Partnership

Novatopia - African American Innovators, LLC - Hesteria Records and Publishing Co.

Rebuilding Global Community through the Arts

1. African American Innovators, LLC

2. Interdisciplinary Artists Aggregation, Inc.

3. Hesteria Records & Publishing Co.

WEB SECTOR 1 : Goals : Rebuilding Global Community through the Arts

• Collecting and promoting international research on Global African music and depositing the results into the Living Encyclopedia of Global African Music at UC Santa Cruz.


• Presenting the annual UC Santa Cruz Global African Music and Arts Festival/Symposium and producing publication of encyclopedia volumes annually. New volumes contribute to the Encyclopedia’s evolution.


• Educational projects designed to enlighten the community to the cultural, economic and spiritual forces associated with African American artists in "jazz" and other Global African music through conferences, workshops, master classes and exchange projects. Special attention is also directed at making Global African youth aware of the importance and necessity of Global African music innovations and evolution. The Institute aims to provide opportunities for young students to research and write meaningful critiques of Global African music in preparation for their own careers in music and art history, socio-cultural analysis and criticism.


• To remain consistent with an Afrocentric approach to music that is inherently interdisciplinary, content-centered (rather than motivated foremost by form), and concerned with the impact of sacred and secular dimensions on artistic expression.

Living Encyclopedia of Global African Music

A living encyclopedia is only possible through field research, documentation and interviews of eyewitness participants in the subject being collected and codified. Global African Music and its most ubiquitous offspring, African American Jazz, are in the twilight of its opportunity to be preserved and collected. The Institute explores the history of "jazz" from its African roots and within the socio-cultural context that shaped its evolution. It establishes an Afrocentric historical nucleus that allows future artists, scholars and students to expand, challenge and refine the ideas presented.

The project’s nucleus:

From Africa to Afrocentric Innovations Some Call "Jazz" (Karlton E. Hester) is a historical reminder that much of the music that drives the music industry and contemporary world culture has Afrocentric origin. New articles, recordings, video footage, interviews, photographs, and other documents by Global African scholars and artists worldwide are organized chronologically based on the book’s structure when received. From Africa to Afrocentric Innovations Some Call "Jazz" consists of 12 chronologically arranged chapters currently presented as a 4-volume set.

• Volume 1 : The Afrocentric Roots of "Jazz" and African Music in the Americas (Antiquity-1910; Chapters 1-4)
• Volume 2 : The Evolution of Classic "Jazz" Forms (1910-1960; Chapters 5-8)
• Volume 3 : The Creation of Free, Fusion and Reconstruction Modern Styles (1960-2000; Chapters 9-12)
• Volume 4 : An Encyclopedia of Music, Musicians and Recordings (Appendices, discography, and biographies of all 12 chapters, and resources for teachers)

Oral History Project :

A number of recent panel discussions and interviews for the Living Encyclopedia of Global African Music are already recorded and transcribed. Others are planned for the future.

Global African Music Festival/Symposium Series

Past: In April 2002 the UCSC Global African Music Festival was launched successfully, followed by the Global African Music and Art Festival/Symposium in 2003. Invited presenters will represent a wide variety of disciplines in addition to music, including art history, performance studies, film viewing, ethnomusicology, dance, anthropology, sociology, etc.

Upcoming: A very brief overview description of the upcoming international event follows:

Subject: UCSC/ISIM Festival/Conference at UCSC
Time: December 3, 2009 at 3pm to December 6, 2009 at 5pm
Location: University of California Santa Cruz
Organized By: Karlton E. Hester:

Event Description:
Theme: Improvisation, Diversity, and Change: Uncovering New Social Paradigms Within Spontaneous Musical Creativity.

In cooperation with the International Society for Improvised Music, with the generous support of Porter College Festival Funding at UCSC, and additional support from UCSC Music Department, the IAA and AAI, we will host a co-sponsored festival & conference of improvised, cross-cultural and interdisciplinary music and arts festival/conference. This is continuation of the Global African Music Festival series and a recent collaboration with International Society of Improvising Musicians that has grown out of 2007 and 2008 ISIM conferences.

The primary objectives and purpose of the UCSC Improvising Artists Festival and Conference (IAFC) is to host a collaborative set of joint events under the co-sponsorship of the annual International Society for Improvised Music Conference (ISIM) and a UCSC festival aimed at an ongoing effort entitled, “Rebuilding Global Community through the Arts.” Thus, the focus of the festival/conference is on creating an environment and infrastructure where people from different creative genres and disciplines can come together for a weekend to explore and imagine new avenues of interdisciplinary, cross-cultural discourse and interaction focused upon 21st century improvisation, diversity and change.

Event Description:
The conference will contain approximately forty events within three days. All events will feature members of ISIM, invited guest performers and scholars, with a special emphasis on UCSC students, invited guests, and faculty presentation and participation. The first two days of the conference will have one keynote speaker in the morning and keynote artists in the evening, for a total of four keynotes. Each full day will also be jam packed innovative presentations, concerts, films, workshops, and panel discussions with guests from around the globe.

Educating Tomorrow's Creative Musicians and Scholars

Please visit: http://aainnovators.com/moodle

In addition to working with university students, there is a special interest in working with a wide range of young and under-served audiences. Wajumbe Cultural Center’s educational programs (San Francisco) will serve as one of the primary sites for pilot educational outreach projects.

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