On Sunday, November 16th, cornetist/composer
Taylor Ho Bynum and his improvising chamber jazz ensemble, SpiderMonkey Strings, will present the Boston premiere of his innovative secular oratorio,
Madeleine Dreams, at
The Boston Center for the Arts (BCA). Inspired by the novel
Madeleine is Sleeping (Harcourt), a 2004 National Book Award finalist written by Bynum’s sister, Sarah Shun-lien Bynum, the piece draws text from the book while further exploring its theme of “the logic of dreams.” SpiderMonkey Strings, which takes its name from two mythical tricksters, Anansi the Spider of West Africa and the Monkey King of China,
debuted the piece in New York earlier this year, and will document it in the studio in late November for a 2009 release on
Firehouse 12 Records.
“Cornetist Taylor Ho Bynum is at the forefront of a younger generation of creative musicians in New York,” writes AllAboutJazz.com’s John Sharpe. “He combines thrilling improvisation with stealthy composition, unconfined by genre.” Other critics agree, calling him “one of the most exciting figures in jazz’s new power generation” (Steve Dollar,
Time Out Chicago), “a strong cornetist and serious-minded composer with experimental tendencies” (Nate Chinen,
New York Times) and “an agile and creative improviser who sounds like no one but himself” (Chris Kelsey,
JazzTimes).
Jazzwise reviewer Kevin Le Gendre adds, “Bynum is thinking outside of the jazz box without getting trapped inside another in the process.”
Bynum’s expansive resume includes a wide variety of work with both his contemporaries and legendary figures alike, most notably the iconic saxophonist/composer Anthony Braxton, with whom he has performed and recorded extensively over the past decade. The Boston native's most recent recordings as a bandleader include
The Middle Picture (Firehouse 12, 2007), featuring his trio/sextet, and
True Events (482 Music, 2007), a recording of cornet/percussion duets with Fujiwara that veteran jazz writers Howard Mandel, Brian Morton and K. Leander Williams, among others, included on their top 10 lists for the year. In addition to leading his own bands, Bynum is a member of such groups as Jason Kao Hwang’s Edge and the large ensembles of creative music icons Bill Dixon and Cecil Taylor. He is also a curator for the annual
Festival of New Trumpet Music (FONT) in New York and a partner in New Haven's Firehouse 12 Records label.
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