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STG Presents & Art Don't Sleep WelcomesEBO TAYLOR + PAT THOMAS
TUE, 15 OCT 2024 at 07:00PM PDT
Ages: All Ages to Enter, 21 & Over to Drink
Doors Open: 07:00PM
OnSale: Thu, 20 Jun 2024 at 09:00AM PDT
Announcement: Thu, 20 Jun 2024 at 09:00AM PDT
Immerse yourself in a night of rich musical heritage and cross-cultural rhythms at The Ford, featuring the legendary
Ghanaian guitarist, composer, and producer Ebo Taylor. With a career spanning over half a century, Taylor's
influence on African music is undeniable, from his early days with highlife bands like the Stargazers to
collaborations with Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti. Taylor's innovative blend of traditional Ghanaian music with jazz,
funk, and Afrobeat creates a signature sound showcased in albums like "Ebo Taylor & the Pelikans" and "Tower
Nyame." Experience the evolution of Taylor's musical journey, from his pioneering horn arrangements to his
timeless classics like "Heaven," as he takes the audience on a soul-stirring exploration of African rhythms and
melodies. This special evening at The Ford celebrates Taylor's enduring legacy and contributions to the global
music scene, promising an unforgettable fusion of sounds and cultures.
Ebo Taylor
Born in 1936, Ghanaian guitarist, composer, arranger, bandleader, and producer Ebo Taylor has been a vital
presence in African music for more than half-a-century. During the early '60s, he was active in the influential
highlife bands the Stargazers and the Broadway Dance Band whose singles were mainstays on national radio. In
1962 he took his Black Star Highlife Band to London and collaborated with other African musicians who were also
in Britain at the time, including Fela Kuti. Back in Ghana, he worked as an influential producer, crafting recordings
for Pat Thomas (his future collaborator) and C.K. Mann, among many others. During the '70s, his own musical
projects combined traditional Ghanaian music with Afro-beat, jazz, and funk, creating a trademark sound as
evidenced by the albums Ebo Taylor & the Pelikans (1976) and Twer Nyame (1978). In the '80s, albums such as
Conflict Nkru! and Hitsville Re-Visited (co-billed to Thomas) by his Uhuru-Yenzu band delivered a rawer, more
immediate sound. Over the next two decades, Taylor was a noted producer, arranger, and composer, working
with Thomas, Mann, Gyedu-Blay Ambolley , Kofi Yankson, and dozens of others. He returned to performing live in
the early 21st century after hip-hop producers began sampling his work. Soundways Records released the
compilation Ghana Special. In 2010, Strut Records released Love and Death, his first internationally distributed
album, followed by a series of catalog reissues and all-new recordings including 2018's Yen Ara.
Taylor was born in Ghana and grew up on the sounds of the wartime big bands. His father nudged him into music,
by encouraging his son to learn to play the family organ. He caught the music bug and began studying guitar in
school, coming under the sway of the emergent highlife movement. He would soon lead his first group, an eight-
piece band named the Stargazers. In 1962, he departed his native Ghana for London to study at the London Eric
Gilder School of Music. He explored jazz, funk, and soul alongside fellow student Fela Kuti and
future Osibisa bandmembers Teddy Osei and Sol Amarfio. They indulged in endless jam sessions in jazz clubs off
Oxford Street, after which Fela would often join Taylor in his flat in Willesden Junction. They would listen to jazz
records for hours, analyzing the structure and chord progressions of Miles Davis and Charlie Parker. During his time
abroad, Taylor founded the Black Star Highlife Band, which showcased one of his greatest contributions to highlife:
His jazz-inspired horn arrangements.
After returning to Ghana, Taylor became an in-house arranger and producer for labels like Essiebons , working with
other leading Ghanaian stars including Mann and Thomas. He was paid to write for them, play guitar on sessions,
and supervise recordings. From the '70s through the '80s, Taylor cut a host of his own solo albums that offered
idiosyncratic but very popular fusions of traditional Ghanaian sounds, Afrobeat, jazz, soul, and funk on albums such
as My Love and Music, Twer Nyame, and Me Kra Tsie. His single "Heaven" from this period stands among the most
revered Ghanaian Afrobeat tunes of the era. Taylor formed Uhuru-Yenzu in 1980 and released the albums Conflict
Nkru! Nsamanfo: People's Highlife, Vol. 1, and Hitsville Re-Visited (the latter co-billed to Thomas). After the album
Pat Thomas & Ebo Taylor in 1984, the guitarist stopped recording and touring and focused instead on producing,
arranging, and composing for dozens of other artists.
In 2008, Taylor met the Berlin-based musicians of the Berlin Afrobeat Academy, including saxophonist Ben
Abarbanel-Wolff. A year later, Usher sampled "Heaven" for his hit "She Don’t Know" (feat. Ludacris). In 2010,
Taylor teamed with Berlin Afrobeat Academy for Love and Death on Strut Records, his first internationally
distributed album. It offered re-recordings of his highlife and Afrobeat hits. Its success prompted Strut to issue the
stellar retrospective Life Stories: Highlife & Afrobeat Classics 1973-1980 in the spring of 2011. In 2012, a
third Strut album, the deeply personal Appia Kwa Bridge, appeared and showed that at 76, Taylor was still intensely
creative and forceful, mixing traditional Fante songs and chants with children's rhymes and personal matters into
his own sharp vision of highlife.
That record marked the beginning of a popular renaissance for Taylor around the world. Early singles and other
tracks appeared on several compilations over the next few years, and in 2015, his rarest album, Ebo Taylor & the
Pelikans, got the grand reissue treatment. His early hit, the Ghana funk anthem "Come Along," made DJ playlists
globally. In February 2016, at age 80, he opened the MOGO Festival's Nights with Music Greats. The gig proved to
be a precursor for the deluxe reissue of his 1975 album, My Love and Music, on Mr. Bongo. In 2018, Taylor issued
the album Yen Ara that saw him translating various strains of Fante music through contemporary Ghanaian highlife
and experimenting with new rhythmic forms through horn-dominated compositions. At age 82, he supported it
with a world tour. The following year, Mr. Bongo reissued Hitsville Re-Visited in May, while BBE Music released the
Palaver album in September, that contained five unissued tracks from a (previously unknown) lost 1980 session. ~
Thom Jurek, Rovi
Pat Thomas
Pat Thomas is a Ghanaian vocalist and songwriter famed for his work in the highlife bands of Ebo Taylor and his
own recordings of Afrobeat and Afro-pop.
Born in Agona, in the Ashanti region, Thomas had music almost literally in his DNA, his father was a music theory
instructor and his mother a bandleader. In the 1970s, he moved to Accra to join Ebo Taylor's legendary highlife
band The Blue Monks; their residency at the Tip Toe Night Club is an important part of modern Ghanaian cultural
history. In the later years he moved to the Ivory Coast and produced various records in Afro-beat, Afro-Latin
sounds and reggae melded to funky African disco.
In 1982, he moved to London, U.K and recorded Hitsville Revisited with Taylor and the guitarist's band, Uhuru
Yenzu. Thomas's first hit outside Africa was 'Asanteman' in 1985. He followed it with Highlife Greats Mbrepa a year
later. In June 2015, the U.K. label Strut released his first recording in over a decade. Dubbed Pat Thomas &
Kwashibu Area Band, it was recorded in Accra. It placed the singer in the company of a band assembled by multi-
instrumentalist Kwame Yeboah and saxophonist Ben Abarbanel-Wolff. Other musicians included drummer Tony
Allen, Noble Kings' bassist Ralph Karikari, and a host of younger players including Thomas' daughter Nanaaya, a
celebrated vocalist in her own right.
Important Information:
* This event is all ages. Valid ID is required to enter bar areas.
* Doors open at the listed event time.
* Event start time is generally one hour after doors open but is subject to change without notice.
* All tickets are nonrefundable with the exception of event cancellation.
* Support acts are subject to change.
This ticket is a revocable license and may be taken up and admission refused upon refunding the purchase price appearing hereon and is grounds for seizure and cancellation without compensation. Holder of this ticket (“Holder”) voluntarily assumes all risks and danger incidental to the event for which this ticket is issued whether occurring prior to, during, or after same, including, but not limited to, contracting, and/or spreading the COVID-19 virus, and agrees that the organization, venue, presenter, agents, participants, or artists are not responsible or liable for any injuries, sickness, or death resulting from such causes. Holder acknowledges that the COVID-19 pandemic remains a threat to individual and public health, COVID-19 is a highly contagious disease transmitted through human contact and respiratory droplets (including through the air and via common surfaces) and it is possible that Holder may contract COVID-19 while at the event for which this ticket is issued. Holder agrees by use of this ticket not to transmit or aid in transmitting any description, account, picture, or reproduction of the event to which this ticket is issued. Breach of the foregoing will automatically terminate this license. Holder agrees that the license comprised by this ticket may be removed and Holder may be ejected from the event for which this ticket is issued in the event that Holder violates any law, ordinance, or venue regulation. Holder grants permission to the organization sponsoring the event for which this ticket is issued to utilize Holder’s image or likeness in connection with any video or other transmission or reproduction of the event to which this ticket relates.
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Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Neumos, Runaway, 1425 10th Ave, Seattle, WA 98122, United States,Seattle, Washington
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