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Graham Haynes

Regarded as an innovator on cornet and flugelhorn, an extraordinary composer, and an emerging force in contemporary electronic music and world music, Graham Haynes has redefined and deconstructed that genre we still call jazz. While his main instrument is the cornet, he is by no means making jazz music these days. Haynes uses technology to create imaginative, subtle sonic environments. Even amidst electronic processing, his horn stands out, providing a level of expression that humanizes and elevates the synthetic sounds.

The son of legendary jazz drummer Roy Haynes, Graham was born in 1960 and raised in Hollis, Queens, where he was surrounded by innovators (his neighbors included Roy Eldridge, Milt Jackson, and Jaki Byard). While studying composition, harmony and theory at Queens College, Graham developed an interest in classical and electronic music (Robert Moog was professor of electronic music at that time). In 1979, he met alto saxophonist Steve Coleman. They formed a band called Five Elements, which launched the M-Base collective, an influential group of New York improvisers. Haynes spent much of the 1980s collaborating with Coleman and Cassandra Wilson. In the late 1980s he formed his own ensemble, Graham Haynes and No Image, and recorded his first album as a leader, "What Time it Be?"

During the late 1980`s, Haynes immersed himself in a wide range of African, Arabic, and South Asian music which prompted his move to Paris in 1990. There he recorded Nocturne Parisian and "The Griots Footsteps", for French PolyGram Records. Haynes spent the next three years studying and performing with masters of African and Asian music, occasionally returning to the U.S. to work with artists such as Ed Blackwell, George Russell, Uri Caine, David Murray and many others. In 1993, Haynes moved back to New York City, where he began investigating sampling and hip hop music. The album "Transition" came out of this investigation. His next project, "Tones for the Twenty-First Century", combined sound effects, textures, drones, and samples, layered over Haynes' electronically manipulated horn.

Graham was extensively working with DJs within drum-n-bass scene in NYC, UK and Europe throughout the 90's. In 2000, he recorded the critically acclaimed "BPM" (Knitting Factory Records), a fusion of drum-n-bass programming and operatic music, specifically the late music of Richard Wagner. Haynes uses technology to create imaginative and even subtle sonic environments, and, of course, he is an evocative player on his primary instrument, the good old-fashioned cornet. "Even amidst all the electronic processing, his horn stands out, providing a level of expression that humanizes and elevates BPM's synthetic sounds." (Dave Lynch, All Music Guide).

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Album Review

Yuko Fujiyama: Quiet Passion

Read "Quiet Passion" reviewed by John Sharpe


American-based Japanese pianist Yuko Fujiyama has recorded sparingly over a 40-year career, so the arrival of Quiet Passion, only the fourth date under her leadership, is an occasion to perk up the ears. Also noteworthy is the unusual instrumentation she has chosen, supplementing her piano with the cornet of Graham Haynes and electronics of Ikue Mori. The resultant 13 cuts constitute a deeply personal album, introspective but simmering with pent up emotion and steely determination. Like many ...

8
Album Review

OGJB Quartet: Ode To O

Read "Ode To O" reviewed by John Sharpe


An assemblage of stars doesn't always result in a constellation. But astronomers will need to take note in the case of the OGJB Quartet, called after the forename initials of the four members: reedman Oliver Lake, cornetist Graham Haynes, bassist Joe Fonda and drummer Barry Altschul. On the venerable collective's second album Ode To O following their eponymous debut in 2019, one of the most striking traits is how much they sound like a band. As might be expected in ...

3
Album Review

Yuko Fujiyama, Graham Haynes, Ikue Mori: Quiet Passion

Read "Quiet Passion" reviewed by Mark Corroto


Pianist Yuko Fujiyama does not routinely release music. When she does, it is always for a special purpose. This trio recording, Quiet Passion, was preceded by Night Wave (Innova Recordings, 2018) and, like her previous album, she is joined by cornetist Graham Haynes. The trio is completed by fellow Japanese- born expatriate Ikue Mori a longtime mainstay of New York's Downtown scene. Fujiyama, a Cecil Taylor devotee, has maintained the essence of Taylor's art but, through the years, she has ...

6
Album Review

The OGJB Quartet: Ode To O

Read "Ode To O" reviewed by Jerome Wilson


The OGJB Quartet, a formidable all-star grouping of saxophonist Oliver Lake, cornetist Graham Haynes, bassist Joe Fonda and drummer Barry Altschul, are back with their second album, one even more wide-ranging and soulful than their first, Bamako, (TUM, 2019). The album combines tracks based on gutbucket rhythms with others full of exploratory abstractions. The album title, Ode To O, refers to Ornette Coleman and the title track, written by Altschul, has he and Fonda laying down an assured ...

7
Album Review

Warriors of the Wonderful Sound: Soundpath

Read "Soundpath" reviewed by Mark Corroto


If we alter President John F. Kennedy's 1962 moon spaceflight speech just a bit, it easily fits the big band adaptation of Muhal Richard Abrams' magnum opus Soundpath, “We choose to perform this composition not because it is easy, but because it is hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept." Accepting the challenge was band leader Bobby Zankel and ...

2
Album Review

Warriors of the Wonderful Sound: Soundpath

Read "Soundpath" reviewed by Giuseppe Segala


Nel 2011 il sassofonista di Filadelfia Bobby Zankel, leader della big band The Warriors of the Wonderful Sound e promotore di laboratori di musica contemporanea, propose a Muhal Richard Abrams un lavoro compositivo che avrebbe dovuto essere affidato alla band, con la direzione dello stesso pianista. Operazioni di questo tipo erano già state realizzate da Zankel negli anni precedenti con le musiche per big band di Julius Hemphill, dirette da Marty Ehrlich, poi con composizioni di Rudresh Mahanthappa e Steve ...

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Extended Analysis

Soundpath

Read "Soundpath" reviewed by Victor L. Schermer


Muhal Richard Abrams (1930-2017) was a revered pianist, composer and teacher of great capability and range who, in addition to his own achievements, inspired and influenced many jazz musicians in both the mainstream and avant-garde categories. Largely self-taught as a result of a personal decision to follow his own path, and early on pursuing church music, big band, blues, bebop and avant-garde jazz in his home city of jny: Chicago, he grasped music from its roots, and so was able ...

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Recording

Acclaimed Experimental Wizard Graham Haynes to Release "Full Circle"

Acclaimed Experimental Wizard Graham Haynes to Release "Full Circle"

Source: Now Forward Music

Full Circle unites the worlds of free-jazz, drum n bass, noise and experimental electronic music

On June 26, RKM Music/Kindred Rhythm Music Group will release Full Circle - the brand new album from forward thinking musician/composer/sound artist Graham Haynes, who is long known as an artist that cannot be contained by artistic boundaries and styles. Haynes' new album - his first in seven years - features numerous guest musicians and traverses a musical world in which jazz, drum ...

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Ode To O

TUM Records
2022

buy

Quiet Passion

Intakt Records
2022

buy

Then & Now

Postcards
2022

buy

Soundpath

Clean Feed Records
2020

buy

Full Circle

RKM Music
2007

buy

BPM

Cuneiform Records
2000

buy

Ode to O

From: Ode To O
By Graham Haynes

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