Music which translates the work of an artist, Jean-Michel Basquiat, into a musical palette. Ellis does this with imagination, integrity and beauty.

16 MP3 Songs
JAZZ: Modern Creative Jazz, AVANT GARDE: Electro-Acoustic

Show all album songs: Sucker Punch Requiem Songs


Details:
Lisle Ellisâs Sucker Punch Requiem: An Homage to Jean-Michel Basquiat

Sucker Punch Requiem: An homage to Jean-Michel Basquiat, music composed by Lisle Ellis, is a delight and surprise. Translating the work of a young visual artist into a musical palette takes some doing, and Ellis does it with great imagination, integrity, and beauty; all those traits exuded by Basquiat as well. More than just fine notes, Ellis and the other musicians portray the passion of art, music, life and its vicissitudes thereof. Certainly Basquiat experienced many of those in his way-too-short life. The music radiates experience, anguish, joy: all the demands and rewards of quotidian life as it unfolds. Some stages/phrases are rough, some smooth; some improvised, some composed; some last awhile and some are fragmented into bits. All are inherent and necessary to creative existence.
And creative this is . . . Sucker Punch Requiem.
Take a listen.

SHORT BIOGRAPHIES
Individual websites included

Lisle Ellis is a multifaceted creator whose work reflects his interests in music, visual art, computers/technology, and community.  As a composer and improvisor-bassist his oeuvre spans three decades and two countries and has brought him international recognition as an artist with an exceptional vision. Ellis's distinct instrumental voice has been heard in concerts in the company of legends of the avant-garde such as Paul Bley, Peter Broetzmann, Andrew Cyrille, and Joe Mcphee, and on more than 40 recordings for international labels such as Black Saint, DIW, and Hat Art, and New World. Currently, Ellis's principal interest is in developing an electro-acoustic architecture he calls string-circuitry confluence; he continues projects with his long standing trio with Larry Ochs and Donald Robinson, What We Live,; Di Terra, an Italian based trio with Alberto Braida and Fabrizio Spera; and duos with pianists Paul Plimley and Mike Wofford.
www.lisleellis.com www.profile.myspace.com/lisleellis
Pamela Z is a composer/performer who makes solo works combining a wide range of vocal techniques with electronic processing, sampled sounds, and The BodySynth⢠gesture controller. She has also composed scores for dance, film, and new music chamber ensembles. Her audio works have been presented in exhibitions at the Whitney in NY and the Diözesanmueum in Cologne. She has toured throughout the US, Europe, and Japan in concerts and festivals including Bang on a Can, the Japan Interlink Festival, Other Minds, and the Venice Biennale. Her numerous awards include a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Creative Capital Fund, the CalArts Alpert Award, the ASCAP Award, and the NEA/JUSFC Fellowship. www.pamelaz.com
Holly Hofmann    "One of the most accomplished jazz flutists in the U.S., she has single-handedly destroyed the stereotype of the delicate female flutist, thanks to her muscular attack and improvisational abandon." (L.A. Times) Since receiving two degrees in music from Cleveland Institute of Music and University of Northern Colorado, Holly now makes her home in San Diego, California where she is the Music Director for several series and festivals. She has gained international notice for her work in jazz with the likes of Ray Brown, Kenny Barron, Cedar Walton, and Mike Wofford to name a few. She has eleven critically acclaimed recordings as a leader and currently tours with her quartet and quintet with string orchestra.
www.hollyhofmann.com
Oliver Lake is a renaissance man who paints, composes and performs and views it all as parts of the same whole. Lake attributes much of his diverse array of musical styles to his experience with the Black Artists Group (BAG), the legendary St. Louis collective he co-founded over 35 years ago. He also cofounded the World Saxophone Quartet with Hemphill, Hamiet Bluiett and David Murray in 1977.  A recipient of the Guggenheim Fellowship. Other commissions received include Library of Congress, the Rockefeller Foundation ASCAP, the Int. Assoc. for Jazz Education, McKim Foundation, Mary Flagler Cary Trust and the Lila Wallace Arts Partners Program.  www.passinthru.org and www.oliverlake.net.
George E. Lewis, improvisor-trombonist, composer and computer/installation artist, is the Edwin H. Case Professor of American Music at Columbia University. The recipient of a MacArthur "genius" Fellowship in 2002, a Cal Arts/Alpert Award in the Arts in 1999, and numerous fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Lewis studied composition with Muhal Richard Abrams at the AACM School of Music, and trombone with Dean Hey. He has explored electronic and computer music, computer-based multimedia installations, text-sound works, and notated forms. A member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) since 1971, Lewis's work as composer, improvisor, performer and interpreter is documented on more than 120 recordings.
www.music.columbia.edu/people/bios/lewis-george
Mike Wofford  "A jazz pianist who makes equal use of brain, heart and muscle." (JazzTimes) He has a long list of associations with such widely diverse artists as Harry "Sweets" Edison, Zoot Sims, Charlie Haden, Shelly Manne, Benny Golson, Vinnie Golia and George Lewis. Wofford is also known for his creative work as pianist and Music Director for the late Sarah Vaughan and Ella Fitzgerald and for his composing and arranging for many years in Los Angeles. Now residing in San Diego, he primarily records and performs with his own trio, as well as in a duo and quartet with his wife, flutist Holly Hofmann. www.mikewofford.com
Susie Ibarra, percussionist, improviser and composer, Ibarra performs both as a soloist and a collaborator. One of her passionate interests is the folkloric and indigenous music of the Philippines which influences her contemporary work. Several recent composition and performances include âPintados Dream/The Paintedâs Dreamâ music for orchestra and drums commissioned by the American Composers Orchestra, âDrum Sketches,â âThese Trees That Speakâ commissioned for Ethos Percussion, âDancestepsâ for solo piano, âBlack and Whiteâ solo violin and field recordings, âDream Etudesâ music for Susie Ibarra Trio, and âParadisoâ music for Electric Kulintang. She received her music diploma from Mannes College of Music, B.A. from Goddard College, and has studied drumset with Milford Graves, Vernel Fournier and Buster Smith and Philippine Kulintang with Danongan Kalanduyan. www.susieibarra.com