Bklyn Sounds: 1/3/2023 - 1/9/2023 + Muyassar Kurdi

Interview with Muyassar Kurdi + Shows: David Berman tributes / Studio Rivbea series / Bill Frisell / The Bunker birthday / Ash Lauryn + Stefan Ringer / Joan As Police Woman

Happy New Year! Scroll down for this week’s slate of local shows, including a couple of special multi-night programs. But first an interview with an incredibly talented woman who is playing at Roulette on Friday.

At first, Muyassar Kurdi was someone I knew better as a member of the community than as a person who makes art. We saw each other at an odd combination of music and art events around town, but the way Kurdi carries herself — with style, inquisitiveness, a graceful nonchalance mixed with passion — you could spot her artist’s soul; and once introduced to the way she stirred together global folk perspectives, minimalist methods, and a broad embrace of improvisational practices, it’s been hard to keep her work out of mind. The 33-year-old Chicago-born, Brooklyn-based artist’s interdisciplinary alchemy blends music, photography, painting, poetry with movement/dance — and her unique results are developing a glowing reputation. Kurdi is one of the 2022-23 artists-in-residence at Roulette, Downtown Brooklyn’s great alternative-arts space, and she is opening its Winter-Spring season with a performance on Friday, January 6th: “Muyassar Kurdi: Where My Olive Trees Grow” will feature Kurdi’s voice and multi-instrumental approach accompanied by Chicago’s Ben LaMar Gay and Brooklyn’s Lester St. Louis, two improvisers wonderfully adept at folding creative music into interdisciplinary performance. The trio will be creating music and “embodied sounds” with Kurdi’s large-scale oil canvases serving as graphic scores. She calls it work “in conversation with Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish and his ruminations on visible music and musical gardens,” offering “visual poetry to those who have been silenced.” 

I took the show as an opportunity to send Muyassar Kurdi a few questions by email, and asked her to talk about the seeds of her many-headed creative practice, about her past in Chicago, and her connections to Darwish. 

Give me a short summary of your art-making life. How did you start making your way as an artist? 

I grew up in an artistic household thanks to my mother. She was a free-spirited, long-haired folk-singer, classical guitar player, nature and animal lover. All four of us kids took piano lessons for six years from the organ player of the baptist church we attended. Her name was Judy, a tall, slender, and strangely quiet woman that taught me to read music, but as soon as she would leave, I would toss my song-book aside and improvise at the piano for hours. I was completely lost in the sound: the freedom and presence of improvisation, a world beyond rules. I was more interested in tapping into my intuition and feeling the music that poured from me in this possessed state. It was a spiritual happening. 

[This] relationship with improvised music probably started when I was 8 years old, sitting at a piano. My feet didn’t even touch the ground when I sat at the bench. My head moved in a circular motion when I played, my entire body undulating like waves of feeling I was lost in, where my fingers would intuitively glide over the keys. Nothing felt more like freedom than that moment of pure meditation when the mind is totally emptied of thoughts, and instead is grounded in this pure presence. 

My father was born in Amman Jordan and left for the United States when he was 18 years old where he had studied engineering and mathematics at the university in Chicago. I never thought he played a major role in my life as an artist, but there are moments that stick with me that have undeniably influenced me. He had a very large collection of dubbed cassette tapes written in his messy script-of music from the MENA regions, mostly Palestinian or Jordanian songs that have impacted my approach to music. As a vocalist I have always gravitated towards the emotive quality of Arab singers. These sounds activated the poet in me. The tonalities, rhythms, and the Arabic language feel imprinted inside my memory and nervous system which connect me to my ancestors.

I bought my first 35mm film camera when I was 16, and I was really into street-photography and self-portraiture. At that time in Chicago I was attending many political events at communal houses and “squats” where anarchists had lived. Music was part of that journey, and I was exposed to more folk music at first, and then I got deeper in the underground music community which was very experimental. I was 20 when I performed music for the first time in front of people at a DIY communal art space called Ball Hall. I’d find myself at warehouse spaces and squeezed into smokey basements with only one exit led by make-shift stairs. It was a thrill. My roots are from the underground music community and culture. Eventually I got deep into the free jazz and improvised music community.

Talk a little bit about your multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary practice. It’s a concept that still often puzzles people.

I never went to art-school, I am self-made. I did study for a handful of years with Meredith Monk at her legendary loft space/living space as well as at workshop retreats upstate. This was a turning point for my career as I became more familiarized with an interdisciplinary practice...that eventually gravitated towards movement and filmmaking. In an effort to connect various modalities and create a cinematic experience, I created dance films and embodied sound performances. My music began to include new elements such as homemade electronics and modular synths which I paired with voice. I am interested in seeing these two worlds coexist, the machine and the body. 

As far as performative elements go, I am eager to challenge the traditional aspects of a performance such as the audience-performer relationship. I would rather blur those lines to highlight the importance of a communal experience as opposed to being consumed as entertainment. The audience doesn’t just get to sit there in plastic chairs at a safe distance from the stage as if separate from the multi-sensory musical experience. Through interactive performance, we can be present in the experience together. It also emphasizes the importance of deep listening. Every day I am learning how to become a better listener. I’ve heard through the grapevine that the best musicians know when not to play. 

Lately I have been creating large-scale oil paintings. With my growing interest in color theory and movement, I can begin to connect these modes. I provide graphic scores to many musicians who perform my works. There is a lot of freedom there, but still with a great love of form, intention, and presence.

I believe there is great strength in presenting a cohesive body of interdisciplinary work although the public is still opening up to this radical idea which aims to unite the disciplines. All of a sudden musicians are moving and movement-artists are playing music, painters are moving and vocalizing. Why not? I am alive, afterall. How can a commercial gallery embrace an artist’s interdisciplinary ways if they are trying to brand you and sell your work to a particular pool of collectors that will expect you to keep creating that kind of work in the same style? There is no sense of adventure in that- in the case that you wanted to try something different perhaps go from figurative to abstract painting or in my case a photographer that also paints among other things. I find that limiting, claustrophobic, and in no way is that enhancing my vision or art-practice. 

How do you describe the art that you make? How do you talk about it? Both the specifics, and also on a philosophical level: What is it that you want your art to convey? 

In performance mode, I get possessed, really. It is a type of meditation for me. I aim to engage with the audience in a very real way, which has led people to call me a performance artist. What amuses me is how everyone tries to categorize me as this or that. I am many things at once, and am part of many different worlds. Not only am I a musician, I am performing sound. I live in the moment. I create a ritual space, and I put myself in a sort of trance. I challenge myself, reaching — reaching transcendence, hopefully — and it can feel like I am clawing at myself from the inside-out trying to break down these walls and chains which keep me from my own liberation. 

I frame my work through the lens of an indigenous woman, one who breaks the silence and reaches others, who are unable to share their own stories. 

The work that you will be performing at Roulette, "Where My Olive Trees Grow," is in conversation with the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish. Tell me where you first engaged with his work and what about it speaks to you? 

I believe I heard about Mahmoud Darwish’s work in my Arabic class when I studied at the University about 10 years ago. My Grandma is from Jerusalem city (and fled in 1948), and at that time I was getting really involved in the Palestinian political movement in Chicago alongside other uprisings. MD is the voice of protest for the Palestinian people, and I have read much of his poetry works in both English and Arabic. I had his books around a lot as I was studying Arabic poetry in order to learn to speak and write in Fusha which is the classical language. I revisited his book of poems in February 2022 and taped pages of his poems onto the walls of my studio space for inspiration. At the time I was creating large-scale abstract oil paintings, and his poetry was the backdrop of much of my works which embodied a geography beyond walls and borders. I was dreaming of landscapes, particularly landscapes in Palestine which MD writes a lot about: musical gardens, colorful landscapes, and olive trees. 

[Read: Mahmoud Darwish’s “I Belong There”]

“Where My Olive Trees Grow” is an act of protest, but also a celebration of the resilience of the Palestinian people who live under apartheid. The title refers to olive trees, which not only carries an economic significance, but also represents the Palestinians' ties to their land. Under apartheid the olive trees are continuously burned along with the destruction of family homes, schools, and hospitals. This work is remembering Palestine in a certain light, where olive trees grow in abundance, and the walls of apartheid come crumbling down.

At Roulette, you will be performing with Ben LaMar Gay and with Lester St. Louis, two musicians associated with music often described as "jazz." What is your relationship with them as musicians? What can people expect?

Ben and I go way back to my Chicago days. As previously mentioned, I was actively engaging in the experimental and “free” music world in Chicago, and I have been watching Ben’s career for quite a while. We shared some programs together, but eventually became good friends who supported each other’s work. I have a very wholesome relationship with Ben, and I remember a few years ago we recorded one summer in Chicago. We smoked joints and laughed until we cried in the garden during an extremely hot summer, and came back inside to record more music. We had this chanting vocal duo that reached the tips of stars. We were both like “whoa, what was that!?”-- it was as though we were having a conversation with our ancestors. I think about how these musical experiences, especially improvising, brings so much richness to my life. These are the transformative and other-wordly experiences that every artist wants to have. Reaching for transcendence. When Ben is in town, he visits my one bedroom apartment in Flatbush. We got the vibes flowing, Japanese whiskey going round, cooking up a storm, Mamman Sani is playing on my stereo. These are good times. Gratitude. 

I had been seeing Lester St. Louis on the scene in NYC, but it wasn’t until more recently that I started seeing him around much more, playing in various bands, attending friends’ hits, and we realized we had so many friends in common. This is our community, and my chosen family. I am honored to share the Roulette stage with him. Ben, Lester, and I will explore love and space in our collaboration.

(Muyassar Kurdi: Where My Olive Trees Grow, Friday, 1/6, 8p @ Roulette 509 Atlantic Ave., Downtown Brooklyn - $25adv/$30)

Wednesday night, there are two events celebrating the life of the great poet and Silver Jews songwriter David “DC” Berman on what would have been his 56th birthday. At the Union Temple House of CBE (in the Eastern Parkway building which used to house the Murmmr Theater), there’s a reading of all the poems in his 1999 book, Actual Air by a glowing list of folks from Brooklyn’s art-literary mafia, including screenwriter Charlie Kaufman, editor Joanna Yas, novelist Sam Lipsyte, actress Dasha Nekrasova, and so on. Tickets are going fast (as of me writing on 1/1), but some will be available at the door. (Wed. 1/4, 7p @ Union Temple House of CBE 17 Eastern Parkway, Prospect Heights - $5) Over at Union Pool, indie-rockers will be performing classic Berman songs. Outside of guitarist Yonatan Gat, who helps spearhead the wonderful Medicine Singers project, I can’t vouch for the artists listed on the bill; but a Baltimore band named Majesties is scheduled to play the Purple Mountains album, and both Peers in the Beerlight and the Blue Arrangements are named after beloved Silver Jews songs (and a cursory search shows previous performances attracting members of The Hold Steady and Titus Andronicus, among others) so I am thinking that this will be a guest vocalist-heavy night. And no dry eyes in the house. (Miss you forever DC - hope you and jaimie are making music together up in heaven!) (Wed. 1/4, 7p @ Union Pool 484 Union Ave., Williamsburg - $20) 

The wonderful Bar Lunatico is celebrating its eighth anniversary, and there’s a few special shows there throughout January, amidst the always-excellent nightly selections. First up in the can’t-miss department, is the incomparable guitarist Bill Frisell, playing in a trio with Tony Scherr and Kenny Wollensen. Get there early to get in, and then bask in the glow of the incredible tone interpreting American classics from Monk and Dylan, to Holiday and Handy. (Wed 1/4, 8:30p & 10:30p @ Bar Lunatico 486 Halsey St., Bed-Stuy - $25)

“Return to Rivbea” is a four-night celebration of Studio Rivbea, the Bond Street loft run by saxophonist Sam Rivers and his wife Bea in the 1970s, when it was one of the epicenters of the city's creative music and free improvisation. It was also a community space for artists whose work was not welcome in mainstream jazz clubs during that period, and for the influx of young free players coming to New York — a generation of “jazz” that Ken Burns’ doc forgot and the canon dismissed, but which increasingly sounds like another golden age for the music (and deeply influential to today’s players). Recently, Arts for Art, the organization behind Vision Festival and other “free jazz” events, realized that the Rivbea loft remains in use as an experimental theater space. So they’ve put together a set of bills for Wednesday through Sunday, featuring artists across generation. That includes musicians like bassist William Parker, pianist Cooper-Moore and trumpeter Ahmed Abdullah who performed there in the ‘70s, next to younger players like Onyx Coillective’s Isiah Barr, and saxophonists Darius Jones and Isaiah Collier, who would have fit right in. There will also be poetry from Anne Waldman and Fred Moten, among others; and talks about Studio Rivbea and the era it symbolizes. The line-up’s not set so please check the schedule; but whoever plays, it’s likely to be special. (Wed. 1/4 thru Sun. 1/8, various times @ Gene Frankel Theater 24 Bond St., Manhattan - $25adv/$30 per night)  

Not a lot of parties make it to five years, much less 20. And I’m still not sure how TF Bryan Kacenic’s The Bunker, an always experimental but always throbbing techno jam that premiered at Sub-Tonic on the LES, has made it to where it’s only one year shy of drinking age, but here we are, and good for them. The two-night birthday blow-out is full of great old friends (Servito, Plaslaiko, Souffront, Russell), great local staples (Analog Soul, Carry Nation, Jadalareign, Lauren Flax), some relative newbies (DJ Wawa, Sister Zo), and more. All quality, all community. The music always gets just hard enough without becoming pummeling, and fun enough to forget how f*cking crowded it is on the dance-floor. Happy Birthday Bunker! (Fri 1/6 + Sat. 1/7, 10p @ Good Room 98 Meserole Ave., Greenpoint - $70both nights/$40per)

If listening to great music amongst The Bunker’s party animals is not your vibe (understandable), how about hearing the wonderful Detroit-in-Atlanta pairing of Ash Lauryn + Stefan Ringer on the beautiful public records soundsystem? Two seriously fantastic selectors/producers, playing deep Black-made dance music through speakers made in heaven might be enough to brave the early Friday night scene there; but if you can make it to 1a, this shit will be the best kind of cruise control. (Fri. 1/6, 10p @ public records 233 Butler St., Gowanus - $25) 

The other of this week’s special shows in Bar Lunatico’s anniversary celebration is a solo performance by Joan As Police Woman, i.e. Joan Wasser. If you know her songwriting acumen, you know. If you don’t, I wrote a big profile of Joan and her incredible 2021 album, The Solution Is Restless that you may wanna read. (Seriously, it’s one I am actually proud of.) Joan’s got songs for days, and she has incredible taste in covers, not just the obscure shit but ones you know that she remakes into her own. Nothing but the best. (Sun 1/8, 9p & 10:15p @ Bar Lunatico 486 Halsey St., Bed-Stuy - $10)