Harpist/composer Zeena Parkins’ music doesn’t pay much attention to generic boundaries or limitations. She works with classical and one-of-a-kind electric harps, keyboards, accordions and an arsenal of shape-shifting pedals and gizmos that would make any rock guitarist jealous, conjuring sound-worlds that can sound gentle and woody, harsh or unsettling. Her pieces incorporate simple triads, melodic intervals and straightforward rhythms, but also distorted wails, shrieks, chaos and noise — why choose?
Parkins’ staggering output over the years encompasses freely improvised jazz, avant-garde classical music and forward-thinking rock, with collaborators like Bjork, Pauline Oliveros, Anthony Braxton, Yoko Ono and Fred Frith. On Saturday, Jan. 17, Parkins performs at Hartford’s Real Art Ways with cornet player Stephen Haynes and guitarist Joe Morris — two steadfast sonic explorers whose terrific concert series, Improvisations, is now in its fourth year of being, or maybe becoming.
IMPROVISATIONS with Stephen Haynes, Joe Morris and Zeena Parkins, is Saturday, Jan. 17, at 7 p.m. at Real Art Ways in Hartford. Tickets are $12-$15. Information: realartways.org.
