Racer Session #541 | Triptet | Sunday April 17th, 2022

Greetings friends!

We’re on for a Racer Session this Sunday at 7pm, and are excited to be presenting out friend Tom Baker, who is bringing his collaborative trio TRIPTET to the Racer stage!

Triptet is a meeting of minds and spontaneous electrical impulses between Michael Monhart (saxophones and percussion), Tom Baker (guitars and effects), and Greg Campbell (percussion and cheap electronics). Formed in 2009 by three members of a Sun Ra Tribute Band, Triptet has performed shows in New York and Seattle, and has been the headliner of the Boise Creative and Improvised Music Festival. They have played at the 2009 and 2011 Is That Jazz? Festival, and recently played at the Stone in NYC. They have opened for Elliott Sharp and the Nels Cline Singers. They have released four albums: Triptet(Low Ways Records), You Can See The Bottom (Present Sounds Recordings), Imaginary Perspective (Engine Records), and Figure in the Carpet (Engine Records). The group spends most of their time inventing modes of flight, and trying to get lift. They practice and practice, working on the length of the running start, size and texture of the wings, the speed and rate of acceleration of the flapping. They have enjoyed momentary freedom from gravity, and vow to keep trying for sustained orbit. Meanwhile, they also play music, exploring the space between.

Read below for some words from Tom Baker himself, and then find yourselves at Cafe Racer in Capitol Hill this Sunday at 7:00pm to catch the music!

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“Dear Racer-ites,

It is an honor and pleasure to be opening the sessions this week. We are so glad that the Racer Sessions are back in action. It has been a while since TRIPTET has left the mothership and landed in Seattle - and I couldn't be happier to get back on the Racer stage with my friends and brothers, Greg Campbell and Michael Monhart (NYC).

We will be performing a freely improvised set of music, with some loose structures that weave in and out of the textures. We hope to focus our sounds and thoughts around the concept of peace and light. While it is the season for rebirth and new beginnings, marked by many with religious rituals for the Easter holiday, Triptet, in the mode of our spiritual mentor Sun Ra, will invoke the interstellar low ways to search for peace and light in these complicated, destructive, and disorienting times. Space is the Place.

After our set, as we transition into the collective, freely improvised jam session to follow, we hope you too will focus your energies on peace and light, and rebirth and beginnings.

As it says in the book of RA, chapter 3 verse 12: "The real aim of music is to coordinate the minds of the people into an intelligent reach for a better world and an intelligent approach to the living future."

- Tom Baker

More info: triptet.net