#ebony-and-ivory

#ebony-and-ivory

The Shakers embraced the concept of radical simplicity in everyday life, as well as mandatory celibacy, pacifism, and gender equality, which continue to resonate today.

All but one of the song titles on Body Sound, the debut album from experimental string trio Whitney Johnson, Lia Kohl, and Macie Stewart, line up nicely-a few words, usually two, usually nouns, separated by a vertical line. The straight line in the middle means different things in different disciplines. In computing, it's called a 'pipe' and serves as a conduit. In poetry, it denotes a pause or break. In music, it marks the beginning and end of measures.

By the early 1900s, player pianos had evolved to more fully reproduce a human performance, including subtle dynamics like tempo changes and the introduction of a damper pedal. The human role went from deskilled to fully deprecated as electric motors replaced foot-powered bellows. With the Seeburg Lilliputian Model L, the only job left for humans who wanted to play the piano in the 1920s was to put in a coin.

The Austrian pianist's expressive, emotional playing may grab the headlines, but it's the unerring sense of underlying architecture that's the thread through her long career. We heard that here, not just within each of the works, but in the shared foundations, and sometimes secret connecting passages, she revealed between them.

While taking a break from her musical career, Tifrere founded the nonprofit organisations ArtLeadHER and Art Genesis in 2016. ArtLeadHER provides visual-arts education and exhibition opportunities to women and teenage girls, while Art Genesis helps organise shows for emerging and underrepresented artists.

At the turn of the 1960s, when free jazz was making its initial seismic impact, multi-instrumentalist Phil Cohran-he later added the name Kelan-was living in Chicago and playing trumpet for Sun Ra's Arkestra. He contributed to crucial recordings by the band during his tenure, including We Travel the Space Ways, but Cohran was a restless autodidact who never stuck with any one project for long.

Redolent of African basketry, hairstyles, headwear, and pottery, Donté K. Hayes ' abstract ceramic sculptures may be interpreted as poetic vessels, even though they lack traditional openings. While we easily associate clay pots and round woven forms with ideas related to storage, protection, and even spiritual significance, they also nod to the human head as a holder-a kind of receptacle for culture, language, personal expression, and dreams.

The architect of the bestselling jazz album of all time, 1959's Kind of Blue, trumpeter Miles Davis is a towering figure in the history of the genre. Possessed of a piercing tone, innate melodic sensibility and a singularly uncompromising approach on the bandstand, Davis spent his five-decade career presiding over numerous stylistic shifts: bebop to cool jazz, modal jazz, electronic fusion, jazz funk and even hip-hop.

Even if you're just a casual jazz fan, you probably recognize "Take the A Train," Duke Ellington's swinging theme song. Or you've heard the melancholy ballad "Lush Life" sung by Nat King Cole, by Linda Ronstadt during her Great American Songbook era, or by Lady Gaga on the album she recorded with Tony Bennett. Both of those - and many other tunes - were written by a gay man, musician, composer, and arranger Billy Strayhorn.