CURATION
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from this page:
by Augmented Matrix
Network Node
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Name:
Richie Barshay
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City/Place:
New York City
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Country:
United States
Life
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Bio:
Richie Barshay began drumming inside kitchen cabinets at an early age, and continues banging on things worldwide to this day.
Noted for his work with the Herbie Hancock Quartet (2003-2007), he's been dubbed "a major rhythm voice on the rise" by Downbeat magazine, and The Guardian (UK) praises "the arrival of a major innovator who also knows how to have fun."
On tour and recordings his diverse résumé includes Hancock, Chick Corea, Esperanza Spalding, The Klezmatics, Fred Hersch, Kenny Werner, Lee Konitz, Natalie Merchant, Bobby McFerrin, and Pete Seeger among others.
Since 2004 he has led outreach projects across 5 continents as an American Musical Envoy with the U.S. State Department. Based in New York City, he can be heard on over 75 recordings including his latest release as leader, Sanctuary (2014), featuring Chick Corea.
More
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Quotes, Notes & Etc.
"Drummer Barshay provided a wealth of energetic support, never losing his nimble way even at the sometimes breakneck paces...He turned the dreaded drum solo segment into an engaging rhythmic call-and-response exercise with the crowd."
Randy Lewis - Los Angeles Times
"Richie Barshay is one of New York's most sought after jazz drummers."
The Seattle Times
"He is one of those players who just needs to breathe on his drum kit to set up a rhythm. His light touch, incorporating tablas, electronic percussion and crisp-sounding cymbals, ensured that there was always an interesting pulse."
The Herald (Edinburgh, Scotland)
“Richie Barshay plays like that.....It’s like a deep fundamental groove that’s always there, no matter how many notes.” Russ Titelman, three-time Grammy Award-winning producer
"Barshay also struck gold with his drum solo on the second to last song, mixing styles and rhythms with ease."
DCMetroTheaterArts
“Then he played, and the tapestry of sound he created - from soft snare rattles and delicate cymbal breezes to electronic percussion - announced the arrival of a major innovator who also knows how to have fun.” “A theme based on a Peruvian rhythm, a twisting Indian tabla feature...confirmed what unusual angles the gifted Barshay comes from. This is just the beginning for him.”
John Fordham - The Guardian (UK)
"This man is a serious percussionist and composer for percussion. Something beneficial has happened to my heartbeat. "
Robert R Calder - PopMatters Music Review
"A player to watch." “He fervently explores the many instruments and rhythms at his beck and call.”
Scott Albin - JazzTimes.
"A fascinating musician."
Chick Corea
“Homework introduces a major rhythm voice on the rise.”
“Some use the word ‘painterly’ to describe piano players engaged in impressionistic flights of fancy. This description also suits the graceful determined phrasings of Richie Barshay.”
Ken Micallef - Downbeat
"Utterly fabulous and uplifting...this musegician drummer/percussionist is a master with the muse and a true gift to this land."
Nancy Nash - June Award nominee Canadian blues singer
“Playing a hybrid kit incorporating hand drums, percussion, and trap set, Barshay swings his butt off, simultaneously creating a Jazz/Indian world like Tony Williams setting fire to the Ganges.”
Modern Drummer
"Listening to Richie Barshay's deft drumming is always a treat."
Time Out New York
“On Homework, his striking debut as a leader, Herbie Hancock’s current drummer, Richie Barshay, effectively incorporated tabla into his drum kit while adding a wide spectrum of Indian and Afro-Cuban instruments to the fabric of his brilliantly original compositions. Tabla has a prominent role throughout.… And we’re not talking overdubbing here. Barshay actually plays the tabla at the kit while simultaneously activating the bass drum and hi-hat with his feet, then alternately picking up sticks to traverse his snare and toms in organic fashion.”
“a showcase of Zen-like cymbal work”"
Bill Milkowski - Traps: The Art of Drumming
"All the right stuff, so we have hope...continues to impress us all with his swing and musicality. "
Bob Brookmeyer
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