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Narr: The simple pleasures of a coronet, bass and a Cole Porter composition streaming through an elegant theater in Chelsea…(Sound Up Jazz) Jazz remains a quintessential New York art form. Its roots in the city date back to the smoky lounges in Harlem where Miles Davis and Dizzie Gillespie first charmed audiences in the 1940s and 50s,,,
(Sound Up Jazz)
Narr: But this performance is being called Harlem in the Himalayas… the result of a unique collaboration between two of New York's newer art institutions - the Jazz Museum of Harlem and Chelsea's Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art
Narr: Tim McHenry directs programming at the Rubin and says the Museum's displays of rare Buddhist, Islamic and Tibetan art from the Himalayas are really meditations on universal ideas…
Ax: What we have here is art that deals with the fundamental human condition which is what are we doing here…While it is traditional in form, it becomes contemporary the moment you put a living person in front of it…
Narr: And the Rubin hopes it's jazz evenings like this one that will bring new viewers into the museum and keep these works relevant. At the bottom of the elegant six-floor gallery, musician Warren Vache entertains a crowd sitting on candle lit tables in the Museum's chic theatre. Behind him, projected images of Buddhist mystics are floating on the wall. Vache says he chose to perform as part of the series for two reasons.
Ax: A check and a payday
Narr: As for the Himalayan art, he's indifferent….
Ax: - I confess complete ignorance as to the artistic exhibit and what's going on upstairs - I didn't get a chance to see it at all, bad person that I am
Narr: Jazz enthusiasts like David French comes to the Rubin to hear music performed without amplification in an intimate and focused setting.
Ax: It's much preferable to a jazz club where people are talking and drinking…
Narr: By the end of the night, the consensus about the music's connection to the Himalayas remains decidedly mixed. Some musicians have drawn direct inspiration from the Buddhist and Islamic art and others like Vache, not at all. Programming director Tim McHenry admits that it's a mixed bag from week to week….
Ax: Not everyone has hit the target, but then again when you're asking people to do new things, you don't gain anything unless you want to take the risks….
Narr: The risks seem to be paying off. Harlem in the Himalayas is in its second year and the series continues to draw sell-out crowds and high profile performers.
As for why Jazz has found a home among the Rubin Museum's Buddhist statues and Tibetan paintings… Jazz Museum director Loren Schoenberg credits the multicultural roots of the music itself…
Ax: There's something inherent in the sound that reflects the multi-stranded heterogeneous roots that speaks to people about the coming together of seeming opposites….
Sound Up: Jazz, Applause…
Bilal Qureshi, Columbia Radio News