October 2000 BAMcinematek 2000 Next Wave Festival Brooklyn Philharmonic Robert Frank. Laura. 1998 BAM Next Wave Festival sponsor: PHILIP MORRIS ~lAGf8lU COMPANIES INC. Brooklyn Academy of Music Bruce C. Ratner Alan H. Fishman Chairman of the Board Chairman of the Campaign for BAM Karen Brooks Hopkins Joseph V. Melillo President Executive Prod ucer presents A Magic Science: Celebrating Jimi Hendrix Running time: BAM Howard Gilman Opera House approximately October 20, 2000, at 8pm (gala performance) two hours with no October 21, 2000, at 7:30pm intermission With Medeski Martin & Wood The Gil Evans Orchestra under the direction of Miles Evans Vernon Reid Featuring Chris Whitley Marc Anthony Thompson Sandra St. Victor OJ Logic and Glenn McKay's Light Show Jonathan "Futz" Cappel stage Iighti ng Danny Kapilian producer The Next Wave Festival Gala is sponsored by Philip Morris Companies Inc. and Ql04.3, with support from Dan Klores Associates and Pine Ridge Wineries. Next Wave Music supported by The Aaron Copland Fund for Music, Inc. 29 Original artwork by Glenn McKay· A Magic Science: Celebrating Jimi Hendrix Medeski Martin & Wood Vernon Reid guitars John Medeski keyboards Chris Whitley guitars Billy Martin drums and percussion Marc Anthony Thompson lead Yocals Chris Wood basses Sandra St. Victor lead Yocals DJ Logic turntables The Gil Evans Orchestra Gil Evans and Miles Evans horn arrangements Miles Evans band leader, trumpet David Bargeron trombone Glenn McKay projected light images Kenny Berger baritone saxophone, Patricia Fox stage manager bass clarinet Philip Harvey sound mix Hiram Bullock guitar Chris Hunter alto saxophone David Mann soprano and tenor saxophones, flute Badal Roy tablas 30 Producer's Note A Magic Science Experience '~ny claim to know where Jimi Hendrix might have taken his talents and interests had he lived is absurd. We live our lives in order to know these things, and when such a passionate and important life is cut so short, simple humility should require us to pause before engaging in any such guesswork. Certainly one of the things that made Jimi Hendrix so great and what helps him remain so fascinating is that he was unpredictable. But one thing we can know about the future ofJimi Hendrix. As long as Jimi was alive, he would have made music and it would have been the greatest music he knew how to make." Dave Marsh There are people who come to understand enough about the mysteries of this life on Earth to comfortably take certain risks. There are a handful of exceptional risk-takers who possess remark­ able gifts of expression. One of those rarest of individuals was James Marshall Hendrix. Jimi Hendrix. Close your eyes right now in your seat, and repeat the name to yourself again in your mind's voice ...go ahead, right now ...close your eyes and think for a moment about Jimi Hendrix. Has there been a name in music so exquisitely evocative for so many? What an incredible package of talent and personality he was. What does his name make you think about right now? Where is Jimi Hendrix in your life these days alongside your D'Angelo, Lauryn Hill, Wynton Marsalis, Moby, Emmylou Harris, Radiohead, Steve Reich, Macy Gray, Bjork, or Beck? Do you own the recently released First Rays of the New Rising Sun~the double album Jimi had virtually com­ pleted at the time he died? Or the magnificent new four-CD Hendrix box of previously unreleased studio and live recordings? (They are revelations bordering on an epiphany...get them and listen with fresh ears.) Any creative endeavor professing to a certain level of intelligence and inspiration possesses a mea­ sure of artistic risk-taking. Last year's multi-artist performance of Prince's album 1999 here at BAM felt so right and straightforward from the very outset. This time, turning my sights to Jimi, I knew the risks were incalculably greater going in. What could be weightier than to tackle the music and legacy of the greatest risk-taker of them all in a completely fresh way? This had to be an absolutely new and contemporary spin, albeit one with a respectful eye and ear picking up whisperings from the magical past. Vernon Reid~the brilliant renaissance man of the present-day electric guitar~was key from the start, and he and I went around and around, trading numerous great ideas about the program. We discussed many facts and theories about what directions Jimi appeared to be heading at the time of his death. (After "Paul is Dead" was there ever a headier or more hotly contested topic in popular music?) One evening I called AI Kooper for his insight. He had played organ with Jimi on Electric Ladyland. AI listened and said, "I've got ten words for you: 'The Gil Evans Orchestra Plays the Music of Jimi Hendrix.' I think it came out in '74. Check that out and see what you come up with." I located the LP and felt as if I'd found the Holy Grail. Because it turned out to be a small but real-life part of the answer to that most debated question of all: what might Jimi have done had he lived. One indisputable fact is that when Jimi died on September 18, 1970, it was one week prior to a planned meeting with the legendary arranger Gil Evans (of Miles Davis fame). Ian Dove wrote in 31 his liner notes on that 1974 Gil Evans album, "Denied the opportunity [to record with Hendrix] when the guitarist died in London a week before the preliminary meetings were set, Gil jumped at the chance to present a whole concert of Hendrix compositions at Carnegie Hall, part of the presti­ gious New York Jazz Repertory Company's 1974 program." So there it was ... but while that album's music was adventurous, I had to make sure that it would still be exciting in the context of today's music audience. Following a talk with Gil's son Miles Evans (who leads the terrific present-day Gil Evans Band), Medeski Martin & Wood jumped in wholeheartedly. Who better than they? MMW are the most inventive instrumental ensemble in all of music today, and perhaps the most talented, as well. Plus they're BAM alumni (they co-billed with Don Byron in the 1997 Next Wave). What a perfect match ...two distinct generations of the jazz avant-garde laying the foundation for a new look at Jimi. Vernon was soon sharing guitar chores with the utterly unique blues master Chris Whitley, and the Gil Evans band's own great Hiram Bullock. Marc Anthony Thompson (of Chocolate Genius) and Sandra St. Victor (of The Family Stand) came aboard to share the lead vocals ...each bringing a distinctive angle on Jimi's soulful sexuality. And there's definitely some magic science in the extraordinary minds and hands of OJ Logic, who spins this all smack into the hip-hop nation-and of Badal Roy, Ornette Coleman's tabla master who played on Jimi's "Rainbow Bridge" soundtrack and afterwards with Miles Davis. BAM suggested the possibility of including a "light show," and I jumped at it. Many here in New York remember the legendary Joshua Light Show of Fillmore East fame. Joshua White is not involved in that kind of creative work now, but I located his San Francisco counterpart. Glenn McKay was the other coast's high priest of projected light art. He did the light show for the leg­ endary Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 and worked extensively with Jefferson Airplane for some years afterwards. He'd hung with Jimi! And most importantly, he was the one guy from that time and place who had done that kind of creative work who was still doing it today-upgraded to incorporate the benefits of modern computer and projection technology. When Glenn excitedly said that he knew all about BAM, and that he'd be thrilled to be a part of this, I knew we were heading right into Jimi's lap. No claim can be made here that we're going to bust apart all notions of what a live concert is capable of. But you will be witness to something utterly original in its conception and its direction. Who is this for, but you, the audience? Couple of months ago I attended an extraordinary concert by Neil Young, and the first of his encores was an unbelievable, fire-breathing performance of Hendrix's arrangement of Dylan's "All Along the Watchtower." When I got home, I didn't know whether to reach first for Neil or Jimi, but Jimi's "Burning of the Midnight Lamp" was on when my head hit the pillow ... I want to thank BAM, and all of the performers taking part in this program. I am deeply grateful for everyone's dedication, belief, and patience and for the opportunity to produce and present this. I hope that you all enjoy tonight's unique Jimi Hendrix experience. And, as if a 6 turned out to be 9, "A Magic Science" will be presented in its entirety on November 26th, the eve of Jimi's birthday, by the Experience Music Project in Seattle. A touch more magic... "Let me live my life the way I want to ... " Play on, Danny Kapilian October 2000 32 ~I1LOO' ~ \I1LOO _ Jimi Hendrix, born Johnny Allen Hendrix on Juma Sultan, and Jerry Velez, during which they November 27, 1942, in Seattle, was later performed the now-famous machine-gun renamed James Marshall Hendrix by his father interpretation of the national anthem. That same James "AI" Hendrix.