On Oct. 14. Flushing Town Hall will host their monthly Virtual Jazz Jam will be kicking off spooky season with, “October: The Heart of Autumn.”
The Virtual Jazz Jam, Led by Astoria resident Carol Sudhalter, is part of the Flushing Town Hall online entertainment series FTH at Home!. This is their aim to provide a sanctuary for jazz musicians and lovers who can’t experience a live show, due to the global pandemic.
The Jam invites a maximum of 15 musicians a month to play their music, as long as they haven’t played at one before. This encourages a variety of artists without repeating the same tunes.
Since spring 2020, there has been a medley of different themes for the jams, including one in August, which was, “unity in mind, spirit and action.”
Tune into Flushing Town Hall’s website at 7:00 pm (EST) on Oct. 14 to experience an autumnal virtual jazz show.
Jazz at Lincoln Center makes music for all ages–even toddlers. On October 30 at 9PM EST, Jazz at Lincoln Center Presents: A Swingin’ Sesame Street Celebration will debut on national PBS stations.
The hour-long special will feature the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis along with Elmo, Bert & Ernie, Big Bird, Herry Monster, Grover, Oscar the Grouch, The Count, Abby, Hoots the Owl, and Rosita.
Wynton Marsalis and Ernie
The orchestra takes Sesame Street favorites like “Rubber Duckie,” “I Don’t Want to Live on the Moon,” and “People in Your Neighborhood” and re-imagines them for the stage. On October 30, PBS will premier the Sesame Street gang singing these classics to a sold out audience.
Since 1969, Sesame Street has introduced young children to music and culture. Jazz legends like Dizzy Gillespie, Herbie Hancock, and Mary Lou Williams all performed on the show. Kenny Rampton, member of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, plays in Sesame Street’s house band.
In this special, Wynton Marsalis meets back up with the familiar the Children’s Television Workshop characters after visiting them on the show in 1991 and 1998.
A Swingin’ Sesame Street Orchestra is funded by Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit organization behind the show. The performance is a part of Jazz at Lincoln Center’s educational and diverse programs that hope to ensure that younger generations appreciate jazz in the future.
Jazz at Lincoln Center’s other educational programs, such as Swing University, WeBop, Essentially Ellington, and Middle School Jazz Academy are available online at jazz.org. They aim to show jazz as a metaphor for democracy and freedom.
Paying tribute to Sesame Street’s New York roots, as of May 1, 2019, sunny days can be found every day at the intersection of West 63rd Street and Broadway. Honoring the show’s 50th anniversary, New York City gave Sesame Street its own real intersection.
Jazz great Wynton Marsalis has been a frequent guest on Sesame Street—and now, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the landmark series, he’s returning the favor. On A Swingin’ Sesame Street Celebration, Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra host thegang in the “House of Swing” for a big band salute to a very special show.
CF Watkins, an Americana pop artist from Brooklyn, released her single “Babygirl” on Wednesday, Sept. 30. The latest single from Watkins’ upcoming sophomore project Babygirl is set to release on Oct. 16 with Whatever’s Clever Records. Watkins has already released two other singles this year called “The Tell” and “Frances” that will also appear on the 11 track LP.
Babygirl will include a combination of Americana/country-leaning and folk/pop songs. Watkins uses other life experiences including homesickness, family, longing, friendship, and her favorite Dostoevsky short story “White Nights” as song inspirations. While the pandemic did not affect the music production of Babygirl, it gave Watkins more mental space to promote the album. “Writing and recording the music is definitely the most rewarding and fun part of the experience- but putting it out can be very daunting,” Watkins explained. “Once the pandemic started, I was able to finally just take the leap and commit to putting it out.”
Watkins collaborated with producer Max Hart to create an ode to her best girlfriends with “Babygirl.” Max Hart has produced multi-instrumental work with artists such as The War on Drugs, Katy Perry, and Melissa Etheridge. Instead of writing “Babygirl” as a typical love song, Watkins’ new album highlights her personal growth as a woman through relatable, powerful, and vulnerable songs. Watkins describes herself as an empath who draws on her own life experiences, loved one’s experiences, and even characters in books. “I suppose I would identify as an empath, so I feel things that happen to others in a way that sticks with me and moves me- even if they are fictional characters,” Watkins said. “Sometimes being that way is exhausting, but it helps in never running out of song material.”
“When I thought of the purest love I know, these relationships were the first to come to mind. In romance, I’ve always been very confused- but love was so clear, magic, and eternal with my best friends, those I called babygirl – who have danced with me in the early morning rain, laughing through the confusion. This is an album meant for other women to hear — with songs that are vulnerable and powerful.”
CF Watkins
Watkins’s Americana-pop style of music comes from her North Carolina roots. Watkins started performing at 14 and has shared the stage with artists like Langhorne Slim, Future Birds, Chatham County Line, Wilder Maker, Lowland Hum, and Alpenglow. Fans can watch the video for another featured song on the Babygirl album called “The Tell,” down below. Watkins describes the opening track as a mission statement about balancing vulnerability and power.
When I think about my last album, I feel I was writing songs about weakness,” Watkins says. “With this album, I made a conscious effort to write songs about the power of choosing yourself.”
Saturday Night Live returned for its 46th season on October 3, with host and SNL alum, Chris Rock, and musical guest, Megan Thee Stallion. The season debut was also the first to be recorded live, from New York, back in Studio 8H since March 7, prior to the pandemic. In the cold open take on Tuesday’s debate, Jim Carrey played Vice President Biden, and Alec Baldwin returned once again to play President Trump. The top memories of the night though belonged to the musical guest.
Megan Thee Stallion has had a huge year. She collaborated with her idol Beyoncé on “Savage,” broke the internet with Cardi B’s “WAP,” made the Time 100 list, and quickly recovered from a widely-publicized shooting. She also remained enrolled in school, continuing to study health administration at Texas Southern University.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9wq14EnezU
Megan’s first performance of the night was “Savage,” in front of a black-and-white graphic saying “Protect Black Women.” While Beyoncé wasn’t in attendance, Megan did a dance break over her verse. Midway through the performance, she stopped rapping as the black-and-white set turned red with bullet holes to reference her shooting. Audio of a Malcolm X speech began playing: “The most disrespected, unprotected, neglected person in America is the black woman.” Beyoncé herself previously sampled the famous speech in her 2016 visual album Lemonade. Megan then chimed in with her own words:
"We need to protect our Black women. And protect our Black women. Cuz at the end of the day, we need our Black women.
We need to protect our Black men and stand up for our Black men because we're tired of seeing hashtags of our Black men." – Meg #SNLpic.twitter.com/wJfTxSu4Cc
She closed out the night with her new song “Don’t Stop,” featuring Young Thug. While not as immediately impactful as “Savage,” it arrives just in time for Halloween with references to Casper the Ghost and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcJxX6h3770
Besides her performances, Megan also appeared in two sketches: “Bottom of Your Face,” a song about catfishing on dates by wearing a mask, and “NBA Bubble Draft,” a fictional game show where basketball groupies compete to enter the Bubble. Watch sketches from the season debut below.
In preparation for the release of his album The Atlas Underground, Tom Morello played 2 sold out shows at New York’s Le Poisson Rouge on October, 2, 2018.
For the first part of the show, Tom Morello was interviewed for almost an hour where he told stories about playing with Bruce Springsteen, meeting Chris Cornell for the first time, and shooting the music video for Rage Against the Machine’s “Sleep Now in the Fire,” where filmmaker and director Michael Moore was arrested. During the interview he also played his guitar solo from Audioslave’s “Like A Stone,” a song he wrote for Chris Cornell called “The Garden of Gethsemane,” and jammed along with Ozzy Osbourne’s “Mr. Crowley.”
Morello recently spoke to Rolling Stone about what it was like to play with Springsteen, in celebration of The Boss’ 71st birthday.
For the next part of the show, Tom let the audience hear The Atlas Underground in its entirety and gave a quick synopsis before every song about the featured guest and how the songs came to be.
The show concluded with Tom playing “The Ghost of Tom Joad” and inviting audience members on stage for a cover of “This Land is Your Land,” and concluded the show by playing “Killing in the Name” while the audience sang vocals.
Setlist: The Garden of Gethsemane Like a Stone Guitar Solo (Audioslave song) Mr. Crowley Jam (Ozzy Osbourne cover)
The Atlas Underground: Battle Sirens, Rabbit’s Revenge, Every Step I Take, We Don’t Need You, Find Another Way, How Long, Lucky One, One Nation, Vigilante Nocturno, Where It’s At Ain’t What It Is, Roadrunner, Lead Poisoning, The Ghost of Tom Joad (Bruce Springsteen cover), This Land Is Your Land (Woody Guthrie cover) (Fans brought on stage), Killing in the Name (Rage Against the Machine song)
“Southern Winds” the new standalone single from NYC indie rocker Arsun, showcases a mature songwriting approach with nostalgic vintage aesthetics and an original style. Glide Magazine praised “Southern Winds” for effectively incorporating the sound of previous decades. Indie88 acknowledged the catchy instrumental that highlights Arsun’s gritty vocals.
Photo Cred: Tasmin Meyer Erashin
Arsun’s musical influence for “Southern Winds” comes from a combination of Phil Spector, Nancy Sinatra’s “You Only Live Twice” and The Beach Boys. Arsun also used inspiration from Homer’s epic “The Odyssey” and popular music from the 1950s and 1960s. The influences help to highlight Arsun’s mature approach to songwriting at 21. Click here to listen to Southern Winds.
The main melody kind of just came out of the blue when I was messing around with some chords one day. I really liked them and thought they had kind of a special surreal sound. I made the lyrics try to kind of reflect that vibe.
Set + Voi, an Asian Electro-Pop Supergroup, debuts their first single “TMRW” on October 2, 2020. Set + Voi hopes that the song will help people to view Asian Americans in a different light than they are portrayed by in the media.
The supergroup is made up of Tony Nguyen of Wind Meets West, Mason Wong of VYZTA, and Ashley Chong of saenabi. The three piece band hails from Brooklyn and has worked completely remotely from each other, creating this song without having ever met each other in person. The supergroup formed during COVID- 19 through the Asian Creative Network, a community to connect and empower Asian creatives. Nguyen initiated the group’s formation by inviting Chong and Wong for a writing session.
The song “TMRW” became their first single after writing sections together where it was formed. Nguyen uses their producing and songwriting skills, Chong uses their lyrics and songwriting, led by poetry and personal narrative, and Wong’s expertise in EDM production make for music that combines emotional honesty and high-toned theatrical flair. Their different musical upbringings create a compelling mix that makes their music unique.
Nguyen spoke on the creation of “TMRW” saying, “I wrote this song about how immigrant parents sometimes can’t conceive a life outside ‘stability=happiness’, that a 9-5 is the only way to find your place in life. This song is for everyone on a nonstandard path in life, those who want to break out and live a different way than they were taught growing up.”
The name Set + Voi, means “set whale,” voi being Vietnamese for ‘whale.’ This name came into being after an inside joke between the band members referring to the whale-like sound that reverberates through their first single ‘TMRW.’
For more information on Set + Voi, visit their Instagram here and stay tuned for more from this supergroup.
Trey Anastasio will hold a series of free live concerts from the Beacon Theatre, in partnership with MSG Entertainment. The Friday night series, dubbed The Beacon Jams, will kick off on October 9 at 8pm and run through November 27, featuring both acoustic and electric performances, as well as home audience interaction, with surprises in store. The series of performances will stream exclusively on Twitch, in partnership with Relix Magazine.
While each performance of The Beacon Jams is free, fans are encouraged to donate to the WaterWheel Foundation, and its new Divided Sky Fund (DSF). The proceeds will be used to deliver help to those affected by addiction and help further plans to open a treatment center in Vermont.
When we thought about playing the Beacon, I was reminded of the meaning of the word. A beacon is a beam of light, often from a lighthouse, which sends it out to sailors who are lost at sea and all alone. They look for the beacon and it guides them home. Sometimes gifts come wrapped in strange packages. A lot of this is thanks to Twitch and our friends and family at MSG Entertainment. When the idea to do these benefits was born, everybody at MSG Entertainment jumped in and partnered with us and the Divided Sky Fund, which is very kind of them. This is an opportunity for forward motion.
Trey Anastasio, on The Beacon Jams
The WaterWheel Foundation, created by Phish in 1997 to oversee the band’s charitable endeavors, partners with local non-profits while Phish is on tour, and partnering with national organizations during times of need, donating millions of dollars over the past 20+ years.
The Divided Sky Fund will focus on delivering quality care and compassionate treatment for those suffering from addiction. Fans will be encouraged to donate throughout the eight-week event; net proceeds from merchandise sales during The Beacon Jams will go directly to the DSF.
I’ve been sober for 13 years. It’s a great blessing in my life. We started talking about the idea of a treatment center about a year ago. I was worried that the project would get derailed because of the pandemic but it didn’t – it actually picked up steam; things are really rolling along now. The Beacon Jams emerged as a way to raise money for it while also allowing me to play for the fans again.
Trey Anastasio, on the Divided Sky Fund
Executive Vice President of MSG Entertainment, Darren Pfeffer spoke highly of the new series.
We’re thrilled to be able to partner with Trey on this very special and first-ever virtual residency at the Beacon Theatre to benefit two immensely important causes – the Divided Sky Fund and the WaterWheel Foundation. As we navigate the live music scene through this socially distant world, we couldn’t think of a more natural way to bring live music to so many fans for such a great cause. Trey’s connection not only with the Beacon Theatre, but with all our venues over the years, including Madison Square Garden, The Chicago Theatre, and Radio City Music Hall, have made this unique concept a perfect partnership.
Darren Pfeffer, Executive VP of MSG Entertainment
Twitch, a platform finding immense popularity in the last year due to the increase in streaming of online performances, also celebrated the partnership.
We could not be more excited to be part of this amazing partnership with Trey Anastasio and MSG Entertainment to help raise donations for such worthy causes. Twitch offers the same intimate experience that artists and their audiences have come to expect from live shows. Over the course of this virtual residency, fans of Trey and Phish will be able to attend performances from anywhere in the world, while feeling like they are right in the front row of the Beacon.
Will Farrell-Green, Head of Music Content at Twitch
Trey Anastasio has been busy since March, releasing numerous songs on his Instagram account, culminating with releasing an album featuring many of these songs, Lonely Trip. Anastasio was also the first in-studio musical guest on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon in late August, performing alongside the Roots.
Experimental funk/jam legends Lettuce have issued an eye-catching official video for the instrumental “Silence Is Golden” off latest album, Resonate.
The colorful, animated storybook visual was created by the Los Angeles-based team at Black Balloon Media. The video is directed by Brad Strickman, produced by Shane Strickman and illustrated by Carolyn Arcabascio.
Images from the video will be transformed into coloring book pages for fans to enjoy, with the first available to download here.
With this video, we want to take you on a visually stunning, colorful journey into a fantastic storybook-like world that invokes peace and inspires creativity. We want to make the connection resonate between ourselves, nature, and the spirit that binds us all together. Lett us present, ‘Silence is Golden.’
Lettuce Guitarist Adam “Shmeeans” Smirnoff.
Black Balloon Media previously worked on a video for Neil Young’s “Powderfinger,” which is what attracted Lettuce to work with the company, seeing a similar style and approach for “Silence is Golden”
Smirnoff connected with the Black Balloon Media team and advised them on the song’s themes of music and nature intertwining and connecting all of us. This also led to discussing having the band members animated in the video and playing their instruments within nature, creating a wide variety of scenes – not just one setting, but instead, in all of nature.
From there, as we do with all projects, we put together some boards and a treatment. There was a little back and forth on the style, colors, and look of the band members. We brought on Carolyn Arcabascio to do a lot of the illustrations. We love her watercolor, painterly style and it fit the direction very well. We had worked with her previously on an animated video for Palisades “Erase the Pain.”
Brad Strickman, Creative Director
With the team together and boards and treatment approved, the team started building shots and assembling an edit. Since “Silence is Golden” appropriately has no lyrics, the video was approached a little differently.
We didn’t have to worry about sync as much as you would with a song with wall to wall singing. We still wanted them to be playing correctly and in time, but we had some leeway. In fact, we built a lot of the scenes without them playing at first, and then as the edit got finalized, we animated them to be more in sync with the locked timing. This gave us more flexibility. As it came together we would send them updated versions. They were loving it, so minor adjustments along the way, handling any notes they had and polished it as we went.
Brad Strickman, Creative Director
“Working on the art, it was amazing to me how Lettuce’s music already felt so visual,” adds the video’s illustrator Carolyn Arcabascio. “You can just imagine the colors as the song goes from dreamy and trance-like to energetic and explosive. A total dream project for an illustrator.”
Brad Strickman, director, also shares, “We really enjoyed bringing this video to life for Lettuce and their management team. The song has such a great vibe and, right from the beginning, we loved their concept of nature and music connecting us all.”
The connection of nature to music is essential to understand. The sound of the leaves swaying in the soft breeze along with the crickets and birds singing, can be very inspiring. This song represents a quiet place that resides in all of our minds that can bring peace to our souls. Lettuce meditate to the golden silence.
Lettuce drummer Adam Deitch
Black Balloon Media, in addition to Lettuce and Neil Young, has worked with Linkin Park, Disturbed, Bebe Rexha, Prince, Neffex, Palisades, Bad Bunny and Stone Temple Pilots, among many others.
Resonate, Lettuce’s seventh studio album, is a sonic continuation of the acclaimed sextet’s 2019 GRAMMY Award-nominated album Elevate, which earned Lettuce their first collective nomination in the category of Best Contemporary Instrumental Album.
On Resonate, Lettuce continue to be celebrated boundary-pushing innovators nearly three decades into their lauded career, blurring the lines and smashing it up with jazz chords, psychedelic passages, big horns, strains of soul and go-go, hip-hop elements and a joyful, uplifting improvisational sound all their own. They also found inspiration from many of their idols, such as James Brown and Earth, Wind & Fire, for the new music. Resonate was helmed by esteemed producer and engineer Russ Elevado [D’Angelo, The Roots, Erykah Badu] and written and recorded during the same Colorado Sound Studio sessions for Elevate.
LiveXLive, based out of New York City, is hosting the Vote Ready Festival livestream event on Oct. 2 at 8:00 p.m. ET/5:00 p.m. PT. The partnership of Atlantic Records’ ATL Votes Initiative, Elektra Music Group, and the voter outreach organization HeadCount will host the three-hour virtual event. The festival will be available to watch for free on LiveXLive’s site and apps.
The Vote Ready Festival will include special appearances from Jack Harlow, Jojo, and Why Don’t We, along with the featured performers listed above. LiveXLive’s has already seen abundant success with its “Music Lives On” festival series that launched back in May of this year. The series has included performances from 90 artists reaching over 165 million fans. In addition to livestream events, LiveXLive’s global platform elevates artists and celebrity voices to cover topics including music, comedy, and pop culture through videos and podcasts.
Music is a uniting force that we’ve watched bring the global village together during this pandemic and every other major movement in history. Joining forces with Atlantic Records on the ATL Votes initiative in association with Headcount to encourage Americans to vote is an important partnership as we head toward Election Day.
LiveXLive’s President Dermot McCormack
The goal of The Vote Ready Festival is to increase support for Headcount’s mission of encouraging fans to register and get out to vote with the help of artists. HeadCount is a non-profit organization that promotes participation in democracy through music, culture, and digital media. Headcount has already registered over 200,000 voters for the 2020 election.
ATL Votes, created by Atlantic Records, encourages voter registration by utilizing the labels’ roster of artists. ATL Votes has incorporated Headcount’s voter registration tools into Atlantic artist websites, email lists, and livestreams. Elektra Music Group, a sister label group of the Atlantic records subsidiaries, will also work closely with ATL Votes and Headcount to encourage fan participation in democracy.
Democracy–and in turn, our country–doesn’t function properly without full participation from its citizens. We are very fortunate to have incredible artists, managers, and partners like Elektra Music Group, Warner Records, HeadCount, and LiveXLive to work alongside us in executing a truly special event we are all proud to be a part of.”
Nick Harvey, Atlantic Records’ Director of Digital Marketing
