Imani Winds Jeff Scott’s Passion for Bach and Coltrane, Announce 23-24 Season

NEW YORK, NY – October 3, 2023 – The GRAMMY® Award-nominated quintet Imani Winds has just released the live, world-premiere recording of Jeff Scott’s Passion for Bach and Coltrane on Imani Winds Media (September 15). Scott’s concert-length oratorio, inspired by J.S. Bach’s Goldberg Variations and John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme, brings to life the poetry of A.B. Spellman that envisages Bach and Coltrane playing music together in heaven. This marks the fourteenth album in Imani Winds’ discography and the first to be released by their newly minted media company, Imani Winds Media – a project dedicated to assisting musicians of color produce and release recordings, podcasts, and videos. The quintet – made up of Brandon Patrick George, flute; Toyin Spellman-Diaz, oboe; Mark Dover, clarinet; Kevin Newton, french horn; and Monica Ellis, bassoon – will also release a DVD of Scott’s Passion in February 2024.
 
Jeff Scott’s Passion combines classical and jazz musical elements with spoken word that encapsulates the spirituality borne from a life lived with a passionate love of music. The poetry was written and is orated by Essence Award®-nominated poet A.B. Spellman, the father of Imani Winds’ oboist Ms. Spellman-Diaz. Additional featured performers on the album are the Harlem Quartet, GRAMMY® Award-nominated pianist Alex Brown, bassist Edward Perez, and drummer Neal Smith. 
 
“Passion for Bach and Coltrane is one of our most personal musical journeys,” says Imani Winds’ oboist Toyin Spellman-Diaz. “Inspiration runs through every aspect of this composition based on music by Johann Sebastian Bach and John Coltrane, and not just in the improvised solos threaded throughout the work. One might be tempted to think this album is a mere redressing of these giants’ works. That too doesn’t tell the whole story - this is a piece of astonishing originality; and in today’s musical landscape, inspiration is an entirely underrated miracle.” 
 
Composer and Imani Winds’ founding French horn player Jeff Scott drew from Bach’s iconic Goldberg Variations to shape his Passion. The work opens with the first part of A.B.’s poem Dear John, with Aria being the opening Goldberg theme, masterfully arranged for the entire ensemble. References to Bach are scattered throughout each movement, the most notable in Variation 13, where Scott makes a jazz variation-within-a-variation. Out Of Nazareth is central to the Passion, as A.B.’s poetry describes Christ’s moments to and from the cross with brutal beauty, accompanied by a Bach chorale.
 
Jazz is equally omnipresent in Scott’s Passion, using the spirit of A Love Supreme – one of Coltrane’s most sacred works – as a guide. The second musical movement, Psalm and the poetry of Dear John Part 2, show us a glimpse of the scope of the piece with a jazz chant and A.B.’s poem that begins “I will die in Havana in a hurricane.” The next track Resolution, after John Coltrane’s rhapsodic tune, is the mirror image of Aria that speaks to A.B.’s deep communion with Coltrane. Groovin Low is a swinging Baroque slow drag: “I bop to the bassline now,” A.B. declares. Poetry in Among the Things I Must Have Known along with music poetry combo Interlude and A Hug for Gonzalo is a tribute to pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba and the sacred power of being a passionate listener of music. Acknowledgement, the final movement, is a play on the Resurrection of Christ, combining “A Love Supreme” and an uplifting poem on death, renewal, and the power of love. 
 
Imani Winds on Tour
Last week, Imani Winds opened their season with the concert “De Memorias – a Latin Perspective” at the University of Nevada at Reno. Their robust touring schedule in the 2023-24 season includes performances at venues in twenty-one states around the U.S.; in St. John, Virgin Islands; and in Montréal, QC, Canada.  Among Imani Winds’ season highlights are a debut at 92NY on November 2 with pianist Terrence Wilson; a stop at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. on April 23 that includes the co-commissioned premiere of Shawn Okpebholo’s work Justice; and collaborative performances with dance company BodyVox in Portland entitled “Beautiful Everything” running April 19-21.

Imani Winds 2023-24 Touring Schedule
Visit imaniwinds.com for full schedule and information.
 
Kennesaw State University Recital
Friday, September 29, 2023 - 8:00 PM - Kennesaw, GA - MORE INFO
 
Duke Arts Presents
Sunday, October 1, 2023 - 8:00 PM - Durham, NC - MORE INFO
 
North Carolina School of the Arts
Tuesday, October 3, 2023 - 7:30 PM - Winston-Salem, NC - MORE INFO
 
Lee University Presidential Concert Series
Thursday, October 26, 2023 - 7:30 PM - Cleveland, TN - MORE INFO
 
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
Sunday, October 29, 2023 - 1:30 PM - Boston, MA - MORE INFO
 
92NY CENTER FOR CULTURE & ARTS
Thursday, November 2, 2023 - 7:30 PM - New York, NY - MORE INFO
 
Dickinson College
Sunday, November 5, 2023 - 4:00 PM - Carlisle, PA - MORE INFO
 
Yale University Oneppo Chamber Music Series
Tuesday, December 5, 2023 - 7:30 PM - New Haven, CT - MORE INFO
 
New Orleans Friends of Chamber Music
Monday, December 11, 2023 - 7:30 PM - New Orleans, LA - MORE INFO
 
West Virginia University Canady Chamber Series
Monday, January 22, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Morgantown, WV - MORE INFO
 
Butler University Jordan College of the Arts Signature Series
Friday, January 26, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Indianapolis, IN - MORE INFO
 
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
Thursday, February 1, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Montréal, QC Canada - MORE INFO
 
Alabama Symphony Intersections Symposium
Saturday, February 3, 2024 - 8:30 AM - Birmingham, AL - MORE INFO
 
St. John School for the Arts, Virgin Islands
Friday, February 9, 2024 - 6:00 PM - St. John, Virgin Islands - MORE INFO
 
University of Northern Iowa
Friday, February 23, 2024 - 7:00 PM - Cedar Falls, IA - MORE INFO
 
Music Institute of Chicago
Saturday, February 24, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Evanston, IL - MORE INFO
 
Portland Youth Philharmonic
Saturday, March 2, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Portland, OR - MORE INFO
 
Oberlin College & Conservatory
Thursday, March 7, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Oberlin, OH
 
Detroit Chamber Music Society
Friday, March 8, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Detroit, MI
 
Chamber Music Cincinnati
Sunday, March 10, 2024 - 4:00 PM - Cincinnati, OH - MORE INFO
Tuesday, March 12, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Cincinnati, OH - MORE INFO
 
Collins Center for the Arts
Saturday, March 16, 2024 - 3:00 PM - Orono, ME - MORE INFO
 
Blue Hill Concert Association
Sunday, March 17, 2024 - 3:00 PM - Blue Hill, ME - MORE INFO
 
The Kennedy Center
Wednesday, April 3, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Washington, DC - MORE INFO
 
University of Mississippi, Ford Center for the Performing Arts
Tuesday, April 9, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Oxford, MS - MORE INFO
 
Boise Chamber Music Series
Friday, April 12, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Boise, ID - MORE INFO
 
The Argyros Performing Arts Center
Saturday, April 13, 2024 - 7:30 PM - Ketchum, ID - MORE INFO
 
Chamber Music Northwest with BodyVox Portland
Friday, April 19, 2024 - 7:30 PM
Saturday, April 20, 2024 - 2:00 PM
Saturday, April 20, 2024 - 7:30 PM
Sunday, April 21, 2024 - 4:00 PM - Portland, OR - MORE INFO
 
Candlelight Concert Series
Sunday, May 12, 2024 - 4:00 PM - Columbia, MD - MORE INFO

About Imani Winds
Celebrating over a quarter century of music making, the twice GRAMMY® Award-nominated Imani Winds has led both a revolution and evolution of the wind quintet through their dynamic playing, adventurous programming, imaginative collaborations, and outreach endeavors that have inspired audiences of all ages and backgrounds.
 
The ensemble’s playlist embraces traditional chamber music repertoire and newly commissioned works from voices that reflect historical events and the times in which we currently live. Twenty-six seasons of full-time touring has brought Imani Winds to virtually every major chamber music series, performing arts center, and summer festival in the U.S. They regularly perform in prominent venues including Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and the Kennedy Center and have a presence at festivals such as Chamber Music Northwest, Chautauqua Institution and Banff Centre. 
 
Appointed in 2021 as Curtis Institute of Music’s first ever Faculty Wind Quintet, Imani Winds commitment to education runs deep. The highly successful Imani Winds Chamber Music Festival launched in 2010, is an annual summer program devoted to musical excellence and career development for pre-professional instrumentalists and composers. The curriculum includes mentorship, masterclasses, entrepreneurial workshops, community engagement activities and performances, with the goal of fostering the complete musician and global citizen. In 2019, the group extended their mission even further by creating the non-profit organization, Imani Winds Foundation, which exists to support, connect and uplift their initiatives and more.
 
Imani Winds’ travels through the jazz world are highlighted by their multi-faceted association with luminary musicians and composers Wayne Shorter, Paquito D’Rivera and Jason Moran. Their ambitious project, "Josephine Baker: A Life of Le Jazz Hot!" featured jazz songstress René Marie in performances that brought the house down in New York, Pittsburgh, San Francisco, Los Angeles and St. Louis.
 
In 2021, Imani Winds released their 9th studio album, “Bruits” on Bright Shiny Things Records, which received a 2022 GRAMMY® nomination for “Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance.” Gramophone states, “the ensemble’s hot rapport churns with conviction throughout.”
 
Imani Winds has recordings on Koch International Classics and E1 Music, including their 2006 GRAMMY® nominated recording, “The Classical Underground”. They have also recorded for Naxos and Blue Note and released an acclaimed arrangement of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring on Warner Classics. They are regularly heard on all media platforms including NPR, American Public Media, the BBC, SiriusXM, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.
 
About A.B. Spellman
A.B. Spellman was born during the Great Depression near Elizabeth City, NC. He was a typical small-town boy who left home for college and never returned. After graduating from Howard University, Spellman attended law school briefly before being dismissed “for a lack of seriousness of purpose,” a fact that his transcript will confirm even today.
 
Spellman moved to lower Manhattan in 1957 to join the poetry scene. He nightly experienced Thelonious Monk’s return from exile to the Five Spot and the formation of the quartet that bloomed John Coltrane, the most cathartic event of his life. He soon began writing about jazz, and he found jazz to be a named or unnamed occupant of the lines of his poetry. Spellman produced Four Lives In The Bebop Business, critical biographies of Cicil Taylor, Ornette Coleman, Jackie McLean, and Herbie Nichols, (Pantheon) in 1966, and the book has remained continually in print from various publishers since. The poetry collection, The Beautiful Days (Poet’s Press) appeared that same year. It took him until 2008 to publish his next volume of verse, Things I Must Have Known (Coffee House Press).
 
In large part this hiatus was the result of his employment at the National Endowment for the Arts, where federal conflict of interest rules forbade publication in the non-profit press. He was at the Endowment for thirty years until he retired in 2005 as Deputy Chairman. They named an award for him: The A.B. Spellman Jazz Master’s Award for Advocacy. That’s a great gold watch. 
 
A.B. Spellman has been married to the perfect Karen for fifty years. They have two daughters, Toyin the oboist for Imani Winds, and Kaji, a very progressive minister in N.Y.C. His son Malcolm is a screenwriter and show-runner in Los Angeles. He couldn’t be more proud.

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