December 30, 2012: #67 – Oswald/Thomson/Stewart

• John Oswald – saxophone
• Scott Thomson – trombone
• Jesse Stewart – drums

January 13th, 2013: #68 – Tena Palmer & Bob Vespaziani (rescheduled)

• Tena Palmer – voice
• Bob Vespaziani – drums/percussion

This concert was originally scheduled for the 6th, but has been rescheduled for the 13th (due to illness).

January 27th, 2013: #69 – Accordion Conspiracy

• David Broscoe – saxophones, winds
• Bernard Stepien – accordion

Accordion Conspiracy is an extension of Bernard Stepien and David Broscoe late ‘90s pure saxophones project then called Breaths. Saxophonist David Broscoe is a master in multi-phonics. Accordion happened to be Bernard Stepien`s first instrument initially in a classical and folkloric music context. Back in the ‘60s, Stepien heard Ornette Coleman and started to play in his harmolodic music style. After switching to saxophones, Stepien neglected Jazz accordion for a few decades but the emergence of French accordionist Richard Galliano and pianist Andrea Parker accordion experiments slowly restored his interest in the accordion. In 2001, Stepien had the immense privilege to study with the great master Cecil Taylor and learn how to play with sounds rather than notes. The button accordion is actually the ideal instrument for producing sounds because it enables to cover large spans of notes and produce unusual harmonies with little efforts compared to a piano. Stepien plays a Hohner Morino accordion from the late ‘50s that has an additional quality to produce unusual sounds in that it has a left hand that is identical to the right hand and thus enables the same capabilities as a piano. Accordion Conspiracy really started as a result of the IMOO Orchestra in 2012 where Stepien was invited to play accordion. Thus, Stepien’s accordion music is in a way the result of peer pressure…

December 2, 2012: #65 – Wellman/Stewart

• Linsey Wellman – saxophone, bass clarinet, etc.
• Jesse Stewart – drums

Click here to RSVP on facebook and let is know you’re coming to concert #65.

December 16, 2011: #40 – A Very Ayler Christmas!

Saxophonist Bernard Stepien and his little helpers introduce the music of Albert Ayler to that of the sweet baby Jesus. HO! HO! HO!

Discover the true meaning of Aylermas!

Here are some words from Bernard:

This year, we caught several people, usually non-musicians, who were convinced that Omega is the Alpha, Ghosts, Bells, and many others, all Albert Ayler compositions, were true Christmas Carols and even subconsciously started to sing them by the Christmas tree.

Well, for us, this almost sounds like mission accomplished.

The concept of mashing up Albert Ayler with Christmas Carols has over the last half dozen of years of concerts slowly wound up into a well accepted tradition. in fact, a few days ago, I realized that I was in deed a fool because after all of these efforts to find matches between the two repertoires and writing the mash-ups, taking fragments of the two repertoires, I found out that it was already there all the time. In fact, Albert Ayler did the reverse process. He took Christmas Carols and transfused them in his own composition by adding, enhancing, modifying them with his own musical concepts giving them a total new perspective. Upon the release of our first CD, critics were unanimous in saying that this was the CD Ayler would have loved to make. What we all missed is that not only the fact that it was already there but also that Albert Ayler was a marketing genius. By not saying anything to anybody, Ayler could play his music year round, especially at those fantastic European summer Jazz festivals. On our side, we are stuck playing our repertoire at Christmas time only. Well, at least we got a review right in the middle of the summer this year:

“We all have our highlights; mine was the Bernard Stepien Orchestra’s holy morph of Albert Ayler and Christmas carols last December.”, Lawrence Joseph, CULT#MTL august 2012

Thus, don’t miss one of the following dates:

 

·         December 13th, 8 pm, at the Artel in Kingston

·         December 16th, 7 pm, at the UMI cafe, IMOO series

Click here to RSVP and let us know you’re coming to concert #66.

November 4, 2012: #63 – CP’s BD

• Craig Pedersen – bass
• Michel Delage – drums
• Mark Molnar – ‘cello/electronics
• Ryan Purchase – trombone
• Linsey Wellman – reeds

This show is in celebration of Craig Pedersen’s 29th birthday! Join this group of friends for some improvised fun!

Click here to RSVP on facebook and let us know you’re coming to concert #63.

November 18, 2012: Ellwood Epps solo and trio

• Ellwood Epps – trumpet
• Aaron Lumley – bass
• Ivan Bamford – drums