Laurie Lee Moses set an ambitious goal for herself the year 2000. For her monthly New Moon, New Music—at the Leading Edge of the Century series she would play with musicians she admired and she would compose a piece for them to perform together.
On Thursday, Aug. 3, Moses shares the stage at the Hot House with her one-time teacher Ari Brown. Brown is associated with Chicago’s AACM and is a multi instrumentalist who has played with Kahil El’Zabar, Anthony Braxton, Lou Rawls, and the Art Ensemble of Chicago.
Laurie Lee Moses
For four decades musicians from various AACM ensembles have connected the past with the future by playing engaging Black improvisational music. Moses studied with Brown to fill in what she described as gaps in her music knowledge. They both play saxophone and piano. Moses’ appearance with Brown moves her just beyond the halfway mark in her series. Moses, who moved to Chicago on a “whim,” has been in the local music scene since graduating with a B.A. in Black Music/Social Science from Bennington College in 1979. It was in the trio Surrender Dorothy that Moses said that, “I got over my shyness. I learned how to talk to the audience with Surrender Dorothy. It was an out lesbian group that played originals. I got introduced to playing in clubs and getting comfortable with that.” Asked to describe her music, Moses said, “I specialize in what is often called free improvisation. It’s improvisation that is not based on a tune structure or a chart per se.”
Laurie got an early start in a family that was given a neighbor’s piano: “I’m one of those people who can’t keep their hands off an instrument I have to try play it.” Later she picked up her brother’s abandoned saxophone. Laurie’s adventure with what some call “outside” music started with “a pretty wild out there album I picked up at the public library with John Coltrane and Don Cherry. It kind of blew my mind.” Moses said as she listened to Coltrane’s and Cherry’s fellow travelers in pushing the edge like Charles Mingus and Ornette Coleman, “I could almost feel my brain changing.” Early in her musical life Moses said, “I was heading that way for sure.” With collective improvisation, “You have to be so in tune with the other people and coming up with ideas all at the same time. It’s a lot to process,” said Moses.
Moses says with improvisational music just “come and not work so hard at trying to figure out what did they just play now and how does that relate to what they just played? Just float in the water, so to speak.”
Bass player Cecile Savage will join Moses and Brown for the performance. Savage and Moses played together for the first time at the Hot House Women in the New Jazz festival this past spring. The show starts at 8 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 3, and is $7 at the door. Hot House is at 31 E. Balbo.