Jay and Chris recently returned from New Zealand, were they were featured as guest soloists with one of New Zealand's greatest composers and keyboardists, Jonathan Crayford. Jonathan also happens to be a Groove Collective Alum. He recorded and composed music for Groove Collective's third album, "Dance of the Drunken Master." He later returned to New Zealand to spread the "Groove" message. Mr Crayford was asked to put together a dream band for the Womad Music festival, which is the brainchild of Peter Gabriel. Jonathan, along with New Zealand's representative from the organization, Roger King, recruited Jay and Chris to being their New York music flavor across the globe for this special event.
Jay and Chris arrived to a royal welcome from the Taranaki Fano (members of the Taranaki Family or Tribe). They are native Maori people who have resided, for thousands of years, on the side of the mountain where Jay and Chris were slated to perform. For an understanding of these people and their lives, Jay and Chris recommend watching the films "Whale Rider" or "Once Were Warriors." According to Jay, "you will be moved. They are proud, beautiful people." Joining Jay and Chris at this arrival ceremony were the Gyuto Monks (throat singers from Tibet), Femi Kuti, Tuvan throat singers, Saeid Shanbehzadeh, Salif Keita, along with a number of other artists from the Niger. Jay remarks, "first things first, they greet us with the most gifted warrior. Back in the day, if you didn't do things right, they took you out from the get go. Once you pass the greeting test, the women put a spell on you with their beautiful, sacred, yearnin' melancholic song. This all takes quite a while, and you are generally moved to tears by the end. Then they dine you. You just had to be there to understand.
Jay continues:
Following the arrival ceremony, Chris and I jumped right into rehearsals. We worked on specific concepts and direction for the concert. In between interviews with national television stations, we prepared sacred works for a smaller trio performance (with Jonathan) at St. Matthews Church in Auckland. We featured pieces by Chris, Jonathan and myself. The music could generally be classified as "Sacred" with an Afro-Latin tinge. It was an absolute success...
We then began looking forward to our next series of performances, featuring some of New Zealand's greatest Maori Soul Warriors. We worked alongside many individuals, including vocalists Emma Paki and Lisa Tomlin, bassist and vocalist Rio Hemopo, guitarist and vocalist Jonathan Pease and drummer Riki Gooch. Unbeknownst to us, drumming legend Billy Cobham was in attendance. Everything went so well, in fact, that Mr. Cobham asked us to join his all-star band for a performance on the final night of the festival. We represented GC Style!
In addition, Jay and Chris took time to reach out to young musicians during a series of workshops. Chris' reflection:
We also had the opportunity to be of service to the local young NZ
musicians by giving lessons and workshops at the Taranaki Arts
center. Located in a beautiful old renovated Nursing hospital, The
Arts center was founded and renovated by music educator Jasmin and
her family and provides dance and music education for young people.
She made the Center available to the WOMAD international festival for
rehearsals and each day we rehearsed we would see young faces poking
through the door for a peek. After a couple of days we told Jasmin
we'd be happy to work with them and on the last day we stayed for a
few hours of drumming and woodwinds workshops with the students.
It was great to be surrounded by young people so energized and
motivated by music and with such an appetite for ideas brought from
other lands.
Look out for Groove Collective on tour…
Europe in April, Japan in May and then headlining a big homecoming show on June 29th for Celebrate Brooklyn, at the Prospect Park band hell. Stay tuned, as we have more summer dates in the works.