Category: Music

Ode B’kongofon
Hafez Modirzadeh Ensemble

Post author By hoisanpoet
Post date May 2, 2022

Thursday, May 12 – 7:30pm

Bird & Beckett Books & Records

653 Chenery Street, San Francisco, CA 94131

With B’kongofonic blood at the saxophonic root, well below surface engraving, resonating within its alloy, sounds are gathering to invoke a heroic people: kongo as “gathering”, a Central African people’s homeland; fon as “sound”, a West African people’s language; B’ referring to all “peoples” along the resistance continuum. Hear ye, the animating force of a strange horn sanctified!

Genny Lim – poetry, invocation
Hafez Modirzadeh – kongofon, assorted winds
Francis Wong – kongofon, assorted winds
John-Carlos Perea – electric bass, cedar flute, vocals
Keshav Batish – drums, tabla

Genny Lim and the ensemble perform Modirzadeh’s epic poem, Ode B’kongofon.

$25 cash cover charge; byob and a mask (optional if vaccinated)

birdbeckett.com

Tags Bird & Beckett, Francis Wong, Hafez Modirzadeh, John-Carlos Perea, Keshav Batish, Ode B’kongofon

Music Performance

Words

Post author By hoisanpoet
Post date February 20, 2021

Del Sol Quartet plays Rzewski, with poetry by Genny Lim

Saturday, February 20, 2021, 6:00pm – 8:00pm

The brilliant composer/pianist Frederic Rzewski joined Del Sol Quartet to present new online performances of Rzewski’s compositions. The program included Words for speaking string quartet and Winter Nights for solo piano, and between musical performances, distinguished San Francisco author Genny Lim contributed a reading of her poetry.

https://www.delsolquartet.com/calendar/2021/2/20/music-of-frederic-rzewski

Del Sol Quartet founder Charlton Lee and Genny Lim join Wanda’s Picks Radio Show on February 19, 2021. Genny reads Word on the Street (for Breonna Taylor) with Del Sol Quartet’s recorded performance of Kerwin Young’s In the Amazon.

Tags Breonna Taylor, Del Sol Quartet, Kerwin Young, Wanda's Picks

Music Performance Poetry

SFJAZZ Poetry Festival 2018 with Genny Lim

Post author By hoisanpoet
Post date April 5, 2018

Thursday, April 5th – Sunday, April 8, 2018, Joe Henderson Lab

Curated by SFJAZZ Poet Laureate Genny Lim, the 2018 Wordology Festival featured “the greatest poets of the Bay Area and beyond, centered on the concept of ‘wordology.’”

Web Gallery

Genny Lim and Francis Wong at SFJazz Poetry Festival 2018

“I want poets to… let go of their concept of how the poem is supposed to be, to surrender to the spirit of improvisation, so the poem can breathe and become a whole new poem.”
GENNY LIM

This year’s festival is bookended by two illustrious poets: on opening night, former California poet laureate Al Young, whom Lim calls “the Duke Ellington of letters,” and who is the much-honored author of 22 books of various genres; and, playing piano at the closing matinee, Ishmael Reed (“just a lion—a political satirist, a playwright, an essayist,” says Lim).
In between is a multicultural and multigenerational lineup of poets, rappers, spoken-word artists and jazz musicians, many among them part of San Francisco’s underground arts scene, many of them social activists as well: Arlene Biala with musician Brittany Biala; Royal Kent with Copus Multimedia (his duo with composer/pianist Wendy Loomis); also Paul Flores, Tongo Eisen-Martin, QR Hand, novelist and hip-hop artist Aya De Leon, Tony Robles, rapper Equipto, the musical ensemble the Broun Fellinis, “drum strategist” Marshall Trammel and saxophonist Francis Wong. The festival includes a tribute to Charles Mingus and Native American sax player Jim Pepper.
Poetry and Jazz Make a Harmonic Hybrid by JEAN SCHIFFMAN, sfarts.org

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