Ben Allison

Our first gig together was at Wall-to-Wall Miles - a 12-hour tribute to the music of Miles Davis held at Symphony Space in NYC in late March 2001. I was asked to arrange a couple of tunes by Miles for my trio with Michael Blake on saxophones and Michael Sarin on drums, along with Mamadou on kora and Famoro Diabate on balafon. Since the music from Miles' modal period had already been chosen by other groups, we decided to play some compositions from his mid-1960s quintet - a challenge as the music from this period contains lots of dense chords and strange harmonic jumps and the kora is not a chromatic instrument (it can be tuned to one of only a handful of keys or modes). When we arrived at the venue there were about 1,100 people crammed into 900 seats, and hundreds more standing in line waiting to get in. The concert was to be broadcast live on national radio and we were scheduled to follow Joe Lovano's group. Pressure? Nah.

Following that performance, I was inspired to write some new material for this quintet, substituting piano for balafon. The result is Peace Pipe.

Ben Allison

bass

Mamadou Diabate

kora

Michael Blake

tenor and soprano sax, bass clarinet

Frank Kimbrough

piano, wurlitzer, prepared piano

Michael Sarin

drums and percussion