Elysium Furnace Works is proud to present Chourmo – a trio of leaders consisting of guitarist David Torn, alto saxophonist Tim Berne, and drummer Tom Rainey – at the VBI Theatre of Cunneen-Hackett Arts Center, located at 12 Vassar St. in Poughkeepsie on Friday, May 17.
Elysium Furnace Works is a cooperative project co-led by Mike Faloon and James Keepnews. EFW seeks to present the work of vanguard artists in settings as dedicated and uncompromising as the art itself, focusing primarily on live music performances in and around New York’s vibrant Hudson Valley.
Chourmo will ignite a fire, intricate abstraction, and passionate forward motion at the venue. David Torn (also, aka “splattercell”) is a composer, texturalist, guitarist, and producer of international stature, renowned for his unique musical voice which seems to span and un-define a range of idioms and styles. His characterful and compositionally textural work has had a material impact and influence on both film scoring — through his scores, and his creative contributions to scores by Carter Burwell, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Cliff Martinez, Howard Shore, Mark Isham, and others. He has assisted artists like David Bowie, k.d. lang, Tim Berne, John Legend, Madonna, Tori Amos, Bill Bruford, and more.
Tim Berne is an American alto saxophonist and record label owner born in Syracuse. His passion for jazz started when he heard the album Dogon A.D. by Julius Hemphill. In 1974, he went to New York to find Hemphill, who gave him saxophone lessons and advice on how to manage his career. Berne started the record label Empire in 1979.
For Empire, he recorded four albums with avant-garde jazz musicians such as John Carter, Alex Cline, Nels Cline, Olu Dara, Vinny Golia, Paul Motian, and Ed Schuller. His next two albums appeared on Soul Note in the early 1980s. He then got a contract with Columbia and recorded with Robertson, Hank Roberts, Bill Frisell, and others. After two albums with Columbia, he signed with JMT, a label known for avant-garde jazz. Over the years he recorded with many bands including Miniature, Caos Totale, Bloodcount, Paraphrase, Hard Cell, Science Friction, Buffalo Collison, Snakeoil, and more.
The final member of Chourmo is drummer Tom Rainey who has performed and or recorded with numerous artists including Mose Allison, Tim Berne, Anthony Braxton, Kris Davis, Ingrid Laubrock, Joe Lovano, and countless others.
Tickets are $20 in advance and $30 at the door — advance tickets are on sale now.
Elysium Furnace Works 2024 Concerts
June 22: Jamaaladeen Tacuma / James Brandon Lewis: “On Your Shoulders”, VBI @ CHAC — A historic congregation of the legendary harmolodic bass pioneer from Ornette Coleman’s innovative electric ensemble Prime Time Tacuma with the DownBeat Magazine Rising Star on tenor saxophone. Lewis is a multi-generational celebration honoring past trailblazers and offering, in Mr. Tacuma’s words, “a special thank you to all the mentors and elders in music sharing their knowledge and creativity with the next generation.”
July 19: Matthew Shipp Trio, St. Andrew’s & St. Luke’s Church, Beacon NY — The renowned, era-defining pianist and composer Shipp returns to this sacred space in Beacon, joined by the world-class rhythm section of Michael Bisio on bass and Newman Taylor Baker on drums, as they celebrate their aptly-titled new recording for ESP-Disk’, New Concepts in Piano Trio Jazz.
September 21: Peter Evans, VBI @ CHAC — The fearsomely gifted trumpeter Evans astonishes audiences with the sheer multiplicity of sounds and textures he can coax from his horn and the staggering inspiration that shapes his fathomless exploration in this rare Hudson Valley solo appearance.
October 19: Yuko Otomo, VBI @ CHAC — In her first solo Hudson Valley appearance, the exceptional poet and writer Otomo brings her revelatory work steeped in humane soul and universal epiphany, accompanied by musicians TBA.
November 16: AM / FM, VBI @ CHAC — This power duo of guitarist Ava Mendoza and violinist Gabby Fluke-Mogul synthesize a heady brew of avant jazz, blues, and noise – radically upending experimental music(s) past, present, and future.
December 7: Harriet Tubman (Ross / Gibbs / Lewis), VBI @ CHAC — Elysium Furnace Works closes out its monumental season with the fiery intensity of the long-running eclectic and electric collective Harriet Tubman, comprising the insanely talented and accomplished trio of guitarist Brandon Ross, bassist Melvin Gibbs and drummer JT Lewis.
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