January 21, 2025
Starting in 1990, Graham Haynes was a conduit for the American cornetist and composer Butch Morris’ structured improvisation method, called Conduction®, a singular form of large-group improvisation in which conductors and ensembles “duet” using a system of signals and gestures. On January 21, 2025, he returns to Nublu for one night of Conduction®, primarily with musicians new to the form: Arina Bagaryakova, Chris Bates, Che Buford, Miranda Daiagnew, Key Hutch, Kenneth Jiménez, Doyeon Kim, Shara Lunon, Eden Mastriani-Levi, Hani’el Mastriani-Levi, Vivek Menon, and Yuma Uesaka, plus longtime collaborators Shakoor Hakeem, Mauro Refosco, and Brandon Ross.
January 26, 2025
The raucous liberatory collective Harriet Tubman, formed by guitarist-vocalist Brandon Ross, bassist Melvin Gibbs, and drummer JT Lewis in 1998, advances a brash, enveloping, danceable sound fusing “genres” of Black music—“the digging of everything,” in the words of Amiri Baraka. Naming themselves after the great Black abolitionist Harriet Tubman, the collective expresses their commitment to social and political liberation through breaking the “chains” of received aesthetic labels of Black musical forms, as Lewis has put it. Harriet Tubman is widely regarded for their astonishing and transporting live and recorded performances, with their 2018 album, The Terror End of Beauty, landing on the year end lists of The New York Times and Rolling Stone. Tubman’s wide-ranging musical collaborations include albums with Cassandra Wilson, who collaborated with them on Black Sun, and Pulitzer Prize finalist Wadada Leo Smith, on their album Araminta, and a forthcoming release with producer/composer/singer Georgia Anne Muldrow. Harriet Tubman will be joined for this performance by their friend and fellow traveler, the shape-shifting bandleader, composer and musician Graham Haynes.