For the better part of the last three decades, Patricia Nicholson has been doing some of New York culture’s heaviest lifting. As co-founder of the city’s annual Vision Festival, now in its twenty-fifth year, and its sister organization, Arts For Art, Nicholson is one of the few remaining veteran shepherds of the city’s improvised music community—a dedicated caretaker of the sound often referred to as “free jazz.”

For Vision Festival, a flagship local event for enthusiasts of this music, Nicholson helps organize its multiple days of live concerts, art installations, film screenings, and accompanying conference that engages the business and social issues of keeping this Black improvisational tradition alive. It is an undertaking rich with artistic and community value, but light on earthly reward, even for many of its long-serving specialists and grassroots musickers. And as is the case for most of this community, the musical practice is not entertainment but a way of life; it's a way of envisioning a perspective on the world, and on the land where the music was born, that's at once critical and utopian. For Nicholson, it is also a matter of family: her longtime partner is the legendary bassist William Parker.

Despite the fact that free jazz has been among Black American music’s most abundant sonic reservoirs since the late 1950s, the quarter-century-long history of Vision Festival and Arts For Art corresponds with a chapter of this music’s story that is marked by “neglect.” This is Nicholson’s description of the circumstances that led to her work. A dancer and organizer, she entered the New York improvisational community in the 1970s, a time of great creativity in the city’s clubs and especially its artist-run spaces (such as saxophonist Sam Rivers and his wife Bea’s famed loft, Studio Rivbea). But as the last two decades of the 20th century codified the mainstream’s history of jazz, many of its more experimental and liberationist creators were left out of the critical conversation. (One of the most stark examples of what Nicholson calls free jazz being “demonized” is Ken Burns’ widely celebrated 2001 PBS documentary Jazz, which barely mentions jazz made after 1961.)

By the time the then-titled Vision (For the 21st Century) Festival made its debut in 1996, this music was having trouble finding a home even in its hometown. Almost instantly, the event provided a bedrock. That year it featured local improvisor fixtures (and future Vision regulars), including Parker, pianists Cooper-Moore and Matthew Shipp, saxophonists Daniel Carter and David S. Ware, trumpeter Roy Campbell, percussionists Susie Ibarra and Andrew Cyrille, as well as other famed community members like poet Amiri Baraka, Art Ensemble of Chicago co-founder Joseph Jarman, legendary drummer Milford Graves, and John Coltrane’s former band members, percussionist Rashied Ali and bassist Reggie Workman. And it hosted musically adjacent visitors like Sonic Youth guitarist Thurston Moore and German saxophonist Peter Brötzmann.

Matthew Shipp String Trio

Over the next two-plus decades, Vision became a safe harbor for different discussions of “jazz” than those that took place at establishment events like Newport Jazz Festival. Moving between downtown Manhattan venues, including Judson Church, Angel Orensanz and the old Knitting Factory, adding offerings such as films and conferences, Vision was constantly reinventing itself, yet always fixed in its focus. Vision gave headliner status to legendary musicians not in popular favor, like the Sun Ra Arkestra, Muhal Richard Abrams, Eddie Gale, and Butch Morris; incorporated wordsmiths who were the music’s social and philosophical backbones, such as Tracie Morris, Jayne Cortez, Thulani Davis and Fred Moten; shined spotlights on rising players and composers, including Craig Taborn, Vijay Iyer, Matana Roberts, Tyshawn Sorey and Mary Halvorson; and expanded the bounds of improvised music by incorporating everything from Medeski Martin & Wood’s jam-band funk in 1997, to Irreversible Entanglements’s “punk jazz” in 2018. Meanwhile, the festival has also done the work of community archiving, paying tribute to its disappearing giants, and acknowledging lifetime achievements by survivors too often swept into margins by the music’s popular histories.

Lately though, things feel and sound a little bit different for free jazz. In recent years, there has been a reckoning with musicians who were working with this form a half-century ago, as well as younger artists channeling their influence into the present. They’re now regularly featured in mainstream cultural pages, and popularly appreciated, if not for the first time, then on bigger stages than previously.This music’s progeny, who’ve remained true to their sonic traditions, are also finding themselves with a broader audience, media interest, and range of artistic opportunities. And yet, many of the social and financial aspects that have long been the music’s impediments, remain the same.

All this simultaneously makes a conversation with Nicholson—who at 71 is forthright and forthcoming—play out like a history lesson, a celebration of survival, an airing of grievances, and a wishlist for the future. (The interview was edited for length and flow.)

How did you come to start Vision Festival? Can you tell me the story of its birth?

I met William in December 1973 at Studio Rivbea. I was looking for musicians to work with and someone brought me there, and that was one of [Ensemble] Muntu’s first performances. In the early days, after we were married in ‘75, I had this image of me and William sort of leading a parade or a march. This was the vision.

Sort of like your own version of a Second Line kind of thing?

More like a movement—I'm coming out of the sixties and seventies—

So like a political march…

Almost, but it wasn't political. It was just an image. It wasn't really defined. It was about us as artists. I always wanted to organize. I also always wanted to be a dancer, and I always want to improvise. In the early days, I was dancing and improvising with William. I tried to organize things, but it didn't quite happen. I was a dancer in the music community, and then I was a white dancer in a Black music community. So that didn't work very well.

Sound Unity happened in 1984, [German bassist] Peter Kowald came to town and stayed with us. Peter, William, and I put together a festival. I loved the idea of it. And we did that again two years later. There was this pot of money from visual arts foundations, and we did a lot with a little, but even then it was difficult to get any press. There was one article written the first year in The Village Voice, for a five-day festival with sold-out situations. I don't remember what the press coverage was two years later, but it was unremarkable.

Early in ‘94, I decided to start the Improvisers Collective, basically because there was nowhere to play or gather around this music. When I was younger, everyone in the community knew each other, all the different musicians, even the ones you didn't always play with. Now no one was around, or they were dispersed, moved to New Jersey or Brooklyn. Or even if they were in the neighborhood, you didn't see them cause everyone just went to Europe. That was the only work and place to play. Even the Knitting Factory, shortly after it opened [in 1987], became like John Zorn's world.

So there was nowhere to feel that it was your space. And as a dancer… forget about it. So I got in touch with people. I wanted it to be intergenerational. And especially at first, Improvisers Collective was fantastic. There were 50 people in it and of the 50, I think 45 of them were musicians. Some dancers, a couple of visual artists and a couple of poets. I wanted to encourage multi-arts. As a dancer, I was always fascinated by Diaghilev because of the incredible multi-arts group, Ballets Russes. This was inspiring to me. I didn't really think of dance as dance, but as visual music. To me, it was just physical energy. There was a rule [in Improvisers Collective] that you could only play with people in the group, and everyone put in a certain amount of money a year. We rented Context Studio, at 28 Avenue A, which was an important hub at the time. It was where everyone rehearsed, not just jazz or free jazz artists, but also the indie music people. Context opened a dance studio, so that was our performance space, where we had weekly events the first year. Whoever led the band also led an open improv for the second half of the set; after a while, that started to create a problem because some people were not disciplined about the improv in my estimation. It chased away audiences. I still thought open improv was important. The second year we did cut it out. I think we also did shows twice a week, the second year. And at the end of every [season] in June, there would be a festival.

After doing this for two years, Assif Tsahar and Blaise Siwula [who went on to curate the improvised music series at Lower East Side DIY/punk space, ABC No Rio], and I had a meeting, and said, “this is just too much work and we're not getting any press.” And the audience wasn't building anymore. At the time, there was a regular at Improvisers Collective shows, Greg Ruggiero, who was publishing a small thing called Open Magazine Pamphlet,  which had printed a little booklet of William’s called “Music is,” and also printed Baraka and Howard Zinn. He said, “I want to do a benefit for my pamphlet.” And I said, “We can't do a benefit, cause the musicians also need a benefit. But we can do something together and share the proceeds.” That became the first Vision Festival. Greg helped design the first brochure and located the venue, a big loft space on the seventh floor of the Learning Alliance, just north of Broadway and Lafayette Street. I talked one person into giving me a donation, $1500, and then I did “A Patricia,” which meant I guaranteed all the musicians a fee. I just said, “I know this is gonna work. Don't worry about it.” William was worried about it. [laughs]

It was all these visual artists, dancers, poets—a big success. Five days. I initially thought of it as a one-off, but afterwards no one wanted it to be a one-off. I booked it in the way that I thought would succeed, sort of inspired by Sounds Unity, bringing in different people from different worlds.

Just to contextualize, were these the same people and community who played and came to Studio Rivbea?

There was more than one community that played at Rivbea and at Environ, which was owned by Chris and Danny Brubeck [sons of pianist Dave Brubeck but run by John Fischer]. Then there were a few others that lingered afterwards. And it was largely the same people at Vision Festival and Improvisers Collective. Vision Festival brought in some bigger names. And the Improvisers Collective, I don't think had any names who were big at that time — plus some young people, some who don't play anymore, but some of them do. It was definitely related to the past. That was the point: to try to build the bridge. That’s what Arts For Art consciously tries to do. “On their shoulders” was a phrase I started using a lot, as an understanding that this work is a line of continuity. We're not the latest thing, or what's cool. That's a stupid way of looking at things, a PR thing that really doesn't do the arts justice; it doesn't encourage the best art because it cuts people off from each other.

So Arts For Art did not preface the festival? I thought they were part and parcel of each other, but also somewhat separate, if with the same mission.

It didn't preface it, that's for sure. And there's no real separation. When the Vision Festival wasn’t a one-off, we needed to get incorporated, so we could actually raise money. Assif was pushing me for that. So we ended up with the name Arts For Art, which was supposed to mean “artists for artists.” The project is all about the artist’s self-determination. People don't really think of me as an artist because they compartmentalize. I am an artist, but I’m also committed to service. It was easier for me psychologically and emotionally to serve than to promote myself. So I serve; but the way that I think, and put the festival together from an artist’s perspective. All this is very much shaped by these ideas. And every year, the work would be reinvented: what is Vision Festival? What are we trying to accomplish this year? Where are we trying to go? Specific intentions. And that has evolved. Now I understand the environment well, understand what I'm up against and what I'm trying to achieve.

How have you evolved your vision in the last decade? It does feel like there’s been a lot of new energy for this music, from a cultural awareness standpoint.

The 2001 festival that was at the Knitting Factory was the most overtly political festival I ever did — it was called “Vision Against Violence.” This was like four months before 9/11, and people pushed back against how political I wanted it to be. I had people talking about the prison pipeline. But I realized I wasn't speaking to people where they were at, and if you want to build community, you want to bring people along, you need to deal with them where they are at. So I pulled away from the political perspective, and I had conferences on, for instance, how money affects your creative choices. I had many conversations about racism, which wouldn't go anywhere because no one wanted to deal with it. So it was trying to figure out where people are really at, and then talking to them. Then there was also the challenge of building a younger audience, a more diverse audience, which, when I focused on it, we’re gradually getting.

The convention at the festival this year is going to take this all on. It's going to be really clear. The title of both days is “Fighting for the Sustainability of Black Improvised Creative Music,” and it's in two parts: the first looks at how systemic racism and colonization has removed jazz, especially free jazz, from the Black community. And the second part is about the lack of support for this music, from (and I don't say this in the program description) the media and government and institutions and foundations. It will talk about the irony of [Congress’] Resolution 57 [passed in 1987], which states that jazz is a national treasure, an example of how they give you the words, but clearly never intend to support it. I want people to understand that we're actually fighting for this music, for equity and diversity within it, that's what Arts For Art has been doing the whole time. So that's been the struggle — but it's been a joyful struggle.

Do you feel that the audience and community now is bigger, younger, and more open to engaging these ideas?

Oh yes. Especially now. At first, I just thought of the artists as the community, but one of the things that happened maybe 10 to 15 years ago is I started thinking, “oh no, community is the artists and the audience.”  I got better and better at welcoming people. For instance, although I love Roulette, [the downtown Brooklyn venue where the festival has been held on-and-off since 2012], it is a hard space. It was great for the sound, but not great for gathering. Always, since the first Vision Festival, all the artists and the audience shared space. We didn't have the artist behind a locked door and you can't see them unless you’re friends and you can get to go backstage, [which is how Roulette operated]. We did the best we could with it, pushed the limits to make it a gathering space. It’s important to make that space for people coming into the community, to help them understand that interaction. There is a very rapidly growing audience for this music, and making sure you're talking their language is important. That involves a lot of stuff that, personally, I'm not that interested in. I want it to happen, but I'm not the one who's going to make it happen on social media. That's where they're looking for information. So everyone new coming in [to work with Vision Festival] is young, they're all under 30. Except the guy who does our design work, who is amazing, and who also made our YouTube channel. So when you talk about community, you have to talk about how they arrive and making space for them, and I do that. Getting them into the space is another thing.

What about the younger and newer musicians?

The thing is, as you become successful, you get drawn in, so you get sent to Europe. That’s success. “Go to Europe, that's where you're gonna make the money,” where you’ll  get a big audience that is going to clap for you. Here, you do what you can. Then there's cool places, but you have to be cool. And that's why part of our vision, our dream for the future of Arts For Art is a space — even though that's also like a nightmare. But if we want to really be able to have a strong community, we need a space.

Is such a space possible in New York City in 2021?

I think so. Investors are a little reluctant because they've created spaces that have failed, but the reason Arts For Art has lasted 25 years is that I'm stubborn. It is important to be stubborn, to absolutely not back down, and know what you want, to be clear.

Now I'm going to talk in a language that business wouldn't like, but is important: I relate to being a shaman. A shaman in the Mayan sense, someone who goes into the upper worlds and shoots down their visions so that those visions can be born into this world. You need to go get your visions and then you plant them well in the ground, on good soil. Once your dream is planted, you do all those practical, pragmatic, realistic things — but not so realistic that you're dealing with other people's ideas of what's realistic. Don't confuse those two worlds. You get your beautiful visionary idea, and then plant it here to make sure that it can grow on this earth.

Is that the vision from which the festival got its name?

No, the name for the festival comes from the idea that everyone has visions. We have all been given visions, we just don't respect them. They're not validated in this world, that's not part of our language. Our society thinks of visions as something you have to take drugs to get rid of. We conflate visions with psychosis and delusion. This is what we’re taught, and that's terrible. Visions are gifts. Those are your great ideas, they are the light bulb, you know, like in cartoons. Vision Festival was originally a vision. All of a sudden, BOOM, I knew. I told William, I couldn't prove that this festival was going to work. It had come to me. When you get an idea and all the bells in your brain start ringing, that's a good idea. But there is nowhere in our society where we can learn about that kind of thing.

At this year's Vision Festival, pianist, vocalist and poet Amina Claudine Myers will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award. Myers was an early member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians.

That's because this is not the society that we live in. The society that we live in wants you to actually not have your own idea. They want you to buy into their idea.

Right. You’re expected to go along with the program.

And, funny enough, that's actually anathema to the nature of the music that you're presenting and to the very idea of improvisation.

So the other thing, when you look at this story of neglect of free jazz, it does make one wonder: why was this music demonized? And I really can't think of any answer except that it was fear. But what in this music made people afraid?

Maybe this speaks to the fear of actual freedom, rather than “freedom” as defined by society.

And that's scary. It's scary to everyone, it's even scary to the people who make this music. It’s so much a part of African-American culture, and yet it's so against the lessons learned from the African-American experience in this society, which is, you know, you can excel in this way and that way, but be very very careful. This music is not about being careful at all. So you have to have a certain sense of something.

I’ll tell you a story: We started Artists For a Free World, which we called our advocacy arm, but was in reality a marching band that participated in many demonstrations, especially in [Trump’s] first year. Between the Women's March, right at Trump's inauguration in January, until the 2017 Vision Festival, which was in June, we were out usually twice a week playing music in the streets. I was there. William was 98% of the time leading the band, usually playing drums, or his double-reed. And one of the things I learned during those marches was when you play this music in the streets for everyone, they love it. There was no disconnect. There was no, “Oh, this music is too far out.” It made sense to people on the street, at a demonstration. It's just very human. Everyone can relate to it. It makes them happy and dance. What it was basically, was rhythms. We had the drummers playing different kinds of rhythms. And then the horns played a few melodies. But it was basically blowing. The drums were like the rhythms of the people, our humanity. And then the horn is the cry of the people. The melodies are things you can capture, they make you feel good, and the improvised horn solo is the cry. This music is not incomprehensible, it is part of the human experience and reflective of our humanity.

So what are your hopes for this year's festival?

I don't know if I use the word hope. I tend to mentally be a few steps ahead of where I actually am. I'm always looking to the future. My hopes are for Arts For Art and for the music. I hope that the music can find its place here in the US so it doesn't have to be so dependent upon Europe. I think we do a real disservice to this music, which comes from a certain place. One of the reasons I stopped booking so many Europeans (and it’s not anti-anything) is I want to support the music in the place where it came from. And that means African-American culture — but it also means American. We need to pay attention to what's going on here. And we need to deal with our systemic racism and we need to stop appropriating the sh*t out of everything. And we need to grow and to demand that we get foundation support. One of the problems that everybody has [with Arts For Art] is that we're not Black enough and we're not white enough. If you're basically white with, you know, a sampling of “diversity,” then you can get funding. If you're all-Black, there’s now Black funding. It's certainly not at the same level as that other funding, but it's funding. Arts For Art is walking a tightrope. And it's because we're acknowledging the African-American experience, but we're also diverse. (The real meaning of diversity, as opposed to diverse as code for Black or Latinx.) The truth is that this music is multicultural. It's not only African-American, but it has to have that core or else you've lost it. And that core needs to be understood and developed and sustained. And then we're doing this convention, which I'm hoping will be a game changer. That's a lot to hope for [laughs], but, you know, I hope—big hope—that it will help people’s understanding of free jazz, its place, its positioning, and importance in history. And what kept it from being more. ♦