Free Listening Party w. Randy Weston & Willard Jenkins Dec 7

Autobiography of Randy Weston, composed by Randy Weston and arranged by Willard Jenkins (Duke University Press) and the album The Storyteller: Live at Dizzy's Club Coca-ColabyRandy Weston and his African Rhythms Sextet (Motma Music). The pianist, composer, and bandleader Randy Weston is one of the world's most influential jazz musicians and a remarkable storyteller whose career has spanned five continents and more than six decades.Packed with fascinating anecdotes, "African Rhythms" is Weston's life story, as told by him to the music journalist Willard Jenkins. It encompasses Weston's childhood in Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood-where his parents and former members of their generation imbued him with pride in his African heritage-and his presentation to know and other days as a player in the artistic ferment of mid-twentieth-century New York.His music has taken him about the world: he has performed in eighteen African countries, in Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines, in the Canterbury Cathedral, and at the grand opening of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina: The New Library of Alexandria.Africa is at the effect of Weston's music and spirituality. He has traversed the continent on a continuous quest to read about its musical traditions, produced its first major jazz festival, and lived for age in Morocco, where he opened a popular jazz club, the African Rhythms Club, in Tangier. Weston's narrative is instinct with tales of the multitude he has met and befriended, and with whom he has worked.He describes his unique partnerships with Langston Hughes, the musician and arranger Melba Liston, and the jazz scholar Marshall Stearns, as good as his friendships and collaborations with Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie, Coleman Hawkins, Thelonious Monk, Billy Strayhorn, Max Roach, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, the novelist Paul Bowles, the Cuban percussionist Candido Camero, the Ghanaian jazz artist Kofi Ghanaba, the Gnawa musicians of Morocco, and many others.With African Rhythms, an international jazz virtuoso continues to create cultural history. The Narrator is Weston's first recording with the all African Rhythms ensemble since 1999's Spirit! The King of Music. Recorded live at Know at Lincoln Center's Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola, the set features drummer Lewis Nash with members of Weston's regular quintet: trombonist Benny Powell; alto saxophonist TK Blue; bassist Alex Blake; and percussionist Neil Clarke. Willard Jenkins is an independent arts consultant, producer, educator, and mark and broadcast journalist. His writing has been featured in JazzTimes, DownBeat, Jazz Report, Jazz Forum, All About Jazz, Jazzwise, and many other publications.He contributed two chapters to Ain't Nothing like the Very Thing: How the Apollo Theater Shaped American Entertainment. For more info on this series, on The Storyteller: Live at Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola, on African Rhythms: The Autobiography of Randy Weston. When: Tuesday, December 7, 2010, 7pm. Where: Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Celebrity at Frederick P. Rose Hall, home of Love at Lincoln Center, Broadway at 60th Street, New York, NY. How: Event is gratuitous and seating is exposed to the world on a first come, first served basis.Doors open at 6:30pm. To buy the album and book package, visit Motma's special offer.