DAVID ORNETTE CHERRY

About me:

David Ornette Cherry grew up in Watts, California. This Watts young man later won the 2003 ASCAP- Chamber Music America Award for adventurous Programming of Contempory Music. He writes, arranges, and improvises music from sunrise to sunset. The pulses and melodies that arise from his jazz, classical, African, world music background, and from playing with some of the great jazz artists of our times, speak about our human experiences through the the language of sound. He listens with an open heart and fresh mind to his collaborators and the world around him in a way that makes his compositions not only music, but a way of life a positive form of energy, and a way to connect. Current work is titled Ensemble for Improvisors. He trains young musicians in world music, theory, and piano. David was born the same year Ornette Coleman and Don Cherry recorded their first album, SOMETHIN ELSE. The ambient music streaming through his childhood was generated by the early collaborations of his dad, Don Cherry, with Coleman and the musicians who visited his parents’ Mariposa Avenue home in Los Angeles. However, it was a wood-chopping accident one summer in Sweden that sealed David’s musical fate as he was confined to music study and later performing with his dad at the age of sixteen years old. Cherry studied music composition at Bishop College in Dallas and concentrating on world music at California Institute of the Arts. He spent challenging and unforgettable summers attending the Creative Music Studio at Woodstock, New York. These summer experiences gave him the space to compose and create music with Trilok Gurtu, Olatunji, Jai Deva, and Foday Musa Suso and to explore the relationship of jazz and music from other cultures. While jazz remains both the root and sustenance of his sound, he often incorporates the sounds of the world in what he calls multi-kulti music. His background includes performances with Don Cherry, Ed Blackwell, Charlie Haden, Billy Higgins, Dewey Redman, Nana Vasconcelos, Olatunji, Hassan Hakmoun, Carlos Ward, Jim Pepper, Collin Walcott, Wadada Leo Smith, Phil Ranelin, Ralph "Buzzy" Jones and Justo Almario. David forges ahead with his own invigoratingly fresh sound punctuated by driving rhythms and memorable lines. The fluidity of his compositions leave just the right amount of improvisational space not grounding his soloists in mid-flight or holding back the vitality of their contribution. Cherry massages the line, stirs it, adds the last spice, lets it simmer and serves it up with satisfaction. He sees himself crossing borders drawing from the past - building a passageway to jazz of the future. David states ;The music never stopped. Jazz is dynamic. It is a continuum that expands and takes from the players and composers so they can add their little something to the art. Its not about JUST referencing the past. It's about keeping the momentum going like a ball that keeps rolling along. He further states; My compositions are a musical fusion of cultures laid firmly down on a foundation of purely garage-style beats. It's a union of textures, sounds, lifestyles, surroundings, and messages in a universal language emphasizing a positive state of mind. Acoustic piano, electronic keyboards, melodica, wood flute and doussn gouni are his instruments. Future plans include: creating a musical intensity which invigorates and sets trends in jazz of the future, passing the torch to take the music beyond...to become another color in the ever-expanding sound spectrum. more info go to: www.davidornettecherry.com ..