Sept./Oct. 2011: Basel/Bulgaria/Brazil

Yes, it’s been hella long since I put one of these up. My latest travels were split up into two parts over the course of a month.

Switzerland and Bulgaria

I flew into Zurich on Sept. 16th to visit my Tapmotif friend Anabel Felix and to play at her Basel Tap Jam. This was my first trip to Switzerland, and I have to say Switzerland totally rocks. I had two very strong artistic revelations on this trip. The first was in Zurich at the Fraumünster church, home of the famous stained glass windows designed by Marc Chagall. It’s always revelatory to feel the power of great art; suffice to say I could have stayed and stared up at those windows all day, or probably for several days on end. The designs and the way Chagall used color were mesmerizing. My second revelation, also in a church, was in Basel where I spent the day being shown around the city by Kay, Anabel’s boyfriend. We wandered into an organ concert in an old Baroque church; the effect was overpowering, to say the least. I had heard plenty of organ music before, but never ‘in context’. To hear that music (in this case a piece by César Franck) played on a beautiful instrument in the reverb-filled spaces of that type of church, well, it all made sense. It was rock and roll, it was revelatory, it was incredible. Again, I could have stayed all day listening, but we had other fish to fry, namely, the Basel Tap Jam that was happening that night.

Anabel, who I met at Tapmotif in Greece in 2010, was inspired by her experiences there to start a tap jam of her own. She found some exceptional young musicians to play at the jam, and has been hosting it for over a year now. Held in the very hip bar of the Hotel Stücki, Anabel’s jam is a lot of fun. I had a great time playing with the dancers who attended, and jamming with the house band. These young guys are badass, and play together as a unit like few their age. Anabel has succeeded in taking tap one step farther in Switzerland. I look forward to the next time I can be part of the jam. Thanks for having me Anabel and Kay!

With Anabel and Kay at the Basel Tap Jam

The next morning we drove a few kilometers across the border to Germany, to hear Anabel’s father Michael Felix play in the Bad Säckingen Cathedral for Sunday mass. Quite a renowned organist, Michael also helped with the design and rebuilding of the cathedral’s organ. After the service he took me inside the three-story instrument to show me the construction of the organ.

Michael Felix and the Bad Säckingen Cathedral organ

We then played a few pieces together, with me on tenor and then soprano sax for Schubert’s ‘Ave Maria’. Playing with Michael was such a new challenge for me, and it got me thinking about doing a concert of music for organ and soprano…

I was soon off to Sofia, Bulgaria, for a week-long tour put together by NYC-based Bulgarian bassist Trifon Dimitrov, and sponsored by the US Embassy in Sofia. Having played with Trifon in NY, I knew how good he was, but I was not prepared for how good the rest of the group would be. Drummer Dimitar Dimitrov and trumpeter Ventzi Blagoev just blew me away. We played six straight days, driving over about half of the country, and every gig was better than the last. I just cannot say enough about these musicians and the fire they lit under the music every day; it was an honor to play with them. Click here to listen to our version of my original “Lucid Dreaming”.

We started out in the city of Plovdiv, at Club Alcohol. I marveled at how apropos the name of this club was considering my sometime touring habits. Hmmm…I know there’s a message in there somewhere…

Beautiful Plovdiv is one of the oldest cities in Europe, boasting both ancient Roman amphitheaters and ancient Mosques. Trifon did a surprisingly good imitation of a Roman emperor giving the thumbs down at an amphitheater excavation site just down the street from Club Alcohol.

Trifon the Mighty in Plovdiv

Our next gig was in Bulgaria’s capitol city Sofia, at Studio 5. The morning after we appeared on Bulgarian national TV, on a morning show connected with that day’s celebration of Bulgarian Independence. The episode we taped is here; we’re on at the end, so you may have to scroll ahead a ways, which can be a bit slow on the program’s website.

After a concert on national radio that evening we went to hang at Ventzi’s regular gig, which was a lot of fun. While there we met Vasko Krupkata, a very famous blues and rock musician in Bulgaria. Vasko invited Trifon and I back to his place after the gig to hang and drink rakia. He and his family were cool peeps, and we had a great time talking music.

Hangin' in Sofia with Vasko & friends

The next day we were off to play at the Haskovo Jazz Festival, and the day after that at Melon Live Music Club in Veliko Tarnovo.

Veliko Tarnovo seen from Tsarevets Castle

Veliko Tarnovo is one of the most beautiful cities I’ve seen; for me it rivals even the Cidade Maravilhosa (‘Marvelous City’), Rio de Janeiro…

Brazil

Which brings me to…Rio! After flying back to NYC for a couple of days, I headed out with Max Pollak to play at the awesomely awesome (and huge) festival Rock in Rio, on the Rock Street stage. Made up of two city blocks of façade built to resemble the French Quarter in New Orleans, Rock Street featured a variety of jazz, world, rock and blues acts. Our buddy Bruce Henry, bassist and vocalist and resident of Rio for many years, hooked us up with the gig. Funny thing about that…Max and I were getting ready to board the plane for Rio at JFK. I turned to him and asked, “Are we getting picked up at the airport in Rio?” Max replied, “I don’t think so.” “Did you talk to Bruce about it?”, I asked. “No”, he responded. “Me either. Do you know what hotel we’re staying in?” “No”. Neither did I. Now that’s how you kick off a tour, you digg! As it turned out we were put up in a killer hotel in Barra da Tijuca. After spending half a day acclimating to the festival, Max and I started working the afternoon of Sept. 30th. We spent the next three days alternating sets with the other acts on Rock Street, hanging backstage and checking out the mainstage acts.

ROCK IN RIO!

On the Rock Street stage, we checked out Scott Feiner’s Pandeiro Jazz, met Brazilian percussion legends Laudir de Oliveira and Marco Suzano, and sat in with Bruce Henry’s band. We also had a great time meeting, hearing and hanging with Saxofonia, Rock Family, Al Pratt, and the River Country Trio. On the festival mainstage, Janelle Monae was a standout…super funky band, a very entertaining and high-energy show.

After a couple of days off in Rio we took the bus to São Jose dos Campos to teach a three day workshop in RumbaTap at the CBS Dance Factory. I’ve done these workshops before with Max, and I’m always impressed at how hard he works when teaching, and how clearly he’s able to break down his performance methods into bite-sized pieces. It’s truly incredible to watch this man work! The students were a great group, very motivated and very open to what Max was showing them. Thanks to everyone there, and to Adriana Brunato for bringing us to SJC!

After busing it back to Rio, Max and I prepared for our final gigs in Brazil: two shows at the SESC Theater in Copacabana. The SESC theaters in Brazil are a kind of municipal venue found in various locales, often very well run and with great equipment. In Copacabana, the SESC is a beautiful theater in the round. Our shows were in tandem with Bruce Henry and tap dancer Steven Harper, in a collaboration called Double Duo. Bruce and Steven, much like Max and I, have been performing together as a duo for years, so it was a natural fit for the four of us to do a show. The day before our first show we all went up to the favela Santa Marta. Steven, who works with the kids of Santa Marta, thought it would be great for Max and I to be part of the Dia das Crianças (Childrens’ Day) festivities being held in the favela. And it was! We got up and broke out in a funk jam that included young beatboxer Gabriel.

The shows in Copacabana were, well, elevating. Bruce and Steven really threw down, and Max and I brought our best to these concerts. I’m always knocked out at how responsive Brazilian audiences are, and these concerts were no exception. The four of us are already plotting our next Double Duo shows…

June/July 2010: Greece & Slovenia

Things have finally slowed down enough for me to be able to get this post together. A lot has happened in the last couple of months!

First stop:

GREECE!

Getting ready to roll out for the Lefkada parade; photo by Vicky Annand

Well, my first trip to Greece was life-altering. I compare it to the first time I went to Brazil in 1998. The music, the people, the food, the landscape…they all blew me away on so many levels.

I went to Greece as a Guest Artist with TapMotif, a 10-day music & dance workshop on the island of Lefkada put together by Thanos Daskalopoulos. The participants came from all over the globe: Finland, Israel, Greece, Great Britain, Germany, Latvia, France, Austria, Canada, Switzerland, and the U.S. were all represented. We flew into Athens, met up in front of the Sofitel Hotel across the street from the airport, and piled onto a bus for the 6-hour ride to Lefkada in the western part of Greece. Thus the hanging began right away, and thus the genius of the TapMotif concept was immediately apparent: unlike any other educational environment I’ve been in, TapMotif offers its participants an unprecedented level of access to the artists. Right from the drop, the faculty and student participants were interacting in a friendly, very social and very nonacademic environment. We stayed in the same hotels together, ate all our meals together, rode the bus to and from classes and other events together. Basically it was a huge, neverending hang. As a teaching artist, I felt there were very few traditional student/teacher boundaries; participants and faculty alike were all ‘TapMotifians’, all part of a shared experience aimed at elevating everyone, with a deep sense of community. You might think that as a teacher one would need some time off, but at no time did I feel overwhelmed by the experience, or that I was unable respond to questions posed by the students. It was all very natural and the ‘classroom’ was anywhere we were, be it at the school where classes took place, at the breakfast table on the beautiful hotel veranda, at the beach, on the bus, or at the nightly jam sessions.

This level of student/teacher interaction and of music/dance integration is very rare, and I would recommend contacting Thanos at the TapMotif website if you are interested in participating next year. The faculty included Max Pollak, Heather Cornell, Petros Klampanis and Spyros Manesis, and master Greek percussionist Petros Kourtis.

The school where TapMotif classes were held in Lefkada

TapMotif finished with a flourish: a concert performance featuring two large music/dance projects put together by the participants as well as various smaller lineups of students and faculty performing individually and together. To promote the event in the town of Lefkada we staged an impromptu parade the day before the concert. Petros Kourtis held down the beat on the davouli (Greek bass drum) while yours truly played sax and flute in conjunction with Magda Giannikou, Petros Klampanis, and Spyros on percussion.

Petros Kourtis, Petros Klampanis, Magda, and Spyros

Here’s some video of the parade, filmed by TapMotifian Vicky Annand:

The concert itself, called Bridges in Time, was staged in a beautiful little open-air theater in the center of Lefkada town, and was an incredible summation of the TapMotif ethos. Many thanks Thanos!

Bridges in Time TapMotif Concert; photo by Anabel Felix

SLOVENIA

I knew my 10 days in Greece would be impossible to compare anything else to, so I looked forward to my trip to Slovenia with brand new eyes. Put together by my good friend and City College of New York classmate, drummer Gasper Bertoncelj, the Legendary Slovenian Tour of 2010 commenced soon after I flew from Athens into Ljubljana, the capital city of Slovenia. The band included Slovenians Jure Pukl on alto saxophone and Nikola Matosic on bass, and American pianist Joe Kaplowitz, who lives in Croatia. Every one of these musicians can really play, and it was a pleasure performing with them. The day after I arrived we rehearsed in a Cold War-Era bomb shelter in Ljubljana now converted into a rehearsal space:

Tha Bomb Shelter

The next day we were off to the city of Koper on the Adriatic Sea, where we performed at the Baladoor Jazz Festival.

The show was a lot of fun, and we hung late that night; I indulged in a couple of great local beers, Union (Gasper’s favorite) and Laško. Slovenians are no slouches when it comes to hanging out, as you can see in this photo:

Jure and Nikola discuss the state of Slovenian jazz

The day after Koper we peeled ourselves off the motel room floor and drove back to Ljubljana for a pre-World Cup Final gig at Sax Pub, a unique venue run by a great patron of the arts, Ljubo.

Photo by Iztok Repovž

After a couple of days off we next performed at Club Gajo in Ljubljana, this time as an organ quartet with Joe, Jure, Gasper and myself. While in Ljubljana some of us stayed at the apartment of Nikola’s father. The place has hosted so many musicians over the years that the jazz community there calls it the ‘Jazz Hotel’. It was very comfortable. Thanks Nikola!!! We then drove up to Bled, a beautiful lake town in the southern Alps, to play at Festival Bled with the full quintet. This gig was in an incredible setting: a former villa of Tito, the long-term head of state of the former Yugoslavia. The villa overlooks the lake and Bled Island, which includes the beautiful Assumption of Mary Pilgrimage Church.

Special Thanks to Gasper for putting all of this together!

UPCOMING

There’s some good stuff coming up:

August 11th at 7PM: Rumbatap will be performing in Weehawken, NJ as part of the Hudson Riverfront Summer Concert Series.

Wednesday August 18th: Paul Carlon & Los Américas at Chris’ Jazz Cafe in Philadelphia
We’ll be rolling into Philly for a quintet version of the group, w/Max Pollak. Sets at 8 & 9:45 PM.

Wednesday September 15th: Paul Carlon & Los Américas at Miles’ Cafe in New York City
Our first NYC show in a while; 7:30-10 pm

Oct. 4-11: The McCarron Brothers Way Down in Honolulu Tour
This is the first time I’ll be bringing a group to Hawaii; we are mega-psyched for this one!

Check my website for details on these and other upcoming events.

Upcoming Events in NYC, Greece, Slovenia…and beyond

Well it’s been quite a while since I’ve posted anything here. Some of that time was filled with a whole lotta nothin’, but things have picked up considerably in the last three months or so. Here’s a peek at what’s coming up for the Summer of 2010:

THE PAUL CARLON OCTET RIDES AGAIN: SAMBA DO MAR LIVE!

This coming Tuesday, May 25th, I’ll be playing with the good ‘ol Octet at S.O.B.’s in Manhattan. Yeah, I know I just got done explaining our name change and all, but there’s a backstory to this one:  A coupla years ago my friend Hiroshi approached me about putting out an Octet track on a compilation disc his record label, Mar Creations, was going to release in Japan. Of course I said HELL YEAH!!!  Fast forward to last summer; Hiroshi had decided on the song Clave 66 from our first CD, Other Tongues, and was ready to release the compilation, to be called Samba do Mar. Fast forward some more, to the advent of the name change to Los Américas, and then some more to Hiroshi nailing down a date to do a live show including three NYC-based acts from the Samba do Mar disc. It just made sense to bill the group under the name that appears on the CD, the Paul Carlon Octet, even though we’re not using that moniker any more.  It also made sense, in an old skool way, to do a gig with an Octet that was just that: eight people, not nine, not ten, but eight. ¡Voila!  Samba do Mar Live! will also present vocalist Catarina dos Santos and guitarist George Petit with his band GP5.  My group will be playing some brand new material as well as some golden oldies. Check it out!

The Paul Carlon Octet at S.O.B.’s/Samba do Mar Live!
05/25/10 | 7:30 to 11:15 PM
New York, NY

7:30 PM: Nanny Assis & Arthur Lipner (Brazilian music)
8:30 PM: Catarina dos Santos (World Music)
9:30 PM: GP5 (Jazz)
10:30 PM: The Paul Carlon Octet
with:
William “Beaver” Bausch: drumset
Dave Ambrosio: bass
John Stenger: piano
Anton Denner: alto sax & flute
Dave Smith: trumpet
Ryan Keberle and Mike Fahie: trombones

Tickets ($15-advance/$20-door) are available at here
Inquiries: Hiroshi Kono (Mar Creation Records) at contact@marcreation.net or 917-400-9362

GREECE & SLOVENIA

In June/July I’ll be traveling to the island of Lefkada, Greece to take part in an incredible and unique combination workshop/festival, TapMotif. I’ll be a guest artist at TapMotif, meaning I’ll be playing for the workshops every day and interacting with an amazing collection of musicians and dancers from around the world. Percussionist and bandleader Cyro Baptista has just confirmed his participation in TapMotif, and my runnin’ pardner Max Pollak will also be there, so it’s bound to be something unprecedented. Spaces are still available for student participants, so if you’re interested in learning more, check out this year’s program.

After Greece I’ll be flying to Slovenia in Central Europe for nine days of gigs with my buddy Gasper Bertoncelj’s quartet and quintet. I met Gasper, a great drummer and all around musician, when I was at the City College of New York. He recently moved to Isreal with his girlfriend so we’ll be linking up in Ljubljana to kick off the tour.

AND BEYOND
There’s a lot in the works for this fall, though none of it is much confirmed yet. I’m putting together another trip to Hawaii, most likely in early October, and am planning on bringing the McCarron Brothers with me. We just finished recording material for our 2nd CD, and we’re pretty psyched about the results. Grupo los Santos will also be recording within the next few months; we’ve been working up a whole mess ‘o new material and can’t wait to get into the recording studio. And I’ll be starting to develop material for the next Los Américas recording over this summer and fall; I’ve got a whole new concept in mind for what this process will be like, and I’ll have some news on that front very soon.

Mahalo my friends!
– Paul

Mutant Road Warriors: Travels in the ’09 Nov. 7 – Dec. 10

Autumn 2009 was filled with various road trips large and small. I kicked it off with some Wheelin’ and Dealin’ in Honolulu in October.  November found me getting ready to roll up to Boston with Max Pollak for Voices and Bodies at Springstep in Medford. The shoestring budget travel options for this trip were: Fung Wah, Mega or Bolt buses. Oh yeah!!! Which leads to a story.

Fung Wah Baby!

The last time I’d ridden Fung Wah was in 2005, when I was on my way to Philadelphia. Back in the day you got on the buses on Forsyth St., practically underneath the Manhattan Bridge. The bus driver for this little excursion must have been watching a lot of Dukes of Hazzard reruns. Not very far onto the NJ Turnpike, he accidentally took a wrong lane onto an exit ramp; rather than continuing on down the road and then figuring out how to get back on the turnpike like anyone else, he drove over the highway divider in his big ‘ol bus. Just thunked right over that thing and got back on the highway. About twenty minutes later he pulled the bus off onto the side of the road and got out without saying a word.  A few minutes later he got back on and the trip continued. In half an hour this routine was repeated, but I was ready for him. I followed him off the bus and around to the back to see what he was up to. He pulled a gallon jug of water out of the storage underneath the bus, opened up the engine casing and began pouring water into the radiator. When I asked him what was going on he replied in broken English that the radiator had a hole in it. I looked down into the radiator and saw by the water coming out of it in a trickle that this was clearly true. The best part about it was that the guy had several gallon jugs at the ready as if this happened all the time, and he acted like this whole scene was the most normal thing in the world. By the time we got to Philly we’d made four or five more unscheduled stops and were an hour and a half late. The passengers were in an ugly mood and seemed ready to mutiny. Some tried to get their money back, but the adamant Chinese lady in the Philadelphia office wasn’t having any of it. Words were spoken, the police were called, and I made my exit from Fung Wah, I thought forever.

Never Say Never

I’d say I definitely got my money’s worth in entertainment value for that $10 bus ride to Philly, but as you can imagine I wasn’t eager to click the ‘take the Fung Wah bus’ box on my way to Boston this past November. But Max had already bought his tickets and it seemed best to travel together, so I clicked that box and got ready for adventure. I have to say I was somewhat disappointed that the trip came off without a hitch.

But I digress!; the performance with Max was part of a very cool night including body percussionists extraordinaire Keith Terry and Evie Laden and the amazing Voices duo of Philip Hamilton and beatboxer Kenny Muhammad.

This was a really fun night to be a part of; we had a great time hanging at the show with the other performers, and afterwards with program director Isabel Fine and her family. Thanks for everything Isabel!

Way Down in Hudson

A week later I was in Hudson, NY with the McCarron Brothers for a night at the Hudson Opera House. Though the ride to Hudson was uneventful and I have no travel stories to relate about this one, the gig was phenomenal, we had a great turnout, and the McCarron Bros. made a big impression on our first out-of-town gig. We should have some video edited soon from the show, so stay tuned!

photo by Francois J. Bourdrez

Nor’Easters

After Hudson it was back to NYC for a couple of weeks and then I hit the road again for the Grupo los Santos Nor’ Easter Tour.  The first gig of the trip was in Albany at the Dublin Underground:

Oh, I’m sorry, did I say the Dublin Underground? Apparently the management hasn’t yet had time to change the signage out front, though if you click on their link you’ll see they’ve photoshopped the new name onto a jpeg. I wasn’t exactly filled with warm anticipation about this gig after rolling up to a place that didn’t seem to exist yet, but I have to say I was completely wrong to judge the Savannah Underground on its outside appearances. This joint rocks! If you’re a fan of draft beer the Something-Something Underground is worth taking a detour for. The bar has nearly fifty beers on tap, including some wicked microbrews.

The place also has a great little stage area in back, with cocktail table seating and a wacky lighting setup. Los Santos had a surprisingly great turnout for this gig. Local jazz and latin jazz networkers AlbanyJazz.com and Jose Cruz helped us enormously with getting out the crowd. We debuted our group batá skills on this one, with Dave leading on the Iyá drum and yours truly singing a chant to Elegua:

photos by Andrzej Pilarczyk

After some motel shenanigans later that night inspired by Hammer of the Gods, it was off to Lenox, MA the next day for a concert at Kimball Farms retirement community. Drummer Matt Garrity, a good friend of the band’s, was on his way back to NY from Boston that day and met us in Lenox for what turned out to be a night of serious hanging. Sometimes it takes a road trip to have time to catch up with friends.

Fifty Miles from Canada

The next day the Nor-Easter Tour lived up to its billing as we drove into a snowstorm in Northern Vermont for a benefit concert at the Elks Lodge in St. Johnsbury.  Held for Dennis Myrick, a local resident fighting ALS (Lou Gehrig’s Disease), the concert was a poignant way to end the Nor’Easter Tour.  Best of luck to you, Dennis, and Best Wishes as well to all the folks I had the privilege of playing for in 2009. Here’s to a fantastic 2010!

PAUL CARLON & LOS AMÉRICAS

The Age of Exploration brought people from various distant cultures to the New World of las Américas, some by choice, some by force, some out of desperation. The musical results of this social fusion have since spread around the globe, inspiring innovation and genre-melding. The blues, rumba, maracatu, jazz, cumbia… all of these styles and more grew up in the fertile soil of las Américas, tied together by the influence of West African cultures such as the Yoruba. In Afro-Cuban chants, in the Afro Sambas of Baden Powell, and in the mythology of the Mississippi Delta, the orishas (deities) of African origin have made their presence felt and respected.

Transposing geography to the stage in the form of a band, Los Américas is made up of musicians from Canada down to the Caribbean, conjuring a parallel on-stage universe where Duke Ellington performs with Cuban timba godfathers los Van Van, and where Brazilian Maracatu powerhouse NaçÂo Estrela Brilhante accompanies blues legend Robert Johnson. Los Américas offers a sonic slideshow of variations on the theme of “who is American?”, striving to showcase the entire expanse of the Americas — North and South. The mind of a scholar will appreciate the intricate complexities of the musical arrangements, the body of a dancer will embrace the rhythmic impulse to move freely, and the soul of a traveler will bond to the familiar soundscapes that oscillate between various cultures.

The brainchild of saxophonist/composer Paul Carlon, Los Américas has grown out of Paul’s Octet, a group that established itself performing primarily Paul’s original compositions as well as arrangements of traditional songs and music by artists such as Billy Strayhorn and Baden Powell. Los Américas will continue in the same spirit as the Octet, taking as its jumping-off point the desire to mix orchestral jazz with styles from all over the hemisphere. How many Americas can you imagine?

Band Personnel and Instrumentation:

Paul Carlon–Tenor Sax, Flute, and Mbira

Anton Denner–Alto Sax and Flute

Dave Smith–Trumpet

Ryan Keberle–Trombone

Mike Fahie–Trombone

John Stenger–Piano

Edward Perez –Bass

William “Beaver” Bausch—Drumset

Max Pollak–Rumbatap

Christelle Durandy–Vocals

The Los Américas Family

The following are members of the extended network of musicians drawn upon for Los Americas worldwide:

Dave Ambrosio

Dave Hertzberg

Nicki Denner

John DiMartino

Matt Pavolka

Felix Sanabria

Mark Miller

Noah Bless

Jose Davila

Dana Leong

Alex Norris

Greg Glassman

Tatum Greenblatt

Joe Magnarelli

Erica von Kleist

Pete Smith

Buddy Terry

Ileana Santamaría

Sofia Tosello

DeShannon Higa

George Young

Curtis Abe

Brien Matson

Robert Shinoda

Dean Taba

Darryl Pellegrini

Sandy Tsukiyama

Santino Sgambelluri

Enrique Zender

The Paul Carlon Octet: So the Story Goes…(A Not-So-Brief History and Bio)

How it all began

In the Spring of 2002 I was approached by visual artist Joan Carlon (aka my mom) regarding writing some music as a kind of accompaniment to Where is Home?, a visual art project she had been developing. The project revolved around the themes of immigration and the way it disrupts, reshapes and redirects the lives of people who come to the United States from all over the world. I put together a group, somewhat randomly I have to admit in terms of instrumentation, and recorded the Where is Home? suite in May 2002. The Spirit Calls is one of the movements from the suite. The recording was intended to be played during the exhibition of Where is Home? Over the next couple of years, the project grew into a multimedia performance piece featuring the Octet, Rumbatap dancer/body percussionist Max Pollak, and an installation of tapestries hung onstage around the band. The tapestries, made from long strips of clear vinyl, were painted with testimonials my mother had collected from various immigrants in the Syracuse, NY area describing their experiences, either in leaving their home countries or in adjusting to their new lives in America. Here’s a couple of examples:

We (the Ocet + Max, with the installation) performed an extended version of Where Is Home? in 2003-2004 at Small’s jazz club and El Taller Latinoamericano in NYC, and at the Delavan Center in Syracuse, NY. As Where is Home? was being developed as a performance piece the Octet also began playing on its own in club and concert settings in New York City. For some time I had been thinking about writing for a group larger than the quartets and quintets I’d primarily been composing for, so once the ball got rolling with the Octet it just seemed to pick up steam.

The Plot Thickens

My early writing for the band involved a combination of original pieces and adaptations of things I’d written for smaller lineups like Grupo los Santos. Over time I moved towards performing material written exclusively for the Octet. I like to include arrangements of other composer’s music as well when something really grabs me, though if we cover another artist’s material I try to reinvent it to give it our own sabor. For the first couple of years of the group’s existence it was more of a side project for me as I went through the process of working different musicians into the group and trying different musical ideas out for the Octet format. I’d been heavily involved in Afro-Cuban and Brazilian music and salsa since the formation of Grupo los Santos in 1998, so those influences were always there in the kind of material I was putting in front of the group. The Cuban influence was present as well in the two-trombone lineup I employed and in the heavy use of the flute. In 2005 I added vocalist Ileana Santamaría to the group as a special guest. Ileana, daughter of the legendary Cuban percussionist Mongo Santamaría, had been putting together her own group, a timba-influenced, high-energy Latin band that I had the privilege of working with as musical director and saxophonist.

First Recording and Tours

Ileana is a featured guest on the Octet’s 2006 debut CD, Other Tongues, along with my longtime creative collaborator, Max Pollak, and one of my mentors on the tenor saxophone, jazz veteran Buddy Terry. The regular Octet lineup by this time was Dave Ambrosio on acoustic bass, William “Beaver” Bausch on drumset, pianist John Stenger, trombonists Mike Fahie and Ryan Keberle, alto saxophonist/flautist Anton Denner, and trumpeter Dave Smith. The CD was recorded and mixed by a good friend of mine who also happens to be an incredible sound engineer, George Petit. The majority of the songs on this recording are originals; listen to Extraordinary Rendition for a taste of what the band was doing. The only exception to the all-originals format was Billy Strayhorn’s “Smada”, which I reimagined as a combination Cuban danzón/Colombian porro.

Artwork by Meg Carlon

In conjunction with the release of Other Tongues, we traveled to Hudson, NY and the Hudson Opera House to play our first show outside of New York since performing Where Is Home? in Syracuse in 2004.

The PC Octet featuring Ileana Santamaria at the Hudson Opera House in 2006; photo by Tina Chaden

The HOH has been our home-away-from-home ever since. Less than a year later, we were on the road again, performing in Boston and in several central New York venues. By this time Ileana had left the band, to be replaced with Afro-Caribbean vocalist Christelle Durandy. Christelle brought to the group a familiarity with Cuban rumba and the tradition of improvising coros as well as a deep knowledge of Afro-Cuban Orisha chants and an extremely honed musicality. Her instincts onstage are right on the money and she has a natural charisma and energy. Bassist Edward Perez also became a regular in the group during this time. Over the next couple of years, the group traveled and gigged together, working up material for our next recording, and developing an extraordinary cohesion and group identity. We performed in upstate and central New York, Boston, and Vermont, including gigs at Cornell University, Hunter College in NYC, and at Mohawk Valley Community College in Utica, NY. These experiences of playing live in front of a variety of audiences, and of traveling together, have been formative ones for the band’s creative core and performance style.

Elliot Spitzer’s Good Works

We’re all aware of how his tenure as governor of New York State came to an end, but I’ll bet you didn’t know this about Elliot Spitzer: without him my Octet’s second CD would not have happened when it did, nor would it have been recorded as well. While he was the Attorney General of the State of New York, Spitzer brought a payola suit against several large music companies; the subsequent settlement payments were used to create the New York State Music Fund, a granting resource used to “benefit the residents of New York State through music education and appreciation programs.” Through the grant-writing efforts of Lesley Tillotson and the Central New York Council for the Arts, my Octet received a generous grant from the NY State Music Fund in support of the Sabor Latino project, which presented a week’s worth of performances in the Utica school districts with my original compositions used as units of study by the program’s teaching artists. Go Elliot!!! The income from the school gigs helped to fund my Octet’s second recording in NYC, and the mixing sessions in Brazil. Say what??? That’s right, Brazil. Remember my good friend and incredible sound engineer George Petit? Well, I brought George in to record our second CD. George arranged for the Octet to record at New York City’s Legacy Studios, one of the finest live rooms in the states. It turns out George was also developing a relationship with Na Cena Studios in São Paulo, Brazil which included him flying down from time to time for recording sessions. George hooked up an amazing deal for mixing time, and I had the necessary grant funds to pay for the deal and an excuse to go to Brazil again. Add Max Pollak’s network to the mix, and voilá! — we had not only mix sessions for the already-tracked Octet tunes, but recording sessions in Brazil for myself and Max to collaborate on a couple of new tracks, and Pollak/Carlon dance/music workshops in Fortaleza and Rio. Gotta love it when the stars align!

Artwork by Meg Carlon

Roots Propaganda

Thus was born our second CD, Roots Propaganda. This album featured Christelle and Max as special guests, and included a few more covers than the first one; songs by Baden Powell, Skip James, and Jimmie Cox made the cut, as well as a couple of traditional Yoruban chants. The rumba-driven Backstory features solos from Edward, Ryan, and Dave Smith, as well as a soulful vocal from Christelle. Launched in August 2008, we had a great run with Roots Propaganda; it garnered stellar reviews as well as airplay around the country, including on NPR’s Morning Edition and All Things Considered. In August we played one of our biggest shows to date, as guests of Max Pollak’s Rumbatap at Summerstage in New York’s Central Park. In October we toured again, this time hitting Springstep in Medford, MA; the Vermont Arts Exchange in North Bennington, VT; and the Hudson Opera House in Hudson, NY.

And to top it off, on election night 2008, my sister called me to tell me she’d heard Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out, from Roots Propaganda, being played on NPR as an interlude between interviews with voters leaving the polls.

Recent Happenings: Hawaii and Japan

More recently I’ve been writing material for the Octet’s next recording. I’m mulling over several ideas for themes for the project; actually there’s at least three different CDs I can see myself wanting to record: the first is a Billy Strayhorn tribute record, the second a tribute to Baden Powell, and the third involves music based on experiences my father had as a U.S. Marine fighting in the Korean War. A fourth idea would combine some elements of all of these as well as other new music I’m working on, which would make it more like the Octet’s first two releases. I’m open to suggestions on this, so feel free to comment below!

Most recently I took the Octet book with me to Oahu and for the first time played an Octet gig without my New York regulars. On October 14th, 2009, the Honolulu edition of the Paul Carlon Octet took the stage at Gordon Biersch beneath the Aloha Tower, and in a beautiful setting right on the water we shared some New York Afro-Latin sounds with an amazing and appreciative Hawaiian audience. Click here to go to my blog about the Hawaii trip.

And hot off the presses is this news: Clave 66, a track from Other Tongues, will be included on a Japanese compilation CD called Samba do Mar, to be released by Mar Creation in the fall of 2009.

The Paul Carlon Octet: Personnel

Though various musicians have performed with the group, I’ve been extremely fortunate in maintaining a stable lineup of some of New York’s finest jazz musicians for the last four or five years. Drummer William “Beaver” Bausch and trumpeter Dave Smith are both founding members, holdovers from the original Where is Home? suite recording. The rest of the Octet’s current lineup includes pianist John Stenger, bassist Edward Perez, trombonists Mike Fahie and Ryan Keberle, alto saxophonist/flautist Anton Denner, and vocalist Christelle Durandy.

Artwork by Meg Carlon

Our next show: This Thursday October 29th at Drom in NYC as part of The Deep End!

Wheelin’ and Dealin’ in Honolulu/Oct. 4-16, 2009

Get Me to The Gig On Time

I arrived in Honolulu on Sunday Oct. 4th and played a gig on the North Shore of Oahu that night. But there’s a story behind that; I played a wedding gig in TriBeCa, NYC, on Saturday night Oct. 3rd. So that’s a Saturday night gig in NYC, Sunday night gig in Hawaii. Call me crazy, but it don’t do to turn down money gigs these days. I got out of the wedding Saturday at around 10 pm, was home at 11:30, slept barely at all and left the house at around 4 AM for the ride to Newark Aiport, where I caught my 6:45 AM flight to Honolulu via Houston. I arrived in Honolulu at 12:50 pm on Sunday, was picked up by my buddy Enrique Zender, and chilled for an hour or so before leaving to drive to Banzai Sushi on the North Shore for a duo gig.

The payoff was worth it; the North Shore of Oahu is an idyllic, laid-back surfer’s paradise:

Caterpillar Rolls at Banzai Sushi

Monday I spent mostly recovering. By Tuesday I was back in the game, playing at Jazz Minds in Honolulu with the Gilbert Batangan Trio. Gilbert’s a fine Honolulu guitarist I met on my last Hawaii trip. And Jazz Minds is a classically funky jazz den. Run by Ms. Young (whom everyone calls Mama), the club has a lounge feel and is populated by a great mix of young & old, tourists & jazz crazies. Just to give you an idea, the last time I was there some guy tried to sell me a pizza out of the trunk of his car in the parking lot behind Jazz Minds.

Wheelin’ and Dealin’

The rest of the week was a combination of jet lag, madly finishing some charts for an upcoming Octet gig, occasional trips to the beach, and hanging until 4 or 5 AM every night, sitting in with various Honolulu musicians. Wednesday Enrique and I went down to Gordon Biersch, right on the pier beneath the Aloha Tower, to check out vocalist Jimmy Borges with special guest saxophonist George Young. George has performed and/or recorded with many many artists; it was a pleasure hearing him play his tenor, and sitting in.

PC, George Young, Jimmy Borges, DeShannon Higa

After the gig we went over to a very cool ultra lounge called Apartm3nt. My friends Justin James, Mark Tanouye and Josh Kaye were laying down the funk and soul, accompanied by guest spoken word artist Bridget Gray and vocalist Sherry Eatmon. We sat in, to the tune of several pints of Guinness. Awww Yeeeahh!

hangin' at Apartm3nt

Thursday and Friday the hang continued with another pass through Jazz Minds, a trip to the Dragon Upstairs to sit in with singer Santino Sgambelluri, and a couple of late-night Honolulu food runs with Gilbert Batangan and Mark Tanouye.

Back to Work

Saturday I played at the Dragon Upstairs with Satomi Yarimizo, Von Baron, and Steve Jones. We had a blast on this gig! Sunday was a return gig at Ward’s Rafters, a unique ‘living room’ venue with one of, if not the best, views from the stage in Honolulu. For this gig I joined Satomi, her husband Shinya on drums, Chris Roth on bass, and Enrique Zender sitting in on percussion.

Tuesday the 13th I was back at Jazz Minds for a really fun gig with Gilbert Batangan, Mark Tanouye, and drummer Chuck James, and I also taught three classes at the Iolani School.

The Paul Carlon Octet, Honolulu Edition

Wednesday Oct. 14th was a big one: the first time I’d played an Octet gig without my regular NY lineup. The Honolulu musicians on the gig were up to the task, and did a stellar job with very little rehearsal time. Muchos Mahalos! George Young was with us, as well as DeShannon Higa on trumpet, and special guest vocalists Sandy Tsukiyama and Santino Sgambelluri, with Enrique once again throwing down on percussion. We got a great writeup in the Honolulu Weekly:

Honolulu Octet listing in Honolulu Weekly

And we rocked it!

Special Thanks to the musicians: DeShannon Higa, George Young, Brien Matson, Curtis Abe, Darryl Pellegrini, Dean Taba, and Robert Shinoda

And also to Gordon Biersch for having us, and to Dave Rohner, DeShannon, Satomi, and Enrique for helping to promote the gig. And to the dancers who got up and made it happen!

Thursday night the 15th was my last gig in Honolulu, a theme night at 39 Hotel called Prohibition. Bassist Jon Hawes and I played duo. Check out 39 Hotel if you’re ever in Honolulu; this is a great club with an open-air veranda and house cocktails. Prohibition happens every Thursday; you need a password to get in so sign up for their newsletter online.

Can’t wait for the next one!

The Deep End October 29th at Drom

You don’t need to stay out of the Deep End of this pool if you can’t swim

The Deep End is a meeting place for music, dance, and improvisation. Three acts will bring their dynamic mix of brass, strings, woodwinds, body percussion, the African mbira, Yoruban chants, and freewheeling improvisation to the stage Oct. 29th at Drom Nightclub in New York.

Max Pollak & Rumbatap

Dancer and percussionist Max Pollak has performed for Fidel Castro one night and rural Cuban sugar workers the next. He has painstakingly transcribed a Mongo Santamaria timbales solo for six tap dancers and has traded moves (and shoes) with Cuba’s rumba masters. It all started when Pollak realized he not only wanted to play Afro-Cuban music, he wanted to dance it. Not dance to it; but audibly create the rhythms with his feet and hands. It’s as if Fred Astaire fell into perfect step with the Santería orishas. Rumbatap is the result: three saxophones, marimba, two vocalists and six dancers bring Max’s vision to life in expressing the transcendent beauty of Afro-Latin and World traditions.
check out Rumbatap’s video clip
Rumbatap website

Gentile/Romano

Michel Gentile (flute) and Tony Romano (acoustic guitar) bring an artistic collaboration of extraordinary maturity and depth to the Deep End. Through a commitment to regular rehearsals and performances,Tony and Michel have been probingly developing a style that invokes the ancient beauty of the sound of the flute and guitar. Dispensing with conventional roles, and taking their cue from the Bill Evans trio, the Paul Motian trio, Jimmy Giuffre, and Hermeto Pascoal, the Gentile/Romano duo has created a musical experience rich with interaction and nuance. The ten tracks on their debut CD Flesh and Steel (Deep Tone 003) navigate Brazilian and jazz standards, focusing on the bossa nova of Jobim, the choro of Pascoal and Pixinguinha, and pieces by Irving Berlin and Alec Wilder. The title track, the album’s lone original, hints at a fascination with the rhythmic expressiveness of Brazil as well as the sonic drama of the Flamenco guitar style.

listen to Gentile/Romano: A Felicidade
Gentile/Romano website

The Paul Carlon Octet

Imagine the soundtrack to a Fellini film starring Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn on a spiritual quest through Cuba, Brazil, Colombia and America, with funky bass, Yoruban chants and a killer horn section, and you’ll begin to get an idea of what this group sounds like. Featuring Saxophonist/Composer Paul Carlon’s original music, vocalist Christelle Durandy, and an array of stellar soloist/instrumentalists, the group ranges stylistically from Cuban rumba to Colombian cumbia to American gutbucket blues. The Octet has released two CDs on Deep Tone, 2006′s Other Tongues and 2008′s Roots Propaganda; they will be debuting some brand new material at the Deep End.

listen to the Paul Carlon Octet: Backstory

Paul Carlon’s website

DJ Medina

DJ David Medina will be spinning his patented mix of Afro-Latin, salsa, and Brazilian soul classics in between sets at the Deep End.

Deep Tone Records

Established in 2006, Deep Tone Records is a NYC indie label specializing in an eclectic mix of jazz, afro-latin, blues and funk styles represented by some of New York’s finest musicians. Each act on the Deep Tone label has invested itself in putting a bold and distinct group sound over individual virtuosity, resulting in recordings that will entice the listener again and again.

Deep Tone Records on Myspace

The Deep End/Event Details

Thursday October 29th from 7 PM to 10 PM

Max Pollak & Rumbatap: 7PM

Gentile/Romano Duo: 8 PM

The Paul Carlon Octet: 9 PM

Drom

85 Avenue A btw. 5th & 6th Streets, New York NY

Phone: (212) 777-1157

Drom’s website
event page/ticket sales

Hawaii, part 2: Upcoming Shows

I’ll be heading back to the Aloha State and the island of Oahu for a series of gigs from Oct. 6th through the 14th. I’ve got a couple of gigs that are yet to be confirmed, but so far here’s the schedule:

Tuesday Oct. 6th: I’ll be guesting with guitarist Gilbert Batangan and bassist Mark Tanouye at Jazz Minds.

Enrique Zender, Shinya & Satomi Yarimizo, PC, Mark Tanouye, Gilbert Batangan

Saturday Oct. 10th: I’ll be playing in a quartet with pianist Satomi Yarimizo, bassist Steve Jones and drummer Von Baron at the Dragon Upstairs, a very cool bar in Honolulu’s China Town.

Steve Jones and Von Baron

The Dragon’s decor is one of the things that makes it an extremely cool place to hang. The walls are hung with large, ornate and funky masks:

Sunday Oct. 11th: I return to Jackie Ward’s unique in-house venue for a Sunday afternoon jam session with Satomi and Shinya Yarimizo.

Tuesday Oct. 13th: I guest once again with Gilbert and Mark at Jazz Minds

Wednesday Oct. 14th: I’ll be performing at Gordon Biersch with a Honolulu edition of the Paul Carlon Octet! Trumpeter extraordinaire DeShannon Higa is putting the group together. I’m really looking forward to this one!

DeShannon Higa

I will be updating this page with any more as-yet-unconfirmed gigs; or you can check my website for updated info.

Lonie Levister/JazzaNova, Part II

In talking with Lonie about my first post we both agreed that there could have been more depth about the Jazzanova recording itself, so here goes:

BACKGROUND AND RECORDING HISTORY

JazzaNova was recorded at various sessions spanning 2007 to 2008. The CD was recorded, mixed, and mastered by Kamilo Kratc at Soundworks Recording Studio in Astoria, Queens, NYC. In my first post I stated that Lonie had “written a series of songs meant to be recorded together as a kind of concept album”, but Lonie pointed out to me that this is not entirely accurate; that, in fact, he did want to record a whole CD’s worth of material, but that the concept evolved and emerged more clearly through both the recording process and the subsequent mixing process. We recorded “Chocolat” first, and it became the template for the rest of the songs, in terms of energy, dynamic, tempo, and the musical ‘veneer’ or layering of sound achieved by the blend of instruments. Lonie felt we’d gotten the feel so right on this first one that it was worth using as a guidepost for the rest of the songs. As we continued to record various tracks, Lonie would take them home, listen, and in listening hear things that could be improved or edited in ways that would contribute to the overall feeling. He would then go back in the studio and edit as needed, or parts would occasionally be rerecorded. In this way the project emerged as a kind of sonic sculpture, carved out over time.

JAZZANOVA IN DEPTH

The finished CD is a series of pieces loosely connected by various recurring themes and an overall attempt to maintain the languid feel of the best bossa nova and cool jazz, with a side excursion to the gutbucket blues. Listened to end to end, the songs on JazzaNova create a beautifully serene, almost austere sense of floating melody, much like a memorably romantic movie soundtrack from the 60′s. The back cover of the CD contains the following text:

This JazzaNova CD is a twenty-five minute piece in 9 separate but connected tracks of Jazz and Bossa Nova designed to be listened to in a continuous, uninterrupted flow. JazzaNova is engineered and mixed for a warm, mellow, hypnotically quiet sound. The goal is to soothe the ear and calm the soul. Good for getting up in the morning. Great for going to bed at night.

The Musicians

The instrumentalists on JazzaNova are some of NY’s finest, and their contributions to the recording are irreplaceable and unique. They are:

Tony Romano: Guitar

Pete Smith: Guitar (on Chocolat only)

Doug Largent: Bass

Greg Glassman: Trumpet

Max Pollak: Percussion

Felix Sanabria: Percussion (on Chocolat only)

and yours truly, Paul Carlon, on Flute and Soprano Sax

The Music

The song list for JazzaNova reads as follows (highlighted songs can be played by clicking the song name):

1. Chocolat

2. Soho (Take the “F” Train) – Interlude

3. Jazzanova (Daba Daba Dadah, Dadah)

4. Soho (Take The “F”_Train)

5. Cool Breeze (The Wings of Time)

6. Jazzanova – Interlude

7. Lower 9th Ward Lowdown Blues

8. Cool Breeze – Reprise

9. Soho Too

The calming energy of the CD is balanced with sporadic improv from primarily the trumpet and flute (and soprano sax on one song); the solo sections are integrated quite well into the overall feel of each piece, which was something Lonie was particularly concerned with in the studio. I think mainly he wanted the solos to be melodic and groove-oriented, “tasty”, and to not range too far from home. The exception to the mellow vibe is “Lower 9th Ward Lowdown Blues”, which to my ears has the 12/8 swing of one of Marvin Gaye’s classic hits from the 60′s, like Trouble Man. There’s a very old-school feel to JazzaNova, in the sense that every part, be it in the background or foreground, was created with a specific place in the overall architecture in mind, and helps to move the song forward.

Interested in learning more, or hearing more of the tracks? Check out these links:

Lonie’s Website

JazzaNova on CD Baby

Lonie on 46th St. in Times Square