Big band jazz still swings （当年在环球时报工作时用英文写的稿，说的是上海的爵士乐scene）
Evolving for almost a century, big band jazz music is still able to draw on a huge fan-base in Shanghai. Through the efforts of international jazz musicians, advocates and fans, this form of music has best captured the city’s transitions over the last century.
by Yu Qi
It’s a Saturday night. Around 10pm, vehicles begin to pull up outside a shadowy three-storey glass-wall building on West Fuxing Road. The passengers pop out of the taxis carrying hard-shell cases of different shapes. Alec Haavik’s bulbous case contains his shiny brass saxophone. He’s here for the JZ Club’s All Star Big Band night, every Saturday from 11:30pm till very, very late.
Haavik met with the Global Times in the club’s musician lounge. This flamboyant New Yorker is tall, a little lean, with old school black-frame glasses and a shock of wild hair.
After the whole first floor becomes packed with excited fans, 16 musicians armed with a shimmering armada of brass and strings take to the stage. Two rows of seats face the crowd, and Haavik takes his place. With the little army ready to battle, the normally spacious venue suddenly appears small and intimate.
The band begins to play. As Music Director Nicholas Bouloukos’ fingers trickle up and down the piano, the band swings, swirls, rocks and rolls through a mix of subtle melodies and cacophonic passages. If only through sheer size, let alone the rambling and frenetic improvisations, the music is already symphonic.
The JZ Big Band is the only regularly playing big band in China. “A big band this size is rare today, even in New York,” said Bouloukos. “People bring their kids, listen to the band, and hang out on the second floor digging the vibe. Everyone digs it.” And back in the swing age of the 1920s and 1930s when Jimmy King’s trumpet soared out over the springy dance-floor of Shanghai Paramount Hall, who would have predicted that this American art-form would still be enchanting diverse audiences a century later?
Haavik did not expect big band music to be so popular in Shanghai. Before arriving in the city four and half years ago, he was a staple performer at some of Taipei’s most respected jazz clubs. “The musicians were all talking about Shanghai at that time. It sounded like there were some big opportunities here.” Haarvik’s first job in Shanghai was playing music at CJW club, another iconic jazz location in town. Back in 2006, there were only a few clubs, such as The House of Blues and Jazz, Cotton Club and CJW, who were providing live jazz. And most of the bands were not able to dedicate solely to jazz music; owners would often request pop songs to make performances more accessible to audiences inexperienced in jazz. “It didn’t take long before people were telling me, ‘Oh you have to go to JZ. Lao Ren is cool. He is running a jazz club. He is one of us’,” said Haavik.
Ren Yuqing, known in Shanghai as “Lao Ren”, is the owner of JZ Club and a respected musician himself. Once the bass player for Chinese rock star Cui Jian, Ren opened the JZ Club in 2004 for a very simple reason: “I just wanted to find a place for us musicians to hang out. We needed a place to drink and play music after our everyday work,” Ren told the Global Times.
Taking over from German saxophonist Rolf Becker, pianist Nicholas Bouloukos has been directing the band since 2006. Also from New York, Bouloukos has been living in Shanghai since 2002. Now happily married to a Chinese girl from Hangzhou, Bouloukos is father of two kids. “This is now my home,” he said with conviction.
Bouloukos and Ren have worked together to ensure that the band performs every week, and to provide a platform for musicians to introduce original material to the group. “I try my best to allow a place for everyone in the band. The players are very happy and free to express themselves,” said Bouloukos.
Ren supports the group both economically and creatively, offering them a slot on his busiest night. “There aren’t too many clubs in the world having a big band playing on Saturday nights. In New York, big band nights are usually seen on Mondays, which is traditionally the musician’s night off. They could earn more money doing something else on Saturday nights.”
And this is just a part of Ren’s quest. The JZ Music School, under the musical directorship of celebrated guitarist Laurence Ku, is another fortress of his jazz movement. Ren also organizes the annual JZ Jazz Festival in Shanghai, a very popular, musically diverse event, which hosts both local and international bands.
The JZ Club is also the home of Shanghai’s premier jam session. While an impromptu session can materialize on any night, post-big band Saturday nights are when musicians from all over the city descend on the club to take part in collective improvisation. With many different nationalities on stage, including musicians from Brazil, Columbia, England, Germany and the U.S., the music usually touches on a broad range of styles.
The JZ Big Band has a number of highly-rated Chinese players among its members, including trumpeter Hu Danfeng, trombonist Hu Qingwen, saxophonist Chen Jiajun and bass trombonist Wang Jun.
“Hu Danfeng and Qingwen could play anywhere, in any city on the planet, and classical music too. From symphony orchestra to jazz; not many people can pull that off. And Jiajun has incredible ears, he’s our rising star,” enthused Bouloukos.
“We make our music to international standards, whilst at the same time being able to do commercial functions and events where we can introduce a repertoire that people really enjoy,” said Bouloukos.
Although the band can draw on the varied repertoire of its musical director, it has tended to focus more on traditional arrangements, performing classic works by composers such as Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus and Frank Sinatra.
However, these days Bouloukos is trying to “turn the canoe in the water toward rapids a little bit,” and perform more challenging music. “We are now starting to develop a sound and character whereby people don’t have to look at the charts [notation] all the time. We are also introducing new material constantly; hopefully we can find the balance.”
It’s not easy to find the balance between old and new material, but it’s even more difficult to manage a 16-piece ensemble. Bouloukos would like the band to rehearse every week, but it’s difficult to maintain focus with so many people. Usually after one hour of a rehearsal, a succession of musicians pick up and leave due to personal affairs. “But they are all here willingly; just wanting to be a part of the band.” [Y1]
This Saturday’s All-Star Big Band night lasts longer than normal. The band kicks in with the première of Alec’s new composition, The Rainbow Bridge Soundbook.
Taking about a year to write, this work draws inspiration from Shanghai’s Hong Qiao [Rainbow Bridge] district and Brazilian samba flavors. Originally intended for a 7-piece band, Alec adapted and rearranged it for big band. It's an exotic, yet somehow oriental cascade of sound, with pulsing guitar and brass, soaring trumpet melodies and soft saxophone lines.
Haarvik takes off - his playing is precise and crisp. A weaving solo invites the listeners into a fantasy world, becoming an evocative voice that crosses geographical and musical borders.
You won’t see Lao Ren. He is in his den at the top of the building, watching the action on a projector-screen from a live camera. Soon he will be on stage for the jam session, providing a robust platform for the other musicians to bounce off. Ren’s original intention was to create a hangout place for musicians and “nothing has changed since.”
