For Immediate Release
WCBN presents: SUN RA 100th BIRTHDAY TRIBUTE CONCERT featuring PLANET D NONET
Performing live at the University Of Michigan Museum Of Art on Friday April 4 2014
Doors at 7:00 pm - Concert is from 8-10 pm.
FREE and open to the public of all ages. UMMA is located at 525 S State St, Ann Arbor, MI 48109
Contact: Shelley Salant, WCBN Events Coordinator [email protected] 734 223 7438
In honor of jazz legend Sun Ra’s 100th Birthday and National Jazz Appreciation Month, WCBN and the Southeastern Michigan Jazz Association (SEMJA) are pleased to present a very special evening of space jazz at UMMA featuring award-winning Detroit band Planet D Nonet....
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For Immediate Release
WCBN presents: SUN RA 100th BIRTHDAY TRIBUTE CONCERT featuring PLANET D NONET
Performing live at the University Of Michigan Museum Of Art on Friday April 4 2014
Doors at 7:00 pm - Concert is from 8-10 pm.
FREE and open to the public of all ages. UMMA is located at 525 S State St, Ann Arbor, MI 48109
Contact: Shelley Salant, WCBN Events Coordinator [email protected] 734 223 7438
In honor of jazz legend Sun Ra’s 100th Birthday and National Jazz Appreciation Month, WCBN and the Southeastern Michigan Jazz Association (SEMJA) are pleased to present a very special evening of space jazz at UMMA featuring award-winning Detroit band Planet D Nonet.
Founded by drummer RJ Spangler & trumpeter James O’Donnell, two eastside Detroit based musicians who’ve been playing together for over 30 years, the Nonet features players from such venerated groups as the Sun Messengers, Bon Ton Roule' and Johnnie Bassett & the Blues Insurgents as well as some talented young veterans. This phenomenal group can transition from scene to scene, playing the classic swing music of Ellington & Strayhorn, Fletcher Henderson, Count Basie & Benny Carter as well as more modern jazz by Sun Ra and Pharoah Saunders, and always with a Detroit twist and an eye toward turning people on to jazz music.
Sun Ra was born Herman Blount on May 22 1914 in Birmingham, Alabama, making this the year he would have turned 100. He became known as a groundbreaking composer, bandleader, philosopher, poet and pianist, and his legend lives on today. He was a pioneer of free improvisation, as well as one of the first artists to use electronic synthesizers. His compositions had an enormous range and incorporated practically every form of jazz, from swing to bebop to free jazz. He said that he was from Saturn, and went on to lead his Arkestra in Chicago, New York and Philadelphia. His influence is felt today not only in jazz but throughout many genres of music as well as in our culture at large. He was truly one of a kind.
WCBN is the University of Michigan's student-run radio station and one of the longest-running freeform radio stations in the country. Sun Ra has long been one of the most played artists on the station. WCBN has broadcasted from the University of Michigan campus continuously since 1952, taking the moniker, WCBN, in 1972. Beginning as a collaboration of stations at East Quad, South Quad, and West Quad, the Campus Broadcasting Network was born as WCBN-AM 650. In 1977, WCBN found its current home at the far left of the FM dial. Since its inception, WCBN has emphasized alternative broadcasting-- challenging what the medium of radio can do. WCBN is fully and proudly staffed by volunteer students, University faculty and staff, and community members.
This event is co-sponsored by UMMA, the Southeastern Michigan Jazz Association (SEMJA), and Encore Records.
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