International House Philadelphia + Ars Nova Workshop present

Seraphic Light: Celebrating John Coltrane’s 80th Birthday

Seraphic Light honors the astonishing oeuvre and 80th birthday of John Coltrane. Philadelphia’s adopted son, Coltrane was arguably the most influential musician in modern jazz, both technically and spiritually. Recording for the first time under Dizzy Gillespie, Coltrane gained recognition as a member of Miles Davis’ remarkable quintet, recording the seminal Kind of Blue (Columbia Records). A brief period with Thelonious Monk in 1957 effectively signaled the start of Coltrane’s career as a leader; and, over the next ten years his quartet – with McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Garrison and Elvin Jones – brought about a seismic shift in jazz harmony, making use of every tonal distortion and timbral effect. Coltrane’s subsequent ensembles – often featuring Eric Dolphy, Rashied Ali, Archie Shepp, Pharoah Sanders and Alice Coltrane, among others – released and performed some of the most radical and exploratory music in jazz. Pivotal albums such as A Love Supreme, Giant Steps, and Interstellar Space remain legendary accomplishments. This series commemorates and continues Coltrane’s legacy through unique performances featuring musicians who continue to explore and celebrate the outer boundaries of jazz and improvisation. We invite you to join us as we pay tribute to John Coltrane.

CLICK HERE for subscriptions + single tickets

Saturday, October 14 at 8pm

Philadelphia Four – World Premiere performance

with Dave Burrell, piano; Reggie Workman, bass; Muhammad Ali, drums; Rashied Ali, drums

 

“Burrell crams a century of jazz history into every chugging stride episode and churning dissonance. Encyclopedic as well as eccentric, he’s a living treasure.” – Francis Davis, The Village Voice

 

Since the mid-1960’s, Dave Burrell has contributed to nearly 150 recordings including pivotal works such as Archie Shepp’s Attica Blues, Pharoah Sanders’ Tauhid, Marion Brown’s Three for Shepp and Grammy Award-winner David Murray’s Lovers and Ballads. A recipient of the Pew Fellowship in Jazz Composition, Burrell’s recent releases include Expansion with his Full-Blown Trio with William Parker and Andrew Cyrille, which was nominated as The Village Voice’s #2 Jazz album of 2004, the reissue of 1970’s After Love (Universal Records) featuring Roscoe Mitchell, and Consequences, his first recording with Medeski, Martin and Wood percussionist Billy Martin.

 

Reggie Workman has long been one of the most technically gifted of all bassists. After working regularly with Gigi Gryce, Red Garland, and Roy Haynes, he became a member of the John Coltrane Quartet, participating in several important recordings such as Africa/Brass and Impressions. Subsequently, Workman became a member of Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, and groups led by Yusef Lateef, Herbie Mann and Thelonious Monk. He recorded frequently in the 1960s (including many Blue Note dates and Archie Shepp’s classic Four for Trane).

 

A Philadelphia native, Rashied Ali became a fixture of New York’s avant-garde in the 1960s, backing up the excursions of such musical free spirits as Don Cherry, Pharoah Sanders, Paul Bley, Archie Shepp, Bill Dixon and Albert Ayler. Ali’s relationship with John Coltrane began in 1965, resulting in the seminal duo recording Interstellar Space. Following Coltrane’s death in 1967, Ali continued playing with pianist Alice Coltrane. A student of Philly Joe Jones and an admirer of Art Blakey, Ali developed the style known as “free jazz” drumming, which liberates the percussionist from the role of human metronome. This unique performance brings Rashied together with his brother Muhammad Ali best known for his contributions to the music of Archie Shepp, Frank Wright and Alan Shorter. He also appeared on Albert Ayler’s last recording, Music is the Healing Force of the Universe.  

Saturday, November 4 at 8pm

Cecil Taylor

 

"I discovered very early that it wasn’t quite enough for me to imitate people.” – Cecil Taylor

 

Few musicians have explored the full tonal range of a keyboard the way that Cecil Taylor has. Since forming his quartet in the mid-50s (which originally included Steve Lacy on soprano saxophone, bassist Buell Neidlinger, and drummer Dennis Charles), Taylor has been an uncompromising trail-blazer. His blending of jazz and modern classical sensibilities has transformed the jazz vocabulary, similar to the work of Ornette Coleman and John Coltrane, with whom he recorded Coltrane Time (Blue Note Records) in 1958. By 1962, Taylor was performing frequently with longtime associate Jimmy Lyons and Sunny Murray, with whom he recorded Nefertiti, The Beautiful One Has Come at Cafe Montmartre, one of the greatest live recordings in jazz. The alumni from his ensembles also include jazz greats such as Archie Shepp, Roswell Rudd, Max Roach, Derek Bailey, Tony Oxley and Leroy Jenkins. In addition, he has collaborated with the Art Ensemble of Chicago and drummer Tony Williams. Even after 45 years as a recording artist he continues to create with astounding rigor and was recently awarded the National Endowment of the Arts Jazz Master Award.

   

NEW SHOW!!!

Friday, December 8 at 8pm

Spaceship on the Highway – East Coast Debut

with Fred Anderson, tenor saxophone; Marshall Allen, alto saxophone; Henry Grimes, bass; Avreeayl Ra, percussion

A "free-form summit...dominated by stratospheric eruptions." - Downbeat 

Please join us for the east coast debut of Spaceship on the Highway, a new quartet of jazz masters and elder statesmen.  Philadelphia native Henry Grimes performed with Anita O'Day, Sonny Rollins, and the Gerry Mulligan Quartet. A versatile instrumentalist, Grimes (quite remarkably) performed at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival with the Benny Goodman Big Band, Lee Konitz, Sonny Rollins, and Thelonious Monk. In 1961 he became a respected contributor to the Free Jazz movement, working regularly with Cecil Taylor, Perry Robinson, Sonny Rollins, Albert Ayler and Don Cherry. By 1967, however, Grimes disappeared completely from jazz. Following three and half decades of destitution, he resurfaced in 2003, after residing in a South Central Los Angeles hotel for nearly 20 years. He now performs regularly with many of the leaders of modern Jazz.

Chicago's Fred Anderson, an "old-school" musician in terms of grounding and early influences, was a founding member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM).  He studied with Gene Ammons, Coleman Hawkins, and Lester Young, and has reflected that training throughout his career, while also easily absorbing the new ideas pioneered by Ornette Coleman and other free theorists.  It is this ability to merge old and new that has made Anderson a seminal figure in this music. Beginning in the early 90s, Anderson has frequently recorded, often with drummer Hamid Drake, on labels such as Thrill Jockey. 

Spaceship also includes Sun Ra Arkestra maestro Marshall Allen, who performed with pianist Art Simmons, Don Byas and James Moody before joining the Arkestra in 1958 and leading Sun Ra's formidable reed section for 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 Ra's musical career. As a member of the Arkestra, Marshall Allen pioneered the Free Jazz movement of the early sixties, having remarkable influence on most of the leading voices in the avant-garde. He is featured on over 200 Sun Ra recordings in addition to collaborating with Phish, Sonic Youth, Digable Planets and Medeski, Martin & Wood.

Percussionist Avreeayl Ra was described by the Chicago Tribune as An indispensable innovator", who "shapes the music-making swirling around him with remarkable precision and poise; extraordinarily sensitive percussion. Avreeayl is a long-term member of the Chicago AACM, his relationship with the seminal music organization having begun with early studies with co-founder Kelan Philip Cohran. He has performed Amiri Baraka, Fontella Bass, Lester Bowie, Henry Byrd (Professor Longhair), Malachi Favors, Sun Ra, and Pharoah Sanders. 

Friday, January 12 at 8pm

David S. Ware Unit – World Premiere performance

with David S. Ware, tenor saxophone; Mat Maneri, viola/violin; Keith Witty, double-bass; Whit Dickey, drums

 

“He is often described as a latter-day exponent of the restless, questing, avant-garde jazz of the 1960s known as Fire Music, and as an heir to its Holy Trinity – Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders and Albert Ayler.” – Brian Norton, The Nation

 

David S. Ware has been performing for over 40 years – first as a youth in informal practice sessions with Sonny Rollins in the 1960s, then as part of the fertile New York Loft Jazz era of the 1970s. During this decade, he joined the Cecil Taylor Unit and Andrew Cyrille’s Maono as well as worked frequently with drummers Beaver Harris and Milford Graves. It wasn’t until the 90s, following Ware’s purposeful and rigorous engagement in a period of extensive woodshedding, that he would totally develop both his personal sound and his visionary group concept. And, with a series of ground-breaking albums by the now defunct

David S. Ware Quartet featuring Matthew Shipp and William Parker, this decade saw the full-on recognition of Ware as a true saxophone colossus. A pointed reference of this period is that many writers and jazz fans alike referred to the David S. Ware Quartet as “the most exciting jazz ensemble since the classic John Coltrane Quartet.”

Indeed, Ware’s typical manner of performance – modal and free, rubato, high-energy collective improvisation – stems directly from Meditations-era Coltrane. This exciting premiere of Ware’s new quartet features Mat Maneri, best known for his ECM recordings and collaborations with his father and microtonal composer Joe Maneri, as well as Keith Witty and Whit Dickey, one of New York’s finest Free Jazz drummers and one of the original members of the Ware Quartet.

 

Saturday, February 10 at 8pm

Rova: Orkestrova = Electric Ascension – East Coast Premiere performance

with Rova Saxophone Quartet - Bruce Ackley, soprano saxophone; Steve Adams, alto saxophone; Larry Ochs, tenor saxophone and Jon Raskin, baritone saxophone
and Nels Cline, electric guitar; Jenny Scheinman, violin; Carla Kihlstedt, violin/efx;
Andrea Parkins, electric. accordion/laptop electronics; Marina Rosenfeld, turntables and dub plates; Trevor Dunn, electric bass; Andrew Cyrille, drums

 

"The idea is similar to what the action painters do in that it creates various surfaces of color which push into each other, creates tensions and counter tensions, and various fields of energy.” – Archie Shepp, on Coltrane’s Ascension

 

In 1965, shortly after receiving “Artist of the Year” and “Best Tenor Saxophonist” honors in Down Beat magazine, John Coltrane recorded his daring, monumental Ascension (Impulse Recordings) – the fifty-minute large ensemble piece that challenged audiences with passages of intense group improvisation and powerful solos. With dense harmonies and explosive dialogues between soloists and rhythm section, Ascension is now widely regarded as Coltrane’s masterwork. Originally featuring some of the most important improvisers in jazz, such as Archie Shepp, Pharoah Sanders, McCoy Tyner and Elvin Jones, Ascension was an ambitious and visionary statement unlike any other composition. Now forty years old, Coltrane’s Ascension is renowned among large ensemble jazz works for its monumental scale, raw emotional power, and historic importance to the evolution of improvised music.

 

Electric Ascension is a contemporary reworking of this profound piece led by the world-renowned Rova Saxophone Quartet, who has, since 1977, fundamentally extended the horizons of modern jazz. With their potent mix of stellar musicianship and compositional creativity, Rova explores the synthesis of composition and collective improvisation. The group has also collaborated with and commissioned over 30 new works for saxophone quartet from artists as aesthetically diverse as minimalist composers Terry Riley and Pauline Oliveros, avant-garde composers Fred Frith and Anthony Braxton, experimental rock musician Lindsay Cooper, and jazz luminaries Jack DeJohnette and John Carter. For their first official performance in Philadelphia, they are joined by some of the most exciting improvisers today, including Wilco guitarist Nels Cline, Fantomas/Mr. Bungle bassist Trevor Dunn, Tin Hat Trio’s Carla Kihlstedt, and Free Jazz veteran Andrew Cyrille.

 

Ascension will be performed in its entirety. Arranged by Ochs and Raskin with Raskin the concert master.

 

Series Subscriptions + Tickets

Subscriber Benefits

* Priority Seating

* Free Parking for all concerts

* Invitation to a free pre-concert, subscriber/member-only reception with Cecil Taylor*

 

5-concert subscription

$92.00 Students

$98.00 Members + Seniors

$108.00 General Admission

3-concert subscription**

$50.50 Students

$54.00 Members + Seniors

$67.50 General Admission

* Pre-concert reception with Cecil Taylor will be open to 3-concert subscription package buyers but ticket to the Cecil Taylor concert must be purchased separately.

** Please note: Cecil Taylor tickets are not available in the 3-concert subscription package

 

Single Tickets

Cecil Taylor

$26.25 Students

$28.00 Members + Seniors

$35.00 General Admission

All Other Concerts

$22.50 Students

$24.00 Members + Seniors

$30.00 General Admission

Purchase subscriptions and single tickets at

or 866.468.7619.

 

Founded in 2000, Ars Nova Workshop (ANW) is a Philadelphia non-profit jazz and experimental music presenting organization. ANW programs events and concerts in alternative spaces, showcasing divergent and challenging musical traditions and perspectives. ANW acts as an intermediary between musicians and composers and their audiences, while working to inform, inspire, and challenge listeners while elevating the role of jazz and experimental music in contemporary culture. Fervently upholding the jazz/Free Jazz continuums by supporting its musicians, other 20th century composers and improvisers as well as the work of emerging artists, ANW events are a forum for discourse and new trends in contemporary music theories and practices.  ANW believes in the transformative power of challenging art and seeks to be a vital cultural resource for Philadelphia (and beyond) by providing the most engaging and appropriate environment for musicians and composers. ANW is the recipient of ASCAP’s 2005 Adventurous Programming of Contemporary Music Award.

Seraphic Light is made possible by a grant from the Philadelphia Music Project, an artistic initiative of The Pew Charitable Trusts, administered by The University of the Arts.