subtlety there. Peter loved ballads and standards and he found a way to incorporate that into his approach and the results are beautiful and mysterious. He did it in a way that only he could have done. A lot of saxophonists are trying to sound like him but they don't feel like him and they don't think like him. Peter was a big thinker and he had very deep emotions. And he was just trying to be himself.

The “Soldier of the Road” documentary about Brötzmann explains that a lot of what he projects in his playing comes from being German and the whole history and trauma comes through.

He would talk about that a lot. Him and Peter Kowald, they were similar in that way. The last time that Brötzmann went to Israel and played at Assif Tsahar’s venue, he gave a talk after the concert, like a huge apology to the people there about what happened with the Holocaust. I think that's a difficult thing to do. His father, as you probably know, was conscripted into the German army during World War II, kind of forced to be a member of the Nazi army, and was captured by the Russians and put in a prisoner of war camp. When he came back home from the war, it was very difficult. Peter told stories about him and his mother having to walk a long distance in cold weather just to get bread and a couple pieces of slabs of bacon to eat. 

Ken Vandermark, Chad Taylor, Hamid Drake, Peter Brötzmann. Cankarjev Dom, Slovenia 2013. Photo by Petra Cvelbar

 Some of his last recordings are with you and one was live in Berlin.

Yeah, live in Berlin with Majid Bekkas. Mokhtar Ghania couldn't make it so we asked Majid. We did another one with Mokhtar before, and with Mahmoud also, Mokhtar's brother. Peter loved Gnawa music, he loved the guembri. We toured Morocco with Majid. For the most part the response from the audience was very good. Some of the Moroccans didn't quite understand where Peter was coming from but they appreciated him and his artistry and his attempt to do something with a sound they were more familiar with. 

Jazzfest Berlin 2022. Photo by Dawid Laskowski

 You were the first artist to release an album on French label RogueArt, and are featured on 15 of their releases. The three Bindu albums have you as the leader. You’re heard with a wide variety of musicians on the label, from Nicole Mitchell to Steve Swell.

The first record is called “Bindu”, it's compositions that the musicians could freely improvise with, we had some established introductions but then we would develop from there. Another one was “Reggaeology” [after “Blissful” that came out in 2008 and was the second of three Bindu albums] which was jazz reggae, or reggae as played by jazzmen. I used to be in a group in Chicago called Third Eye, another one called Birds of a Feather, and they were both jazz reggae groups.

You are a regular presence at the Sons d’Hiver festival, with 32 sets since 2002. Each time with a different band or project, from the Pyramid Trio to Material, Indigo Trio, Kidd Jordan, Ernest Dawkins, Michel Portal and so on.

I had no idea there had been so many. Each concert was different and each was important. Playing with Michel Portal was amazing. The duet was one of Ludmilla's illuminations. Portal is unique and I’m grateful that happened. He's a genius in his own way, an ustad [master] . He moves through many different worlds, performing classical music, being on the improvised music scene, the straight-ahead jazz world, folk music too. In addition to saxophone and clarinet, he's a bandoneon player. He's from the Basque region and there's a lot from that tradition that he brings into his music. 

William Parker and Hamid Drake. Vision Festival 2013. Photo by Petra Cvelbar.

You have other connections to French musicians – flute player/singer Naïssam Jalal, bagpipe player Erwan Keravec, clarinet player Sylvain Kassap, pianist Eve Risser…

Eve Risser is an extraordinary musician. That big group she has with musicians from Africa is fantastic. She has a couple different versions of it [Red Desert Orchestra & Kogoba Basigui]. The percussionists, except for the drummer, are all women. The djembe player, the balafon player, all women. She chose the right pool together. I participated in a version of that group years ago, but not in the current one. I love the trio she has with drummer Edward Perraud who was in Thomas de Pourquery’s Supersonic.

What project would you like to set up if you had an unlimited budget and all the people you wanted?

Oh, wow [laughs, and pauses to think]! I would like to find a way to musically bring together all of these mystical traditions: Sufism, Tibetan Buddhism, mystical Christianity, mystical Judaism, shamanic… These ancient traditions that people have, and do a unified musical form with all of them, where they could blend together but also represent their own thing. There are people who practice several different mystical traditions and they hold multiple citizenships in those various sacred traditions. I’d like to do something like that with music, and that would have to also include dance and visual arts and spoken word. 

Skopje Jazz Festival 2022. Photo by Petra Cvelbar

 What are your sources of inspiration, do you get ideas from what you see around the world, and other artforms?

One of our biggest senses is visual, right? My music teacher Eric Evans taught me about the principles of the arts, showed me that the same principles govern all artforms, whether it’s music, painting, poetry. There's depth, space, color, negative and positive space. Eric taught music through the medium of visual arts, by demonstrating those principles on the visual palette and then relating it to music and sound. To me all the arts are related, they're just different modalities of the one creative expression. A lot of musicians speak about synesthesia, the ability to see the sounds as shapes and colors. William Parker speaks about that in relationship with what might relate to the four strings on the acoustic bass, for instance. Max Roach talked about that in his relationship to sound on the drums, and I’m sure a lot of musicians see and feel that way. I would assume that even people who are blind, they might experience colors with their inner vision. It's difficult for us to imagine. All the arts are reflective of each other, they all have a part of the other arts in their thing – dancers experience rhythm, sound, colors too, space division just like we have in the visual arts, music and writing. I don't think about those things consciously when I'm playing, it just comes intuitively. Thinking about them consciously would get in the way of the natural creative process. But those things are always bouncing in front of me somehow. I'm not trying to determine whether this should be here, that should be there. That goes into the thought creation part of the music, but during the actual playing those things come naturally on their own.

How about the Heart Trio [Aum Fidelity, 2024]?

William Parker introduced me to Cooper-Moore. And of course, it was Peter Brötzmann who brought William and I together. William and I knew about each other before meeting, but had never met or played together. When Peter wanted to form Die like a Dog he brought William and I together with Toshinori Kondo on trumpet. That's when my relationship with William started and it continued from there. William introduced me to a lot of the New York musicians on the particular scene that he was involved in. Cooper-Moore was one of those people. He's an incredible guy, instrument maker, piano player, historian, storyteller, the whole gamut, he's got it. We had quartets and trios together. He’s a scholar on the banjo and other folk instruments from the Southern part of the United States, which also have origins in Africa. Last quartet tour we did was William, Cooper-Moore, James Brandon Lewis and myself. Cooper-Moore and William are kind of responsible for guiding James Brandon Lewis into the music. The Heart Trio is special because we're playing all kinds of acoustic instruments. I play some drum set and frame drum. William is playing the guembri and reeds, and Cooper-Moore is playing his own self-created banjo, harp and so forth. It is different from In Order to Survive, another group the three of us play in together. In the Heart Trio Cooper-Moore is not playing any piano. Same guy, completely different music.

How did the album with Jamie Saft around the music of Thelonious Monk happen?

With bass player Brad Jones, we had played together in Jamie Saft’ New Zion Trio, and both were also part of the tribute to Alice Coltrane. I met Jamie when I was working with Bill Laswell and Jamie was working with John Zorn. Laswell and Zorn have a long relationship – they're like two opponents in a way but always come back together. I played in PainKiller with Mike Patton, Bill and Zorn for a minute. I had known Zorn for a few years before playing with him. Jamie had a very thorough relationship with Zorn. I think it's been some time since they've done something together, but they used to be like brothers from another mother, always together doing stuff. Jamie probably helped to develop Zorn's music to some extent and Zorn helped to develop Jamie's music. The Monk album was Jamie's idea. He wanted to do a tribute to Monk as a trio. And he wanted to do it without saxophone because he felt that could give it more openness and brevity. We're playing the tunes but it's Jamie's arrangement of the tunes and there's a very open dimension to how we approach the music. We went to a very good studio in Milano and the engineer really took his time the way he set up every microphone and everything. We would do several takes and listen back. He had a real precision to how he recorded it.

You swing pretty hard on it.

My foundation is in more straight-ahead music and it was later that I moved into the more free-flowing stuff. But on this recording, you don't just keep the beat, you're always pushing the music forward. A lot of the jazz drummers I admire, that's what they did too. They would keep time, of course, they believed in supporting the music but they also had the melodic approach, and the way they supported the music was by being true to themselves. They were playing in a melodic way when supporting the other musicians. Roy Haynes was great at that, Art Taylor and Max Roach as well but Max had a different approach because of his position as a leader. Elvin Jones was always doing that as well. When you listen to them, you see how perhaps they're the ones that are really in control of the music. It's like the drums are singing. You can just focus on them and listen to what they do. There are a few records with Fred Anderson that I recently re-released. One’s called “The Milwaukee Tapes”. That's a very early recording, I think the second one I did with Fred. Me and the bass player are playing pretty much straight-ahead... There's another recording with Harrison Bankhead on bass and Jim Baker, a pianist from Chicago, “Birdhouse”. We're taking Fred's tunes and playing them in a straight-ahead way, very strong swinging. But Pharoah Sanders, his music was swinging, you know. The years that I played with David Murray involved a lot of swinging and funk. Those were the things I was doing before I entered the so-called improvised music world. I say so-called because most musicians improvise in their own way. 

Moor Mother and Hamid Drake. Sons D'Hivers 2025. Photo © m.rodrigues

Do you play in a lot of contexts where the music is written?

Sure. You follow that. But people always gave me the freedom to do my own personal interpretation.

When playing, you seem to be entering a state of trance, closing your eyes and connecting to the pulse or heart of the music. Can you make that work with something that is pre-planned?

The intention is always the same, that is to try and serve the music to the best of my ability. There's not much difference whether it’s scripted or improvised. In whatever situation, you still have to be yourself. And if you're doing something that's scripted, even though you might think there's no room for you to add your own thing, you can't help but putting your spin on it, maybe only just little things here and there – always in service of the music.

Among your latest recordings we also find “Cosmic Waves” on the No Business label.

It's with Albert Beger, Ziv Taubenfeld and Shay Hazan. I’ve had an extensive relationship with Albert, met him through Assif Tsahar. The first recording I did with Albert was with William Parker. Ziv is originally from Israel but lives in Portugal. Bass player Shay was living in Amsterdam but had moved back to Israel. For a long time, Albert had wanted to bring the four of us together and do something. Albert knew that we were all going to be in Israel at that particular time so he brought us together and we did the recording, and also a concert at Assif Tsahar's venue. There should be another record coming out soon.

* at the Sons d’Hiver festival near Paris, with Moor Mother, Pasquale Mirra and Cosmic Ear.

Latest albums

• Pasquale Mirra/Hamid Drake “Lhasa” (Parco della musica, 2025)
• Jamie Saft trio “Plays Monk” (Oystertones, 2024)
• William Parker “Heart Trio” (Aum Fidelity, 2024)
• Beger/Taubenfeld/Hazan/Drake “Cosmic Waves” (No Business, 2024)
• Natural Information Society “Since Time is Gravity” (Eremite, 2024)
• Amaro Freitas “Y'Y” (Psychic Hotline, 2024)

Hamid Drake on RogueArt

https://roguart.com/artist/hamid-drake/1

Hamid Drake on Aum Fidelity

https://aumfidelity.com/collections/hamid-drake

Live

10 May
Luis Vicente & Hamid Drake
Amadora Jazz, Portugal

21 May
William Parker Circular Pyramid feat. Hamid Drake & Ava Mendoza with Celeste Dalla Porta “In the name of Rosa Parks”
Vicenza Jazz, Italy

22 May
William Parker Circular Pyramid feat. Hamid Drake & Ava Mendoza
Bologna, Italy

23 May
William Parker Circular Pyramid feat. Hamid Drake & Ava Mendoza 
Jazz Cerkno, Slovenia

4 June
Indigenous Mind (Hamid Drake, Daniel Carter, Cooper-Moore, Alfredo Colón, Melanie Dyer, William Parker)
Vision Festival, New York, USA

7 June
Healing Message from Time & Space (William Parker, Hamid Drake, Selendis, Aakash Mittal, Sula Spirit, Mixashawn, Frank London)
Vision Festival, New York, USA

13 June
Michiyo Yagi and Hamid Drake Duo with Wacław Zimpel
Jazztopad @ Lincoln Center , New York, USA

21 June
Percfestival, Laigueglia, Italy

29 June
Hamid Drake “Turiya: Honoring Alice Coltrane” with special guest James Brandon Lewis
“The night of the spiritual jazz”, Ravenna, Italy

6 July
Ava Mendoza/Brad Jones/Hamid Drake
Galeria Zé dos Bois, Lisbon, Portugal

1 August
Heart Trio
Jazz em Agosto, Lisbon, Portugal

14 August
Andreas Røysum/Joshua Abrams/Hamid Drake 
Oslo Jazz Festival, Norway

17 August
Duet with Pasquale Mirra
Musica sulle bocche, Jazz in Sardegna, Italy

3 October
Duet with Shabaka Hutchings
Riga, Latvia

1 November
With Kalle Kallima
Tampere Jazz Happening, Finland

Anouar Brahem - After the Last Sky (ECM, 2025)

By Don Phipps

There’s a foreverness in the music of Anouar Brahem’s After the Last Sky. The music covers a landscape of feelings that stretches outward over a vast desert – the undulating dunes, the wind, the dry arid heat, the romance – a beautiful and captivating work that reaches out in profound grace.

This is music to be savored, like that perfect glass of pinot noir or chianti on a warm summer evening – the moon and planets emerging from the ether. Brahem is a master of the Middle Eastern oud, an instrument that surfaced in the Middle Ages. It has a neck and a round bowl shape that adheres to the soundboard. And even though the instrument speaks to antiquity, under Brahem’s masterful technique, it becomes a jazzy bouquet of texture and sound, delicate yet pronounced.

Brahem is joined by the magnificent Dave Holland on bass, Django Bates on piano, and Anja Lechner on cello. Together they produce intimate music, just spicy enough at times to suggest sensual dances, while at other times, one can imagine windswept dunes that stretch forever outward against a blue sky, not unlike the movie opening of Anthony Minghella’s movie The English Patient or the great North African terrain described in Paul Bowles seminal novel The Sheltering Sky. Brahem also composed the numbers herein (except for “The Eternal Olive Tree, which he jointly composed with Dave Holland),

The music begs the question – what is after the last sky? We know for all living things there is a last sky. And that may speak to why the compositions possess a mysterious quality – the contemplation of what comes after. What hammers home this contemplation is the sweeping and haunting music that permeate the compositions. Of note in this regard are Lechner’s wonderful, bowed phrases. Check out her closing on “Endless Wandering” or her work on the short tone poem “Vague,” which lifts the piece into the sublime.

Holland stays mostly in the background, creating mood and atmospheres with plucks or soft, steady, and exquisite repetition (for example, his arpeggios on “The Sweet Oranges of Jaffa”). Occasionally, his lines emerge like a sailboat driven briskly by the wind – for instance, the beginning of “The Eternal Olive Tree.” And Bates creates seemingly uninterrupted poetry. On “After the Last Sky,” listen for the overtones in his unison duet with Brahem. Or his delicate interchange with Holland on “Never Forget.” Or the interlude he provides on “Edward Said’s Reverie.” Or the ballet of the fingers he brings to “Awake,” perhaps the most engaging piece on the album.

But if this effort belongs to anyone, it is most certainly Anouar Brahem. His popping and precise attacks and plucks, the breathing space he gives to his notes (his opening on “After the Last Sky), and his sweeping panoramic motifs (“Endless Wandering”) propel the music in unhurried fashion – think sea turtle swimming blithely by, surrounded by the dark blue water and beneath it, sparkling white sand.

“Sky” holds other charms – the tango-ish feel of “Dancing Under the Meteorites” or the artful dance of “The Sweet Oranges of Jaffa,” the black and white of “Remembering Hind,” or the salsa undertones in “After the Last Sky.” Brahem offers this point of view: “Today, the sonic materials that seem particularly transformable and stimulating to me are those that combine tradition and modernity…. For example, the Arabic maqams, which are at the heart of my musical identity, fascinate me with their melodic richness and their ability to integrate into contemporary musical contexts. They offer an infinite terrain for experimentation. I find it exciting to juxtapose these ancient modal structures with harmonic approaches from jazz, creating a dialogue between past and present, between cultures and styles.”

An infinite terrain…. Yes, and it all adds up to a beautiful and exotic experience – sounds and notes that take you far away to open ground, stunning vistas, and wind-swept patterns crossing a distant dune. Enjoy!

Marilyn Crispell / Thommy Andersson / Michala Østergaard-Nielsen - The Cave (ILK Music, 2025)

By Eyal Hareuveni

Danish drummer-composer Michala Østergaard-Nielsen has a new trio with legendary American pianist Marilyn Crispell and Swedish double bass player Thommy Andersson (who has played with Yusef Lateef, Paul Bley, and Kenny Werner). The trio’s debut album, The Cave, was recorded during its first Scandinavian tour in 2022. Østergaard-Nielsen has led the Scandinavian supergroup Østergaard Art Quartet with Norwegian trumpeter Per Jørgensen, Danish trumpeter Kasper Tranberg, French guitarist Marc Ducret (who was born in Denmark), but is known for the jazz meets free-pop vocal ensembles Nuaia and David’s Angels.

Østergaard-Nielsen found deep affinity with Crispell’s lyricism, which, in its turn, was deeply influenced by her work with Swedish double bass player Anders Jormin (a collaborator of Østergaard-Nielsen). Crispell described the meeting with Jormin as a “life-changing, music-changing experience” and recorded two albums with him (the trio album Spring Tour, with drummer Raymond Strid, Alice Musik Produktion, 1995, and Jormin’s In Winds, In Light (ECM, 2004). Andersson, like Jormin, has a warm, rich sound that owes much to Swedish folk music. Østergaard-Nielsen completes the trio’s sonic palette with poetic, serene percussive touches.

Østergaard-Nielsen cleverly employs the “lyrical quality” that Crispell found in her meeting with Jormin and composed a set of six melodic compositions that allow generous degrees of freedom and two free improvisations. The Cave begins with the title piece, a hymn-like piece that Østergaard-Nielsen describes as “a quiet tribute to life, peace, and the silence that surrounds us”. It captures the poetic essence of the album and suggests a delicate balance between well-crafted, contemplative, and lyrical melody and spontaneous improvisation that evokes a rich, dream-like landscape.

On the following pieces, Crispell, Andersson Østergaard-Nielsen continue to weave poetic, collective sound, open and intuitive dynamics, and silence into an organic flow, always playing with the subtle tension between structure and freedom, and allowing a space where both can enrich each other, and often expand into uncharted territories. Pieces like “My Spirit Heart”, “Into the Light”, and “A Smile of a Butterfly” testify to the profound, immersive beauty of The Cave.

Drank (Ingrid Schmoliner, Alex Kranabetter) - Breath in Definition (Trost Records, 2025)

By Martin Schray

The last words on this album are: “Can you tell me about hell?” They are spoken by Anja Plaschg, who is better known under her moniker Soap&Skin. The actress and musician can only be heard on the title track, where she speaks dark lyrics over minimal set pieces. Breath in Definition creates an apocalyptic musical landscape. At some point, the piece stops and there are 70 seconds of complete silence - before Plaschg says the above-mentioned sentence. This is disturbing, but - astonishingly - the piece is also breathtakingly beautiful. This applies not only to the piece, but to the whole album.

Ingrid Schmoliner (prepared piano) and Alexander Kranabetter (trumpet, electronics) - the duo behind Drank - are prominent sound researchers of the Austrian improv scene, their focus is on experimental music. The pieces they create combine improvised music, pop, ambient, minimal music, folklore and electronic new music and they link dark loops and drones with recurrent patterns, church bell-like, meditative sounds with fleeting melodies and bumpy beats. The textures are varied and open, and what is always interesting is what is not played.

The beauty of the duo’s music lies in the fleeting melodies, the repetitive structures and the sounds that ricochet through empty echo chambers. They outline the sound architecture and give the music the necessary stability - as in “Iridescent”, the album’s opener, which sounds like a roughened composition by Kenny Wheeler. Kranabetter’s polyphonic trumpet floats weightlessly over broad surfaces, Schmoliner keeps a very low profile. This is music that could also be released by ECM if it weren’t for the barely perceptible dissonances in the background, that push themselves more and more to the fore towards the end of the piece. However, “Iridescent” does not set the tone for the rest of the album, it’s rather a starting point. “Min” and “Gitta”, the pieces that follow, are reminiscent of minimal music, Schmoliner gets more involved in the music. She determines the basic structure, Kranabetter sets the accents, whereby the trumpet is heavily distorted. “Gitta”, featuring Lukas Koenig on marimba and effects, has something of a tricky ambient techno piece. The tectonic soundscapes move only slowly, but the music’s appeal especially lies in these repetitions and slower shifts.

The highlight of the album is the aforementioned title track, the piece that it all comes down to. It’s where gloom and beauty come together most perfectly, because on the one hand the monotony is almost unbearable, but on the other hand you don’t want the piece to end. The rhythms are restrained and stoic, Kranatbetter’s trumpet is delicate but also askew, Anja Plaschg’s lyrics are desperate and lost, then again they go straight to the heart.

For fans of 23 Skidoo, Robert Wyatt, LaMonte Young and early Jon Hassell. Very recommended!

Breath in Definition is available on vinyl, as a CD and as a download.

You can listen to the album and order it here:

FMP Today: Q&A with Markus Müller

Markus Müller. Photo by Cristina Marx/Photomusix

In 2022, Markus Müller, released a fantastic book about the history of FMP. Working closely with Jost Gebers, owner and founder of the important and influential West German record label, Müller provided a expansive and engaging history of the label in its effort to document and promote the creative music developing on the border between the former East and West Berlin. We covered the FMP: The Living Music here and interviewed Müller at the time, here. 

After Geber's passing in 2023, Mueller became the owner of FMP (which he discusses below) and has been quietly working on starting a new chapter in the label's history. Martin Schray and I pooled a set of questions for Müller, who in between trips to the US and opening the new FMP office with a series of free concerts (see below), took the time to answer. Enjoy!  -Paul Acquaro

FJB: You were recently in Chicago at the Corbett v Dempsey gallery, can you tell us about this event?

MM: It was my privilege to be invited to present my FMP book and specifically FMP’s collateral relationship to Chicago and it was an honor that Ken Vandermark introduced this presentation with an Albert Ayler composition, Love Call and joined our discussion afterwards. An extra perk was being able to see the Albert Oehlen Kim Gordon exhibition as well as the Sun Ra-Covers group show.

What is the connection between FMP and the Chicago scene?

Well, initially there was an FMP fest in Chicago in 1995. I called the relation collateral because the real relation was built on John Corbett organising the possibility of Brötzmann’s Chicago Octet/Tentett experience starting in 1997. That in itself was obviously a monumental achievement: a European starts a large-scale ensemble of international colleagues and this continues to be on the road until 2011, incredible. It eventually led to John Corbett licensing FMP recordings for Atavistic Records etc. etc. etc. I believe it is fair to say that what Ken Vandermark and others have established with Catalytic Sound and Catalytic Soundstream or what Mike Reed is establishing with the Hungry Brain and Constellation, “his” two venues in Chicago, is next generation continuation of some of FMP’s ideas. And when you think of AACM’s obvious influence on FMP, you suddenly have a full circle Chicago – FMP– Chicago roundabout. Anyway, there are a lot of people in Chicago who think that FMP is a worthwhile and interesting model. And the city has the music to back it up. I had a great time at Peter Margasak’s Frequency Festival, and I loved David Rempis and PT with Joshua Abrams and Mike Reed at the Brain. And don’t get me started about Fridays at the Green Mill (thank you, again, Ken Vandermark).

CvD reissued FMP recordings over the years on CD, is this something you will continue?

Yes, the collaborations with both CvD and Trost will continue never change a winning team.

You also work with Trost, re-releasing authentic versions of the classic recordings on LP, also can we expect to see some more of these? (I have almost all of the Trost/Cien Feugos reissues, they're a treat!)

See above…

Back to Berlin... how did the move from Jost Geber's store house in the western side of Germany back home to Berlin in the far eastern side go?

Oh, it is still going on. Technically we have offices in Borken and Berlin and I am very thankful that Anna Maria Ostendorff, Jost’s wife, is still supporting FMP. I have the good fortune of being allowed to tap into her knowledge and to move things step by step.

Do the many recordings that were stored with Jost Gebers' still have musical significance beyond a historical one?

Jost had a full studio in Borken, a fully functioning office and a full storage and he was preparing recordings to be mastered by Olaf Rupp basically non-stop until the very end. Given the interest in seminal historical recordings we see right now, let us say recordings by Milford Graves for example, I would say that yes there are still quite a few unpublished recordings that have musical significance. It is all about making things available that are here, were there, and are underrepresented by the mainstream. It was John Corbett who found the alternate take to Pakistani Pomade by the Schlippenbach Trio in Borken. Who knows what I am to find?

If so, which ones do you think are particularly exciting?

I do not want to cherry-pick. But there is something for everybody. And I will also publish new old recordings that are not in the FMP vaults. I am looking at material by the wonderful Hans Schneider for example that was brought to my attention by Stefan Keune, or King Übü Orchestrü recordings that Erhard Hirt found etc. etc. by the end of April (25/26/27), when Wolke Verlag and FMP will celebrate moving into their new offices at FMP1 (no joke), I hope to have all the details for the first releases ready, they will drop in the Fall of 2025.

Can you discuss some of the developments since the The Living Music was published and FMP moved back to Berlin? Perhaps a bit more about the new location and your connection with Wolke?

Yes indeed. The new location is the former Neues Deutschland building, which was the GDR state newspaper, now FMP1 at Franz-Mehring-Platz 1, located between Ostbahnhof and Berghain and it gives us the opportunity to have offices as well as storage as well as quite a handful of different size venues that we will be able to use for our Spring Fest. Plus, there is a paternoster and, yes, we will perform Sven Åke Johansson’s “Paternoster” twice on Saturday the 26 ^th (something for all members of the family!). Thanks to Takako Suzuki and Hannes Lingen, who have both worked on the piece before, and specially to Takako, who was able to recruit and work with the required dancers. We are honored that quite a few old and new friends will join us, just to name a few: Alexander von Schlippenbach and Aki Takase, Georg Graewe, Olaf Rupp, Michael Wertmüller, Marino Pliakas, Erhard Hirt and Stefan Keune but also Burkhard Beins and Andrea Neuman, Silke Eberhard and Harri Sjöström and many more, the program is in the works. We will soon communicate all the details so please forgive me for not mentioning all involved. It will not be a generic festival, but rather a kaleidoscope of short and beautiful interventions, musics, discussions and performances: free of charge. This is all without any funding, so let us hope that our pockets are deep enough to survive this. 

Photo by Cristina Marx / Photomusix

First and foremost: we are honored and privileged to get this extra-ordinary support from the community, we will try to pay back! Wolke and FMP I believe share a similar DNA, in both their histories and in the simple fact that Wolke published a lot of Brötzmann, and Hans Reichel, Cecil Taylor, and Sven Åke Johansson, and last but not least my book. Plus, it is a beacon of working outside the box, it is a multi-dimensional publishing house and I think it is exemplary in it’s practice. “Es wächst zusammen, was zusammen gehört”. Just joking, I think it is a very good fit and I am enthusiastic about this.

Photo by Cristina Marx / Photomusix

Does the future of FMP only include the management of historical recordings or are new releases also planned? If so, would this also happen under the FMP label or under a new name that could then be associated with FMP (such as Uhlklang)?

Yes, we will do both, we will “complete” our download-site on bandcamp and we will dig in the vaults and publish new new musics. But it will be only download and CD and as such it will continue the FMP CD catalog, meaning after FMP CD 148, STRETTO by Honsinger & Rupp, we will do FMP CD 150 in the Fall. We might continue the OWN Series as well as the FMP Special Editions and these will be very special indeed.

In an earlier interview with us, you said that everything about FMP was political and that it was very much about self-empowerment. To what extent does this also have significance for the future of improvised music?

I think there is no improvised music without self-empowerment. As far as the political is concerned I think we will have to talk about possibilities and strategies of resistance and survival, and these will become more crucial than ever.

In this context, cultural promotion is at stake, especially in view of the rise of populist and anti-democratic parties. Is the continuation of a brand that always sees itself as a left-wing label also to be understood as a sign in this context?

I think we are past these labels. I am for the empowerment of minorities and cosmopolitanism. But that is just me. And I will do project specific albeit sometimes extremely multifaceted and even contradictory potentialities based on FMP’s music legacy. I hope people will continue to be interested in hearing that in the future.

And to come back to now, what can we be expecting from FMP in the coming months?

Spring Fest on April 25/26/27 and new downloads and physical products in the Fall. 

Download Event Program

Finally, could you explain how you became the new curator of FMP? What do you think is the importance of the label to this day?

I am not the curator, I am the owner of FMP and it is quite a responsibility to carry. Jost Gebers wanted me to take on that role and Brötzmann agreed. I am standing on the shoulders of giants and time will tell if I can contribute to the legacy in any meaningful way, shape or form. It certainly is worth trying, especially in times like these.

Wendy Eisenberg, More Eaze, Emily Wittbrodt and Ryan Sawyer at JAKI, Cologne

By Matty Bannond

Something chlorine-scented is heroically battling the stench of mold at JAKI—but the club’s neatly spaced overhead tube lights have shrugged a meek surrender to shadow. Perhaps jet-black paint or glittery murals cover the walls. Maybe tooth fairies or werewolves fill the fifty seats. The naked eye gets bundled up in a pitch-dark blanket at this highly regarded, subterranean venue on April 7.

On a low stage, guitarist and vocalist Wendy Eisenberg performs alongside two collaborators all the way from the USA and one comrade based right here in Cologne, Germany. Violin and pedal steel guitar player More Eaze (Mari Rubio) and drummer Ryan Sawyer have traversed perilous landscapes and seascapes to support Set One. Cellist Emily Wittbrodt has flopped out of bed to join Set Two.

The show starts with “Lasik”, which also kicks off Eisenberg’s 2024 release Viewfinder (American Dreams Records). Like an angel’s wingtip, the guitarist’s delicate singing slices through thick clouds of sound from violin and drums. Eisenberg reaches for typically spidering melodic shapes beneath lyrics that mix the plain-speaking intimacy of a teenager’s diary with harder-won, slower-cooked insights.

More Eaze switches to pedal steel for “Another Lifetime Floats Away” and “I Don’t Miss You”. The instrument’s slippery, meowing properties make it a neat fit with Eisenberg’s vocals. Again, the lyrics tell homely stories wrapped in near-translucent layers of deeper messaging. There are elements of country music in the first of these two tunes, with echoes of Johnny Marr’s guitar in the second.

A cello and some sheet music arrive on stage after the interval. The quartet presents three Wittbrodt compositions that unfold tenderly behind her patient poetry. Next comes a More Eaze piece balanced on shifting sonic-tectonic plates. Sawyer then sings “Hate Is The New Love”, taken from The Mekons’ album OOOH (Quartersick Records, 2002). His faltering vocals bring out the mournful quality of the song text, which feels bang up-to-date despite its quarter-century vintage.

Big emotions run through the music of this small group. Wendy Eisenberg is a fancy-free artist who flirts with every style, from free jazz to folk storytelling and miles beyond, without ever settling down with one of them. Even with foul smells and disorienting gloom in JAKI’s windowless underground vault, this trio-plus-one gave its audience something fresh and bright to carry home.

2025 Big Ears Festival, Day 4: Sunday, March 30

 

By Sarah Grosser

I had been fortunate enough to use my Media wristband as the equivalent of a Premier pass, and boy does it make a difference to use the Premier queues. If you can’t quite afford the VIP lane, which is also reserved for artists, the Premier pass is worth the investment for its “second priority” lane, allowing you preference of entry over those with general admission. This allows you to find better seats or standing room first, although some smaller venues such as the Jig & Reel, there are no priority lanes due to maximum capacity being much smaller. If you line up early enough for a show you really want to see, you will get in. I did not find queueing to be an issue at all. In fact, I think this is one of the most splendidly organised aspects of the entire event. Plenty of staff are on hand to check bags and scan wristbands, so there is never too much of a stall, and most everyone working and volunteering was polite and welcoming.

Phantom Orchard (Ikue Mori & Zeena Parkins) at the Bijou Theatre

Phantom Orchard. Photo by Taryn Ferro

Avant Garde after a night of good drinking is a choice, especially for those who haven't even managed a coffee, but the prepared harp is a loveable instrument. Zeena's table is covered with electronic effects and machines. Ikue's table has her laptop and a few other gadgets. Up the back is a third table with weird objects on it and a gold statue. From the back of the balcony, it's hard to discern what it is, but it is hairy. One by one, the musicians go up to the third table and take an object and create sounds with it into a microphone, while an ambient loop plays in the background before returning to their primary instrument.

“Show me your dream.” A screen is revealed from behind the big curtains and a film starts with a bunch of weird marionettes and rainbows and strange saturated footage of dolls, disco balls, and material. The harp and electronics do complement each other. It's a strange and complicated little world these two are creating, but certainly unique.

Lonnie Holley at the Mill & Mine

Lonnie Holley. Photo by Eli Johnson

"We came here so that our ears can grow… God I love y'all, Let's geddit on!" Lonnie leads a set of improvised music and spontaneous lyrics and poetry with a huge ensemble of ten additional musicians. Is Shahzad Ismaily one of them? Of course he is!!

Lonnie is charismatic, guiding the slowly evolving jam with his deep crooning voice. It has a raspiness to it, gritty and authentic like Gil-Scott Heron. The musical accompaniment is patient and appropriate, with every musician respecting the space for the others. Nobody is too dominant and everyone gets a little space to flourish and embellish naturally. It's a great organic jam - warm, beautiful, and heartfelt. A total mood, and a perfectly curated artist for the last day of the fest.

Mary Lattimore at the Bijou Theatre

Mary Lattimore. Photo by Cora Wagoner

The Susan Alcorn Tribute was originally on my schedule, featuring Mary Halvorson among others, but in favor of brain protection and healing, I instead made the pivot to a relaxing harp. And what a fine decision that was too. Lattimore demonstrates the most exquisite use of a loop station so far, feeding her harp through it to create heavenly cycles of blissfully exquisite melodies. The harmonies of which gently fill the little theatre; it's the perfect Sunday comedown compliment. Her stage presence is so down to earth and friendly. She has a happy-go-lucky spirit and seems really happy to be here. She praises the festival "I've cried so many times [this weekend] just from the music.” And, like so many others this weekend, uses her platform to speak out against the system: “We need to take care of our most vulnerable people."

Lattimore also announced that she is so inspired to go home and write and make things. This further underlines how important it is that these festivals exist, giving so many artists the opportunity to come together to meet and positively influence each other. I can only imagine what wonderful things Lattimore might do.

The visual accompaniment of the flowers on the big screen is just the right medicine. She tells a cute, whimsical story about “waving at people on boats - it’s like, when you're on a boat and you see someone else on a boat and you just have this urge to wave at them.” Her energy is just gorgeous and so is her music. Just beautiful.

Knoxville Gospel Choir and the Dedicated Men of Zion at the Knoxville Civic Center 

 

 
Choir Soloists:

Evelyn Jack ("This Is the Day")

Hugh Dixson ("Grateful")

Keri Prigmore ("I Am God")

Michael Rodgers ("Mighty God/Outstanding")

Dedicated Men of Zion (Vocallists)
Anthony “Amp” Daniels
Antwan Daniels
Dexter Weaver
Marcus Sugg

If this jazz journalist is going to hell for missing the Susan Alcorn tribute then perhaps those sins could be atoned for by having opted for the Knoxville Gospel Choir and Dedicated Men of Zion performance. That's pronounced "Zay'N" or "ZIE-on" depending on what part of the South you are from. The Civic Center was only half full, so the sweet usher encouraged all patrons to go sit in the normally-reserved VIP area up front. "Now,” she announces happily in her adorable southern accent ”let's go to church!" The scene is set.

The Knoxville Gospel Choir led by Jeanie Turner Melton is proud to host around thirty talented singers of all different creeds and colors. The women’s diamante brooches glisten as they sway in time to the music. They wear black suits, a bold coloured top, and they all appear to be thrilled to perform. Their enthusiasm is palpable, and it's hard to resist clapping and even singing along, as some folks in the audience do. Soulful lead solos by Evelyn Jack, Hugh Dixson, and Michael Rodgers encouraged the happy vibe of joyful worship. The superstar of the night, however, was Keri Prigmore who dang near brought the house down channeling Whitney Houston for her incredible rendition of "I Am God." Why she was not headlining her own show is a mystery. Witnessing this chillingly precise and impassioned version had me wondering if perhaps I should start going to church. Granted there are few gospel choirs in southern Germany, but this chick has been truly blessed with a gift from God.

After a couple of choir-only songs the Dedicated Men of Zion come out in suits and sunglasses looking unbelievably cool. The soul in four-part harmony accompanied by their family band was totally infectious. During one magical moment, one of the singers repeatedly nailed an impossibly high falsetto note, complete with palms up to the sky and dramatic showmanship – for me, this epic display was a highlight of the entire festival.

Upon leaving the auditorium a security guard recognised me from the way in. He asked: “Hey! You feelin’ better?” Throwing my hands in the air I shouted: “I think I found Jesus!”

Far too early for me, but Big Ears also showed the Aretha Franklin film Amazing Grace, about the recording of said live album at a gospel church in Los Angeles in 1972. Friends who went to it reported it to be outstanding and claimed it would have perfectly complemented this performance.

Rufus Wainwright at the Knoxville Civic Center

 

Rufus Wainwright. Photo by Cora Wagoner

For a free-jazz website, it does feel a little odd to be reviewing a singer/songwriter, especially one who is musically uncomplicated. But from the moment I entered the Knoxville Civic Center a few minutes late through the center aise, I was greeted by the apparition of a male angel on guitar in the distance. A single beam of light, spotlighting him in an auditorium bulging with presence, and a voice that simply soared. This image will stay with me for life, as it was so unexpected and so beautiful. What followed was probably standard practice for Rufus, commanding the stage and winning over hearts with adorably flamboyant charisma and fun stage banter. For a new song, he described how his recent London stage show had tanked so badly he wrote a song about it. "Here's a song about suicide!" he jovially quipped. The dark humor was a hit and the audience laughed. Maybe it's projection, but it seemed there was hardly a dry eye in the house after the line "Can I cry myself awake yet?" Similarly, and probably even more poignantly, Rufus sang an old song of his entitled "Going to a Town," the lyrics of which, although fifteen years old by now, ring more true today than when they were penned: "I'm going to a place that has already been burned down, I'm so tired of America." Then adding the spoken adlib, "No fucking shit," which drew further laughter and cheers from the audience.

There is so much beauty in the confident simplicity and technical brilliance of Rufus's voice. Recorded versions simply do not do him justice. He must be experienced live. Highly recommended for lovers of passionate, heartfelt pop songs on guitar and piano, a la the Beatles.

Just a few days after the festival, news was released that 83 year old guitarist Michael Hurley had suddenly passed away. His performances at Big Ears would have most likely been his last. It’s becoming something of a recurring theme; that Big Ears is not only a celebration of life, but also a place where musicians and music lovers gather and pay tribute to their fallen friends. In this regard, and so many others, this is so much more than "just a festival." It’s a spiritual pilgrimage. And one that I dearly hope I will be able to make, over and over again in the years to come. 

 

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Read: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4