About Christopher Braig
http://www.ancientactionmusic.com
Christopher Braig, born Covington, Kentucky 1966, is the first musician to win a New York Jazz Film Festival award in the category of “Best Director” and six weeks later debut a CD of experimental, original music at Shapeshifter Lab in Brooklyn. Shows prior to COVID-19 include Silvana in Harlem with German/American musicians Peter Knoll and Christian Finger and with American singer/pianist Lauren Lee, with Italian vocalist Marilena Paradisi at The Lilypad and Third Life Studio in Boston, Monticello Street Fest in Chicago, Warsaw Indiana Jazz Festival with 4=One, with his own group at Cafe Vivace and at The Point with Sicialian vocalist Laura Campisi in Cincinnati.
Christopher’s first album of his own compositions Blue Morpho came out in 2016. The 2020 version contains new material and recombinations of the original five songs. Like the artist Robert Rauschenberg, Braig seeks to work in collage using his own compositions, improvisations, films, photos and experiences to create new works of art. He incorporates field recordings as inspired by his hero American folklorists and musicologist Alan Lomax into his pieces. Braig works by the David Bowie axium, “There is no journey. We are arriving and departing all at the same time.”
Christopher recorded In Your Maze with the New York City based group Breathe-Live in 2018 at Brooklyn Bull Studios. He has composed more than three hundred works ranging from radio jingles to Your Inner Fish, an “evolutionary symphony” in celebration of Charles Darwin for jazz orchestra.
Braig’s first documentary film Jimmy McGary The Best Jazz You Never Heard was selected to appear on the inaugural offerings of The BeBop Channel, the only all jazz content media service in the world. He was selected as one of first featured artists and is a voting shareholder in the company.
In the 2019 book St. Louis, A Jazz History author Dennis Owsley cited Braig as, "enormously patient, very creative and his approach is collaborative. He's about getting students to build a creative space and take responsibility for the music coming out of their horn. He can get music out of anybody.”
Posts by Christopher Braig:
