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Trumpeter Stanton Davis Featured at Harlem Speaks Thursday, May 31 6:30PM-8:30PM.

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The National Jazz Museum in Harlem
104 East 126th Street
New York, NY 10035
212 348-8300



Trumpeter Stanton Davis Featured at Harlem Speaks

Time: May 31, 2007 , 6:30pm-8:30pm. This discussion series is free to the public.

Location: 104 East 126th Street, Suite 2D, New York, NY



New York, NY - Stanton Davis, a New Orleans-born jazz, soul, R&B and Latin trumpeter/flugelhornist is the honored guest of the bi-weekly Harlem Speaks series of the National Jazz Museum in Harlem on Thursday, May 31st.

Even before graduating from the prestigious New England Conservatory of Music in 1973 with a degree in Composition and Performance, Davis had been steeped in the fluid sounds of jazz, blues, soul and R&B from his early life in the Crescent City. In the early '70s he led a Boston-based, highly praised electric jazz/funk fusion group, Ghetto Mysticism, which recorded the album Brighter Days and toured throughout New England and New York.

Since then, Davis has performed, toured, and/or recorded with a plethora of jazz groups: The Mercer Ellington Orchestra, The Lionel Hampton Orchestra, George Russell's Living Time Orchestra, Mongo Santamaria's Orchestra, Mario Bauza & His Afro-Cuban Jazz Orchestra, Lester Bowie's Brass Fantasy and bassist Charlie Haden's group. Davis also appeared as a soloist on David Sanborn's Night Music on NBC TV and has performed in concerts with jazz artists such as George Gruntz, Jim Pepper, Bob Stewart, David Murray, Richard Abrams, Sam Rivers, Gil Evans, Webster Lewis, Jaki Byard, and Max Roach.

As a free-lance musician, Davis has been a key player in the orchestra pit for shows such as The Diana Ross' TV Special, and Broadway and touring shows such as Jelly's Last Jam, Black and Blue, Ain't Misbehavin', Sophisticated Ladies, Play On, Dinah Was and Bring In 'da Noise, Bring In 'da Funk as well as The Apollo Theatre's Harlem Song in New York.

Davis's soulful trumpet voice also graced the soundtracks for television documentaries such as PBS' An American Dream and The Virgin Island Adventure. He also appeared in George Russell's Living Time on TV in Stockholm and on MZIZI ROOTS, on WBZ-TV in Boston.



Further, Davis has been heard in concerts and festivals with such R&B and pop artists as Jon Lucien, Al Cooper, The Four Tops, Lou Rawls, David Ruffin, The Dells, Gladys Knight, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye and Tavares. Davis also performed in The Festival of Joy Tour for DIW Records in Tokyo, Japan and at the Berlin Jazz Festival with George Russell.

As a composer, Davis's 1989 album, Manhattan Melody was selected as “Pick Album" by Lufthansa Airlines. Davis's composition credits also include the music for Third World on WCVB-TV in Boston, the soundtrack for a multimedia show called Where's Boston? and the soundtrack for Union Station.

Davis also received a Creative Artist Fellowship for composition from the Massachusetts Foundation for The Arts and Humanities and a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship for Jazz Composition. Davis is included in Who's Who in Entertainment.

The gifted pianist Marc Cary engaged in a revealing, insightful discussion with museum Executive Director Loren Schoenberg on May 17, 2007.

Born in New York City, Cary spent his formative years in the “very diverse" Adams-Morgan section of Washington, DC, which he called “south up north, concrete country." Surrounded by music his whole life, Cary gives his mother, Diane Lee Williams (nicknamed Penny) primary credit for exposing him to “great music." She was a also a tribal chief of the Wampanoag Nation.

Throughout the conversation Cary referenced his Native American heritage, the African-based rhythms of Go Go found in DC, his overriding orientation to rhythm, and the deep musical roots of his parents and grandparents.



He also discussed his apprenticeship into the jazz tradition and language. But that didn't come at first.

“I fully embraced music around 12 or 13. My neighborhood had about 10 bands, and whenever you perform, your neighborhood is there." Go Go was the rage, “and my concept was to take that rhythm and superimpose melodies, rhythms and harmonies from other countries."

Considering his fascination with rhythm it isn't surprising that he began on drums. Then Cary tried out the cello and trumpet. In each case better musicians on those instruments came in the band so he moved on, settling on piano and keyboard.

At 15, Cary's mom and stepdad, Wayne P. Williams, decided to put him into a program, RAP (Regional Addiction Prevention), Inc., to get his head and social skills together. Through the assistance of men there like Kokayi Patterson and pianist Daniel Witt, Cary got real serious about his goals and direction. Private lessons with Eleanor Oxendine grounded his discipline for learning the piano, immersion, even to the extent of practicing all day and missing school, followed. “I embraced music with a passion, with a fury," he said.

His experience at the Duke Ellington School of the Performing Arts was yet another landmark; instructors Atreus Fleming and John Malachai fueled his flame for music. From Malachai (Sarah Vaughan's long-time accompanist) Cary learned “voicing, how to play with a vocalist, and how to play ballads at a slow tempo." This training served Cary well when he played with singers Betty Carter and Abbey Lincoln.

Cary also spent time in the Blues Alley Youth Orchestra in Washington, DC. The band director of the orchestra never gave Cary solos, but when Dizzy Gillespie rehearsed the band for an upcoming performance he pointed to Cary to take one. To the band director's chagrin, Cary impressed Gillespie so much that he had Cary take the first solo during the concert.

His jazz apprenticeship continued after he searched out fellow pianist Walter Davis, Jr., whom Cary remembered as “one of the sweetest guys. He had a different look, and wide hands. He totally embraced music, especially jazz. He knew all the solos on bebop records. After hearing me play the first time, he turned me on to Bud Powell. I would watch his breathing and what excited him. From Davis I learned that music is a language."

Through Davis he met Arthur Taylor, after he moved back to New York. “That was my first big call! He lived on 158th and Edgecombe Avenue, and when he asked me where I lived I told him 156th and St. Nicholas Avenue. He told me to come right over! His place had a long hallway. He walked down it to pick me up. He had just one eye. When he sat down at the drum set, he said, 'Alright, “Gingerbread Boy!" After about four choruses, he stopped. He invited me to join his band."

Next he joined the Betty Carter School. “With Betty, you had to be on your toes. She was very demanding, challenging. She would re- construct and de-construct tunes on the spot, go into another time signature and tempo that we hadn't even rehearsed. I would break out into hot and cold sweats playing with Betty."

Whereas Betty Carter was, “about the rhythm, Abbey Lincoln was about the melody. But both were so steeped in the culture, where it comes from, and who they were. With Abbey her singing involved her life, politics, the past, the present, and how you fit in it."

After a break, Cary discussed his work with youth at the Langston Hughes House in Harlem, where he passes on the knowledge about life and music that he's learned from jazz masters.

Save the Date!

June 14, 2007: NEA Jazz Master, Writer Nat Hentoff

June 29, 2007: Dancer, Choreographer Frankie Manning*

* This special Friday session of Harlem Speaks will take place in the Theater of the Riverside Church, 91 Claremont Avenue (between 120th and 122nd Streets).

The Harlem Speaks series, supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, is produced by the Jazz Museum in Harlem's Executive Director, Loren Schoenberg, Co- Director Christian McBride, and Greg Thomas, host and co-producer of the web's only jazz news and entertainment television series, Jazz it Up! Time: 6:30pm-8:30pm.



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