Border Crossings: A Musical Conversation

In my last post about the Palestinian-American composer and musician Simon Shaheen, I made reference to a violinist friend who leads a number of jazz ensembles. In the piece, I attempted to show a cultural timeline that connected Arabic music to that of the Caribbean, via both Spain and Africa, and further went on to be an ingredient of jazz. I rather shamelessly concluded the piece with a plug for my friend's upcoming performance. Consider this the follow-up.

Proyecto Libre at Constellation Chicago, March 7, 2014

Violinist James Sanders presented his Proyecto Libre, or "Free Project", for only their second performance since being formed in the fall of 2013. Sanders has led a Latin jazz band in Chicago for many years, but he also works frequently in mainstream jazz and collaborates regularly with several members of the Chicago avant-garde collective Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM). The connective tissue to all of this is the art of improvisation, and a huge influence is Sanders' Dominican heritage and the Afro-Caribbean music he grew up listening to. The commonality is African music, or more specifically, what African music became when it reached the Americas.

In the Caribbean and South America, African traditions mingled with Spanish and Portuguese culture along with indigenous sounds to form cumbia, merengue, samba, bomba y plena, danzon, son jarocho and so on. In the colonies settled primarily by the English (you know, the United States) Africans encountered something different: Scottish ballads, military bands, European classical. And then there's New Orleans, which had a little of everything: First ruled by France, then Spain, then briefly back to France before being given over to the United States, and everyone passing through Cuba and Saint-Domingue before making their way there. "Same ship, different ports," is how New Orleans jazz musician Irvin Mayfield describes this cultural migration imposed by the slave trade. Military brass bands were especially popular in New Orleans too (a side effect, I suppose, of all those competing countries jostling for dominion). Jelly Roll Morton took it all in as he began to invent what would become jazz, but he was careful to cite the "Spanish tinge" for giving the music that extra syncopation.

Congo Square, New Orleans

Jazz, of course, grew and mutated as subsequent generations sought new artistic challenges. Those changes often took the art form down divergent paths. There's Latin jazz, of course, which had its beginnings when be-boppers of the 40s and 50s experimented with Afro-Cuban rhythms. Post-bop, you had the giants of free improvisation taking jazz into entirely uncharted waters, often reaching all the way back to Africa for inspiration, but mostly skipping the islands in between. The AACM collective more or less descends from these Afrocentric explorations. Meanwhile, back in Africa, innovators were listening and creating their own homegrown African jazz.

What Sanders is trying to do with Proyecto Libre is have a family reunion. He has organized it as a collective, but the driver is the idea that there is common ground between these disparate musical languages, and by bringing together musicians fluent in one language but not as much another, they could engage in fruitful conversation. The current line-up includes an Afro-Cuban percussionist plus a drummer and bassist from the AACM side. In the middle, moderating the "discussion", is Sanders and his violin, using his rigorous classical training and experience in both languages to open up space for everyone to contribute. Jazz is as much about listening as it is playing, and nowhere is this more true than in free improvisation.

James Sanders' violin.

When I heard Proyecto Libre in their first performance in December at the Afro-Caribbean Improvised Music Festival, I was impressed by the artistic give and take, but I had a sense that the Afro-Cuban element was looking for a way in to a scene that was being dominated by the other players. Well, what a difference a couple of months can make. For their second performance, which I witnessed this past Friday night, all four members were on equal footing from the start, having found time to musically get to know each other during the interim. Sanders started things off with a few plucked notes on his violin, soon joined by the bass and little cymbal accents on the drum kit. Within a minute or so, the congas joined in, and the gentle interplay between the four musicians suggested the elegance of a danzon without precisely sounding like one. This suggestion, but not imitation, of the classic Cuban sound showed how much the players were learning about each others specialties and finding something new to say together. Soon, Sanders was using his bow while the drums and congas played interlocking rhythms and the bass negotiated the space between them, gently prodding things in one direction or another as the intensity built.

What followed was over an hour of straight music making, and all of it improvised, literally being created as it was happening. To use the conversation metaphor, one player would introduce a thought that would take the discussion in a particular direction, each participant offering their contribution. After that line played out a bit, there would be something of a pause to take a breath and reflect on what was just discussed, allowing someone else to contribute a fresh idea, which would take the conversation in a new direction. Passions ran high, but mostly joyful ones, as one thought inspired another. It was especially compelling to watch the two drummers, brothers from different mothers if you will, lock eyes and smile as each new idea surfaced.

As an intellectual exercise, it was impressive. As music, it was nearly transcendent. This was the sound of borders being breached, of walls being torn down. African-American, Afro-Caribbean, and African languages were all spoken, but more importantly, also listened to, responded to, moving the music forward.  When music works, it does so on a level that bypasses intellect and is experienced by the entire body. This certainly happened Friday night. Hell, there was even some dancing at the end. This was fun. It wasn't until the following morning that I thought about Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti, whose legendary jams would go on for hours and hours, music that combined the fierceness of John Coltrane's fiery explorations, the out-and-out funk of James Brown and a cry against injustice that frightened the authorities. And doing all of that in a big, sweaty dance party.

Sanders has a website that is packed with video and audio performances that touch on all the facets of his musical journey. Proyecto Libre already have another performance scheduled in April. I talked to James after his Friday performance, and he hinted that he was already planning on experimenting with different voices to see where that particular conversation will lead. I'll be there listening.

Puerto Rico en Chicago

photo by Don Macica

Within hours of arriving home from a recent visit to New Orleans, a place I've described as having a Caribbean soul, I found more of the same as I entered the welcoming confines of the Segundo Ruiz Belvis Cultural Center on Chicago's northwest side. A friend of mine who, remarkably, makes his living as a musician was debuting a new free jazz/Latin group dubbed Proyecto Libre, or Free Project. I reviewed the performance for Agúzate, an Afro-Latin cultural organization, and you can read that here.  The music was wonderful, and I'm truly impressed (and often amazed) by the adventurous spirit that guides my friend's artistic endeavors.

But that's not what this post is about.

photo by Silvia Gonzales

The concert was occasioned by the grand re-opening of Segundo Ruiz Belvis, which has been dedicated to preserving Puerto Rican culture outside of the island for over 42 years. Hermosa, the neighborhood in which the center is currently located, is, especially on a cold winter night, rather grim. It's poor, and there are problems with gangs and crime. The center, once located in Wicker Park (a neighborhood that I passingly referred to in a recent post about gentrification), occupies a large space in a former movie theater that it bought. It is quite beautiful in a loft apartment sort of way, with exposed brick walls, colorful artwork, and stylish seating areas. They can afford the large building because the smaller space that they previously owned in Wicker Park sold for millions in a newly desirable neighborhood that was no longer so desiring of having poor ethnic folks live there. The current building lies somewhere that nobody would live in if they could afford to live elsewhere.

photo by Silvia Gonzales

Except that is not necessarily true. Communities may be poor, but that is not to say they are without culture or resources, and Segundo Ruiz Belvis is a manifestation of this. Culture, family, community: These are indeed desirable things, and especially so when you are separated by many thousands of miles (and perhaps even generations) from your home. In this context, art and culture are not pastimes or luxuries, but necessities for keeping the spirit alive. Real lives are no doubt saved as well, when young people feel cultural pride and turn away from gangs and crime.

photo by Don Macica

I couldn't help thinking of Central City in New Orleans, a poor community by any economic measure, but one in which I had the good fortune of participating in a second line parade just a few days earlier. A second line, as I described in my last post, is a joyously exuberant cultural expression of traditions that go back generations and, here and now, a way for the community to take to the streets and take a stand against crime, violence and, as the event flyer put it, "foolishness".

Segundo Ruiz Belvis takes a stand against foolishness as well.

May it long continue to do so.

NOLA diary: It's complicated

I've been back in cold and snowy Chicago for nearly a week, but my thoughts still return to New Orleans several times a day. I guess the spirits that haunt that city followed me onto the plane and have decided that they'll hang around for a while.

New Orleans is a city populated by storytellers. Don't ask anyone a question unless you've got plenty of time for their answer. While there, I talked to people from different rungs on the economic ladder, and naturally, their stories are different. Some had families that went back several generations. Some were relative newcomers, moving there 10, 20, or 30 years ago. There's a category called the "never lefts". They came to New Orleans for school, or to attend a convention, or for a vacation, and never went back to the grey places they used to call home. Then, finally, there's the post-Katrina boom fueled by real estate and the migration of thousands of young, largely white professionals and creatives lured by the city's many charms.

The total population, according to one of the never lefts (25 years) that I talked to, is nearly back to pre-Katrina levels. In my last post, I mentioned the restaurant boom that is currently in high gear. This growth, of course, is largely powered by these new arrivals, and most of the restaurants and cocktail shrines opening up are mid- to upscale. It's natural, of course, that chefs and mixologists are drawn to this place, with its almost holy reverence for food and drink. I went to a few myself, and let me tell you, they are wonderful.

There's a flip side to this narrative, though. A cab driver that I spoke with, who lived over on the West Bank in suburban Marrero, made it clear to me that almost all of the post-Katrina investment is happening in areas frequented by tourists. There's a logic to this, of course. Tourism was a major segment of the economy before the flood, and its influx of dollars is crucial. As evidenced by the restaurant boom, there are neighborhoods that are wealthier than ever, and business is booming. There are, however, large parts of the city that are a long way from recovery. This is where organizations like Habitat for Humanity and other volunteers work with community groups on the slow, painstaking rebuilding of neighborhoods that were home to generations of working class families. Even in Pontchartrain Park, a middle class community founded in the 1950s by African-Americans in a still officially segregated south, the rebuilding is slow. I read an interview with actor Wendell Pierce, who portrays Antoine Batiste on HBO's Treme and was born in Pontchartrain Park. He's extremely active on the local Neighborhood Association, and in the interview he pointed to the "nearly 30" new homes that have been built. In the 2000 census, the community was home to 2,600 residents, almost all of them homeowners in the suburban-like enclave that included a public golf course. Seven years after Katrina, the population is only half that. In the context of Black New Orleans, this counts as a success. 

And then there's the projects. New Orleans had four large ones that never re-opened after Katrina. On the Sunday of my visit, I joined a second line parade through Central City. As you can likely tell from its name, the area is quite close to downtown and just a few blocks north of the stately homes of the Garden District. Despite this seeming prime location, the area is plagued by poverty. Central City was the location of the Magnolia Projects, an infamous, crime filled place that was nonetheless home to hundreds of poor working class families. (Quick detour: Second line parades are organized by Social Aid and Pleasure Clubs. They are raucous, fun-filled events led by brass bands [I was especially lucky; the great Rebirth Brass Band was one of two bands in this one] that parade for several hours through the neighborhood. They are also strong cultural expressions of community, a way for neighbors to take to the streets and show solidarity, celebrating traditions that go back hundreds of years. As the event flyer stated, "Please leave your pets, problems and weapons at home. We want to continue our culture without violence or foolishness.")  The Magnolia Projects are gone, replaced by a mixed-income development called Harmony Oaks. It's hard not to see this as a positive thing, yet once again a place that once housed thousands now has room for half that.

On another day, I took the streetcar up Canal past the Iberville Projects, which lie immediately north of the French Quarter. They are in the process of being demolished, and its not clear what will be built in their place. Look, I'm from Chicago, I'm no stranger to how this works. As the Gold Coast expanded westward, the Cabrini-Green projects here became mighty inconvenient, and they were demolished. I understand that the Lathrop Homes at Diversey and Damen are facing the same fate. There is way too much money to be made in the building of mixed-income developments while making nearby upper income areas "safe", therefore paving the way for even more development. New Orleans isn't that different. In that context, Katrina was practically an economic growth engine.

That might have been what a woman I spoke with meant when she said that, in some ways, Katrina was "a blessing".  Her home was on the high ground of Gentilly Ridge, and it didn't flood, though she was forced to evacuate the city for over a month. I couldn't help feeling that she was quite happy that the projects were gone and that thousands of poor people were being replaced by wealthier ones.

Ah, Katrina. One thing that nearly everyone in New Orleans agrees on is that it wasn't the hurricane that almost destroyed the city, but the "failure of the Federal Army Corps of Engineers levees". That assertion is even made in official language, like the sign that greets visitors at the entrance of beautiful City Park. Everyone, even the aforementioned "blessing" woman, just under their Laissez les bons temps rouler exterior, carries a sense of anger and betrayal. From that anger, however, seems to come a new sense of determination and community.

Here's a paradox. The thing that nearly killed New Orleans also revealed it to the world and even, perhaps, to itself. Wendell Pierce again, from that same interview: "We also knew we could possibly lose the culture altogether, which made people keenly aware that you can’t take that culture for granted. So you find people who are New Orleanians, lived here their whole life, coming to their first second lines. I’ve seen people who’ve lived their whole lives in New Orleans decide to come and see for the first time what an Indian practice is all about. People who lived near Treme who had never gone to Treme whatsoever who would say, ‘I would go to the French Quarter and was told never to cross Rampart Street and I never have.’ So the evolution of waking up the cultural fire in people who had never paid attention to this culture is the other side of that two-sided coin."

Perhaps that is the true, hard won blessing of Katrina. I love New Orleans. I had planned to blog about the highlights of my trip, the delicious food, the potent cocktails, the fabulous music. I experienced all of that, and I had a really good time, some of it transcendentally good. (Quick and highly personal rundown for this visit: Herbsaint has the best food, Cane & Table the best cocktails, d.b.a. the best music.) But there was so much more. It's complicated.

I'm beginning to suspect that one day, the "never lefts" will claim me as one of their own.

NOLA diary: You're different here. Or at least I am.

I'm getting used to New Orleans.

What I mean by that is, pretty much from the moment I step off the plane, the city starts working on me, transforming me, altering my nature. Maybe it's that brass band that greets me at baggage claim. Maybe it's the friendly cab driver that takes me to my hotel. Maybe it's knowing that I'll be spending the next several days eating some of the most delicious food of my life. Maybe it's just the humidity. But I see things differently here. More specifically, I see people differently. I'm less, um, judgmental. I'm friendlier. I start conversations with strangers. I smile a lot.

I can see the Mississippi from my hotel window and the huge American flag at the ferry dock across the way in Algiers. It doesn't exactly look special from here, a thin horizontal gray bar across the middle of the picture on this cloudy day. And then, suddenly, a huge cargo ship cruises into the frame, then quickly exits it, reminding me that the river was a superhighway before there were superhighways. I could do this all day.

Except I can't. I have a lunch reservation at Antoine's, serving old school Louisiana Creole cuisine continually since 1840. Well, except for few months after Hurricane Katrina damaged the building and, because of the lack of electricity, caused the loss of 25,000 bottles of wine from the climate-controlled cellar. Antoine's is huge: 14 dining rooms, several hundred employees, and one very cool bar (more on that later). After Katrina, Antoine's had to track down those employees and, even though business took years to rebound, put them back to work. Did I mention that it's still owned by the same family, and that, by tradition, they are never open on Thanksgiving, Christmas, or Mardi Gras? Take that, Walmart!

Everybody in New Orleans seems to work in a restaurant or a bar. Walking through the French Quarter, you pass them by constantly, identifiable by the chef's aprons or the customary white shirt and bow tie worn by wait staff, while they take smoke breaks or make phone calls. According to a New York Times article that I read the other day, the city still has fewer people than pre-Katrina, but an incredible 70% more restaurants.

So, last night, we're at Hermes Bar. It's part of Antoine's, so you can order food. They have absolute classic New Orleans cocktails like the sazarac, Ramos gin fizz, and French 75. And on Friday and Saturday they have live jazz. Last night it was drummer Shannon Powell, a master of funky New Orleans rhythms and a bit of a staunch traditionalist.  The bar was fairly full, but not uncomfortably so. There was a table adjacent to ours where a group of 10 people or so were celebrating Christmas. In this group was a woman who was getting more and more tipsy as the evening progressed. Of course, so was I and so was everyone else, but she was one of those enthusiastic drunks. In another context, say, Chicago, I might have called her obnoxious, but here, deep in the heart of New Orleans, she was an inspiration. She was joie de vivre personified. We may have been in Hermes Bar, but she was Aphrodite.

And that's what I mean about me being transformed by New Orleans. There is no dance floor at Hermes, but that didn't stop her. Very soon afterward, it didn't stop us, either. Our new friend kept upping her game, though. At one point she appointed herself the solicitor of Shannon Powell's tip jar, working the crowd to make sure the drummer got paid.  Suddenly, our plan for one set, a bite to eat, a cocktail or two and then off to bed after a long travel day turned into a party, complete with a cheerleader.

Shannon Powell is amazing. Besides jazz, he easily dips into Meters and James Brown style funk, Cuban-tinged rhythms and works the cowbell like crazy on songs like Big Chief. He sings, too, sort of, at least enough to exhort the crowd to merriment. We were easily persuaded, to say the least.

The Saints play tomorrow. I'm pretty sure my NOLA transformation will be kicking into a higher gear. But first: Lunch, more music tonight, and a side of red beans and rice.

Do you know what it means...

Some day, when I'm feeling more confessional, I'll (maybe) share the story of how Hurricane Katrina changed my life. On the face of it, that's an enormously stupid and self-serving statement, considering that in August of 2005 I was enjoying a typical Chicago summer in a comfortable, well constructed home many miles from any natural and/or man made disaster. For now, though, I'll simply state around that time I began to find my voice as a writer, and the horrible blow that New Orleans suffered and the events that followed played a significant role in unearthing it.

New Orleans. The Big Easy. Nawlins. The Crescent City. NOLA.

I'm heading back there in a couple of weeks for my third post-Katrina visit. It is, far and away, my favorite city in North America. It is, without question, the most unique. It doesn't quite feel like the United States. A Dominican friend of mine told me, over a delicious Creole lunch in the French Quarter, that New Orleans reminded him of Santo Domingo. My own point of reference would be to San Juan, Puerto Rico, a place I go to as often as I can. New Orleans has a Caribbean soul.

Some, like jazz musician and favorite son Irvin Mayfield, say that NOLA is the northernmost tip of the Caribbean. Geographically debatable, perhaps, but culturally true. With its mix of French, Spanish and, most importantly, African influences, New Orleans was thoroughly shaped by the slave trade, just like its Caribbean cousins. Cuban rumba, Dominican merengue, Trinidadian calypso, Jamaican reggae, Puerto Rican bomba, Colombian cumbia, New Orleans jazz. They're all a cultural expression of the African diaspora when it arrived in the Americas and mingled with both European practices and indigenous customs. "Same ship, different ports," is how Mayfield describes it. People from New Orleans like to use the culinary term 'gumbo' when describing this mix of cultures. Every distinct ingredient, flavor and texture is crucial to the whole.

I was fortunate to be able to talk with Irvin Mayfield earlier this week because he was bringing the magnificent New Orleans Jazz Orchestra to the Chicago Theatre and a couple of online publications were kind enough to let me write a preview article.

You can read the whole thing here.

The concert was a sprawling, 3 hour tribute to jazz and the two cities that are crucial to its development; New Orleans, where it was born, and Chicago, where it grew up. The New Orleans Jazz Orchestra (NOJO) is no period piece. It doesn't, as a rule, do traditional stuff. Rather, it's a muscular ensemble that navigates the whole history of jazz. The inclusion of not one, but two selections from Duke Ellington underscored the fact that this music had to journey from New Orleans to Chicago before it reached Duke, inspiring one of America's greatest composers. Original compositions dotted the program, including a blistering Cuban-inspired number from Mayfield's days co-leading Los Hombres Calientes, a NOLA band that explicitly traced African music through the Caribbean and Brazil. Trad was not ignored altogether. In fact, it was prominently featured with the help of guests the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, keeping the tradition alive since the early 60s. The R&B side was ably represented as well by the one and only Allen Toussaint, who's been working even longer.

photo by Lynn Orman

There were plenty of props to Chicago, too, with guest appearances by vocalist Kurt Elling, trumpeter Orbert Davis (who leads the ambitious Chicago Jazz Philharmonic) and a host of journeymen who labor farther from the spotlight: bassist Larry Gray, drummer Robert Shy and the amazing 82-years-young pianist Willie Pickens. "I think it's all a scam so we'll treat him with reverence," joked Mayfield from the stage. "I think he's really 42."

Of course, the whole thing ended in a New Orleans second line parade, the band and its guests streaming up and down the Chicago Theatre aisles while hundreds danced joyfully, waving their handkerchiefs in the air.

My flight leaves in two weeks. NOJO holds court in Mayfield's own Jazz Playhouse in the Quarter every Wednesday evening. That's one stop I have to make. Stay tuned.

A Perfect Evening.

When Time Out Chicago was still a print publication, I enjoyed a column that was called "Your Perfect Weekend" or something like that, where they highlighted select events that didn't conflict on the schedule. I kinda had my perfect day yesterday, as little reminders of this blog's guiding philosophy kept popping up.

The first event was a no-brainer, given the title of this blog. Victor Garcia is a very talented jazz trumpeter who got to showcase a project on a major outdoor stage for the Made in Chicago: World Class Jazz series curated by the Jazz Institute of Chicago. Garcia called his project Crossing Borders, and what he did was interpret the music of his Mexican ancestry through a a modern jazz lens. He hired a 13 piece band made up of musicians from both jazz and folkloric backgrounds, then wrote new arrangements for them. The whole enterprise came off magnificently, but I was especially thrilled when a dance melody from Jalisco was wedded to the birthplace of jazz through a lively New Orleans brass band arrangement. Really good stuff.

That concert wrapped up around 8:30, but the other event that I wanted to check out didn't start until 10:30. That left time for a stop at La Pasadita, a hole in the wall Mexican eatery that has perhaps the best carne asada tacos in the city.  When the restaurant opened in 1976, it was in a solidly Mexican area. The same address now sits on the eastern edge of a hipster enclave. As a consequence, the mix of diners at any given moment leans a bit more toward gringo than Latino. I thought, well, there's another migration, but not one you typically think of that way. The newcomers here are young folks from the suburbs or maybe another midwestern city that isn't, well, Chicago. Like any migration, though, the purpose is the same: to seek a better life.

As 10:30 approached, we got back in the car and headed up the street a couple of miles to Barra ñ, a tiny nightspot run by Argentinians who also own Tango Sur and a neighboring grocer on the north side and also recently opened a Latin American lounge and restaurant in the aforementioned hipster enclave. Barra ñ was hosting a DJ session by Coba Sound System, who are at the core of Novalima, the Afro-Peruvian group I wrote about last week. The bar was packed with people of varying skin tones drinking and dancing in very close proximity. As the DJs got deeper into their groove and I began to surrender to the rhythm, I realized that the underlying beat was derived from house music, which was more or less invented in, wait for it... Chicago!  There you have it: Chicago music conquers the international club scene, only to return to it's birthplace by a couple of guys from Peru.

I was up way too late last night.