Henry Threadgill’s music sounds so magnificently unbounded that you might think he wouldn’t spin tales about the music in the nightlife of the south side of Chicago 60+ years ago. You’d be wrong. Very, very wrong. Henry can take you upstairs to the Persian Ballroom (you might want to pause halfway up to catch an earful of Sun Ra playing downstairs at the Persian Lounge) to hear a young Ahmad Jamal. Maybe Jamal was playing with Von Freeman and his brothers, whom Henry memorialized the previous time he was on Deep Focus. Are there unheard recordings of Ahmad Jamal in the WKCR archives?
Were Ahmad Jamal’s subtle yet vital gifts apparent then?
Did his approach influence Henry’s distinctive concepts, then or later?
What brings your mind back to something you heard 60 years ago?
Host Mitch Goldman is surely going to ask Henry Threadgill on Deep Focus. Tune in this Monday (4/27) from 6pm to 9pm NYC time on WKCR 89.9FM, WKCR-HD or wkcr.org.
Or join us when it goes up on the Deep Focus podcast on your favorite podcasting app or at https://mitchgoldman.podbean.com/. Subscribe right now to get notifications when new episodes are posted. It’s ad-free, all free, totally non-commercial. We won’t even ask for your contact info.
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Photo credit: Ahmad Jamal – Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Gift of David D. Spitzer NMAAHC-2012_164_68_001
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