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| Skychefs, Tomchess and James Keepnews to Perform at Knitting Factory -- June 12 Improvisation goes global and undergoes electro-shock therapy at the Knitting Factory's Old Office on Sunday, Jun 12th, as Richi Debonis' Skychefs, the new inter-galactic free-funk rave group, joins forces with multi-cultural multi-instrumentalist Tomchess and computer-interactive guitarist and improviser James Keepnews for scorching sets of new, experimental beat-driven electronic explorations, drawing upon music from around the world for their inspiration. Skychefs lifts off from the template defined by the genre-exploding work of electric Miles Davis and late-century, slice-and-dice DJs, blasting into uncharted realms powered by the exceptional, jazz-honed talents of its members. Led by drummer Richi Debonis -- whose jazz chops and tight, fast drum 'n bass jungle beats for which he is renowned -- Skychefs serves up a tantalizing array of directions in music including electronica, jazz and funk that will rock your senses and show you a groovy taste of the future. Joining Richi will be saxophonist Joel Frahm and his fellow performers on the bill for the evening. Both Tomchess and James Keepnews have had a long association with New York area experiemental music, and this will be the first appearance at the Knitting Factory for either in many years. Richi Debonis (SkyChef Drummer, leader) has preformed and recorded with great musicians of all styles and eras. Jaco Pastorius, Ace Frehley, Bill Watrous, Ron Carter, Chris Potter to name but a few. He has been touring recently with Chris Calloway (singer, daughter of Cab Calloway) and jazz great Frank Morgan. He currently has numerous creative projects in New York City including SkyChefs, the Nowtet and many others. Tomchess (Ney, western flute, Oud) is a Multiinstrumentalist/Improviser/Composer. He plays reeds, flute, arabic/turkish ney flute, oud, djembé and guitar. He has performed with Drummer Ronald Shannon Jackson' Decoding Society, Butch Morris's Sheng Skyscraper, recorded with Tenor players Dewey Redman, and Pharoah Sanders, Morrocan Sintarist Hassan Hakmoun and drummer Cody Moffett. He also leads a guitar trio with Drummer Phil Haynes and bassist Drew Gress called Seven Times a Year. He has studied Middle Eastern and West African music spending time in West Africa playing and performing. He has studied with Bassam Saba, Tidiani Bangoura, Abdul Aziz Tourè and Mohammad Camarra. He currently lives in NYC where he performs in the trio Music of Their Disapearance with Matt Heyner and David Gould, his ensembles The Lovedogs, and Bombpop. James Keepnews is a musician, composer, writer, actor and multimedia artist -- often blurring each of these roles in his work. He has performed with dozens of bands and performing artists over the course of two decades, including George Lewis, Joe Giardullo, Linda Montano, Holland Hopson, Damian Catera and many others. Keepnews has performed at such venues as The Kitchen, Knitting Factory, Bard College, Bennington College, Washington Square Church, Continental, One Station Plaza, among many others. write your comments about the article :: © 2005 Jazz News :: home page |