Black Girls Rock: Monae Davis, Philly girl in the boys little league world series
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Sen. Ran Paul on Ferguson and American Racism, esp. the high black incarceration rate
SALAMA, Guatemala — Just before departing for the rural town here where he performed charity eye surgeries over several days, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) caused a stir with an op-ed in Time about the violence in Ferguson, Missouri, calling for the police to be “demilitarized” and saying race skews the application of criminal justice in the U.S.
In an interview, he elaborated on his article and responded to critics on the right whom he said had misconstrued what he wrote.
“If you look at crime statistics, many people look at the crime statistics and say that blacks and Hispanics are disproportionately incarcerated with regard to what percentage of time they’re in for,” Paul said. “With drug statistics, they say blacks and whites use drugs at about the same rate, but the prisons are three out of four people are black or brown. So it’s not on purpose. It’s not a purposeful racism. It’s an inadvertent racial sort of outcome is what it is.”
In the op-ed, Paul wrote that “Given the racial disparities in our criminal justice system, it is impossible for African-Americans not to feel like their government is particularly targeting them.” Another sentence said, “Anyone who thinks that race does not still, even if inadvertently, skew the application of criminal justice in this country is just not paying close enough attention.”
The remarks prompted a pushback from critics who said Paul had attributed racial motives to the police officer who shot unarmed 18-year-old Michael Brown after a confrontation about which details remain murky, even after nearly two weeks of national debate on the incident.
For example, the Missouri GOP’s executive director said Paul’s comments were “unhelpful,” and black conservative radio figure Larry Elder said that Paul’s op-ed “lend[s] fuel to this notion that 'cops are out to get us,’” something Elder argued on Laura Ingraham’s radio show hurts GOP efforts to reach potential black voters.
Paul said he wasn't accusing the Ferguson police of racism:
No, the point I’m making is that, let’s say you’re African American and you live in our country and see the statistics and see three out of four people in prison are black or brown, and you see whites are using drugs at the same rate, you’d say: ‘Gosh it seems unfair.’ Your perception would be that ‘I’m unfairly being targeted’ when in reality maybe it’s poverty, maybe it’s the police tend to patrol more in one area than another. What I was saying is that it’s impossible for them not to feel [that way], and I think we put the word ‘feel’ for them to feel like they’re not being targeted. But I wasn’t saying that about this particular instance—I have no idea about the specifics of this. But you see how if a black community has a lot of their community in jail for drugs or whatever, that when a young black man is shot while unarmed, you could see how this is something that is just a big example of what is going on.
Regardless of the facts of the case, Paul says, “that’s the perception.”
“I think what we said in the op-ed is that it’s impossible for them not to feel like they’re being targeted,” Paul added, emphasizing the word “feel.”
Paul noted that, while President Obama “has recently started commuting some sentences of people in jail for crack cocaine,” several people “who have 15 and 20-year sentences for crack cocaine are still in jail from even before we” changed the system to lessen the disparities between crack and powder cocaine sentencing.
“The disparity used to be 100:1 crack to powder, and five to 10 years ago we changed it to 18:1—they didn’t grandfather in the people from before we changed it,” Paul said. “There are many instances where a white kid goes to jail using powder cocaine and getting out in six months with a good attorney or never going to jail, and then someone with a similar weight of crack cocaine going to jail for 15 years.”
Paul said that when young people go away for such long sentences for nonviolent crimes, they get sucked into the criminal justice system, something that’s nearly impossible to break free from. “How do you get a job when you get out? It’s almost impossible to get a job,” he said. “It all adds together. There are statistics that back up that the criminal justice system and the war on drugs has disproportionately incarcerated Hispanics and African Americans, and that if you are an African American, and you see something happen, you think it’s just one more thing piling on top.”
“I have no idea about the intent about any of the people involved in this, and that ought to be judged by the people,” Paul added. “But I can see why people would be unhappy.”
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Book Review: Ralph Nadar's Unstoppable
Timothy Noah is the author of “The Great Divergence: America’s Growing Inequality Crisis and What We Can Do About It.” He writes twice weekly for MSNBC.com.
Ralph Nader wants liberals and conservatives to work together. In his new book, “Unstoppable,” he cites many instances in which such cooperation ought to be possible, at least theoretically. But the book’s greater value may lie in the opportunity to contemplate, almost half a century after he first stepped onto the national stage, where Nader himself fits on the ideological spectrum.
Any discussion of Nader must begin with the acknowledgment that he is a great man. He created modern consumer advocacy when he published“Unsafe at Any Speed,” his 1965 book about auto safety, and he founded a network of nonprofits dedicated to muckraking and lobbying in the public interest, challenging the government on a host of regulatory issues that previously received scant attention. It’s a backhanded compliment to Nader that the stampede of corporate lobbyists into Washington starting in the 1970s began as an effort to counter him (before it acquired a fevered momentum of its own).
Most people would situate Nader on the left. That’s a reasonable judgment but also a simplistic one, because in many ways he is fairly conservative — conservative enough to harvest favorable book-jacket blurbs for “Unstoppable” from the likes of anti-tax activist Grover Norquist and anti-immigration activist Ron Unz. No doubt part of Nader’s appeal to such folks is their sheer gratitude that he helped keep Al Gore out of the White House (though with a margin as thin as the one in Florida’s vote count, you could blame Gore’s 2000 defeat — or, if you prefer, thwarted victory — on just about anything). But the right’s affinity for Nader is not based solely on partisan interest. He holds more beliefs in common with conservatives than is generally recognized.
Income distribution, a long-standing concern for the left, has seldom interested Nader, except insofar as government can be stopped from redistributing upward. He favors much stronger government regulation of corporations, but his argument is that corporations would otherwise avoid the sort of accountability that any well-functioning market demands. If a pro-regulatory, highly litigious libertarian can be imagined, that’s what Nader is.
An entire chapter of “Unstoppable” celebrates the Southern Agrarians, a reactionary populist movement of the 1930s that cast “a baleful eye on both Wall Street and Washington, D.C.” Nader admires the Southern Agrarians not for their racial attitudes (most of them were notably racist and anti-Semitic) but because they believed fiercely in maintaining small-scale rural economies in which both ownership and control stayed local, often in the form of a co-op. Squint a little, and the Southern Agrarians may start to resemble today’s left-wing microbrewers and locavores.“Any government intrusion into the economy,” he wrote in 1962, “deters the alleged beneficiaries from voicing their views or participating in civic life.” He probably wouldn’t put it so tea-party-ishly today. But he remains much less enamored than most liberals of representative government as a solution to life’s problems. Nader’s allegiance is not to politicians and bureaucrats, whom he routinely excoriates, but to the citizens who petition them, sue them and vote for or against them. His ideal is a small community (like Winsted, Conn., where he grew up) that unites to force corporations and unresponsive government to act in the public interest. Think of every Frank Capra movie you ever saw. People often assume that Capra was a New Deal Democrat, but in fact he was a lifelong Republican.
Much of the left’s agenda, “Unstoppable” argues, can be justified by citing revered conservative authors. Adam Smith described the invisible hand but also the “bad effects of high profits.” Friedrich Hayek condemned certain cartels and monopolies. Russell Kirk, who feared untrammeled government and capitalism, wrote that John D. Rockefeller and Karl Marx“were merely two agents of the same social force — an appetite cruelly inimical to human individuation.”
Nader cites these and other examples to argue that left and right should band together against the common enemy of “corporatism.” It’s really more the Naderite left he’s talking about, and an ever-shrinking pool of principled conservatives. But let’s hear him out. The issues he has in mind for a left-right alliance break down into three categories.
Category One is the Centrist Agenda. This consists of ideas that are uncontroversial but difficult to achieve in practice. They include promoting more efficiency in government contracting and spending, requiring an annual audit of the Pentagon budget, reviving civic education in schools, and preventing private exploitation of “the commons,” i.e., anything that’s owned by everybody — public lands, public airwaves, the Internet, etc. (One of two people to whom Nader dedicates “Unstoppable” is my late friend Jonathan Rowe, a journalist whose 2013 book, “Our Common Wealth,” argues for better stewardship of the commons. Like Nader, Rowe makes the case that there are good conservative reasons to do this.)
Category Two is what I’d call the Right On Agenda. It consists of ideas that are controversial to some degree but (to my mind, at least) extremely worthwhile. These include adjusting the minimum wage automatically to inflation, as proposed by the Obama administration — and supported by Mitt Romney before he ran for president. One argument Nader could make here, but doesn’t, is that such automatic adjustments would deprive Democrats of a political stick with which they’ve lately been beating Republicans who don’t want to raise the minimum wage.
Another controversial but worthwhile idea is to break up the “too big to fail” banks. Several prominent conservatives already support such a move, including Washington Post columnist George Will; Richard Fisher, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas; and Sen.David Vitter (R-La.). Limiting the size of banks appeals to both left and right because it would eliminate any need to bail them out in the future. Now proponents just have to win over centrists such as former treasury secretary Tim Geithner, who has pronounced any effort to end “too big to fail” “quixotic” and “misguided.”
A third controversial but valuable idea suggested by Nader is to rein in commercial marketing to children, especially through TV. This is exploitation, plain and simple. Trying to stop it has been the life’s work of Peggy Charren, founder of the now-defunct liberal group Action for Children’s Television. Nader notes that the evangelical right is also troubled by the way toy companies and fast-food restaurants are permitted to hawk often-questionable products to kids.
Category Three is what I’d call the Nutty Agenda, a rubric that should be self-explanatory. Nader favors further direct democracy through initiative, referendum and recall, but the results from these have seldom been encouraging. California’s Proposition 13, for instance, launched a nationwide revolt against property taxes — Thomas Piketty’s worst nightmare — and hobbled California’s state budget for a generation. Nader’s advocacy in this instance reflects his too-severe impatience with representative democracy. It’s probably not too much of an exaggeration to say that his ideal republic would conduct government business almost entirely by plebiscite, with the rest settled in the courts.
Nader would also like to end fast-track trade agreements, a goal more in tune with the left (and less so, I think, with the right). But although I’m sympathetic to many of his pro-labor and environmental arguments, the damage done by fast-track trade deals would not, I believe, exceed the likely damage that protectionist Senate amendments would do to slower-track agreements.
“End unconstitutional wars,” another overlap on Nader’s left-right Venn diagram, sounds reasonable enough — Nader is correct that a strict reading of the Constitution assigns exclusive warmaking authority to Congress. But Congress has demonstrated in a thousand ways since 1941 that it doesn’t want to assume much responsibility, pro or con, for foreign interventions. How does one force it to? Nader is pretty vague about that in “Unstoppable,” but elsewhere he’s said he’d like to impeach President Obama for “war crimes.” He similarly wanted to impeach George W. Bush for waging war “based on false pretenses.” This seems indiscriminate, to say the least, and another sign that Nader deems representative government highly disposable.
Of course someone has to pay for all this politicking. One of the zanier directions Nader’s thinking has taken in recent years is the belief that public-interest-minded rich people can be relied on to restore political power to ordinary citizens. This is the theme of his 2009 novel, “Only the Super-Rich Can Save Us.” In the book, rich self-described “Meliorists” enact single-payer health insurance, elect Warren Beatty governor of California and persuade Wal-Mart to unionize.
Back here in the real world, though, the main way rich people have lately exerted significant power over the political process has been through conservative super PACs. During the 2012 Republican primaries, pashas such as Sheldon Adelson, Harold Simmons and Foster Friess were calling the shots as never before. One especially touching belief of Nader’s, expressed in a chapter of “Unstoppable” titled “Dear Billionaire,” is thatrich patrons can be persuaded to cede control over how their money is spent in pursuit of the common weal.
Cooperation ought to be possible, even in this age of political bad faith, between left and right. That Nader is pursuing it so vigorously in the current hyper-partisan environment is yet another reason to admire the man. But at least to some extent, when Nader thinks he’s talking to conservatives, he’s actually talking to the quirky conservative within himself.
Timothy Noah is the author of “The Great Divergence: America’s Growing Inequality Crisis and What We Can Do About It.” He writes twice weekly for MSNBC.com.
UNSTOPPABLE
The Emerging Left-Right Alliance
to Dismantle the Corporate State
to Dismantle the Corporate State
By Ralph Nader
Nation Books. 224 pp. $25.99
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Brazil: Black Woman President: Marina Silva?
Tragedy puts Marina Silva at heart of Brazil campaign
Environmental activist Marina Silva has unexpectedly found herself centre stage in Brazil's presidential election campaign, following the death in a plane crash of Eduardo Campos, the candidate for the Brazilian Socialist Party (PSB).
But Ms Silva is an experienced politician with an impressive record.
A former environment minister during the government of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva she is seen as having the national and international profile to replace Mr Campos.
In 2010, she ran for president for the tiny Green Party and secured 19 million votes, forcing the race into a second round.
At the time, she said she wanted to be "the first black woman of poor origins" to reach the presidency.
Difficult alliancesMost people expected her to try again in 2014.
But after her newly created party, the Sustainability Network, failed to achieve the 500,000 signatures needed to be officially recognised, she joined Mr Campos as his vice-presidential running mate.
Now she will face the challenge of remaining faithful to his legacy - which PSB officials are determined to hold her to - while staying true to her own ideals.
Ms Silva opposed some of Mr Campos's alliances with regional candidates - especially when they were members of the country's powerful agribusiness lobby, which accounts for over one fifth of Brazil's GDP.
Having locked horns with the sector during her time as environment minister, she may now have to reach a compromise with its backers.
Humble beginningsMs Silva was born into a family of 11 children in the northern state of Acre, in the heart of the Amazon.
As a child she would walk several miles in the forest with her father and siblings every day to collect rubber from trees.
She campaigned alongside the rubber tapper and trade union leader Chico Mendes, who was killed in 1988 for his activism.
Throughout her childhood years, she was seriously ill a number of times - suffering from hepatitis, malaria and contamination by heavy metals.
As a result she suffers from frail health and has an intolerance to a long list of things - such as cosmetics, perfume, alcoholic beverages and red meat.
This and her devout evangelism have marked her style. She uses no make-up and prefers simple and sober clothing, mainly long dresses.
She often wears her hair in a tight bun tied by a thin braid.
It is a stern image, but according to political scientist Ricardo Ismael she also conveys personal warmth.
"She inspires confidence in ordinary voters - that she is accessible," explains Mr Ismael, who is a professor at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio.
"Wherever she goes, she approaches people and allows herself to be approached. She seems frail but conveys remarkable strength.
"She knows Brazil. She knows the problems from seeing them on the streets, or living them," he adds.
Educational successAged 16, Ms Silva left her community of rubber workers in Bagaco and moved to Rio Branco, the capital of Acre, to study and get treatment for hepatitis.
She was taken in by nuns in a convent and became the first person in her family to learn how to read and write.
"When I saw my name on the list of people that had passed the course, I knelt down and gave thanks to God. That list saying I was literate opened doors for me," she said in an interview with BBC Brasil years later.
After she left the convent, she went to work as a domestic maid in exchange for lodging.
Ms Silva was widely praised on an international level for her work as environment minister under President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
During those five years, hundreds were arrested for crimes against the environment, a record area of territory was set aside as indigenous reserves and there was a significant slowdown in rainforest deforestation rates.
But she also faced defeats such as the approval of the first genetically modified soybean crops, which she had opposed.
Fearing her agenda was losing ground, she resigned in 2008 and a year later left the governing Workers' Party.
Agenda of changeOpinion polls conducted following last year's wave of protests against World Cup spending, corruption and poor public services suggested Ms Silva was the only politician whose image had benefitted from the unrest.
Political scientist David Fleischer of the University of Brasilia says she appeals to the younger generation and those who want change.
"Those who took to the streets saying they didn't feel represented by Brazil's political system were still undecided, and now many will choose to vote for her", he says.
However, some of those critical of the bigger establishment parties are also uneasy about Ms Silva's devout religious views, fearing she is too conservative on social issues such as gay marriage and abortion.
Even though the protests have diminished, her supporters believe there is still a yearning for change.
They hope that the desire for change along with the emotional circumstances of her selection will result in a powerful boost to her campaign just weeks ahead of the election.
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Black Bird Press News & Review: Race in America: The Grand Denial
Black Bird Press News & Review: Race in America: The Grand Denial
Denial is quite simply the evasion of reality. Denial can be personal or communal, for sometimes an entire nation can be in denial about its abominations, for they are too painful to make adjustments in the collective psyche and the personal reality, for to do so would incriminate the mythology and ritual of said society, and thus the normal daily round would be disrupted and dysfunctional, for painful adjustments would be in order, and as long as we can avoid the painful the better, after all, the status quo can be maintained.
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The Mythic Afro Horn of Francisco Mora Catlett
art by David Mora Catlett
Note: Marvin X performed with Afro Horn at the memorial for Elizabeth Catlett Mora, Schomburg library in Harlem. He reunited with her sons, Francisco and David, after thirty years during his Mexico City exile after refusing to serve in Vietnam for American imperialism. It is his desire to connect his Black Arts Movement Poets Choir and Arkestra with Afro Horn, especially when he arrive on the east coast. Francisco and Marvin X both worked with Sun Ra's Arkestra.
--Black Bird Press News & Review
Track Listing: CD1: Egun Moyuba; Saints at Congo Square; Barasuayo; Quinto Regimento; Hush Rush; 125th & Lenox. CD2: 125th & Lenox; Los Consejos Del Olumo; Wemilere; Afro Horn MX; Cultural Warrior.
Note: Marvin X performed with Afro Horn at the memorial for Elizabeth Catlett Mora, Schomburg library in Harlem. He reunited with her sons, Francisco and David, after thirty years during his Mexico City exile after refusing to serve in Vietnam for American imperialism. It is his desire to connect his Black Arts Movement Poets Choir and Arkestra with Afro Horn, especially when he arrive on the east coast. Francisco and Marvin X both worked with Sun Ra's Arkestra.
--Black Bird Press News & Review
Francisco Mora-Catlett and Afro Horn
Zinc Bar
Greenwich Village, NY
January 8, 2014
There was a moment during Afro-Horn's performance at the Zinc Bar where the lines between reality and fiction became a blur. It occurred when Sam Newsome, an imposing figure of a man and a consummate reed player, appeared to be possessed by the spirit of Probe, the protagonist and wielder of the Afro Horn, a rare object of power in Henry Dumas's short-story, "Will the Circle Be Unbroken." In the midst of an intense and passionate solo, Newsome's ..." lips swelled over the reed and each note fell into the circle like an acrobat on a tight rope stretched radially across the center of the universe."
For the uninitiated, Afro Horn is a multicultural, multigenerational ensemble created by the Mexican-American drummer, composer and visionary Francisco Mora-Catlett, who was introduced to the writings of Henry Dumas and the legend of the Afro Horn during his tenure with Sun Ra. Mora-Catlett was so moved with Dumas's message and the concept of an instrument with the power to unite people and "clear out" unfounded notions and misconceptions, that he formed an ensemble around the idea.
The ensemble opened with an invocation praising the ancestors, then wasted no time in plunging into a wildly progressive interpretation of the gospel hymn, "When the Saints Go Marching In," followed by "Afra Jum," a play on the words, "Afro Jam," an open invitation for everyone to participate in the festivities. "Barasuayo Mamakeña" is a praise song dedicated to the West African deity, Elegua. The set concluded with "5XMax," a tribute to the legendary drummer, Max Roach. The music was in the moment, fluid and true to its intrinsic nature, free.
As the evening came to a close there was an eerie silence, a collective feeling of, "What just happened?" and smiles all around. Afro Horn is: Rashaan Carter, bass; Aruan Ortiz, piano; Sam Newsome, reeds; Roman Diaz, percussion/vocals; and Francisco Mora-Catlett, drums, leader. Absent was saxophonist Alex Harding.
Zinc Bar
Greenwich Village, NY
January 8, 2014
There was a moment during Afro-Horn's performance at the Zinc Bar where the lines between reality and fiction became a blur. It occurred when Sam Newsome, an imposing figure of a man and a consummate reed player, appeared to be possessed by the spirit of Probe, the protagonist and wielder of the Afro Horn, a rare object of power in Henry Dumas's short-story, "Will the Circle Be Unbroken." In the midst of an intense and passionate solo, Newsome's ..." lips swelled over the reed and each note fell into the circle like an acrobat on a tight rope stretched radially across the center of the universe."
For the uninitiated, Afro Horn is a multicultural, multigenerational ensemble created by the Mexican-American drummer, composer and visionary Francisco Mora-Catlett, who was introduced to the writings of Henry Dumas and the legend of the Afro Horn during his tenure with Sun Ra. Mora-Catlett was so moved with Dumas's message and the concept of an instrument with the power to unite people and "clear out" unfounded notions and misconceptions, that he formed an ensemble around the idea.
The ensemble opened with an invocation praising the ancestors, then wasted no time in plunging into a wildly progressive interpretation of the gospel hymn, "When the Saints Go Marching In," followed by "Afra Jum," a play on the words, "Afro Jam," an open invitation for everyone to participate in the festivities. "Barasuayo Mamakeña" is a praise song dedicated to the West African deity, Elegua. The set concluded with "5XMax," a tribute to the legendary drummer, Max Roach. The music was in the moment, fluid and true to its intrinsic nature, free.
As the evening came to a close there was an eerie silence, a collective feeling of, "What just happened?" and smiles all around. Afro Horn is: Rashaan Carter, bass; Aruan Ortiz, piano; Sam Newsome, reeds; Roman Diaz, percussion/vocals; and Francisco Mora-Catlett, drums, leader. Absent was saxophonist Alex Harding.
Francisco Mora Catlett: Afro Horn MX
Francisco Mora Catlett
Afro Horn MX
AACE Records
2012
When Afro-Mexican Drummer Francisco Mora Catlett first came to this country in the1970s, he dreamed of playing drums for the Sun Ra Arkestra. Not only did Mora achieve his dream, he also forged a lifelong relationship with drum legend Max Roach, which resulted in his performing in Roach's seminal drum ensemble, M'Boom. As a composer and bandleader in Detroit, Mora focused on creating Music of "The Afro-Americas," a vision which encompassed fusing the music of Cuba, Brazil with American modern jazz.
For the highly-anticipated double-disc Afro Horn MX, Mora draws inspiration from the legend of the Afro Horns, with Henry Dumas (1934-1968) writing, in his short story "Will The Circle Be Unbroken?," that there are only known to be three actual "Afro Horns" on the planet. The horns are forged in a rare metal only found in Africa and South America. No one knows who forged the horns, but some think that it was the Egyptians. There is one in a heavily-guarded European museum and another on the west coast of Mexico, amongst a tribe of Indians. MX also stands for Malcolm X and Mexico.
To advance his vision, Mora put together a crack team of players which includes three of the baddest reedmen to come out of Detroit—JD Allen and Vincent Bowens on tenors, andAlex Harding on baritone. The rhythm section is superb, too, including master Afro-Cuban drummer Roman Diaz , who performed with the legendary group Yoruba and Puntilla Rios, and here handles congas and bata.
The music seems to revolve around a central theme: the journey of the Africans to what is now the Americas and the diverse musics they created. The set begins with an invocation to the Yoruba orishas with Mora and Diaz playing bata drums. "Saints at Congo Square" follows, commemorating the first City of Afro-American culture, New Orleans, and is also an homage to Mora's mother, renowned sculptor Elizabeth Catlett, who created the statue ofLouis Armstrong in Congo Square. The music uses "When The Saints Go Marching In" as a recurring theme while the horns create a swirling ethereal mist of sound.
"Barasuayo" features all three horns playing a mournful melody over a base of ritual bata drums, segueing into "Quinto Regimiento," which starts off with Mora evoking Roach, as Allen and Bowens engage in some sax talk that brings to mind John Coltrane,Pharoah Sanders, and Archie Shepp. Bowens, who possesses that rougher Detroit edge, comes out with guns blazing. Pianist Aruan Ortiz (someone to watch for) has a thundering attack, whose use of arpeggios brings to mind Don Pullen in his younger days.
The highlight of the set is "Los Consejos Del Olumo," a mashup of Yoruba ritual and coffeehouse slam, with Roman Diaz reading the poem on which the song is based, and a turn by Allen. The date ends with "Cultural Warrior," a dedication to the late Detroit pianistKenny Cox (of Contemporary Jazz Quintet fame), and immediately brings to mind 'Trane and his 1960s quartet.
Even though this is an extended outing, there isn't a boring moment on Afro Horn MX. Mora is one of the most versatile percussionists in jazz and Afro-Latin music, as well as an original composer. Allen and Bowens stack up against any tenor man in jazz (including the 2012 Downbeat Rising Tenor Star, Anat Cohen), while Harding is a blaster who displays complete mastery of his instrument. Here's hoping that word of this dynamic ensemble gets out beyond the island (Mahattan) and reaches the hinterlands.
Tracks: CD1: Egun Moyuba; Saints at Congo Square; Barasuayo; Quinto Regimento; Hush Rush; 125th & Lenox. CD2: 125th & Lenox; Los Consejos Del Olumo; Wemilere; Afro Horn MX; Cultural Warrior.
Personnel: JD Allen: tenor sax; Vincent Bowens: tenor sax; Alex Harding: britone sax; Aruan Ortiz: piano; Francisco Mora Catlett: drums, bata; Roman Diaz: congas, bata, voice.
Afro Horn MX
AACE Records
2012
When Afro-Mexican Drummer Francisco Mora Catlett first came to this country in the1970s, he dreamed of playing drums for the Sun Ra Arkestra. Not only did Mora achieve his dream, he also forged a lifelong relationship with drum legend Max Roach, which resulted in his performing in Roach's seminal drum ensemble, M'Boom. As a composer and bandleader in Detroit, Mora focused on creating Music of "The Afro-Americas," a vision which encompassed fusing the music of Cuba, Brazil with American modern jazz.
For the highly-anticipated double-disc Afro Horn MX, Mora draws inspiration from the legend of the Afro Horns, with Henry Dumas (1934-1968) writing, in his short story "Will The Circle Be Unbroken?," that there are only known to be three actual "Afro Horns" on the planet. The horns are forged in a rare metal only found in Africa and South America. No one knows who forged the horns, but some think that it was the Egyptians. There is one in a heavily-guarded European museum and another on the west coast of Mexico, amongst a tribe of Indians. MX also stands for Malcolm X and Mexico.
To advance his vision, Mora put together a crack team of players which includes three of the baddest reedmen to come out of Detroit—JD Allen and Vincent Bowens on tenors, andAlex Harding on baritone. The rhythm section is superb, too, including master Afro-Cuban drummer Roman Diaz , who performed with the legendary group Yoruba and Puntilla Rios, and here handles congas and bata.
The music seems to revolve around a central theme: the journey of the Africans to what is now the Americas and the diverse musics they created. The set begins with an invocation to the Yoruba orishas with Mora and Diaz playing bata drums. "Saints at Congo Square" follows, commemorating the first City of Afro-American culture, New Orleans, and is also an homage to Mora's mother, renowned sculptor Elizabeth Catlett, who created the statue ofLouis Armstrong in Congo Square. The music uses "When The Saints Go Marching In" as a recurring theme while the horns create a swirling ethereal mist of sound.
"Barasuayo" features all three horns playing a mournful melody over a base of ritual bata drums, segueing into "Quinto Regimiento," which starts off with Mora evoking Roach, as Allen and Bowens engage in some sax talk that brings to mind John Coltrane,Pharoah Sanders, and Archie Shepp. Bowens, who possesses that rougher Detroit edge, comes out with guns blazing. Pianist Aruan Ortiz (someone to watch for) has a thundering attack, whose use of arpeggios brings to mind Don Pullen in his younger days.
The highlight of the set is "Los Consejos Del Olumo," a mashup of Yoruba ritual and coffeehouse slam, with Roman Diaz reading the poem on which the song is based, and a turn by Allen. The date ends with "Cultural Warrior," a dedication to the late Detroit pianistKenny Cox (of Contemporary Jazz Quintet fame), and immediately brings to mind 'Trane and his 1960s quartet.
Even though this is an extended outing, there isn't a boring moment on Afro Horn MX. Mora is one of the most versatile percussionists in jazz and Afro-Latin music, as well as an original composer. Allen and Bowens stack up against any tenor man in jazz (including the 2012 Downbeat Rising Tenor Star, Anat Cohen), while Harding is a blaster who displays complete mastery of his instrument. Here's hoping that word of this dynamic ensemble gets out beyond the island (Mahattan) and reaches the hinterlands.
Tracks: CD1: Egun Moyuba; Saints at Congo Square; Barasuayo; Quinto Regimento; Hush Rush; 125th & Lenox. CD2: 125th & Lenox; Los Consejos Del Olumo; Wemilere; Afro Horn MX; Cultural Warrior.
Personnel: JD Allen: tenor sax; Vincent Bowens: tenor sax; Alex Harding: britone sax; Aruan Ortiz: piano; Francisco Mora Catlett: drums, bata; Roman Diaz: congas, bata, voice.
Track Listing: CD1: Egun Moyuba; Saints at Congo Square; Barasuayo; Quinto Regimento; Hush Rush; 125th & Lenox. CD2: 125th & Lenox; Los Consejos Del Olumo; Wemilere; Afro Horn MX; Cultural Warrior.
Personnel: JD Allen: tenor sax; Vincent Bowens: tenor sax; Alex Harding: britone sax; Aruan Ortiz: piano; Francisco Mora Catlett: drums, bata; Roman Diaz: congas, bata, voice.
Record Label: AACE Records
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Dr. Tony Montiero and Temple U's din of iniquity directed by the Afrocentric Nigguh, now Afrocologist
August 24, 2014
To Donors and Signers of the Call for Monteiro:
You are receiving this because you are a signer or a donor to the struggle for Dr. Anthony Monteiro. We send out a hearty thank you to all, especially to those of you who have contributed financially. All of you played a crucial role in Dr. Monteiro’s struggle and the contributions you made are still having impact.
We have two purposes in writing you now: first, to announce a change in the Monteiro coalition’s way of deploying the funds raised on his behalf through the Indiegogo campaign, in the amount of $1045 (far short of our needed $17,000 for a summer time ad in the Chronicle of Higher Education), and second, to provide you important information on the current state of the struggle for Dr. Monteiro.
This has always been about more than Dr. Monteiro; it is about the health of a vigorous and needed and historic African American Studies program at Temple, and about university relations to gentrifying dynamics in urban communities. Consequently, Dr. Monteiro, student activists, community leaders, and politicians at the highest levels of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania politics are still in vigorous struggle to pressure TU to reinstate Dr. Monteiro. This struggle is far from over, and because of Dr. Monteiro’s organic connection to his community and to Pennsylvania politics, this is a long-term political effort. It will take time to play out. It will certainly continue into the next academic year.
Dr. Monteiro’s contract has now expired, but even as he looks for alternative employment, he and his supporters in Philadelphia have been planning both summer and Fall activities on his behalf.
On Redeploying the Funds
It is clear now that the fundamental need for funding is at the local Philadelphia and Pennsylvania levels. The Chronicle ad would have been nice, but a summer ad does not have the greatest impact. Moreover, we feel that national and world scholars have already weighed in with significant influence with the “Call for Monteiro.” The primary need now is to deploy funds in an aggressive local and state effort on behalf of Dr. Monteiro and the issues of scholarship and social justice he represents.
The bulk of the Indiegogo funds will be re-deployed locally for hiring artists to work up a logo for the Coalition to Reinstate Dr. Monteiro. The company, Reclaim, will also be paid for producing T-shirts for the movement which, again, will highlight Dr. Monteiro’s struggle for reinstatement at Temple but as related to the broad campaign in Philadelphia and the Pennsylvania legislature for community justice against gentrification and amid Temple University’s often blatant disregard for Black Philadelphians and their community needs. As a sign of how vibrant the local campaign is, a Philadelphia jazz event sponsored by the Coalition brought in additional funds that community members will use to augment the Indiegogo funds. So know that our funds are being put to first-rate use, as community social movements continue to put legs on the national campaign that we have built for Dr. Monteiro.
The Monteiro Struggle Today
at Temple, and in Philadelphia & Pennsylvania
Perhaps the dramatic nature and complexity of the struggle for Dr. Monteiro is best exemplified by remarks offered on the floor of the Pennsylvania legislature by State Representative W. Curtis Thomas. Rep. Thomas is the Pennsylvania legislator for the Philadelphia District in which lies the majority of the campus of Temple University and for communities strongly affected by Temple University policies. The remarks by Rep. Thomas suggested putting a hold on some funds for Temple University (TU), which the University normally receives, if TU administrators do not respond positively to the following four conditions:
(1) Reinstate Dr. Anthony Monteiro to his post in TU’s African American Studies Department, not only because of his excellence as teacher and scholar, but also as a voucher of good faith commitment to high quality relationships between the North Philadelphia black community and the University.
(2) Reinforce Temple’s commitment to educational opportunities afforded North Philadelphia. These were significantly undermined when Temple seemed to proceed with an illegal purchase of William Penn High School, in order to build at its location its own university stadium and athletic facilities for TU students. (Under pressure from Rep. Curtis and the Monteiro movement, TU has now announced that it will work with the community to establish an educational center for the neighborhood at the former high school site, complete with a new Career Educational Technical Center.)
(3) Redress the increasing problem of a severe “lack of diversity” at Temple University, both in the ranks of its faculty and also in the upper level of its administrators.
(4) Reverse TU’s ongoing neglect of the basic needs of North Philadelphia communities that border the University. Showing good faith, here, would mean admitting more of the graduating honors students from neighboring black Philadelphia high schools and redressing students' needs in those neighborhoods.
At present, Rep. Thomas and others are working every possible political and community angle on behalf of Dr. Monteiro, together with these broader issues. The funding from the Pennsylvania legislature to TU is not automatic, and Rep. Thomas seems to have support from both Republicans and Democrats to hold up the dispersal of these funds.
Indeed, the power of the purse-strings has been evident, as Rep. Curtis has had personal meetings with the President of Temple University, Neil Theobald, on all these matters, and especially on the firing of Dr. Monteiro.
We are upbeat, and so is Dr. Monteiro. He has reports that TU administrators have had up to 3-hour meetings on his case, and that TU knows that its reputation on these matters is not strong, in the media or in the local urban community. Dr. Monteiro’s case is at the heart of the deep concerns over urban gentrification in the TU area, and has stimulated renewed organizing around whether black folk will be allowed to live in North Philly near to Temple University.
Moreover, since Dr. Molefi Kete Asante’s independently initiated role in the firing of Dr. Monteiro (and we now know that this is the case from the highest level of Temple administrators), the African American Studies Department remains in a state of seeming chaos. Dr. Asante is trying to have it renamed Department of “Africology,”organizing it around his own version of Afrocentrism. Significantly, though, one promising young scholar in the Department just submitted last week – unannounced and just weeks before start-up of classes – her resignation from the Department. Dr. Monteiro’s stabilizing influence is still needed in the Department – now more than ever – as is his commitment to principles of community justice that he combined with rigorous scholarship in the Black radical tradition of W. E. B. Du Bois and Angela Y. Davis.
It is for the purpose of supporting these powerful local and state efforts that we now are suggesting that the funds raised for the Chronicle ad, be released to activist in the Philadelphia and Pennsylvania organizing work.
Thank you everyone for your support. We will continue to keep you updated.
Sincerely,
Mark Lewis Taylor, Professor, Religion and Society, Princeton Theological Seminary
Johanna Fernandez , Professor, Dept. of History and Black and Latino/a Studies
Jamila K Wilson, Campaign to Bring Mumia Home
Patrice K. Armstead, Coalition for the Reinstatement of Dr. Anthony Monteiro/Philadelphia
↧
Ishmael Reed on the Black Arts Movement: the Good, the Bad, the Ugly
Bay Area black artists, left to right: painters Dewey Crumpler, Arthur Monroe; poets Ishmael Reed, Conyus, Marvin X and Al Young
photo Tennessee Reed
If not for the Black Arts Movement, Black culture would be extinct.--Ishmael Reed
We appreciate Ishmael Reed for his belated blackness. He was a keynote speaker, along with myself, at the Black Arts Movement Conference, University of California, Merced earlier this year, and he has been a supporter of my work for many years. He described me as "Plato teaching on the streets of Oakland."--Marvin X
Yes, there was also a nutty side to The Black Arts movement in New York. You had some of the smartest of black intellectuals subscribing to the notion that white people were an evil race that was created by a black scientist. They got that from Elijah Muhammad, who apparently didn’t believe it because he had some of these evil beasts at his dinner table.He said that he was referring to white men who lived in the south. When found partying with some English girls, and asked why by Jim Brown, Muhammad Ali said that Elijah Muhammad had made an exception for the English.But the Black Arts in New York wouldn’t be the first movement in the arts to have a whack job side.Moreover, instead of engaging in physical combat with these beasts, some of whom gave money to the Black Arts movement,they assaulted each other. Indeed, the Black Arts Repertory theater became a black on black crime scene. Not only did they commit or threaten each other with violence but those whose lifestyles they didn’t approve of. They didn't approve of my lifestyle, but in this regard they were hypocrites.
Amiri Baraka wrote articles in The New York Times that were meant to intimidate black theater people who were involved in interracial relationships. Of course some of the key personnel at the Times date out and marry out ,but their behavior hasn’t been treated with this kind of ridicule. Nor has any other ethnic group had women writers as a class pitted against male writers as class as Henry Louis Gates,Jr. on the orders of Rebecca Penny Sinkler, the kind of feminist critic who uses black men as a substitute for whatever abuses men of her ethnic background commit against women; community mores require that such abuses be kept a secret. She’s not the only one. Irish American feminist Catlin Flannagan writes about how cruel black men are toward black women. Maybe Irish American men ought to write guidelines for the fellas to follow. Maybe members of The Westies gang can do an anthology.Ms. Sinkler got into trouble when she tried a feminist experiment on Norman Mailer, who, for The New York Intelligentsia, was more important than all of the black male writers combined, of course they’ve only read a few. ( Former go-between, Irving Howe believed that the black tradition began with Richard Wright.)
Gates was forced to throw the brothers overboard because he was under pressure from feminists like Michele Wallace,who, writing in the black male hating Village Voice, recently in trouble for running prostitution soliciting ads on its “back page,” said that he was hogging all of the black women studies loot.Yes, Gates has made a career of pointing out the flaws in the Black Arts movement, but is his judgement to be trusted after the African American Studies Dept. endorsed the Neo Nazi series,”The Wire,” or his own backing of Tarantino’s wretched “ Django Unchained” on NPR,without informing NPR that the post-racial zine that he fronts for The Washington Post, called TheRoot, received ad revenue from the producers of “Django Unchained?”It remains to see whether Gates will give the Black Arts movement the same kind of consideration that he gives to “Django Unchained,” a project that accepts the discredited “Sambo Thesis” of black history ,or that his department accords “The Wire.” He has an opportunty to revise his notion that Black Arts was “short-lived” and that Baraka, Bullins, Sanchez , and Marvin X have done some of their best work post sixties.We’ll see whether he changes his mind in the
forthcoming Norton Anthology of African American Literature 3.
Black Arts did more to reach black audiences than any of its critics, sheltered academics who know very little about the day to day lives of black citizens.
The good black arts brought Jazz, literature to the masses of people. Ed Bullins, Aishah Rahman and Amiri Baraka introduced theater to people who had never seen a play.
Though the Black Arts Repertory theater received government funds, its existence made
the New York cultural establishment , an establishment that had been directing trends
in African American culture at least since the 1920s, when writers fought each other over uptown patronage; for once, an independent movement had arisen.
Though i’ve been associated with the Black Arts, with the exception of two fund raising events, I didn’t participate. I was living in Chelsea at the time at work on my first novel, “The Free Lance Pallbearers.” I’d also shared an apartment with three of the Black Arts founders before they moved up town. My associating me with Black Arts, they are giving me credit with work I had no part in creating.
Moreover,how they treated each other or outsiders didn’t matter to those “entrenched interests” as Irving Howe put it, one of those explainers-of-blacks to mainstream readers.( He was put out of business by black critics like Larry Neal.) Amiri has a record of being harder on black writers than his beat friends. Because Steve Cannon and I suggested that there might be a more critical examination of Malcolm X,’s legacy than laying prostrate hero worship, he suggested that Steve and I could be "iced," causing us to be targets of all of the loose nuts associated with black nationalism.The editor of this black magazine, The African American Review, which received more grants than any black magazine in history didn't know what "iced "meant.In that essay, a number of gifted black writers were condemned for their lack of revolutionary fervor.
He doesn’t understand that the current crop could not advance to mainstream acceptance without disassociating themselves from Black Arts,which was despised by those who set trends in black literature New York,where trends in black culture are managed by over fifty year old white men and women. Plus the Black Arts professed alliance with Malcolm X, who was tainted with the reputation of anti Semitism by the media of the time; this didn’t make them any friends downtown,except for those on the bohemian fringes..One remembers the gnashing at the teeth,viscous hair- tearing- out Times editorial on the occasion Malcolm’s death.
For the American media, black men don’t even have a first act and so his evolution wasn’t noticed by The New York media which celebrated his murder.
The trend setters of black literature, theater and the other arts are usually outsiders. Bell hooks says that white feminists told her that in order to get over she had to write for them, which explains the flurry of what... calls “black boogeyman”products,books film and theater that have made some white men rich and puts the issue of racism in the background.
Gates,who even used an essay about Philiss Wheatley to condemn the black arts is inconsistent in another way. He says that a discovery of a novel by Claude McKay extends the Harlem Rennassiance into the 1930s; why doesn’t the fact that some of those who have been associated with Black Arts continue writing well and publishing extend Black Arts into the present?, By 1975, with the Black Arts Movement dead, His Norton Anthology asserted that Black Arts was “short lived,” which set the pattern followed by Charles Rowell that in order to get a Norton anthology a black anthology one has to denounce black nationalism ,a standard that doesn’t apply to white editors. Most norton anthologies are Eurocentric, or white nationalist anthologies with minorities arbitrarily sprinkled here and there,which explains why white editors don’t have to denounce white nationalism.White supremacy is a given.This is nothing new. Even Amiri’s hero, Langston Hughes ,had to renounce his earlier radical poetry when the House Un American Activities Committee was breathing down his neck.Ellison’s anti Communist testimony came in the form of his novel,” Invisible Man,” which became mainstream as a result of his cutting out a radical character. He had to stab Richard Wright, his mentor, in the back, and even cut some of his “Literary Sons,” in order to maintain his status as The Only One. Baraka has witnessed enough cultural wars over the years to understand why some of those whom he criticizes in his review of Rowell’s anthology, for the sake of career moves, had to renounce the Black Arts in order to receive academic and publishing acceptance.
But he’s a little harsh in his assessment of their poetry. These are excellent writers.He should give them that. The difference between him and they is that he is an original. Baraka is also in
the tradition of Richard Wright and Langston Hughes and his contemporaries, Quincy Troupe and Eugene Redmond. That of encouraging new talent. Wright aided an ungrateful Baldwin and Hughes helped Ellison who eventually betrayed his mentor. Baraka identifies new talent in the course of his review. In the old days writers would not only discover new talent but had enough patronage to get them money so that they could take time off from crummy jobs in order to write. That role has been transferred to a black literary Czar. He has a foundation that’s suppose to support writers. So far the grants have gone to his friends.He decides who gets Fletcher awards and directs patronage to writers from a foundation based in Cleveland.
Maybe as a result of Barka’s review, originally published in Poetry magazine, The Norton company will end its feud with the Black Arts Movement.
Finally, how long can Amiri behave as an outsider raging against the Establishment as though it was 1965 outside. He is a member of the most select establishment club in the United States .The 250 member American Academy of Arts and letters. You can’t get anymore Establishment than that. Can’t he understand that members of the younger generation want their shot? I know what this curmudgeon is going to do. I’m going to help them get through.
I mentioned that publishers are insisting upon “Black Boogeyman” and “Gangsta Books.” They even gave $100,00 advance to a white girl for a gang memoir. ” Turns out, she made it up. They said that they were going withdraw the book. It’s still on sale.What happens when you don’t give cross over mall audiences the side of the black experience for which they will put out hard cold cash? Mr. or the child molester in “Precious” or Leroy in” The Help.Why was Alice Walker’s remarkable book, “ The Temple of my Familiar” hated by the same critics who praised “The Color Purple.” So what happens to a black woman who dares tackle male members of the ruling class and its subsidiaries. The kind of men who publish,stage and film "black boogeymen" products. Who are mentors for playwrights who stage a theater that show Martin Luther King,Jr. as a hapless, lecherous buffoon.Who dole out hundreds of thousands dollar to a "poet" who help to fuel the hysteria that got the Central Park Five committed to prison on the testimony of lying detectives and, innocent boys who were railroaded by a feminist district attorney and prosecutor.
Jamaica Kincaid has risked her career by taking on the men who are part of the ruling class’s subsidiary:members of the patriarchal cultural elite of New York.One of their friends, a powerful critic, said that the book should have remained unpublished. Fortunately the book was published. It is a remarkable book. It is a book that will be regarded as a classic when all of the fuss dies down....
↧
Dr. Anthony Montiero teaching Liberation and Ownership Course
Date: Mon, Aug 25, 2014 at 4:10 PM
Subject: Fwd: LIBERATION & OWNERSHIP course with Dr. Anthony Montiero
To: mstanfrd@temple.edu
-----Original Message-----
From: Aissia Richardson <aissia.richardson@gmail.com>
To: barbaracoxeasley <barbaracoxeasley@aol.com>; Black Love
<prodeternal@hotmail.com>; Linda Richardson
<lrichardson.uptown@gmail.com>; Andrea Brown <suni44andi@yahoo.com>;
Yumy Odom <yumyodom@thefratorheruinstitute.org>
Sent: Sat, Aug 23, 2014 3:37 pm
Subject: LIBERATION & OWNERSHIP course with Dr. Anthony Montiero
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Andrew Lamas <atlamas@sas.upenn.edu>
Date: Sat, Aug 23, 2014 at 2:21 PM
Subject: Re: Andy Lamas -- important
To: "lamarphil4@aol.com"<lamarphil4@aol.com>, Gregory Johns-Miller
<g.johns21@yahoo.com>, Seongho An <anseong@sp2.upenn.edu>, Rapheal
Randall <raphealrandall1@gmail.com>, Penny Jennewein
<pennycjennewein@gmail.com>, Sara Schwartz <schwartz.sl@gmail.com>,
Sara Blazevic <sara.blazevic@gmail.com>, Brendan Sculley
<sculleyb@gmail.com>, ANNAMARIE MARQUET <marqueta@sas.upenn.edu>,
Wanda Bailey <wandabailey28@gmail.com>, Madeleine Wattenbarger
<madeleine.wattenbarger@gmail.com>, JULIA GRABER
<becamebird@gmail.com>, Daniel Cooper <dcooper2408@gmail.com>, JAVIER
GARCIA HERNANDEZ <javg@sas.upenn.edu>, Kate Aronoff
<karonoff18@gmail.com>, Sachie Hopkins Hayakawa <sachiehh@gmail.com>,
Will Lawrence <lawrence.will@gmail.com>, Chloe Wayne
<chloewayne@gmail.com>, Mahfuz Sultan <mahfuz.sultan@gmail.com>,
Caroline Cohn <caroline.p.cohn@gmail.com>, "Athanasia (Nantina)
Vgontzas"<nvgontzas@gmail.com>, Meghna Chandra
<chandra.meg@gmail.com>, Nicole Griffin Ward
<nicogriffinward@gmail.com>, Luna Nguyen <lunanguyen3@gmail.com>,
Fabricio Rodriguez <frodriguez@powerphiladelphia.org>, John Gilmore
<johngilmore@dswellness.com>, Eliana Machefsky <emachefsky@gmail.com>,
Katera Moore <katera.moore@gmail.com>, Yuyuan Liu
<liuyuyuan1988@gmail.com>, Aissia Richardson
<aissia.richardson@gmail.com>, "양준호 Dr. Jun-Ho Yang"
<junho@incheo>
FYI:
We will make the focus of the course issues at the intersection of
race and class in the context of capitalism. We will study Hegel,
Marx, Du Bois, Marcuse, Angela Davis, Critical Theory, Critical Race
Theory and other significant theoretical positions (including feminist
theory, queer theory, subaltern studies) ... along with specific
anticapitalist material.
The course will be lively, nonconformist, counter-conventional,
critical, and deeply intellectual in both pedagogy and content. It
will be grounded in the realities and struggles of our time. A
Syllabus will be sent out before the course begins (but the Syllabus
will be modified as we proceed through the course ... based on the
needs and interests of the those assembled in the class).
Warmly,
Andy
___________________________
On Sat, Aug 23, 2014 at 2:05 PM, Andrew Lamas <atlamas@sas.upenn.edu> wrote:
>
> Hey, folks.
>
> Dr. Anthony Monteiro, one of the most important scholar-activists on the Black Left and one of the world's leading scholars on W.E.B. Du Bois, was recently fired -- for political reasons -- from Temple University. He has accepted my invitation to co-teach with me this Fall Term in the Monday evening LIBERATION & OWNERSHIP course (5-8pm / McNeil Building, Room 167-68) beginning September 8th and ending December 8th). Because of Dr. Monteiro's presence (and that of a number of his friends, colleagues, and comrades who will be sitting in on the class), this is going to be an incredibly exciting course.
>
> I want to invite each of you to join the class as well and to share your own important insights, analysis, and contributions. As always, I am very open to arranging classes around your own presentations and interventions; so, if you have ideas please let me know. In the hopes that you will be attending, I will be sending you an initial set of emails later today ... in case you decide you would like to begin preparing for our course.
>
> Please seriously consider attending. You will be warmly welcomed. Nothing would make me happier than to see you again ... and to continue to learn with you! It is through these extended interactions and dialogues that our intellectual community is made wiser, more loving, more powerful (and more dangerous).
>
> Warmly,
> Andy
>
--
Prof. Andrew T. Lamas
Faculty / Urban Studies Program
University of Pennsylvania
3718 Locust Walk / McNeil Building 130
Philadelphia, PA 19104
cell-tel: 215-565-5850 / h-tel: 215-242-0523
email: atlamas@sas.upenn.edu
Penn Faculty Bio
Academia.edu Postings
Wordpress: Refusals Critiques Alternatives
Tumblr: Critical Refusals, Creative Praxis, Cooperative Alternatives
--
Aissia Richardson
2227 N. Broad Street
Philadelphia, PA 19132-4502
215-236-1878
215-454-2583
SUMMER Hours: Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM.
Upcoming Events:
Fri., Sept 12-Sun., Sept. 14 - Philadelphia HomeGrown Music Festival,
various Phila. locations
http://philadelphiahomegrownmusicfestival.com/
Fri., NOV. 7, Uptown Youth Got Talent Show. Call 215-236-1878 for
audition schedule.
Subject: Fwd: LIBERATION & OWNERSHIP course with Dr. Anthony Montiero
To: mstanfrd@temple.edu
-----Original Message-----
From: Aissia Richardson <aissia.richardson@gmail.com>
To: barbaracoxeasley <barbaracoxeasley@aol.com>; Black Love
<prodeternal@hotmail.com>; Linda Richardson
<lrichardson.uptown@gmail.com>; Andrea Brown <suni44andi@yahoo.com>;
Yumy Odom <yumyodom@thefratorheruinstitute.org>
Sent: Sat, Aug 23, 2014 3:37 pm
Subject: LIBERATION & OWNERSHIP course with Dr. Anthony Montiero
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Andrew Lamas <atlamas@sas.upenn.edu>
Date: Sat, Aug 23, 2014 at 2:21 PM
Subject: Re: Andy Lamas -- important
To: "lamarphil4@aol.com"<lamarphil4@aol.com>, Gregory Johns-Miller
<g.johns21@yahoo.com>, Seongho An <anseong@sp2.upenn.edu>, Rapheal
Randall <raphealrandall1@gmail.com>, Penny Jennewein
<pennycjennewein@gmail.com>, Sara Schwartz <schwartz.sl@gmail.com>,
Sara Blazevic <sara.blazevic@gmail.com>, Brendan Sculley
<sculleyb@gmail.com>, ANNAMARIE MARQUET <marqueta@sas.upenn.edu>,
Wanda Bailey <wandabailey28@gmail.com>, Madeleine Wattenbarger
<madeleine.wattenbarger@gmail.com>, JULIA GRABER
<becamebird@gmail.com>, Daniel Cooper <dcooper2408@gmail.com>, JAVIER
GARCIA HERNANDEZ <javg@sas.upenn.edu>, Kate Aronoff
<karonoff18@gmail.com>, Sachie Hopkins Hayakawa <sachiehh@gmail.com>,
Will Lawrence <lawrence.will@gmail.com>, Chloe Wayne
<chloewayne@gmail.com>, Mahfuz Sultan <mahfuz.sultan@gmail.com>,
Caroline Cohn <caroline.p.cohn@gmail.com>, "Athanasia (Nantina)
Vgontzas"<nvgontzas@gmail.com>, Meghna Chandra
<chandra.meg@gmail.com>, Nicole Griffin Ward
<nicogriffinward@gmail.com>, Luna Nguyen <lunanguyen3@gmail.com>,
Fabricio Rodriguez <frodriguez@powerphiladelphia.org>, John Gilmore
<johngilmore@dswellness.com>, Eliana Machefsky <emachefsky@gmail.com>,
Katera Moore <katera.moore@gmail.com>, Yuyuan Liu
<liuyuyuan1988@gmail.com>, Aissia Richardson
<aissia.richardson@gmail.com>, "양준호 Dr. Jun-Ho Yang"
<junho@incheo>
FYI:
We will make the focus of the course issues at the intersection of
race and class in the context of capitalism. We will study Hegel,
Marx, Du Bois, Marcuse, Angela Davis, Critical Theory, Critical Race
Theory and other significant theoretical positions (including feminist
theory, queer theory, subaltern studies) ... along with specific
anticapitalist material.
The course will be lively, nonconformist, counter-conventional,
critical, and deeply intellectual in both pedagogy and content. It
will be grounded in the realities and struggles of our time. A
Syllabus will be sent out before the course begins (but the Syllabus
will be modified as we proceed through the course ... based on the
needs and interests of the those assembled in the class).
Warmly,
Andy
___________________________
On Sat, Aug 23, 2014 at 2:05 PM, Andrew Lamas <atlamas@sas.upenn.edu> wrote:
>
> Hey, folks.
>
> Dr. Anthony Monteiro, one of the most important scholar-activists on the Black Left and one of the world's leading scholars on W.E.B. Du Bois, was recently fired -- for political reasons -- from Temple University. He has accepted my invitation to co-teach with me this Fall Term in the Monday evening LIBERATION & OWNERSHIP course (5-8pm / McNeil Building, Room 167-68) beginning September 8th and ending December 8th). Because of Dr. Monteiro's presence (and that of a number of his friends, colleagues, and comrades who will be sitting in on the class), this is going to be an incredibly exciting course.
>
> I want to invite each of you to join the class as well and to share your own important insights, analysis, and contributions. As always, I am very open to arranging classes around your own presentations and interventions; so, if you have ideas please let me know. In the hopes that you will be attending, I will be sending you an initial set of emails later today ... in case you decide you would like to begin preparing for our course.
>
> Please seriously consider attending. You will be warmly welcomed. Nothing would make me happier than to see you again ... and to continue to learn with you! It is through these extended interactions and dialogues that our intellectual community is made wiser, more loving, more powerful (and more dangerous).
>
> Warmly,
> Andy
>
--
Prof. Andrew T. Lamas
Faculty / Urban Studies Program
University of Pennsylvania
3718 Locust Walk / McNeil Building 130
Philadelphia, PA 19104
cell-tel: 215-565-5850 / h-tel: 215-242-0523
email: atlamas@sas.upenn.edu
Penn Faculty Bio
Academia.edu Postings
Wordpress: Refusals Critiques Alternatives
Tumblr: Critical Refusals, Creative Praxis, Cooperative Alternatives
--
Aissia Richardson
2227 N. Broad Street
Philadelphia, PA 19132-4502
215-236-1878
215-454-2583
SUMMER Hours: Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM.
Upcoming Events:
Fri., Sept 12-Sun., Sept. 14 - Philadelphia HomeGrown Music Festival,
various Phila. locations
http://philadelphiahomegrownmusicfestival.com/
Fri., NOV. 7, Uptown Youth Got Talent Show. Call 215-236-1878 for
audition schedule.
↧
↧
Article 0
Mark your calendars, friends! (See the attached flyer )
The long-awaited Fred Ho West Coast Tribute Memorial is only two weeks away!
Struggle for a New World: Fred Ho Memorial Tribute
Sunday, Sept. 7, 2014, 2:00-4:30 p.m.
Oakland Asian Cultural Center, Oakland, CA. 2 p.m.
This remarkable landmark gathering of Fred Ho's artistic collaborators, ranging from composers, musicians, poets, singers, storytellers and activists, have come together to pay homage to this great baritone saxophone-composer, cultural activist, teacher, author, pioneer and legend.
The event is open and free to the public with a suggested donation of $10 or more to help defray the cost of the event.
Hope to see many of you there!
Genny
↧
Marvin X poem: Apology to my Higher Self and Miles Davis - Time After Time (Live 1985)
Apology to My Higher Self
Oh, Higher Self
I apologize to you
Greater Self
Holy Self
Righteous Self
I seek to harm no one
but to glorify You always and forever
Have mercy on me
have mercy on myself
Oh, Higher Self
pleae forgive me for allowing my lower self to rule
Please have mercy on me Higher Self, Divine Self
If I will only flow in the flow of You
pick me up Higher Self
when my lower self comes to call
the whispering devil whispers into the hearts of men
and women and children
to take us all down under
to the thrashing floor
the road where wise men fear to tread
down in the dungeon
rat hole
I become the rat
associating with the rats
dwelling in the dungeon
of my mind
Lift me up Highter Power
let me dwell with You forever
in the Upper Room
surely I know truth from lies
surely I know fire from water
yet I walk into the fire
I am burned again again again
easy to lead in the wrong direction
hard to lead in the right direction,
the Elijah lesson teach us
And why do we love the devil
because he gives us nothing!
Take me Higher Power
into your loving hands
save me from the fire
whose fuel is men and stones,
Qur'an.
let not the weakness of my lower self
ontrol me
let me cast away illusions
a donkey is not a stalion
Oh Higher Power
catch me if I fall
take me forward faster
time after time
time after time.
--Marvin X
9/28/14
Bob Holman says Marvin X is the USA's Rumi. The humor of Pietri, politics of Baraka, the wisdom of Saadi, the ecstasy of Hafiz.....
Ishmael Reed says Marvin X is Plato teaching on the streets of Oakland. His play One Day in the Life is the most powerful drama I've seen.
Ishmael Reed says Marvin X is Plato teaching on the streets of Oakland. His play One Day in the Life is the most powerful drama I've seen.
Dr. Nathan Hare says Marvin X is still the undisputed champion of Black Consciousness.
On Monday, September 1, Marvin X will receive the Elders Award from the Pan African festival, at Oakland's Mosswood Park.
On Septemer 13, he will receive the Humanitarian of the Year Award from the Los Angeles Black Books Expo.
Earlier this year, Feb/March, 2014, Marvin X (with Kim McMillan) produced a conference on the Black Arts Movement at the University of California, Merced. He is now planning a Bay Area Celebration of the Black Arts Movement, tentatively for February 2015. Paul Cobb, Publisher of the Post Newspaper Group is a co-planner, along with Eastside Arts and the City of Oakland. Stanford University African American Studies and Laney College want to be sponsors also. We have the support of Dr. Ayodele Nizinga's Lower Bottom Players, Geoffery Grier's San Francisco Recovery Theatre. If you or your organization would like to participate on any level, especially as possible funders, sponsors, participants. Contact Marvin X: 510-2004154
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Black Bird Press News & Review: Video: Marvin X and the BAM Poets Choir & Arkestra: The Black Arts Movement Celebrating Amiri Baraka
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Miles Davis - Sketches of Spain (Original Full Album)
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The Gullah Sentinel Newspaper
Dear valued client,
Our telephone contact numbers have recently changed. We expect the most professional business phone service that is currently available from the major carriers. To reflect this expectation, we have changed carriers and upgraded our services in order to meet our technological goals.
We ask that you update your records with the following ‘phone numbers’ (Included are full mailing address details, which will remain the same).
We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience that this may cause.
(1) The Gullah Sentinel Newspaper
909 Bladen Street
Beaufort, SC 29902
Phone: (843) 379-0004
Phone: (843) 379-0004
Email: gullah@thegullahnews.net
(2) “ Gullah Peoples Radio “
WKWQ 100.7 FM Radio
69 Robert Smalls Parkway, #2-T
Beaufort, SC 29902
Phone: (843) 379-1010
Email: WKWQ@gullahradio.net
Web: www.gullahradio.net
Benita
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Douglas McCain, Black American Jihadist killed in Syria
News / Middle East
Details Emerge About Douglas McCain, American Jihadist Killed in Syria
Douglas McAuthur McCain appears in a 2008 photo provided by the Hennepin County, Minn., Sheriff's Office.
Last updated on: August 27, 2014 11:18 AM
WASHINGTON—
Douglas McAuthur McCain, the first known American to be killed while fighting alongside Islamic militants in Syria, was an undistinguished 33-year-old raised in Minnesota who most recently worked as a caregiver in California.
So what compelled him to leave for the Middle East this spring and to take up arms on behalf of religious extremists?
The U.S. National Security Council confirmed McCain's death on Tuesday. The State Department said U.S. officials had been in contact with McCain's family.
The issue of Americans joining radical forces in places like Syria, getting training and even indoctrination in terrorist ideology, has pushed to the forefront concern among U.S. officials, who fear one or more might try to return and commit terrorist acts on American soil.
McCain had reportedly made his way from the United States to Turkey, and then into territory controlled by the Islamic State, the radical organization that has swept through northern Iraq terrorizing many with its brutal version of Islamic law. Over the weekend, McCain took part in an attack on a Syrian opposition checkpoint near Aleppo, according to NBC News, which first reported the story.
Rebels in the Free Syrian Army, one of groups fighting the regime of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, retaliated, killing McCain. They beheaded six other Islamic State fighters, but not McCain, and posted photos on Facebook, NBC reported, attributing the information to the rebel army. The rebels reportedly found McCain with his U.S. passport and $800 in his pocket.
The FBI also is investigating. The bureau's field office in Minneapolis for almost a decade has looked into the cases of several young Somali-Americans joining the terrorist group al-Shabab in Somalia.
E.K. Wilson, spokesman for the field office, told The Associated Press: "We have done extensive outreach recently, as we have the last seven years, but we've had a concerted effort ... over the last few months" involving travel to Syria.
On a watch list
U.S. officials said McCain's posts to Facebook, Twitter and other social media had put him on a watch list for international flights.
"We continue to use every tool we possess to disrupt and dissuade individuals from traveling abroad for violent jihad and to track and engage those who return," said Caitlin Hayden, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council.
Thousands of foreign fighters have flooded into Syria in recent years, joining rebel groups, of which many are far more radical than the Free Syria Army. Most of the fighters are Europeans. The FBI and other U.S. officials estimate anywhere from several dozen to more than 100 Americans have gone to fight in Syria.
Australian intelligence chief David Irvine said Wednesday that 15 Australians are believed to have died fighting in Syria and Iraq, and that about 60 Australians are fighting with jihadist groups such as IS.
The U.S. government's "largest concern is the regional and even global aspirations" of the Islamic State," said Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. John Kirby.
"Obviously, we’re concerned about Americans that become attracted," Kirby said. If they join forces with a terrorist group, they become enemies of the state, he said: "They take on those actions at their own peril."
Lost identity
McCain was born in Illinois and raised in the Minneapolis suburb of New Hope, where he attended Robbinsdale Cooper High School. He ran into some trouble with the law, with convictions for theft, drug possession, disorderly conduct and driving after his license had been revoked, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported.
Later, he moved to San Diego, California, as did his mother and a sister. McCain worked for a Somali-operated African Spice market, now closed, and attended a local community college. He also had a daughter, almost 1 year old, family members told the Star Tribune.
According to McCain's social media accounts, which were taken down Tuesday, he converted from Christianity to Islam in 2004.
"I will never look back the best thing that ever happened to me," he tweeted in May. He identified himself on Facebook as "Duale ThaslaveofAllah" and on Twitter as Duale Khalid, "iamthetooth."
A selection of Twitter posts, reported by the San Diego Union-Tribune, reflect McCain's changing attitudes and circumstances.
In December 2012, he tweeted that the film "The Help"– about black maids working for white families in Mississippi in the 1960s – was "starting to make me hate white people."
Along with racist and sexist views, the posts show McCain's enthusiasm for basketball, rap music and, especially, his faith.
"To all my Muslim out there stand strong we will soon be 1... In sha Allah," he tweeted in May.
McCain’s cousin, Kenyata McCain, described him as a "humble, caring man" who "lost his identity" after becoming involved with Somali Muslims in the Minneapolis area. Minnesota has the country's largest community of Somalis, with an estimated 32,000 people of that ancestry.
Ya Allah when it's my time to go have mercy on my soul have mercy on my bros— Duale Khalid (@iamthetooth) May 15, 2014
"I know that he had strong Muslim beliefs," the cousin told the Star Tribune, "but I didn't know that he was in support of ISIS [an earlier acronym for the Islamic State]. I didn't think he would be."
Minnesota Public Radio also reported that, from McCain's Facebook page, it appears he knew Abdirahman Muhumed, "a Minneapolis man who went to Syria and joined the Islamic State."
Muhumed had posted a photo of himself holding a rifle and a Qur'an, eliciting negative responses from Facebook "friends," MPR said. But McCain, in a Feb. 19 post, encouraged Muhumed to "continue protecting our brothers and sisters."
Kenyata McCain said she was in regular contact with her cousin and exchanged messages with him as recently as last Friday. "He was telling all of us he was in Turkey," she told the Star Tribune.
Government Responses
State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said the threat of terrorism by people training with religious extremists is a priority for policymakers in the U.S. and other Western nations.
"The issue of foreign fighters and the concern of individuals with Western passports or passports that would enable them to travel into countries where they can do harm is certainly at the top of our agenda and the top of the agenda of many countries," she said at a briefing Tuesday.
Last month, Attorney General Eric Holder said he was concerned fighters from Europe and the United States were supporting violent insurgents in Syria and joining forces with Yemeni bomb makers.
In July, FBI Director James B. Comey addressed an international law enforcement conference in Miami, saying he was "especially concerned about Syria."
"Syria serves as a breeding ground, a training ground, and a networking ground for thousands of jihadis all over the world," he said. "They have gone there in huge numbers to join the fight with groups like al Nusra or ISIL. The going is very worrisome. It is the coming out that worries me even more.
"We’re trying to build effective relationships with the private sector and our government partners," Comey said. "We are trying to train so we learn to play well. We are engaged in simulations that as best we can are intended to duplicate what we face in real life."
Serious threat
Jonathan Adelman, associate professor at the University of Denver’s Korbel School of International Relations, said foreign fighters pose a serious threat to Western nations, including the United States.
He estimated roughly 100 Americans, between 400 to 500 British citizens and several hundred French are among the 2,000 Westerners fighting on behalf of the Islamic State.
"I think this is something that really we have to take very seriously," Adelman said. The threat "isn’t as remote as we thought it was after Osama bin Laden was killed."
Many of these foreign fighters are being recruited through social media, he said.
"I think for a lot of these kids ... there's a level of excitement about this. 'We’re going to have foreign adventure. We are going to stand up against all the evils of this world,'" Adelman said. "But, it’s frightening. We’re a country of 315 million people. All it’s going to take is a dozen of these people, with the fighting experience they’re getting in Syria and Iraq, and all the training they’re getting, to be able to come in here quite legally, and we’re fairly vulnerable."
Three types of people are most susceptible to involvement with terrorist organizations, according to Clifford May, a national security specialist and president of the Washington-based Foundation for the Defense of Democracy: sociopaths, those searching for meaning, and highly educated people with a misguided sense of mission.
The last category, he said, includes the Islamic State’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. He claims to hold a doctorate from Islamic University in Baghdad and degrees in Islamic studies and history. Al-Baghdadi, for whom the U.S. has offered a $10 million bounty, "believes that Americans don’t deserve the power they wield" and is willing to take it by force, May said.
May speculated McCain might be one of "what you might call ‘lost boys’ who are desperate for meaning and a transcendent cause."
Journalist released
The renewed concern over foreign fighters came as American journalist Peter Theo Curtis returned to the United States late Tuesday, just two days after being freed from nearly two years captivity at the hands of the Islamist Jabhat al-Nusrah group in Syria.
The renewed concern over foreign fighters came as American journalist Peter Theo Curtis returned to the United States late Tuesday, just two days after being freed from nearly two years captivity at the hands of the Islamist Jabhat al-Nusrah group in Syria.
In a statement, Curtis thanked U.S. officials and the Qatari government for intervening on his behalf.
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2nd US Islamist fighter killed in Syria
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Pan African Theatre: Egypt denies it attacked Libya
Egypt denies role in air attacks in Libya |
US says it believes Egypt and UAE attacked rebels in Tripoli, a claim Cairo denies saying it respects the will of Libya.Last updated: 26 Aug 2014 19:10 |
Egypt has denied any role in air attacks in Libya, as the US said it believed Cairo worked with the UAE to attack rebels in the capital Tripoli. The US government on Tuesday said it believed the UAE and Egypt carried out raids in Libya, a day after the New York Times quoted unnamed officials as saying the same. Egypt's foreign minister Sameh Shoukry said his country was not involved "in any military activity and it does not have any military presence on Libyan territories". "We respect the Libyan people's will represented by the parliament and all its decisions." An Emirati official told the AFP news agency on Tuesday that his country had "no reaction" to such reports. Separately, the US, France, Germany, Italy and the UK gave warning against "outside interference" in Libya, saying it "exacerbates current divisions and undermines Libya's democratic transition". "France, Germany, Italy, the UK and the US strongly condemn the escalation of fighting and violence in and around Tripoli, Benghazi, and across Libya, ... by both land attacks and air strikes." Bernardino Leon, the newly appointed UN envoy to Libya, said that he opposed foreign intervention as a strategy to halt the crisis in the country. But the Spaniard added that Libya needs international support to back "Libyans who want to fight chaos ... through a political proces". The air raids in Tripoli may have been a bid to prevent the capture of the Tripoli airport, but fighters later seized control. Former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi was overthrown in 2011 by rebels backed by US, French and British air power. |
Source: Al Jazeera and agencies |
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California town running out of drinking water
Residents of East Porterville,
California,
Running Out of Drinking Water
By Sean Breslin Published: Aug 25, 2014, 2:59 PM EDT weather.com
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Marvin X honored at Oakland's Pan-African Family Reunion
It's that time of year again! Our PAN AFRICAN FAMILY REUNION is right around the corner on LABOR DAY, MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2014 ( Click Here for Facebook Invitation) and we can't wait to celebrate our beautiful lives together with you.
Our PAN AFRICAN FAMILY REUNION is a free day of sunshine in the park with a great variety of music, live art, dancing, and games for adults and kids alike. This is an event like no other set to purify our souls and reinvigorate us with the promise of our bright future! We serve free lunch from 12pm-2pm, have arts, crafts and food vendors, performances, and a full day of hanging out with friends and family.
This year has been more expensive then any past year, mostly because permit and fee costs have gone up for us. We really need your help covering some of these expenses to keep this event successful year after year. PLEASE GIVE WHAT YOU CAN, WHETHER THAT IS $3 OR $100. Every dollar helps.
We aim to make every year better than the last and look forward to celebrating this year with you!
Your Brothers and Sisters.
Afrocentric Oakland
Our PAN AFRICAN FAMILY REUNION is a free day of sunshine in the park with a great variety of music, live art, dancing, and games for adults and kids alike. This is an event like no other set to purify our souls and reinvigorate us with the promise of our bright future! We serve free lunch from 12pm-2pm, have arts, crafts and food vendors, performances, and a full day of hanging out with friends and family.
This year has been more expensive then any past year, mostly because permit and fee costs have gone up for us. We really need your help covering some of these expenses to keep this event successful year after year. PLEASE GIVE WHAT YOU CAN, WHETHER THAT IS $3 OR $100. Every dollar helps.
We aim to make every year better than the last and look forward to celebrating this year with you!
Your Brothers and Sisters.
Afrocentric Oakland
P.S. Poet, activist, scholar, essayist, organizer, publisher Marvin X will be among the elders honored at this years festival.
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Marshall Allen and Sun Ra's Arkestra in London
SUN RA ARKESTRA - UNDER THE DIRECTION OF MARSHALL ALLEN - FOUR DAY RESIDENCY CELEBRATING THE CENTENARY OF SUN RA'S BIRTH
Photo by Fabio Lugaro
Monday 16 June 2014, 8pm
SOLD OUT
Tuesday 17 June 2014, 8pm
SOLD OUT
Wednesday 25 June 2014, 8pm
SOLD OUT
Thursday 26 June 2014, 8pm
SOLD OUT
A pleasure as ever to welcome back one of the greatest big bands of all time - The Sun Ra Arkestra. This year marks the centenary of Sun Ra's birth and these four nights promise to be a very special celebration of one of the greats. Operating under the direction of saxophonist Marshall Allen - who himself is celebrating his 90th year, the Arkestra have made Cafe OTO their home in London and this will be their sixth residency here. With such a massive, joyous songbook and the kind of well organised chaos that sees their legendary 3 hour sets move deftly between rolling grooves, sing-along chants and atonal blasts of mischievous brass the Arkestra never disappoint.
"Resplendent in sparkling red robes, Allen commanded the stage from front left, orchestrating, directing, and choosing soloists. He was full of energy at 85 years old, and needed it as the Arkestra presented two typically far reaching sets totaling nearly 165 minutes" - AllAboutJazz
LINE-UP: Marshall Allen / director, alto sax, flute
Tara Middleton / vocal
Vincent Chancey / flugelhorn
Cecil Brooks / trumpet
Knoel Scott / vocal, saxes, dance
Charles Davis / tenor sax
Danny Ray Thompson / baritone sax
Dave Davis / trombone
Farid Barron / piano
Dave Hotep / electr. guitar
Stanley Morgan / congas, perc
Elson Nascimento / perc, surdo
Tyler Mitchell / bass
Wayne Anthony Smith Jr. / drums
SUN RA
Sun Ra was one of the greatest and least known jazz artists of the last four decades, whose influence on diverse musicians is little known to the general public. A pianist and band leader, his style ranged from retro swing to avant free, and often in the same piece. His band could play a swinging Gershwin tune and almost imperceptibly soar into their free cosmic equational tones as if they possessed a single mind.
Ra was a keyboard improviser of great originality, but his foremost talent was for inspiring and teaching creative musicians to improvise freely but together. This tension between freedom and coherence was something he explored with abundant energy and skill.
Sun Ra died in 1993. The Arkestra performs today, under the direction of alto saxophonist Marshall Allen.
MARSHALL ALLEN
Photo above by Fabio Lugaro
As a young musician, Marshall Belford Allen (b. May 25, 1924) performed with pianist Art Simmons, Don Byas and James Moody before enrolling in the Paris Conservatory of Music. After relocating to Chicago, Allen became a pupil of Sun Ra, subsequently joining the Arkestra in 1958 and leading Sun Ra's formidable reed section for the next 40 years. Marshall, along with John Gilmore, June Tyson and James Jacson, lived, rehearsed, toured and recorded with Sun Ra almost exclusively for much of Sun Ra's musical career. As a member of the Arkestra, Allen pioneered the Free Jazz movement of the early sixties, having remarkable influence on the leading voices in the avant-garde. He is featured on over 200 Sun Ra recordings in addition to collaborations with Phish, Sonic Youth, Digable Planets and Medeski, Martin & Wood.
Allen assumed the position of Arkestra Musical Director in 1995, following the ascension of Sun Ra in 1993 and John Gilmore in 1995. Marshall continues to be committed to the study, research, and development of Sun Ra's musical precepts and has launched the Sun Ra Arkestra into a dimension beyond that of mere "ghost" band by writing fresh arrangements of Sun Ra's music, as well as composing new music and arrangement for the Arkestra. He works unceasingly to keep the big-band tradition alive.
www.elrarecords.com
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