Art & Jazz Together on Stage!
Recently, visual art and jazz came together at the Intergenerational Center for Arts and Wellness (Generations Center) for the standing-room-only OMA/Jazz Concert. The no-cost event, sponsored by Music Carolina and the Senior Services Williams Adult Day Center, featured original “Art/Jazz” music composed by jazz bassist, composer, recording artist, and Music Carolina Co-Artistic Director Matt Kendrick.
Each of the seven arrangements performed was inspired by Opening Minds Through Art (OMA) artwork created by participants who are living with dementia and attend the Williams Adult Day Center.
Kendrick’s unique musical style grew out of a deep connection he felt to visual art. In 1990, the Reynolda House Museum of American Art commissioned him to write a musical piece inspired by Stuart Davis’s painting “For Internal Use Only,” and Art/Jazz was born.
He’s been creating music based on visual art ever since, “I’d go into their collections, tour the museums, and hang out with paintings until I found ones that ‘spoke to me,’” Kendrick said. “I would get prints of each picture, put them in my studio, get my bass out, and just ‘jam’ with them, noticing what came to mind as I stared at the picture and played. Finally, after weeks or months of jamming to the prints, I would put the music into notation software and print it out for other musicians.” Kendrick has used works displayed in the North Carolina Museum of Art, Reynolda House Museum of American Art, the Hunter Museum of American Art, the Knoxville Museum of Art, and the Mint Museum in Charlotte.
The concert came about as a result of a series of fortunate events. The first was Music Carolina becoming a Generations Center partner after Joe Mount, co-artistic director of Music Carolina, recognized the potential to bring music to a wider audience after taking a pottery class there. The second was due to a casual conversation between Kendrick and Senior Services staff where he shared about Art/Jazz. “I was sitting in Renee [Griffin]’s office with Lisa [Terry], talking about how I used to do this Art/Jazz thing, and they both got incredulous, wild looks in their eyes.” They said, ‘Can you do that for us?’ Well, yeah, seems like a good fit.” The OMA/Jazz concert was born.
OMA, which stands for Opening Minds through Art, is a nationally recognized, award-winning, evidence-based program that pairs trained Williams Adult Day Center staff and volunteers with adults living with dementia. Together, they create abstract, “no-fail” artwork that focuses on each participant’s strengths, abilities, and creativity.
“I’m an abstract expressionist fan. These paintings by OMA participants are all pretty abstract,” Kendrick said. “They aren’t all that different, inspiration-wise, from masterworks in museums. There is still line, form, and color. I chose the ones I thought really had a little something extra. I can see the art peeking through. For this concert, I had different styles. I’d look at one painting and say, well, that looks like Calypso Island under the sea. The artists’ titles helped me, too, because they describe what the artist was thinking about.”
To bring the concept to life, Kendrick (middle) enlisted longtime friends and fellow musicians Federico “Fred” Pivetta (right) on keyboards and John Wilson (left) on drums to perform his original compositions inspired by artwork created by OMA participants at the Williams Adult Day Center.
The connection between the visual art and the music was unmistakable. During the concert, a slideshow of 14 paintings was projected on stage as the trio performed, creating a visual and musical experience that reflected the important relationship between what we see and hear. This type of sensory connection can help the brain create a more unified perception of the world and support cognitive engagement, an especially meaningful experience for people living with dementia.
“This concert was designed to combine OMA with Jazz, transforming participants’ artistic expressions into a powerful musical experience.” –Matt Kendrick
For him, the project carried a deeply personal meaning. When asked if he had any personal connection to using OMA artwork in this way, he answered emphatically, “Yes! My father died of dementia, and many families deal with it. I feel good that I can do something to help because once you go through it with somebody, you feel different about it. Maybe this allows me to give back a little. The opportunity to write and play this music for people with varying degrees of dementia is a learning experience that I’m not done with.”
By combining the creativity of OMA participants with the improvisational spirit of jazz, the concert celebrated not only art and music, but also connection, expression, and the power of creative engagement at every stage of life.
The OMA Jazz concert was just another example of the wonderful work that happens at the Williams Adult Day Center and the importance of supporting people in our community who are living with memory loss and/or frailty. A dementia diagnosis doesn’t prevent them from being creative or from sharing art that has enriched the lives of others.
