Billie Davies Nominated "Best Drummer" By Best Of The Beat 2019 Awards

Billie Davies has been nominated "Best Drummer" for the Best Of The Beat Awards 2019.

The OffBeat Music and Cultural Arts Foundation’s Best of the Beat Nominations are in.
We solicited nominations from musicians and many others in the music community. We then gave the results to our writers and editors and with input from both, determined the nominations in each category. Click here to vote!
The public starts voting on December 26 at OffBeat.com and voting ends on January 15. Winners will be announced at the Best of the Beat, which will be held at the New Orleans Jazz Market on Thursday January 30.

This is the second time that Billie has been nominated for her exceptional talent since she has moved to New Orleans. The 2017 Best Of The Beat awards nominated her for Best Contemporary Jazz Artist.
Billie would like to express her sincere thanks for the recognition.


HER MUSIC IS IT'S OWN ORIGINAL BEAST
Billie Davies is an American jazz drummer and composer best known for her free and avant-garde jazz compositions since the mid-1990s, and her improvisational drumming techniques. The music of BILLIE DAVIES line-ups moves beyond Jazz with it's own unique and truly improvisational style
"...reminding us sometimes of many different things but in the end, it is its own original beast, as powerful as anything more well-known musicians have created.. Jerome Wilson, All About Jazz".


On her latest album:
PERSPECTIVES II
BILLIE DAVIES TRIO REVIEWED IN JAZZ VIEWS
“Given the melting pot that New Orleans continues to be for jazz, it is not surprising that Davies has based herself here, nor that the musicians she gathers around her are not easy to pigeon-hole into one style of jazz (or even one style of music in any wider sense). This is another very successful experiment by Davies in mining the creative depths of improvised music making, producing a sound that cannot be simply labelled as jazz (even if it fully has the swing of jazz in all of the pieces brought by Davies and Watkinson in their dynamic partnership) and which really does respond to the cosmic dimensions of its inspiration.” - Chris Baber, Jazz Views (May, 2019)

BILLIE DAVIES "PERSPECTIVES II" at the ART KLUB Theater in New Orleans

BILLIE DAVIES

"PERSPECTIVES II PHOTOS"

BILLIE DAVIES trio: Billie Davies - drums | Evan Oberla - piano/keys/trombone | Oliver Watkinson - bass
Featuring: Ari Kohn - reeds | Iris P - vocals | Allie Porter - vocals
Dance by: Artivism Dance Theatre - dance improvisation featuring Elle Ciccarone Jones and Briana Alston.
Venue: Art Klub - Theater, 1941 Arts Street, New Orleans LA 70117

In anticipation of the upcoming video/audio release of "Perspectives II" here are some screenshots / photos of the Live video/audio recording session ...

"PERSPECTIVES II" continues an all spontaneous, instinctive, intuitive improvisation inspired by 7 perspectives, words and 7 chakra musical keys, expressed by a quartet of piano / keys, baritone sax / flute, bass and drums, vocals / spoken word by 2 female vocalists and 2 female dancers.

Perspectives that affect all human beings, regardless of race, nationality, culture, gender, creed, religion, politics, social status and personhood.

Abstract Expressionist Improvisations

Neither confused by the light

Nor blinded by dogma, color or political correctness

Music by the BILLIE DAVIES trio

Thinking of Marie Laveau (Billie Davies trio)


On Hollywood Boulevard 1 (Davies, Oberla, Watkinson) - BILLIE DAVIES - A Nu Experience - On Hollywood Boulevard


Palm Trees (Billie Davies) - BILLIE DAVIES - A Nu Experience - On Hollywood Boulevard -

MORE MUSIC

Press

"Billie Davies ... plays her own music. Freedom and expression. These are the things that matter most to Billie Davies, who has used the drums for more than 40 years now. For Davies, seeking freedom is a purpose, a way of life. It stems from her days among bohemian communities in southern France, living in a DIY RV and playing music in the streets, where she shaped her chops early on, playing by herself or along manouche and blues musicians." — Noe Cugny, OffBeat, Jul 2, 2018

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Power Players: Billie Davies plays her own music - OffBeat Magazine

Power Players: Billie Davies plays her own music - OffBeat Magazine: Noé Cugny talks about Billie Davies, who has used the drums as a means to express herself freely for more than 40 years now.

Watch: Live Spontaneous Improvisation From Billie Davies Trio & More

Watch: Live Spontaneous Improvisation From Billie Davies Trio & More: The latest live performance video from the Billie Davies trio is an all-spontaneous improvisation with a piano, reeds, bass, drums and spoken word.

Billie Davies, "A Nu Experience: On Hollywood Boulevard" (Independent) - OffBeat Magazine

Billie Davies, "A Nu Experience: On Hollywood Boulevard" (Independent) - OffBeat Magazine

OffBeat Magazine
Billie Davies, “A Nu Experience: On Hollywood Boulevard” (Independent) 
By Robert Fontenot
Published: February 08, 2017
Despite the best efforts of James M. Cain, Chinatown and BoJack Horseman, L.A. noir still doesn’t get the respect it deserves next to what goes on in Gotham. This is doubly true for jazz, where a combo of experimentalism, perceived lack of gravitas and the general laid-back vibe of West Coast Cool doom it to second-fiddle status, seemingly forever. All these years later, and when folks want to feel how La La Land destroys the dreams of its citizens, they dig out “Hotel California,” not Chet Baker. Shame, really.
If anyone could change that perception, it’s pioneering avant-garde drummer Billie Davies, a disciple of fellow “California Hard” stylist Max Roach and someone who, true to her gypsy resume, actually lived on Hollywood Boulevard for a time. Her latest release is typically daring, capturing the perfectly frightening freedom of being lost in El Lay, largely thanks to the cool glissandos and lonely brass of keyboardist Evan Oberla and the kind of youthful energy you need for this sort of piece: new vocalist IRIS P, who brings some R&B flair to tracks like “Jacaranda” and “Yellow Sunshine” (which is not the kind of nature you’re thinking of, maybe). Meanwhile, Billie as usual plays counterpoint, creating the menace simmering under the surface naiveté that makes all that ambition seem weighted down, if not doomed, by reality. The set’s only major flaw is her decision to use electronic drums on half the album, augmenting and sometimes replacing her usual setup entirely; they just don’t have the expressiveness of a trap kit, turning Billie’s wise Greek chorus into a drunken party crasher. Ironically, a little more traditionalist grounding is just what the album and its subjects need most.
~Robert Fontenot, OffBeat Magazine