Sons d'Hiver Festival:
FREE JAZZ, BLACK POWER
(in 1971, Philippe Carles & Jean-Louis Comolli published "Free Jazz, Black Power", a landmark book about jazz in its Afro-american socio-political context. A book now available in trade paperback "Folio" collection.)

Since the New Thing emerged in the mid-60’s, Jazz has been closely linked to the social, political and cultural history of Black Folks and to their liberation movements. We’re pleased to introduce you to two personalities with quite a different background but who took a common part in the revolutionary adventure of the 70’s: the Black Panther Party. Matthew Shipp & Ernest Dawkins are the living proofs that the fight is not over.

January 13, 2006, 8:30 pm
"FRED HAMPTON PROJECT" CHICAGO 12
ERNEST DAWKINS, composer, conductor, saxophone
KHARI B, spoken words / AARON GETSUG, baritone saxophone / KEVIN NABORS, tenor saxophone / GREG WARD, alto saxophone / NORMAN PALM III, trombone / COREY WILKES, trumpets / HARRISON BANKHEAD, JOSH ABRAMS, double bass / JUSTIN DILLARD, piano / ISAIAH SPENCER, HAMID DRAKE, drums

35 years after his assassination by the FBI, Fred Hampton, tragic hero of the Black Panther Party, has become a genuine icon of Afro-american counter-culture. Ernest Dawkins, key figure of the Chicago Jazz scene, lyrical saxophonist and, above all, hyperactive militant within the black community is a tremendous catalyst of energies willing to musically draw the portrait of a Black Folks cause’s martyr, turning his music into a political weapon. With the explosive AACM youngsters of the Chicago 12, Dawkins is creating an ambitious music both looking back at its Great Black Music roots and opened to the more recent fads of contemporary Black music (Khari B, a young militant poet, even gives the orchestra a Hip-Hop flavour). Dawkins, here, let us hear that Afro-american still is untameable. Fred Hampton can be proud.

Espace André Malraux
Le Kremlin-Bicêtre
2 place Victor Hugo

http://www.afro.com/history/Panthers/Hampton/Hampton.html