2017-2018 French-American Jazz Exchange Tours

Baltimore – August 8, 2017 – Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation has announced grants to six mid-Atlantic based presenting organizations, totaling $13,100, in support of engagements through the 2017-2018 French-American Jazz Exchange Tours program. French-American Jazz Exchange Tours provide greater visibility to the artists and projects of the French-American Jazz Exchange (FAJE) through opportunities of extended touring for FAJE projects and grantees. French-American Jazz Exchange Tours invites ensembles awarded project grants through the FAJE program to tour those projects in the United States with subsidy support provided specifically to presenters in the mid-Atlantic region.

The 2017-2018 tours include:

Abu Sadiya featuring Yacine Boulares (US) and Vincent Segal (France)
Saxophonist Yacine Boulares and French cellist Vincent Segal composed a suite of variations reimagining the Tunisian healing trance music –Stambeli – for their trio with American drummer Nasheet Waits. Their original compositions form a series of variations on the legend of Abu Sadiya. In his wandering search for his enslaved daughter, Abu Sadiya danced and sang his sorrow in the streets of Tunis, becoming the first musician of Stambeli and personifying the memory of Sub-Saharan slaves in Tunisia.

Abu Sadiya will visit:

• Ars Nova Workshop, Philadelphia, PA
• Atlas Performing Arts Center, Washington, DC
• Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA
• Lincoln Center at the Rubenstein Atrium, New York, NY

Ancestral Memories featuring Yosvany Terry (US) and Baptiste Trotignon (France)
Cuban-American saxophonist/percussionist/composer Yosvany Terry and French pianist Baptiste Trotignon present a unique program inspired by the rich and diverse musical traditions of the African Diaspora in the United States and former French colonies in the Americas. Their co-led Ancestral Memories Quartet (with bassist Yunior Terry and drummer Jeff “Tain” Watts) captures the rhythms, melodies, and harmonies of the Caribbean, New Orleans and French Louisiana, re-imagined through 21st century aesthetics and a modern jazz sensibility.

Ancestral Memories will visit:

• DC Jazz Festival, Washington, DC
• National Sawdust, New York, NY

For more information and tour schedules, click here. Please contact venues directly for tickets and to confirm performance dates and times.

About Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation
Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation develops partnerships and programs that reinforce artists’ capacity to create and present work and advance access to and participation in the arts. The Foundation was created in 1979 and is a private non-profit organization that is closely allied with the region’s state arts councils and the National Endowment for the Arts. It combines funding from state and federal resources with private support from corporations, foundations, and individuals to address needs in the arts from a regional, national, and international perspective. For more information on the Foundation’s programs and services, please visit: www.midatlanticarts.org

Contact:
Karen Newell
Director, External Affairs
Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation
karen@midatlanticarts.org
410.539.6656 x104