 |
 |
 |
  |
 |
About the Detroit Artists Workshop 40th Anniversary Celebration
If you weren’t there…
…And you’d like to know more of what the Detroit Artists Workshop 40 th Anniversary Reunion was about?
You’ve come to the right place!
Praise
More Praise
The Detroit Artists Workshop 40th Anniversary Celebration
look on each act as future history.-- John Sinclair, This Is Our Music (Artists Workshop Press, 1965)
The Detroit Artists Workshop opened its doors in 1964, during a golden age of Detroit culture, when John Coltrane and Miles Davis appeared at the Minor Key and Motown Records was thriving . In what is now a strip mall and parking lot, the Workshop once flourished. You can click on what they said …
This was just the beginning. Soon, waves of teenagers from Detroit suburbs adopted the Workshop as their role model and sent it into another dimension – the hippie era. In a historic move, the Workshop reinvented itself as Trans-Love Energies and the Grande Ballroom became the center of action…
In its heyday, the Workshop laid the foundation for many offshoots, many threads of cultural activity. These are a few:
- The Trans-Love Energies commune, successor to the Artists Workshop, migrating to Ann Arbor as the White Panthers and eventually the Rainbow Peoples Party; admirably chronicled in John Sinclair’s book, Guitar Army.
- The self-determination concept - the idea of musicians working together to establish a forum for creative work - has become a recurring theme in the musical life of this city. The Detroit Creative Musician's Association was active producing concerts and sessions in the late 1960s; Strata Corporation and its non-profit affiliate, the Allied Artists Association of America were multi-level efforts spearheaded by Kenn Cox and Charles Moore, that included the Strata Concert Gallery, and Strata records; Wendell Harrison built the Tribe record label (and magazine); John Sinclair, Sam Sanders, Frank Bach and many others generated a hive of activity at the Detroit Jazz Center, the successor to Allied Artists Association; Wendell Harrison teamed up with Harold McKinney to form Rebirth, Inc. (source: Ron English, excerpt from Unfinished Business, 2004).
- By their embrace of avant-garde jazz and black roots rock, the MC5 became ambassadors bringing black culture to the attention of white suburban youth. The RAMONES were also highly indebted to the intense style and high-powered antics of Detroit bands like the MC5 and Stooges. The punk scene of the late 1970s in Europe (British punk) and America can be seen as inspired and fueled by a handful of high-octane albums from the Motor City (source: Cary Loren, excerpt from unfinished anthology, 2004).
The Detroit Artists Workshop 40th Anniversary Celebration
November, 2004, marked the 40 th anniversary of the Detroit Artists Workshop, returning again with exciting jazz concerts, poetry readings, symposiums and exhibits. Most of the functions occurred within Detroit’s Cultural Center and on the Wayne State University campus nearby. It was a week-long celebration, culminating in the Detroit Institute of Arts First Fridays concert on November 5, and a WSU concert the following night. Our own John Sinclair, taking time out from Blues Scholar sessions in New York and Amsterdam, opened the nightly festivities.
For all of us, the 40 th anniversary celebration occurred on many levels:
- It was truly a reunion for many
- It was a time of recognition for 40 years of artistic work
- It kicked off a new round of cultural enrichment activities for the Detroit area.
At the Scarab Club welcoming reception on November 4, the Detroit mayor and City Council presented four documents (an award and three testimonials) to the DAW committee. Also received were a proclamation from Congressman Conyers and a letter of congratulations from Governmor Granholm. Not the least significant, John Sinclair’s historic signing of a ceiling beam took place at that event.
The award presentation and beam signing can be viewed in the photo collections on this website. For those of you who are interested, the online Program Book , as well as the documents themselves, will put things in perspective.
In closing, the numerous awards and testimonials are witness in themselves that the community leadership believes in the Detroit Artists Workshop. Not only is our work of the past forty years recognized, but also our present ability to bring about cultural enrichment in the future. As Governor Jennifer Granholm put it, “I can only imagine the wonders in store for the next 40 years.”
|
|
Top Home About Us Search Site Map What's New Scholars Visual Literature Music Store Contact Us Links Messages