Chris Washburne, Trombonist
Contributed by Joe Montague
Tuesday, 28 November 2006
The first time Chris Washburne picked up a trombone it
was a rather auspicious occasion. The superbly
talented jazz musician, bandleader and composer seemed
to have fun in relating the experience to me. I didn’t
pick the trombone the trombone picked me. When I was
ten years old I wanted to play the trumpet because it
was shiny and because it played high and loud. There
were still music programs in all the high schools and
grade schools. At ten you could go and rent an
instrument fairly cheaply and sign up for lessons at
school,” he says.
Washburne’s mother made him a deal when he was ten
years old. She agreed to take him to the school to
pick out an instrument to play. “I ran, made a beeline
for it and blew as hard as I could. No sound came out.
I kept trying and trying and still no sound came out.
(My mother) looked at me and asked, ‘Are you sure that
you want to play the trumpet?’ and I said, ‘ya’ I want
to play the trumpet.’ She (agreed) as long as I tried
one other instrument before we left.”
Washburne recalls, “The trombone just happened to be
on the table next to the trumpet. I picked up the
trombone and blew into it. A sound came out. I walked
home with a trombone that night.” Millions of jazz
fans around the world are glad that he did.
Washburne has performed on Broadway and been the
musician of choice in live performances for the likes
of Celine Dion, Gloria Estefan and Justin Timberlake.
He has performed with orchestras and has two bands of
his own SYOTOS a Latin Jazz group and the straight
ahead jazz septet/sextet NYNDK.
Unless you dig beneath the surface Washburne’s tale of
his career comes out sounding more like good fortune
and happenstance. The truth is he has worked
incredibly hard at perfecting his craft. He holds a
masters degree from the New England Conservatory in
and a doctorate in Ethnomusicology from Columbia
University.
Still he persists with statements such as, “I kind of
fell into Latin music by accident. I grew up on a farm
in Ohio and attended school in the Midwest at the
University of Wisconsin. It wasn’t until I was in
graduate school at the New England Conservatory in
Boston before I was first introduced to Latin music
and salsa.”
A musician friend of his couldn’t make it to a gig so
he asked Washburne if he would substitute for him.
Washburne agreed but inquired as to what type of music
they would be performing. His friend told him it was
salsa. As he relates the story Washburne laughs
telling me that he had no idea what salsa was. His
friend told him just to show up and play really
loudly. The Colombian band was popular in the Latino
community playing a mix of merengue, cumbia and salsa.
The band asked Washburne if he would play with them on
a regular basis. That was his first introduction to
Latin music.
“I was immediately taken with the rhythms. As a
trombone player I was also taken with the role of the
trombone in the ensemble as a solo instrument,” he
says.
The discovery of genres and sub genres of music in
which the trombone played a prominent role was a far
cry from scratching his head trying to figure out how
to work a trombone into a more significant role with
the rock bands he had accompanied in Ohio.
Washburne’s new found love for Latin grooves let him
to a record store and a man who handed him a copy of
Eddie Palmieri’s White album. “He said with a glint in
his eye, ‘This is all you will ever need.’ That record
featured Barry Rogers on the trombone. It was one of
Eddie’s best records. I heard the (music), I heard
Barry Rogers playing trombone and I said wow I want to
do that,” says Washburne. Little did he know years
later he would perform and record with Palmieri and
another great mambo innovator Tito Puente.
It was love at first listen. Washburne returned to the
store and purchased all of Eddie Palmieri’s records.
“I transcribed all of Barry Rogers’ solos. I really
dug and studied the music seriously. Once you start it
is like any jazz tradition,” he says and then draws an
analogy, “You may start with a Miles Davis type of
blues but eventually you are going back in history
tracing the steps of how that came to be.”
Dare we say Washburne might easily be referred to as
the artist formerly known as sponge? He literally
soaked up every Latin note that he could lay his hands
on. He was enthralled with the music of Tito Puente,
Tito Rodgrigues and the Afro-Cuban Machito Band.
Washburne refers to these artists as the triumvirate
of Mambo bands that formed the New York Latin sound
that eventually evolved into the music of other
artists such as Eddie Palmieri.
Times have changed somewhat on the New York City jazz
music scene. “The scene has changed so much in the
last few years. There is still a lot of music
happening in this city. There is still more jazz than
any other place but it is not as easy for young
musicians nowadays as when I first came to New York
City (eighteen years ago). The generation before me
said the same thing. There are less and less
opportunities to make a living and there are fewer
venues that require live music,” he says. Washburne
points to the fact there are fewer studios in New York
City today and therefore less studio players are
required. The musicians who used to do a lot of studio
work to supplement their incomes are now doing
Broadway gigs and replacing those artists.
All that being said Wasburne would like to pass along
a piece of sage advice he once received from John
Swallow one of his professors at the New England
Conservatory, “If you can survive the first five years
of starvation, the second five years they will work
you to death and if you survive those five years then
in the tenth through fifteenth years you will really
get to enjoy your career. You will pick and choose
what you want to do.”
Washburne says he is fortunate because he hit New York
City’s pavement playing. When Washburne first arrived
in the Big Apple it was easy for a good musician to
land gigs playing with Latin groove oriented bands. He
notes that it was during the second five year segment
of his career that he started playing between eight
and fifteen gigs per week (yes you read that
correctly). “I was working seven nights per week just
running myself ragged but I was making money and
getting lots of opportunities,” he says.
Washburne believes that the key to success for a jazz
artist today is to remain flexible about the types of
music you play, where you will play and most
importantly not to get discouraged. He then gives me a
peek at his own schedule for this particular week. The
week includes playing with a Machito band in the
Bronx, performing with his ensemble at Smoke Jazz Club
and Lounge, doing a private function with a jazz trio,
a recording session with a funk band and for good
measure throwing in playing Klezmer music at a Jewish
temple. The week winds up with a music festival.
When it comes time to write original charts artists
take various approaches to their compositions, for
some it is a cathartic experience, some are inspired
by another piece of music and still others draw upon
personal experiences. Washburne says his approach to
composition is a combination of all three. He did let
me in however on the story behind one of his songs,
“Pink”. “In “Pink” the opening gesture on the piano is
taken from a Chu Chu Valdez recording. Chu Chu is
another big hero of mine and he plays this groove that
is just so great,” says Washburne.
Washburne’s 2003 project Paradise In Trouble was
written in the aftermath of 9/11. He says, “For the
artists who were living in New York City at the time
it was a very trying experience because a lot of
things were cancelled. When 9/11 happened nobody
wanted to play anyway. The last thing on my mind for
the weeks following 9/11 was to perform. Everyone just
wanted to leave.”
You might say Washburne and his band members had their
mettle put to the test as they had a regular gig a few
days following the tragedy. “I didn’t want to be there
and none of my guys did either. We decided to go and
play and the place was absolutely packed, not with
tourists which is the norm but with New Yorkers,
people who lived in the neighborhood. They wanted to
convene, share experiences or perhaps not talk about
it at all. (People just) needed to commune,” he says.
It was a defining moment for Washburne, “At that
moment I realized the powerful role and essential role
that musicians have in society. Those people needed us
to play. They needed us to be there and we had no
choice in the matter. It really didn’t matter what we
played either. It wasn’t a matter of us choosing
repertoire that was happy, it was just being there and
playing for them. It was some of the best performing
experiences that I have had in New York City.”
About the CD Paradise In Trouble Washburne says, “It
is really a tribute to the city that I live in and the
city that I love. It was in turmoil. In some ways for
a jazz musician New York City is a paradise. (It is
also) a paradise for a lot of other people. I saw it
as a paradise that was shaken at its very roots, to
its very core. At that point it was clear that we were
in trouble and we still are. We haven’t come out of
that trouble.”
In the wake of 9/11 Washburne became more vocal in
terms of speaking out concerning political issues.
“The new release Land Of Nod is all political. I got
to the point where I couldn’t avoid making a political
statement with my music. I feel pretty disempowered
within my country as to how we interact with the rest
of the world. Musicians are world travelers; we travel
all over the place and interact with world cultures,
way more so than I think our politicians do. In some
ways we are on the front lines and see the reactions.
We see how people are reacting in other places. Those
are our audience members and we care about it. I just
felt I might not be able to make a lot of difference
but maybe I could make a little bit of a difference by
the music that I record, the messages that I put forth
and also on the stage,” he says.
“Land of Nod is a phrase that I took from Jonathan
Swift. The Land of Nod is about a place where all the
inhabitants walk around in a slumberous state. The way
that I perceive my music is that I am trying to make a
wake up call to those who are asleep at the wheel and
not paying attention to what is really going on,” says
Washburne.
Source:
http://www.jazzpolice.com/content/view/6520/117/
Luis Moreno
http://www.jazzbuffalo.com
