LONDON -
PRECIOUS few musicians have had the distinction of using their own nocturnal
experiences on the bandstand as basic raw material for serious academic
research and credit.
Classically trained jazz trombonist Chris
Washburne is just such a musician. Whether he is fronting his weekly SYOTOS
(See You On The Other Side) Latin jazz band, or in his role as Associate
Professor of Ethnomusicology, Dr. Washburne always has something of great
significance to say. At 37, Chris exhibits a sureness of technical touch on
trombone, together with a formidable depth of knowledge and insight on
Afro-Latin music. What's more, he gigs regularly with Celia Cruz and Mark
Anthony and is first 'bone chair with the Manhattan Chamber Orchestra. On "The
Other Side …" (Jazzheads Records JH 1139, 2001) SYOTOS performs tunes
written by Washburne and band members, as well as compositions penned by Tito
Puente. In SYOTOS one finds the cream of musicians on the Latin jazz scene such
as trumpeters Ray Vega and John Walsh, bassist Harvie Swartz, and drummer Vince
Cherico.
Earlier this month, this writer caught up with Washburne at
his office on campus at New York's Columbia University.
JAZZREVIEW.COM: Your band SYOTOS has a remarkable reason for
coming into being. Could you share with us how it all started and about your
involvement with the Nuyorican Poets Cafe?
CHRIS WASHBURNE: I
started my band ten years ago because I was interested in mixing my jazz
background with all of my salsa performance experience. The name SYOTOS did not
come into being until eight years ago. It stemmed from an experience I had with
a bout of cancer. Eight years ago I was diagnosed with a virulent type of skin
cancer on my face. After consulting doctors, they informed me that the only
option was surgery and that all the muscles and nerves would be removed from
one side of my face. According to them, it would prevent me from ever playing
trombone again. Without the surgery I would have a 50% chance of surviving. The
night before the surgery I was going to play my last gig and at the end of
night I said to my fellow band members, "see you on the other side," meaning,
see you on the side of my life where I won't be playing trombone anymore or
worse. The operation, however, was a success, leaving no cancer and just a
scar. The downside was that it left me with no feeling or muscle control on
half of my face. As for never playing again, after three months I said 'to hell
with this' and slowly began to teach myself again with literally half a face.
The first day I played for 30 seconds with the range of a tritone on the bottom
of the horn. For six months I forced myself to play 30 seconds longer each day
and attempted to add a half step to my range. At the end of the six months, I
took my first gig. It took two years of rigorous self-imposed discipline before
I felt I had exceeded the stamina and technique of my pre-operation career. I
named the band SYOTOS,an acronym for See You On The Other Side, as a tribute to
that life changing experience and a reminder of the value of life and the
ability to play trombone. The Nuyorican Poets Cafe is a very funky East-Village
hang-out that provides a special nurturing environment for artists, poets, and
musicians. Six years ago they approached me about playing every Thursday night.
Weekly gigs are rare in New York City and usually don't last long, so I
tentatively said OK expecting the gig to end within a month or so. As the
audiences grew, the support of the people at Nuyorican Cafe endured. I had
embarked on the longest running jazz gig currently running in NYC. A true
blessing for both the musicians in my band and myself. The value of having a
venue for trying out new ideas is immeasurable. Without the Nuyorican Poets
Cafe the band would not sound the way it does or have grown musically. As a
tribute to the special people and all their support, I named my first record
"Nuyorican Nights." (Jazzheads Records JH 1138) In addition, over the last
seven months we have been playing at SMOKE, a club on the Upper West Side every
Sunday evening. Now having two nights a week to perform the band has grown
monumentally.
JAZZREVIEW.COM: That must truly be one of the most
intriguing stories in jazz, Chris! Tell our readers a little about your most
recent CD?
CHRIS WASHBURNE: I originally conceived my second
album with the SYOTOS Band as a tribute to Tito Puente, with Tito himself as
featured guest. But just as the band was about to enter the studio, last year,
Puente died, and I no longer felt comfortable recording an album devoted to
Tito's compositions. I didn't want it to look as though we were trying to
capitalize on the passing of someone who was very special to me. Instead, on
this record, "The Other Side …" (Jazzheads Records JH 1139) I perform my
own tunes and those of my band members, as well as Puente's. This is my tribute
to Tito but it's my personal tribute. In fact, the album has a personal meaning
for me that transcends any connection to Puente's music.
JAZZREVIEW.COM: The trombone has wielded quiet authority
throughout the history of jazz. But a great many of its most committed and
creative exponents have not enjoyed as a high a profile as say, J.J. Johnson or
Al Grey, for example. Why has this been the case?
CHRIS WASHBURNE:
John, I wish I could tell you myself! I have no clue. My record collection
contains so many recordings of great trombone players, including J.J. Johnson
and Al Grey. Some of my favorite trombonists are Slide Hampton, Curtis Fuller,
Frank Rasolino, Barry Rogers, George Lewis, Ray Anderson, Conrad Herwig and so
many others too numerous to mention. In my mind these musicians should enjoy as
high profile as any of the important jazz saxophonists or trumpet players in
jazz.
JAZZREVIEW.COM: SYOTOS manages to braid together many
apparently disparate musical strands: Dissonance, a straight-ahead be-bop
big-band feel, and an overarching Afro-Latin rhythmic pulse which draws on
diverse rhythms such as the clave and the Brazilian 'partido alto' among
others. Is this a statement of the band's rich diversity or it a fleshing out,
so to speak, of your own investigations into harmony and melody?
CHRIS WASHBURNE: First, I don't view the musical strands that
are braided together in my music as disparate. These styles share a common
ancestry, both from Africa and the mixing that took place in the New World.
This common ancestry is what makes them so pliable and easily mixed. The reason
that they're present in my own music is because I love those styles. I love
Afro-Cuban rhythms, Brazilian music, and I love to dance to a hot Mambo. I hear
clave in much of the music that is considered jazz and rock-and -roll for that
matter.
JAZZREVIEW.COM: It may be successfully argued that ever
since the late 1940s Dizzy Gillespie, Ray Barretto, Chano Pozo, Eddie Palmieri,
Art Blakey and others have already done what you are currently doing. Is your
project just a case of new wine re-packaged in old wineskins?
CHRIS
WASHBURNE: First, to be compared with the great musicians listed above is
one of the best compliments I could ever receive. I can only hope in my music
to be half as successful as these inspiring musicians were and are in their
careers. Secondly, I would contend that what I am doing in this music has been
going on since the beginning of jazz with Jelly Roll Morton, Scott Joplin and
before. Cultural mixing has been one of the most productive sources in
stylistic innovation in music. The great artists that you mention certainly
have participated in important creative innovation in the Latin jazz realm. I
like to see what I do as in the tradition of Dizzy Gillespie, Jelly Roll Morton
and Eddie Palmieri, just with a more contemporary sound and attitude.
JAZZREVIEW.COM: Describe your early beginnings as a musician.
CHRIS WASHBURNE: I started playing trombone in my grade school
band program. School band programs have yielded many great brass and woodwind
players. It is lamentable that many of these school programs in the U.S are
being discontinued due to lack of funding and a political climate where art and
music are viewed as superfluous to education. It really concerns me when I
think of the future of the trombone and other band instruments, as fewer and
fewer young people are having the opportunity to learn and appreciate music
through performance. My early jazz experience came from my stepfather, an
amateur swing drummer, who took me to hear Count Basie and Woody Herman in
concert. I also played in garage rock and blues bands in high school. I went on
to pursue a performance degree in classical trombone from the University of
Wisconsin-Madison and because I love classical and jazz performance equally I
went on to get a Master's degree from the New England Conservatory in Third
Stream Studies. This program was started by Gunther Schuller incorporating both
classical, jazz and ethnic music performance. While in Boston I had the
opportunity to see Gil Evans' orchestra. I was so inspired. It was made up of
NY studio musicians and from their performance I decided to move to New York to
try to begin a career as a NY studio musician that would incorporate both my
jazz and classical background. I had no connections and knew it would take a
while to get gigs, and I also enjoyed studying music, so I applied to Columbia
University and was accepted to their ethno-musicology Ph.D. program.
JAZZREVIEW.COM: What drew you to the academic side of music?
What was your Ph.D. dissertation and what are your current academic projects?
CHRIS WASHBURNE: I was lucky because within the first year of my
move to NY I was performing every week with a combination of Latin, jazz and
classical group and began to do some recording. By the second year I was able
to support myself through playing and was considering stopping my studies at
Columbia. But the more I studied the theoretic and historical sides of music, I
realized how enriching that experience could be to my performance and I found a
new love for writing about music. I also realized that as a performer I had a
unique opportunity to write about music from the perspective that for someone
who was solely an academic might not have access to. So my dissertation topic
was an ethnographic study of the salsa scene in the 1990's from a musician's
perspective. Temple University Press will publish that dissertation as a book
next year. My other current projects, besides being an assistant professor at
Columbia University teaching jazz and Latin music history, includes writing
articles about Latin jazz history. I have recently published a chapter on the
history of miscellaneous instruments in jazz in the new Oxford Jazz Companion
(Oxford University Press 2000).
JAZZREVIEW.COM: How have your
studies enriched your musical life and vice versa?
CHRIS WASHBURNE:
I view my musical life and studies as inseparable. Writing about music,
writing music, performing music, and listening to music are all creative
endeavors that enrich each other.
JAZZREVIEW.COM: Who are your
major musical influences?
CHRIS WASHBURNE: In terms of Latin
music, the trombone playing of Barry Rogers, the heavy grooving of Eddie
Palmieri and the innovative arranging techniques of Tito Puente. In terms of
jazz, every single great trombonist I have ever heard, although I am partial to
J.J. Johnson, Frank Rasolino and George Lewis.
JAZZREVIEW.COM:
What channels are there in the US to enable people to get to know about
Afro-Cuban and Afro-Latin/Caribbean in more depth?
CHRIS WASHBURNE:
Just turn on the TV! The three main pop stars today are Cuban and Puerto
Rican. Gloria Estefan, Ricky Martin and Mark Anthony all incorporate Afro-Cuban
tradition in their music. I think that the world is experiencing and Afro-Cuban
craze. Latin music is permeating American and European culture like never
before. Walk into any European cafe and listen to what they're playing on the
stereo.
JAZZREVIEW.COM: Musical tastes in the US and Europe are
at best dictated by a 'flavour of the month' mentality or at worst severely
ghetto-ised and balkanised. Americans, in particular, hardly listen to music
which is not "mainstream" or music which does not receive heavy doses of
promotion and hype. How have you been able to deal with this?
CHRIS
WASHBURNE: It is frustrating as an artist not on a major label to get radio
air play and the type of promotion needed to get your music out there. As a
result many musicians end up promoting themselves on the Internet. The
advantage of being signed to an independent label is that I remain in full
artistic control of my music and my band and I work from the bottom up seeking
opportunities to get my music heard. We must continue to fight as musicians to
make people aware of what they are missing. We should create a demand in the
general public to be able to listen to what they WANT to listen to as opposed
to what major labels and record companies TELL them to listen to.
JAZZREVIEW.COM: Thank you very much Chris. It was a pleasure
talking to you!
JazzReview.com
