William Parker Heart Trio (USA)
William Parker - double bass, ngoni, shakuhachi, duduk
Cooper-Moore - xilofone, harpa horizontal
Hamid Drake – drums and percussion

 

William Parker is not just an improviser, writer and poet, he is a prolific composer and has written everything from operas, oratorios, ballets and film scores to soliloquies for solo instruments. He has participated in approximately 500 recordings with over 50 albums under his leadership. The bassist, composer and band leader has been at the forefront of the creative jazz scene for decades. His music and his extraordinary bass playing maintain high standards whether he plays in small ensembles or large bands, never turning his back on innovation and spontaneous creativity. His talent as a composer has found many avenues of exploration, operas, music, theater, film and ballet. Fascinated by Eastern cultures, he collects instruments from all over the world while traveling, which he sometimes poetically and skillfully adds to the double bass during concerts. One of his favorites is the Japanese shakuhachi flute.
 

And the indomitable bridge between the two is Hamid Drake who boasts decades of collaboration with Parker composing the most interesting, poetic and multifaceted rhythm section of dreams. Hamid Drake is considered one of the greatest drummers in contemporary jazz: from his career, which began in the seventies, we remember the long collaboration with Don Cherry, and then the intense partnership with William Parker, considered by many to be the catalyst of the black avant-garde in New York.
 

He is a master of the jazz language but also an expert in oriental percussion and Caribbean rhythms. Raised musically alongside saxophonist Fred Anderson and many artists from the AACM in Chicago, the city where he has lived since childhood, he has collaborated intensely with trumpeter Don Cherry. His main inspirations are Ed Blackwell, Alan Rudolph, Max Roach. Also heavily influenced by Eastern and African spirituality, Drake has become an absolute protagonist of the most innovative and improvisation-related music since the 80s. Partner in many situations with bassist William Parker, he is a pillar of the latter's groups (with whom he also performs and records in duo). He has also played and recorded with other international music stars, including Peter Brötzmann, Bill Laswell & Material, Ken Vandermark, Nicole Mitchell, David Murray, Archie Shepp, Pierre Dorge, Herbie Hancock, Misha Mengelberg, Pharoah Sanders, Wayne Shorter, Malachi Thompson, With such a variety of influences Drake has adopted North and West African idioms and Indian influences as well as reggae and Latin American music. He often plays without sticks using his hands to create particular sound rhythms. His organic and powerful drumming, always masterful even on the frame drum, often leaves room for singing and a slow, cadenced recitation.
 

According to William Parker, Cooper-Moore and Hamid Drake, this is music for sunrise and sunset, music for everyday life, tuned to a cure for any ailments (more spiritual than physical) through sound. That's why they called upon the Heart Trio, in search of a vital essence, a way of relating to sound that transcends simple musical performance. Longtime accomplices, and reunited since 2012 in the quartet In Order to Survive, they explore here a connection to ancestral African and Eastern music, adopting instruments such as the ngoni, the shakuhachi, the duduk or instruments created by themselves, generating mesmerizing music with an intense connection to the earth. Organic music, in desired opposition to a world increasingly hostage to technological acceleration, overflowing with humanism.
 

Heart Trio features three lifelong-devoted fellow travelers on the path of healing through sound. World-renowned & revered bassist, multi-instrumentalist, composer, improvisor, community leader William Parker has performed and recorded extensively with both master pianist, multi-instrumentalist, composer, improviser, inveterate performer Cooper-Moore & master drummer, improviser, composer Hamid Drake over the past 30+ years. And, the three of them have been core since 2012 in Parker’s reborn In Order To Survive quartet.