On March 3, 1979, jazz pianist Dave Burrell gave two solo performances at the Entermedia Theater in New York. The concerts were recorded, and one set was featured on NPR’s show Jazz Alive later that year. The tapes then resided in Burrell’s personal collection until he donated his archive to the University of Pittsburgh Library System in 2020.
The recording and broadcast occurred at a pivotal moment in Burrell’s career. For at least a year he had been composing a jazz opera, Windward Passages, with his wife and librettist Monika Larsson. By the time of the March 3 concert, he had enough material to play solo sets of tunes from the opera.
On September 13, 1979, Burrell recorded another live solo concert of excerpts from the opera that was released on hat Hut records in 1980. The set list of the Entermedia concert aligns with the first seven tracks of the recording, although the improvisatory nature of Burrell’s performances renders them very different.
Because of the Entermedia concert and recording, Burrell formed a relationship with Jazz Alive producer Tim Owens. Owens recorded a later solo performance by Burrell at Blues Alley in Washington DC on June 2, 1980. That performance was broadcast on Jazz Alive on October 12, 1980.
Owens also sent Burrell a list of European jazz producers and advised him on how to get them to book him for performances. Windward Passages and the relationships the opera helped Burrell form fueled much of his work throughout the 1980s. For much of the decade, Burrell toured Europe with a trio that performed excerpts from the opera.
This is a collaboration between the Center for American Music, Theodore M. Finney Music Library, and Archives & Special Collections.