CURATION
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from this page:
by Augmented Matrix
Network Node
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Name:
Adam Cruz
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City/Place:
New York City
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Country:
United States
Life & Work
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Bio:
Drummer, composer, and educator Adam Cruz was born in New York City and has been a vital creative force on the international jazz scene for the last two decades. He leads his own group, is an integral part of renowned pianist Danilo Perez’s trio, and regularly works with artists such as Tom Harrell, The Mingus Big Band, Joey Calderazzo, Chris Potter, Steve Wilson and Edward Simon. Adam currently teaches at CCNY and the Berklee Global Jazz Institute.
As a drummer, Adam represents a unique place in the American jazz lineage. His mixed ethnic background informs his playing in ways that transcend easy stylistic categorization. The wealth of his rhythmic knowledge, his deep sense of jazz swing and his knowledge of Latin American rhythms, all coalesce into his personal sound, giving his playing a powerful depth and a rare and distinctive musicality.
Adam first emerged professionally in the early 1990’s, performing and recording extensively with saxophonist David Sanchez and the Charles Mingus Big Band. He toured with pianist Chick Corea, recording Origin - A Week at the Blue Note. He spent the end of that decade touring as a duo with guitarist Charlie Hunter, and then began his long-term association with pianist Danilo Perez in 2000, along with bassist Ben Street.
Adam studied at Rutgers’ Mason Gross School of the Arts and The New School for Social Research, where he received his BFA and his teachers included Joe Chambers, Keith Copland, Kenny Washington, Frank Malabe, Victor Lewis, Lewis Nash and Portinho.
He was first introduced to music by his father Ray Cruz, a renowned New York-born percussionist of Puerto Rican heritage. His mother hails from a rich musical background as well. She is the daughter of Italian-American trumpeter Ricky Trent (who worked with Paul Whiteman and Tommy Dorsey) and Mildred Kapner, a Jewish-American dancer. The diversity of Adam’s background is greatly reflected in his work as a musician and educator.
In 2010, he was awarded a grant from the ACFM to record Milestone, his much anticipated-debut recording as a composer and bandleader. Milestone was released in 2011 on Sunnyside Records to great critical acclaim by the Los Angeles Times, Downbeat Magazine, and Jazz Times among others. The New York Times described the album as "Informed by several strains of Latin music but just as meaningfully by brisk post-bop and lyrically minded free jazz… featuring intricately shifting counterpoint” and “brilliant surging solos.”
Throughout his illustrious career as a drummer, Adam has toured and recorded with artists as diverse as Danilo Perez, Tom Harrell, McCoy Tyner, Chick Corea, Pharaoh Sanders, John Patitucci, Eddie Palmieri, Joanne Braackeen, Chris Potter, Edward Simon, Steve Wilson, Charlie Hunter, and Lee Konitz. He continues to maintain a busy performing and teaching schedule, sharing his talent, knowledge and experience with appreciative fans all over the world.
More
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Quotes, Notes & Etc.
“Drummer Adam Cruz pairs flawless technique and a crystalline touch with a level of prophetic intuition that is awe-inspiring.”
- Modern Drummer
“Adam Cruz is the classic drummer bandleader, in the tradition of Philly Joe Jones and Elvin Jones, who knows how to stroke the fire from the proverbial engine room, but he’s gone the extra mile on Milestone in crafting quite a solid compositional woodpile of original music.”
- Downbeat Magazine
Clips (more may be added)
I created this matrix so the world could discover elemental cultural genius here in Bahia: João do Boi (rest in power), Roberto Mendes, Raymundo Sodré and magisterial others. To make these artists discoverable worldwide though, there's a catch: The matrix must encompass so far as possible ALL CREATORS EVERYWHERE.
The Integrated Global Creative Economy, uncoiling from this sprawling Indigenous, African, Sephardic and then Ashkenazic, Arabic, European, Asian cultural matrix.
The mathematics of the small world phenomenon transforming the creative universe into a creative village wherein all are connected by short pathways to all.
Tap the crosses on somebody's Matrix Page to recommend that person for that category.
(Crosses visible when you are logged in)
The crosses will turn green.
That person/category will appear in your My Curation & Recommendations.
You will appear in that person's Incoming Curation and Recommendations.
You and the person you are recommending will be pulled by mathematical gravity to within DISCOVERABLE distance of EVERYBODY ELSE INSIDE the Matrix.
In a small world great things are possible.
"Thanks, this is a brilliant idea!!"
—Alicia Svigals (NEW YORK CITY): Apotheosis of klezmer violinists
"Dear Sparrow: I am thrilled to receive your email! Thank you for including me in this wonderful matrix."
—Susan Rogers (BOSTON): Director of the Berklee Music Perception and Cognition Laboratory ... Former personal recording engineer for Prince; "Purple Rain", "Sign o' the Times", "Around the World in a Day"
"Dear Sparrow, Many thanks for this – I am touched!"
—Julian Lloyd Webber (LONDON): Premier cellist in UK; brother of Andrew (Evita, Jesus Christ Superstar, Cats, Phantom of the Opera...)
"This is super impressive work ! Congratulations ! Thanks for including me :)))"
—Clarice Assad (RIO DE JANEIRO/CHICAGO): Pianist and composer with works performed by Yo Yo Ma and orchestras around the world
Salvador is our base. If you plan to visit Bahia, there are some things you should probably know and you should first visit:
www.salvadorbahiabrazil.com
Conceived under a Spiritus Mundi ranging from the quilombos and senzalas of Cachoeira and Santo Amaro to Havana and the provinces of Cuba to the wards of New Orleans to the South Side of Chicago to the sidewalks of Harlem to the townships of South Africa to the villages of Ireland to the Roma camps of France and Belgium to the Vienna of Beethoven to the shtetls of Eastern Europe...*
Sodré
*...in conversation with Raymundo Sodré, who summed up the irony in this sequence by opining for the ages: "Where there's misery, there's music!" Hence A Massa, anthem for the trod-upon folk of Brazil, which blasted from every radio between the Amazon and Brazil's industrial south until Sodré was silenced, threatened with death and forced into exile...
And hence a platform whereupon all creators tend to accessible proximity to all other creators, irrespective of degree of fame, location, or the censor.
Matrix Ground Zero is the Recôncavo, bewitching and bewitched, contouring the resplendent Bay of All Saints (end of clip below, before credits), absolute center of terrestrial gravity for the disembarkation of enslaved human beings (and for the sublimity these people created), the bay presided over by Brazil's ineffable Black Rome (seat of the Integrated Global Creative Economy* and where Bule Bule is seated below, around the corner from where we built this matrix as an extension of our record shop).
Assis Valente's (of Santo Amaro, Bahia) "Brasil Pandeiro" filmed by Betão Aguiar
Betão Aguiar
("Black Rome" is an appellation per Caetano, via Mãe Aninha of Ilê Axé Opô Afonjá.)
*Darius Mans holds a Ph.D. in Economics from MIT, and lives between Washington D.C. and Salvador da Bahia.
Between 2000 and 2004 he served as the World Bank’s Country Director for Mozambique and Angola. In that capacity, Darius led a team which generated $150 million in annual lending to Mozambique, including support for public private partnerships in infrastructure which catalyzed over $1 billion in private investment.
Darius was an economist with the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, where he worked closely with the U.S. Treasury and the IMF to establish a framework to avoid debt repudiation and to restructure private commercial debt in Brazil and Chile.
He taught Economics at the University of Maryland and was a consultant to KPMG on infrastructure projects in Latin America.
Replete with Brazilian greatness, but we listened to Miles Davis and Jimmy Cliff in there too; visitors are David Dye & Kim Junod for NPR/WXPN
I'm Pardal here in Brazil (that's "Sparrow" in English). The deep roots of this project are in Manhattan, where Allen Klein (managed the Beatles and The Rolling Stones) called me about royalties for the estate of Sam Cooke... where Jerry Ragovoy (co-wrote Time is On My Side, sung by the Stones; Piece of My Heart, Janis Joplin of course; and Pata Pata, sung by the great Miriam Makeba) called me looking for unpaid royalties... where I did contract and licensing for Carlinhos Brown's participation on Bahia Black with Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock...
...where I rescued unpaid royalties for Aretha Franklin (from Atlantic Records), Barbra Streisand (from CBS Records), Led Zeppelin, Mongo Santamaria, Gilberto Gil, Astrud Gilberto, Airto Moreira, Jim Hall, Wah Wah Watson (Melvin Ragin), Ray Barretto, Philip Glass, Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd for his interest in Bob Marley compositions, Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam and others...
...where I worked with Earl "Speedo" Carroll of the Cadillacs (who went from doo-wopping as a kid on Harlem streetcorners to top of the charts to working as a janitor at P.S. 87 in Manhattan without ever losing what it was that made him special in the first place), and with Jake and Zeke Carey of The Flamingos (I Only Have Eyes for You)... stuff like that.
Yeah this is Bob's first record contract, made with Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd of Studio One and co-signed by his aunt because he was under 21. I took it to Black Rock to argue with CBS' lawyers about the royalties they didn't want to pay (they paid).
Matrix founding creators are behind "one of 10 of the best (radios) around the world", per The Guardian.
This list is random, and incomplete. Reload the page for another list.
Pardal/Sparrow
Ex Terra Brasilis
Wolfram MathWorld
UNIVERSAL
Alicia Svigals
Susan Rogers
Julian Lloyd Webber
Clarice Assad
Luciano Calazans
Kamasi Washington
Randy Brecker
Gustavo Caribé
J Velloso
Lázaro Ramos
Fernando Guerreiro
Maria Marighella
Russell Okung
Bule Bule
Caetano Veloso
RÁDIO MATRIX