Every year the JZ group hold a jazz festival around the end of September. A great time of the year here before winter sets in.
Previous years have mainly international acts as well as a few well established local artists. This year they kinda flipped that around with just a couple international artists and a lot of locals. This years main acts are Branford Marsalis, and the Gypsy Kings.
I was lucky enough to be asked to play with the teachers and students of the JZ school. And then I would be free to go around and watch some of the other artists.
These were the musicians I played with:
It seemed to go well enough. Not many people there at that time though (10:30am start). It was still too early and I had another gig later that afternoon, so I left, had a quick nap, and did some double bass practice.
The other gig was on the other side of town, and I was surprised with quite a large turn out. It was a little flea market set up around the Chair Club area. Most of the crowd seemed to be foreigners too, with lots of dogs and kids running about.
This gig had a bit of a back story. Tony had asked a guitar player originally, but he had to cover another gig. So once again a last minute call to Alex Soul asking him to come out and play accordion with us.
So the set up was no drums, electric bass, accordion and vocals (with a little guitar and percussion). I should also add this was the first time Alex is played accordion with this group. I think it turned out pretty well. I definitely had fun anyway! This market really did have a nice vibe.
On top of that, I just bought a new action camera. Just about a month ago, I had already sent one back because of the terrible sound quality and also cause you needed wifi to connect it (VPN in China...thats another story). Anyway this new one was cheap! $80 or so, with a bunch of accessories to clip it on to various objects. But you pay for what you get.... It said the battery life was 2 hours, and I only managed to squeeze 35mins out of it.
I wanted to record the festival but I didn't have time to set it up. So later on the market gig I took a bit of a stroll around the market. Looks a bit choppy. Just the quality isn't there I guess.
Then I attached it to the head stock of my bass. This angle looks kinda weird, but I like it! The bass is straight, but everything else is bumbing around!
Also check out the lights! Haha
This was one of Tony's tunes and I took a bit of a solo. Which I didn't really want to upload to be honest (cringe). This always happens... I just tense up and it doesn't come out right.... I hope I can embarrass myself enough into relaxing and just playing whatever phrases that are there, ready to come out.
But back to the camera...
The sound was better than I expected too.... but only 35mins of recording time??? I think I need to get a refund. It said 2 hours so.....
But anyway, Alex was half an hour late on this one cause he was coming from another gig. Which meant I was in a rush to get back to the festival to watch Branford Marsalis!
I took a share bike (with a bass and cajon) to metro, then another share bike back home, dropped my stuff off and rode my bike to the festival. It was just a few blocks away so I caught most of the set.
Pretty amazing stuff. Just another level of musicians! I really want to know what the bass player is thinking. Does he know exactly what he's playing? Or is he just letting all of his skill sets go and acting on impulse. Or is it somewhere in between?
They did play a couple of "easier on the ear" type stuff. They played a Latin bolero thing, and also Sunny Side of the Street as slowish ballad. But when they go free.... it's just intense. Anyway, I got to learn more about that kinda stuff. And there's no better teacher that seeing it happen live right in front of you.
I also strolled over to watch some of the Gypsy Kings. I was struck by one of the solo guitar players was mixing it up between clasical finger style and 2 finger plucking like on a bass. And phenomenal! Such ease and speed. When I see this kinda stuff I know that I'm doing something wrong. It needs to be completely relaxed, and just repeated over and over until it just happens by itself. Easier said than done of course.
Looking forward to tomorrow and hoping to catch more artists and carry on with more inspiration.