Weds, June 29: A Wild Musical Ride at the Montclair public Library

FuturePresent: Bandsc@pe

Jazz Concert and Neuroscience on the Montclair Public Library plaza

50 South Fullerton Street - Montclair, NJ 07042

Wednesday, June 29th - 7-9pm

FREE and open to the public

Seed Artists and the Adult School Department of the Montclair Public Library present an evening of adventurous jazz and a journey through the neuroscience of music. Free and open to the public, a summer’s night on the library plaza.

The trio of Pheeroan akLaff (drums), Scott Robinson (reeds, brass, woodwinds, theremin…) and Julian Thayer, Ph.D. (bass), have been pushing the boundaries of jazz for 25 years. Between them, they have recorded and performed with everyone from Ella Fitzgerald, Sting and Vernon Reid to avant-garde icons Cecil Taylor and Anthony Braxton. With the help of three very special guests—Nat Adderley Jr. (piano), Aska Kaneko (violin), Julius Tomkins (guitar)—they will take the audience on a wild musical ride that starts with jazz and ends wherever their collective creativity takes them.

Dr. Thayer, eminent cognitive scientist at Ohio State University, will intersperse the concert with an engaging discussion of the neuroscience of music and the nature of improvisation.

FuturePresent is the latest Seed Artists project to introduce audiences to boundary-pushing jazz and its vanguard musicians. Like all of Seed’s programming, this concert is intended to enrich the cultural fabric, encourage curiosity, and build community through the arts. And as always, children are welcome.

The concert is made possible in part by funds from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State, a Partner Agency of the National Endowment for the Arts, and administered by the Essex County Division of Cultural and Historic Affairs and from the Reberta C. and Louis F. Albright Foundation.

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The Musicians

Drummer, composer, educator and Montclair resident Pheeroan akLaff is one of the leading drummers in modern jazz. His recording and performance credits include a Who’s Who of contemporary innovators: Cecil Taylor, Andrew Hill, Mal Waldron, Sam Rivers, Anthony Braxton, Henry Threadgill, Wadada Leo Smith, Oliver Lake, Geri Allen and David Murray. akLaff has taught for more than 20 years at Wesleyan University and leads percussion workshops worldwide. He is Executive Director of Seed Artists.

The Wall Street Journal rightly called two-time Grammy winner Scott Robinson a “mad scientist” of jazz. The Jersey resident plays a bewildering array of instruments, from all manner of reeds and brass to oddities like theremin, slide saxophone, ophicleide, trautonium, jazzophone, and a seven-foot banjo. Across more than 200 recordings, he has worked with everyone from Lionel Hampton, Buck Clayton and Ella Fitzgerald to Sting, Elton John, and the New York City Opera. Robinson’s ScienSonic label produces decidedly avant-garde projects, including his own works inspired by Doc Savage science-fiction stories.

As a musician, double-bassist Dr. Julian Thayer’s many credits include John Hicks, Terrell Stafford, Geri Allen, Vernon Reid, Charlie Mariano, Cyro Baptiste, and Buck Hill. He is Ohio Eminent Scholar Professor in Health Psychology at Ohio State University, where his research interests include the neuroscience of music. Thayer has published nearly 200 papers and book chapters on wide-ranging subjects and is recipient of numerous academic awards, including a Fulbright Fellowship and the Alexander von Humboldt Research Award. Thayer previously served as Chief of the Emotions and Quantitative Psychophysiology Section in the Laboratory of Personality and Cognition at the National Institute on Aging.

Jersey resident Nat Adderley Jr. is probably best known for more than two decades as musical director, arranger and pianist for his former high-school classmate Luther Vandross. Adderley’s voluminous credits range from Aretha Franklin, Cissy Houston, Mavis Staples and Beyonce to Herbie Mann and Cannonball Adderley, his uncle. Adderley is a graduate of Yale University.

Aska Kaneko is a virtuoso violinist, a composer, vocalist, musical director and theater producer. Her many projects include the London-based group Mekong Zoo; Aska Strings, involving more than 30 musicians; the electric-ambient group Yula; the Asian Fantasy Orchestra and Asian Bow String Orchestra, which explore musical traditions of India, China, Mongolia, Uzbekistan and beyond; and the Japanese-Argentinian combo Gaia Cuatro. Kaneko’s collaborators include Zakir Hussain, Bill Laswell, Butch Morris and Jane Birkin.

Detroit-based electric guitarist Julius Tomkins is making waves. You’ll hear why.

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ABOUT SEED ARTISTS

Seed Artists is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization headquartered in Montclair, New Jersey. Its mission: Great Art for Good Works. Seed produces jazz, creative-music and arts programming designed to enrich the cultural fabric, build community and inspire the next generation.

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