Wadada Leo Smith//Lecture 18.11.25 at 15:30// Dynjandi, Skipholt 31, 105 Reykjavík
Trumpeter and composer Wadada Leo Smith will present his music and his own graphic notation in Dynjanda Tuesday, November 18, 3:30 pm.
Wadada Leo Smith is a big name in the world of progressive jazz music, composition and free improvisation He has a long career behind him through collaborations with key people such as Anthony Braxton, Muhal Richard Abrams and John Zorn.
The event is organized by MÍT and LHÍ and everyone is welcome.
Wadada Leo Smith
Trumpeter and composer Wadada Leo Smith will be on tour in Europe in
next November for the last time in a long career. He has visited Iceland nine
times in over 40 years, first in 1982 when he played in the Student Association on the roads
Jazz revivals Wadada has visited the country for concerts and teaching regularly, sometimes in
long time at a time. During this period, he has had a great influence on Icelandic musicians and had
collaboration with numerous people, including Skúla Sverrisson, Matthías Hemstock, Magnús Trygvason
Elíassen, Hilmar Jensson etc. who have performed with him and also acted on recordings.
The concert between Wadada and pianist Vijay Iyer in Harpa in January 2017 was well attended and
memorable. The art gallery Mengi published Wadada's reflections, Notur, in 2018.
Wadada's colleagues in Iceland believe it is important to use the opportunity for the planned last one
his tour to Europe and organize the last concert in Iceland November 18, to celebrate them
milestone and thank you for Wadada's contribution to Icelandic music.
Wadada Leo Smith is a pioneer in American jazz and modern music and one of the major
contemporary trumpeters In 2016, he was named the jazz's best trumpeter and jazz player
of the year by DownBeat magazine and the Jazz Journalists Association, he chose the composer of the year in 2015.
His ode to human rights activism, the four-CD box Ten Freedom Summers, was
nominated for the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Music In addition to musical performance, Wadada has taught
composition at Bard College, CalArts, and Harvard School The Trumpet Master and Composer
will be 84 years old in December and in recent years has received many awards such as senior
UCLA University's 2019 Player Recognition, but others who have received that recognition
include Ella Fitzgerald, Henry Mancini, Herb Alpert and Quincy Jones, writer Toni
Morrison and former President Bill Clinton. Wadada was in 2023 inducted into American
Academy of Arts and Letters, an honorary community of artists and writers, for its contributions to
music creation.
Despite his advanced age, Wadada has had little relaxation In March of this year, he had ferns
a concert at the Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, where his twentieth string quartet was performed
and this April, his duet album and Vijay Iyer of the ECM label was released.
At the concert in Iðnó on November 18. play together with Wadada, Jakob Bro guitarist, Skúli Sverrisson bassist and Matthías Hemstock drummer.