Born January 15, 1947. Baikida is both a composer as well as a trumpeter. His music and trumpet have been a highlight of theater, dance and TV for over four decades. His music can be heard at many prestigious venues around the globe, including Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, The Walker Arts Center, La MaMa Theatre, The Chicago Art Museum, The Chicago Art Museum, The McCarter Theatre, (Princeton, NY), The Mark Taper Forum, The Asolo Theatre, (Sarasoto, FL), Merkin Concert Hall, Le Grand Palais, Paris, Belgium Opera, and the Market Theater (Johannesburg, South Africa) and a variety of international jazz festivals. He has recorded and performed with many artists, including Cecil Taylor and Sam Rivers, Dewey Redman and Billy Hart. He was the featured soloist on Julius Hemphill’s Dogon A.D., Coon Bid’ness, Oliver Lake’s first album NTU, John Carter’s Castles Of Ghana and Muhal Richard Abrams’ 1983 Down Beat Record of the Year Blues Forever. Jack De Johnettes’ acclaimed Inflation Blues also featured him. Baikida performed her classic opera Escalator over the Hill on a European tour in 1999. He recorded “Inspiration”, a 2000 Grammy-nominated CD, live in New York City with Sam Rivers and the Sam Rivers All Star Big Band. This ensemble was created to celebrate Rivers’ 75th birthday. His recordings include Orange Fish Tears and The Spoken Word, Shadows and Reflections and Marionettes on the High Wire. Uncle Vanya, By Anton Chekov, For Coloured Girls Who Have Considered Taking Their Own Lives/When The Rainbow is Enuf, Miss Julie, Miss Julie, Miss Julie by August Strindberg and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, by Tennessee Williams, Betrayal, A Doll House, by Henrik Ibsen and King Lear, by William Shakespeare are some of his theater compositions. He was also the composer of Betsey Brown, a highly acclaimed musical by Emily Mann, Ntozake Shange, as well as the Broadway hit, Having Our Say, which won the Tony Award for Best Musical. The Washington, DC Shakespeare Festival was invited by The Athens Festival to present Michael Kahn’s adaptation of Sophocles’ epic trilogy, The Oedipus Plays (Oedipus The King, Oedipus At Colonus, and Antigone) in September 2003. This monumental theatrical endeavor was created by Baikida. Athens Festival, the largest event in Greece, attracts thousands of visitors every year to see performances of classical music and opera. The New York Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein, Kirov and Bolshoi Ballets as well as the American Ballet Theatre, Royal National Theatre of England and performers like Margo Fonteyn and Martha Graham were among the participants. The Oedipus plays were performed at the Roman Odeon in Herod Atticus on the south slope in the shadows of the Parthenon. Baikida was a teacher at Queens College (NYC), the Community Arts Conservatory in St. Louis, and an Artist in Residence at American Center for Students and Artists (Paris), Bard College, Annandale, NY, The Creative Music Studio, Woodstock, NY, and the BAG Music School, St. Louis (MO). Allaboutjazz
