Support a Jazz Activist to Pay Bills & Relocate!
Donation protected
I hope my friend's words, below, resonate with you as much as they have for me. In the spirit of reciprocity - may you be able to support his work as a artist so that he can meet some basic financial needs as well as paying some medical bills.
Our fundraising team is updating this page with more links to his work, some tracks of his poetry and musical collaborations. Check them out and help support a lifelong artist and activist in the next phase of his life, as he recovers and rises to the challenge of social justice work.
Listen: Street Shaman , words and vocal by Adrian Murillo, music and production by Paul Rosales
Listen: Ravens Blues , music, lyrics, vocal by Adrian Murillo
Listen: Frozen in Time , live at 3 Friends Cafe, 2010
Listen: City of Poets , live at 3 Friends Cafe, 2010
Listen: Dont Forget Me , guitar and chorus by Joe Morales, spoken word "Blueprint for the 21st Century" by Adrian Murillo, Wrong Way Train Productions, Los Angeles
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The Jazz Activist
by Adrian Murillo
I am a jazz activist. But let me be clear, I don't aim to represent. I seek to synthesize multiple ideas, other
voices, past and present harmonizing with my own all the while riffing like a jazz musician de-constructing and reinterpreting the old standards of society to expand them to include new forms of intellect and vision, sense and sensibility, ethnicity, Queer spirit, Indigenous spirituality. A Paradigm shift y'all!
Life is one long jam session a collaborative experience like democracy itself, propulsive and improvisational, swinging in good times, flipping the trip on a nightmare with straight drive during bad.
It's like Ray Charles said about performing, so too with activism. Your confidence has got to be your attitude.
And the writer Rollo May once said something about passion in the context of the creative process that
equally applies. Your passion for justice isn't about how intense you feel, how loud you rant and rave and shout down the other side; it's about the quality of your commitment to justice work, to inclusion, equity, economic justice, ecological sustainability, to peace and love. The jazz activists brings new life! Into that old 60s vision song of peace and love.
Revolutions have been launched in the same way jazz musicians perform: with bold moves executed with
tactical intelligence.
Collectively, we can and will diffuse the spell of fascism emanating from the White House. That pendejo thinks he can change the tune of what America is all about. But we got the funk and grace to drop the groove of resistance deep deep in the pocket. First, tune yourself to the energies on the street. Give the people what they want, the inspiration they need. Turn your shadow side into cool shade and give the unloved respect, merciful justice, the chance to sit in on the jam session and hone the chops that handle adversity.
Democracy is one long social jam session experiment and the point of the experiment is to keep the experiment going because the beat goes on and death is the drummer beating life force - that pulsing desire for transcendence, the hungry hearts songs of earthly delights - into developmental cycles of love and sorrow.
So forgive yourself the transgressions of the past and learn from your mistakes so you never repeat them. Believe in yourself by tuning in to the better angels of you nature. To riff on something jazz trumpeter Christian Scott once said, our creative work, this political struggle, is valid because we are valid. Learn to improvise at a moment's notice while never losing sight of the lyrical themes of justice.
As every Latino parent at the board who has had their child stolen from them and locked up in cages god knows, some who have died there knows all too well, yes ohh, yes, they can break our hearts. But they will never ever! break our spirit and resolve.
Our fundraising team is updating this page with more links to his work, some tracks of his poetry and musical collaborations. Check them out and help support a lifelong artist and activist in the next phase of his life, as he recovers and rises to the challenge of social justice work.
Listen: Street Shaman , words and vocal by Adrian Murillo, music and production by Paul Rosales
Listen: Ravens Blues , music, lyrics, vocal by Adrian Murillo
Listen: Frozen in Time , live at 3 Friends Cafe, 2010
Listen: City of Poets , live at 3 Friends Cafe, 2010
Listen: Dont Forget Me , guitar and chorus by Joe Morales, spoken word "Blueprint for the 21st Century" by Adrian Murillo, Wrong Way Train Productions, Los Angeles
---
The Jazz Activist
by Adrian Murillo
I am a jazz activist. But let me be clear, I don't aim to represent. I seek to synthesize multiple ideas, other
voices, past and present harmonizing with my own all the while riffing like a jazz musician de-constructing and reinterpreting the old standards of society to expand them to include new forms of intellect and vision, sense and sensibility, ethnicity, Queer spirit, Indigenous spirituality. A Paradigm shift y'all!
Life is one long jam session a collaborative experience like democracy itself, propulsive and improvisational, swinging in good times, flipping the trip on a nightmare with straight drive during bad.
It's like Ray Charles said about performing, so too with activism. Your confidence has got to be your attitude.
And the writer Rollo May once said something about passion in the context of the creative process that
equally applies. Your passion for justice isn't about how intense you feel, how loud you rant and rave and shout down the other side; it's about the quality of your commitment to justice work, to inclusion, equity, economic justice, ecological sustainability, to peace and love. The jazz activists brings new life! Into that old 60s vision song of peace and love.
Revolutions have been launched in the same way jazz musicians perform: with bold moves executed with
tactical intelligence.
Collectively, we can and will diffuse the spell of fascism emanating from the White House. That pendejo thinks he can change the tune of what America is all about. But we got the funk and grace to drop the groove of resistance deep deep in the pocket. First, tune yourself to the energies on the street. Give the people what they want, the inspiration they need. Turn your shadow side into cool shade and give the unloved respect, merciful justice, the chance to sit in on the jam session and hone the chops that handle adversity.
Democracy is one long social jam session experiment and the point of the experiment is to keep the experiment going because the beat goes on and death is the drummer beating life force - that pulsing desire for transcendence, the hungry hearts songs of earthly delights - into developmental cycles of love and sorrow.
So forgive yourself the transgressions of the past and learn from your mistakes so you never repeat them. Believe in yourself by tuning in to the better angels of you nature. To riff on something jazz trumpeter Christian Scott once said, our creative work, this political struggle, is valid because we are valid. Learn to improvise at a moment's notice while never losing sight of the lyrical themes of justice.
As every Latino parent at the board who has had their child stolen from them and locked up in cages god knows, some who have died there knows all too well, yes ohh, yes, they can break our hearts. But they will never ever! break our spirit and resolve.
Organizer and beneficiary
Carrie Clayton
Organizer
Sandpoint, ID
Adrian Murillo
Beneficiary
