Photo: marswilliams.com
Mars Williams
Mars Williams
The holidays are upon us. If you are tired of being bombarded with the annual crass commercialization, consider Mars Williams’ as the antidote. For the last decade Chicago-based saxophonist Williams has been performing the music of Albert Ayler to celebrate the season, blending it with well-known holiday classics.
Mars Williams presents: An Ayler Xmas happens Sunday at Sugar Maple, 4 p.m.
A renegade avant-garde jazz pioneer, Ayler’s music was built on improvisation, moving from humble folk melodies to wild ecstasy within the same piece.
Williams has been with the Psychedelic Furs since 1983 but listeners have heard his insistent horn riff since 1981 in The Waitresses “Christmas Wrapping.”
While his music moves from free jazz, funk, hip-hop and rock, Williams’ time studying with trumpeter Don Cherry as well as Chicago’s legendary collective Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians and rubbing shoulders with Ornette Coleman connects the dots to the ongoing Ayler Xmas project.
Playing with Williams will be Jim Baker (piano, synthesizer); Josh Berman (cornet, violin); Peter Maunu (violin); Kent Kessler (bass); Brian Sandstrom (bass, guitar and trumpet) and Steve Hunt (drums, percussion and glockenspiel).
Williams said that Ayler’s music offers a landscape for improvisation where the players can play a familiar holiday melody then light for the outer limits before returning to the theme. “The Twelve Days of Christmas” morphs into “Jingle Bells” before acknowledging Ayler’s “Spirits.”
Asked what the question would be he’d pose to the late Albert Ayler, Williams said he’d like to know how he led his groups. Sunday’s performance will offer insight on Williams’ version on that very question.
