In 1997, the Kennedy Center and the Department of State joined in presenting classical musicians as Artistic Ambassadors from the United States. In 1998 and 2000, the Kennedy Center and the Department of State jointly presented jazz musicians in Jazz Ambassadors Tours of Africa, the Middle East, South Asia and Latin America. This year, Jazz Ambassadors 2001 is proud to bring the Jubilee Jazz Trio to West Africa. PaJohn Dadson met the Trio who are currently in Ghana, one of eleven West African countries in which the Trio will play as Jazz Ambassadors during their current tour.
They are in town, and have already visited Cape Coast, and performed at the Prempeh Assembly Hall in Kumasi. This Friday June 22, The Jubilee Jazz Trio will give another performance, this time for Accranians at the National Theatre in Accra. And they will be performing compositions of Loius 'Satchmo' Armstrong, in commemoration of the centenary of Armstrong's birth.
Scott Robinson, a graduate of Berklee School of Music in Boston and great cornet and saxophonist, leads Larry Ham; Pianist, and Patrick O'Leary; bassist, both with degrees from The Crane School of Music at the State University of New York in Potsdam, New York to form The Jubilee Jazz Trio.
Organised in 1999 by these three friends who have been making music together for over 14 years, the group was selected by the US State Department through a rigorous screening process that ended with competitive auditions held in New York City. Theirs is to represent American music overseas as Kennedy Center- Department of State Jazz Ambassadors.
The Kennedy Center, one of America's leading arts venues, and the U.S. Department of State are in their fifth year of a partnership created to showcase some of the most talented musicians in the United States in performances that highlight the contributions of American music to world culture. Ghana is one of eleven West African countries in which the Trio will play as Jazz Ambassadors during their current tour.
Scott Robinson, who himself undertook to perform Armstrong's compositions about six years ago, says he did it "to bring some attention to Armstrong's work as a composer, something which is easily overlooked."
And as this is the centenary of the birth of the man who can be easily described as the Father of Jazz, there is, perhaps, no better way to celebrate his music than through the Kennedy Center- Department of State Jazz Ambassadors programme.
The Jubilee Jazz Trio, whose members have all performed, toured, and recorded with some of the greatest names in jazz, such as Lionel Hampton and Illinois Jacquet, and have studied and absorbed the traditions of jazz performance and improvisation, bring a collective wealth of experience to their current collaboration. They are looking forward to hearing some good Ghanaian highlife music, as well as meet with local musicians to interact with.
"We'd like to hear the traditional music," says Patrick, and is anxiously looking forward, like the other two, to a workshop being put together for them by the National Theatre on Thursday.
Having learnt a bit about Ghanaian highlife, and how it has evolved, the Trio juxtaposed it to Jazz, which is a "flexible" type of music, and gives both the audience and players a capacity to assimilate its rhythms in a variety of ways.
The songs they'll play on Friday are Armstrong's less popular tunes. You won't hear, for instance, Wonderful World. They will play his compositions, and while the music may not be familiar, the style and technique adopted by the man himself will filter through as one listens to the Trio. "Hopefully, the audience will join us on the journey," says the Trio, who would like people to hear what they have to say through their instruments. "We like our audience to get involved in what we play, because there is always something new and fresh about our music all the time," they say, expecting a large audience turn out to participate fully in the concert. After all, the concert is free.
Jazz music is growing because its players are expressive and dynamic. Hopefully, after listening to the Trio, musicians will learn to be more expressive with highlife music.
The Trio are excited about their concerts in Ghana. They confessed that, of all the countries they had been to in West Africa over the past month, they like Ghana best. And they have already been to Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon, Chad, Burkina Faso, Niger, Benin, and Nigeria; and are yet to visit Cote d'Ivoire, Guinea and Senegal, before hopping off back to New York.
After several years of playing all around the world, the Trio have been influenced in different ways by different cultures, and musically Scott says the culture that shook him up was Korea! "They play some unbelievable, and terrifyingly amazing stuff," says Scott. Cuba was another place where their music made a big impression on him.
So also Patrick, who thought Cubans play music in such a "beautiful and heartfelt way that depicts the true celebration of life, which is, perhaps, their way of rising above whatever their experiences are." The Chinese is the other culture whose music gives Pat goose pimples.
Larry has a hard time saying which music is greatest for him, because there are so many. For him, it is something about the depth of the person who is playing, and the music of West Africa may come close. Maybe, someone in Ghana will top it up for him.
The Jubilee Jazz Trio is a mature group that plays mature music. The kind of music that send multiples of ecstasy through you when you sit quietly, and shut your eyes, and listen to it. They play at the National Theatre this Friday June 22, at 7pm.
Be sure to make it a date.
Louis Armstrong is an American hero. "He was born poor, died rich and never hurt anyone along the way," said Duke Elllington. During his climb from abject poverty to international acclaim, he created music of unparalleled brilliance and soaring beauty.
Many of his nearly five decades of recordings are as startling, even avant garde, today as when they were made. He was and is king of American music. Yet few realise the immensity of his accomplishment.
Many know Armstrong primarily as a singer and entertainer - yet he was a virtuoso trumpeter whose contributions to melody and rhythm are immeasurable. If his instrumental gifts are sometimes overlooked, his compositional talents are even more so.
He created original tunes with a great deal of character - some in collaboration with other artists, but all bearing the Armstrong mark of melodic beauty and rhythmic sophistication.
It is part of jazz tradition to seek out good material and present it from an original perspective, and it is in this spirit that the Jubilee Jazz Trio has prepared this programme of Armstrong's works. They are pleased to present Armstrong's music in the classic style, while drawing on other more recent jazz traditions to reinterpret some of his compositions.
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