If you had to name the one thing that fueled Carei Thomas' passion for music through a six-decade career as jazz pianist, composer, educator and community arts organizer, his wife believes the answer would be: everyone else who worked with him.
"When he got out there with other musicians and artists, you could just see him light up," Joyce Thomas said. "He fed off the energy of other people like no one else."
As the Minneapolis neighborhood he and Joyce called home for three decades was engulfed by racial tensions that he long worked to alleviate, Thomas died last Thursday at 81. After a fall, complications arose at HCMC that led to heart failure, his wife said.
Despite the consuming chaos surrounding George Floyd's tragic death just blocks from the Thomases' home, many friends, fans and fellow musicians from around Minnesota sent online tributes to Thomas over the weekend.
Internationally known jazz singer José James — who performed with and learned from Thomas' many Twin Cities ensembles — called him "a brilliant pianist, composer and mentor to a generation of artists."
"He opened my mind and heart to a deeper understanding of music and black culture and showed me that everything is connected — jazz, blues, R&B, doo-wop and so-called classical music," James said.
Another singer half his age, Mankwe Ndosi said Thomas — who also preached Buddhism to many of his protégés — taught her "theory, joy, humility, persistence, resilience, transformation."
Known for crafting adventurous and genre-bending musical pieces under his own name and with such groups and collectives as Zeitgeist, the Elders and the Neighborhood Ensemble, Thomas also pioneered such musical concepts as controlled improvisation and tonal fabrics.
