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Congo Square
Feat. the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis, Yacub Addy and Odadaa! European Premiere
10 July 2012 / 19:30
Hall
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Tickets:
£15 - 35
subject to availability
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Yacub Addy and Odadaa!
Yacub Addy is an elder drummer, composer, and choreographer, senior among the renowned Addy family of drummers from Accra, Ghana. He’s a master of traditional classics of the Ga people and creator of new works rooted in tradition. A true pioneer who bucked the status quo, Addy’s art took him from Ghana to Europe and America, where he created the acclaimed performance ensemble Odadaa!, described by the New York Times as an “irresistible, hypnotically charged, earthy and stately treasure.” Addy’s work preserves and advances the vibrant musical and movement heritage of Ghana – it is the power of ancient rhythm breathing new life into the 21st century. Also a unique and respected educator, Addy taught widely, including 16 years at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, NY in the Music Department and Dance Program. In 2012, Addy was awarded America’s highest honor for traditional and folk artists, a National Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.
Addy is the son of Okonfo Akoto, a powerful wontse (won-che) – a medicine man or shaman - and Akua Hagan, lead singer in her husband’s medicine music. Raised in the British colony of the Gold Coast and determined, despite the pressures to westernize, to keep his culture alive, Addy organized and led the first staged performance of genuinely traditional Ghanaian music and dance in 1956, the year before Ghana’s independence. He later formed Ashiedu Ketrekre, which set a performance standard in Ghana in the 1960s, and Oboade, the first professional traditional Ghanaian group to tour in the West. Oboade recorded the classic Kpanlogo Party in London in 1973. In 1982 in America he created Odadaa!, composed predominantly of artists of his own Ga ethnic group. Over the years, he incorporated additional instruments with Odadaa!, working with Foday Musa Suso (kora), T.K. Blue (saxes, flute), and Stefon Harris (marimba).
Addy’s most important collaboration is with Wynton Marsalis, with whom he created two projects, Africa Jazz (2003) and the ground-breaking co-compositon Congo Square (2006). The latter premiered in Congo Square in Katrina-ravaged New Orleans in April 2006 as a gift for the spiritual revival of the Crescent City. The project toured in four seasons, and was documented in a CD (available on iTunes) and a DVD recorded at the 2007 Montreal Jazz Festival.
In addition to Kpanlogo Party and Congo Square, Addy’s recordings include Yacub Addy, Master Drummer of Ghana: Blema Bii (1982) and Yacub Addy’s Odadaa! – Children of the Ancients (1999).
Odadaa! was formed in 1982 and grew out of a succession of groups created by Yacub Addy since 1956. Addy named Odadaa! for a traditional rhythm, one which is played once a year in Ghana’s capital of Accra to officially open a harvest festival celebrated by the Ga people. The sound of the Odadaa rhythm on two royal obonu drums and the cheer which heralds its playing signal the celebrants that “The way is open! Let the music begin!”.
Odadaa! performs traditional Ghanaian classics arranged by Addy and creative music written by Addy and group members. Addy calls this new music Tsimo (chee-mo), meaning “spiritually heavy”.
Odadaa!’s traditional instruments serve specific purposes. Each drum and bell have a name, voice, function, and history. A variety of drums are played in various sets and combinations using ambidextrous hands, straight or curved sticks, sticks and hands, even hands and feet. A bell usually provides the critical basic beat, and interlocking drums, shakers, additional bells, bamboo flutes, guitar, bass, balaphons and voices elaborate.
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