“BloomBars to Celebrate DC’s Go-Go Music With A Week-long Artist Residency Feat: Renowned Keyboardist and Drummer Marc Cary and “The Indigenous Arkestra.”

From BloomBars (3222 11th St, NW):

“From Tuesday, June 14th-18th, BloomBars will host The Indigenous Arkestra – an all-star big band collaboration feat: Marc Cary, Tarus Mateen, Casey Benjamin, Brandon Woody, Lil Mickey, BJ aka “The Future,” YML, Jrok, with additional vocalists, Michelle Blackwell, Kacey, and Killa Cal. This is the first time The Indigenous will record or perform as a big band.

The residency was made possible by a grant from the South Arts – Jazz Road Creative Residencies, and presented by Intrinsic Artists Music. Marc’s inspiration and goal for the residency is to bring community-driven Go-Go culture in DC to a wider audience in the U.S. and internationally. With his pan-ethnic collective Indigenous People band – which merges poetic rhyme flow, soulful chanting, native Go-Go rhythms and a groove at home in the stellar realms of “interplanetary funkmanship,” Marc and Intrinsic Artistsare planning a world tour to kick off the album.

Opportunities for the public to watch and tune-in include:

Wednesday, June 15th from 1pm to 2pm – Live Steam Open Rehearsal

Friday, June 17th from 3pm to 4pm – Open Rehearsal (Outdoor Patio Viewing)

Friday, June 17th from 4pm to 5pm – Musical Preview/Demonstration/Q & A

Saturday, June 18th at 3pm – Performance at Columbia Heights Day Stage on the Harriette Tubman Field.

The intergenerational ensemble represents the roots, legacy, and future of Go-Go – recently recognized as the official music of Washington DC. In fusing the jazz and Go-Go legacies of Marc’s musical upbringing, he hopes to add something new to pantheon of international folkloric percussive traditions. The live recording will be released as an album with the documentary webisodes on YouTube.

The Indigenous’ core ensemble has album releases spanning 22 years, including Indigenous People, captured live in Brazil, Indigenous People N.G.G.R (Native GoGo Rhythm Please), Indigenous People Unite, and Cosmic Indigenous. Marc Cary has received the coveted Billboard BET Jazz best newcomer award in 2000 with Indigenous People and their release Native Go Go Rhythms Please. Indigenous People have also performed at The Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, NYC Winter Jazz Festival, and internationally including tours of Brazil (where the first Indigenous People album “Captured Live in Brazil” was recorded at the historic Free Jazz Festival), South Africa, Guinea and more.

Marc Cary stands apart by way of pedigree and design as one of New York’s (now Baltimore-based) highly acclaimed jazz pianists, and continues to influence future generations as a Jazz faculty member at both The Juilliard School and Manhattan School of Music. None of his prestigious peer group ever set the groove behind the drums in Washington DC go-go bands nor are any others graduates of both Betty Carter and Abbey Lincoln’s daunting bandstand academies. He has shared stages and cultivated his craft with Dizzy Gillespie, Arthur Taylor, Carlos Garnett, Jackie McLean, Wynton Marsalis, and Carmen McRae. His comfort with women bandleaders also made him a favorite accompanist among other modern singers, notably Meshell Ndegeocello, Erykah Badu, Lauryn Hill and Ani Di Franco. Cary has been Grammy nominated in both Stefon Harris’s Blackout Group, and with Abbey Lincoln. He remains one of the progenitors of contemporary jazz, evident in his influence on peers. Live gigs with Stefon Harris and bandmate Casey Benjamin began the genesis of Robert Glasper’s recording Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” and Cary’s record “Taiwa” from Focus in 2006 evolved into “For You” on Glasper’s Double Booked and Harris’ Urbanus. Cary collaborator Roy Hargrove exalted him with “Caryisms” on 1992’s The Vibe, an album whose title track is one of two Cary originals including “Running Out of Time,” now part of the lexicon of live repertoire among jazz stalwarts Hargrove, Dr. Lonnie Smith, and Igmar Thomas’ Revive Big Band. As Nate Chinen observed, “There isn’t much in the modern-jazz-musician tool kit that Marc Cary hasn’t mastered, but he has a particular subspecialty in the area of groove…with a range of rhythmic strategies, from a deep-house pulse to a swinging churn. Mr. Cary richly embodies the spirit of diverse streams that feed into the ample body of what we consider jazz history today.”

BloomBars works to inspire compassionate, creative and purposeful communities through the arts. Our goal is to foster personal and collective growth and cultivate a legion of artists to be the catalyst for community transformation across the globe. We offer a safe space for creative expression, community building, wellness, entertainment and anything that nurtures meaningful human connections and motivates people to service. We redefine the perception of a bar by providing opportunities for diverse, multi-lingual, multi-generational communities to gather in a culturally rich and alcohol-free environment. We are 100% donation driven, volunteer run and love fueled.

Jazz Road is an artist-centric touring and residency grants program promoting deeper engagement between jazz musicians, presenters, and communities.”