I finally got my hands on our footage from NAMM. Enter a parade of ridiculous interviews beginning with saxophonist and super producer, Terrace Martin.
Stay tuned for more!
Category Archives: Jazz
This City is a Dag-nab Pack of Angels
Get used to it.
Hello from Los Angeles!
We are kicking up a fuss in Hollywood for Season Two of the podcast this week. We’re in town for NAMM, getting the skinny on all the gadgets you sexy music nerds and savvy broadcasters need. Our guests are out of control, running the foolish gamut of producers, comedians, broadcast legends, and an alarming roster of musicians. It’s Comic-Con for the road dogs and session cats, and I’ll be smack dab in the middle. You will be overwhelmed by the deluge of madness ahead, musical and otherwise.
Stay tuned!
It’s a Very Merry Crisman Show, Indeed
Ever wander right into a music video?
We are so proud to bring you the dopest podcast episode yet, with more guests and new music. This show is sick and hot all at the same time. Sarah gets her interview on with renowned producer/performer Deonis, the incomparable artist Chelsea West, and panels stylist Mattie Michelle and urban legend, Keite Young. Hear music from Pumah, Chelsea West, Snarky Puppy, and BRAND NEW Deonis. That’s not all, folks! We are honored to premier the Black and Blue’s first single LoveCrazy.
Now let’s get to the meaty part of this message: Premier Variety Showcase Presents: X-Mas Subscribonation, the Enfoodening of the Masses is on for 5 more days. We’ll donate $1 to the North Texas Food Bank for every new podcast subscriber between now and Christmas; so please tell ALL your friends to click subscribe. Tell your cool friends to actually listen. Each subscription feeds three people in North Texas.
Connect with us on Facebook, follow Sarah on Twitter, and share our site with others you think might be interested in what we’re doing. We just love you for listening and coming with us on this ride.
Happy Holidays from the Crisman Show team. We love you!
Search and Restore Brings NYC Jazz to You
We like to keep our fingers on the pulse of the greatest music on the planet. This venture would be frankly remiss without Adam Schatz at Search and Restore (check his interview on Episode 5 of The Crisman Show). I want to share with you a letter from our friend on how you can help further the cause of living jazz. Please take a moment to enjoy his hard work, and consider throwing monetary love their way.
Thanks, Sarah
Schatz Sez:
This year has been madness for me with Search & Restore, last year’s fundraiser allowed me to focus on running the non-profit full time, and we just launched the new website as a result. Search and Restore is loaded with awesome videos we’ve shot throughout scene this year. It’s a dynamic point of discovery for the new jazz & improvised music community, and I’d love to know what you think of it!
Crisman’s Note: Search and Restore provides hours of entertainment and musical discovery. These guys are not kidding around.
Now we’re fundraising for 2012, with a tremendous goal of $200,000 which we’re trying to reach by December 19th. Aside from helping the organization and community grow tremendously, the funds raised will also save my life, because I’ll be able to hire a few full time employees before I explode from doing the work of 5 people. The fundraiser is happening online and it lives at Jazz2012.com
If you’re down to contribute, it would mean the world to me, a $25 or more donation will get you a unique download compilation featuring music from artists throughout the scene as a reward.
Some amazing artists have contributed 25 second videos to encourage everyone to donate, you can check some of them out here:
Joshua Redman
Medeski, Martin & Wood
Chris Dingman
Deerhoof
Thanks so much for checking this out, I wouldn’t be reaching out unless this was something that I truly believed it, and I’d love it if you were a part of it all! Word of mouth is supreme as well, so if you feel like sending the http://Jazz2012.com link to anyone who you think might me interested, or throwing it up on Facebook, I would appreciate it.
Episode Five: What Weird Edit
Oh look, Dear! It's a teeny-tiny Faerie door with itsy-bitsy stairs.
And some priceless modeling advice from Sarah Crisman.
The Crisman Show is proud to present: The Crisman Show Podcast, Episode Five: What Weird Edit. In this episode, we hear from Adam Schatz about Search & Restore, an “organization committed to bringing the artists and audiences of new jazz and improvised music together in new ways, while never forgetting it’s DIY roots.” We love them and you should, too. Also, settle into the backseat while Sarah and Mark Lettieri cruise around suburbia blaring Mark’s new (fantastic!) album, Knows. And of course there’s also the usual nonsense we all love. Don’t use iTunes? You’re still welcome to enjoy The Crisman Show through Feedburner. If you like what you hear, share it with your friends and foes and leave us reviews!
Are you ready for your close-up? Sarah Crisman recorded a video full of modeling advice for everyone who is willing to watch. (That should include you. Trust us, you don’t want to miss this!) Also, she has some upcoming gig news for you Dentonites.
If you want to give a little more love than your usual ratings and comments, consider donating to The Crisman Show through our FundRazr page. Your donations can be as large or as small as you like and you can rest assured that each dollar you donate will go straight to producing more podcasts and even video episodes for your enjoyment. We love what we do and we love to share it with you. Your support makes The Crisman Show possible.
Preach Blaq: The Fourth Dimension of Cool
This story is told as a part of Crisman AD. For more information on Artist Development, including biography and consultation services, please contact me at SarahCrisman@gmail.com.
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Preach Blaq knows the addictive hook of a powerful brass line. While hip-hop has trusted the rhyme across a canvas of funk since the dawn of Chic, few venture as far as to invite the horn section in as hypemen. Today an obscure lab in Houston is cooking a project that will marry the high energy of live instrumentation to intelligent lyricism and the ones and twos.
Born in Little Rock, Arkansas, Preach came up in and Austin, Texas where his family instilled a deep tradition of musicality.
“That was me before I even started school,” Preach said. From an early age, Preach was playing trumpet like his father and tagging along with his mother to choir rehearsal. More influenced by jazz than hip-hop, Preach eventually turned to the cypher to showcase his prowess as a writer and emcee.
“When I was in high school in Austin, there was a hip-hop spot where local cats could perform with a live band every Wednesday. That was the first place I ever grabbed a mic and really spit, and that was long before I ever stepped in a studio.”
Under the tutelage of Houston’s Devin the Dude, Preach developed and honed his songwriting skills. Not just the ability to write verses or hooks, but a complete song. Touring for years with the man the New York Times declared “a brilliant oddball with a spaced-out flow,” Devin has shown Preach by example how to be musically relevant, but not necessarily typical.
“He’s an artist in the truest sense of the word and being in his company was not only inspiring, but also a priceless education in the inner workings of the music business. I was able to learn about the industry and how important it is to be an educated business person. I saw this first hand through the experiences of successful and unsuccessful artist alike. That was the more important lesson. We will always collaborate, but now it’s also time for me grow myself and be my own artist.”
Preach, being a universally minded progressive thinker is now poised to be much more than a Hometown Legend.
“I had to step back record and build a catalog of original music. It was necessary for me to recognize that to solidify myself as an emcee I needed to create more material. Now I’m ready and well prepared.”
Legacy is Not a Choice: The Freddy Hall, Jr Story
From the Legacy of Seattle to the Pocket of Dallas
I first met Freddy Hall on the train. This has become one of my favorite ways to meet people, especially the more I’ve gotten to know this teddy bear of ambition. The ice was broken when he sat beside me and whipped out a Chris Dave shed video on his phone. Immediately I knew the Lord had brought me a new friend. What I couldn’t tell fully at the time, was the intelligent design behind my placement on the Red Line that day. I have discovered within Freddy a dear friend and truly gifted drummer. It is my honor today to tell you the story about this Seattle cat who migrated to the pocket of Dallas to find his identity as a drummer — a pilgrimage that began when he was born to Seattle legend, Fred Hall. You can hear Freddy’s work after the jump below. -Crisman
“I’m old school, right? I’m taking older songs, chopping them up like ?uestlove, and putting live drums in. That’s what I’m going for. As far as making a simple beat or loop, or sampling, I fall on my dude who samples a lot of tracks — a lot of old school songs that make for a sick beat. We progress from there to the drum kit. I started doing this in 2008, I got hooked with Aretha Franklin. I took the first 15 seconds of a song and chopped it up. When I first started, I couldn’t believe how simple it was. I got hooked!”
“My buddy had this program called Recycle and Reason — he had ProTools but I didn’t know how to use that at the time, so I would just making beats from scratch with Reason. Then I started playing with Recycle, I took a song, liked the 15-20 of it, and made a beat. I made a beat for a skit on Johnny Roullete’s She album in 2009 (the album didn’t drop until early 2010). We met at Collin College, started talking about music, and got hooked. Six months into it, he was putting out his album, Based on a True Story, and I put in the live drums on a track called ‘Money Maker’.”
“Back in Seattle, I was vibing a little with the musicians there, but it didn’t really happen until I moved to Dallas. I wasn’t studying music and drummers, I just knew how to play, it was something I was born with.”
In fact, Freddy’ father was Seattle drum legend, Fred Hall.
“When I moved to Dallas, I looked back at the old days who the successful drummers were; I realized they were all jazz drummers. I went back to the roots and listening to jazz, trying to get my chops up like Tony Williams, Buddy Rich, Dennis Chambers. That’s how it all started.”
Freddy’s not only a student of our percussive forefathers, he knows what time it with today’s cats.
“Chris Dave is a drum god. He’s ahead of his time. When I heard Allen Matthews — he’s a beast! –say that Texas is about the drummers, and I’d always heard that Dallas has the musicians. I kept that in the back of my mind. I moved to Dallas to get in on the scene and see who’s on the scene, started hitting the Prophet Bar right away. First person I saw was Candy West, then Erykah Badu, Musiq Soulchild, Dwele, Common, and Mos Def – and those were all on just regular nights that I was going to anyway!”
“The first drummer I liked was Robert “Sput” Searight. I asked him, how do you get on your level?”
“Just listen,” he said.
“The next drummer who caught my eye was Cleon Edwards. I like Cleon because he lays the pocket, and he’s kind of like Chris Dave that way. He holds the pocket, the groove is there. Once you’re around those cats enough, it just gets in you. It becomes a part of your identity. You’re taking all these characteristics from the drummers that can play the gigs and make the money. I look at them as the foundation. We got a lot of drummers out there doing it. Chris Coleman took drumming to a whole new level.”
“Right now it’s about getting the studio together and working on production. Building my own sound from my own studio, finding my identity as a drummer. I’m gonna focus on production, making tracks. People get it twisted — loops is just something you put on repeat, but a track is making a song for an artist. I want to get my bearings with loops and work my way up to tracks. That is the plan.”
“My father passed away in 2007, I had moved to Dallas in 2006. Legacy is not a choice, it’s in my blood. Now, I might not be at the level as everybody else around here at the moment, but I’m getting there.”
The Undead Jazz Movement Needs YOU
Are you ready for the Zombie Jazz apocalypse?
Over the past year, I have had the pleasure of working with Adam Schatz and the fine, frenzied folk at Search and Restore. We first met at the NYC Winter Jazz Fest where I had my face repeatedly rocked-and-wooed by artists like Gretchen Parlato, Rudder, Ambrose Akinmusire, The Chris Dave Trio, and Lionel Loueke (among dozens more). Since then we have bonded over a shared passion for proselytizing the living gospel of live jazz — get it? Not dead.
We know they’ve been declaring “jazz is dead” since 1929. Got it. It’s all over. We also know we’ve been listening to innovative movements of the finest American art form ever since. Today’s generation of jazz artists face many of the same challenges the BeBop cats had to deal with (just look at Jason Marsalis and the “jazz nerd” debate). Many traditionalists don’t like the way hip-hop bleeds into jazz, sparking once again the unending debate of what is or is not “jazz.”
Search and Restore is not taking this lightly. Live from the boiling pot of New York City comes a massive project ready to represent the state of jazz in our generation. Jazz is a living beast that feeds on your very ability to listen. I’m going to let Adam take it from here and implore you to find that rebellious, jazz-loving fool within you and throw a little love their way. They’ve got you covered for anything you’ll ever need about NYC jazz (and I love, love, love the podcast).
- Crisman
Jazz is dying, or so the critics would have you believe…
In a world where the audience for jazz is shrinking, Search and Restore is stepping up to change the future of the music as we know it, and we need your help! Between 2002 and 2008, the median age of Americans who attended a live jazz performance increased from 29 to 49. The fact that the media coverage of jazz has been in strictly traditional outlets with heavy references to the past, reinforces the stigma of jazz as an old music. Coupled with cover charges at high profile clubs of $30 or more, new fans are increasingly less likely to discover and connect with the music.
Our mission: Develop and Unite the New Jazz Community!
The audience may be fading, but the music most definitely is not. Search and Restore wants to introduce a new generation of fans to the powerful new jazz being created in New York and beyond. Since 2008, Search and Restore has been expanding the reach of new jazz. Our shows, with new, dynamic presentation and promotion do justice to the excitement we all feel for this music, and attract a growing audience of young, passionate fans. With an expanding group of committed volunteers, we have started building a palpable community for contemporary jazz, bringing aboard hundreds of new fans and artists along the way. Last June’s Undead Jazz Festival alone, attracted a crowd of 1500! SearchAndRestore.com has become the go to place to see what’s happening in jazz in NYC, with nightly listings and original content. But don’t take our word for it; see our press in the Wall Street Journal, Village Voice, NPR and New York Times.
With our new 501 (c) (3) status from the IRS, we are ready make Search and Restore a viable non-profit organization with a mission of promoting a sustainable community for new jazz. But the hard work and good will of volunteers cannot continue to sustain our operations. Our business plan is to generate revenue through a mix of advertising, grants and private donations. We are learning the hard way that foundations want to see an operating history before awarding grants, so expanding our web presence is at the heart of our plans. With your help, we can expose new audiences around the world to new jazz music and build a scene that is more sustainable and vibrant than ever before.
Our goal: $75,000 (Go big or go home!)
Search and Restore is embarking on a groundbreaking web-based video project that will simultaneously expand the contemporary jazz community without borders, and make us an attractive site for advertisers, supporting the sustainability of our efforts. The new SearchAndRestore.com will become a one-of-a kind home base for a growing audience for new jazz, providing them access to hundreds of artist pages for the mind-blowing composers and improvisers that make our community such a special one.
Over the course of one year, we will
• Send our team out to the New York City clubs and spaces where new jazz happens in New York City and capture footage of 4 concerts per week; that’s 208 concerts in one year!
• Integrate the footage into artist pages for every musician we film, complete with streaming mp3s, upcoming shows, a bio, and links to purchase their music.
• Create a feature for up and coming musicians to build their own artist pages, making SearchAndRestore.com simultaneously an amazing tool for the discovery of new music, and a way to consolidate promotional efforts for artists.
Your contribution will go towards the costs of redesigning the website, as well as staffing and equipment for video production and post-production work.
Donating is easy; you can help save jazz!
I’m asking you to join me and the others who believe jazz that is still groundbreaking, truly exciting, worth saving and indeed, celebrating! Our goal is to create a sustainable community for jazz with a new generation who will come to the music on their own terms.
With your support, Search and Restore will be at the heart of that community.
Follow this link for more details on our video project, or to make your tax deductible donation now.
Thanks for your support,
Adam Schatz
Founder, Search and Restore
P.S. Click the donate button and help save jazz today!
DONATE HERE (tax deductible!):
We will only receive the money if we meet our goal!
