52nd Annual Pitt Jazz Seminar and Concert Program
Monday, October 31st
12:00pm—Kickoff Performance: William Pitt Union, Lower Lounge
Tuesday, November 1st
8:00pm—Dave Burrell Trio with Nicole Mitchell: Bellefield Hall Auditorium
Wednesday, November 2nd
7:30pm—Film Screening: “We Knew What We Had: The Greatest Jazz Story Never Told” (2018): Cathedral of Learning Room G24
Thursday, November 3rd
7:30pm—“Conceptions and Expansions: A Discussion of the Music of Dave Burrell”: Frick Fine Arts Auditorium
Friday, November 4th
1:00pm—Visiting Scholar Series—Fumi Okiji: Cathedral of Learning, Room 213
7:30pm—Feature Artist Concert—with Tia Fuller: Bellefield Hall Auditorium
Saturday, November 5th
2:00pm—Community Outreach—Workshop with Tia Fuller, hosted by Dr. James Johnson Jr.: Afro-American Music Institute
7:30pm—Pitt Jazz Faculty Concert—Featuring Tia Fuller: Bellefield Hall Auditorium
Monday, October 31
Noon
Kickoff Performance
William Pitt Union, Lower Lounge
The student-based Jazz Ensemble will perform under the direction of Ralph Guzzi.
Tuesday, October 31
8:00pm
Dave Burrell Trio with Nicole Mitchell
Bellefield Hall Auditorium
The Dave Burrell Trio, featuring Hamid Drake and Joshua Abrams along with Nicole Mitchell. There will be a presentation to Pitt of the Dave Burrell Archive at this event.
Gift to the Pitt Jazz Archives
The Center for American Music, part of the University of Pittsburgh Library System, has acquired the Dave Burrell Archive.
Burrell was an influential innovator in New York’s free jazz scene and played alongside such trailblazing musicians as alto saxophonist Marion Brown and tenor saxophonists Pharoah Sanders, Archie Shepp, and David Murray.
Burrell’s compositions for the theater include the opera Windward Passages (1979), with a libretto by his wife, Monika Larsson, and Holy Smoke (1999), created with choreographer Eva Gholson. As a composer-in-residence at the Rosenbach Museum and Library in Philadelphia, he wrote numerous pieces inspired by archival documents and other materials, including Bill of Sale for a Slave (2007), Syllables of the Poetry of Marianne Moore (2008), and Western Extension of the United States of America 1811 (2009). In 2010 he launched a project called American Civil War: 1861–1865, which led to a number of compositions.
The Burrell Archive consists of twenty-four linear feet of posters, recordings, programs, photographs, correspondence, scores, and contracts that document his career from the 1960s through the present. It will open to researchers later this year.
Featuring:
Dave Burrell, a distinguished composer-pianist, is an African-American performing artist of singular stature on the international contemporary music scene. His dynamic compositions with blues and gospel roots recall the tradition of Jelly Roll Morton, James P. Johnson and Duke Ellington, as well as avant garde composers Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane.
Hamid Drake is an American jazz drummer and percussionist. He studied drums extensively, including eastern and Caribbean styles. He frequently plays without sticks, using his hands to develop subtle commanding undertones. His tabla playing is notable for his subtlety and flair. Drake's questing nature and his interest in Caribbean percussion led to a deep involvement with reggae.
Joshua Abrams is a composer, bassist, and improviser. His early formative musical experiences include performing in a chamber group conducted by Earle Brown, and busking on the streets of Philadelphia as an original member of The Roots. Since the mid-1990s, Abrams has been a key figure in Chicago's creative music communities and an international touring musician with artists across genres.
Nicole Mitchell Gantt is an award-winning creative flutist, composer, conceptualist, bandleader and educator. A United States Artist (2020), a Doris Duke Artist (2012), and a recipient of the Herb Alpert Award (2011) her research centers on the powerful legacy of contemporary African American culture and black experimental art.
Thursday, November 3
7:30pm
"Conceptions and Expansions: A Discussion of the Music of Dave Burrell"
Frick Fine Arts Auditorium
A panel of jazz musicians and scholars will include Burrell; his wife, Monika Larsson; John Szwed; David Murray; Ted Daniel; and Pitt Associate Professor of Jazz Studies Michael Heller. A performance of Dave Burrell's chamber pieces will follow the panel discussion.
Featuring:
Panelists
Dave Burrell
Monika Larsson
Michael Heller
John Szwed
David Murray
Ted Daniel
Performers
Piano- Mark Micchelli
Piano- Rob Frankenberry
Violin- Roger Zahab
Trumpet- Adam Gillespie
Selections
Existence
Suite for Piano, Viola and Trumpet
Transformation
Friday, November 4
1:00pm
Visiting Scholar Series - Fumi Okiji
Cathedral of Learning, Room 213
Visiting Scholar Fumi Okiji discusses "Aesthetic form in musique informelle and the new thing"
Abstract: While a diversity of scholarship has found remarkable consensus in narrating the emergence of the new thing, and, incidentally, the contemporaneous developments in the European and Euro-American avant-garde, as the rejection of external forms and an accompanying absorption in what might be understood as raw sonic material, I am interested in what aesthetic form contributes to the picture. I propose that the new thing be recognized as an unadulteration of the core motivation of the music we call jazz—namely, the pursuit of moments of complete communion; in other words, the pursuit of aesthetic form.
Fumi Okiji arrived at the academy by way of the London jazz scene in which she took an active part as a vocalist and improvisor. She works across black study, critical theory, and sound and music studies. Her research and teaching looks to black expression for ways to understand modern and contemporary life, which is to say, she explores works and practices for what they can provide by way of social theory.
Friday, November 4
7:30pm
Feature Artist Concert - With Tia Fuller
Bellefield Hall Auditorium
Performers
Saxophone- Tia Fuller
Drums- Roger Humphries
Piano- Alton Merrell
Bass- Jeffrey Grubbs
Selections
Crowns of Grey
Delight
I Love You
In the Trenches
Joe'in Around
Queen Intuition
Soul Eyes
The Coming
Featuring:
When Grammy-nominated Mack Avenue recording artist, composer, and bandleader Tia Fuller picks up her saxophone, something amazing happens. Blending technical brilliance, melodic creativity, and the performing precision drawn from both her academic and stage experience, Fuller is a force to be reckoned with in the worlds of jazz, pop, R&B, and more. Currently, Fuller balances the worlds of performance and education, fulfilling a demanding schedule as both a busy touring and recording artist and a full-time professor at the Berklee College of Music in Boston.
Roger Humphries is an American jazz drummer. Early in the 1960s, he began touring with jazz musicians; his list of credits in jazz, R&B, and pop is extensive. Humphries led his own band in the early 1970s, R.H. Factor, and led ensembles under other names into the 1990s. He has also held teaching positions at the University of Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh High School for the Creative and Performing Arts. He released albums under his own name in 1993, 2003, and 2011.
Alton Merrell is a world class pianist, Hammond B-3 organist, composer, and educator. He has performed and taught throughout the United States, Europe, Asia and parts of the Caribbean. Merrell’s musical artistry is a unique blend of lyrical melodies, rich harmonies, and fluid technique that spans multiple music genres including jazz, gospel, classical, pop, and rhythm and blues. Whether performing his own compositions or commissioned to celebrate the music of legendary artists, Merrell’s rich musical interpretations take listeners on spirit-filled excursions that deeply touch the soul.
Jeffrey Grubbs, a native of Cleveland, Ohio, comes from a family of music-loving non-musicians. He started as a violinist through his public elementary school at age nine and later switched to the double bass at age 18. He went on to pursue his musical training at Youngstown State University, the Cleveland Institute of Music, and the University of Southern California. In addition to several orchestral achievements, Jeffrey Grubbs is an accomplished jazz bassist. He has performed and recorded with many touring internationally-known jazz artists and is currently actively performing in the Pittsburgh jazz community.
Saturday, November 5
7:30pm
Pitt Jazz Faculty Concert, feat. Tia Fuller
Bellefield Hall Auditorium
This concert will feature guest artist Tia Fuller along with Pitt Jazz Faculty performers. Non-faculty bassist Tony DePaolis will join them in a performance of the music of Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers.
Performers
Saxophone- Yoko Suzuki
Trumpet- Ralph Guzzi
Trombone- Aaron Johnson
Bass- Tony DePaolis
Drums- James Johnson III
Piano- Irene Monteverde
Piano- Deanna Witkowski
Selections
United
Ugetsu
Time Off
Pensativa
Sweet 'N' Sour
This is for Albert
Skylark
Free For All
Featuring:
When Grammy-nominated Mack Avenue recording artist, composer, and bandleader Tia Fuller picks up her saxophone, something amazing happens. Blending technical brilliance, melodic creativity, and the performing precision drawn from both her academic and stage experience, Fuller is a force to be reckoned with in the worlds of jazz, pop, R&B, and more. Currently, Fuller balances the worlds of performance and education, fulfilling a demanding schedule as both a busy touring and recording artist and a full-time professor at the Berklee College of Music in Boston.