Regina Carter
PROJECTS:
Violinist/educator Regina Carter is a recipient of the MacArthur ‘genius’ award and a Doris Duke Artist Award, has been named an NEA Jazz Master, and is a three-time Pulitzer Prize jurist. In 2018, Regina Carter was named artistic director of the Geri Allen Jazz Camp, formerly named, New Jersey Performing Arts All-Female Jazz Residency.
Regina tours with her own group and has appeared with such performers as Wynton Marsalis and JALC, Kenny Barron, Ray Brown, Mary J. Blige, Chucho Valdés, Joe Jackson, Billy Joel, Dolly Parton and Omara Portuondo. She has also been a guest soloist with several major symphony orchestras, including the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Pops, and the Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo.
She is currently on the faculty of the Manhattan School of Music and New Jersey City University and is artist in residence at the Oakland University School of Music, Theatre, and Dance. She has been resident artist for San Francisco Performances, and resident artistic director for SFJAZZ.
GONE IN A PHRASE OF AIR
Regina Carter’s projects – including Reverse Thread, Southern Comfort, and Simply Ella – have always been very personal stories, journeys of self-discovery and identity achieved by researching and understanding family and subjects that have impacted her family. In her newest project, GONE IN A PHRASE OF AIR, Regina explores areas across America where hundreds of thousands of its citizens, most often African Americans, immigrants, and the disadvantaged, witnessed their homes, businesses, and churches being demolished, all in the name of urban renewal.
Detroit, Regina’s hometown, has always attracted and been the home of many of America’s music legends. Jazz greats including Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, and Teddy Harris Jr. performed in Black Bottom and Paradise Valley, two of the city’s predominantly black neighborhoods that were lively hubs of culture, commerce, faith, and families.
Beginning in the 1950s, however, Black Bottom and Paradise Valley were targeted for demolition, making way for highways and public housing developments as part of a nationwide urban renewal movement. Countless numbers of people were displaced, often without financial support or any regard for their well-being.
By the early 1960s, similar areas around the country – Mill Creek Valley in St. Louis; the Hayti district in Durham, North Carolina; Bronzeville in Chicago; and neighborhoods in Coos Bay, Oregon, Boston, and Lubbock, Texas, among many others – with their own musical greats, like Grady Tate and Sam Cooke, were gone, “Gone in a Phrase of Air, just as if they had never been there” (poet Leslie Reese, “Black Bottom”*).
GONE IN A PHRASE OF AIR celebrates these vanished communities and some of the music associated with them. It will reach a broad range of listeners and strike a responsive chord. Listeners who have ties to similar communities will enjoy the message and the music, and others new to these stories will discover the vibrancy and spirit of these lost places.
The program will include original music as well as music of that time, poetry, and spoken word, and the concert experience will include visual art elements as well.
For Grammy nominated artist Regina Carter, the violin isn’t simply an improvisational vehicle; it’s a passport to unexpected realms. Her quest for beauty combined with her passion for excellence did not escape the attention of the MacArthur Foundation, which awarded Regina their prestigious MacArthur fellowship “genius grant.” San Francisco Performances also took note of Regina’s exceptional work and appointed her Artist-in-Residence for five years. She also served as one of the Resident Artistic Directors for the discerning SFJAZZ during its inaugural season in its spectacular new home. Most recently, the acclaimed violinist was awarded a Doris Duke Artist Award and in 2018 was appointed as the Director of the New Jersey Performing Arts Center’s All-Female Jazz Residency, a unique summer immersion program for aspiring women jazz professionals.
*“Black Bottom,” an original composition by Regina Carter, was created in 2006/2007 as a commission by Lincoln Center.
REGINA CARTER & XAVIER DAVIS DUO
In this intimate offering, described as a “simpatico merging of two great musical minds and four talented hands” by Twin Cities Pioneer Press, violinist Regina Carter and pianist Xavier Davis have an electric connection on stage. Hailed as the foremost jazz violinist of her generation, Regina Carter’s quest for beauty combined with her passion for excellence did not escape the attention of the MacArthur Foundation, awarding her a prestigious “genius grant” fellowship. Regina has a very special musical relationship with Xavier Davis, and she has performed on-and-off with Davis since 2004. Featured on more than 50 albums and known as one of the most accomplished jazz pianists in the world, Davis is considered a virtuoso in his own regard. Coming together for a series of performances in 2018 and 2019, the Regina Carter & Xavier Davis duo program is a “near-telepathic” experience, according to the Twin Cities Pioneer Press, as the two extremely accomplished musicians complement each other with their respective talents.
SYMPHONY
Considered the foremost jazz violinist of her generation, Regina Carter transcends genre in a symphony program that draws influences not only from jazz, but blues, roots, and classical idioms as well. The centerpiece of this collection is a piece entitled “4 Sisters” composed by David Schiff to honor four legendary vocalists: Aretha Franklin, Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, and Sarah Vaughan. In a breathtaking performance of “4 Sisters” with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Regina “announced her charismatic presence by painting the air with swing” (Detroit Free Press). This piece features solo violin with orchestra. Regina has additional charts available for jazz quartet plus orchestra, including selections from her album Paganini: After a Dream. VIDEO / AUDIO
PRESS QUOTES:
“A talented, charismatic player who is almost single-handedly reviving interest in the violin as a jazz instrument”
The Los Angeles Times
“Ms. Carter, jazz’s leading mainstream violinist, plays with a thick, warm-molasses tone; she’s equally indebted to classical technique and folk song”
The New York Times
“Regina Carter creates music that is wonderfully listenable, probingly intelligent and, at times, breathtakingly daring…taking the listener into the future of jazz”
Time Magazine
“Her impeccable pitch, lovely grace notes and delicately bent pitches reminding listeners of why she practically has become a symbol of jazz violin in our times. Moreover, she reaffirms that music as wholly accessible and entertaining as this also can be smart and sophisticated.”
The Chicago Tribune
