Speaker 1: The band in Motion is launching their album at Jazz
Speaker 1: in the Native Yards tonight, and we wanted to have
Speaker 1: band leaders of vom Ian Levin on guitar. He's not
Speaker 1: on guitar right now, but he will be later and
Speaker 1: Theodore Bould on the line to tell us more about
Speaker 1: the launch and the album and their music. Good morning
Speaker 1: to you both. Have we got you both hopefully via zoom.
Speaker 2: Yes we're here.
Speaker 1: Hello, Hello, Hello, morning morning gens.
Speaker 3: Listen.
Speaker 1: Tell us a little bit about the band, a little
Speaker 1: bit about your background. How long have you been together
Speaker 1: and from where do you hail?
Speaker 3: Well, I'm from Johannesburg, South Africa, and Tao is from Geneva, Switzerland,
Speaker 3: and we met in Montroux in Switzerland. We both participated
Speaker 3: in a guitar competition and yeah, that's how we met.
Speaker 2: That was when was that sixteen?
Speaker 3: I guess twenty sixteen exactly, and we've known each other
Speaker 3: since then.
Speaker 2: The band's been together since twenty nineteen. I guess yeah.
Speaker 2: And yeah, so that's how we met and that's how
Speaker 2: I've been together.
Speaker 1: Tayor, I'm so sorry I pronounced your name incorrectly. I
Speaker 1: do apologize, Tao, not for the tear and then tell
Speaker 1: us about the album and how long has it been,
Speaker 1: how long has it been in the works, and obviously
Speaker 1: now you're ready to launch. What can we expect from
Speaker 1: from the album.
Speaker 4: Well, we recorded this album actually exactly two years ago,
Speaker 4: so in July twenty twenty three in Switzerland, and it's
Speaker 4: been out only two days ago, so it's quite fresh
Speaker 4: and we're pretty proud and happy of it. We all
Speaker 4: wrote songs for this for this album, A remember the
Speaker 4: of the each member of the band. So there's like
Speaker 4: a lot of different influences and vibes and this album,
Speaker 4: but I think at the end it all comes together
Speaker 4: very coherently and and yeah nicely. It also goes in
Speaker 4: the direction that we we're looking for, which is a
Speaker 4: blend of many different yeah influences, and yep, we're very
Speaker 4: happy about it.
Speaker 1: Just talk to us about those those influences, because we
Speaker 1: can tell from your accents that you are you know,
Speaker 1: you're from You're from around, not necessarily from South Africa.
Speaker 1: So what are the influences, what are the what what
Speaker 1: what sounds influenced your sound?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: So the idea was basically to transcribe music from what
Speaker 3: the fourteenth win on madrigals fourteenth century like the Renaissance
Speaker 3: fifteenth century music, I guess, basically the period of early
Speaker 3: colonialism from Europe music called madrigals and traditional indigenous South
Speaker 3: African music, and to try and blend these sounds together
Speaker 3: using jazz. South African jazz is the kind of theater
Speaker 3: or meeting point between these two forms and contemporary giazz
Speaker 3: as well, because this is the sheard vocabulary between all
Speaker 3: of us. And it was part of a broader sort
Speaker 3: of project that we were awarded through prohibits here. The
Speaker 3: Confluences Grant Proves here is a Swiss funding organization and
Speaker 3: they basically gave us a seed fund to try and
Speaker 3: explore this project. And yeah, the result was basically the
Speaker 3: compositions that we generated for the album. But there's all
Speaker 3: sorts of other influences on their rock, popular music, dance music,
Speaker 3: so it's really like a medley of forms.
Speaker 2: I would say in genres, I wonder.
Speaker 1: How those different musical worlds that you've just described to us,
Speaker 1: how did they speak to each other? Is it presumably
Speaker 1: quite fluently?
Speaker 4: Well? The common thing that Woma didn't mention is the
Speaker 4: improvisation we all jazz musician, and so we share this
Speaker 4: this love and this this interest in improvisation. So in
Speaker 4: a way, the fact that we're composing live, let's say,
Speaker 4: and improvising brings everything together. And at the end we
Speaker 4: just use different elements of those of those different generals
Speaker 4: that wom I mentioned to improvise and to bring the
Speaker 4: music somewhere. But that's what jazz is about anyway. It's
Speaker 4: always using different elements and bringing the music somewhere. So
Speaker 4: we're just doing this again with different elements, and I
Speaker 4: think that's something interesting in jazz when people bring in
Speaker 4: some new kind of elements from from somewhere else.
Speaker 1: How then do you how then do you balance that improvisation,
Speaker 1: which is a core part of jazz music obviously, with
Speaker 1: with historical or archive of material that by its very
Speaker 1: nature is fixed.
Speaker 2: Well, I would say two things.
Speaker 3: I would say first of all, that traditional indigenous music
Speaker 3: has a very large improvisational component, right, So a lot
Speaker 3: of those forms are rarely repeated patterns, rhythmic, harmonic, melodic patterns,
Speaker 3: and then people kind of improvise inside of those repetitions.
Speaker 3: So already that's a point of I guess, empathetic resonance
Speaker 3: and then I guess a lot of the composed material
Speaker 3: takes place during the melodies, during the main themes, so
Speaker 3: we capitulate a theme and then perhaps have some improvisational
Speaker 3: components and then recapitulate the theme or move onto another
Speaker 3: composed section. So this kind of a balance between composed
Speaker 3: components and improvised components. And I guess traditional indigenous music,
Speaker 3: as I said, is again another theater for enabling points
Speaker 3: of empathetic resonance between all these forms.
Speaker 1: Tell us a little bit about tonight's Tonight's launch and
Speaker 1: more audiences can expect tonight, and also, most importantly, how
Speaker 1: they can get hold of tickets.
Speaker 2: Yes, actually the launches this afternoon.
Speaker 3: Okay, it's at Jazz and the Native Yards in Langa,
Speaker 3: which is a really kind of cool community based project.
Speaker 3: And yeah, tickets are available on cuicket. They're one and
Speaker 3: eighty rand and the show starts at three pm, so
Speaker 3: we al really hope people come out and enjoy the music.
Speaker 3: It's in a beautiful gallery space that is being developed
Speaker 3: specifically for these sorts of current sets.
Speaker 1: And then in terms of getting hold of the album,
Speaker 1: it was released a couple of days ago, so presumably
Speaker 1: available to download on all digital platforms.
Speaker 2: Yes, exactly.
Speaker 4: We decided to go only digital this time, so it's
Speaker 4: on every platform and also on band camp if people
Speaker 4: want to support let's say a bit more than just
Speaker 4: usual streams.
Speaker 2: So yeah, every platforms and band Camp. Okay.
Speaker 1: I'm fascinated by by your your your love of jazz.
Speaker 1: I'm always interested by by people's love of jazz. And
Speaker 1: we we have such a an incredible talent of young
Speaker 1: people now, young jazz musicians, particularly in Cape Town, and
Speaker 1: it's it always interests me because I think people often
Speaker 1: find jazz or there is a perception that it's maybe
Speaker 1: not terribly accessible, or it's it's a difficult genre. Just
Speaker 1: tell me a little bit about your love affair with jazz.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's very interesting.
Speaker 3: Last night we were on our way to a concerting
Speaker 3: Musenberg and we're chatting with an uber driver about exactly
Speaker 3: this the sort of jazz scene that is very very
Speaker 3: present in Cape Town and a lot of the horn plays,
Speaker 3: I guess come out of the cups of klopsa tradition
Speaker 3: as well as kind of community based.
Speaker 2: Brass band traditions. So there's very there's a very very
Speaker 2: strong brass band tradition in Cape Town, and I guess
Speaker 2: a lot of people come through the ranks through that
Speaker 2: brass band tradition, and as a consequence, in Cape Town
Speaker 2: in particular, we have like one of the strongest saxophone
Speaker 2: and trumpet sections in the country. And that's really something
Speaker 2: that develops organically through sort of grassroots intervention, through these
Speaker 2: brass bands and community based projects. But for myself, it
Speaker 2: was already very long journey towards jazz. I mean I
Speaker 2: listened to it a.
Speaker 3: Lot when I was very very young, because my dad
Speaker 3: played a lot of John portraying John McLachlan, Miles Davis,
Speaker 3: and then I.
Speaker 2: Sort of segued into it.
Speaker 1: Did it resonate with you?
Speaker 3: Sorry?
Speaker 1: So did it resonate with you at that age?
Speaker 2: Was that?
Speaker 4: Did it?
Speaker 1: Did it do something to you at that young mash?
Speaker 3: Of course, I mean I was four or five years old.
Speaker 3: But I think most importantly it left a kind of
Speaker 3: emotional memory so that when he visited it later on,
Speaker 3: it was kind of easy to tap into it again. Yeah,
Speaker 3: And I kind of arrived the jazz indirectly through bands
Speaker 3: like Radiohead and portous Head and more Chiba sort of
Speaker 3: pop bands that use a lot of the harmonic, melodic
Speaker 3: and rhythmic material of jazz, but in a more kind
Speaker 3: of accessible way.
Speaker 1: I haven't heard somebody say more chiba for about ten years, voomas.
Speaker 1: Thank you for that. That takes me back to a time.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2: I guess I'm showing my age right now.
Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, not at all. I'm so glad that
Speaker 1: that's that's something to listen to in the car on
Speaker 1: the way home. Some more Cheba listen. I'm so excited
Speaker 1: for this, for this launch. The album is called Allegories, right.
Speaker 2: Allegories, Allegories.
Speaker 1: I'm so sorry. Yeah, Allegory. People can download it. We're
Speaker 1: looking forward to it. Just remind us again you're going
Speaker 1: to be at three o'clock Jazz in the Native Yards
Speaker 1: in Langa today.
Speaker 3: Yes, at Jazz in the Native Yards three today. Tickets
Speaker 3: are available on cicket for one hundred and eighty rand
Speaker 3: or you can get them at the door for two
Speaker 3: hundred grand.
Speaker 1: Okay, get them run, folks, don't walk. Thank you very
Speaker 1: much both for joining us this morning to tell us
Speaker 1: about the launch. A little bit about the background. Voomitian
Speaker 1: Levin on guitar and Teo Deboule, who was also being guitar. Later,
Speaker 1: when the band in Motion launches their album at Jazz
Speaker 1: in the Native Yards,