Steve Dalachinsky
Encyclopedia
Steve Dalachinsky is a New York downtown poet. He is active in the poetry, music, art and music- Free jazz
scene.
Dalachinsky was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1946. He has been writing poetry for many years and has worked with such musicians as William Parker
, Susie Ibarra
, Matthew Shipp
, Roy Campbell
, Daniel Carter
, Sabir Mateen
, Mat Maneri
, Federico Ughi
, Loren Mazzacane Connors
, Rob Brown, Tim Barnes
and Jim O'Rourke
. He has appeared at most of the Vision Festival
s, an Avant-jazz festival involving many of these musicians. He also appears often at the Knitting Factory
. He currently lives in Manhattan with his wife, painter and poet Yuko Otomo.
Dalachinsky's books include "A Superintendent's Eyes" (Hozomeen Press 2000), his PEN Award Winning book The Final Nite & Other Poems: Complete Notes From A Charles Gayle Notebook 1987-2006 (Ugly Duckling Presse
, 2006), a compendium of poetry written while watching saxophonist Charles Gayle
perform throughout New York City in that time period, and "Logos and Language", co-authored with pianist Matthew Shipp
(RogueArt 2008) and Reaching Into The Unknown, a collaboration with French photographer Jacques Bisceglia (RogueArt 2009).
Dalachinsky's other publications include Trial and Error in Paris from Loudmouth Collective Press and Quicksand from Isis Press. His spoken word
albums include Incomplete Directions, I thought it was the end of the world then the end of the world happened again with Federico Ughi
, and Phenomena of Interference with Matthew Shipp
.
Dalachinsky's work has appeared in the following journals on & off line: Big Bridge, Milk, Unlikely Stories, Xpressed, Ratapallax, Evergreen Review, Long Shot, Alpha Beat Soup, Xtant, Blue Beat Jacket, N.Y. Arts Magazine, Tribes, The Helix, 6x6, Cannot Exist, Home Planet News, Polisz, Unarmed, The GW Review, Gare Maritime, Alternating Current, Bathtub Gin, 88, The Wandering Hermit Review, Mima'amakim, Lost and Found Times and many others.
Dalachinsky has written extensively for the Brooklyn Rail
.
His poems are included in the anthologies Beat Indeed, Writers Beyond the Margin, The Haiku Moment, Downtown Poets, Resistance, A History of Jews and the Lower East Side, The Unbearables anthologies Help Yourself and The Worse Book I Ever Read, Up is Up but So is Down, viviparous blenny, Ragged Lion, Off the Cuffs, In the Arms of Words, Hurricane Blues, An Eye for an Eye Makes the Whole World Blind, La tentation du silence, DOC(K)S ("Lecon d'amour), LePetite Mercure's Le gout du Jazz and the Outlaw Bible of American Poetry.
Dalachinsky has written liner notes for the CDs of many artists including Anthony Braxton, Charles Gayle, Derek Bailey, James "Blood" Ulmer, Rashied Ali, Roy Campbell, Matthew Shipp and Roscoe Mitchell.
Among his many chapbooks are Musicology (Editions Pioche, Paris 2005), Trial and Error in Paris (Loudmouth Collective 2003), Lautreamont's Laments (Furniture Press 2005), In Glorious Black and White (Ugly Duckling Presse 2005), St. Lucie (King of Mice Press 2005), Are We Not MEN and Fake Book (2 books of collage - 8 Page Press 2005), Dream Book (Avantcular Press 2005), Totems (Unarmed Press 2008), Christ Amongst the Fishes (a book of collage - Oil Can Press 2009) and Invasion of the Animal People (Alternating Current 2009).
His 1999 CD, Incomplete Directions (Knitting Factory Records), a collection of his poetry read in collaboration with various musicians, such as William Parker, Matthew Shipp, Daniel Carter, Sabir Mateen, Thurston Moore (SonicYouth) and Vernon Reid (Living Colour) has garnered much praise.
Among Dalachinsky's other CDs are Thin Air with guitarist Loren Mazzacane Connors (Silver Wonder Recording recorded 2001, released 2006), Phenomena of Interference, a collaboration with pianist Matthew Shipp (Hopscotch Records 2006), Merci Pour le Visite with Didier Lassere, drums and Sebastian Capezza, saxophone (Amor Fati 2007). His work has also been read by Derek Bailey and John Tchicai on their respective cds.
He has read throughout the N.Y. area including the Poetry Project and the Vision Festival. Dalachinsky has also read in San Francisco and other cities throughout the U.S., Japan and Europe, including Germany, England and France. Some of the venues in France are Instants Chavires, the Olympic Cafe and Sete Lizards. He also participated in the Sons d'Hiver Festival (2004) and the Biennial of Poetry in Val de Marne (2007), CIPM in Marseille (2007) and Maison d'Poesie in Nantes (at Pannonica 2007). He recently read his Insomnia Poems (written for Louise Bourgeois), a collaboration with British composer Pete Wyer, for the BBC's Jazz on 3 in England.
New collaboration in 2011 with french duet art-rockers The Snobs on new cd album; Steve Dalachinsky and The Snobs "Massive Liquidity"- An unsurreal post-apocalyptic anti-opera in two acts -( french label Bam Balam.records). "Steve Dalachinsky and The Snobs" met in winter 2011 in Paris to record some vocals for the project. (Harmonie Magazine #72)
"Massive Liquidity" presents two twenty minutes musical suites made of various influences: 1969’s Miles Davis’ instrumental freedom hit Einstürzende Neubauten’s industrial and elegant sense of rhythm. Psychedelic effects are both essential and measured to let a strict groove between James Brown and Arnold Schoenberg happen. Dalachinsky’s voice is the narrative element: it can be a gentle whisper at a moment and turn into a wild and menacing raucous noise just few seconds later. Words and music interact, they sometimes hurt each other or simply become one only powerful and moving sound. The record’s closing belongs to the voice, which seems to clarify the violent and cosmic experience the listener just had: "It’s his head now… Pull the trigger".
Dalachinsky's main influences are the Beats, Blake, The Odyssey, obsession, socio-political angst, human disappointment, music (especially Jazz), and visual art with leanings toward abstraction. His work, for the most part is spontaneous and leans towards transforming the image rather than merely describing it, in what he now refers to as transformative description/descriptive transformation.
Free jazz
Free jazz is an approach to jazz music that was first developed in the 1950s and 1960s. Though the music produced by free jazz pioneers varied widely, the common feature was a dissatisfaction with the limitations of bebop, hard bop, and modal jazz, which had developed in the 1940s and 1950s...
scene.
Dalachinsky was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1946. He has been writing poetry for many years and has worked with such musicians as William Parker
William Parker (musician)
William Parker is an American free jazz double bassist, poet and composer.-Biography:Parker was not formally trained as a classical player, though he did study with Jimmy Garrison, Richard Davis, and Wilbur Ware and learned the tradition. Parker is one of few jazz bassists who regularly plays arco...
, Susie Ibarra
Susie Ibarra
Susie Ibarra is a Contemporary Composer and Percussionist who has worked and recorded with jazz, classical, world, and Indigenous musicians. She is known for her work as a performer in avant-garde, jazz, world and new music...
, Matthew Shipp
Matthew Shipp
Matthew Shipp is an American pianist, composer and bandleader.Shipp was raised in Wilmington, Delaware, and began playing piano at six years old. His mother was a friend of trumpeter Clifford Brown....
, Roy Campbell
Roy Campbell, Jr.
Roy Campbell, Jr. is versatile trumpeter frequently linked to free jazz, though he has also performed rhythm and blues, bebop and funk at times during his career. Born in Los Angeles, California in 1952, Campbell was raised in New York. At age fifteen Campbell began learning to play trumpet and...
, Daniel Carter
Daniel Carter (musician)
Daniel Carter is an American free jazz saxophone, flute, clarinet, and trumpet player active mainly in New York City since the early 1970s...
, Sabir Mateen
Sabir Mateen
Sabir Mateen is a musician and composer from Philadelphia who plays primarily in the avant-garde jazz idiom. He plays tenor and alto saxophone, B♭ and alto clarinet, and flute....
, Mat Maneri
Mat Maneri
Mat Maneri, born on October 4, 1969 in Brooklyn, New York is an American composer, improviser and jazz violin and viola player, specifically derivatives such as the five-string viola, the electric six-string violin, and the baritone violin...
, Federico Ughi
Federico Ughi
Federico Ughi is an Italian drummer and composer. He works primarily in the fields of free improvisation and jazz. Originally from Italy, he has lived in New York City since 2000, and is based in Brooklyn, New York...
, Loren Mazzacane Connors
Loren Mazzacane Connors
Loren MazzaCane Connors is an American experimental musician who has recorded and performed under several different names: Guitar Roberts, Loren Mazzacane, Loren Mattei, and currently Loren Connors...
, Rob Brown, Tim Barnes
Tim Barnes
Timothy Kent "Tim" Barnes is a Democratic party politician in Tennessee, representing the 22nd District as State Senator since 2009. He is perhaps best known for his primary challenge of then-State Senator Rosalind Kurita in 2008.-External links:...
and Jim O'Rourke
Jim O'Rourke (musician)
Jim O'Rourke is an Irish-American musician and record producer. He was long associated with the Chicago experimental and improv scene...
. He has appeared at most of the Vision Festival
Vision Festival
The Vision Festival is the world's premier festival of experimental music , art, film and dance. Inspired by the 1984 and '88 Sound Unity Festivals. It was a direct out growth of the Improvisors Collective 1994 and '95. In 1996, Dancer-choreographer Patricia Nicholson Parker, initiated the First...
s, an Avant-jazz festival involving many of these musicians. He also appears often at the Knitting Factory
Knitting Factory
The Knitting Factory is a music venue and concert house with locations in Brooklyn, Boise, Reno, and Spokane. The club originally specialized in jazz and experimental music and has expanded to showcasing all genres of music, performing arts and comedy....
. He currently lives in Manhattan with his wife, painter and poet Yuko Otomo.
Dalachinsky's books include "A Superintendent's Eyes" (Hozomeen Press 2000), his PEN Award Winning book The Final Nite & Other Poems: Complete Notes From A Charles Gayle Notebook 1987-2006 (Ugly Duckling Presse
Ugly Duckling Presse
Ugly Duckling Presse is an American nonprofit art and publishing collective based in Brooklyn, New York City that publishes small to mid-size runs of poetry, translations, lost works, and artist's books. It was founded in 1993 by Matvei Yankelevich as a college zine before expanding to publishing...
, 2006), a compendium of poetry written while watching saxophonist Charles Gayle
Charles Gayle
Charles Gayle is a free jazz saxophonist, pianist, bass clarinetist, and percussionist.-Biography:Charles Gayle was born in Buffalo, New York. Some of Gayle's history is unclear. He was apparently homeless for approximately twenty years, playing saxophone on street corners and subway platforms...
perform throughout New York City in that time period, and "Logos and Language", co-authored with pianist Matthew Shipp
Matthew Shipp
Matthew Shipp is an American pianist, composer and bandleader.Shipp was raised in Wilmington, Delaware, and began playing piano at six years old. His mother was a friend of trumpeter Clifford Brown....
(RogueArt 2008) and Reaching Into The Unknown, a collaboration with French photographer Jacques Bisceglia (RogueArt 2009).
Dalachinsky's other publications include Trial and Error in Paris from Loudmouth Collective Press and Quicksand from Isis Press. His spoken word
Spoken word
Spoken word is a form of poetry that often uses alliterated prose or verse and occasionally uses metered verse to express social commentary. Traditionally it is in the first person, is from the poet’s point of view and is themed in current events....
albums include Incomplete Directions, I thought it was the end of the world then the end of the world happened again with Federico Ughi
Federico Ughi
Federico Ughi is an Italian drummer and composer. He works primarily in the fields of free improvisation and jazz. Originally from Italy, he has lived in New York City since 2000, and is based in Brooklyn, New York...
, and Phenomena of Interference with Matthew Shipp
Matthew Shipp
Matthew Shipp is an American pianist, composer and bandleader.Shipp was raised in Wilmington, Delaware, and began playing piano at six years old. His mother was a friend of trumpeter Clifford Brown....
.
Dalachinsky's work has appeared in the following journals on & off line: Big Bridge, Milk, Unlikely Stories, Xpressed, Ratapallax, Evergreen Review, Long Shot, Alpha Beat Soup, Xtant, Blue Beat Jacket, N.Y. Arts Magazine, Tribes, The Helix, 6x6, Cannot Exist, Home Planet News, Polisz, Unarmed, The GW Review, Gare Maritime, Alternating Current, Bathtub Gin, 88, The Wandering Hermit Review, Mima'amakim, Lost and Found Times and many others.
Dalachinsky has written extensively for the Brooklyn Rail
The Brooklyn Rail
The Brooklyn Rail is a political, artistic and literary magazine based in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Coverage includes political andliterary essays, art criticism, interviews, original fiction and poetry, and reviews....
.
His poems are included in the anthologies Beat Indeed, Writers Beyond the Margin, The Haiku Moment, Downtown Poets, Resistance, A History of Jews and the Lower East Side, The Unbearables anthologies Help Yourself and The Worse Book I Ever Read, Up is Up but So is Down, viviparous blenny, Ragged Lion, Off the Cuffs, In the Arms of Words, Hurricane Blues, An Eye for an Eye Makes the Whole World Blind, La tentation du silence, DOC(K)S ("Lecon d'amour), LePetite Mercure's Le gout du Jazz and the Outlaw Bible of American Poetry.
Dalachinsky has written liner notes for the CDs of many artists including Anthony Braxton, Charles Gayle, Derek Bailey, James "Blood" Ulmer, Rashied Ali, Roy Campbell, Matthew Shipp and Roscoe Mitchell.
Among his many chapbooks are Musicology (Editions Pioche, Paris 2005), Trial and Error in Paris (Loudmouth Collective 2003), Lautreamont's Laments (Furniture Press 2005), In Glorious Black and White (Ugly Duckling Presse 2005), St. Lucie (King of Mice Press 2005), Are We Not MEN and Fake Book (2 books of collage - 8 Page Press 2005), Dream Book (Avantcular Press 2005), Totems (Unarmed Press 2008), Christ Amongst the Fishes (a book of collage - Oil Can Press 2009) and Invasion of the Animal People (Alternating Current 2009).
His 1999 CD, Incomplete Directions (Knitting Factory Records), a collection of his poetry read in collaboration with various musicians, such as William Parker, Matthew Shipp, Daniel Carter, Sabir Mateen, Thurston Moore (SonicYouth) and Vernon Reid (Living Colour) has garnered much praise.
Among Dalachinsky's other CDs are Thin Air with guitarist Loren Mazzacane Connors (Silver Wonder Recording recorded 2001, released 2006), Phenomena of Interference, a collaboration with pianist Matthew Shipp (Hopscotch Records 2006), Merci Pour le Visite with Didier Lassere, drums and Sebastian Capezza, saxophone (Amor Fati 2007). His work has also been read by Derek Bailey and John Tchicai on their respective cds.
He has read throughout the N.Y. area including the Poetry Project and the Vision Festival. Dalachinsky has also read in San Francisco and other cities throughout the U.S., Japan and Europe, including Germany, England and France. Some of the venues in France are Instants Chavires, the Olympic Cafe and Sete Lizards. He also participated in the Sons d'Hiver Festival (2004) and the Biennial of Poetry in Val de Marne (2007), CIPM in Marseille (2007) and Maison d'Poesie in Nantes (at Pannonica 2007). He recently read his Insomnia Poems (written for Louise Bourgeois), a collaboration with British composer Pete Wyer, for the BBC's Jazz on 3 in England.
New collaboration in 2011 with french duet art-rockers The Snobs on new cd album; Steve Dalachinsky and The Snobs "Massive Liquidity"- An unsurreal post-apocalyptic anti-opera in two acts -( french label Bam Balam.records). "Steve Dalachinsky and The Snobs" met in winter 2011 in Paris to record some vocals for the project. (Harmonie Magazine #72)
"Massive Liquidity" presents two twenty minutes musical suites made of various influences: 1969’s Miles Davis’ instrumental freedom hit Einstürzende Neubauten’s industrial and elegant sense of rhythm. Psychedelic effects are both essential and measured to let a strict groove between James Brown and Arnold Schoenberg happen. Dalachinsky’s voice is the narrative element: it can be a gentle whisper at a moment and turn into a wild and menacing raucous noise just few seconds later. Words and music interact, they sometimes hurt each other or simply become one only powerful and moving sound. The record’s closing belongs to the voice, which seems to clarify the violent and cosmic experience the listener just had: "It’s his head now… Pull the trigger".
Dalachinsky's main influences are the Beats, Blake, The Odyssey, obsession, socio-political angst, human disappointment, music (especially Jazz), and visual art with leanings toward abstraction. His work, for the most part is spontaneous and leans towards transforming the image rather than merely describing it, in what he now refers to as transformative description/descriptive transformation.