NYE in Los Angeles with Antibalas

Catch me headlining this free party in downtown LA with Antibalas. Hosted by Novena Carmel of KCRW and lots of good bands and DJs.

Suns of Mothers (Live) 12-29-2024

The second installment of the trio I’m part of with Tommy Guerrero and Nino Moschella. Performing live at Little Hill Lounge, El Cerrito California 12-29-2024. (Free)

We spent two days in the studio last week to record some ideas and shape together some songs. It has been quite liberating to play in a small ensemble with so much space for texture, silence, and rhythm. We just started playing together a few months ago but we have spent decades drinking from a lot of the same musical fountains and when we get together, things just flow.

Suns of Mothers: Debut Performance

Suns of Mothers is a new improvisational music trio me 🎷🪈Tommy Guerrero 🛹🔥🎸and Nino Moschella 🥁🎙️ put together.

We played our first show 11-20-2024 at the Little Hill Lounge in El Cerrito, California. It was a jam. We were joined by vocalist Destani Wolf who took us and the music to a whole other dimension.

I regret we didn’t record the whole set as it turned out to exceed my wildest expectations, but some friends fortunately shot a few clips. We are hoping to do this once a month at Little Hill- next one late December or early January. Stay tuned IG: @sunsofmothers

Sonorous Present at Getty Center LA 3/16-17

Los Angeles! I’ll be performing at the Getty Center on March 16-17 as part of a beautiful musical project called Sonorous Present, composed and performed by my dear friend, musician/scholar Alex E. Chávez with musical direction by Grammy-award winning producer/musician Quetzal Flores. The event is FREE. Yes FREE. You have to sign up to reserve your tickets HERE.

From the Getty Museum:

“Sounds of LA 2024 launches with an exclusive performance of immersive, poetic music from Alex E. Chávez’s forthcoming album SONOROUS PRESENT. What began as an experimental, collaborative, and improvised performance in Chicago—inspired by the music and poetics of Chávez’s award-winning book Sounds of Crossing—has been subsequently reimagined as a studio album in collaboration with Grammy Award-winning producer Quetzal Flores. SONOROUS PRESENT offers a never-before-heard blend of Mexican and Latin American folk elements with progressive jazz, poetry, dance, field recordings, and ethnographic songwriting that crosses the sunburst surrealism of America's musical and cultural borderlands.”

The main band will be composed of Alex Chávez (pictured below), and members of the group Quetzal. I’ll be doing my horn thing, flying down from the Bay with a few armloads of saxophones and flutes and percussion and getting in where I fit in. The music is so beautiful. It is an honor to be a part of this, and to be part of the maiden voyage of bringing this to the stage and public. Hope to see you there.

I first met Alex in Southeast Austin in 2003 when I was on a roadtrip from Brooklyn to Michoacan. My friend Adrian Quesada, on one of our many runs around the city, took me to his apartment one day to meet him. Little did I know then that I would be relocating two years later to Austin, and that we’d cross paths many times, whether it was a University of Texas grad student circles that he and my wife ran in, double bills with my Ocote Soul Sounds and his Maneja Beto, or guest appearances on album’s by his group Mitote. The friendship lasted after we both left Austin. He continued on to Chicago to teach and start another great musical project, Dos Santos, which I’ve had the pleasure of making cameo appearances. And now this.

Oñi Ocan: The Heart of Sweetness

It has been a pleasure to collaborate with my partner Courtney Desiree Morris, finally, on more big art things that put our heads and talents together. Below are shots from Oñi Ocan: The Heart of Sweetness, a multi-modal performance art piece she designed/directed and performed in. The multi-channel video piece and altar installation just went up at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco. Below are shots from the performance of the work at Berkeley Art Center. I did live sound and sound design in collaboration with sound artist/scholar SA Smythe.

Oñí Ocan: The Heart of Sweetness (dir. Courtney Desiree Morris, 2023)
live performance programmed for Rabbit Hole (exhibition feat. Courtney Desiree Morris)
Berkeley Art Center, Berkeley, California, USA
Curator: Adrianne Ramsey
all photos © Carla Hernández Ramírez

The Yoruba term oñí ocan is typically applied to initiates of Oshun, the orisha of rivers, freshwaters, sweetness, and everything that makes life worth living. Like all orisha she operates in duality: she is the divine embodiment of abundance, sensuality, fertility/pregnancy, wealth, pleasure and good fortune. She is also an orisha who has experienced grief, disappointment, abandonment, rejection, and loss. Because of this complexity, Oshun is known as a healer who works with honey and cool water to restore the body and bring mental clarity and self-awareness through the use of her mirror. She is also the patron orisha of sex workers and LGBT practitioners. Oñí Ocan is a multimedia performance ritual that focuses on the use of honey as a material and metaphysical healing modality, as well as a way to honor current and former sex workers and pleasure activists. It is composed of a five-channel experimental film as well as live performances of honey rituals.

The Honey Drippers (actors): Arianne Benford, Kendall Benford, Kiara Brown, Monica Canilao, Odaymar Cuesta Kruda, Rachel De Souza Bolden, Ashara Ekundayo, Dillon Gardner, Sura Hertzberg, Ignacia, Alie Jones, Aja Lenae, Janelle Luster, Sam McGinnis, Pi Palomo, Callan Porter-Romero, Kiara Sample, Savannah Shange, Annie Sprinkle, Undine, & Avery Zeus

Support for Oñí Ocan provided by: The Panta Rhea Foundation, The City of Berkeley, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, & the Foundation for Contemporary Art

Film shot on location at Toro y Moi Studios in Oakland, California
Liver performance at the Berkeley Art Center in Berkeley, California
all photos © Carla Hernández Ramírez

Jamcruise 2018: Reflections

 Putting aside for a moment the strangeness of being on a massive floating city and fraught politics of global capitalism inherent in pretty much everything we do, Jamcruise ​16 was amazing and along with going to Cuba and Benin, probably the richest musical experiences of my life. 

​Five days, nights and morning of performing, listening, collaborating and creating with some of my most favorite and esteemed musicians, people I listened to and adored well before I ever imagined myself playing music: Maceo Parker, George Porter if the Meters, Steel Pulse, John Scofield, to make just a few. 

I am truly grateful to have been a part of this and in awe of the tremendous amount of work it took to put together such a magical event. It was transformational and I want to see this happen again and that far more people- musicians and fans can experience this. 

I am fascinated by the concept of modifying the concept of a cruise ship into something more sustainable. How could it run with a zero carbon footprint, with equitable labor practices, cooperative ownership, healthier connections with the people in the different port cities to build systems which promote economic self determination and cultural understanding and appreciation.  

The cruise ships are sophisticated, well oiled machines and I wonder how much of this is possible only because of all the social and environmental costs and externalities that are hidden from us. Having several friends from Nicaragua who have spent decades working on and off ship, it is a mixed bag. It does offer new possibilities, relationships and income not possible at home. At the same time, the work is intense and demanding and full of assaults to ones dignity. And the price of being separated from ones family and community for periods of nine months at a time over several years. 

All that to say that in addition to my gratitude to the people who organized the event, I am even deeper indebted to the people on the ship grinding tirelessly to create a space for other people to experience such an intensely joyful event.  Til next time.