An unflinching look at life in post-Reconstruction America, commemorating the anniversary of Nancy Cunard's 1934 collection of African-American writings, poems, and song lyrics titled Negro: An Anthology, from Elliott Sharp's Terraplane, with vocalists Tracie Morris, Eric Mingus, Mikel Banks, and instrumentalist including Sharp, Dave Hofstra, recordings from Hubert Sumlin, &c.
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Sample The Album:
Tracie Morris-vocals
Mikel Banks-vocals
Eric Mingus-vocals
Hubert Sumlin-guitar
Al Kaatz-guitar
Melanie Dyer-viola
Taylor Ho Bynum-trumpet
Dave Hofstra-acoustic bass
Don McKenzie-drums
Elliott Sharp-guitars, steel guitar, electric bass, banjo, saxophones, keyboards, electronics, e—drum programming
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UPC: 755491204399
Label: zOaR Records
Catalog ID: ZCD 086
Squidco Product Code: 30726
Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2021
Country: USA
Packaging: Cardboard Gatefold
Recorded at Studio zOaR, in New York, New York.
"This latest Terraplane album, Century, found its genesis in a 2020 radio-play for the Bavarian Radio in Munich commemorating the 100th anniversary of the book Negro, a collection of African-American writings, poems, and song lyrics edited by shipping heiress Nancy Cunard. The book is a collection of African-American writings, poems, and song lyrics. This volume, controversial as it was at its inception, introduced African-American literature and culture from the likes of Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, and Zora Neale Hurston to the unknowing white world. Beginning with a commission to write five songs based on the uncompromising and blistering texts found in the book, the project expanded. These texts took an unflinching look at life in post-Reconstruction post-WWI America with lynchings, beatings, and blatant racist discrimination the norm, and displayed courageous defiance and clear-headed analysis, often in guttural and graphic terms. The "n-word" was in common usage and is indeed found in some of these lyrics. A century later, how much has changed?
As a son of a Holocaust survivor raised on the necessity of confronting racism in all its forms, I was unsure of how to proceed. With the encouragement, discussion, and collaboration of Tracie Morris and Mikel Banks, songs were written and recorded based on the old texts with new music to bring them to date. "Tol' Mah Capn", "Whip & Trigger", "Stan Boys Stan", "Goin To Atlanta" all frame their anger in a world-weary and slyly humorous stance. New songs as well were composed with Eric Mingus thatcomment on the state of things, pointed, but without falling into polemic: "Toppling Statues" is as direct as can be. The album continues with the instrumental memorials "Tulsa '21" and "The Murder of Elijah McClain" - grim reminders of a terrible past that is still very much present. Elijah McClain was a musician and his story resonated deeply with me but his is not the only one: there are far too many of late: their names, their names. The set is rounded out with a century-old song of continual relevance, Blind Alfred Reed's classic, "How Can A Poor Man Stand Such Times And Live?" and a new song, "Exit Strategy", that came out of a deep dive into an old hard drive. Lost guitar parts by the legendary Hubert Sumlin surfaced: obbligati to a track never completed for Terraplane's 2011 album Sky Road Songs, now ready to go. -- Elliott Sharp, NYC June 2021
"At the root of these songs and the anthology that compiled them among others, are the twins of joy and despair, resolute hope and the depths of epigenetic loss. They are aesthetic meditations on individual and collective despair as well as the indomitable spirit of humanity. The results of this alchemy of profound feeling are poetry and sounds that shake the world and right it. It is this extraordinary sense of being, this legacy that we honor with these creative offerings. - Tracie Morris
The songs are a century old,but the sentiment,ideas and content are surprisingly (unfortunately) contemporary. Albeit spoken in antique language style.... the songs put on glaring display.... just how little we have advanced in race relations. A century ago the authors of these words were speaking their truths about the tribulations they faced, although those tribulations have mutated with time and new technology.... they are present as ever! The relevance of these tunes... including the use of the N word...are on point as ever! Sharply descriptive, poetic and timeless, these words still cut deep in the souls of American culture to this very moment in time. -- Mikel Banks
At the heart of Terraplane is the blues. A music in itself that is political. Created by folks whose mere existence is a political statement. Elliott takes that tradition and runs with it head on and we the band members march side by side with him. It's heartwarming how our audiences have responded to our grooves and political statements, it is terrifying that we still have to sing them as it seems America has a hard time shaking free from it's checkered past. We play on until the change comes."-Eric Mingus
Artist Biographies
• Show Bio for Tracie Morris "Tracie Morris is an award-winning American poet. She has also served as a performance artist, vocalist, voice consultant, page-based writer, critic, scholar, bandleader, actor and consultant. Morris is from Brooklyn, New York. Morris' sound poetics have long been progressive and improvisational. She is a tenured professor. Tracie Morris earned a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Poetry at Hunter College and her Ph.D in Performance Studies at New York University with an emphasis on speech act theory, poetry and Black aesthetics, under the supervision of José Esteban Muñoz. She also studied classical British acting at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (London) and American acting techniques and voice at Michael Howard Studios. Morris writes about abuse, power, race, gender and the body, among other topics, through reverberation and accumulative alterations or substituting, thereby creating dynamic and intimate work. Although primarily known for her live performances, Morris has written several books and has been heavily anthologized as a writer as a poet, interviewer and essayist. Morris emerged as a poet, performer and writer from the Lower East Side poetry scene in the early 1990s. She became known as a local poet in the "slam" scene of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe in New York City, New York, and eventually made the 1993 Nuyorican Poetry Slam team, the same year she won the Nuyorican Grand Slam. She competed in the 1993 National Poetry Slam held that year in San Francisco with other poets from the Nuyorican team. Morris also won the "national haiku slam" that year and her interest in the form lead her to Asia to research poetic forms and cultures from the region in 1998. She is the recipient of NYFA, Creative Capital, Asian Cultural Council and other grants, fellowships, residencies and other awards for poetry including the Yaddo, Millay, MacDowell colonies. She has been a member of the MLA (Modern Language Association), Associated Writing Programs, The Shakespeare Society and The Shakespeare Forum. Her work has been featured in Fuse Magazine, The Amsterdam News, The Village Voice, Tribes Magazine, Bomb Magazine, The Brooklyn Rail and San Francisco Weekly as well as many cultural and scholarly journals. She has performed at Lincoln Center, St. Mark's Poetry Project, CBGBs, Lollapalooza, SxSW, The Whitney Museum, MoMA, Albertine, The New Museum, Centre Pompidou (Paris), Centre for Creative Arts (Durban), Victoria and Albert Museum, Queensland Poetry Festival (Brisbane, Melbourne) and many other regional, national, and international venues. She has presented her work throughout Asia, Africa, Latin America, and Europe. Morris began performing with music from the outset of her poetry career- those initial collaborations beginning with musicians she met as a member of the Black Rock Coalition. Morris' work is embraced by slam and performance poets as well as the Language Poets, a contemporary poetic avant-garde. She is featured, for example, on Charles Bernstein's Close Listening radio program and was featured at a 2008 conference on Conceptual Poetics alongside Bernstein, Marjorie Perloff, Craig Dworkin and others. Morris also received the Creative Capital Performing Arts award in the year 2000. In addition to being an experimental poet, Morris writes poetry in conventional forms and forms. Morris is known as a sound artist and specialist in sound poetry as well as an occasional theatrical performer. (She is also a singer with composer/musician Elliott Sharp's band, Terraplane, and her eponymous band.) She has studied British acting technique as well as Laban and Meisner techniques in the United States. Her work was featured in the 2002 Whitney Biennial. In 2008 her poem "Africa(n)" was included on the compilation album Crosstalk: American Speech Music (Bridge Records; produced by Mendi & Keith Obadike). Morris has taught in several institutions of higher education (she is a full professor at Pratt Institute, specializing in Performance Studies, literature and popular culture, African diaspora culture, Shakespearean sonnets, and voice). She was the 2007-2008 Center for Programs in Contemporary Writing Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania., is a 2018 Master Artist of the Atlantic Center for the Arts and the 2018 WPR Fellow at Harvard University. Morris has been the inaugural Distinguished Visiting Professor of Poetry at the Iowa Writers Workshop since January, 2019. Morris presents workshops on creative writing, voice and strategic planning for activists, artists, youth, women, underserved communities as well as private and non-profit organizations. She has served on panels, given talks and has been a guest artist for prestigious educational organizations including Modern Language Association, Associated Writing Program, Columbia University, Princeton University, MIT, Pomona College, Dartmouth College, Smith College, University of Arizona, among others. Morris has been a consultant for educational and arts organizations. She has served on Board of Trustees/Board of Directors, committees and Artist Advisory boards for: the New York Foundation for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, the Black Rock Coalition, Pew Center for Arts and Culture, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, the Creative Capital Foundation, the Community of Literary Magazines and Presses, Pratt Institute and the Cave Canem Foundation, among others. She is also an in-demand workshop leader for innovative poetry conducting intensives for many organizations including St. Mark's Poetry Project, Atlantic Center for the Arts, Poets' House, Naropa University, Kore Press and Cave Canem Foundation." ^ Hide Bio for Tracie Morris • Show Bio for Mikel Banks "As a vocalist, musician (digital horn, harmonica, percussion & flute), actor (Beyonce & Jay Z videos), storyteller & teaching artist, Mikel Banks has been performing with a wide variety of artists for many years. He is currently performing with the Burnt Sugar the Arkestra Chamber, Digital Diaspora, the Roughstars and the Dustbin Brothers (Mikel's DJ duo with IncogNegro Michael Adams). His new project,"Mr. Mikel's Tot Rock & Reggae Experience" (ABC's, 123's & Positives for Pre-Schoolers & 1st Graders), is an outgrowth of being a pre-school music teacher. Mikel has developed new songs & adapting some traditional ones to reggae & rock styles, all with sing-along messages for the little ones." ^ Hide Bio for Mikel Banks • Show Bio for Eric Mingus "b. 8 July 1964, New York City, New York, USA. The son of the legendary jazz bass player, Charles Mingus, he too plays bass. For some years he worked as a session musician and backing singer, playing on dates with artists such as Carla Bley, Bobby McFerrin and Karen Mantler. When performing in his own right, Mingus' work displays a politically aware and somewhat rebellious streak reminiscent of his father although in a different genre. In many of the songs he performs, some of which he also writes, he confronts issues that still detrimentally affect Black and mixed-race Americans. At the end of the 90s, Mingus' reputation began to spread overseas, owing in part to an appearance in England at the Meltdown Festival, during which he performed at London's Royal Festival Hall." ^ Hide Bio for Eric Mingus • Show Bio for Hubert Sumlin "Hubert Charles Sumlin (November 16, 1931 Ð December 4, 2011) was a Chicago blues guitarist and singer, best known for his "wrenched, shattering bursts of notes, sudden cliff-hanger silences and daring rhythmic suspensions" as a member of Howlin' Wolf's band. He was ranked number 43 in Rolling Stone's "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time". Sumlin was born in Greenwood, Mississippi, and raised in Hughes, Arkansas. He got his first guitar when he was eight years old. As a boy, he met Howlin' Wolf by sneaking into a performance. Wolf relocated from Memphis to Chicago in 1953, but his longtime guitarist Willie Johnson chose not to join him. In Chicago, Wolf hired the guitarist Jody Williams, but in 1954 he invited Sumlin to move to Chicago to play second guitar in his band. Williams left the band in 1955, leaving Sumlin as the primary guitarist, a position he held almost continuously (except for a brief spell playing with Muddy Waters around 1956) for the remainder of Wolf's career. According to Sumlin, Howlin' Wolf sent him to a classical guitar instructor at the Chicago Conservatory of Music to learn keyboards and scales. Sumlin played on the album Howlin' Wolf (called the "rocking chair album", with reference to its cover illustration), which was named the third greatest guitar album of all time by Mojo magazine in 2004.Sumlin performing in France, December 17, 1975, five days before recording My Guitar and Me Upon Wolf's death in 1976, Sumlin continued playing with several other members of Wolf's band, as the Wolf Gang, until about 1980. He also recorded under his own name, beginning with a session from a tour of Europe with Wolf in 1964. His last solo album was About Them Shoes, released in 2004 by Tone-Cool Records. He underwent lung removal surgery the same year, but he continued performing until just before his death. His final recording, just days before his death, was tracks for an album by Stephen Dale Petit, Cracking The Code (333 Records). Sumlin was inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame in 2008. He was nominated for four Grammy Awards: in 1999 for the album Tribute to Howlin' Wolf, with Henry Gray, Calvin Jones, Sam Lay, and Colin Linden; in 2000 for Legends, with Pinetop Perkins; in 2006, for his solo project About Them Shoes (which features performances by Keith Richards, Eric Clapton, Levon Helm, David Johansen and James Cotton) and in 2010 for his contribution to Kenny Wayne Shepherd's Live! in Chicago. He won multiple Blues Music Awards. He was a judge for the fifth annual Independent Music Awards, given to support the careers of independent artists. Sumlin lived in Totowa, New Jersey for 10 years before his death. He died of heart failure on December 4, 2011, at the age of 80, in a hospital in Wayne, New Jersey. Mick Jagger and Keith Richards paid Sumlin's funeral expenses." ^ Hide Bio for Hubert Sumlin • Show Bio for Melanie Dyer "Melanie Dyer performs and composes in creative, improvised and through-composed music spheres. She trained with William Lincer (Principal Violist, New York Philharmonic), Lee Yeingst (Principal Violist, Colorado Symphony Orchestra), John Jake Kella (NY Metropolitan Opera) and Naomi Fellows (Colorado Symphony Orchestra); and studied viola performance at the LaMont School of Music/University of Denver. Melanie founded WeFreeStrings, an improvising string/rhythm collective rooted in improvised music in 2011. From 2004 - 2013, under her Bb Universe banner and in collaboration with the multi-generational, multi-ethnic Scientific Soul Sessions collective, Melanie's Harlem home became the scene of underground public performances by WeFreeStrings and other large and small music ensembles. Bb Universe hosted open rehearsals and performances, recordings, lectures, one-act plays and films including presentations by recognized indigenous activists Toaksin Ghosthorse, a performance of Robbie McCauley's Sally's Rape and a screening of John Douglas' documentary, Grenada: The Future Coming Towards Us. These monthly and semi-monthly events brought cultural luminaries, emerging artists, social and environmental activists, working and under-employed people together. Open dialogues, emphasizing individuals as agents of change, were central to Bb Universe and Scientific Soul Sessions.Melanie currently performs with the Sun Ra Arkestra, Heroes Are Gang Leaders, Gwen Laster's New Muse 4tet, William Parker, Tomeka Reid Stringtet, Patricia Nicholson's Women w an Axe to Grind. She's played and/or recorded with Henry Grimes, Nona Hendryx, Joe Bonner, Reggie Workman, Howard Johnson, and a many other notable musicians in Europe, South Africa and across the U.S. Recordings include WeFreeStrings Fulfillment (Indepstrings, 2018), David Haney's Birth of a City (2019), Come Sunday (T. Cumberbatch, 2015); Fred Ho & Quincy Saul Present the Music of Cal Massey: A Tribute (2011); Live at St Nick's Pub, Salim Washington & Donald Smith Ensemble, Cadence Records (2007); With Strings, Salim Washington & The Harlem Arts Ensemble, CIMP Records (2007); Harlem Homecoming, Salim Washington & The Harlem Arts Ensemble, UJam Records (2005), and others. WeFreeStrings has received project support from New Music USA, Chamber Music America, Bonfils-Stanton Foundation, and individual donors." ^ Hide Bio for Melanie Dyer • Show Bio for Taylor Ho Bynum "Taylor Ho Bynum (b. 1975) has spent his career navigating the intersections between structure and improvisation - through musical composition, performance and interdisciplinary collaboration, and through production, organizing, teaching, writing and advocacy. As heard on over twenty recordings as a bandleader, Bynum's expressionistic playing on cornet and his expansive vision as composer have garnered him critical attention as one of the singular musical voices of his generation. He currently leads his Sextet and 7-tette, and works with many collective ensembles including a duo with drummer Tomas Fujiwara, the improv trio Book of Three, the UK/US collaborative Convergence Quartet, the dance/music interdisciplinary ensemble Masters of Ceremony, and the trans-idiomatic little big band Positive Catastrophe. His varied endeavors include his Acoustic Bicycle Tours (where he travels to concerts solely by bike across thousands of miles) and his stewardship of Anthony Braxton's Tri-Centric Foundation (which he serves as executive director, producing most of Braxton's recent major projects). In addition to his own bands, his ongoing collaboration with Braxton, past work with other legendary figures such as Bill Dixon and Cecil Taylor, and current collective projects with forward thinking peers, Bynum increasingly travels the globe to conduct community-based large ensembles in explorations of new creative orchestra music. He is also a published author and contributor to The New Yorker's Culture Blog, has taught at universities, festivals, and workshops worldwide, and has served as a panelist and consultant for leading funders and organizations. His work has received support from Creative Capital, the Connecticut Office of the Arts, Chamber Music America, New Music USA, USArtists International, and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation." ^ Hide Bio for Taylor Ho Bynum • Show Bio for Dave Hofstra "David Carl "Dave" Hofstra (born May 21, 1953, Leavenworth, Kansas) is an Americh jazz double-bassist. He also plays bass guitar and tuba. Hofstra was an autodidact on bass. He worked with Robin Holcomb, John Zorn, Joel Forrester, and Dave Sewelson (de) in the late 1970s.[1] He was active primarily in New York from the 1980s, playing with William Parker, Lou Grassi (de), Denis Charles, Elliott Sharp, Paul Shapiro, Bobby Previte, Wayne Horvitz, Saheb Sarbib, Bobby Radcliff, Jemeel Moondoc, Marie McAuliffe, Bill Frisell, Robin Eubanks, Greg Osby, David Rosenbloom, Phillip Johnston, Chris Kelsey, Rachelle Garniez (de), Clare Daly, William Gagliardi (de), and Robin Holcomb." ^ Hide Bio for Dave Hofstra • Show Bio for Don McKenzie "Don McKenzie (born June 28, 1974 in Brooklyn, New York) is a drummer known to many through his tenure with Living Colour guitarist Vernon Reid, in the band Masque. Reid the founder and leader of Masque has described its music as: "the place where rock, jazz, hip-hop and technology meet." When asked for his views on McKenzie's drumming, Reid says "His sense of pocket is very firm. I've always been fortunate to work with great drummers, like Marlon Browden and Ronald Shannon Jackson and Will Calhoun. Don is right up there at that level." McKenzie has also played with multi-instrumentalist/composer/producer Elliott Sharp, who says that: "Don McKenzie not only has the hands to play deep-pocket hip-hop and rock grooves, hard-hitting and asymmetrical jazz flavors, a la Tony Williams, and light-fingered sonic abstractions; most importantly, he has the ears to turn his authoritative gestures into music." Other artists McKenzie has played with includes Pharoahe Monch, New Kingdom, Sweetback, Martin Luther, Marc Ribot, The Persuaders, Mr. Complex, DJ Spinna, Cody Chestnutt, and jazz legend Roswell Rudd. McKenzie's first instrument was guitar, but at the age of six he switched to drums. McKenzie's playing has a strong grounding in music theory and technique and for a period of time was a student of Everett Collins, who played with The Isley Brothers. Keyboardist/singer Leon Gruenbaum, who has worked with Don on a number of projects (including his own Math Camp), notes that: "Don is a total powerhouse who can play in any style. He never overplays, instead allowing his extremely solid groove to provide a bed on which other musicians can feel completely comfortable to express themselves." For the latest Vernon Reid and Masque album, Other True Self, McKenzie composed Kizzy, inspired by a close friend." ^ Hide Bio for Don McKenzie • Show Bio for Elliott Sharp "Elliott Sharp is an American multi-instrumentalist, composer, and performer. A central figure in the avant-garde and experimental music scene in New York City for over 30 years, Elliott Sharp has released over eighty-five recordings ranging from orchestral music to blues, jazz, noise, no wave rock, and techno music. He leads the projects Carbon and Orchestra Carbon, Tectonics, and Terraplane and has pioneered ways of applying fractal geometry, chaos theory, and genetic metaphors to musical composition and interaction. His collaborators have included Radio-Sinfonie Frankfurt; pop singer Debbie Harry; Ensemble Modern; Qawwali singer Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan; Kronos String Quartet; Ensemble Resonanz; cello innovator Frances Marie Uitti; blues legends Hubert Sumlin and Pops Staples; pipa virtuoso Min-Xiao Feng; jazz greats Jack deJohnette, Oliver Lake, and Sonny Sharrock; multimedia artists Christian Marclay and Pierre Huyghe; and Bachir Attar, leader of the Master Musicians Of Jajouka. Sharp is a 2014 Guggenheim Fellow, and a 2014 Fellow at Parson's Center for Transformative Media. He received the 2015 Berlin Prize in Musical Composition from the American Academy in Berlin. He has composed scores for feature films and documentaries; created sound-design for interstitials on The Sundance Channel, MTV and Bravo networks; and has presented numerous sound installations in art galleries and museums. He is the subject of a new documentary "Doing The Don't" by filmmaker Bert Shapiro."-Elliott Sharp ^ Hide Bio for Elliott Sharp
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Track Listing:
1. Tol' Mah Capn 3:34
2. Toppling Statues 4:46
3. Stan' Boys Stan' 4:14
4. Exit Strategy (Featuring Hubert Sumlin) 5:22
5. Went To Atlanta 4:23
6. Whip And Trigger 4:10
7. Tulsa '21 6:59
8. How Can A Poor Man Stand Such Times And Live? 3:54
9. The Murder Of Elijah McClain 5:33
10. Money Man 5:01
11. Whatcha Gonna Do 5:21
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