Ali Jackson via giant steps through a matrix based in the phenomenon placing most of the 7.8 billion of us within 6 or fewer degrees — steps — of each other...
- Steps from Ali Jackson:
I'LL TAKE YOU THERE! ▶
'mātriks / "source" / from "mater", Latin for "mother". We're real mothers for ya!
I'LL TAKE YOU THERE! ▶
- Steps forward by: The Matrix
Who I Am & Where I Live
- Name: Ali Jackson
- City: West Orange, New Jersey
- Country: United States
- Hometown: Detroit, Michigan
My Life & Work
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Bio:
Award-winning musician, composer, arranger, educator, and percussionist Ali Jackson developed his talent at an early age. A virtuoso, Ali has contributed significant musical works as a composer and arranger and he holds the distinction of being the first percussionist to perform and create music across the entire spectrum of musical styles.
He began playing drums at the age of two and piano by the age of five. As a child growing up in Detroit, Ali found himself immersed in serious study alongside his father, the great jazz bassist Ali Jackson Sr., who gave him an intense introduction to music, taking him on gigs where he began playing professionally at eight years old.
Ali’s natural ability and passion for music bloomed and by the age of 11 his aptitude flourished as a result of a steady stream of lessons and mentoring from an all-star lineup of music legends, including Max Roach, Milt Hinton, Dr. Donald Byrd, Betty Carter, Aretha Franklin and James Mtume. During one lesson when he was 12, Ali met Wynton Marsalis and impressed the trumpet virtuoso and future collaborator with his maturity and his advanced knowledge of the piano and music theory — skills rare among drummers.
Ali graduated as a music major with high honors from Detroit’s prestigious Cass Tech High School, a program with a rich legacy of consistently producing the country’s top musicians.
As a student at the New School University for Contemporary Music in New York City, he was privileged to study with Max Roach and Elvin Jones. He attended college on a full academic scholarship, earning an undergraduate degree in music composition. In 1994 Ali was selected as the guest soloist for the Beacons of Jazz program honoring legendary jazz drummer Max Roach. The Thelonius Monk Institute and Jazz Aspen selected him to participate in the first annual Jazz Aspen for gifted and talented musicians. Ali was also the first recipient of the state of Michigan’s prestigious Artserv Emerging Artist award in 1998.
After moving to New York for college, Ali became highly sought after for his distinctive, powerful swing, which is marked by a comprehensive knowledge of different styles, genres and historical eras. Known for playing innovative, melodic drum solos utilizing all of the surfaces of the drum set, Ali’s playing is compact, tight and full of a simmering intensity that is unmistakable.
Upon graduation Ali spent several years touring and recording with a diverse group of musicians before accepting the role as Drum Chair of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra in 2005. Ali was the driving heartbeat of the big band, which was founded by Wynton Marsalis to bring together the world’s top jazz musicians on every instrument to showcase the music of Duke Ellington and other great composers and arrangers. As an integral part of the rhythm section, Ali’s playing helped define the sound of the JLCO and Wynton Marsalis for more than a decade and is documented in hundreds of recordings and videos of concerts that were witnessed by millions around the globe.
Ali has performed and recorded with a multitude of artists including Wynton Marsalis, Jon Batiste, Willie Nelson, Tony Bennett, Faith Hill, Karriem Riggins, Bobby McFerrin, Buster Williams, Norah Jones, Eric Clapton, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Aretha Franklin, George Benson, Harry Connick, Jr., KRS-1, Marcus Roberts, Joshua Redman, Vinx, Seito Kinen, Seiji Ozawa, Diana Krall, Gerald Albright, Michael Heise, Russell Gunn, James Morrison, Craig Handy, Jacky Terrasson, Kurt Rosenwinkel, and the New York City Ballet.
As a bandleader, Ali has recorded five albums, including Amalgamations, Wheelz Keep Rollin’, Big Brown Getdown and the Yes! Trio album. Ali’s playing is featured on more than 40 other albums, including Congo Square, Touchdown, Gunn Fu, Young Gunn Plus, European Sessions, Live at Yoshi’s, Reflections in Change, Back East, Two Men With The Blues, Three-Five, Here We Go Again: Celebrating the Genius of Ray Charles, He and She, The Magic Hour and From the Plantation to the Penitentiary. Jackson also collaborated with jazz greats Cyrus Chestnut, Reginald Veal, and James
Carter on Gold Sounds, an innovative album that sought to transform songs by indie alternative rock band Pavement into unique virtuosic interpretations with the spirit of the church and the attitude of the juke joint. His production skills can be heard on George Benson’s album Irreplaceable. He is also the voice of Duck Ellington, a character in the Penguin book series Baby Loves Jazz.
Ali is also an acclaimed composer whose voice is unique in its command of the universal language of the groove and the power of thoughtful use of space — both rhythmically and harmonically. His most recent masterworks include the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra-commissioned Living Grooves: A World in Jazz Rhythm, and a ballet composed for the Alvin Ailey Dance Company titled r-Evolution, Dream.
Ali’s collaborations with other artists continue to push the envelope of jazz music and its connection to the human spirit. In 2010, Ali executive produced an original work called Beats of NYC, a project blending the musical idioms of Congolese, Senegalese, Tap, and modern dances juxtaposed with various styles of spoken word and the history of the blues. He also composed a ballet with long-time collaborator Hope Boykin titled Ballet: Watching go by the Day.
Beyond the performance stage, Ali takes a leading role in advocating for arts and musical education to build stronger communities around the world. As an active supporter of the arts, music, and the humanities, Ali believes in the power of jazz education to help students cope with life experiences by creating a positive mindset and working collectively toward common goals. He has donated musical instruments and conducted numerous master classes in the effort to improve music knowledge and uplift aspiring students. He has given lectures on jazz and culture at New York University, Stanford University, Eastman College of Music and Columbia University and has taught hundreds of music education classes for grade school students across the country.
Contact Information
- Email: info@alidrums.com
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Management/Booking:
Management & Booking
Robert Fleischmann
Management & Booking US /America
rfleischmgmt@gmail.com
Elvire Delagrange
Note Only Management & Booking France / Europe:
elviredelagrange@noteonly.com
My Media & Markets
- ▶ Twitter: alidrums
- ▶ Instagram: ajaxdrums
- ▶ Website: http://alidrums.com
- ▶ Blog: http://alidrums.com/news/
- ▶ YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/alijacksonjr
- ▶ YouTube Music: http://music.youtube.com/channel/UCqTKVaJ5P_S9Jp9eN4AO7zg
- ▶ Spotify: http://open.spotify.com/album/5HpcL5QwL69nFU2Ew6QOKL
- ▶ Spotify 2: http://open.spotify.com/album/3xhKoxjBmsiJTEG75Ct9iJ
- ▶ Spotify 3: http://open.spotify.com/album/3H779IqcX12IPfKnVnWBlp
Clips (more may be added)
The world's artistry via giant steps through a matrix based in the phenomenon placing most of the 7.8 billion of us within 6 or fewer degrees — steps — of each other ...
... a project conceived and built in the fertile, fecund and atavistic ground zero of Bahia, Brazil initially for the discoverability of this singular region's dispossessed genius.
All explained in the window immediately below. Followed — beneath this window — by scores of magnificent artists, each leading to myriads more artists/categories. Inside this window also may be found our Brazilian record store radio, named by British journal The Guardian as one of 10 of the Best Radio Stations Around the World!
IF YOU CAN'T STAND THE HEAT
Brazil is not a European nation. It's not a North American nation. It's not an East Asian nation. It straddles -- jungle and desert and dense urban centers -- both the equator and the Tropic of Capricorn. It absorbed over ten times the number of African slaves taken to the United States of America, and much of its aboriginal population was absorbed into the general population-at-large. Its people have lived under oligarchy, plutocracy, dictatorships and massive corruption, with elements of these still strongly entrenched today.
But!
Brazil has buzz...not the shallow buzz of a fashionable moment...but the deep buzz of a population which in spite of -- or perhaps because of -- the tough slog through life they've been allotted by humanity's dregs-in-fine-linen, have chosen not to simply pull themselves along but to lift their voices in song and their bodies in dance...to eat well and converse well and much and to wring the joy out of the day-to-day happenings and small pleasures of life which are so often set aside or ignored in the European, North American, and East Asian nations.
For this Brazil has a genius perhaps unparalleled in all other countries and societies, a genius which thrives alongside peeling paint and holes in the streets and roads, under bad organization by the powers-that-be, both civil and governmental, under a constant rain of societal indignities...
Which is all to say that if you don't know Brazil and you're expecting any semblance of order, progress and light, you will certainly find the light! And the buzz of a people who for generations have responded to privation at many different levels by somehow rising above it all.
Raimundo Sodré, in a conversation ranging from New Orleans to Harlem and the South Side of Chicago ... through Appalachia and Irish villages and Russian shtetls and the unofficial symbol of Brazil's Bahian-born national music (the pandeiro) almost certainly having arrived in Brazil in the hands of Sephardic Jews (including conversos) fleeing the Inquisition, once remarked: "Where there's misery, there's music!"
A pandeirista on the roof. And it's not just music. And it's not just Brazil.
