Brazzil
Music
Press Release
October 2002
A festival presenting the music of the state of Louisiana side by side with that of the nation of Brazil, Jambalaya Jazz was created to establish permanent musical and cultural bridges between these two great musical cultures. The first ever “Jambalaya Jazz Festival” will take place from November 6 – 10, 2002 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. From samba and bossa nova to jazz and blues, perhaps no two other places have impacted the world’s music as significantly as Brazil and Louisiana.
Named for the spicy jambalaya, a typical Cajun dish that is a succulent mixture of rice, seafood, sausage and chicken, the festival will feature a sampler of bands from Louisiana playing jazz, zydeco, and blues to recreate the sensual atmosphere of Louisiana in Brazil. The festival was conceived of and organized by founder and director, Thomas Andre, a native of New Orleans, Louisiana who has also lived and worked in Brazil. This year’s headliners include jazz legend Alvin Batiste and bluesman Walter “Wolfman” Washington. Internationally-renowned Brazilian clarinetist-saxophonist-composer Paulo Moura will also headline the four-day festival. (See complete list of artists below.).
Culturally, Brazil and Louisiana have a lot in common. Both places are known for their unique melding of African, European and indigenous cultures. Jambalaya Jazz Founder Andre admits that the similarities between these two rich cultures are what convinced him that producing this festival was essential to furthering cultural ties between the two places, saying “It's no secret that the best music in the Americas - and in my opinion, the world –comes from the places which have the closest cultural ties to Africa like Brazil and Louisiana. With Jambalaya Jazz, we're bringing together styles and cultures that share similar roots, but developed in different ways. Then, of course, there are the other benefits: we're also uniting the two places that throw the best parties on earth." Rio de Janeiro needs no introduction. Beach after glorious beach radiate south from the historic center of the city. Chic neighborhoods such as Ipanema offer great restaurants, nightlife, and shopping, making Rio the perfect host for this festival..
Ticket and Travel information:.
Tickets for Jambalaya Jazz went on sale in Rio de Janeiro on October 15, 2002 at the venue box offices. Special travel packages with VIP advance tickets are available through Brazil Nuts tours at www.brazilnuts.com or 1-800-553-9959.
Jambalaya Jazz Festival Event Schedule:
November 7 – 10, 2002, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
· Wednesday, November 6
Welcome reception for guests and VIPs, Cais do Oriente, 7pm· Thursday, November 7
Jambalaya All-stars, Cais do Oriente, 7pm & 9:30pm featuring Kent Jordan and Paulo Moura with special guest Mauro Senise· Friday, November 8
Education Event: Master Classes at local schools, 9am to 4pm Alvin Batiste & Jazztronauts with special guest Leila Maria, Cais do Oriente, 7pm & 9:30pm Dance Party, featuring Sean Ardoin & Zydekool, New Birth Brass Band, Trio Nordestino & Mestre Ambrosio, Fundição Progresso, 11:00pm· Saturday, November 9
Walter "Wolfman" Washington & the Roadmasters with special guest Flavio Guimarães, Cais do Oriente, 8:30pm and 11pm· Sunday, November 10
Charity Blues Brunch featuring Walter “Wolfman” Washington and special guests, Hotel Sofitel, noon to 6pmFeatured Artists:
Alvin Batiste & Jazztronauts (Jazz Clarinetist & Bandleader) Alvin Batiste, New Orleans educator, jazz artist and composer, has performed and recorded with a multitude of jazz artists, including John Carter, David Murray and Jimmy Hamilton, as a part of The Clarinet Summit, which has recorded for both India Navigation and Black Saint Records. He has guest artists such as Rufus Reid, Kenny Barron, Herman Jackson and Wes Anderson appearing on ‘Late’, his own band’s album, presented in Sony Records’ Legendary Pioneers of Jazz Series.
He holds a Masters of Music in clarinet performance and composition from Louisiana State University, and a Bachelors degree from Southern University, and taught in the latter’s Jazz and Louisiana Music Institute from 1965 - 1989, returning in 1992. Batiste upgraded Institute programs to include the study of linkages of jazz, blues, gospel and diasporan (Cuban, Brazilian and South Louisiana and African) music. A roster of former students include Henry Butler, Herman Jackson, Branford Marsalis, Donald Harrison, Reginald Veal, Herlin Riley, Wes Anderson, and others, who have gone on to distinguish themselves with groups like the Basie and Ellington orchestras, and Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers.
Batiste’s also latest achievements include a first - the 1997 New Orleans Jazz Clarinet workshop, sponsored by the New Orleans Jazz National Historical Park and Evolution Hall production company. The workshop, features Batiste, along with Michael White, Victor Goines, Michael Pierce, and a host of the world’s finest New Orleans clarinetists.
Kent Jordan (Saxophonist & Co-Artistic Director, Jambalaya Jazz) The son of well-known and well-respected saxophonist Kidd Jordan and the older brother of outstanding trumpeter Marlon Jordan, Kent Jordan's is one of New Orleans’ most prominent jazz musicians. He studied at the Eastman School of Music and New Orleans' Center for the Creative Arts, being inspired at the latter by Ellis Marsalis (father of the famous Marsalis brothers – Wynton and Branford and a noted music educator and pianist) Jordan played and recorded with the groups Jasmine and the Improvisational Arts Quartet before cutting two critically acclaimed Columbia albums in 1984 and 1986. His third Columbia album (1988's Essence) is his strongest, revealing him to be a capable soloist and composer. Since then, Jordan has toured extensively with jazz drum legend Elvin Jones and contines to show the jazz world that he is one of the most creative musicians around.
Sean Ardoin and Zydekool (Zydeco Group) Sean Ardoin represents both the rural roots and progressive future of Louisiana's foot-stomping Creole-zydeco sound like no other artist. Sean's family is truly zydeco royalty: his great-great-uncle Amédé was the first south Louisiana Creole accordionist to record; his grandfather Bois-Sec has been one of the best-known practitioners of the state's rural Creole sound for six decades; his father Lawrence brought the family's sound to his generation; and Sean co-led the acclaimed zydeco outfit Double Clutchin' with his younger brother Chris.
From dancehalls to festival stages, Sean Ardoin & ZydeKool have made hundreds of national and international appearances on stage and on television including a recent performance on BET's top-rated "COMICVIEW" hot on the heels of their gig at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival.
The group was also nominated for "Best New Zydeco Band" by the Crescent City's OffBeat magazine. They tour nationally, playing every weekend they're home in dancehalls and clubs from New Orleans to Houston, regularly stopping off for high-profile gigs, such as; the New Orleans Swamp Festival and The Original Southwest Louisiana Zydeco Festival.
New Birth Brass Band (Traditional New Orleans Brass Band) Brass bands play the most popular home-grown music in the Big Easy. A mixture of drums, horns, funk and jazz, brass bands are nonstop excitement, energy, and action. They combine the improvisation and spontaneity of jazz with popular harmonies and fast rhythms that have audiences dancing until exhaustion, and wondering who is having more fun: the crowd or the band? The New Birth Brass Band is at the forefront of the recent New Orleans brass band renaissance. The band fuses hip-hop, Mardi Gras Indian chants, funk, and modern jazz with age old traditional sounds. Although all under 30, the members of New Birth are all jazz veterans and have played with everyone from Wynton Marsalis to Dizzy Gillespie.
The New Birth Brass Band has recently gained national acclaim with features on MTV and articles in several high profile national publications.
Walter "Wolfman" Washington (Blues Guitarist and Singer) Walter "Wolfman" Washington is a rare talent in the world of rhythm and blues. His soaring, deep soul vocals and funky, choked guitar sound are so immediately recognizable that he'd never be mistaken for anyone else. His late night sets at clubs such as New Orleans' Maple Leaf Bar are legendary.
Born in New Orleans in 1943, Walter began playing guitar at an early age. By the time he was a teenager, he was already touring the country and working with a host of important Blues figures like Eddie Bo, Johnny Adams, Lee Dorsey and Irma Thomas. By the late '70s, he had started to develop his own sound. Incorporating soul, funk, jazz, and blues with fluency and power he was soon touring the United States and Europe with his own band, The Roadmasters.
Walter Wolfman Washington & the Roadmasters produced several exciting albums in the 1990s: the Ray-Charles-influenced Sada on Pointblank in 1991, Blue Moon Rising, recorded in Europe with James Brown's horn section, the J.B. Horns (Maceo Parker, Pee Wee Ellis, and Fred Wesley) in 1994, and Funk Is in the House, a heady brew of furious funk and soul on Rounder's subsidiary label Bullseye in 1997.
The band's most recent album, On the Prowl, released in 2000 on Bullseye label, was greeted with high praise for its "fiery, skintight ensemble sound... an overall level of performance that places Wolfman at the top of the class as a contemporary urban blues guitarist and vocalist" (Living Blues Magazine).
Winners of two Offbeat Magazine "Best of the Beat Awards," including Best Blues Band 2000 and Best Blues Album 2000 "On the Prowl" Walter Wolfman Washington & the Roadmasters are one of the very best rhythm and blues bands working today. Burning up the stage wherever they go they never cease to amaze audiences with their blend of blues, soul, gospel, and funk.
Paulo Moura (Brazilian Music Clarinetist & Co-Artistic Director, Jambalaya Jazz) Paulo Moura grew up among melodies and rhythms. He learned notes before he learned words, as they flowed through his home in São José do Rio Preto, in the interior of São Paulo. The youngest of ten brothers, Paulo waited twelve years before joining his father - the head of the military band in that small town - and his siblings as they entertained at dances and parties in the clubs of the local black community. His instruments: clarinet and alto saxophone.
After that, he studied at music schools and at age 19 was featured as a soloist at the Brazilian Symphony Orchestra, performing Weber's "Concertino" on the clarinet. From the origins of black music in rural São Paulo State to the popular music in the suburbs of Rio to the orquestras on national radio, he records and plays with Brazilian and international musicians on the musical vanguard, and has been the clarinetist for the Municipal Theater Orquestra in Rio de Janeiro - the first black artist to achieve that position. He delves in symphonies, operas, ballets and concerts in the evenings, while late at night he applies his technique and imagination to jam sessions, arrangements and experiences with bossa nova.
In 1988, he led the Brazilian Symphony Orquestra at the National Theater in Brasília with his piece "Urban Fantasy for Popular Percussion," specially written in commemoration of the one-hundredth anniversary of the freeing of the slaves in Brazil. In 1992, the Brazilian press chose Paulo as the best classical instrumentalist for his solo performance with the Chamber Orchestra of Moscow at the Mozart Festival. He has recorded over 20 albums, available in Brazil and abroad. In the coming months he will launch K-Ximblues, with special guest Mauricio Eihorn, in a mixture of blues and choro, a path which links African roots with Brazilian and American popular music.
Mauro Senise (Brazilian Music Saxophonist and Flautist) Mauro Senise started to study music rather late in his life at the age of 20. He had Odette Ernst Dias as his teacher of classical flute and Paulo Moura taught him to play the saxophone. He quickly became a busy sideman for popular music artists, participating in several recordings and performances. As an instrumental musician, he worked with most important artists in Brazil, like Wagner Tiso, Hermeto Pascoal, and Egberto Gismonti. In 1981, along with Robertinho Silva, Zeca Assumpção, and André Dequech, he founded the group Alquimia. Senise has played many times in Europe and the United States. He recorded his first solo album only in 1988, Mauro Senise, and has recorded several other albums since then, in some of them having the company of such musicians as Romero Lubambo, Gilson Peranzzetta, and Raul Mascarenhas. In 2001, he participated in two important jazz festivals in Brazil, the Chivas Jazz Festival and the Free Jazz Festival (performing in the latter in the exciting Moacir Santos tribute). He has also been a member of the instrumental group Cama de Gato since its formation in 1982. Also a classical musician, Senise developed work with Rosana Lanzelotte (clavier) and David Chew (cello).
For more info visit www.jambalayajazz.com for more information.