Rozanne Levine & Chakra Tuning at CSV Cultural Center, NYC

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The Vision Festival's Evolving Music Mondays continues into December with another performance in its Creative Sounds of Dissension series. On December 12th, they present Rozanne Levine & Chakra Tuning at 7:30PM, followed by Vincent Chancey's Phat Chance at 8:45PM and Tony Malaby's TUKOTUKO at 10:00PM. The performances take place at the CSV Cultural Center's LES Gallery in Lower Manhattan, at 107 Suffolk Street. Rozanne Levine & Chakra Tuning weave a magical musical tapestry from organically shifting melodies based on traditional notation, graphic scores and improvisation, creating music that is meditative, rich in images and moods, and takes the listener on a transforming, unfolding journey.

Speaking of clarinetist and composer Rozanne Levine's latest recording, Only Moment, Cadence music critic Phillip McNally acknowledges her as a "mature artist" making a "powerful statement" – an artist who has "labored long and hard at [her] craft, found [her] individual voice." Her 4-piece ensemble Chakra Tuning gives voice to her love of improvisational spontaneity and organic, subtly shifting sounds. Sonic conversations emerge and develop as the group explores textures, sonorities and space.

Ms. Levine performs on alto clarinet, clarinet and bamboo flute, and her long-time band mate Mark Whitecage joins her on clarinet and alto & soprano saxes. Adding their totally original voices to Chakra Tuning are clarinetist Perry Robinson and violinist/vocalist Rosi Hertlein.

Rozanne Levine's compositions form the main thematic material from which the musicians improvise, each artist adding their distinct voice to the mix as well as compositions. Ms. Levine draws inspiration for her work from myths from China to New Zealand, cosmologies and spiritual traditions both east and west, and current events, out of which she and her band mates weave a musical tapestry. Bird whistles, ocarinas, half horns, Native American rattles, percussion, Rozanne's photographs, and storytelling play a part in the group sound.

Rozanne Levine was introduced to jazz/new music fans as a performer with William Parker and Patricia Nicholson Parker's Centering Music/Dance Ensemble during the mid 1970s. She appears on William Parker's Eremite CD, Through Acceptance of the Mystery Peace/The Music of William Parker, a document of the early work of bassist Parker. In 1993 she rejoined the Parkers as a founding member of their New York-based Improvisors Collective and formed the Clarinet Choir and Crystal Clarinets to showcase her musical concepts. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s she performed in Mark Whitecage's Glass House Ensemble, playing both clarinet and Whitecage's sound sculptures. In 1999 Levine and Whitecage formed a touring duo, RoMarkable. Some of their work together is documented on Tres Gone Presents The Bi-Coastal Orchestra "Live" at the Dunes with Robert Mahaffay, Armen Halburian, Scott Steele, Eric Hausmann, Mark Whitecage and Rozanne Levine (Mahaffay Musical Archives).

Ms. Levine performs with Mark Whitecage and The Bi-Coastal Orchestra, a group of East and West Coast musicians that includes Scott Steele, Bill Larimer and Robert Mahaffay. In 2005 they released their debut CD, BushWacked – A Spoken Opera on the Acoustics label. She has performed with Anthony Braxton, The New Reed Quartet, Jason Kao Hwang, Jackson Krall, Theo Jorgensmann and Blaise Siwula, among others. She appeared in Johnny Reinhard's Microtonal Festival and appears annually in vocalist Nicki Mathis' Many Colors of a Woman Jazz Festival, and she has been a staple of various Clarinet Choirs. Ms. Levine is also a noted photographer and integrates her images into her scores. The Painted Bride Art Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania awarded her a commission grant for both her music and photographs. A gallery of her performance photographs is on the internet at http://www.erjn.it/gallery/levine.htm.

All the members of Chakra Tuning are acclaimed composers and bandleaders. Mark Whitecage is internationally known as an innovative instrumentalist and composer in the fields of jazz and new music. He has performed internationally and recorded with some of the leading artists of our time, including Jeanne Lee, Anthony Braxton, Jacques Coursil, The Nu Band, Drunk Butterfly, Gunter Hampel, Mario Pavone, Joe McPhee, William Parker, Marshall Allen and Steve Swell. Perry Robinson is a master of the clarinet in jazz, folk and avant-garde music who has worked with everyone from Dave Brubeck and Bill Dixon to Pete Seeger, George Clinton, Badal Roy and Anthony Braxton; and Rosi Hertlein is trained in both classical and new music idioms and she improvises on both violin and voice. She has performed and recorded with Cecil Taylor, John Tchicai, Pauline Oliveros, Reggie Workman, Joe McPhee, Joe Giardullo, Ivo Perelman, Wendy Osserman Dance Company, and Howard Johnson, to name a few.

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