Food & Thought From Kitchen to Stage: Black Women’s Contribution to Jazz

**UCI students only!
Sustainability Reminder: Please bring your own utensils, water bottle, and to-go containers for extra food! We are striving for a zero waste event.



For the last event of the celebration of African American Heritage Month and the centennial of Miles Davis and John Coltrane, Illuminations hosts a special event to honor Black women’s contribution to jazz in a special place—Kitchen, a traditionally gendered space where women’s value is defined by their domestic skills. We often neglect the generative power and creative talent that women possess, or their contribution to the world. As we look back in history, Kitchen, therefore, becomes the best place to learn about the legacy of women artists from Dr. Norfleet, while enjoying a meal modified from a legendary recipe of Miles Davis.

Details about Dr. Dawn Norfleet and her talk “Beyond-Beings: Alice Coltrane and Betty Davis”

Dr. Norfleet’s talk focuses on the unique artistry of two exceptional women, Alice Coltrane (wife of John Coltrane) and Betty Davis (wife of Miles Davis). These artists played significant roles not only in the lives and music of jazz icons John and Miles during their brief marriages, but also as impactful music and culture creators whose full recognition may have been overshadowed by their legendary husbands. In this talk, Dr. Norfleet will discuss selected songs representing the strong impact that Alice and Betty had on the musical direction of John and Miles; she will also illustrate how these powerful women have gained wider recognition in their own right as exceptional artists and cultural shapers. Their influence continues to grow after their deaths. Beyond being John’s collaborator, Alice Coltrane, later revered as Swamini A.C. Turiyasangitananda by her followers, was a music visionary, fusing improvisation, jazz, gospel, and Indian traditions in her compositions and recordings. In 1983 she founded a Hindu faith center in Malibu. Beyond being “Miles’ muse,” Betty Gray Mabry was a trailblazing, Black female rocker, songwriter, and bandleader at the height of the Soul Era. Her raspy voice and often-raunchy lyrics expressed an overt sexuality and aggressive performativity that was presumed the domain of white male rock artists, rather than the Black gospel-influenced vocal luminaries of her generation.

Dr. Dawn Norfleet is a member of the Jazz Studies Faculty at UCI and a Los Angeles-based composer and musician of notated and improvised music. She received her M.A. in Music Composition from Wellesley College and her Ph.D in Ethnomusicology in Music from Columbia University. At UCI she teaches topics related to jazz, hip-hop, and African American music; she has also taught in many other universities, including Colorado College and UCLA. As a composer, she received numerous distinctions and commissions, including the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music, American Composers Orchestra, Utah State University, and Ensemble for These Times. As a vocalist, she worked with celebrated jazz saxophonist, Kamasi Washington since 2013, and has led her own jazz ensembles in New York and Los Angeles as a composer, flutist, and bandleader. Dr. Norfleet is also a scholar who has published on African American music and has lectured across the country.

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