Muhal Richard Abrams/Yolanda Nieves
Muhal Richard Abrams-#1
I just decided one day that I wanted to play the piano. It
happened in a funny way. My sister had a music theory book.
So I picked that book up and decided I was going to learn what all those symbols meant.
-Muhal Richard Abrams
National Endowment for the Arts 2010 Interview
The blue music notes celebrate in
slow
then fast motion your authority
is action
as you create new rhythms in
smooth wanderings of sounds
born to a new life
so much depends
on the hot
perfection of your prayer
in unison of brain, fingers,
and breath
the moments of truth
rise
in cool smoky vibrations
Great Divinity emerges from
black and white
piano keys illuminating modulations
no one has ever
heard before.
Name Me Some Songs* Muhal!
So young at heart
while
wise in time
with levels and degrees of light
my Afrisong spirals live at Montreux 1978.
Blues forever!
Mama and Daddy
in the family talk
gave me the
visibility of thought
one line two views
think all, focus one
reiterate in an
open air meeting.
The roots of blue
sight song
is a
spectrum
song for all
things to come from those now gone
a
vision toward essence
streaming
blu, blu, blu.
*Names of all his major albums
Dear Muhal-May the Road to Jazz be Forever Free
While governments wage war to
eliminate avante-guard
jazz, sass, and
the sacred illogicality
of blues
curtailing musicians to
pistol-shot poverty
forcing pianos to be silent
while guitars linger in
the blackness of cases
hungry
thick-skinned musicians
live on
the dangerous edge of revolution
in soulful evolution
demanding to give to the world
musical transmissions
an allegiant
worship of the blues
jazzing half-note and
full-notes that
rotate on an axis
this fire
emerges from
an eclipse burning with
a million heartbeats
into existence
one soul
for all.