When he last visited the Montreal International Jazz Festival in 2019, he was still called Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah. At the dawn of his 40th birthday, he is now Chief Adjuah, the new chief of the Xodokan nation, resulting from the meeting between the slaves who freed themselves from their chains and the First Nations peoples in this region of the American South that is Louisiana. These maroons have a centuries-old musical tradition that is at the heart of the new creative cycle that the brilliant composer and trumpeter is about to initiate, in concert on the evening of July 5 at the Monument-National.
It appears Chief Adjuah, the voice of the modern American jazz scene, hasn’t spent his pandemic watching Netflix. “Oh yes, you will hear some new material! promises the sympathetic musician, happy to reconnect with the Montreal public, which he has frequented since the beginning of his career. “From February 2023, we will present three new original albums”, his second trilogy, which appears six years later The Centennial Trilogy.
The first album, “probably the one I’ve had the most fun to record in my career”, will combine this ancestral repertoire of the Black Indians with the blues and rock of the 21ste century ; Adjuah registers the second album “in the canon of what I have already presented”, a jazz with a resolutely modern approach integrating synthetic instruments, effects pedals and hip-hop references, but anchored to the African rhythms which gave birth to the blues. and jazz in his hometown, New Orleans — a record in the spirit of the double album recorded live Axiomreleased in the summer of 2020 and which, through its long and shimmering grooves, evokes the rich Creole and African musical tradition of the cradle of jazz.
The third album in this series, which he presents as being musically very varied, but thematically united, “underlines the perspective of women in our culture, through their music, their compositions. It doesn’t have a title yet, but it will be released this summer, ”adds the musician, specifying that he has finished recording the three albums.
Modernity and tradition
Another not trivial detail: on the first of the three discs, Chief Adjuah does not play any trumpet. It is that in addition to having composed and recorded this trilogy, he also spent his pandemic inventing two new musical instruments, baptized Adjuah bows. One electric, the other acoustic, which he plays on this first disc and which he can’t wait to show to the audience on Tuesday evening.
“Imagine a version of the XXIe century of traditional instruments, something between the kora and the ngoni [sorte de petite guitare traditionnelle d’Afrique de l’Ouest], these instruments that the slaves brought and which are the basis of the blues. I wanted to create a version of these instruments that was of our time, really cool and modern,” says Chief Adjuah, who asked kora master Amadou Kouyaté for advice on designing this unique instrument.
Well, it’s one thing to invent an instrument that didn’t exist, at least not in this form, but it’s another to then learn to play it, isn’t it? “Of course, but you know, basically, I grew up in an environment where lots of different instruments were lying around everywhere,” he replies, referring in particular to his uncle Donald Harrison Jr, a composer and saxophonist who, among other things, exploits, joined Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers in the 1980s and recorded a handful of albums with a quintet he co-led with trumpeter Terence Blanchard.
“Besides, I always knew that an ancient memory lived in these instruments. When I take these instruments in my hands, I have the feeling that someone of my ancestors has played them before; these instruments have never seemed foreign to me. That said, I actually had to spend a lot of time with great players like Amadou to learn how to master this instrument. I am very excited to present this new sound to you! »
memory and history
On the album AxiomChief Adjuah and his orchestra took over an original composition taken from his album Stretch Music (2015) titled The Last Chieftaindedicated to the memory of his grandfather Big Chief Donald Harrison Sr, memory that he keeps alive by accepting in turn the title of chieftain of the Xodokan nation.
“It’s a title that comes with several responsibilities, some are clearly established, others that I will have to learn with experience, explains Adjuah. In general, during ceremonies such as Carnival or Mardi Gras, the chief leads his nation, his community or his district during the processions. The chief figure embodies the image of the father of the family, fatherhood. However, it is not only a title of representative of a community before the other chiefs of nations, but also a model for the people of our nation or our community, in addition to the spiritual dimension, the chief embodying all the history bequeathed to us by our ancestors. »