Network Node
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Name:
Jacám Manricks
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City/Place:
At large in California
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Country:
United States
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Hometown:
Brisbane, Australia
Life
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Bio:
Sri Lankan/Portuguese Australian-born saxophonist/composer Jacam Manricks was raised in a musical family. His parents were resident classical musicians in the state symphony in his hometown of Brisbane and his grandfather was a famous Portuguese jazz clarinetist and saxophonist in Sri Lanka. As a child Jacam frequently attended his parents’ symphony concerts and was introduced to jazz at home through his fathers’ jazz record collection. Due to these surroundings, Jacam was able to build a diverse musical foundation from a young age that combined jazz and classical music, two genres that continue to influence his music today. Jacam began studying piano at age 5 and the alto saxophone at 9. His formal musical training continued in New York in 2001, culminating with a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in JazzArts from the Manhattan School of Music in 2007.
As a saxophonist and woodwind player, Jacam has performed and/or recorded with some of the most prestigious international artists of our time. He has performed at venues such as the Jazz Standard, the Jazz Gallery, Cornelia Street Café, Smalls, and Jazz at Lincoln Center.
As a composer, soloist and ensemble leader, Jacam has recorded six albums to date (Sky’s the Limit, Labyrinth, Trigonometry, Could Nine, Chamber Jazz, and GilManricks). His music has been highly commended in major jazz magazines, websites and newspapers in the United States, Canada, France, Italy, Ireland, Germany, Australia, New Zealand and elsewhere. In 2009 Jacam released his second album Labyrinth, which received rave reviews in JazzTimes, Downbeat, All About Jazz-NY, Sydney Morning Herald and the Irish Times among others. Labyrinth consists of Jacam’s compositions for jazz quintet and chamber orchestra and features some of New York’s finest jazz soloists (Ben Monder – guitars, Thomas Morgan – bass, Tyshawn Sorey – drums, Jacob Sacks – piano and himself on saxophones/woodwinds).
His third album Trigonometry, which was recorded in New York in May 2010 (Posi-tone Records), features Jacam’s compositions for jazz quartet and septet, performed by leading New York jazz artists (Gary Versace – piano, Joe Martin – bass, Obed Calvaire – drums, Scott Wendholt – trumpet, Alan Ferber – trombone and himself – saxophones). Trigonometry has been highly praised by writers for international jazz market media magazines, newspapers and websites. These include Jazz Times, The New York Times, All About Jazz, Time Out-New York, The Australian, The Sydney Morning Herald, Ottowa Citizen, All Music Guide, EJazzNews and more. In October 2011, Jacam recorded Could Nine (Posi-tone Records), released in 2012. The album features Jacam’s original compositions and arrangements for jazz quartet performed by internationally respected jazz artists (Adam Rogers– guitar, Matt Wilson – drums, Sam Yahel-Organ, and himself – alto saxophone).
Jacam has received a number of prestigious awards and scholarships for artistic excellence and touring, such as the International Pathways Touring Grant in 2011, the Contemporary Music Touring Program awards in 2010, 2009 and 2008, the Australian National Jazz Award- 2009, the Marten Bequest Arts Fellowship in 2005 and the Queensland Lord Mayors Performing Arts Fellowship in 2000. He has toured extensively throughout Europe, Australia, Canada and the US as a soloist and/or bandleader.
Jacam has composed works for a number of different ensembles worldwide. These include a Suite for Symphony Orchestra and Big Band, which was premiered as a part of the Manhattan School of Music’s 90th Anniversary Celebration Concert in New York in October 2007. The concert featured Jacam as composer/orchestrator and alto saxophone soloist. He has written and/or conducted other works for the William Patterson University Big Band (New Jersey, USA), the Manhattan School of Music Jazz Orchestra (New York, USA), The Mothership Jazz Orchestra (Sydney, Australia), numerous ensembles at the Helsinki Polytechnics Pop and Jazz Conservatory (Finland), the Norwegian Academy of Music in Oslo (Norway Fall-2010), and the Queensland Conservatorium of Music (Brisbane, Australia).
In addition to performing and composing, Jacam is a very experienced musical educator. He has done lectures, courses, master classes and clinics at internationally renowned institutions such as the Manhattan School of Music (New York, NY), the William Paterson University (Patterson, NJ), the New School of Jazz and Contemporary Music (New York, NY), University of California Davis (Davis, CA), University of Toronto (Canada), Sydney Conservatorium of Music (Sydney, Australia), Victorian College of the Arts (Melbourne, Australia), Queensland Conservatorium of Music (Brisbane, Australia).
Jacam received his Bachelor degree in Music Performance from the Queensland Conservatorium, Brisbane, Australia in 2000, his Masters degree in jazz composition and arranging at the William Paterson University in New Jersey in 2003, and his Doctor of Musical Arts (DMA) degree from the Manhattan School of Music, New York, in 2007 as one of the first doctorate-level graduates in the field of jazz composition/performance/pedagogy.
More
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Quotes, Notes & Etc.
"Superb saxophone work, intellectually stimulating writing and ingenious dovetailed rhythmic lines"
- ALL ABOUT JAZZ
"First class talent... a potent swinging chemistry... he gives the genre meaning that people can relate to and apply to their own lives"
- JAZZ TIMES MAGAZINE
"Mellifluous... meditative... beautifully contoured... impressive collection of pieces"
- DOWNBEAT MAGAZINE
Clips (more may be added)
The Integrated Global Creative Economy
Wolfram Mathematics
This technological matrix originating in Bahia, Brazil and positioning creators around the world within reach of each other and the entire planet is able to do so because it is small-world (see Wolfram).
Bahia itself, final port-of-call for more enslaved human beings than any other place on earth throughout all of human history, refuge for Lusitanian Sephardim fleeing the Inquisition, Indigenous both apart and subsumed into a sociocultural matrix comprised of these three peoples and more, is small-world.
Human society, the billions of us, is small-world. Neural structures for human memory are small-world...
In small worlds great things are possible.
Alicia Svigals
"Thanks, this is a brilliant idea!!"
—Alicia Svigals (NEW YORK CITY): Apotheosis of klezmer violinists
"I'm truly thankful ... Sohlangana ngokuzayo :)"
—Nduduzo Makhathini (JOHANNESBURG): piano, Blue Note recording artist
"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
"We appreciate you including Kamasi in the matrix, Sparrow."
—Banch Abegaze (LOS ANGELES): manager, Kamasi Washington
"Thanks! It looks great!....I didn't write 'Cantaloupe Island' though...Herbie Hancock did! Great Page though, well done! best, Randy"
"Very nice! Thank you for this. Warmest regards and wishing much success for the project! Matt"
—Son of Jimmy Garrison (bass for John Coltrane, Bill Evans...); plays with Herbie Hancock and other greats...
Dear friends & colleagues,
Having arrived in Salvador 13 years earlier, I opened a record shop in 2005 in order to create an outlet to the wider world for Bahian musicians, many of them magisterial but unknown.
David Dye & Kim Junod for NPR found us (above), and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (he's a huge jazz fan), David Byrne, Oscar Castro-Neves... Spike Lee walked past the place while I was sitting on the stoop across the street drinking beer and listening to samba from the speaker in the window...
But we weren't exactly easy for the world-at-large to get to. So in order to extend the place's ethos I transformed the site associated with it into a network wherein Brazilian musicians I knew would recommend other Brazilian musicians, who would recommend others...
And as I anticipated, the chalky hand of God-as-mathematician intervened: In human society — per the small-world phenomenon — most of the billions of us on earth are within some 6 or fewer degrees of each other. Likewise, within a network of interlinked artists as I've described above, most of these artists will in the same manner be at most a handful of steps away from each other.
So then, all that's necessary to put the Bahians and other Brazilians within possible purview of the wide wide world is to include them among a wide wide range of artists around that world.
If, for example, Quincy Jones is inside the matrix (people who have passed are not removed), then anybody on his page — whether they be accessing from a campus in L.A., a pub in Dublin, a shebeen in Cape Town, a tent in Mongolia — will be close, transitable steps away from Raymundo Sodré, even if they know nothing of Brazil and are unaware that Sodré sings/dances upon this planet. Sodré, having been knocked from the perch of fame and ground into anonymity by Brazil's dictatorship, has now the alternative of access to the world-at-large via recourse to the vast potential of network theory.
...to the degree that other artists et al — writers, researchers, filmmakers, painters, choreographers...everywhere — do also. Artificial intelligence not required. Real intelligence, yes.
Years ago in NYC I "rescued" unpaid royalties (performance & mechanical) for artists/composers including Barbra Streisand, Aretha Franklin, Mongo Santamaria, Jim Hall, Clement "Coxsone" Dodd (for his rights in Bob Marley compositions; Clement was Bob's first producer), Led Zeppelin, Ray Barretto, Philip Glass and many others. Aretha called me out of the blue vis-à-vis money owed by Atlantic Records. Allen Klein (managed The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Ray Charles) called about money due the estate of Sam Cooke. Jerry Ragovoy (Time Is On My Side, Piece of My Heart) called just to see if he had any unpaid money floating around out there (the royalty world was a shark-filled jungle, to mangle metaphors, and I doubt it's changed).
But the pertinent client (and friend) in the present context is Earl "Speedo" Carroll, of The Cadillacs. Earl went from doo-wopping on Harlem streetcorners to chart-topping success to working as a custodian at PS 87 elementary school on the west side of Manhattan. Through all of this he never lost what made him great.
Greatness and fame are too often conflated. The former should be accessible independently of the latter.
Matrix founding creators are behind "one of 10 of the best (radios) around the world", per The Guardian.
Recent access to this matrix and Bahia are from these places (a single marker can denote multiple accesses).
Across the creative universe... For another list, reload page.
This list is random, and incomplete. Reload the page for another list.
For a complete list of everybody inside, tap TOTAL below:
TOTAL
Nduduzo Makhathini
Susan Rogers
Julian Lloyd Webber
Clarice Assad
Kamasi Washington
Randy Brecker
Matt Garrison
RÁDIO MATRIX