November 10th, 2009
Welcome to MattJenson.Com
This is my blog and website where you can learn about the various projects I’m working on and bands that I play in: Rebel Tumbao, Dragonfly Taxi Recording Project, Combo Sabroso, and I-Level (Reggae!.)
Also you can link to my involvement in education including my very popular Music and Life of Bob Marley class, Latin Piano Lab and my work as Assistant professor of piano at Berklee College of Music where I’ve been teaching for some 8 years now.
You will find a lot of music on this site that can be accessed in two ways: 1) hit the play button on the player in the upper right hand corner of each page (and scroll to different tunes with the arrows), 2) the site is set up with a ‘one shot’ player that I use to drop in pretty much any kind of audio I want including hot-off-the-griddle excerpts of new tunes I’m writing and recording. As you scroll through various pages you’ll see a speaker and play button icon, just hit it!
Much of my music is influenced by the socio-political happenings of the day and I spend a lot of time thinking about and discussing with friends and colleagues WHAT’s GOING ON as part of a life-long calling I’ve had to revel in the beautiful aspects of life and to continually work towards a deeper understanding of the not so beautiful aspects of how the human race functions. A lot of what I write comes from what I see as our collective inability to put human and environmental welfare before the obsession with material gain and how we continually allow such a tiny minority of people to have such a drastic concentration of power and money.
This is indeed a BLOG site so you’ll see various blog posts on the main page regarding my thoughts. I also will post updates on the above mentioned projects and as well I will post on my travel experiences, most recently to JAMAICA!
Thanks for dropping by and if you want to stay informed as to what I’m doing, please sign my email list to the right.
August 27th, 2010
Rebel Tumbao recording session in NYC 8/21-23/10
We finally got ourselves into the studio to begin the new Rebel Tumbao recording! I’m writing this the morning after the session and in a state of exhausted inspiration. We completed simply WICKED rhythm tracks for 7 out of 11 tunes and the ball is now rolling with lots of editing and overdubbing work ahead of us. It was a fantastic pleasure and honor for me to work with Ruben Rodriguez (bass), Anthony Carillo (percussion), Orlando Vega (congas) and of course, my partner in the project, Jose Claussell (timbales). All of these amazing musicians took to heart the Rebel Tumbao vision which is just as the band name name states: GROOVING in the name of a positive and progressive rebellious movement! And we mean groove: we all worked hard to create deep and spacious riddims, something that you don’t hear that much these days, especially in Latin music. And now, I’m going to get some R&R before the semester starts at Berklee!!
July 29th, 2010
Michael Franti for Corona beer?
Gotta say I’m confounded by this: FrantiBeerAd??
Michael Franti doing a TV ad for Corona, (Corona LIGHT no less.) Anyone else notice this? Your thoughts?
July 25th, 2010
Fight Washington Corruption Pledge
I just signed the “Fight Washington Corruption” pledge disemenated through the web by Moveon.org. Maybe it’ll have some sort of impact if enough people sign it. Here’s the wording of the pledge:
Overturn Citizens United:
Amend the Constitution to protect America from unlimited corporate spending on our elections by overturning the Supreme Court’s decision giving corporations the same First Amendment rights as people.
Fair elections now:
Pass the Fair Elections Now Act, providing public financing to candidates who are supported by small donors so they can compete with corporate-backed and self-funded candidates.
Lobbyist Reform Act:
Pass legislation to end the overwhelming influence of corporate lobbyists by: prohibiting individuals from switching from corporate lobbying to government service, or vice-versa, within a 5-year period; stopping corporate lobbyists from giving gifts and providing free travel to government officials; and posting online the attendees and content of all meetings between lobbyists and government officials.
This is my optional note to my State Representative Ed Markey included with my signing of the pledge:
“Please, please, please pass all of these acts! The simple fact of the matter is that when decisions involving the well being of the public are subject to the profit motive, only a very few, at the very top of the income bracket, are served, and with these few in power, this incredibly unjust system will continue to abuse and ultimately destroy all of what is the best for man kind in general.”
June 23rd, 2010
Declaring Independence from Wall Street! (and writing music about it…)
These days I’m deep in the shed and studio writing new music and completing arrangements for the Rebel Tumbao recording that’s coming up in August. A huge part of my process is delving deeply into current progressive (if not revolutionary!) thinking, with deep inspiration from Frances Moore Lappe, at the moment, Naomi Klein (I’m reading “The Shock Doctorine”), but also, on the other side of the spectrum, I’m reading Milton Friedman’s “Capitalism and Freedom” (pretty much the road map for laissez-faire Capitalism) and I’m listening to conservative hard core right talk radio. To me it’s important to understand all viewpoints. From this I’m crafting lyrics for new music for the project.
I am saddened by not being able to make it to the US Social Forum taking place NOW, BUT, most recently I listened to David Korten’s talk at the 2009 Green Festival in Seattle:
