Omer Avital has established himself as a top bass player on the jazz scene, but also is bringing traditional Jewish music into the future
By MORDECAI SPECKTOR
Israeli native and bass player extraordinaire Omer Avital sees himself as a bridge builder, in a musical and cultural sense.
Among his many current projects, Avital is the co-director, with Yair Harel, of the New Jerusalem Orchestra (NJO). This large ensemble of musicians from Israel (and at least one American, jazz tenor saxophonist Greg Tardy) performs a repertoire of Sephardic piyyutim (liturgical songs).
On his Web site, the bassist notes that NJO’s goal “is to perpetuate the traditional sound with its stylistic and aesthetic components, while aspiring to inventive and inspired artistic arrangements.”
Omer Avital and the Band of the East, Jan. 10 at St. Paul JCC
NJO’s first performance, “Ahavat Olamim (Everlasting Love)” — an exploration of the “Andalusian Hebrew song from the Maghreb to Jerusalem,” featuring Rabbi Haim Louk, a Moroccan native, Torah scholar and captivating vocalist — was given the opening spot at the Israel Festival, in May 2010.
“My father’s Moroccan and my mother’s Yemenite, so I know a good deal of the music,” Avital commented, regarding his participation in NJO, during a recent phone interview with the AJW from his home in New Jersey.
Omer Avital: I like jazz; I like traditional and roots music, in general. (Photo: Roberto Cifarelli)
Avital said his formal studies have encompassed Western classical music, jazz, and Middle Eastern and North African musical styles. These varied influences come together in the 41-year-old musician’s new project, the Band of the East, an exciting jazz ensemble that will perform on the evening of Jan. 10 at the St. Paul JCC.
TSF Jazz, the Paris-based jazz radio station, chose the group’s acclaimed 2012 album, Suite of the East (Anzic Records), a soulful and rocking collection of original tunes, as the album of the year; and when the AJW talked with Avital, he was preparing for a week of gigs in the City of Lights in mid-December.
The lineup for the St. Paul JCC gig will be slightly different than the group that recorded Suite of the East (which made a number of Top 10 jazz album lists for 2012), and flew over the pond for the Paris dates.
The Band of the East rhythm section will feature Avital on bass, of course, and drummer Daniel Freedman, a dynamic percussionist who played with Anat Cohen’s quartet at the Dakota Jazz Club in November. Freedman has played behind a diverse group of pop and jazz musicians, and is a talented composer and bandleader. The West African-tinged songs on his latest album, Bamako By Bus (Anzic Records), are buoyed by a talented group of musicians, including trumpeter Avishai Cohen, guitarist and vocalist Lionel Loueke, bassist Meshell Ndegeocello, and Jason Lindner on keyboards.
Lindner, who also was on the Dakota bandstand with Anat Cohen and Freedman this past November (and toured Japan recently with Avital and Freedman), will return to the Twin Cities as part of Avital’s quintet. An entertaining magician of the keys, Lindner has led both small combos and big bands. (Omer Klein — who brought his trio, including Avital, to the St. Paul JCC several years ago — played piano on Suite of the East, which actually was recorded in 2006.) Avital said that Lindner will mainly play piano in St. Paul, along with synthesizer and, perhaps, a Fender Rhodes keyboard.
Tardy, a journeyman tenor saxophonist, also will play with Avital and his mates. A longtime friend of Avital, Tardy was a sensational addition to the New Jerusalem Orchestra, at their 2010 performance in Jerusalem. If you want to get a taste of Tardy playing with NJO, look for the YouTube video of the ensemble’s performance of the song “Tzur Shehechyani”; at 4:50 in the video, Tardy begins his solo, which obviously delights his fellow musicians — about 30 players and vocalists assembled on stage — and brings out the universal blues embedded in the Sephardic melody. Somehow Tardy’s jazz licks enhance the Jewish piece, enriching and elevating the whole.
“I just love his playing,” said Avital about Tardy, who has played with such luminaries as Elvin Jones, Dave Douglas and Bill Frisell.
Avital added, “This band has a guitar, too, so it’s not a classic quintet.” Nadav Remez, a young fleet guitarist, plays in the jazz vein, and also imparts “Israeli flavors” to the music, according to Avital. Remez plays brilliantly on the nine original songs comprising his debut album, So Far (Brooklyn Jazz Underground Records), which came out in 2011.
“Song for Peace,” a nearly 15-minute workout that melds the blues with Middle Eastern modes, emerged as a popular track on Suite of the East.
“I think it’s a good melody and people love it,” Avital commented about the tune. “In Paris, people really like it. It’s got that subtle connection… I’m not a ‘world music’ person so much. I like jazz; I like traditional and roots music, in general. I’m not a big fan of fusion. So, it’s like, how do you bring things together? I think that song has that element, that Middle Eastern desert phrasing, but at the same time it has the gospel in it, and the feeling of swing and blues. Pretty much that’s what I’m trying to go for, to be very much in the tradition and the lineage of American jazz music, but with my own voice and incorporating into the art form my own music in a seamless kind of way, rather than creating more of a fusion, or world music-type of aesthetic.”
With Tardy and Remez in the Band of the East’s front line (instead of trumpeter Cohen and saxophonist Joel Frahm, who played on the record), the group that plays the St. Paul JCC will bring out new nuances in Avital’s music. Minnesota music fans are fortunate that the St. Paul JCC’s Jeffrey Richman booked this band, which is also playing dates in Chicago and New York City on this mini-tour.
Perhaps Avital and his Band of the East will play “Song for Peace”; but Avital said that the Jan. 10 show will feature mainly new material that he is working out prior to going into the recording studio later this month. And Avital, who played oud, a Middle Eastern lute, when Yemen Blues performed at the Cedar last year (12-23-11 AJW), said that he might play an oud solo as part of his concert here.
Since coming to New York in 1992, following his army service in Israel, Avital has been a fixture of the scene at Small’s Jazz Club in Greenwich Village, and led his own jazz ensembles. He also has been part of the rhythm section in Avishai Cohen’s band Triveni, which has recorded two great albums; and plays and records with Third World Love, with Cohen, Freedman and pianist Yonatan Avishai.
Avital says that his current projects preclude more gigs with Yemen Blues in the near future; but he hopes to be doing shows and recording with his pal, Ravid Kahalani, one of these days.
Returning to the New Jerusalem Orchestra, Avital should be widely acknowledged for his trailblazing work on this project. In a review of Ahavat Olamim (Jewish Music Research Centre), the recording of NJO’s inaugural performance in 2010, Aryeh Tepper, writing in the Jewish Review of Books last year, said, “Two of the most interesting developments in the Israeli music scene over the past 15 years have been the rise of world-class Israeli jazz and the turn to classic Sephardic piyyut (liturgical music).”
Omer Avital has emerged as a central figure in both of these “interesting developments.”
In a Web video introducing NJO, Avital comments, “There was a deep cultural and historical disconnect. Our generation is trying to build a bridge to the past, and create a path for the future.”
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Omer Avital and the Band of the East will perform 7 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 10 at the St. Paul JCC, 1375 St. Paul Ave. Tickets at $15 for JCC members and $20 for nonmembers; for reservations, go to: stpauljcc.org, or call the St. Paul JCC at 651-698-0751.
(American Jewish World, 1.4.13)
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