Avantdale Bowling Club to headline the 2020 Wellington Jazz Festival

West Auckland rapper and hip hop artist Tom Scott will bring his “stunning” (NPR) genre-pushing jazz, hip-hop project Avantdale Bowling Club to Wellington for “an incredible journey of jazz, rap, soul, and spoken word” (Radio13) at the Opera House on Saturday 21 November. 

Joined by some of the country’s top musicians, Scott’s “turn-on-a-pin rhythmic cadence” (Metromag) and his “brutally honest, startlingly raw” lyrics (NZ Herald) promise one of the best nights of live music you’ll experience this year. 

In 2019, his first album under the moniker Avantdale Bowling Club saw Scott win the Taite Music Prize, Album of the Year and Hip-hop Artist awards at the New Zealand Music Awards, as well as being named a finalist at the Silver Scrolls for the song Years Gone By. 

Influenced by the likes of Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders and Alice Coltrane, Scott describes his latest album as “a self-help book addressed to myself” that was four years in the making.   

Avantdale Bowling Club’s genre isn’t easy to pin down. Typically irreverent, Scott’s Spotify profile for the project calls it “irrelevant jazz from an island nation off the coast of Antarctica.”   

“The album’s about home and its inhabitants, with all their inadequacies and complexities. It’s about finding peace in the little piece of land you stand on,” he says. 

Scott first emerged in 2007 with Home Brew, a band that still performs live. His other projects – Average Rap Band, @Peace, a new Average Man collaboration and his new label ‘Years Gone By’, ensure that he continues to influence a generation of young rappers and push boundaries across genres. 

Scott has been hard at work on ABC 2, so the Wellington Jazz Festival audience is likely to hear new material from his stellar ensemble including Tonga Vaea (vocals/keys/trumpet), Guy Harrison (keys/trumpet), JY Lee (saxophone), Ben Turua (upright bass/bass guitar) and Julien Dyne (drums). 

Wellington Jazz Festival Creative Director Marnie Karmelita says she is looking forward to Wellington Jazz Festival audiences experiencing the incredible ensemble for themselves.  

“Surrounding himself with some of the best jazz musicians in the country, Tom Scott’s latest project has been recognised for its innovation and sheer brilliance. I’m thrilled we were still able to secure them for the rescheduled Wellington Jazz Festival in November this year in a completely New Zealand focused programme.” 

Tickets for Avantdale Bowling Club will be on public sale from 1 September on Ticketmaster. There will be a Culture Club supporters pre-sale from 25 August. Head here to join and find out more.

Keep an eye out for further programme updates over the coming weeks. 

Dave Brubeck dies - age 92

Catch the Coffeebar Kid's tribute on-air tonight from 7.30pm NZ time.
For millions of Jazz Lovers who came of age in the 1950s, Dave Brubeck was jazz. His performances on college campuses, Top 40 radio play, his role as a jazz ambassador for the U.S., his picture on the cover of Time magazine — all made him one of the most recognized and recognizable musicians of the era.

He died Wednesday morning, the day before his 92nd birthday, in Norwalk, Connecticut of heart failure.

Read about the Story of "Take Five" here.

Brubeck's start in music was like the jazz he played: unorthodox. He never learned to read sheet music growing up. He refused classical training. And he developed his chops playing in a military band for Gen. George Patton's Third Army. In the '50s he formed a quartet with saxophone player Paul Desmond that broke into the Top 40 with "Blue Rondo à la Turk."

That song is in 9/8 time — a radical departure from the 4/4 rhythm that Brubeck says Americans were comfortable with at the time. Audiences weren't the only ones taken aback by his music. In interviews that aired on NPR's Jazz Profiles series, Brubeck and Desmond said their musical styles often clashed.

"I was very wild harmonically in those days," said Brubeck. "And the first chord I hit scared Desmond to the point where he thought I was stark raving mad."
"Well," said Desmond, "I was trying to play some sort of melodic chorus, and he would be in 15 different keys on an out-of-tune piano, and there were occasions where I was totally desperate about the situation."
Nevertheless, the two collaborated for decades. In 1959, a song that Desmond wrote earned the quartet its greatest success.
"Take 5" was named after the song's 5/4 time signature.
It appeared on the album Time Out with other tunes that jumped back and forth between different rhythms. The president of Columbia Records was excited that the album was so different from anything else on his label.
But Brubeck said the marketing department was not. "They said, 'You've broken all the rules — the unwritten laws of Columbia Records. You have all originals on this album. Also, you want to use a painting on the cover, and people can't dance to this.' "
Radio stations in Chicago and Detroit disagreed, playing "Take 5" repeatedly.
Brubeck saw the fruits of that exposure firsthand. "In Detroit," he said, "that whole ballroom was dancing in 5/4 — you know, where they throw couples up in the air and between their legs and over their shoulders."

The song climbed to No. 25 on Billboard's Hot 100. College students across the country were dancing to it. In fact, Brubeck made his name playing colleges in the early '50s. One of his early successes was his recording Jazz Goes to College.
After the original Dave Brubeck quartet broke up in the '60s, he came out with an album composed of music he once thought was too structured. In 1968, Brubeck collaborated with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra on a religious piece called The Light in the Wilderness.
Jazz critic Nat Hentoff says he was blown away by Brubeck's transformation from jazz player to classical composer. "He's a much underrated composer. I heard a concerto — it was a religious work, and it was so powerful that it brought me to tears."
Later, Brubeck joined the Catholic Church. He became fascinated with composing religious fugues, operas and symphonies. That's not to say Brubeck stopped touring with his jazz groups — some of which included his sons.
Even after bouts of serious illness that forced him into a wheelchair, Brubeck seemed transformed as he sat at the piano — striking the keys with an energy he never seemed to lose. He played hundreds of gigs around the world almost till the end of his life.
Hentoff says Brubeck's professional longevity will be his legacy. "Professional musicians eventually may say, 'OK, we figured out some changes in rhythms that influenced us to think about.' But the main point is the vitality that keeps going. I always called jazz the life force and, my goodness, Mr. Brubeck exemplifies that."

Jazz News!

There are 2 Wellington jazz Club gigs this month;
The welcome return of the 10th avenue band from San Diego, 1 day shy of a year since they last performed for us. Tight swing and trad jazz on Wednesday the 20th of Feb at the Loaded Hog ballroom from 7.30.
Feb 24th sees Eric newton - popular English clarinet player - return once again to bring us that classic jazz sound at Old St Pauls. 5pm start. Both concerts are $15 or $12 for members of the Wgtn JAzz Club.

The 46th National Jazz festival is comming up over Easter in Tauranga. Stay tuned to Groove 107.7FM formore details.

Also, the International Festival of the Arts features some jazz artists this time around. Again, more information on Groove.

Supporting the community and especially the jazz scene, Groove 107.7FM, NZ's only cafe style jazz radio station!