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In meditating on how to present this recorded document it’s become increasingly apparent to me that only those that are born of African descent in America can clearly articulate the spirit and concept of the music created here. I’ve taken the responsibility to approximate this position to those who read these liner notes.
History has taught me a valuable lesson; that one culture cannot define another, because culture is the most intricate part of a peoples’ identity and experience, and the arts are the most powerful characteristic that separate one culture from another. The phenomenon of African American music has suffered tremendously because we have allowed other cultures and industries to describe our art and attach to it what they infer from their cultural intuitions. African American music is primal unsophisticated music, delving into our deities for spiritual and emotional expression.
Although the message in this music is universal and without any bias the fact remains that this is Black music emphatically! Its purpose is to remind us of the power of self-awareness and its responsibility to enlighten the masses to the omnipotent potential of the human spirit. I boldly claim this music as the organic creation of Black folks experience here in North America. Political correctness and validation by European standards have not been a compulsion in the making of this music nor its narrative. It has been created from the group’s soul experience and is intended for the hearts and souls of those that are open enough to hear it. We ask that the listener willingly let go of the common preconceptions of what music is and allow the music to take you into that intimate dialog of purposeful spiritual exchange: a spiritual exchange that reaches for unification and peaceful coexistence.
This music does not follow the traditional paths of chord changes, song forms, scales and modes. These devices have been used to narrow the creative process instead of as tools for conveying the concepts of a living art form– an art form full of experience and spiritual perspective. I challenge the so-called Jazz participant (musician, listener, and those that exploit the genre for economic gains) to consider this question: given the state of the music today, has the music evolved from where Bird, Dolphy, Coltrane, and Ayler left off? Or, has it been institutionalized, co-opted, and made multi-cultural for economic reasons? History will confirm hundreds of years from now the profound musical contribution of the African in America.
The African in America will be recognized for the impact we have had on mankind and will get the credit that is our due. This music is born out of the disenfranchisement of a people crying out to be accepted, and yet this same music has the power to resurrect mankind. Rhythm, melody, and harmony, the principals at the crux of music are also the building blocks on which our material universe rests.
Music does indeed influence the course of human evolution. This fact is mostly ignored today by the African American artist. We do not understand the negative residual effects of capitalism. Caught in the struggle for survival that the capitalist system ensnares us in, this condition typically supplants our natural intuitive instinctual calling. Capitalism dulls humanities quest for reaching for our higher self-potential. This condition is further exacerbated by other factors such as class, ignorance, and covert racism. You get my point, please just listen to the music, it is with love it was created. Musicians must address these social realities and acknowledge the fact that Art has had the greatest influence on the evolution of mankind, more so than any other thing on Earth. Technology has created an illusion that the world is smaller, and that information is easily accessed.
The fact is the world is the same size it has always been, and that the ability to communicate is the basis of all information transfer has gotten harder. Given the state of instability throughout the world today there is obviously not enough real communication being done to remedy the world’s problems. The core of the music presented here is communication in its most intimate form, with sensitivity and respect to each other’s perspectives. Our approach in creating this music is to listen to each other and respond as individuals attempting to meld into one stream of consciousness.
Language at its core is the medium that transmits ideas, emotions, imaginations, and concepts. The vocabularies that you hear in these compositions are other worldly, because the desired affect within this music speak to the expectation that Heaven (a state of pure consciousness) can be obtained, while we are yet alive!
I can speak truthfully in my years of musical study that the Creator (my highest consciousness or awareness) has brought me to this point where I know that my God dwells within.
Peace & Blessings
Eliel Sherman Storey
Our vision is to build relationships by creating new media, new narratives, new definitions, and lastly new images that can offer viable and meaningful alternatives.