The work and legacy of renowned composer and multi-instrumentalist Anthony Braxton was celebrated throughout November in Brooklyn at Roulette Intermedium, featuring a series of workshops, performances, and a conversation with the influential figure who has challenged musical conventions for nearly six decades. Players that span three generations including George Lewis, Mary Halvorson, and Adam Matlock gathered at the experimental theater space across 4 different events to pay tribute to the NEA Jazz Master who turned 80 this year.
Braxton’s prolific career boasts a wide body of work that spans groups of various incarnations, styles and sizes, compositions that utilize unusual methods, and a unique philosophical approach at creation that blurs the lines between improvisation and composition. Roulette, which has provided space for experimental art in New York City since its founding in 1978, provided context to some of Braxton’s philosophy and methodology at a workshop on November 4 that featured vocalists and frequent collaborators Adam Matlock, Anne Rhodes, and Kyoko Kitamura. The trio discussed Braxton’s Ghost Trance Music, Tri-Axium Writings, and Language Music – leading musicians and non-musicians in improvised group performances that sometimes-featured audience participants conducting. “I can’t stress enough, the importance of being in the room with each other,” Kitamura told the audience, highlighting how communication and connection were central aspects to performing language music – a method of performance that utilizes at least one conductor who led the players through the use of pre-determined, open-ended prompts. Braxton’s compositional approach leaves a great deal open for interpretation, and all his compositions and ideas exist in a sort of multi-verse where at certain point, a conductor or player can launch themselves, the group, or a portion of the group into an entirely new piece.
Roulette staged vastly different performances of Braxton works, beginning on November 5 with the Tri-Centric Vocal Ensemble who performed an interpretation of Ghost Trance Music that featured different groups of vocalists in various parts of the theater, including the boxes above, and behind the seated audience. Pianist Shinya-Lin and saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock opened with a performance on Braxton’s Composition 101. The next week on November 12, former student and renowned guitarist Mary Halvorson joined Braxton and AACM trombonist/moderator George Lewis in conversation ahead of performances of pieces of Braxton and Halvorson by the International Contemporary Ensemble. At the end of each performance, Braxton could be seen at the side of the stage thanking the musicians, and he echoed a similar sentiment when he spoke onstage, taking time to laud his collaborators, students, and the musicians who interpreted pieces across his unique body of work. “I feel like the creator of the universe has helped me on so many different levels,” Braxton told the audience on November 12. “But certainly, the fact that I was lucky enough to meet George Lewis, to meet Mary Halvorson,” he explained. “I know how lucky I am.” Despite his penchant for pushing the boundaries of sound and composition, Braxton has “been listening to a lot of marching band music,” he told the audience.
Roulette has new discounted Student and Artist memberships – you can learn more about those here and stay up to date with Anthony Braxton at tricentricfoundation.org.
Review Round-up: Roulette Intermedium celebrates the legacy of pioneering composer Anthony Braxton
