norma winstone

Saturday, September 23rd, 2006

Norma Winstone’s new CD with the NDR Bigband is a lesson in how to sing contemporary songs with ease, style and a depth that comes from a place that most singers reach for but never realise. Her experience and love of all good songs and songwriters shines through on this album, which includes songs by Elvis Costello, Joni Mitchell and Randy Newman. Norma’s career is well documented with musicians such as John Taylor, Ralph Towner, Michael Garrick, Kenny Wheeler, Fred Hersch and Jimmy Rowles.

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christian bök / poetry

Saturday, September 23rd, 2006

Christian Bök (born Book, 1966) is a Canadian experimental poet. He lives in Calgary.

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shoji hano

Friday, September 22nd, 2006

Photo: Peter Gannushkin / downtownmusic.net

Shoji Hano was born March 1, 1955 in Kokura, Fukuoka prefecture, Japan. His first drumming experience was at the age of four, when he played a traditional Japanese drum at the Kokura Festival. He began playing the western drum set at 15. It was around this time that he also started listening to jazz and studying the drumming of jazz masters such as Max Roach, Art Blakey and “Philly” Joe Jones.

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samm bennett

Friday, September 22nd, 2006

photo by Shuichi Chino

Samm Bennett was born in 1957 in Birmingham, Alabama.

In 1995 he moved to Tokyo. Since then he has worked with improvisers such as drummer Yasuhiro Yoshigaki, guitarist Natsuki Kido, clarinetist Wataru Ohkuma, and vocalist Koichi Makigami. He has worked with Butoh dance figure Min Tanaka, and has appeared on 2 CDs by the highly regarded Tetsuhiro Daiku, a singer of Okinawan traditional music.

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phil minton

Thursday, September 21st, 2006

The town of Torquay, in England’s Devon County, sometime around 1957. A kid a couple of years out of school and as many years into unwelcome labor at a printing plant, is introduced to the work of painter Jackson Pollock, courtesy of an art-student friend’s book of reproductions. The kid, who’s been listening to John Coltrane and wood shedding trumpet licks, searching for new modes of musical expression, drinks in the riots of colour, the explosions of nonfigurative streaks, splatters, blobs, drips, squirts, and dribbles, and decides, “That’s what music should sound like”.

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whi / phil hargreaves / uk

Wednesday, September 20th, 2006

whi music is dedicated to promoting the power and beauty of improvised and experimental music and it’s run by Phil Hargreaves, a Liverpool-based instrumentalist and composer working in the field of improvised and experimental music. whi offers already much from it’s site, including RealAudio and MP3 files and loads of info about local artists.

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john zorn

Tuesday, September 19th, 2006

Photo: Peter Gannushkin / downtownmusic.net

Filmworks XV: Protocols Of Zion - Protocoles des Sages de Sion

Working fast and loose with a small unit of close friends, Zorn has created a sensitive and intimate score for a dynamic new documentary film on a controversial subject: the rise of anti semitism after 9/11.

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joëlle léandre

Tuesday, September 19th, 2006

Photo: Peter Gannushkin / downtownmusic.net

Joëlle Léandre Discography. A complete sourcebook about the extraordinary French doublebass player and composer written by Francesco Martinelli.Pisa 2002, bandecchi & vivaldi editore, 159 pages, black and white photographs ISBN: 88-8341-015-7

Joëlle Léandre (born September 12, 1951 in Aix-en-Provence, France) is a double bassist, vocalist, and composer active in new music and free improvisation.

Francesco Martinelli has published several books about contemporary improvising musicians and is contributing regularly to avantgarde music magazines.

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