Jazz Police

The Ways Ensemble

Beverly Cottman (storyteller) says “My work is informed by and a reflection of my cultural identity. I look to Mother Africa for inspiration as I interpret patterns and designs found in cloth, baskets, carvings and other works of art. I try to understand my present day existence by learning and telling age-old tales with morals, which are relevant in the 21st Century. This explains how I have come to know what I know and is the foundation of my creative expressions.”

Rene Ford is a Texas composer/performance artist. His work is about capturing the moment of creativity through jazz improvisation and collaboration with artists willing to freely blend their aesthetics with his. Heavily influenced by John Coltrane and Sun Ra, Ford has recorded a unique blend of free jazz and beat poetry Twin Cities’ artists J. Otis Powell, Mankwe Ndosi, Alicia Wiley, Jeff Bailey, Kevin Washington and Eliezar Frites-Santos entitled Unsentimental.

Steve Hirsh©Andrea Canter

Drummer Steve Hirsch started playing drums at age 12, but also studied guitar and saxophone in junior high until his orthodontist suggested a reed instrument would further worsen an overbite. Hirsh went on to play drums in college (“nothing memorable”) but gave up his dream of becoming a professional musician and ultimately sold the drums in the 1980s “to pay rent.” It was another 20 years before Hirsh returned to his first love. In the interim, he became an attorney, working for Legal Aid and later for the Center for Reducing Rural Violence in northern Minnesota before relocating to the Twin Cities two years ago. In 2005, Hirsh received an Individual Artist Grant from the Region 2 Arts Board, which supported his recording with his quartet, Black Ice. He also plays around town with other like-minded experimenters.

Tom Kanthak

Tom Kanthak –a composer, dance musician, choreographer, dancer, and performer—has been involved in music for dance for three decades. Starting classical music training on piano at age six, today he plays a variety of instruments and is a trained modern dancer, having studied with Nancy Hauser, Alwin Nikolais, Murray Louis, and many others. The Music Director and Dance Musician of the Dance Program at the Arts High School of the Perpich Center for Arts Education, he has taught dance composition and improvisation, music for dance, arts improvisation, and the New Music Ensemble. Tom is the originator of SoniCoMotion, which is the umbrella term for collaborations with many composers, musicians, choreographers, dancers and dance musicians.

Mankwe Ndose

Mankwe Ndosi is a Minneapolis-based vocalist and multidisciplinary performer who has spent the past ten years working in theater, dance, music, spoken word and improvisation. A member of Douglas R. Ewart & Orchestra Inventions, a Chicago-based improvisational group rooted in creative black music, Mankwe is also a board member of Speak-Out Sisters, coordinating the Revolutionary Women’s Cabaret. Mankwe leads workshops in voice, writing and stage work, leads wild plant walks, and writes unfinished spirituals.

Michael O'Brien©Andrea Canter

Michael O’Brien studied bass with Anthony Cox and West African and Haitian percussion with Marc Anderson, earning a BA in Spanish at the University of Minnesota. Over the years he has appeared with a wide range of artists including Gene Pitney, Dave King, David Binney, The Jazz Mandolin Project, Peter Ostroushko, Christian Howes, Stephanie Nakasian, Roseanna Vitro, Bruce Henry, Harry Connick, Jr., Laura Caviani, Electropolis, Clay Moore, Kelly Rossum, Connie Evingson, and Prudence Johnson. His compositions have been widely played and he has collaborated with numerous theater and dance projects, including the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. In the Twin Cities he taught at the West Bank School of Music and MusicTech (McNally Smith College) and was an artist-in-residence for the Minneapolis Public Schools. He relocated to New York City in 2006 but has returned to participate in a variety of music and integrated arts projects.

J. Otis Powell

J. Otis Powell works as a poet (writer), media producer, performance artist, producer and curator of performance events, arts administrator, educator and consultant in the Twin Cities. Trained from early childhood as an actor, Powell worked for two decades in black and conventional theater, film and television. J. Otis received his undergraduate degree in television production from Alabama A&M University where he minored in philosophy. He has published two books of his poetry, Theology (Traffic Street Press) and My Tongue Has No Bone (Porter Publishing), and numerous anthologies and in magazines. A recipient of a McKnight Fellowship and several Jerome grants, Powell was a founding producer on the award winning Write On Radio!, the Twin Cities literary connection at KFAI-FM in Minneapolis. He also worked as Communities’ Liaison & Program Director for Interdisciplinary Collaborations at The Loft Literary Center, the nation's most comprehensive independent literary organization.

Kenna Sarge

Kenna Sarge, a graduate of Minneapolis North High School with a Master’s degree from the University of Minnesota College of Education is a dance educator in the Art Courses for Educators Program at Perpich Center for Arts Education, The Art of Dance Studio and Zenon Dance Company; curator of Black Choreographers’ Evening; principal dancer in Ananya Dance Theater, an Odissi-based modern dance/social activist company led by Dr. Ananya Chatterjee; and a member of the Minnesota Regional Arts Council board of directors.

Pangea World Theater is committed to international works, styles and traditions that illuminate the human condition, end divisiveness and celebrate differences. The Avalon Theater in south Minneapolis is the home of the Heart of the Beast Theater Company.

The Ways Ensemble will perform the full-length a Disease called Freedom on October 4-7 at 7:30 pm at the Avalon Theater, 1500 East Lake Street in Minneapolis. Tickets at 612-203-1088 or visit www.pangeaworldtheater.org.

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