7/25/19:</br>Lafayette Gilchrist

Lafayette Gilchrist toured with David Murray in his octet and quartets for 13 years. He has performed with Cassandra Wilson, Macy Gray, Oliver Lake, Andrew Cyrille, Orrin Evans, Paul Dunmall, Hamid Drake, William Parker and many more. His compositions appear in David Simon’s soundtracks for The Wire, The Deuce, and Treme.

His Baltimore-based band the New Volcanoes stews in the heat of D.C. go-go, old school soul, hard funk and progressive hip-hop, with the potential for social critique and invective as evidenced by the powerful Blues for Freddie Gray. This July, he releases a solo piano album entitled Dark Matter.

Troy Collins writes, "His dark, melodious writing has roots in Andrew Hill's harmonic sophistication, Thelonious Monk's angular intervals and Duke Ellington's earthy simplicity.” But you could add Jelly Roll Morton, James P. Johnson and more. Lots of sources and influences coming together here. Hence the title. Mr. Gilchrist explains, “Dark matter is the thing that keeps everything from drifting apart.…this invisible force that holds the universe together. That came to mind because the tunes on the album are so different one from the other that I felt the title suggested a binding of a kind—a desire for the listener to hear it all as one sound.”

Listen to the first cut For the Go Go.

Then, RSVP to join us for an evening with this extraordinary artist….

@exuberance parties at Matt’s are by invitation only to provide a dignified, comfortable and acoustically ideal setting for worthwhile art and ideas. Cellphones and other devices are to be holstered during the performances. Between sets, conviviality rules.