“Defiant is a powerful term,” says the legendary composer-trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith. “The defiant person knows, completely and wholeheartedly, what’s right and what’s wrong, and they cannot be persuaded to think any other kind of way. And that defiance matches their action.... So it’s not just that you disagree; it’s a much deeper embodiment of your own self-realization.” Collaborators for over two decades, Smith and composer-pianist Vijay Iyer make music from what Iyer calls “our individual languages, our mutual aural attunement, and what I would call a shared aesthetic of necessity.” This performance celebrates the release of their new album, Defiant Life.
This performance, featuring Wadada Leo Smith on trumpet and Vijay Iyer on piano, Fender Rhodes, and electronics, is part of Monumental Concerns, a gathering convened by acclaimed interdisciplinary artist Carrie Mae Weems. This daylong program (10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.) will bring together a rich array of artists, poets, scholars, activists, and theorists to explore the rocky terrain of contested sites of memory and monuments. It will explore questions such as: How might we understand the stakes of the dialogue and debate around monuments and the sites they commemorate? How do we negotiate among multiple–often conflicting–narratives and the way they show up in public space? And is disagreement crucial to transformation? Its aim, in offering an evocative examination of the politics of disagreement, is to help us collectively create a framework for moving towards a sense of belonging for all.
Monumental Concerns is free and open to the public. Registration is required, and there will be a standby line.
Monumental Concerns is co-organized by Syracuse University and The Museum of Modern Art.