Brassy melodies will fill Cohen Auditorium tonight as the Tufts Jazz Big Band presents its spring concert. The group's "Tribute to Jazz Trumpet Giants" will feature Tufts' own Tiger Okoshi performing several dynamic trumpet solos.
Joel LaRue Smith, a music lecturer at Tufts and director of the Tufts Jazz Big Band, spoke to the Daily earlier this week about the band, his background, and what to expect from the concert.
<I>The Tufts Daily: How did the show evolve from a Miles Davis tribute to "Jazz Trumpet Giants"?
Joel LaRue-Smith: We did start it out as Miles Davis, but then Tiger [Okoshi] kind of gave us the repertoire that he wanted to use. I noticed the repertoire that he gave me, and the repertoire that I was doing independent of him. Without him as a soloist, we were including the music of Dizzy Gillespie, and Sandoval, and he had the music of Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, and Louis Armstrong.
So, I said wait a second - this isn't just about Miles, this is about the trumpet giants. There's also a lineage, there's a history with Louis and then Dizzy and then Miles and then Sandoval. Also, Dizzy Gillespie has to be included because he's really the one who bridged the gap between Cuban music and North American music in this country. He's the one who started introducing the great Cuban musicians to the American public.
TD: What do those two styles have in common?
JLS: Both of the musics are derived as a result of the African Diaspora, the displaced African in the Carribean and North America. The commonalities are that they both are improvised music, and they both tend to use call-and-response type components in the structure. They also have the use of the trumpet and percussion as a main focal point. Cuban music tends to use a lot of trumpets, and typically the most famous players in the history of jazz, like Louis Armstrong and Miles Davis, have been trumpeters.
It goes back to the whole religious concept of the walls of Jericho being tumbled down by Gabriel blowing his horn, or the mighty elephants of Africa - their screeching is like that of a trumpet. It has force; people who are typically oppressed need a voice, and what larger voice than the trumpet? It cries out, but it's also very moaning and sensual. It's not just a sound of anger or rebellion.
TD: Who can we expect to see performing?
JLS: Tiger Okoshi. He's a world renowned trumpet player. He teaches at Berklee, and he also teaches here at Tufts now. He's an author, and he travels all around the world - he plays with some of the best people, the top names in jazz. Tito Ayala is the congero that's playing with us, and he plays in a lot of Salsa bands, and does a lot of Latin jazz. They're both going to give a big boost from the two ends of the spectrum, the horn and the drum.
TD: Are there any Tufts students that are standing out?
JLS: Well, the whole band has done an amazing job as a cohesive group. I think we're focusing on one trumpeter in particular, a student here, Chris Kottke. Chris is this amazing honor student, I think he's a sophomore, and he's going to be a featured soloist in a lot of the compositions. And he's definitely someone to watch out for. I think he's taking a year off to study at Berklee and then returning.
TD: How did you wind up at Tufts yourself?
JLS: I came to Tufts from New York City. I was freelancing, playing Jazz and Latin music in New York, and I was also going to graduate school at Manhattan School of Music, and Tufts needed a full-time person to direct the jazz program. I wanted to do it because I think it's important, and this is the controversial part. As some might see it, and some might see it as very logical, I think it's important for their to be the presence of an African-American, teaching African-American music.
I was fortunate - I had Ryan Carter, who was in the Miles Davis Quintet, as one of my teachers, and this guy's so famous, I wondered why he's in a university teaching. He's a major player, just like I consider myself to be, and a major first-call session guy. He said, well, we need to have a clear presence in the university because this music is going in there now, and there needs to be serious representation. I thought well I could do that, it's steady income, and it's also a good way to give back.
It's important not to just take, and want to be a superstar, but to give back to the students, and I love it. I love doing what I'm doing. I played with Tito Puente, Mario Bauza, Tony Bennett... I played with all of those people, and I still love playing, and I'm still playing a whole lot, but there is something rewarding about teaching and it also clears things up in my head
TD: And this clarifies your sense of the music?
JLS: Yeah, and I feel like it clarifies my commitment to society, as being a responsible, reliable musician as opposed to like this egotistical, narcissistic, mercenary kind of a person. That's really important, for me anyway. Plus the kids at Tufts are just so cool, because... they're so smart! Everyone at Tufts is really smart. They're hard studiers, and I mean, their interests are very varied, very few undergraduates really focus on anything, but maybe that's the beauty of it too, they're open, it's like Sonny Rollins says, music is an open sky. So in that regard I dig Tufts; that's why I came, and I'm still here... this is going on my fifth year, and I'm still here.
TD: Who should come to the show on Thursday?
JLS: Everyone should come to the show. In the wake of Sept. 11 everyone has been hooraying over Americanism and patriotism, and still jazz is treated like a stepchild in the American popular culture and definitely in the academy. We need to reexamine matching the rhetoric with the action. The rhetoric is "yes, yes, let's revisit, let's reignite our old ties with what is true." This music is distinctively American. It's a combination of Europe and Africa happening as a result of the slave trade. It couldn't happen in Europe, it couldn't happen in Africa. It happened here. And it's a phenomenon, people need to really embrace it.
