Jason Adasiewicz plays Roscoe Mitchell

Saturday, September 23

TIME: 3:00-4:00pm

VENUE: augustana lutheran church. 5500 south woodlawn ave.

Jason Adasiewicz

Vibraphonist, drummer, and composer Jason Adasiewicz is an essential player in Chicago’s avant-garde and improvised jazz scenes. He has played with countless acts including Mike Reed’s Loose Assembly, Rob Mazurek’s Starlicker and Exploding Star Orchestra, Josh Berman and His Gang, Nicole Mitchell’s Ice Crystal, James Falzone’s Klang, Ingebrigt Häker Flaten Chicago Sextet, and Ken Vandermark’s Topology, Audio One, and Midwest School, and has founded groups including Rolldown, the Jason Adasiewicz Duo, and (with Nate McBride and Mike Reed) the trio Sun Rooms. He has played and recorded widely, and performs frequently in Europe and at festivals including the Doek Festival in Amsterdam and the Made in Chicago Festival in Poland.

Program Notes from March 2023 Performance at Corbett vs. Dempsey Gallery

As a closing-day celebration for the Roscoe Mitchell exhibition Keeper of the Code: Paintings 1963-2022, CvsD is very pleased to present a special program of Mitchell's compositions transcribed, arranged, and performed by Jason Adasiewicz. One of the contemporary giants of Chicago's improvised music scene, Adasiewicz had been in discussion with CvsD about a Roscoe Mitchell project for years, inspired in part by the presence of tuned keys and other metallic percussion in Mitchell's oeuvre. The exhibition gave renewed impetus to its realization, with a secret commission: for the afterparty following Mitchell’s opening in January, as a surprise, Adasiewicz performed four of Mitchell's historical compositions—Toro, Jo Jar, The Waltz, and Walking in the Moonlight—to the master composer, who responded enthusiastically with multiple standing ovations.

Since that time, Adasiewicz has worked nonstop on the development of a full program of Mitchell works, drawing from the songbooks of his classic pieces, including those composed for the Art Ensemble of Chicago and pieces with prior lives as vehicles for Mitchell's Sound and Space Ensembles and other groups. Arranging these works for solo vibraphone, Adasiewicz has boldly reworked them but remained unshakably true to the original compositions, exploring different ways to account for multiple voicings on his four-malleted instrument and submerging himself in Mitchell’s resounding melodic imagination. What Adasiewicz presents in this concert will be the working blueprint of a future CvsD release tentatively titled Roscoe Village. Homage to one of the great visionaries of creative music, re-envisioned with love and affection by a true detective of Mitchell's muse.

-John Corbett

The musician:

Jason Adasiewicz - vibes