On the occasion of the JAM Performance Festival, acclaimed artists and musicians come together to present a weekend of Lawrence D. “Butch” Morris’s Conduction®, including Vernon Reid, collaborating musicians from Greg Tate’s Burnt Sugar The Arkestra Chamber, rotating special guest soloists James Blood Ulmer and David A. Barnes, Beans and DJ Logic, and Brandee Younger, as well as live projections by Allison Costa. A cornetist, conductor, and composer, Morris developed Conduction® as a vocabulary of hand signs and baton gestures to direct a creative ensemble of any kind. Short for “conducted improvisation,” the practice invokes the scientific term for the transfer of heat or energy, and is a means for people across disciplines to commune and create as they go.

Morris passed on the method to musicians and key collaborators at JAM, including Greg Tate and Vernon Reid. Tate was the founder of Burnt Sugar The Arkestra Chamber and a famed writer, musician, and cultural critic. Deftly moving between music and text, his creativity bridges written, musical, and visual disciplines, setting the tone for new generations of critics and artists alike to move across fields of inquiry. Each evening’s “J.A.M. On It” Conduction® pays homage to Morris, Tate, and their play with two meanings of “jam”: a sweet mixture and a form of improvisation.

For more information about this performance, please visit the event website.