JAZZ OCCURRENCE SEXTET LIVE JAZZ PERFORMANCE TO BRING ART ALIVE AUG. 1
A second “occurrence,” a live jazz music and visual arts event, will bring both art and music to life on Aug. 1 among the Jazz Occurrence exhibit on display at the David L. Pierce Art and History Center, 20 E. Downer Pl., in Downtown Aurora.
The Jazz Occurrence Sextet will perform live on Friday, Aug. 1, from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m., in conjunction with First Fridays events going on around downtown Aurora. The sextet will play free jazz while artist Lewis Achenbach paints on canvasses placed around the band, his goal, to “capture the frequency of the room through form and color and create an environment of complete freedom,” Achenbach said. ...
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JAZZ OCCURRENCE SEXTET LIVE JAZZ PERFORMANCE TO BRING ART ALIVE AUG. 1
A second “occurrence,” a live jazz music and visual arts event, will bring both art and music to life on Aug. 1 among the Jazz Occurrence exhibit on display at the David L. Pierce Art and History Center, 20 E. Downer Pl., in Downtown Aurora.
The Jazz Occurrence Sextet will perform live on Friday, Aug. 1, from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m., in conjunction with First Fridays events going on around downtown Aurora. The sextet will play free jazz while artist Lewis Achenbach paints on canvasses placed around the band, his goal, to “capture the frequency of the room through form and color and create an environment of complete freedom,” Achenbach said.
This is the second music event to take place in the Aurora Public Art Commission during the Jazz Occurrence exhibit. The first event, on the show’s opening night in May, included music by the Vince David Achtect.
The Jazz Occurrence Sextet is a collaborative supergroup consisting of members of Volcano Radar, the Human Rhythm Project, the Sun Ra band, and 8 Bold Souls, featuring Achenbach, plus Elbio Barilari, Tim Davis, Julia Miller, Rollo Radford, and Edward Wilkerson Jr.
Achenbach, who founded Jazz Occurrence, has been drawing and painting the local jazz scene for several years, but Jazz Occurrence is a truly participatory event, he said.
“All those who attend the event will be participants also, as the room itself will be a character in this play of sound and vision,” Achenbach said.
The surrounding Jazz Occurrence exhibit features the jazz-inspired work of 30 local and international artists. The exhibit will be on display in the Art Center’s third floor gallery until Aug. 23. Admission is free. Gallery hours are from noon to 4 p.m., Wednesday to Friday.
The Aurora Public Art Commission is a civic organization dedicated to the presentation of all forms of public art. For more information on the Commission or the gallery visit the City of Aurora's website at www.aurora-il.org, or call (630) 256-INFO (4636).
Musician Bios
Lewis Achenbach
Lewis Achenbach, founder and producer of the Jazz Occurrence, began the project, a film curating the marriage of the sonic and visual arts, this May. The Jazz Occurrence film project is a free-form documentary of interviews with artists and visitors, performance footage, and Achenbach’s own animations derived from his live sketching gigs.
Elbio Rodriguez Barilari
Uruguayan-born clarinetist and saxophonist Elbio RodrĂguez Barilari is the founder of “Global Warming,” a Chicago ensemble devoted to the exploration of various cultural traditions, and has received commissions from the Grant Park Music Festival, Concertante di Chicago, Chicago Park District, Chicago Composer Forums, and Orquesta Filarmonica de Montevideo. In addition he has written the scores to more than 40 plays performed throughout the Americas and works as a music critic and columnist for the newspaper El PaĂs as well as editor-in-chief for La Raza, and director of Arena Cultural.
Julia A. Miller
Julia A. Miller is a sound artist, guitarist, improvisor, composer, visual artist, curator and
educator. Miller plays guitar with the noise funk quartet Volcano Radar, which released their first digital EP, “Refutation of Time” in 2013. She hosts and programs Articular Facet, a series of electro-acoustic compositions and structured improvisations that features the incorporation of the visual and physical into the sonic, reflecting the use of ancient, adapted, or hacked technology, invented instruments and performative objects combined with traditional musical instruments.
Tim Davis
A native of Kansas City, Missouri, Drummer Tim Davis currently performs with many resident Chicago jazz artists including Steve Million, Jim Gailloreto, Dennis Luxion, Jeremy Kahn and is resident drummer for the Chicago Human Rhythm Project. Davis has recorded with a variety of people and can be heard on a number of albums, most recently on the latest Curtis Fuller release, “Up Jumped Spring”.
Rollo Radford
Bassist and singer-songwriter Rollo Radford began his professional career at 19 with legendary jazz vocalist, Dinah Washington. He performed has with Martha and the Vandellas, and has appeared on “Midnight Special” with soul singer Walter Jackson, with blues legend Muddy Waters on “Soundstage,” and on “Great Performances,” with Siegel-Schwall, Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops Symphony, and Chuck Berry. Radford has toured around the globe with the innovative jazz master, Sun Ra, playing the great halls of the world such as Carnegie Hall.
Edward L. Wilkerson, Jr.,
Edward L. Wilkerson, Jr. is an internationally recognized jazz composer, arranger, musician, and educator. He founded 8 Bold Souls and the 25-member performance ensemble Shadow Vignettes, and has toured festivals and concert halls throughout the world. His music can be heard on fourteen recordings, including two film soundtracks and the critically acclaimed albums Birth of a Notion, and 8 Bold Souls. Best known as a bandleader and composer, Wilkerson is also one of the great saxophone and clarinet players on the Chicago scene.
Location: Aurora, IL
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