Bandung finally has its own party that makes its 207th anniversary very special. The party is called Seni Bandung #1, served grand for one full month, from 25 October to 25 November 2017 by presenting 5 art forms such as MUSIC, VISUAL ART, THEATRE, SCULPTURE and DANCE, integratedly. This festival involves around 2500 artists spread on over 600 events at 48 different locations around Bandung (conventional and public areas). “A Collaborative Arts Event” is the theme, underlining the collaborative work ethics which shows the characteristic in Bandung’s world of arts. The title given to this first installment is “Air, Tanah dan Udara” (Water, Earth and Air).

We are honored to be chosen as one of the representatives in music, particularly jazz. We have been running our own regular jazz community event for more than 4 years by holding a mission to push the regeneration and development of this particular genre. Looking at the fact that jazz is actually accepted as one of the art forms in Bandung motivates us to keep going and would be happy to walk extra mile.

As one of the characteristics of jazz is its openness towards local music, it’s easy to find jazz assimilating with Sundanese traditional music which has been going on for some decades. What’s great is that the combination have limitless possibilities and variations. Different band has different way to fuse it with their own formula and portion, creating many delightful styles of Sundanese jazz. One of the evidence is the ensemble we featured in the first part (13 October 2017), where Sundanese traditional music found its harmony with the diatonic-based Minangkabau (West Sumatra) music inside progressive, chromatic jazz fusion. This combination was played by West Java Syndicate collaborating with Palanta Line Art and 11 year-old wonder girl, Nadine Adrianna.

Now we are ready to roll with the second part. It’s scheduled exactly a week after the first one, on 20 October 2017. It’s going to be served at another popular hangout place in Bandung, the Cikapundung River Spot starting from 3:30 pm onwards. We have prepared some of the best talents we found in Bandung jazz scene over the past several years who have supported and gave their best shot to our regular event: Nayra Dharma Group and Sasadana.

First, let’s take a closer look at the mind-bending band of young stunts, Sasadana. This band was built upon the freedom and fun way of play which certainly never sticked too tightly into any particular genre. It was born in 2013 by a circle of high school and junior high school friends. As you can see, they were still boys, but what they showed with this band was beyond believe. Everytime they appeared, they exceeded anyone’s expectation. They were like bunch of kids playing in the fun park, throwing the laughters, jokes and sounding their instruments producing amusing, highly entertaining performance.

4 years passed, the band is still in business. Just like life, they have had some ups and downs, but what’s really important is they are still alive and kickass. The founders Pangestu Hning Bhawana (violin), Rifky Adam Rahman (bass) and Diaz ‘Digun’ Guntara (drum/tatabeuhan) still stand tall inside the band, plus a cute young lady positioned on keys: Ratih Putria who has been joining the team for some times now.

Having a violinist in front with colorful backgrounds, a young girl who could surprise people with her key-ploration and the wicked connection between the bass and drum, spontaneous jokes and play from Sasadana guarantee a highly entertaining show. This band is really liquid, so liquid that they could let you taste the madness of traditional music from Sundanese, Balinese and beyond, and the modern western music from jazz, blues, rock, rock and roll and so on back and forth before you notice.

Like the West Java Syndicate we featured in the first part, the Sasadana has the tendency to explore the archipelago too, even across nations with their own style and way. If you have seen them you should know what we mean, but if you haven’t seen them, do come and see why we really have to feature them in an event as important as this. Three playful boys and one girl who deceives you with her cute look, Sasadana redefines what music entertainment should be like.

The second featured band we are proud to mention is Nayra Dharma Group. Nayra Dharma, the leader of the band is a 17 year-old singing guitarist. As she was born right in the millenium, you probably could tell that she should have been around the scene not that long, and that’s true. She began appearing in public just two years ago, shortly after she decided to have a career as a musician like her daddy, maestro Pra Budidharma, the co-founder of superband Krakatau.

We have featured her from the beginning of her career, since she was still playing solo. But then, she has been progressing and evolving really fast, probably the fastest we have seen so far. Inheriting the DNA from his father, Nayra equipped herself with technique and skill fast. But that’s not only because of it, because she is commited and passionate in playing music. While girls her age mostly love to hangout with friends, she spends hours and hours everyday to practice. She plays guitar like a pro, taking on complex compositions from jazz and bossanova songbooks and surprisingly sing too at the same time. From solo to trio (with bass and drum), then changing the formation to guitar-keyboard and bass, from using just guitar to combine it with ukulele.

She emerges fast as she got the chance to play alongside so many jazz giants which surely helps in enhancing her maturity as a musician and performer. It’s certainly fascinating to watch her transformation. We have mentioned her before as the female Joe Pass due to her guitar playing style, but now we like more to describe her progress as ‘Nayravolution’ based on the rapid (and daring) changes she has been making in a very short period.

Recently she decided to change her band’s name from using ‘Trio’ to Nayra Dharma Group. This change would enable her to extend her formation as much as she likes. The recent trio formation (without drum) is still kept, but now she has added kendang that could really spice her concept up.

For this event, the young key-wiz Jason Limanjaya will be standing side by side with her. Nayra and Jason are the key of the group, so in whatever formation they bring, these two have to be present. From what we have seen, even when they appear only as a duo, they could already serve attractive appearance.

Once again, our second participation in Seni Bandung #1 is set to go on Friday, 20 October 2017, starting at 3:30 pm at CIKAPUNDUNG RIVER SPOT, Bandung. As always, this event is totally FREE of any charge. Alrighty, hope to see you there!

Based on our experience in covering jazz events, we learn that consistency is the one of the most important key to have a successful one. It’s not easy, definitely. It takes strength, persistency, or even sacrifice to make things work especially when the event’s just started. But one day you will find it’s all worth it. Usually, a regular jazz event contributes a great deal to jazz development in local area, which in the end gives benefit to bigger scene, even globally. As the habit of jazz is absorbing any local traditional music, it can even give birth to new jazz breed.

For a multi-ethnic province like North Sumatra, a regular jazz event can open up a big opportunity to introduce the richness of the cultures living in it to the global world, including the traditional music. We are proud that this province already has its own annual jazz event which has been running for 7 years in a row. This international-scaled jazz event is growing bigger and better each year. It serves variety of jazz from the traditional to modern, but it has been involving or introducing local ethnic musics too in each edition. Taking place in Medan, the capital of the province, the event’s called NORTH SUMATRA JAZZ FESTIVAL.

In previous editions they have presented many great bands/artists from Indonesia, even some superbands and legends from the chairman’s band Erucakra & C Man, Sherly O, Fusion Stuff, Bintang Indrianto Trio++, Rieka Roslan, Yovie Widianto Fusion, Ligro, Donny Suhendra Project, Balawan, Iwanouz, Agam Hamzah with Rafli Wa Saja, Reza Artamevia, Bertha, Teza Sumendra, Barry Likumahuwa, Echa Soemantri, Ricad Hutapea to Keenan Nasution, Emerald BEX and Krakatau Reunion. From the international source, this event has invited shining international musicians from around the world such as from Norway: Espen Eriksen Trio, from Malaysia: Steve Thornton and Suhu, from Korea: Phil Yoon Group and from USA: native Lebanese Jamal Mohamed, Jonathan Jones and Jeff Lorber.

This year the 7th North Sumatra Jazz Festival has just done successfully. Like before, this edition presented the combination of the top stars and experienced musicians from national and international scene without leaving the local musicians and the ethnic music found in it. This year they invited one of the most shining artists in Indonesia today coming from Bandung, Tulus. Then, a classical maestro who has been living in Medan for many years, Ed van Ness, continuing his magical work together with the founder of the festival, Erucakra Mahameru. Erucakra also acted as the homeband with his phenomenal band, Erucakra & C Man. There were also Indonesian Idol’s alumnus from Medan, Chelsea Hadi who managed to reach the top 20 in this competition in 2014 and a special project Mahasora which involved a singing an rapping DJ also from Medan, Steven Aldo representing the EDM Jazz Jamming with Indian instrument.

Just like the previous editions, the Grand Ballroom of JW Marriott’s lobby was already full of crowds from all ages long before the show started.

The show started with classical music veteran Ed Van Ness feat Erucakra C Man. Spent most of his age being a violinist, conductor, writer and teacher in Medan than New Jersey where he’s originally came from, Van Ness continued his project with Erucakra on jazz and Indian classical music living legend Terrence Mitchell ‘Terry’ Riley’s famous composition from 1964: “In C”. They have launched “Terry Riley ‘In C’ part I a while ago, now the audience got a golden chance to enjoy the Pat II of this project.

It’s really nice to see the violin-guitar duet performed by van Ness and Erucakra, two maestros from different world. It takes guts, courage and creativity to pin a monumental work like this, but both Erucakra and van Ness surprisingly did a marvelous job. Not only they delivered the masterpiece in full respect, they managed to breath fresh air into it by combining their skill, ability and experience. They showed that when jazz and classical collides, it can create a whole different soundscape especially when it comes from the hands of maestros like them.

The evergreen “Summertime” was the next delightful treat from this unique collaboration.

Erucakra & C Man then got its turn. Before we carry on with their performance, let’s take a closer look on this band. The C Man band was established in 2011 by Erucakra following his success with “Aranti’s Code” and the album “Marathon Journey C Man” over major digital outlets. They have landed on the Java Jazz Festival in 2011 and proudly participated in Yongin Global Jazz Festival (2015) and Daegu International Jazz Festival (2016). How many jazz band from Medan could achieve such greatness? This band did it. That’s why we say this band is phenomenal.

Though we’ve seen their performance every year in this event, there are always new things we got from this great Neo Progressive band. This year, in two of his own composition “Question of the Moment” and “Hold On”, Erucakra also showed his diverse talent as a lead vocalist.

Chelsea Hadi then joined the party. As we mentioned earlier, this girl reached the top 40 in Indonesian Idol 2014. She might have been famous with this shining achievement, but she also became the finalist of Indonesia Mencari Bakat and Bintang Asik Global TV and has sung with the likes of Titi DJ, Krisdayanti and Petra Sihombing. With Erucakra & C Man, Chelsea lit up the stage with Stevie Wonder’s medley “I Wish” and “Isn’t She Lovely”.

Then came Erucakra’s new arrangement “Wak Uteh”, sang by Tito. This song was made playful with thick North Sumatra – especially the Medan’s Malay tribe ethnic music. Erucakra ended his performance with one of his finest, “Balap Liar”. Brian Harefa was on fire with his saxophone, resulting a superb performance, the best we have seen from him so far.

After an appearance of the Governor of North Sumatra, the audience got histerical. Why? Because the most awaited artist, one of the most popular superstars in today’s time, Tulus finally came onto the stage! His satin-smooth, thick soulful crooning voice is like no one else. He makes songs with ear-catchy melody and poetic lyrics. He has a really familiar and connected stage appearance and a tremendous team. These are the keys of his success that makes him stands as who he is today.

Tulus gave his fans a moment to remember by singing his greatest hits from all his albums such as “Gajah”, “Batu”, “Monokrom”, “Ruang Sendiri”, “Tukar Jiwa”, “Sepatu”, “Cahaya”, “Teman Hidup”, and the song that made him a superstar, “Sewindu”. Not only singing, Tulus also took three lucky fans up on stage and going to the audience’s seats.

Many audience started leaving the ballroom probably because they already felt satisfy with Tulus’ show. Actually, the 7th North Sumatra Jazz Festival still got one final performance: Mahasora. Appearing with three personnels; Steven Aldo, Devin Giovani and Wisnu Bangun, this unique band might be the first group to blend Karo ethnic music – one of the most popular genres in North Sumatra that mostly needs only one keyboard in ethnic events and wedding ceremonies –, Indian music with the touch of Tabla (Indian/South Asian membranophone percussion instrument and EDM. The music they created was really different. We say, this unique concept of jazz-jamming played by Mahasora really needs to be explored more to enrich the local North Sumatra music scene and can be used to introduce the diversity of cultures found in this province to the world. With this stunning show, this year’s edition reached the end.

The North Sumatra Jazz Festival 2017 continued what has been built since 7 years ago. True, this event has presented some of the best local and international artists, but let’s not forget that this event has highlighted the traditional musics from tribes living in its land. We think it’s very important because not only it will create new style, jazz as the universal language can bring the traditional musics to be accepted by the modern societies and be promoted widely throughout the world. We congratulate Erucakra and everyone behind this event. Thanks to them, we can hope for a bright future of jazz in North Sumatra and the capital city Medan. Keep up the good work, hope to see you again next year!

See more pictures:

Reporter and photographer: Daniel Irawan
Editor: Riandy Kurniawan   .

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Bandung city got a very special gift for its 207th anniversary. For the first time Bandung held a grand festival for not a day or two but one full month involving 5 art forms: MUSIC, VISUAL ART, THEATRE, SCULPTURE and DANCE, integratedly. It’s called SENI BANDUNG #1. There are around 2500 artists in 600 events, spreading on 48 different locations around Bandung, both conventional and public areas. The theme is “A Collaborative Arts Event”, underlining the collaborative work ethics which shows the characteristic in Bandung’s world of arts. The title given to this first installment is “Air, Tanah dan Udara” (Water, Earth and Air).

What’s interesting is that the fest doesn’t only cover traditional arts but also contemporary, even those who are originally not from Bandung or Indonesia. Jazz for example, is a music style originated in America around the turn of the 20th century. But as it’s spread aroun the world, this intoxicating music is now belong to the world, especially since jazz has the ‘habit’ to blend with regional, local music cultures everywhere it’s landed. This ‘habit’ has been giving rise to many distinctive style which is still going on until now.

So what about Bandung? Proud to say that historically speaking, Bandung is one of cities where jazz first came in. So, Bandung and jazz has been having historical connection for many decades. Today This city never runs out of jazz players, and speaking of jazz style, Bandung has it all, including the fuse between jazz and traditional Sundanese music or any other ethnics. Based on these facts, jazz is indeed a part of Bandung’s art forms, especially music. The committee and Bandung’s government seem to realize that too as they included jazz in this one full month art fest.

After running a regular monthly jazz community event for more than 4 years with many things to be proud of, we are thankful to be selected as one of jazz representatives for this event. For us it’s an acknowledgement that encourages us to keep going.

For Seni Bandung #1 we were listed as a part of “Musik Interupsi” series. It’s called like that because the committee has the idea of interrupting the daily activities happening in a spot with good quality music. We set the lineup by inviting bands who we think could suit the concept, also those who have unique concept and stand as some of the best we got so far from our regular community events.

We got two schedules, Friday 13 October and 20 October 2017 both took place at the public (hangout) places. For each part we presented two shows that contained traditional Sundanese music inside progressive fusion jazz, and also those who recently have given fine contributions towards Bandung (West Java)’s music as a part of its art world.

Let’s see the part one first, located at Dalem Kaum street. Here we invited a nu soul diva who recently made a remarkable breakthrough with her single after a year of ‘absence’ from wide public appearance and a mind-bending cross Sundanese-Minangkabau ensemble who locked themselves up inside a progressive jazz fusion, featuring an 11 year-old wonder girl on piano.

Appearing first was the no soul diva, Agis Kania. She found success as a part of vintage Gypsy Swing group Satura and even better as a dynamic duo Agis Bape, but her career actually began much earlier when she was still in tender age, not in any modern western music but in pop Sundanese.

After her duo Agis Bape reached the end of the line, she decided to step out off the spotlight for a while. After around a year, one day she was contacted by Ajier T-Five who offered her a composition, asking her to add up the lyrics and sing it. She fell in love instantly with the song. She directly wrote the lyrics and did the recordings, amazingly all was done only in just 2 hours. The song’s titled “Baby You”, made with love within tasty, steamy Nu Soul. This song already has the videoclip (watch it here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CM3RyTUbMU4) and officially launched in our event Braga Jazz Night #36 (http://jazzuality.com/jazz-event-report/braga-jazz-night-36-ramadhan-edition-the-report/). This song has been doing really, really well over the top digital outlets and received praises from her friends and fans. In just 3 months, 16.000 people have listened, it’s been downloaded by many, with 70% of them were from other countries. That’s a remarkable achievement.

For this event she performed in minimalist formation, together with keyboardist Aria Nugraha. The cool after the rain weather created a perfect atmosphere for Agis’ smooth, mellow soulful selection. Look at what she started with: Brian McKnight’s “Another You.” Don’t you think this song, under the voice of the lady of soul would match? Romantic, relaxing, dreamy, but that’s not all because the audience also admired her voice as Agis and Aria received applauses and cheers.

Then Agis chose two Sundanese (folk)songs for two reasons: one, she wanted to share a part of her career when she sang Pop Sundanese around 2002, and two, she wanted to fit her repertoires to Bandung’s art fest. The songs were Iyar Wiyarsih’s “Mojang Priyangan” and Benny Corda’s “Bubuy Bulan”, rearranged in sweet Soul Jazz by them, played beautifully by Aria.

Agis then sang “You and I”. Some of you might have remembered the Michael Buble version from 2005, but originally the song was written by Stevie Wonder which can be found in his 1972 album, “Talking Book”. She effortlessly built the momentum, climbing the notes until she reached the end with stunning climax. For the last song, she sang her most recent hit, “Baby You” and showed why this song could become a global hit on the digital platforms. This song has everything needed to be a global Nu Soul hit. Catchy melody, cool mid-tempo beat, sexy lyrics, lovely arrangement, it’s current and built within a strong soulful voice with character. She received huge appreciation from the crowds.

Agis is a top-notch jazz and blues singer. She has the old soul just like the jazz and blues ladies in the golden era. That’s true. She even admits that eventhough she could sing anything, jazz always has a very special place in her heart. But when it’s about Nu Soul, this modern soul movement seems to represent her the best at present time. Her voice has a very thick, pure soulful character just like fine singers who were born and raised out there in the land where this music was originated. Even appearing only with a keyboardist is not a problem for her since her voice is already like an orchestra.

This big breakthrough of Agis will make her being exposed not only nationally but also internationally, as we heard she got offers to build her career abroad. It certainly makes us happy when we see a friend finally receives the recognition she deserves after long, struggling years. And if you want to know another important reason of why we invited her to represent our community for Seni Bandung #1, we see her as a perfect example of Bandung’s success story in arts especially music.

The second round was crazy. There’s a group of madmen who played music borderless inside a multi-dimensional horizons. On one foot they embrace the mystical Sundanese world of music, but on the other one they dig modern western music from jazz, blues, rock even rock and roll. The gang consisting of founder Zahar Mustilaq (drum), YD Nafis (keys), Dede SP (bass), Randy Gevenk (traditional woodwinds) and the youngest IpinZbet (kendang), together as West Java Syndicate.

It didn’t take long for them to find the blending formula after they were formed in 2010. But what’s good about this band is, they keep evolving. You can listen to their transformation from the first EP “Album Leutik” to the just-released “Bubuka”. But they don’t stop there, because they also dare to explore another traditional realm from West Sumatra. With Maspon Herizal and his solid team Palanta Line Art, the West Java Syndicate has been having fun in finding the harmony between pentatonic and diatonic, optimizing the role of Minangkabau’s traditional instrument talempong (small kettle gongs) played by Sandy Ndunk and Kiki Septian along with the ancient woodwinds mastered by Maspon. This year this unique combination has performed a couple of times, from the Asian-African Carnival 2017 to our event, the Braga Jazz Night.

For this event, two of the members of West Java Syndicate was missing: Randy is still studying in China and Ipin was having an exam. But that’s not a problem, they even widened the pallette by having not one but two sets of talempongs, sets of Minangkabau traditional woodwinds played by Sandi Ndung and Kiky Septian. If that’s not enough, they also got an 11 year-old wonder girl who has collaborated with them earlier, pianist Nadine Adrianna. This combination created an ace composition and the unique musical texture like no others.

After Agis’ sexy, smooth Nu Soul Jazz music, the mood quickly changed with strong Minangkabau rhythmical patterns. They began from 50 meters in front of the stage, playing some of the kettle gongs and woodwinds as they made their way to the stage. Zahar guarded the steps with strong syncopatic drum beating. Then, when all gathered on stage, they quickly locked with “Bubuka”, the title track of the new album. We have heard the original version which purely made in modern, progressive Sundanese fusion, but here the version got splashes of Minangkabau music. Throwing a killing punch for a start made them quickly gained lots of audience. Many of the audience recorded their performance by using their smart phones/gadgets.

For the second song, they played a song written by the 11 year-old Nadine, “Harewos Bulan”. Imagine a complex pentatonic-based song made by a girl so young to honor the late Riza Arshad, then played by a cross ensemble like this, it was totally magnificent. As this is Nadine’s song, she got a lot of space to fly freely, which she took happily with manic improvisations, twists and manouvers. This girl is magic!

Then, it’s time to hear the epic composition from Maspon, “Andalas Raya”. Opening the song with saluang (traditional bamboo flute), this song invited us into a glorious journey through the landscapic hills of Minangkabau land. As usual, Zahar kept on laughing and shouting, boosting the spirit of his mates and made the performance really fun to watch. For the last song, they invited Agis Kania to join them for Guruh Soekarnoputra’s “Zamrud Khatulistiwa.” As the late Chrisye later made the song popular again, the song is still very well known. Many of the audience sang along and in the end gave them loud applause.

Having out of the world collaboration like this shows the creative side of Bandung at max, and for us gives a solid proof that there are still many things to explore in music. This multi-generation team has done magnificent cohesive works that creates a new hybrid. They build the bridge connecting the diatonic land of Minangkabau and pentatonic Sundanese, and let us ride on it with modern, progressive vehicle. That is why we think the West Java Syndicate Collaboration has to mark their existance in Bandung’s grand art fest.

A week later, on 20 October we proceed with the second part of our contribution. Due to some problems, the venue was moved to another location, the Cikapundung River Spot. Eventhough we love the first location, this new one is very interesting due to the huge historical contain this place has. From what we learnt, this is the very spot where the civilization in Bandung began thousands of years ago. We felt happy that we had the chance to bring jazz to where everything started. This time presenting another two bands: the new format of 17 year-old girl’s band and a spontaneous crossover band consisting of youngsters.

Let’s begin with the first act: Nayra Dharma Group. This group is the continuation of Nayra Dharma Trio, the band owned by a young girl talented in jazz guitar playing and sing, Nayra Dharma. She began not that long ago, only around two years earlier but she hatched fast, gracing many stages in just a short time. From appearing alone, she formed a trio involving bass and drum. Then she changed the format, replacing drum with keyboard which for us is a brave move since not many band dare to form a band without having any drummer.

Lately she thought of expanding the concept with more player in. Because of that, she changed the name from ‘Trio’ to ‘Group’, allowing her to have the number of players as she wishes. At present time this group actually grows by adding up a kendang player. We planned to bring this new formation, however, due to some reasons the bassist and kendang player canceled their participation. It’s quite unfortunate, but above all, Nayra Dharma and the expressive key-wiz Jason Limanjaya are the core of the group. That’s what’s important for us.

Just like the first event, we had to wait until the rain stopped to run. People started coming soon after, ready to enjoy the show. The sweet, smooth swingin’ bossa music from the dynamic duo was really perfect for a cool, after-rain late afternoon. Antonio Carlos ‘Tom’ Jobim’s classic, “Wave” was the song. Then they moved way back to year 1934 when a famous jazz standard, “Stompin’ at the Savoy” was made. If some of us are familiar with the grand big band version from the likes of Benny Goodman or Chick Webb, or maybe through the magic hands of Art Tatum, this song is actually nice to play by using the combination of guitar and keyboard. Just like the first song, Nayra demonstrated her ability to sing and playing guitar in fingerstyle at the same time.

Stevie Wonder’s “Isn’t She Lovely” was their next presentation. The more familiar song like this one made some of the audience sang along and swayed gently. Then Nayra and Jason picked a song mostly related to Billie Holiday, “The End of a Love Affair”. Not many people might remember this song nowadays especially in Indonesia, so it was a very nice reminder for us, delivered beautifully by them. They moved back to bossa, playing another Jobim’s classic “How Insensitive” that put us deeper into the chillax mood. For the last song they invited young guitarist Anjuan Julio who happened to be there to join them. From two to three, they expanded their musical canvas to play “Four”, a Miles Davis’ song. Anjuan demonstrated his ability in singing what he plays on guitar. Then, Nayra, Jason and Anjuan did cool three-ways trading that drew cheers and applauses from the audience. With this song, they sealed their performance in such style.

The combination of Swing and Brazilian from two connected young is able to create such beautiful preentation. Smooth, sweet, but clearly contains skill and feel. It’s a demonstration of playing music effortlessly which actually is very important in jazz. Both Jason and Nayra, then anjuan who joined them in the end play as simple and natural as drawing a breath. That makes everyone in there, even those who are not really into jazz could accept and feel their music. For us, they can become an example of how success could happen from such young age. Cute, charismatic, female singing fingerstyle guitarist with his genius compatriote behind the keyboard is a great pairing, full of charm and solid. Nice, really nice.

The second round was a band formed back then by a circle of friends consisting of high school and junior high school students called Sasadana. 4 years passed, the band’s still alive and kicking. With a little changes over the years, the band now keeps its existance by having 4 musicians: the founders Pangestu Hning Bhawana (violin), Rifky Adam Rahman (bass) and Diaz Guntara ‘Digun’ (drum/tatabeuhan), and a cute and beautiful young lady positioned on keys: Ratih Putria. Joining them was a lovely lady with powerful voice, Tiara Effendy.

From smooth, chillax show of Nayra Dharma Group, Sasadana took us into a wild, joyride right from the start. All of them including Tiara delivered a cool mashup of JavaJazz’s “Bulan di Atas Asia (Moon Over Asia)” and Indonesian folk song from Sulawesi, “O Ina Ni Keke”. It’s a surprising blend as these songs are not similiar at all, yet they mashed it perfectly. They bagged loud of applause. Since the praying call was about to come, Sasadana had to pause their performance for a while.

After around 15 minutes break, they came back again and delivered their original composition named after the group, “Sasadana”. Pumped fusion song became a jolly playground for them, which suits the name which more or less means: sounds as free as their wish. For the next song they brought us to the West Sumatra by playing a folk song from that land, “Ayam Den Lapeh”. Again, like a bunch of kids having fun in a park, they played freely with lots of laughters, changing the beat, the tempo, twisted the song up side down, resulting one helluva performance.

Ratih might be petite and cute, but she is wild on the keys. Diaz worked perfectly as the beat factory, throwing all kinds of beat which amazingly locked cohesively with Rifky’s basslines. As for the motor, Gypsy violinist Estu he controls everything to ensure the finest products. He is also attractive and expressive in front.

Tiara was called to be with them for a very interesting cover of “Djanger Bali”. Tiara sang it out loud, capturing all the mystical nuances together with the free-flowing sounds from the band. It looked like they spent all their energy on this song, but it turned out that it wasn’t the last song, because they took us into one last ride, rockin’ and rollin’ with The Beatles’ “Come Together”.

Right near the end came a surprise. There was a lady suddenly arrived on the scene, dancing merrily while holding two koi fish painting. She placed the painting on the left and right side of the stage then continued dancing with scarf. This scene created what the Seni Bandung #1 is all about: celebrating variety of arts collaboratively. With her appearance, we got music, dance, painting and theatrical act altogether. What a scene!

Sasadana is the kind of band that doesn’t like to be trapped in any particular genre. They all have colorful backgrounds which has been shaping them to be explorative (and at times, explosive) musicians. What’s amazing is, their crossover style happens spontaneously based on where their hearts lead them to. In just one solid, clean-cut strike, you can find jazz, blues, rock, Sundanese even Balinese coming out of their instruments in harmony. What’s also cool is that they have high entertaining factor. They like to joke, playing around just like a bunch of kids enjoying their moment in the fun park. That makes their performance often brings laughters, loud cheers and applause as the audience don’t only enjoy the music but also their stage act.

Based on the skill, the multi-colored music style, the fun factor, the energy and dynamics, we just believe we have bring them in our participation for Seni Bandung #1 Festival. People has to know that crossover music doesn’t always have to be complex and difficult to chew, it can also appear as a joyride for everyone. They proved us right. Look at how they gained love from the crowds.

We feel blessed by this invitation to be a part of the Seni Bandung #1. In this very special fest, we wanted to show the rich, multi-colored jazz existed in Bandung, the talented musicians who live in this city to penetrate the public, presented by some of the best performances in our regular community events throughout the years. The combination of experienced musicians and daring young guns, the collaborative acts, mind-bending concepts and fine jazz crafts hopefully would let everyone know that jazz, as a part of Bandung’s creative art is still pulsing and progressing healthily. We hope we have sent the message right.

On behalf of Jazzuality.com and jazz in Bandung, we thank the committee for having us in. We hope this event to continue for more years to come. It feels great to see a creative city like Bandung now has its own party that embraces all kinds of arts from music, visual art, theatre, sculpture and dance integratedly. As a part of music, jazz has been doing really well over the years, and we are happy to have the chance to contribute in it. Thank you, see you again next year.

See more pictures:

Reporter/photographer: Riandy Kurniawan
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We began the Braga Jazz Night (formerly known as Braga Jazz Walk) in September 2014, now we have reached the 40th edition. Showcasing 3 or 4 bands in one edition, that means we have featured hundreds of bands and musicians. Some of them started from our stage, we still remember when they were still shy and fought to overcome the stage fright, but now they have succeed in running their career. Some have played alongside mega stars, even top international musicians, gracing prestigious jazz festivals or making their way to perform abroad. There are very young musicians too who now appear on TV shows, commercials and so on.

Everyone can use our stage to practice what they have learnt, try new concept, new band, gain more experience or promoting their movement. It’s an event where everyone can make themselves at home. This event is just a small community event, but it has bore good fruits. This month the Jazzuality Community was also chosen to participate in Bandung’s grand fest, Seni Bandung #1 representing jazz as a part of art forms found in Bandung. We are happy to see jazz is accepted as one of the arts. All of these motivates us to keep going for the sake of Bandung or even Indonesian jazz development.

In this Braga Jazz Night #40 once again we gave support to the young musicians, not only those who live in Bandung but also from the capital city, Jakarta. All young, all passionate, all skillful and has big potential. We wouldn’t be surprised if they stand as the top stars in the near future, we’d be happy that they were once found on our stage.

Performing first is the 11 year-old wonder girl, Nadine Adrianna with her trio simply called after her name, NADINE ADRIANNA TRIO. This girl started from this event, when she was still 8 years old. From playing solo, we encouraged her to form her own group and write songs. She did that in no time, with remarkable result.

If you listen to her compositions, you would be surprised that the songs were written by a little girl. Not long after that, she joined The BFG and landed on the Java Jazz Festival earlier this year. She didn’t just perform but also joined the after midnight jam session where she played with the likes of Maurice Brown. She then went to Bali and mentored by Indra Lesmana. While she was there, she got the chance to perform here and there with Sandy Winarta, Indra Gupta and Kevin Suwandhi. Now she occassionally plays with West Java Syndicate, a band who put their feet on both traditional ethnic and modern, progressive fusion jazz. Isn’t it difficult? She says yes it is, but it’s really fun as well. And she loves it.

What we haven’t mentioned is at the present time she also has her own trio. This latest formation with Jere Fernando (bass) and Shallom Tangki (drum) has been running for a year. This team is rock solid with strong chemistry. Here in this edition, finally we got the chance to introduce them to the jazzuality universe.

We still remember when she did her very first composition honoring Wayne Shorter titled “Wayne Street”. Two years passed, she now has a lot of compositions which are not only improved but also rich in variety, interestingly inspired from everything she found in her daily life. For this gig we got the chance to enjoy her masterpieces, especially the new ones.

Nadine, Jere and Shallom started with “Coconut Jam”, served grand in swing. Starting from the second song “Rabbit”, Gilang joined the trio and added more tone with his tasty trumpet sound. These band which is led by a little girl played like a real jazz pro in the turn of modern jazz era. If you don’t see the musicians, you wouldn’t dare to guess that this kind of music comes from musicians as young as them, and the compositions were made by an 11 year-old girl.

Nadine showed a great leadership to her team, controling the pace, the dynamic, the turn and so on. Such evidence continued to be seen in the next two songs, “30 Seconds” and “New Eleven”. All the way to the end Nadine and her mates demonstrated how fluid they are in playing jazz. All the joy, the fun, the free flowing, the dynamic and fun of improvising were captured from their performance. The audience gave high respect to Nadine and the band by pouring them cheers and applauses.

The Nadine Adrianna Trio speaks pure jazz fluently and played like a pro. The original compositions are so beautiful as if they were made by jazz giants from the golden era. It’s almost hard to believe that it all comes from a trio led by a girl who hasn’t even reached the teenage years. What’s even more unbelievable is that this girl can already play and compose pentatonic-based jazz songs which probably would still be difficult to do by musicians double or even triple her age.

Jere and Shallom are perfect to accompany her. These young musicians know exactly what to do and have strong sense of dynamics. Comparing to how she did back then, now Nadine is much more calmer, equipped with more ammos, really great in controlling the emotion and dynamics. She is much more improved! We love the trio too. We are proud to have her back along with this wonderful formation. We hope to see this trio back again some times soon.

The second session was taken by another trio, this time from Jakarta. The name is J/E/G TRIO, consisting of Joshua Alexander (bass), Ersandy Nasharizky (tenor sax) and Gearda Dewantara (guitar). These are young musicians who just began their journey but surely has everything needed to stand at the top of the game.

This trio was born after these three friends felt connected from series of jam sessions they participated in at the famous jazz community event in Depok, the Margo Friday Jazz. Ersandy has been inspired by senior saxophonist Arief Setiadi and his group, while Gearda is a proud student of guitarist Tiyo Alibasjah. If having these names as mentors is already awesome, they are also monitored by the founder of Margo Friday Jazz, legendary jazzman Benny Likumahuwa every week. These mentors have one thing in common: they play jazz with heart. They are not the kind of ‘show-off’ musicians but those who pour their feelings out into beautiful streaming of jazz. We expected the same from these young guns, and that’s what we really got after watching them on our stage.

Look at how the opened up their gig, swinging with a song from 1968 by Duke Pearson Trio: “Jeannine”. We were directly treated with sheer jazz extacy. Pure jazz played simple, elegant, honest as if it was coming from true jazz musicians who have been active for ages. Then they went on with a more famous jazz standard, “S’wonderful” that interestingly served different than usual. This new treatment makes the song appears as new. They went on swinging with another classic from many decades ago, “East of the Sun (and West of the Moon)”. Up to this point their explorative attempts were appreciated by the audience with applauses.

The next song was an original composition written by Ersandy for her father who sadly passed away just last month, “Kembali Pulang”. According to Ersandy, the song was actually got its titled here in this event. Although the song contained deep emotion, the J/E/G Trio didnt want to make it as a sad song. Instead, they made it sweet and smooth in bossa. For the last song, they covered a song from Nial Djuliarso which was written for his wife, “Hello Gib”. Again we enjoyed their easy going gestures in building up a song. A gentle song full of love landed right on point through the hands (and hearts) of these three young dudes.

Playing jazz is never about showing off your skill but how to make the audience feel what you want to share to them through music. You can play something simple, but when you have your audience feel you, they will remember it and take your performance as something special. The J/E/G Trio showed us the essence of jazz performance. They flew together smoothly and delivered the beauty of this genre pure, clear and bright.

Swing and Brazilian are their forte which they often bring altogether. They are still young, but they play like traditional jazz musicians who deeply depend on their feeling in executing each song. It makes us happy to see a swingin’ jazz band this good coming from the new generation. And for us, the way they play and their music remind us why we love jazz in first place. We really appreciate them for coming all the way from Jakarta, struggling with a terrible jam caused by the development of ‘dystopian’ new city located at the eastern part of Jakarta that forced them to spend more than 8 hours to reach us. We hope they are not traumatized and willing to be back again some times soon.

The soundscape suddenly changed in the third session. Here we featured a band who refer themselves as a cute, relatively harmless but have sharp spikes. This animal is also like a superhero in the legendary Sega games. Yes, it’s none other than THE HEDGEHOG. This band is a quartet consisting of former ITJazz Chairman Mikhael Martin (guitar), Rinomulat Sembada (drum), Leo Hansen (bass) and Ditra Prasista (keys). We haven’t got Leo on this event for almost 3 years since he played with Olteje back then. Ditra Prasista was here a couple of months ago supporting his friend, he also has a band that’s currently working on the studio The Blue Ocean Project.

The Hedgehog is not a new band, it was established last year, but for some reasons they haven’t been appeared that much just yet. We heard about this band around a month ago and knew we really have to feature it in this event.

Being inspired by the likes of John Scofield’s Überjam Band, MMW (Medeski Martin and Wood) also the famous old school funk band Lettuce, this band plays intoxicating music, cored in the groovy funk jazz/avant funk, hardbop/soulbop with strong scent of psychedelic sound from the 70’s. We don’t get to hear this kind of music so often nowadays, so it’s surprisingly interesting for us to have them taking us back to the glorious psychedelic years.

This cool sound appeared first through a song taken from the collaborative album between Medeski Martin & Wood and John Scofield (MSMW) called “Little Walter Rides Again”. Doping funky drumbeat and bass, the graphic guitar melody, the naughty, steamy sound of organ created ‘dirty’ avant-jazz-funk music, so dirty, you could get high and trip over the tune.

These Hedgehogs continued stabbing us with their spikes by going back almost 40 years earlier with a historical gold from The Meters, “Cissy Strut”. Rino captured the high-flying drum sound really, really well along with the chunky, crunchy basslines from Leo. Jazz-rock fusion guitar playing by Mikha and the teasy organ melodies from Ditra blew our mind away.

As we were still like being high on drugs, they ‘tortured’ us even more with Oasis’ “Stop Crying Your Heart Out”. For the last song they kept the psychedelic funk in pocket by covering today’s avant jazz funk band based in Boston USA, Lettuce. The song title is “Reunion”. We still wished for more, and the band actually still had some on their list, but as we still had to showcase one more band while the time was running out, The Hedgehog had to rest their case.

How relevant is jazz funk in modern days? For us, funk has been infecting many musical areas throughout the decades, even rock, and it will continue to live on forever. The Hedgehog captured the rebelious underground form of expression very well. Their psychedelic music gives a strong statement of funk in its finest, fusing sophisticated techniques of playing with strong spirit and creativity by using the right funk idiom. We know we ain’t see nothing yet, we are not satisfied just yet, therefore we are definitely going to invite them again soon. How about revealing the funk side of 70’s rock from a band like The Doors? Well, stay tuned for the updates. One thing for sure, The Hedgehog’s funky spikes are infectious, we want more!

For the final act we introduced a new band in town: THE NEW BLOOD. Although the band is new, it has 5 young wizs with amazing skill. On guitar is Anjuan Julio, a jazz genius who has started his career early. With his band AFA Trio, he has landed on the Java Jazz Festival and currently working on the debut album. Then there is Jason Limanjaya on keyboard. This dude is expressive and brave in exploring the keys. He is active in some other bands too like Nayra Dharma Group and Funktop.

Then there’s a young prodigy, Philip Manfred Pincencia on saxophone. This boy has saxophone as his forte, but he can also play piano just as good. He began his journey right here two years ago, but he’s been progressing fast. So fast that he has performed alongside today’s top stars like Tulus and Isyana Sarasvati. On bass is Ezra Manuhutu, the son of Venche Manuhutu and brother of David Manuhutu who also plays in New Equinox, a band that already has 3 released albums. Then, Sugih Gumilang on drum is no stranger since he is a proud member of Mahagaza, a pop jazz band with a successful single over the radio charts. As you can see, these boys have achieved great things in their career. Formed by jazz/bluesman Hari Pochang, this band becomes the new force in our jazz scene.

These young guns appeared mad right from the start, blazing like a wild fire by serving up a medley of Chad Lefkowitz-Brown’s “Blues for Randy” and Mezzoforte’s “E.G. Blues”. Three frontliners: the bandleader Jason Limanjaya on keys, Anjuan Julio on guitar and the young sax prodigy Philip Manfred worked together in harmony. They knew when to trade punches, when to attack together, when to move in front and when to step back. The cohesive work between Sugih’s drumming and Ezra’s bass delivered rock solid attractive groove. Together they built momentum in such madness.

Just when we thought they were already on the top of the game, they rose the intensity even more. For the last song they threw Michael and Randy Brecker aka The Brecker Brothers’ song, the title track of their album that won the Grammy Awards a decade ago, “Some Skunk Funk”. It was a fierceful execution that kept us at the edge of our seat, or made the standing ones unable to still. Not only us, even the New Blood boys went mad. Jason expressively showed how he couldn’t sit anymore near the end. He stood up, exploded in every key he pressed and led the rest of the boys to detonate the rest of the bombs (and energy) they had left. What a thrilling performance by these funk skunks. Too bad we couldn’t get more since the we have already way passed the closing time of the mall. As much as we still want more, we got to seal this edition right here.

As what we have predicted, this group is a stunner. These young lads played great like a long time experienced pro exceeding their ages. As we mentioned before, all of them have been doing and achieving remarkable things with their bands, they have gained many valuable experiences and made some breakthroughs. They know when to serve, when to guard and when to run wild in front. Each of them can become a vital role even a standout band leader, but what makes this cohesive unit works is that eventhough they are all very talented and skillful, they are humble and happy to work as a unit instead of being individual.

The New Blood shows how intense jazz can be. If some of you still think jazz is only about relaxing tunes, these boys proved that jazz could offer a non stop action that would push everyone to the edge of their seat. If in football there’s something called dream team, the New Blood represents it inside the jazz world. It’s certainly a pleasure to feature the new force of Indonesian jazz in this episode, and we hope to bring them again in more comfortable time in the near future.

The Braga Jazz Night #40 is very interesting for having all high-skilled, hard-working and commited musicians who share the same passion in jazz. Other than that, it’s also a full round showcase of young musicians (starting from 11 year-old) who play by feel. From swing to Brazilian, to hardbop, funk and to fusion, all were heartfelt but also full of action. This #40 edition defines our mission in any way. Words can’t describe how young musicians could bring madness in the name of jazz.

We will be back again next month with a fresh batch. There will be a jazz guitarist from far away city situated in the island between Indonesia and Singapore. Also, there will be a young indie singer originally came from even further island in the eastern part of Indonesia. It’s going to be another interesting chapter before closing the year with a Christmas edition in December. We thank all musicians, partners, supporters, soundman and everyone who came to watch the shows. We couldn’t do it without you! See you again in November!

Watch the highlight of Braga Jazz Night #40

See more pictures:

Reporter and photographer: Riandy Kurniawan
Video editor: Vierna Mariska Kurniawan .

There are more and more jazz lovers in Palembang today, both from the number of audience and the musicians. While we have been noticing the commitment of Bank Sumsel Babel in supporting the jazz development in Palembang, the role of Pal Jazz aka Palembang Jazz Community is undeniable too. They have been existed and consistent in socializing jazz performance and clinic which is held monthly.

Here’s the news. Bank Sumsel Babel in cooperation with Pal Jazz – Palembang Jazz Community proudly present an event called DIGI JAZZ “Digital Banking N Jazz Community.”

According to the chairman of Pal Jazz Hanani, this event is made as a place for jazz communities from different cities to gather, know one another and interact through music. Based on that, in this event you will see Trio Mengapa from Jazz Mben Senin Yogyakarta and some other communities from different cities. Also to perform are IBF – Indonesian Bass Family, GOMBAL – Gerombolan Blues Palembang and Friendship from DRDP – Divisi Regional Drummer Palembang.

The Executive Chairman of DIGI JAZZ “Digital Banking N Jazz Community” Amrul Muslimin says that this event is free and open for public. Everyone can enjoy the performances. That’s our way to say thank you, we hope this event would bring us closer to the society.” he continues further.

According to the President Director of Bank Sumsel Babel Muhammad Adil, other than created in accordance to the bank’s 60th anniversary and its readiness for the Digital Banking products, the bank wishes to keep their consistency in supporting the growth of jazz in Palembang. It’s a fact that majority of jazz events made by Pal Jazz has been supported by this bank.

DIGI JAZZ “Digital Banking N Jazz Community” will come soon on Saturday, 11 November 2017 starting from 3:00 pm until 10:00 pm located at the yard of Bank Sumsel Babel Jakabaring Palembang. There will be jam session as we are told, so if you can involve much further than being just an audience. There will be guest stars from Jakarta: the beautiful jazz lady Sierra Soetedjo accompanied by BSB Band, and for the final act, a proud Atjeh’s son who is now standing comfortably among the top stars, Tompi is set to sing by having the support from Pal Jazz Brass Band.

If you are in Palembang on that date, make sure not to miss this event. Keep jazzin’ on Palembang!

Over the last 4 years, we have featured more than one hundred bands in our regular community events. Some of them had our stage as their starting point and now they have found their solid grip in pursuing their career, some have even played among the greats – we’re not talking just national but also international scale. We have supported any movements made by the bands such as releasing album or single, projects, special tributes, promoting bands and the richness of concepts from pop jazz, traditional swing, modern bebop, post bop, funk jazz, fusion, jazz-rock, soul and variety of ethnic jazz, and hey, we have featured some very, very talented musicians from the overseas as well.

We always want our event to be the land of opportunities. Everyone can play, everyone can have fun, everyone can be entertained, learn and find that jazz has never ending styles and there are so many unique things still yet to discover. In the end, we do hope our small contribution could give benefit to the future of jazz in this nation, which we believe will give some values to the global scene.

We are ready to launch the 41st edition of Braga Jazz Night. For this time we are going to feature musicians and singers who have something special inside them that will let you enjoy different kinds of jazz from pop, soul to pure jazz, not only from Bandung but also from a city located in an island quite far from us in the middle part of Sumatra. As usual we are going to let you know about them one by one, but first please take note that the Braga Jazz Night #41 will come on Thursday, 16 November 2017, starting 7:00 pm at the Braga CityWalk. Like always, this event is totall FREE of any charge.

Now let’s see who we are featuring this time. First, it’s a great honor to welcome an experienced, skillful and passionate jazz guitarist from the city of Batam in Riau’s archipelago: Tchepy Wijaya Soekardi. Better known as just Tchepy, this man has been true to his passion in jazz from the very beginning. He learnt guitar from the legendary jazzman who for many holds the most delicate swing touch, Oele Pattiselano and also Kadek Rihardika. While he is also having a career as one of the Financial Verification staffs of People’s Representative Council (DPRD) in Batam, he is very active as a jazz musician at least since the turn of the millenium.

Throughout his career, Tchepy has landed on many stages from small to big, in Batam, Jakarta, other cities and even abroad. He has graced The Malacca Straight Jazz Festival (2007), Tangsel Jazz Festival (2015), Jazz and Fashion (2015-2017), Jazz at Harbour Bay (with Rieka Roslan and friends) and supporting Soukma in Melia Regency in 2017 just to mention a few. Another impressive achievement we haven’t mentioned yet is his regular appearance at the international jazz festival in Batam, the Asean Jazz Festival from 2008 to 2015. It was in this event, in 2012 where we first met him and noticed his talent. It was still clear in our mind that together with his fellas, he dipped some traditional songs into jazz, from the Batavian “Jali-Jali” to Balinese “Djanger Bali”. After this period, he decided to dip into swing fully. He has delivered tributes to the likes of Bill Evans and Antonio Carlos Jobim. While he has his own band in Batam simple called Tchepy Trio, he is also active in the local community named Batam Jazz Society.

For the Braga Jazz Night #41, Tchepy will perform as Tchepy Trio. Not with his compatriotes in Batam but with two young musicians from Bandung with good skills: the explosive drummer Alman Naufal and all-rounder bassist/multi-instrumentalist Aries Ardiansyah.

For the very first time we got a special guest coming all the way from Batam. We are delighted that our stage could welcome great musicians beyond the local Bandung area, even from a far away island in Sumatra.

Then, let’s see a cool dynamic duo which will make you forget that they appear only by two: Putri Rahel Sihombing and Hardi Suryana, together as Ael/Hardi. This duo wowed us in September with their cool, relaxing traditional jazz in purity, offering us a ride through the time tunnel from the golden 20’s era to the 70’s by taking some golden jazz hits. The true, rich jazz guitar playing by Hardi match the beautiful voice of Rahel which for us appears as the reminiscing of the divas from early jazz era, not only from her vocal vibe and tone but also from the wide vocal range and the way she executes the song. Surprisingly, this young girl actually started with classical, the music that has brought her to win something prestigious at a choir competition in Arezo, Italy.

Meanwhile, Hardi has been clearly showing his passion in jazz for a very long time. His encounter with jazz started with Jazz Rock back in 1994 when he began learning jazz. But shortly after he found out his true soul was actually in mainstream, especially straight ahead. Today he pursues his music career both as a player and a teacher. Jazz streams in his vein, and with Putri Rahel’s journey in jazz which he mentors, together they create a diamond that will let anyone feel the true soul of jazz in simplicity.

For this episode we invite Ael/Hardi to bring a special concept: “Sings Disney”. As we all know, Disney has so many everlasting songs that are clearly rooted in jazz. So, it’s going to be interesting to focus on the jazz side of Disney. But we also have another ‘better’ reason. It’s a fact that Rahel fell in love with jazz for his love towards Disney songs. So we thought, why don’t we invite her to sing Disney? Other than letting her trace back her jazz track, who knows she would make the mall-goers fall in love with jazz like her. Therefore, we put special theme for this duo: Ael/Hardi Sings Disney. Well known soundtracks from the Disney collections are to be expected.

The Eastern part of Indonesia never stops giving birth to so many amazing singers and musicians. Not only from Ambon because we have seen many great artists from other islands too including the fascinating and beautiful island of Flores, a big island located just on the right side of the carnivorous dragons, the Komodo Island. Speaking of music, there’s a proud Flores son Ivan Nestorman who consistently brings the beauty of Flores music, language and tradition through his works like what he does with his band Nera. Now allow us to introduce a young man also from the same island but currently studying in Bandung. This young man sings, plays guitar and write songs, showing how gifted he is in music. His name is Marlon Fridolin. To make it simple, he only use his first name: Marlon.

If you read his profile, you will find that Marlon has done quite remarkable works and achievements in such young age. He won the best vocal in several competitions both in his hometown Bontang and where he is now, Bandung, as a jingle maker for some companies like Speedy, Groovia TV and IndiHome, making music score for television soap operas, as judges in many competitions, working as a private vocal teacher, also experienced as music director and mixing/mastering albums. He reached top 36 at Indonesia Mencari Bakat season 1. He’s involved in several gospel and Christmas compilation albums. He is really something.

As an active musician, he has made some singles such as “Tlah Usai” (2015) which you can watch on Youtube with 12k viewers (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqOqp_zEWLI). The latest single is “Sewaktu Hujan”, a song according to him is still in process. We have listened to the sample last August, so we are curious to hear how the song is after a couple of revisions.

Marlon has a soulful high pitched and wide range vocal. So far he makes pop songs, but he told us that he is into jazz and blues, and actually his solo career seems to be going towards pop with light jazz touch. We think this man has a big potential to be a successful singer, so it’s time for us to check him out on stage. He has appeared once at Braga Jazz Night supporting Antoni Sijabat, now he will have his own moment on stage. Joining him are Boyke Nainggolan (bass), Yabes Ambarita (guitar), Daniel (drum) and Yulius Ferdian (saxophone).

The Braga Jazz Night #41 is coming soon on Thursday, 16 November 2017 at Braga CityWalk, starting from 7:00 pm onwards. This event is 100% FREE of any charge. If you come, not only you will be entertained by variety of jazz styles but you will also be a part of jazz development in Bandung. These bands need your support, we need your support, jazz needs your support. We can’t do it without you guys. Hopefully you are with us to make Bandung beautiful with jazz.

Braga Jazz Night #41

Date: 16 November 2017
Time: 07:00 pm – 10:00 pm
Location: Braga CityWalk
Jl. Braga 99 – 101, Bandung

FREE EVENT!

FEATURING:

:: TCHEPY TRIO :: (Batam-Bandung)
Tchepy Wijaya Soekardi (guitar)
Alman Naufal (drum)
Aries Ardiansyah (bass)

:: MARLON ::
Marlon Fridolin (vocal/guitar)
Boyke Nainggolan (bass)
Yabes Ambarita (guitar)
Daniel (drum)
Yulius Ferdian (saxophone)

:: AEL/HARDI ::
Putri Rahel Sihombing (vocal)
Hardi Suryana (guitar)

Jazz and the favorite university Institute Technology of Bandung (ITB) has been historically connected for many decades. This campus has held jazz concerts since the 60’s, presenting the jazz giants from national and international scene. In the 70’s, ITB just got crazier in presenting jazz. Look at the event called Pro Jazz 1975 which was held at the Aula Barat ITB which sihowcased jazz musicians from 3 cities: Bandung, Jakarta and Surabaya. In 1977 the campus presented Jazz Rendezvous with Indonesian All Stars. The jazz pulse was kept alive entering the 80’s. One of the biggest wave was when ITB invited Benny Golson All Stars in September 1987.

Other than those historical events, the venues for jazz in ITB also stands as the silent witness of Indonesian and Bandung jazz history. One of them is Aula Barat (the West Hall) which is considered as a landmark of ITB building. Built in 1919 by Dutch architect Henry Maclaint Pont, this side of ITB has accomodated so many jazz events and discussions. That’s why the Aula Barat is identical with jazz.

In 2013 the students of ITB decided to re-establish Aula Barat as the undisputed home of jazz. On April 1st 2013, finally Aula Barat found its new grip through a periodic event called Jazz Aula Barat. For the premiere edition, the curator Riza Arshad brought his super trio, the #3scapes aka Trioscapes. It was a big return, but this event was on hiatus until April 2016 when the 2nd edition came in, presenting simakDialog. The third edition was held in December featuring Mery Kasiman Big Band. The passing of Riza in January 2017 shocked everyone. There were some worries about the future of this event, but luckly the ITB Jazz (formerly known as ITJazz), an official students’ activity unit (UKM) of ITB is committed to keep it alive. The 4th episode was on March 2017, presenting Nita Aartsen Quatro.

As told to us, the ITB Jazz wishes to bring the event on at least twice a year. As we are getting closer to the end of 2017, ITB Jazz officially announced the next episode. The Jazz Aula Barat #5 is coming soon on Thursday, 23 November 2017 starting from 7:30 pm onwards.

Everyone who have seen the poster should be surprised. Why? There are at least 3 reasons:
1. The Jazz Aula Barat #5 is made to celebrate the 11th Anniversary of the world-class bigband from Bandung, the great Salamander Big Band
2. This edition is dedicated to Riza Arshad, served grand in swing
3. The guest stars are shocking: Tulus and Yura!
ITB is crazy to make this. For us this is like a dream come true, and we have no doubt it’s going to be wild!

Now let’s talk about the big band who’s having the birthday, the Salamander Big Band. Since it was established 11 years ago, this Big Band has set the course bravely no matter what the stream is. Salamander Big Band is an authentic big band, not a band that’s big. The founder and conductor, also a proud citizen of ITB, Devy Ferdianto clearly stated that to us around a decade ago as we have seen the evidence since then. As the time goes by, the Big Band becomes more solid and fluid in serving their music. By placing their roots on such format like Cole Porter and Duke Ellington’s, Salamander is an expert in delivering the authentic sound of swinging dance band like how it was in the golden era. But what’s amazing is, it doesn’t stuck in the 20’s – 40’s. They explore the style and sound of big band from other eras. They are great in capturing the 70’s funk scene, delivering the European style (including the classic German style), they can embed some ethnics inside, or even rearrange some evergreen Indonesian songs to make the songs as if they were made for real big band.

If you wonder how they could do that, other than having highly skilled, passionate musicians and amazing line of singers from solo to vocal harmony group, they have gained experiences and learnt from world’s best musicians. Look at these names they have played with: Frank Reinshagen, Dieter Mack, Thorsten Wollmann and Ack van Rooyen, Benny Likumahuwa, Bertha, Gilang Ramadhan, Sam Bimbo, Margie Segers and Bob Tutupoly, just to name a few.

The Salamander Big Band has graced many prestigious stages too such as the Java Jazz Festival to Ubud Village Jazz Festival in Bali, even to Bangkok at the end of 2013.

It’s remarkable that the Salamander Big Band is committed to serve two concerts every year: The Mid Year Concert and Anniversary Concert. For this year, the Mid Year Concert was held on the monumental amphitheatre of Selasar Sunaryo Art Space (SSAS) on July 13th (Read the coverage here: http://jazzuality.com/jazz-event-report/salamander-big-band-2017-mid-year-concert-the-report/). If at that time they paid tribute to Titiek Puspa, this time they are going to make a special tribute to Riza Arshad under the title of “Tunes of Stage & Screen.”

For this special occassion, Salamander Big Band made a big surprise by featuring two mega stars in today’s industry: Tulus and Yura. Both of them are among the best ‘exports’ from Bandung in recent years, a solid show-stoppers and crowd-magnets. The phenomenal success of Tulus and Yura has proven the fact that Bandung has a lot of amazing talents that can shine not only in their own nation but also internationally. Eventhough they have wide coverage of styles in their albums, surely we all agree that they suit to sing jazz and will work perfectly to go with big band. The thick, satin smooth voice of Tulus and crisp, sky-bright voice of Yura in front of the authentic swingin’ sound of Salamander Big Band will give the audience the memory that last a life time.

From what we heard, with a very (unbelievably) affordable ticket price (only IDR 25k), the ticket has sold out just hours after it was announced. If you are late to secure your seat, we suggest you to contact the ITB Jazz and ask if they still have some left.

For the continuation and the future of Jazz Aula Barat and jazz in ITB, for the 11th Anniversary of Salamander Big Band, the collaboration between the big band and two mega stars and a tribute to a very important figure who we still miss, this event is important. We hope to see you there, but if you fail to get your ticket, we will try our best to share each moment in our coverage. There will be many stories to tell and remember from the Jazz Aula Barat #5. Look forward to jazz together with you.

JAZZ AULA BARAT #5 : “Tunes of Stage & Screen” – A Tribute to Riza Arshad
Celebrating the 11th Anniversary of Salamander Big Band

Date: Thusday, 23 November 2017
Time: 7:30 pm onwards
Location: Aula Barat ITB, Jl. Ganesha 10, Bandung

Entrance Fee: IDR 25k

Info ticket: +62 821-1257-0682

photo ©2017 tiff-jp

As the Award-winning musician-composer Ryuichi Sakamoto presented his music documentary directed by Stephen Nomura Schible (co-producer of “Lost in Translation”) titled “Ryuichi Sakamoto: CODA” in Tokyo International Film Festival (TIFF/TIFFJP)’s special screening section, he received TIFF Samurai Award on November 1st, 2017.

This award was previously given to Takeshi Kitano & Tim Burton (2014), Yoji Yamada & John Woo (2015) and Martin Scorcese & Kiyoshi Kurosawa (2016) as veteran filmmakers and other creators for their contribution towards the groundbreaking works that carve pathways to a new era in cinema. This year Sakamoto joins these big names as the first honoree who’s not a director or filmmaker as well as the first to bring a measure of levity to the proceedings.

Receiving this award in the special ceremony from TIFF’s new festival director Takeo Hisamatsu, Sakamoto said with a big smile that the Katana sword symbol engraved to the trophy reminded him of the sword he used in his first movie appearance; “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence” (Nagisa Oshima, 1983). He also recalled that he had to spend eight days in a dojo to learn how to use the sword. He felt proud, but at the same time he also felt sorry that during the training session he chopped down so many trees on the Pacific Island. More than 30 years later, he realized that he wasn’t as environmentally conscious as he is now. As an environmental activist, Sakamoto now works to plant and preserve trees beside his career as a musician.

Director Stephen Nomura Schible then joined him on stage telling behind the scenes stories of CODA which started shooting in the summer of 2012 and some thankful notes to the crew and people involved. Like a special talk show, Sakamoto said that he usually didn’t like to reveal his true self to people, yet when Schible came to him with this idea of a documentary, he got interested. They both admitted that a feature documentary like this which took five years in the making is never an easy thing.

     photo ©2017 tiff-jp

To Schible, the essential heart of this documentary lies in the year in which Sakamoto is forced to be on hiatus from work and performing because he had to focus on his treatment after being diagnosed with oropharyngeal cancer. The rest follows from this monumental turning point in Sakamoto’s life, like a contemplation from a man worrying about his mortality but still eager to set masterpieces.

Sakamoto added that he always wanted to write music and he won’t be ashamed to be left behind, yet he also constantly bumping up against his own limitations in his old age.

From his NY-based basement studios to the journey to Arctic Circle to record the sounds of nature as a ceaseless habit, CODA took us to Sakamoto’s process in creating and mixing his distinctive music style, the one he called ‘auditory texture in pursuit of sonic blending, both chaotic and unified’.

One of this style of work to produce natural sounds can be seen in his film score compositions, which director Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu specifically asked him to do: “The Revenant”. Sakamoto told that he was supposed to be on hiatus for his treatment but he couldn’t say no because he admired Inarritu too much.

Sakamoto also described how he, being an environmental activist, organizing a No Nukes concert and took part in one of the frequent anti-nuclear demonstrations. He also talked about how the 3/11 Earthquake/Tsunami experience in Japan reminded him of his 9/11 experience in New York. He remembered that the music vanished from Manhattan for a week, and stunned to realize it when he heard a guitar a week later.

Closing his stage appearance after receiving this year’s TIFF Samurai Award, Sakamoto said “Tonight you’ll be seeing my documentary, and I want to thank you all for being here.” Soon after, he corrected himself by laughing: “Well, it’s not my film, I’m the main character but I didn’t make it.”

Reporter: Daniel Irawan
Editor: Riandy Kurniawan .

Director: Stephen Nomura Schible
Production: Avrotros, Avex Digital, Borderland Media, Cineric Creative, DENTSU Music and Entertainment, Documentary Japan, Kadokawa, NHK, 2017

As not only a musician, pianist and award winning film composer, Ryuichi Sakamoto is also known as a writer, actor and activist. Starting his career in the electronic music trio YMO (Yellow Magic Orchestra), Sakamoto began his solo career in 1978 with the electronic fusion album Thousand Knives. Since then, he explored wide variety through his experimental style from electronic to classical, even techno and hip hop music. As a musician who loves to paint from broad palette of genres, he has encountered jazz many, many times. Other than involving in jazz festivals, some of his albums also highlighted jazz. For example “Etude” from his album “Illustrated Musical Encyclopedia” (1986) which stands as one of our all time favorites.

In the film world, Sakamoto has won an Oscar, BAFTA, Grammy and two Golden Globe Awards. His first film work where he also played as an actor along with David Bowie, Takeshi Kitano and Tom Conti is “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence” (Nagisa Oshima, 1983). The main theme was adapted into the single “Forbidden Colours” which became an international hit. After that, Sakamoto’s successful compositions were heard in “The Last Emperor” (1987) which earned him the Oscar with David Byrne and Cong Su, “The Sheltering Sky” (1990), “Little Buddha” (1993), “Snake Eyes” (1998), “Femme Fatale” (2002) and “The Revenant” (2015).

Music documentary Coda, directed by Stephen Nomura Schible who’s known as the co-producer of Sofia Coppola’s “Lost in Translation” and 2004’s “Eric Clapton: Sessions for Robert J” took us to explore the journey and creative process of Sakamoto. Not just in making music, but also his life efforts as an iconic activist in Japan’s social movement against nuclear power. Yet overall, Coda depicts Sakamoto’s return to create a masterpiece through his latest 2017 album, “async”, which considered one of the finest records of his career among the struggling process following his stage III throat cancer diagnosis in 2014.

Portraying Sakamoto both as a music auteur and a common man struggling with his disease, the best thing about Coda is that Schible never once approaches the cliches in music documentaries. It’s neither about the whole Sakamoto’s career since his early years, nor his personal life, but cinematically followed every process that took us to know more about his subject as an inspiring and very personal piece.

Starting with a scene in a damaged high school caused by tsunami that hit Japan in 2011, the film pictured Sakamoto found a broken baby grand piano and made sounds out of it. Coda captured Sakamoto’s search of natural sounds in amazing details, from his New York basement studios to his journey exploring nature in glacier site in Kenya, Lake Turkana, where he recorded the sound of glaciers and dipping a rod with a microphone attached into the Arctic waters to record the ‘fish sounds’.

Along with the music process, Schible also observed Sakamoto’s concern as an anti-nuclear activist from the contaminated zone in Fukushima to a protest at the Prime Minister’s residence, also his melancholy switched to the spirit in facing the cancer diagnosis, treatment and special healthy diets. All is been told honestly with distinct aesthetic details you won’t find in most of music documentaries, including some glimpses of arts from Warhol to Arseny Tarkovsky’s poem.

Capturing this intimate explorations, directors of photography Neo Sora and veteran Tom Richmond’s camera works run smooth with Hisayo Kushida’s editing to keep the 100 mins duration flow at the right pace, while his pieces of compositions comes like the soundtrack of life. At the end, Schible described a long journey not from an artist, but a man from going through his life crisis to the triumph of finding new musical expressions.

Quiet yet harmonic, melancholic yet spirited. Like one of the most wonderful sequence where Sakamoto recited his melodious “Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence” theme at a shrine to remember and paid respect to the tsunami victims, Coda will resonate long after the documentary ends as a man’s intimate contemplation of life.

Reviewer: Daniel Irawan
Editor: Riandy Kurniawan .

It feels like yesterday when we walked into year 2017, but now we are already in the month of November. This means soon we are going to march into the new year, and of course before that, Christmas will come first. Probably most of us would agree that 2017 is not an easy year to go through. The loss of purchasing power, the disintegration, fanaticism, political issues are among the problems that put our nation and its people under pressure. But we should not loose our joy right? Christmas celebration can spread the joy to the world, and how wonderful it is to see that it comes early!

SHOUT! (Six Human of Unstoppable Talents) who believes they are the ones who dare to shout the good things in creative ways are ready to celebrate Christmas a month earlier through their event called “I WISH – A Christmas Concert”. For you in Jakarta, you can be joyful with them really soon, on Saturday, 25 November 2017 at Basilea Menteng. The event is going to be divided into two sessions: The first session will start from 4:00 pm til 5:30 pm, and the second session is set from 7:00 pm to 8:30. The ticket is now ON SALE!

For this event, SHOUT! has prepared great lineup that will make the celebration merrier by their presence and talent. Let’s take a closer look at them.

THE OVERTUNES is a siblings trio who rose to fame from the X Factor Indonesia Season 1. Consisting of Mada Emmanuelle Brahmatyo, Reuben Nathaniel Brahmantyo and Mikha Angelo Brahmantyo, the siblings is now listed among the popular stars especially for youngsters. The trio writes and composes their own songs, some have been used as original soundtracks (OST) of box office and award-winning movies. The latest one is comedian/writer/actor Ernest Prakasa’s movie: Susah Sinyal. SHOUT! believes The Overtunes will indulge your ears with their amazing talents. We have no doubts about that.

PANGERAN MUDA (PANDA) is no stranger to us. While he has such voice that would bring Pop Opera at its best, this tall, handsome young man has performed a couple of times on our jazz stage. We even had the honor of having him representing us for TP Jazz three years ago. It’s true that he is still young, but you will be surprise to know that he has bagged no less than 200 achievements since he was still a little boy. He has landed on Java Jazz Festival and JakJazz, he has graced the stages in Hong Kong and Macau, appearing in musical series on television, you can hear his voice in some jingles both on television and radio. He has made some albums ; religious and secular ; he also reached top 20 in Indonesian Idol 2014 and won some talent search competitions, he’s done it all before his age even reach 30. Surely you agree that this man is really something. Oh yeah, he is also a member of SHOUT!

Other than performing as himself, Pangeran will also appear with his trio, the AGIAN TRIO. This trio has been active at least since 2011, the year when they won Suara Indonesia Trans TV. Other than Pangeran, the trio has two ladies with beautiful voices: Ervina Simarmata and Ruth Nelly Sihotang. The trio was a part of Viky Sianipar Inc. who presents the songs from various Batak tribes in much modern style. Agian Trio can sing songs from various styles and genres with unique harmonizations and voice characters, plus eye catchy performance. It’s great to see the trio still solid over the years, their appearance in this event will make a strong statement that the Agian Trio is still alive and kick hard.

Last but not least, LATINKA is also listed. Latinka Sidabutar is a young pop singer who debuted in 2011 with her single “Aku Bisa Mati”. The combination of friendly and elegant style with beautiful voice will make everyone feel at ease. Imagine if her comforting voice is used to sing Christmas carols. “That will make you smile even wider,” says SHOUT!.

Once again, I WISH Christmas Concert is coming soon on Saturday, 25 November 2017 at BASILEA MENTENG, Jl. Cimahi no 23, JAKARTA. This is your chance to celebrate Christmas early with wonderful musical performance. After having such difficult year, it’s time to give yourself a treat with something peaceful and full of joy. On behalf of SHOUT! and the performers, we invite you to come. Merry Early Christmas!

Watch the teaser:

Session 1: 4:00 pm – 5:30 pm
Session 2: 7:00 pm – 8:30 pm

Participation FEE: 100k
including:
– Concert Pass
– Christmas Album
– Sponsor Product
– Wrist Band
– Special Christmas Wish Card

For more information, follow their instagram @shout.indonesia or contact +62 81288900690 (Hannah)

The Jazz Goes to Campus was born in 1976 as a part of a variety of arts event. According to its founder Candra Darusman who was still a Universitas Indonesia’s Faculty of Economics students at that time, it was held with minimalist stage set surrounded by trees with a very cheap ticket, only IDR 500 (equal to 3 cents in recent currency). We don’t know if Candra already had a vision at that time or not, but today this annual jazz fest stands as the longest running jazz festival in Indonesia, even one of the oldest in the world!

The event is carried on by students and all stakeholders of the Economics and Business Faculty of Universitas Indonesia from one year to another, passing the torch in each and every edition to keep the event not only alive, but growing. From legends, the top stars of each era to newcomers have been there to build the event to its greatness. There are so many unforgettable acts, there have been many historical moments, and if you ask about the success story, you have to spare days, probably even weeks to talk about it.

If you wonder why, allow us to give you a simple fact: This event manages to bring more than 30 local and international groups, spread over 4 stages with phenomenal number of audience which could reach 20.000 people in average.

Now hear this. As a form of continuation of idealism to present a jazz event that can be enjoyed by just about anyone, The 40th Jazz Goes to Campus is right around the corner! The series of pre-events has begun since last month, accumulating to the main event which will come on Sunday, 26 November 2017 at the Campus Ground, Faculty of Business and Economics Universitas Indonesia. As usual, it will begin since noon all the way until near midnight. Plenty of performers including your favorites will give you a whole day of jazz-perience that only Jazz Goes to Campus (JGTC) can give.

We will let you know more about the lineup, but first let’s see this event from the bigger perspective. Every year, Jazz Goes to Campus offers more than just a jazz festival. This event has successfully supported the development of musicians who dedicated themselves into jazz and the communities. As usual, the event began with JGTC Opening and Press Conference, JGTC Clinic, JGTC Competition, JGTC Roadshow (this year to Yogyakarta), JGTC Gathering and Charity Night, JGTC Community Night and the final and main event, JGTC Festival.

In 2017, The 40th Jazz Goes to Campus Festival which will come on 26 November 2017 will be served along with JGTC Jazz Museum and JGTC Choice Award.

The 40th Jazz Goes to Campus is holding the theme Jazzing Through Decades which comes from an awareness that jazz has been giving birth to uncountable, diverse types from time to time. With all the stakeholders, The 40th Jazz Goes to Campus wishes to celebrate the diversity thrugh series of events which highlights variety styles of jazz and each of their fans. By using Jazzing Through Decades as the theme, the committee hopes to be able to present the difference within the same atmosphere created by the rich variety of jazz.

For this 4th decades celebration, as the only festival who has presented three generation of jazz musicians in Indonesia, they have prepared top class acts including the legendary Fariz RM and Chaseiro, the mega-star Tulus, RAN, Maliq & D’Essentials, The Groove, ska-jazz ensemble Sentimental Moods, French group RP3 (Remi Panossian Trio – with Maxime Delporte, Frederic Petitprez), Sri Hanuraga Trio ft Dira Sugandi: Indonesia Vol 1, Rendy Pandugo, and the avant-funk madness Tomorrow People Ensemble. Three more big names just came in: Gerald Situmorang Dimensions which is higlighting his second solo album titled “Dimension”, Danilla and Vira Talisa.

A big surprise, for you who love Earth Wind and Fire, this year you can take a memory lane with its hits, brought by Al McKay’s Earth Wind Fire Experience! We have seen this large group at the Java Jazz Festival, and we tell you, as the original member of this legendary band, Al McKay knows how to bring the experience as authentic as the original which will make you feel like watching the real band.

Just like in previous years, Jazz Goes to Campus always includes young lions who for us are the future of jazz in Indonesia. We know and have featured many of them in our own events, so we know how good these youngsters really are. They are Fabian Winandi, the stunning jazz fusion band 5 Petani, the winner of last year’s JGTC Competition Hareguna Trio, Kasyfi & Friends, Antoni Sidjabat and WFR. Also to perform are NYD Project, Full Lights Out, Mas Bagas and many more.

If in case you haven’t heard about this year’s Jazz Goes to Campus, be quick to secure your place! With the price starting from IDR 87.000, you can buy the ticket at the official website https://www.jgtc-festival.com/ticket/ or other outlets such as Goers, Alfamart, Traveloka, Indomaret, Ibu Dibjo, Tokopedia and Tiket.com .

Other than the regular, you can also buy he Premium Ticket which will give you:
– Exclusive viewing area to watch your favorite performers
– Access to the premium lounge with complementary buffet
– Special Entry Line

For more info, log on to the website or contact +62 81316566433.

All said. Grab your ticket now and be a part of The 40th Jazz Goes to Campus 2017!

Watch the Official Video Trailer of The 40th Jazz Goes to Campus

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Right in the first day of November 2017, early in the morning we got a terrible news. A man who we are really close with, an established communications strategist, independent creative development collaborator, a storyteller and host at Demajors Radio’s 2Jams Widyasena Sumadio passed away at the age of 51 caused by heart attack.

To us, he is like a father/brother/friend/mentor/motivator and bank of ideas. It was him who helped us to establish ourselves. He opened up the door, introduced us to some important figures as well as letting them know about us and what we’re doing. At that time he was still acted as the Promotion officer of the Java Jazz Festival. During this period, the medias often met him in any press conferences held by the Java Jazz. While waiting for the artist, he communicatively made everyone felt at ease by throwing jokes as well as subliminally set the standard of interview session. A great moderator and MC he was, he always knew how to bridge the artist and medias that in the end created a quality session.

As a jazz enthusiast, this man who was actually gifted with singing voice had a deep concern of jazz in Indonesia. He has done many things any which way he could to keep pushing jazz forward. He helped promoting many bands, giving them ideas, even did talkshows to help young musicians to promote their bands. One of this talkshow was in our event in 2012 with the title: “Communication Tools for Your B(r)and” (http://jazzuality.com/jazz-event-report/jazzuality-christmas-jazz-at-bandung-indah-plaza-the-report/).

You see, his passion, calling and works are unique. Perhaps some might find it difficult to get what he was doing. We asked him once about his profession, asking him to simplify it so we could understand, and he said this: “Well, basically what I’m doing is connecting the dots.” Yes, connecting the dots. Connecting people so they could grow and achieve bigger things. Connecting ideas to make something new. Connecting spirits to overcome obstacles and stand as the winner.

During the past several years until the end of his life he worked as the host of 2Jams, a jazz program of Demajors Radio. He interviewed musicians and bands, promoting their album, playing their songs and anything else to let the listeners know every interesting stuff about the particular band he was talking about. In fact, he was still doing it passed midnight in the last day of his life.

His last program was promoting the new album of LIGRO : “Transisi” including an in-depth interview with two of the founders, Agam Hamzah and Gusti Hendy ‘Gigi’. He felt pain in his chest when he woke up in the morning, brought to the hospital. The medics did everything they could, but failed to save him. Just like us, many people was shocked with the news. The grief immidiately took the social medias by storm. So many musicians and jazz figures are still mourning until now including us.

As we thought of making something special, we got an offer from The Papandayan Hotel. This hotel has been doing tremendously in presenting high quality of jazz to all jazz afficionados in Bandung with its TP Jazz which is still running after around 4 years. From the curator Venche Manuhutu, we heard the wish of them to support the jazz development further by inviting jazz communities to be a part of them. “We realize how important the role of jazz communities really is, we have seen the fruits, so we want us to work together for the future of jazz in Indonesia.” said Venche to us. They let us utilize their supercool TP Stage which is built exclusively for jazz with high quality acoustic treatment to make anyone able to feel the perfect ambience just like being in a top class jazz clubs out there. Having a jazz community in this kind of environment will definitely boost the regeneration much faster and better. We can bring the young talents to taste how it is playing in a room with top-notch acoustic and sound. And of course, this spot is perfect for a special tribute to honor an important figure like Widyasena Sumadio.

So, we dedicate our first edition of JAZZUALITY @ TP to honor him. The theme is “IN MEMORY OF WIDYASENA SUMADIO”. After deciding the theme and plan, we directly arranged the lineup, trying to invite musicians who are connected to him and those who he was really proud of. Apparently many musicians love, respect and miss him like we do. Quickly we got names to fill up the slot, consisting of musicians from Bandung and Jakarta who got his support during their career. They are ready to give honour to Widyasena through what they do best: playing music.

First, there will be Agam Hamzah. This man plays guitar like a maestro. He plays jazz, bossanova, classical, rock and everything in between like magic. With his daredevil avant-garde jazz-rock experimental Ligro, he has gone international under USA-based label MoonJune Records with so many praises given to him and the band from all over the world.

Ligro is the last band Widyasena interviewed for 2Jams, a program of Demajors Radio just a couple of hours before his passing. All the way to midnight, they talked about the new release of Ligro titled “Transisi”. Agam and Widyasena still chatted after that until around 1:30 am, not knowing that it was going to be their last talk. We invited Agam to participate in this event since he was one of the last person who interacted with Widyasena. He is important, luckily he was available and agreed to visit Bandung for this event.

You will have the chance to listen to the music that ‘speaks’ from him. He can swing sweet and smooth, he can play breezy and dreamy with bossa, he can combine any of those with classical seamlessly, but when the time’s right, he can be so venomous and edgy the way he’s been showing with Ligro. As we said, this man doesn’t just play music, he speaks, whispers even shouts through music. Don’t believe us? Come see and hear yourself.

We also invited some of the successful music artistes from Bandung who Widyasena’s always been proud of. First, the one of a kind guitarist with such skill and brain far ahead his age. Like Agam Hamzah, he has marked his existance internationally but at much younger age, again thanks to MoonJune Records. He builds his fortress in between Progressive and Experimental Jazz, he has quite remarkable experience in Ethnic and World Music as well. He is none other than Tesla Manaf.

We still remember the day when he started his career as a duo alongside Bayu Kristanto almost 10 years ago and followed his journey ever since. He carried on with two other duos: with Grace Sahertian and Ivan ‘AJ the Real’, both resulted one album. He made huge wave with G.E.T, but then he surprised everyone by establishing a progressive jazz with Balinese taste: the Tesla Manaf ft Mahagotra Ganesha (using a gamelan ensemble and a Barong dancer). This groundbreaking concept placed him higher than before, which also attracted MoonJune to recruited him. With MoonJune he went international with an album full of praises from critics around the world. Suddenly world is within reach for him. He went touring overseas and the world recognizes him as a brilliant, if not genius, musician and places him among the best in the world.

Last August we noticed that he made another movement that invites his audience into a bizzare, surrealistic world through his music. Haunting, hypnotizing, full of emotion, he unlocks the door never opened before and let us feel what we never thought existed. Just a few weeks ago Tesla collaborated with photographer Mia Damayanti Sjahir to create one stunning collaboration that stimulate the ears, eyes and feels ; all to remember the late Riza Arshad. The combination of his music and slides of Riza Arshad’s photos taken by Mia proves that the combination of art forms could create a new experience that would last a life time.

Grieving could have a different perspective through his music, we have no doubt of that. And this man always have his own way to send the messages about anything he feels. The late Widyasena had always been proud of him as he stated to us many, many times, so Tesla Manaf’s presence is a must.

Next, the Manuhutu Brothers: David Manuhutu and Ezra Manuhutu are confirmed. David Manuhutu is now enjoying his career on top. We first known him as a phenomenal jazz kid when he showed tremendous talent in jazz at his early teen years with his band Bop Vivant among others. It didn’t take long for him to gain recognition as well as achievements such as earning jury’s appreciation at Montreaux Piano Jazz Festival in 2008, the Winner and Grand Champion of Singapore Performing Arts Junior Competition 2010 with the Indonesian Youth Regeneration. He has performed in many prestigious stages like the Java Jazz Fetival, Wine and Jazz Festival 2010 in Singapore and the Shanghai World Expo 2010.

Just a year later, he went to Berklee College of Music under scholarship. According to his father, senior jazz guitarist/teacher Venche Manuhutu, it was Widyasena who suggested him to contact Dwiki Dharmawan to ask about the possibility of getting a scholarship from the government. His suggestion proved to be right. David got it and went to Berklee. In there, he earned place on Dean’s List, given to students who achieve high grades by the average of 3.4 or above.

After returning home, he’s been making big wave. Look at his album, “A Journey” which featured two top American jazz guitarists: Adam Rogers and Peter Bernstein plus drummer from Peru, Ken Ychicawa. The last time we met him was at the Ubud Village Jazz Festival 2017 with Rafi Muhammad and Robert MR among others, and just a couple of days ago, we saw him as a proud member of the new Indro Hardjodikoro Quartet. He’s just back from Album Tour in Japan too earlier this month, visiting Tokyo and Nagoya.

We believe he is going to make more waves as he’s just begun with this new chapter. We haven’t been able to feature him after his return, we are excited to see what he has in store today.

David’s younger brother, Ezra Manuhutu is a rising bassist who is going to follow his footsteps soon. Ezra was once a saxophonist, but later switched to bass. He was the bassist of New Equinox, a jazz trio who played regularly in our past event, the Bumi Sangkuriang Jazz Night. Now he is active in a group full of young jazz stunts: The New Blood. He is having better and better groove now along with enhanced skill. This time he will play with his big bro, it’s going to be cool to see jazz flowing out from the Manuhutu Brothers.

Also from Bandung is a girl who’s not only gifted in singing with her strong soulful vocal character but also has strong artistic taste. True, she is also a fiber artist, but in pursuing her singing career she makes her journey far more meaningful than just to entertain. She has a solid character, she knows what she wants and she stays true to it. She is Grace Sahertian.

Like Tesla, we have been following her steps from the start, when she served as the vocalist of a soulful jazz band Palm from Moodytunes. As we mentioned, she made a collaboration with Tesla exploring the world music terrain. Amazingly, she also joined the neo soul group Circle O’Fifth in the same year. We found her in Margo Rising Stars among other projects she was involved in.

Since 2011 she came to realize that in order to fulfill her dream, she got to listen to her heart. However, it still took a couple of years of soul searching to finally found what she really wanted and how she should make her debut album. When it was released last year, we knew that it was worth to wait. The album contains more than just songs. In this album titled “Hela”, she tells a lot of stories about her life, including tracing back her roots all the way back to Porto land in Saparua, Maluku. She takes it important as she sang the title track by using the nearly extinct language, Yamdena. Other than taking us to tracing back her roots, she lets the listeners feel what she feels. Sadness, anger, desperation, contemplation and motivation to stand tall and keep on moving.

For this event Grace is bringing her players including Omega Touselak (keys & synth), Rayhan Sudrajat (guitar), Faishal M Fasya (keys & synth bass) and Gantira Sena (drums).

She is among young artists from Bandung who Widaysena was really proud of. So we think it’s important to have her in this musical ceremony.

The last name joining this special ceremony’s lineup is a phenomenal young man who shone from a very early age. He is a drummer, but he surprised everyone not only because he played amazingly good, but he released his debut album titled “Can’t Stop the Beat” by having Harvey Mason as the producer, and featured no less than 18 world’s jazz giants including Mason’s mates in Fourplay Bob James and Nathan East, Ernest Tibbs, Tom Scott and many more. He also holds 3 MURI (The Indonesia World Records Museum) Records, all related to his awesome achievements in such tender age, and for us, this young man’s never stop redefining jazz with his distinctive, youthful flavors, by simply being himself. He simply knows how to hippin’ and hoppin’ with jazz. Any bands he’s in will bring such vibrant colors which feels modern yet ‘jazzy tasty’. He is none other than Rafi Muhammad.

We believe that short introduction above would already show you that Rafi is like no other. Even Harvey Mason told us that he is indeed rare. But actually he’s never stop moving with ideas and creativity. He made impact with his bands, from Rafi and the Beat to The Art of Tree, he was in LLW second formation, then Her Coat of Arms.

Last year he announced his upcoming solo album followed by the release of his single “Break the Rules” on March 2017. All these activities leads to the release of his album “Transition” just a couple of days ago (12 November) which was launched not in Indonesia but in Motion Blue Yokohama, Japan! It became possible since this album is under an open minded Japanese record label, AMSA Records. This label holds great artists in variety of genres from rock to jazz. We found some of amazing musicians inside this label other than Rafi that we know very well like Boris Savoldelli (Italy) and two impressionistic jazzmen from USA, guitarist Hristo Vitchev and pianist Weber Iago.

Rafi’s new album “Transition” is a big movement for him as he steps into his young adult age. This album more or less depicts his musical journey and experience throughout the years. You will find the genre he has encountered from jazz, rock (fusion), psychedelic music, progressive and of course hip hop. Dewa Budjana and Indra Lesmana were featured in this album among other fellow musicians.

Widyasena has been supporting Rafi for many years. We met them together 3 years ago in Bandung when they promoted the Art of Tree, and he spoke many great things about the band and Rafi. When we make a tribute like this to him, we know that we have to invite Rafi. Luckily he’s available and happy to be in this event.  For this gig he will play alongside Doni Joesran (keyboard) and Taufan Wirzon (bass).

Once again, the Jazzuality @ TP will come on Sunday, 26 November 2017 at the TP STAGE , THE PAPANDAYAN HOTEL starting from 7:00 pm onwards. This event is totally FREE of any charge. We hope you to come and join us in this jazzy ceremony. We all miss him, may God rest his soul and spirit peacefully, we will always pray for him and hope this event could become our way to send our respect to him.

JAZZUALITY @ TP : IN MEMORY OF WIDYASENA

Date: Sunday, 26 November 2017
Time: 07:00 – onwards
Location: TP Stage, The Papandayan Hotel
Jl. Jendral Gatot Subroto no 83, Bandung

FREE EVENT!

Featuring:
– Agam Hamzah (Jakarta)
– Rafi Muhammad (Jakarta)
– The Manuhutu Brothers: David Manuhutu and Ezra Manuhutu
– Tesla Manaf
– Grace Sahertian

Supported by: Demajors (thanks to David Karto) and Venche Music School

We have presented around 150 showcases in Braga Jazz Night (formerly known as Braga Jazz Walk) since it was started more than 3 years ago. For us, this shows that Bandung, or in bigger scene, Indonesia, has endless numbers of talents, something which we always believe even before we started this event. By collaborating with the happening mall and favorite hangout place located in the historical Braga street, the Braga City Walk, we’re keep doing our commitment in contributing to the jazz development in Indonesia, especially in the regeneration process. In this event we mainly want to provide time and chance for young musicians to gain experience and be known. We want them to know, that when no other place believe in them, we are always here for them. We started simple by supporting the local talents from our hometown, but as the event progressed, we started welcoming musicians and bands from other cities, even nations. Making this event a home for everybody is what we wanted from the start, and now we are very happy to see it happens.

For the Braga Jazz Night #41 we featured 3 groups with different formation and style, ranging from full band, trio and duo. We got one native Flores young man, born in Borneo but now is studying in Bandung. Then, we got a duo to bring the jazzy side of Disney songs, and for the first time welcome a jazz guitarist from a quite far city located in the mid part of Sumatra, near Singapore, the city of Batam. For this event he built a Batam-Bandung Connection by performing with two compatriotes from Bandung. So, from Flores to Batam to Bandung, to Disney, that’s pretty much the plot for this 41st edition.

Performing first was a dynamic, acoustic duo that we invited to bring a specific theme. The duo is called AEL/HARDI, and the theme is “Sings Disney”. Ael/Hardi consists of a young female singer whose voice has a vibe of jazz/blues ladies from the past, Putri Rahel and a well established jazz guitarist and respected guitar teacher, Hardi Suryana.

We have invited them a couple of months ago. In that edition they wowed us by serving simple but heartfelt performance, taking on jazz standards ranging from the 20’s to 70’s. Ael (Rahel) actually has built a good career upon classical singing. As a part of a choir from her campus, she has reached Italy and won the competition in there. But then, she got interested in jazz and found a good mentor in Hardi. Knowing that one of the reasons for Ael (Rahel) to falling in love into jazz from listening to Disney songs, we thought it’s going to be perfect to let her bring Disney songs in one special session. We also want to remind everyone that there are so many Disney songs built within jazz since the first Disney cartoon appeared in the late 20’s. The soundtrack of it’s first fully animated feature film in 1937 “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs”, “Someday My Prince Will Come” has even taken as a jazz standard. The newer songs would also be nice to compose with jazz.

Ael must have loved the plan because she wore Mickey Mouse shirt to fit the ‘Sings Disney’ theme. Another thing that we always love from this duo is the fact that they love to think out of the box by picking interesting, unpredictable song lists not many remember anymore. The evidence came directly from the first song, originally sang by Peggy Lee from Disney’s 1955 animated classic Lady & The Tramp: “He’s a Tramp”. Think of it, how often do we hear this classic, jazz-based Disney song nowadays? Slim chance. That’s why we are happy to have this song back alive on stage again, especially when it was brought by a acoustic jazz duo as good as this. If that song is now rare for us to hear, the second song probably is even rarer. They took the theme song of Disney’s The Aristocats (1970): “Everybody Wants To Be A Cat”. Again, it was beautifully delivered.

Ael showed how much she loved Disney. She didn’t just sing the songs but also told us a little story of each film. Next she took a song from a legendary Disney film from 1959, “The Sleeping Beauty” titled “Once Upon A Dream”. “If you remember, the Princess sang this song in the wood.” said Ael. Yes, we do remember that memorable scene, and love the song ever since. Ael/Hardi waltzed throughout the song with a perfect blend of swing.

The next one was more familiar to younger audience, since it was from Pocahontas. Yes, that’s “Colors of the Wind”. It’s just cool to see them keeping the beautiful, earthy feel of it while infusing some jazz not too much but naturally. For the last song they covered a classic song from the 40’s but used in “Finding Nemo” (2003) by the voice of Robbie Williams, “Somewhere Beyond The Sea”. This song gave a perfect ending to their show.

As expected, the full rounded music from Hardi and lovely vintage jazzy voice of Ael over beautiful Disney songs created a fine show. Other than we enjoyed the famous, classic Disney songs in jazz, it became more relevant since we are getting closer to Walt Disney’s birthday which will come on December 5. The world of Disney is the world children grew up with for generations. Besides its famous cartoon characters, the songs have become classics too. In this event we got the chance to listen to them. They cleverly took us into a journey over the Disney World from 1955 t0 2003, from The Lady & the Tramp, The Aristocats, Sleeping Beauty, Pocahontas and Finding Nemo.

All classic songs, we love to hear them again, and how wonderful it is to have it from a duo as good as Ael/Hardi. There are still so many great Disney songs to go with. What about Mary Poppins? Pinocchio? Cinderella? Little Mermaid? Beauty and the Beast? Or the newer ones like Tangled, Frozen and Moana? If they agree, we would love to have the second part of this Disney theme coming from them.

In the second session we featured the young man with lots of talents in music. Like we said before, he is native Flores who was born in Borneo but now resides in Bandung. His name is Marlon Fridolin, and he chose to go only with MARLON to make it easier to remember. In such young age he has been doing a lot of things in music business. He works as a jingle maker, music score for television soap operas, being a judge in singing competitions, music director and mixing/mastering, and on top of it all, he is a singer and musician. Other than teaching, he writes songs for himself. As an evidence of his vocal quality, he has won many competitions and reached the Top 36 at Indonesia Mencari Bakat Season 1.

He has started his solo career some years ago, releasing a successful single titled “Tlah Usai” and gained more than 12k viewers from 2015. He came to us offering his new single “Sewaktu Hujan”. Eventhough he is still trying to find the best arrangement for the song, we think the song has a very good chance to be loved by music lovers so we brought him in. While this is his solo debut for Braga Jazz Night, it’s not his first time because he was here last time supporting his good friend, Antoni Sidjabat.

He brought some of his friends supporting him for this event. They are Boyke Nainggolan (bass), Yabes Ambarita (guitar) and Daniel (drum). Yulius Ferdian (saxophone) was supposed to be here, but he didn’t show up at all until the last minutes. Losing one player could suffer the band, but Marlon led the rest of the team to give their best.

Coincidence or not, the Disney theme continued on with 98°and Stevie Wonder’s “True To Your Heart” which appeared in Disney’s 1998 film, Mulan. Marlon voice suits to sing this kind of soulful, groovy song and his stage appearance is really nice to see too. Marlon knows what kind of song would go well with his high pitched voice as he covered a classic from Daniel Sahuleka, “You Make My World So Colorful”. Daniel, Boyke and Yabes did well in accompanying him. For the last song they took Ruth Sahanaya’s hit “Keliru”. Once again, Marlon showed us that what song would fit his vocal range and pitch. Just like the previous two choices, he nailed this one pretty well.

This man has a forte in ballad and high pitched, wide vocal range, has good stage presence and bunch of talented friends who are happy to support him. He writes good songs, ear cachy melodies and simple lyrics that should connect to everybody’s daily life and experience. He is a fine musician that knows what to do in every process of production. As you can see, this man is a complete package. What he needs is time and more chance to proof himself. We always feel happy to meet a talent like Marlon. Too bad he didn’t sing his own originals because according to him he’s still working to find the best compositions. We hope next time we invite him, he will bring on one or two.

For the third and final session we proudly welcome a swingin’ guitarist from Batam on our stage. His name is Tchepy Wijaya Soekardi. Like Marlon, Tchepy likes to use just his first name in his music career.

We knew him for the first time when we covered the Asean Jazz Festival 2012, an annual jazz fest held in Batam. We still remember how good he was, fusing jazz with Javanese and Balinese ethnic music at that time, even using kendang players instead of drums. He was a fine jazz fusion guitarist, but he told us that right after that performance, he decided to go deeper into the pure world of jazz by focusing on traditional swing, something his teacher, Oele Pattiselano is best at. Other than Oele, he was also learnt from senior guitarist Kadek Rihardika.

Tchepy is active in the Batam Jazz Community and has been spending his nights for many year as an established jazz musicians in his city. To us, this man is a portrait of how jazz is in Batam. He gives a strong statement of the existance and growth of jazz in there.

For this event he appeared as TCHEPY TRIO. We paired him up with two jazz musicians from Bandung: Alman Naufal (drum) and Aries Ardiansyah (bass). These musicians have been playing together many times, including in many gigs of the New Equinox. They haven’t met before, yet they felt connected through chats and phone talks. This pairing creates a harmonious Batam-Bandung connection which we believe will give benefit to both side. At least now Tchepy has a team whenever he has gigs in Bandung or nearby, vise versa.

The beauty of pure jazz appeared right from the start with Cole Porter’s “I Love You”. Not wasting any time, Tchepy gave rooms for his compatriotes to shine by including some cool tradings. They carried on with Richard Rodgers’ composition from 1935, “My Romance”. Tchepy demonstrated how well he could swing. Like an architect, he calmly built each song to perfection. The improvisations were delicious, appeared naturally without any intention once so ever to show off.

The famous jazz standard everyone know “Autumn Leaves” became the next canvas for them to paint. Again, the sweet jazz harmony and chord progression were tasty and charming. The intensity rose when Tchepy pinned the bebop mainstay from Dizzy Gillespie, “Groovin’ High”. If usually we heard this song played by saxophone/trumpet players and the likes, this time Tchepy showed us that this song can be played with guitar just as good. The manic solo drum by Alman was wild on this one.

What’s interesting about Tchepy Trio is that they gained more and more audience throughout the performance. To show that they didn’t want to lose the momentum, they dropped one last bomb, a Charlie Parker’s masterpiece titled “Billie’s Bounce”.

Tchepy is indeed a fine jazz purist. He swings ellegantly in humble way. His way of improvising is as wide and clear as the sky, yet as we said before, he brings it honestly without any intention to show off. He takes his time to build any song, embracing the momentum and build each one to perfection. We feel happy to be able to invite him from Batam, not only to show how well jazz in Batam today really is but also to remind us of why we love jazz in first place.

Band-wise speaking, such lovely harmony from musicians who have never even met before is really inspiring. The Tchepy Trio played like they have been together for years, sharing, supporting, exploring, trading to one another. They kept the foundation of each song the way they discussed then joyfully went improvising whenever they could. As a result, we got sheer swing extacy where passion, fun and love to this music filled the air. A successful cross-city collaboration it was, we hope the trio will be kept to strengthen the jazz connection between the great city of Batam and Bandung.

Since we still got a little time left, we opened the jam session. Guitarist/bassist Kanggep Kusuma who came to support his son Alman agreed to join in. The soul diva Agis Kania who soon will release her second single happily stood on stage as well. Alman and Aries secured the rhythm. Voila, a solid team was built. They sang Antonio Carlos Jobim’s evergreen from 1967, “Wave” . It was spontaneous, but they played real solid as if they were a band. “I haven’t shared the stage with Kanggep for so long, so I’m happy that it happened right here.” said Agis to us. Kanggep also shared his happiness to be able to jam at the Braga Jazz Night.

With this 41st edition, the Braga Jazz Night has expanded its wings to support wider areas in Indonesia. This fact strengthen our wish to make this event as the home of everybody. We are never interested in being segmented, nor that we want to be a closed group or circle. We want to open our stage as wide as possible, reaching and welcoming jazz-related musicians from wherever they come from, whoever they are. No discrimination, no different treatment. We want to extend our reach as wide as possible, supporting more musicians even further than we ever imagine.

As we are approaching December, we are preparing a special Christmas Edition and hope to be able to spread the peace and joy to everyone through good quality of jazz music. Thank you everyone, see you again in December!

Watch the highlights of Braga Jazz Night #41

See more pictures:

Reporter: Riandy Kurniawan
Video editor: Vierna Mariska Kurniawan .

Bandung should be proud of having a great big band with international reputation and standard, The Salamander Big Band. Ever since it was established in 2006 by Devy Ferdianto, this big band has boldly set off its course against the mainstream. Like a team of time traveller, they go back in time exploring the beautiful world of swing from the golden era to the way big band sounded in different periods. Like what we always said, the Salamander Big Band is an authentic big band, not a band that’s big. The formation is set to be like Cole Porter or Duke Ellington’s, it has so many high skilled professional musicians who could bring the best out of great compositions. We have been with them for almost 10 years now, covering almost all their performances both their own concerts and when they participated in international festivals like the Java Jazz Festival or Ubud Village Jazz Festival.

Speaking of concert, they always try their best to make two each year: The Mid Year Concert and Anniversary Concert. It’s been a higlight for us for almost a decade. From time to time they bring something different and unique to the table. Letting the fans and jazz enthusiasts taste the grand big band sound capturing different jazz milestones, collaborating with giants and legends both from our own nation and also from abroad. The skill, the harmony got tastier and tastier each time we saw them. Not only the musicians, they have an amazing line of vocals too which we can proudly compare with just about any great ones out there.

The last concert the Salamander had was the Mid Year at Selasar Sunaryo Art Space. At that time they gave tribute to legendary artist Titiek Puspa. You can read our coverage here: http://jazzuality.com/jazz-event-report/salamander-big-band-2017-mid-year-concert-the-report/. At that time, Devy Ferdianto had told us that they would be back again this year for the 11th Anniversary Celebration in November. Entering the month, we noticed that that plan has come into realization.

The thing is, eventhough we have known the plan since months ago, this awesome ensemble were still able to caught us by surprise in their 11th Anniversary. Why? At least because of four reasons:
1. they brought in two of today’s mega-stars: TULUS and YURA
2. they paid tribute to key-wiz, composer Riza Arshad
3. they carried TUNES OF STAGE & SCREEN as the theme, presenting great songs from the movies from the 60’s to now
4. it was held as the program of JAZZ AULA BARAT #5

For you who are still not familiar with the Jazz Aula Barat, this event was started in 2013 as a program of the students’ activity unit (UKM) of Institut Technology of Bandung called ITB JAZZ (formerly known as ITJazz). If you wonder why they use AULA BARAT as the name, this building which was built in 1919 and stands as the landmark of ITB building has witnessed and welcomed so many jazz figures for decades. The Aula Barat is a part of jazz history of Bandung and Indonesia, it’s iconic, legendary and important.

Riza Arshad, who sadly passed away in January 2017 had a vision to make Aula Barat as one of the cultural centers that serve good, appreciative music performance especially jazz. That idea came to life in 2013 and then continued on in 2016. Series of concerts presenting big names (bands and musicians) who have been dedicating their life and career to this particular music we all love. Today, acting as the curator of Jazz Aula Barat is highy respected figure in jazz, pianist/composer Imam Pras. We know in his hands, this Jazz Aula Barat will continue to have a great future.

After an opening speech and introduction by ITB Jazz’s chief Samuel and The Director of Public Relation and Alumni Dra Samitha Dewi Djajanti, Salamander Big Band arrived on the scene under round applause from the audience. Without further adue they energized the audience with the theme song of the second most financially successful tv animated franchise, “The Flinstones”. The Salamander Big Band executed this song very well just like the original version which was recorded with 22 piece jazz band. Dicky Ampouw and Matt Ashworth became the soloist on this one. The curator Imam Pras joined the ensemble on this one. Loud cheers and applauses were poured on them.

Starting from the first song, this event gave more than just a music performance. They provided a big screen behind the band that revealed the title and also scene from each movie they took the song from. They carried on with another animated movie, this time from the Disney’s “Jungle Book” called “Bare Necessities”. It’s cool to see Mowgli and Baloo dancing on the background while they played the song. Andriyanto Haryanto and Recky Darmawan on trombones were the soloist.

Enough with the animated movie, they switched to a famous song written by filmmaker/actor/comedian extraordinaire Charlie Chaplin, “Smile”. You could hear this song in the biopic “Chaplin” (1992). The Diane Schuur of Indonesia, Nenden Syintawati was on vocal with established saxophonist from Jakarta Donny Koeswinarno on solo. Like the previous song, the sound of flutes enriched the song’s texture.

The famous song from a 1956 movie starring Bing Crosby, written by Cole Porter came right after: “Anything Goes”. Imelda Rosalin left the piano and paired with Gail Satiawaki in front. If you remember, this song appeared grand again 28 years later as the opening of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, sang by the heroine Kate Capshaw along with cool cabaret, Broadway style dancing. Imelda and Gail nailed it as before, and Matt Ashworth got his role again as the soloist. Another song taken from the same movie also written by Porter followed, it’s “De-Lovely”. Amalia Ramdhan was in charge with the vocal.

We enjoyed the scene from “Anything Goes” in two songs. Then Salamander Big Band jumped years forward to pin recent time’s popular song of Sam Smith made as the theme song of 007 James Bond movie, “Spectre”. Yes, it’s “Writing’s On The Wall”! As this song is familiar to today’s generation, they received some noise from the audience. Gail ellegantly sang this song the way Sam Smith did, including Smith’s falsetto trademark. Having the English super spy while enjoying real big band gave us chills, it’s something we don’t get to see often.

Then came the amazing vocal harmony group of Salamander Big Band called Salamander Voices. This vocal group consists of Amalia Ramdhan, Sekar Teja Inten, Devi Remondi and Adi Sigerra. Its first appearance was 4 years ago in the 7th Anniversary Concert. This group of 4 singers has a superb vocal skills and harmony. Of course, when they sing a song from “Finding Nemo”, “Somewhere Beyond the Sea”, it works like charm.

Imelda Rosalin was given the chance to sing one of her favorite song written by one of her all-time favorite composer Burt Bacharach: “A House Is Not a Home”. Singing while having her fingers dance over the keys on grand piano is one of the things she does best. Do we love it? Absolutely.

As they were also tributing Riza Arshad, the brain of this event, Devy Ferdianto announced that they would play two of Riza’s compositions, and since both songs were arranged by Imam Pras, Devy gladly gave his position to him as the conductor. Imam Pras stood up facing the big band and let them on “Black Hole”. We still remember this song was played by Imam Pras and his group TCP/IP in 2010 edition of Serambi Jazz (http://jazzuality.com/jazz-event-report/serambi-jazz-2010-tcpip-the-report/). Dicky Ampouw flew up high in his solo run, as this song got richer sound by the additional clarinet and flute. Riza’s other composition “Empty Room” hit our emotion. The complexity and feel of emptiness made us realize that the master composer is no longer with us physically. We believe those who know him could shed a tear listening to this one.

For the last song of the first session, they flipped our mood back up again with Gordon Goodwin’s song “Backrow Politics”. This song offers a trumpet feast where the straight eights groove and funky punch rules big time. Not only the magical sound of 6 trumpets altogether, 4 trumpeters (Oki Dirgualam, Ujung Sitorus, Wisnu Maulana and Brury Effendy) also got their solos. Devy made them run solo in order from left to right, giving us some visual action along with the playful music. This song was the real kick both for the Salamander and audience, making us unpatiently waited for the second part of the concert.

After 15 minutes break, everyone outside rushed in to enjoy the rest of the show. They made a very interesting open up by taking Quincy Jones’ 1962 gem “Soul Bossa-Nova”. This song was used as the theme song of comical 60’s hipster, psychedelic secret agent movie starring Mike Myers, “Austin Powers”. As we said before, the Salamander Big Band doesn’t only play traditional swing from the golden era, but they also capable to bring the scene of big band sound from later years. In this song we enjoyed the 60’s feel created effortlessly by the ensemble.

If you already watched movies in mid 90’s, you should remember there was a rom-com movie with the late Whitney Houston and Denzel Washington as the lead stars. The movie’s titled “The Preacher’s Wife”. There’s a Whitney song within the soundtrack that’s not only became a top five hit in the USA at that time but also nominated for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance at the 40th Grammy Awards: “I Believe In You and Me”. Perhaps no one’s better to take on this song than the runner-up of The Voice Indonesia season 2 (2016) who is also a proud member of The Salamander Voices, Sekar Teja Inten. This young lady has an outstanding soulful vocal quality which is perfect to sing any R&B songs including a difficult ones like Whitney’s. Sekar took her time, connecting her heart with the audience until she completed the song. Rika Andryani was the only pianist playing in this part.

Gail was back on stage to sing Oasis’ “Wonderwall”. As shown on screen, this song was featured in the final scene of an episode of Smallville season 3. We have heard some jazz versions of this song before (including by Brad Mehldau), but now it’s arranged for big band. Cool arrangement, nice vocal work. The blind lady with unbelievable voice Nenden Syintawati replaced Gail to cover “People”, a Barbra Streisand’s hit from her movie in 1968, “Funny Girl”. Dreamy-flowing melody and strong vocal blew our mind away.

Imelda Rosalin got her second round leading in front. This time she sang not other but her own song, “Hidup Ini Indah”, a hit from the soap opera “Strawberry” in 2002. “Life is beautiful”, that’s how she sum up the character who has honest and sincere personality. Many of the audience still remember this song as we saw happy smile rose upon many faces. A hit circa 1970 from the late Chrisye, “Badai Pasti Berlalu” sounded beautiful in vocal harmony style by the Salamander Voices.

Then came the time for Salamander to bring in the guest stars, starting with Yura. Yura (Yunita Rachman) is a very talented lady with unique beautiful voice that is following Tulus’ footsteps as popular artist. It’s no secret that she gained popularity after being the contestant of The Voice 2013. Eventhough she didn’t win, Glenn Fredly knew that she’s different offered to make her album and signed her in his label. Their duet “Cinta dan Rahasia” topped the charts of many radios. True, but her own songs have the power to be hits too, like “Balada Sirkus” and “Berawal dari Tatap”. Another interesting fact, before she competed in that mentioned talent search above, she was already active as the keyboardist of Risa Sarasvati. She was also existed as a backing vocal, for example in Tulus’ “Konser Diorama” in May 2013 that we still remember clearly.

Yura has just made a wonderful achievement by winning the Best Song for AMI Awards 2017 and Best Female Solo Artist with her album “Intuisi”. Huge pops from the crowds were heard as she walked in. “I’m going to sing the song as requested by Salamander”, she said. And it turns out to be the another James Bond theme, “Skyfall”. It’s kind of surprise us since we didn’t expect her to sing this one, but Devy seemed to know Yura’s indeed the right choice. Her strong voice, steady vibe and clear pronounciation made the song served grand.

Yura carried on with her own song, “Kataji”. “Since I perform here in Bandung, I’m going to sing my own song written in Sundanese”, she said. So there, we got the chance to hear the song in big band fashion. Imam Pras joined Rika on keys. She involved the audience in this one.

Then came the phenomenal star of the decade, Tulus! On the surface, people would think that Tulus rose to fame over a night with his phenomenal first single, “Sewindu.” Although the single and the debut album was really a bullseye in hitting people’s hearts, Tulus has worked hard since at least 5 years earlier to establish himself in this business. He can make catchy melodies and smart lyrics. It can be poetic, it can be simple, but these lyrics which give portraits of what we all experience are made with class. No wonder all his album, from the self-titled debut “Tulus”, “Gajah” to “Monokrom” are all very well-received by fans. He is also a great example of how a musician could achieve success from the community. We know how serious and committed he is, so we are happy to see him being on top today.

At the AMI Awards 2017 (16 November), Tulus wins big by sweeping 5 awards in categories: The Best Album, The Best Production, The Best Soul/R&B/Urban Album, Best Male/Female Soul/R&B/Urban Singer also Best Recording Producer, all for his album Monokrom. We have listened and loved his songs from the albums and concerts, but as we wished, this time we got the chance to hear some of the hits in Big Band arrangement.

Thunderous cheers and applause filled the hall when he came in and waved. On stage, he told a little story that eventhough he wasn’t studied in ITB, he actually came there often, sitting in one corner to write many songs. The third track from the phenomenal first album, “Kisah Sebentar” was the first choice. Many of his fans sang along with him. Some girls moved to the front of the stage so they could snap some photos with their gadgets. Tulus’ crooning voice suits to go with big band. Maybe he doesn’t get much chance now since he has so many invitations from everywhere, but lucky for us, we could see it in this event. “I was so happy and excited when I was asked, I said yes right away.” said Tulus while smiling wide.

For the next song, the audience already knew when he gave a little introduction. It’s the title track of his latest album which swept the AMI Awards, “Monokrom”. We guess nobody in the room are strangers to this song. They sang along and did even louder when Tulus led them from the stage to be a giant choir. The curator of the event Imam Pras took part in Tulus’ performance.

Just two songs from both guest stars, but for us it’s already enough to create something special. Watching Yura and Tulus singing with the big band, for us it’s like a dream come true. We send respect to them both for being a part of this event and for making up such charming, energetic and memorable appearance.

Salamander Big Band still got one last song to deliver. Behold, the force was felt so strong because they played John Williams’ “Star Wars” theme. We have heard many version of this song from classical to disco to even jazz, but we never heard a fully jazz version like this. The song gave a perfect ending after we all got wonderful treats from the combination between lovely big band tunes and visual scenes from the movies.

So there, it was a blast, more than you can imagine. This is what’s funny about the Salamander Big Band. Everytime we saw them performing, we thought we have seen the best, but they kept on topping their previous ones with even better play. Plus, they never stop surprising us. Tonight they brought in two mega-stars to join their cruise, for a tribute to a highly respected figure in music particularly jazz, for an important event like this, it was wonderful!

Based on this and how we have seen the Salamander, we know that they can achieve much bigger things in the future. It’s far from over, the best is yet to come. We are always proud of the Salamander Big Band. As for the Jazz Aula Barat, we believe this event is important and have all the right to be one of the milestones of Indonesian jazz history. We wish ITB Jazz, the stakeholders and the curator, Imam Pras the best. Long live to you all, we enjoyed it, we loved it, we hope to see you again soon!

Salamander Big Band are:

Conductor: Devy Ferdianto
Saxophone: Matt Ashworth (tenor), Joseph Sinaga (alto), Dicky Ampouw (alto), Donny Koeswinarno (tenor), Bonny Buntoro (baritone)
Trumpet: Brury Effendy, Oki Dirgualam, Andri Hadiyono, Wisnu Maulana, Ujung Sitorus, Diana Saralely
Trombone: Agus Suherman, Andriyanto Haryanto, Afdhal Zickri, Arief Budhiyana, Recky Darmawan
Keys: Imelda Rosalin (+vocal), Rika Andryani, Imam Pras
Guitar: Bramania
Bass: Roy Bimantoro
Drums: Augustinus
Percussions: Adya Dhivara
Vocal: Nenden Syintawati, Gail Satiawaki, Salamander Voices (Adi Sigerra, Sekar Teja Inten, Amalia Ramdhan, Devi Remondi)

See more pictures:

Reporter: Riandy Kurniawan
Photographer: Mia Damayati Sjahir & Riandy Kurniawan .

In a fine morning on the 1st of November we got a sad news. Widyasena Sumadio, a communications strategist, independent creative development collaborator, a storyteller, hosting a radio program at Demajors’ Radio who for us is like a brother, buddy, mentor, motivator, passed away at the age of 51 due to a heart attack. He has helped not only us but also a lot of musicians/bands/groups in his life. Helping to connect the dots to achieve bigger and better things, helping with ideas and moral support. A very kind man with a big heart, always placing himself as a close relative who knew what we were struggling with and care enough to give solutions. That’s why many of us grief over his passing.

When we heard about this, we knew that we just had to make something special to remember him. We wanted to bring some of the musicians that he was always proud of and sent our respect through one thing we were connected with: jazz. As we had that plan, we were told that The Papandayan Hotel wanted to share its amazing TP Stage to us. The Papandayan has been successfully running its TP Jazz for around 4 years. Not only it’s served weekly, they also have the grant festival every year and consistently held knowledge sharing with clinics and talks. We feel honored that they wish to support the movement and effort made by a jazz community. We believe this will give benefit to the process of jazz development and regeneration that we have been working on for the last 5 years. We named the event as JAZZUALITY @ TP, set to run on the fourth Sunday of each month.

We respectfully dedicated the first edition for him and gave the title: “In Memory of Widyasena Sumadio”. As soon as we set the theme and date, we started inviting some musicians that we know he always proud of and directly got positive response and support from them. From Bandung are the Manuhutu Brothers (David and Ezra Manuhutu), Tesla Manaf and Grace Sahertian. Then, from Jakarta are Rafi Muhammad along with two friends: ex-BLP keyboardist Doni ‘Don Joe’ Joesran and Taufan Wirzon. As you have probably seen in the flyer and article, a senior guitarist/founder of Ligro whom Widyasena interviewed just a couple of hours before he passed away, Agam Hamzah was supposed to join the lineup, but unfortunately since he catches a bad cold he had to cancel his participation. We hope we could have him in this event some other time.

Performing first was a young jazz genius, Tesla Manaf. Tesla is different. He thinks differently, he executes differently. If you wonder how he could be so different, probably the music environment he grew up with contributed in some ways. Look, he was raised in 60’s-70’s rock progressive styles from the likes of Mahavisnu Orchestra, Gentle Giant, ELP to Soft Machine, but also embracing contemporary music from maestros like Debussy, Bela Bartok and Krzysztof Penderecki. Being fed from these two sides of musical sphere gave him inspirations especially in terms of composing with odd melodies and open-minded, even wild music imagination and exploration.

He has taken his journey one step at a time, which we feel fortunate to be able to witness right from the beginning of his career not long after he moved to Bandung. From a duo with Bayu Kristanto, with Ivan ‘AJ the Real’ Jonathan, with Grace Sahertian and even his successful trio G/E/T to his awesome project combining progressive jazz with traditional Balinese music, instrument and dance, the Tesla Manaf ft Mahagotra Ganesha, he showed tremendous progress. It wasn’t easy, he got to fight all obstacles and kept on sailing through stormy weathers. He caught the attention of MoonJune with the cross-progressive Balinese ensemble who directly signed him, resulting his solo debut album built upon progressive acoustic experimental music that placed him among the world’s top guitarist at recent time.

It’s not Tesla if he stops doing something new. Last August we covered his performance at the Ubud Village Jazz Festival where he played all by himself. He did efforts of connecting ears and eyes to heart in his performance resulting a new experience of enjoying his music. It continued on by collaborating with Mia Damayanti’s photo slides tributing the late key-wiz Riza Arshad a month ago.

Before he begin, he took his time to share his memory with Widyasena. “He loved to give advices, he often said things that I couldn’t understand at first, but when I think of it later, it all made sense and became really important to my career.” Tesla also reminds the audience of something we tend to forget or ignore. “Our works as musicans can be seen through our songs, whether in physics or digitally. But don’t forget that there are people behind the curtain. They might be unseen but we can’t be who we are without them. We have to remember and appreciate them too.” Well said, Tesla.

This time he did another new thing. We were surprised when he told us and the audience that he wouldn’t use his guitar this time, because he wanted to send his respect in special way. “I took my guitar, I played, but for strange reason it didn’t feel right. So I decided to do it in another way. I want this to be special and not like just another gig. I’m sorry if the sound would disturb you later, but this is how I feel for losing him.” he said.

If watching him on stage without guitar is already strange, what he did and the sound he made were much more bizzare. Using his Noise Box/Modular Synthesizer, he created a fully improvised soundscape in such dimension we have never been in before. It’s like he was trying to establish connection to the other world by using the sound of frequencies, sound clips from the movies and songs. The sound of people talking, the disturbing distortion, broken and chaotic, the space-y noise, all were produced from the panel by him.

Throughout the performance everyone were in total silence as Telsa dragged everyone into the tragic realm beyond sadness. In the last 5 minutes, suddenly we heard the voice of Widyasena doing the interview. And yes, it was taken from the last one he made with Ligro just a couple of hours before he died. We could still hear his excited voice, his way of laughing and so on. Then it started to get broken and slowly faded away. Empty, quiet, dark, until the applauses being thrown at him.

Mind-torturing, heart-tearing, provocative, unfamiliar sound to catch, especially on jazz stage. So unfamiliar that we might never understand what he made. But we are sure everyone who listened would get his feeling of pain, anger, sadness and every mixed emotions he has deep within.

Our fellow photographer, Kherisnawan said that Tesla’s play reminds him of Jonny Greenwood, the guitarist/keyboardist of Radiohead. It was like fully improvised bizzare experimental post rock with no pattern or steady beat even melody. This shocking start allowed us to feel the other side of music far transcending whatever we know about it. None of us predicted him playing this way, but after seing it, we realize that another form is existed, and there will be more to discover in other periods of time. And what’s also important is, we can see Tesla now not just as a young guitar virtuoso but also a true artist who know what to do and use in order to deliver his feeling. Simply magnificent.

The second session featured an artistic soulful diva who started her career around the same period with Tesla. She is none other than Grace Sahertian. We have also seen her growth from the start, when she was still with her band Palm From Moodytunes. She began wish soulful, jazz influenced groove, but later on she went on digging wider, reaching the world music as a duo with Tesla and even the urban jazzy hip hop with Circle O’Fifth which has one hit single “Honestunes”.

At a certain time she realized that she had to proceed with her solo career. At first it wasn’t easy for her to find the concept especially since she listened to what people said, but when she decided to listen to her own heart, she finally knew what she wanted and needed to do. After three years in the making, she has released her debut solo album titled “Hela”. With this album she’s taking the listeners into her life process, the highlights of her musical journey (you will find soul, gospel, blues, jazz and world music throughout the tracks) and amazingly brings us into the voyage of finding her roots, using the nearly extinct language of Yamdena. (Read the story about the album here: http://jazzuality.com/album-reviews/grace-sahertian-hela-tracing-back-the-roots/ ). If you follow her career and listen to her albums, also the fact that she is a fine fiber artist, you will agree with us that she is really, really artistic.

For this tribute she took her strong team including Rayhan Sudrajat (guitar), Omega Touselak (keys), Faishal M Fasya (keys and synth bass) and Gantira Sena (drum).

After sharing her memory with Widyasena the last time they met, what he told her and gave his support to Grace’s debut solo album, Grace took us into a journey towards her roots back to the beautiful island in Maluku through her title track “Hela”. Grace’s vocal backed with Rayhan’s voicing and the music served by her team made our imagination appear as if we were rowing bravely in the deep blue sea, facing no matter situation lies ahead with head straight. Just like in the ancient beliefs, this voyage theme could become a way for Grace to sail his spirit out to the better, peaceful world of afterlife in a majestic, elegant and heartful way.

Grace carried on with a track that always brings all her heart and soul out to be felt by the audience due to its strong nature, “Fallin'”. From there, she took Michael Jackson’s “Human Nature” and then as how she always wants it to be, she ended up by spreading positive motivating vibe with her song “Sun of Hope”. “The universe wants the best for you, so shine a light and be alive. Bring out the sun to shine,” she sang out loud. If the first song took us into a journey of sailing, the last presentation invited us to go through another different journey, this time into the vast rainforest in Africa through the beat and upmoving melody.

Grace has the kind of voice with strong character that can make any theme to be at its best. Especially for a tribute of someone who Grace knows and respects like this, she gave a heartfelt appearance. As one of the artists that Widyasena really proud of, we know that inviting her is a must. It turns out that she decorated this event soulfully delicious. She gave an expressive, exquisite soul-connected performance.

The sister of Widyasena, Mrs Widyawati, her son and Widyasena’s girlfriend Nirmala Hapsari attended this event. Before we continued with the performance, we invited the representative from the family, Nirmala to share some words on stage. Joining us was Hari Pochang and Venche Manuhutu as the representative of The Papandayan and his friend from Jakarta, show director/production manager Damar Hatmadi to share some sweet memories with the man we gave respect to.

Back to the performance, next we featured The Manuhutu Brothers: David and Ezra Manuhutu. They are the sons of senior jazz guitar teacher and founder of VMS, Venche Manuhutu.

David began his career since he was still a teenager around the same time of Tesla and Grace. After being active for a couple of years either with his own bands/projects or as a part of the Indonesian Youth Regeneration (IYR) who won the Grand Champion at Singapore Performing Arts Junior Competition in 2010, he got the chance to study at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, USA under a scholarship. According to Venche, it was Widyasena who suggested him to contact Dwiki Dharmawan to find the scholarship, and it was a right sugestion. In Berklee, David continued to make achievements, including earning place on Dean’s List given to students who achieve high grades by the average of 3.4 and above.

Now as he has done with his study, he quickly placed himself among the great young jazz musicians who are equipped with high jazz playing technique. He has made an album titled “A Journey” where he played alongside two top American jazz guitarists: Adam Rogers and Peter Bernstein, plus a drummer from Peru, Ken Ychicawa. He recently joins the Indro Hardjodikoro Quartet too and just came home from an album tour in Japan visiting two cities: Tokyo and Nagoya.

As for Ezra, we first knew him as a saxophonist, but later he switched to and found his existance in bass playing. He grew as a solid bassist with The New Equinox and now stands as the bassist of a band full of amazing young players, The New Blood.

As we mentioned before, The Manuhutu Brothers was supposed to play with Agam Hamzah. Since Agam couldn’t come, they had to play alone. But that’s not a problem, because good players like them could always do great things even just by two. For this event they played two jazz standards: 1930’s gem “Body and Soul” and Charlie Parker’s composition from 1946, “Confirmation”. In each song the siblings locked up tightly, connecting their brain, heart and soul to erve jazz in purity. Everything you love from jazz were there. They played tight, cleanly executed each one, spared plenty of room for improvising. A real treat for jazz purists or the hardcore jazz lovers.

Projected to play as trio, they ended up just as a duo at the last minute. But that’s the magic of jazz, you can still expect a good round from a class-act musicians. While we have known the amazing skill of David Manuhutu, it’s great to see that his little brother Ezra is going to the same direction. Beautiful songs, beautiful play, beautiful jazz.

For the final session we featured a phenomenal young drummer who with lots of achievements and holds 3 MURI Records (Indonesian World Records Museum): Rafi Muhammad. If you wonder why we refer him as a phenomenal musician, it’s because he has done so many amazing things since he was still a kid. The first time we heard his name was when his debut album “Can’t Stop The Beat” was released more than 10 years ago. This album was produced by Harvey Mason, featuring no less than 18 world’s jazz giants like Mason’s compatriotes in Fourplay: Bob James and Nathan East, Tom Scott, and Ernest Tibbs just to mention a few. Speaking of MURI Records, he is listed under 3 categories: the youngest musician who performs at the Java Jazz Festival, the youngest musician who collaborated with 18 international musicians and the youngest producer for his own album at the age of 14.

Speaking of skill, he is great not only in mastering variety of styles but also by his playing style which is distinctive and full of youthful energy. He is the master of infusing rock and urban hip hop into jazz that feels natural and fluid. Look at his band and project he’s in throughout his career, from Rafi and the Beat, The Art of Tree, the second formation of LLW (with Indra Lesmana and Barry Likumahuwa) and Her Coat of Arms (along with Sri Hanuraga and Adra Karim).

Just a few days ago he released a new album titled “Transition”. As usual, he made another breakthrough with this album. “Transition” is under a Japanese record label who signed artists in wide array of genres from jazz to rock, AMSA Records. The album launching gig was made not in Indonesia but at Motion Blue in Yokohama, Japan. As mentioned by Rafi when releasing the single a year ago titled “Break The RuleS”, this album depicts his journey in music since the moment he began his career up until now. Because of that you can find jazz, rock, fusion, psychedelic, progressive and urban hiphop.

Rafi is among the artists that Widyasena supported for many years. It’s still like yesterday when we met him with Rafi and his band The Art of Tree in Bandung. Therefore we had Rafi in our list when we came out with this tribute event, luckily he’s available and agreed to join. Rafi performed in trio formation with Doni Joesran (keyboard) and Taufan Wirzon (bass). To Rafi, Widyasena is a figure of his life. He told us that Widyasena played a very important role to his Japan tour. And to Doni, Widyasena is a companion of his life. “All songs we are going to play are dedicated to him, Rafi said right before he jumped into his saddle behind the set of drums.

The trio played songs from Rafi’s new album “Transition”. First was “When I Was 10”, a playful track with strong funky beat. This song caught the attention of the audience as they bagged applause a couple of times whenever the audience were pleased with their shot. The title track “Transition” followed directly afterwards. Don Joe moved from the grand piano to keyboard while the other two maintained their positions. This song is lethal with graphic beat and melody. Certainly not easy to play since it has a lot of twists and tricky moments.

Rafi, made the stage like his fun playground. He teased and threw jokes spontaneously when he’s not busy banging the drums. Then Don Joe stepped forward and gave a speech. Rafi offered to provide some music by placing himself behind the grand piano. Doni then told us about a song he wrote inspired by his chat with Widyasena a while ago about the power of mother’s prayers. The song’s titled “Her-Lachrymose” (Latin – means: tearful/weeping). This song was played in a solo piano recital. Don Joe had a short moment of silence before he started pouring sad, bitter-sweet streams of melody. The combination of classical with light jazz at its best, full with emotion creating a touching moment. This song is so beautiful, we hope it will go into the recording, either appear in Don Joe’s upcoming solo debut or in any other ones. Rafi and Taufan regrouped and gave one last action. Again, strong, furious track was served in full round which sealed this tribute in style.

The trio of Rafi Muhammad hows attractive jazz in urban feel at present time. The energetic powerful beat, the captivating bass walk and the vibrant piano sound, all packed in one rock solid performance. Rafi shared 3 songs from his new innovation/movement which is now available to hear in his latest album released just a week ago in Japan. Rafi and his beat is always too hard to handle, and this trio appears as a very strong unit. We are happy to be able to invite them and hope we can have them again some other times.

We thank all the participating artists who have given their best, The Papandayan Hotel, all who came and everyone behind this event. We hope everything we all did with this event ; eventhough small ; could send our respect and prayers to Widyasena. We miss his friendly appearance, his jokes, his thoughts, his ideas, his support and writings. He’s physically gone, but certainly not forgotten. Rest in peace mas Wid, we will keep on carrying your passion, wishes and hopes. We will always remember you.

See more pictures:

Reporter: Riandy Kurniawan
Photographer: Riandy Kurniawan, Mia Damayanti, Prama Hanindia Wirakusumah .

The month of December is the most festive season for us who celebrate Christmas. It’s swinging, so swinging that you can hear the jazzy Christmas songs being played almost wherever you go. True, Indonesia is a tropical country with no white snow that probably is the best representation of the season, but the swingin’ Christmas tunes along with colorful decorations are usually able to let us enjoy it just as good.

Since four years ago we have been celebrating the season by making our regular event special with Christmas Edition. But this year it’s different. If usually we only have one, this year we are going to have two. Other than in the Braga Citywalk where we have been serving our jazz community event, now we have a new ground zero, at the TP Stage of The Papandayan Hotel. In this venue, we name our regular event as JAZZUALITY @ TP , served once a month every fourth Sunday.

As you might already know, we have started in there last month with a special tribute honoring a late jazz figure Widyasena Sumadio (read the report here: http://jazzuality.com/jazz-event-report/jazzuality-tp-widyasena-report/). Now we are ready to present our first-ever special edition to celebrate Christmas, and to fit the cool, cozy jazz lounge of TP Stage, we are giving this one as “SWINGIN’ CHRISTMAS”.

If we fit our regular schedule, the fourth Sunday will fall exactly on Christmas Eve. As we wish to let the musicians to spend it with their family, we decide to move it a week earlier. So, the Jazzuality @ TP : Swingin’ Christmas is coming soon on Sunday, 17 December 2017 at the TP Stage, Papandayan Hotel starting from 7:00 pm onwards.

One thing you should know, eventhough this event is held at the luxurious lounge of a 5-star hotel, you don’t have to spend any dime as it’s totally FREE of any charge.

Now, who will swing in this special edition? Let’s break the lineup down one by one.

First of all, we are proud to bring one of our partners, an awesome music school to taste the spot for the very first time, the ME Music School. This school is the brainchild of Michelle Efferin in 2006 only about a year after she’s graduated from the Australian Institute of Music in Sydney. Being the first one to apply the Encore Music Education curriculum in Indonesia (also an official representative of it) makes the school able to shape talented kids from such early age under an international standard, as early as 2 years old. Classes like piano, drum, vocal, violin and guitar can be joined by students from the age of 4 and above, and what’s cool is that jazz has been sounding loud and clear from this music education centre.

What’s also great about this school is that it has been consistantly making concerts that’s not only able to show the progress of its students but also give the students to gain experiences even before they finish studying. Realizing that we share the same passion and dream, we have been walking side by side an supporting each other. We also bring the students to perform live in front of real audience in our events, hoping that they would hatch fast and ready to fly over the real sky. And from all that moments, they always exceed our expectation.

Just a week before this event, ME Music Centre has just done with their Christmas concert. Calling it Christmas Jazz Night, ME Music School brings some of their best students to join the teachers for one full show. We want to bring a slice of it to our event, letting them swingin’ merrily once again in this special edition. So, for Jazzuality @ TP Swingin’ Christmas, the ME Music School sends the combination of teachers-students : Iwan (bass), Oggie Samuel (guitar), Richard (drum), Kevin Chrisandy and Madeline Abigail (piano) to provide music. On vocal, beside Madeline and Kevin there will be Patricia Angelica, Christopher Emmanuel, Sydney Gabrielle and the little 6 year-old prodigy, proud daughter of Michelle Efferin (and Richard Sirait) Kezia to stand behind the mikes. We are excited to have them gracing our Christmas edition once again, and we proudly invite you to celebrate together with them.

Next, let’s take a look at a very interesting collaboration between two of the best jazz-driven musicians from the young generation reside in Bandung, pianist Jason Limanjaya and guitarist Anjuan Julio Siahaan. Calling the group as Juan Jason Project, these two jazz genius are trying to make new invention out of their success in each of their bands. While Jason can be found in The New Equinox and Nayra Dharma Group, Anjuan is riding a success with his AFA Trio, currently is in the process of recording. Outside these mentioned bands, they have been together two in some bands and projects, including Funktop and the new sensation full of young wizards, The New Blood. So, it’s not a wonder how they can have their souls locked in playing harmoniously.

We don’t call them two of the best jazz-driven players for no reason. Jason seems to have a deep passion in jazz funk, but he can swing very well too. As for Anjuan, we first met him as a wonderful swing guitarist but now he is hungry in exploring the fusion world. Both musicians have delicate touch and strong sense, both are extraordinary and risk takers especially during improvisations. They can always make a difference wherever they are placed, they can play smooth but can go really wild when they feel like it. So you can imagine what kind of surprise they could do when they join forces.

We have heard about this project from Jason since last year. They have been gracing jazz and blues stage, participating in the Bandung big art fest, but they haven’t played in our events just yet. Now we get the chance to bring them in, and it feels good to have them swingin’ for Christmas. Juan Jason Project, the double J is the one to watch if you are looking for entertaining and dynamic performance, full of twists and turns, unpredictable and high risk manouvers in jazz improvisations.

When you found a great vocal-guitar jazz duo, you woul just know that you could expect them to enlive any concept or occassion. That’s what we felt when we invited experienced jazz guitarist Hardi Suryana and singer Putri Rahel Sihombing, together as Ael/Hardi for the first time a couple of months ago. Based on the recommendation from KlabJazz founder Dwi Cahya Yuniman, we were surprised to see them highlighting the best jazz years from the 20’s to 70’s in the September edition of Braga Jazz Night (https://jazzuality.com/jazz-event-report/braga-jazz-night-39-the-report/).

Having a strong background and success in classical and a unique old-soul vocal vibe makes Ael an exceptional singer especially in going into the jazz standards (including the ‘forgotten’ ones). As for Hardi, his skill on swing is unquestionable. Together they make a solid acoustic duo, outstanding in song selection and sharp in execution.

The last time we had them in our event was just last month in Braga Jazz Night (https://jazzuality.com/jazz-event-report/braga-jazz-night-41-the-report/). There, we asked them to bring ‘Sings Disney’ as the theme since we realize how much Ael loves Disney songs. Once again this duo exceeded our expectation, and again they took us into a memory lane by singing Disney soundtracks from 30’s to 90’s.

So, we thought, why don’t we invite them for Christmas? If probably many people would prefer full band to swing the Christmas carols, we want to show that this concept could work really well in the hands of good quality duo. We have had them twice, trust us that they will hook you up from the first note and make you forget about full band to quench your jazz thirst.

Three showcases presenting two duos (one instrumental and one with vocal) and a participation from a very well established music school where jazz is ringing will make your Christmas mood feels better. Once again, this Special Edition is coming soon this Sunday, 17 December 2017, starting at 7:00 pm and totally, absolutely FREE of any charge!

So please mark your calendar and be there. It’s time to jazz this special season, it’s time to celebrate Christmas in Swing! There will be no snow, there will be no Santa Claus, but there will be jazzy Christmas that will fill your heart with peace. See you there!

JAZZUALITY @ TP : SWINGIN’ CHRISTMAS

Date: Sunday, 17 December 2017
Time: 07:00 pm – onwards
Location: TP Stage, The Papandayan Hotel
Jl. Gatot Subroto no.83, Malabar, Bandung

FREE OF CHARGE!

Featuring:

:: JUAN JASON PROJECT ::
Anjuan Julio – guitar
Jason Limanjaya – piano/keyboard

:: AEL/HARDI ::
Putri Rahel Sihombing – vocal
Hardi Suryana – guitar

:: ME MUSIC CENTRE ::
Iwan – bass
Ogie Samuel – guitar
Richard – drum
Kevin Chrisandy – piano/vocal
Madeline Abigail – piano/vocal
Patricia Angelica – vocal
Sydney Gabrielle – vocal
Christopher Emmanuel – vocal
Kezia Alexis (6 year old) – vocal

2017 is a special year for us in terms of Christmas, because unlike before, this year not only we make one but two Christmas-themed events. We have announced the first one, taking place this Sunday on 17 December 2017 at our new venue, the cozy jazz lounge TP Stage owned by The Papandayan Hotel. And the second one is here at the Braga CityWalk, our ground zero in cooperation with the mall which has been running for almost 4 years.

Since we have been there that long, we have every December edition to celebrate Christmas, jazz way. This year will mark the 4th Christmas edition being held in this historical Bandung area. Oh yeah, just in case you still don’t know, our event is called BRAGA JAZZ NIGHT, formerly known as Braga Jazz Walk. This Special Christmas Edition (episode #42 in number) is coming really soon on Thursday, 21 December 2017, starting at 7:00 pm and as always, FREE of any charge.

So far, each edition has become the symbol of peace, unity and tolerance, since the lineup always consists of not just Christians. This year it’s going to be the same. We will let you know who are in the lineup and a little story about each of them, but first, let’s talk about the tagline for this year: CHRISTMAS SMOOTHIES. Why smoothies? Because we are making it rich in variety, creamy, tasty and healthy. If at the TP Stage we choose “Swing” as the concept, in this one we want to offer wider variety of styles, performed by the combination of young (teenage) talents and well-experienced, senior musicians. There are teachers, there are students. There is even a worship leader from a church to extend her service outside the wall by using jazz as the core. From traditional swing to pop, to funky chops and groovy bites, all are expected to come out from these wonderful musicians.

First, allow us to announce that we are going to bring the emerging young jazz star, still in his mid-teens but now is stepping onto the higher ground. He plays piano, but his major seems to be saxophone, the instrumental that brings him to the stage where he is now. He is none other than Philip Manfred Pincencia.

We came to know Philip by recommendation of his piano teacher, Mr Yahya Salam around two years ago. We saw the video when he took difficult materials such as “Donna Lee” and had lots of fun raggin’ with Scott Joplin’s “The Entertainer”. It was a wow, especially since it was a 12 year-old boy who did it. We then brought him for the first time in the 19th edition of this event (it was still named Braga Jazz Walk at that time). He played with his teacher and demonstrated how good he could go jazzin’ with piano and saxophone. (read the coverage of that moment here:http://jazzuality.com/jazz-event-report/braga-jazz-walk-19-the-report/). Oh yeah, one of Salamander Big Band’s troops, Alfred Dicky Ampouw is his sax teacher.

This man found his way to success faster than anyone thought. Not long after his debut, he made headlines by performing with the likes of Tulus and Isyana Sarasvati, while still keeping his pace with a couple of interesting projects such as Funktop and the most recent band he is in, New Blood. This boy has infectious funk drives and great in bopping. Either in group or soloing in front, he’s always able to be an attraction.

For this Christmas Smoothies edition Philip will perform under PHIL TRIO with a real-life jazz couple, bassist Rudy Zulkarnaen (simakDialog, 4Peniti) and drummer Adisty Zulkarnaen (SHE, Jazzy Juice). Rudy has just won an AMI Awards as the Best Sound Producer with sibling Ari Renaldi and without a doubt one of the all-time best bassists of Indonesia, while his wife Adisty is an all-round drummer with attractive appearance. What a trio this is. According to Philip, they are going to swing with well-known jazz standards and Christmas songs. So, swing with funk bites? That would be something cool. We can’t wait!

Philip is not the only prodigy debuted on our event, because the next name we are going to mention is another one. She is still 11 years old, but she has achieved so many things that jazz musicians in this nation dreams to have. She is NADINE ADRIANNA.

Nadine got her first gig right here in the #12 edition. At that time she played solo, still kind of nervous but yet somehow managed to take on complex compositions such as “Night in Tunisia” and “Take Five” (read the coverage here: http://jazzuality.com/jazz-event-report/braga-jazz-walk-12-the-report/). It was like finding a raw gemstone that will become a diamond in the near future.

From that first appearance, she continued to develop fast. She answered our challenge to make a band and original compositions in no time. She wrote songs from the eyes of the child, yet the compositions appeared as if they were written by long time jazz pros. She led her band in different formations, until finally settled with trio. Other than her own band, she is also the pianist of BFG Trio which has landed big on the Java Jazz Festival 2017. She is also a bold explorer, because from swing and bop, she reached the ethnic jazz world. Her song “Harewos Bulan” is built within the pentatonic scales, dedicated to the late Riza Arshad, founder of the world acclaimed ethno-jazz progressive ensemble simakDialog. This move also brought her to enter the progressive Sundanese fusion band, West Java Syndicate as the second keyboardist. Back to her moment at the Java Jazz Festival, she joined the after midnight jam session held in the hotel and played with many renowned jazz musicians, including Maurice Brown.

At the time we write this article, Nadine is in Bali continuing her study with the iconic, legendary jazz maestro, Indra Lesmana whom she has also shared the stage with. Speaking of Bali, she has performed in many places and played with the likes of Sandy Winarta, Indra Gupta and Kevin Suwandi. Imagine how all these things could happen to a little 11 year-old girl only in 3 years time. It’s remarkable, if not unbelievable like a fairy tales come true.

For this special Christmas edition she will present a solo piano recital, just like what she did a couple of years ago on the same stage. It’s time to see her current progress in skill and appearance. One thing for sure, we are always proud and happy to have her in.

Let’s continue with another young talent, Luis Anastasia Sinaga. She is now at the third semester of the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Medicine, Universitas Jendral Achmad Yani (Unjani), but like Philip and Nadine, she has started early too. She is certainly not a stranger to this event since she was here a couple of times with her vocal harmony group, Puella, established in 2010 and already has one album titled “Aku Cinta Dia.” She has also performed with her church friends.

Out of her study and band activity, she has been serving in her church, GKI Maulana Yusuf. Currently she is the song leader of sunday school in there.

We haven’t met her for a couple of years. The last time she performed in Braga Jazz Walk was when she was still in high school. What we remember from last time is that she has a delicate, sweet voice with good control. From a teen to young adult, it’s time to bring her back and find out how she’s doing now.

For this gig she will perform as a duo with a guitar teacher/active musician Jhonny Edwin Sitompul. He has been teaching at Purwacaraka Music Studio since the start of the millenium. That’s already a long time, but he started composing much earlier than that, since 1986, even before he entered the Faculty of Cultural Science of North Sumatra University majoring Ethnomusicology. If two years ago he played with a combo playing swing, pop to sharp ethnic fusion in this event, now he’s going acoustic as a duo with Luis. The name of this group is simply using their names: LUIS & JHONNY.

Finally, the fourth to mention is a new band called THE PARADOX. This band was established by a student of ME Music Centre, Kevin Chrisandy with her high school friends. From what we have seen, this very talented boy is really into jazz. He plays jazz on piano really well, he’s able to improvise and hey, he sings too.

Life hasn’t been easy for him. He was struggling with his self confidence. He was afraid to perform on stage, he almost quitted, but we know he has something special inside him. He is gifted and different. Somehow we believe music is his calling. As we didn’t want him to loose, we stood beside him and support his fight against all odds. Now, he could make his own band, he acted as the band leader and arranger besides doing his role as pianist and vocalist. In ME Music School’s event he stands as the MC too, which indeed works very well. We are really proud of him.

Like a football manager, he builds the band by having some subs, just in case some of the personnels can’t make it. For this show, the confirmed ones so far are Keane, Nathanael and Johnson.

So, from being once a boy with lack of confidence, a boy who could easily crumble and fall over even a small matter to a fine singing jazz pianist, a band leader and arranger, that’s a paradox. Being a boy who has to fight against the world but now stands as the winner, that’s a paradox. Timely speaking, he told us that he would love to show his process of building himself back, evolving, bouncing back from deep down below to the victorious stand point. So far he has proven us right. He is strong, he can do this as this is his passion. He is worth to fighting for, we really want him to succeed and we will support him in any which way we can for that.

Once again, our special edition of BRAGA JAZZ NIGHT #42 : CHRISTMAS SMOOTHIES will come on Thursday, 21 December 2017 at Braga CityWalk Bandung, starting from 7:00 pm onwards. Just like usual, the event is FREE of any charge. Do come and let’s spread joy together with us, while you can enjoy variety of jazz from these cool lineup! See you.

BRAGA JAZZ NIGHT #42 : CHRISTMAS SMOOTHIES

Date: Thursday, 21 December 2017
Time: 7:00 pm – 10 pm
Location: Braga CityWalk
Jl. Braga 99 – 101 Bandung

FREE EVENT!

Featuring:

:: PHIL TRIO ::
Philip Manfred Pincencia – sax
Rudy Zulkarnaen – bass
Adisty Zulkarnaen – drum

:: NADINE ADRIANNA ::
Nadine Adrianna – piano

:: LUIS & JHONNY ::
Luis Anastasia Sinaga – vocal
Jhonny Edwin Sitompul – guitar

:: THE PARADOX ::
Kevin Chrisandy – piano/vocal
tba

As you might already know, we are now running two regular events every month. One at the location we have been in for the last 3 and a half year, the Braga CityWalk, and the other one is just started last month, at the TP Stage, the cozy jazz lounge of the 5-star hotel, The Papandayan. That means, now we have two places where we can give our support towards the regeneration of jazz musicians and the development in Indonesia especially in Bandung.

We name the one in the TP Stage “JAZZUALITY @ TP “. As we are now in December, we make our second episode special for Christmas celebration. Three showcases presenting two duos (one instrumental and one with vocal) and a participation from a very well established music school where jazz is ringing, that’s what the menu for this time. Oh yeah, “Swingin’ Christmas” is the theme, showing our intention to celebrate it in swing.

Performing first was the duo consisting of young jazz dudes: Anjuan Julio Siahaan (guitar) and Jason Limanjaya (piano), together as Juan Jason Project. We always consider them as two of the best and most interesting jazz musicians coming from the new generation. Jason and Juan are equipped with great skill and sharp in sense. Both of them shine in each of their bands: Juan in AFA Trio and Jason in The New Equinox and Nayra Dharma Group), but they have also played together in one band like Funktop and the most recently with New Blood.

Since the end of last year, we have heard that Juan and Jason were establishing a project filled by just them. They have graced many stages soon after from jazz to blues. We haven’t got the chance to feature them, but in this special Swingin’ Christmas edition finally we got them.

What’s interesting about these young men is that they both can make good compositions. They like to draw inspiration from daily lives, what they see, hear or feel, but they see it from the different angle. If Juan is more serious in selecting his subjects, Jason seems to have playful mind as he takes funny matters. They brought these subjects up in a story telling mode by using their respective instruments.

Right after we opened up the show and introduced them, they locked up with a song to fit the occasion, “Santa Claus is Coming to Town”. They made it like jamming, fully depending on their feel and connection all the way to the end. After that, Juan told everyone that the next song is about his wish to share his life with someone. “Looking for Love”, that’s the title, composed in Samba mode inspired by one of Chick Corea’s song. Juan didn’t want to make it as a sad ballad, instead he described it sweet and romantic with cheerful vibes.

Then Jason got her turn to introduce his composition. “I’m no Don Juan, I’m not the romantic kind of guy,” he said laughing. What his composition based on is not most of people would think of, it’s called “Lutung”, in English means langur, the old world monkey. This song is so playful. Sneaky, jolly jumper and naughty, we guess portraying the daily life of langur in a wild forest. He injected some ethnic touches here and there while trading some jumping notes with Juan.

The interesting song carried on with another unusual source of inspiration Jason had in mind: “Baso Tahu”. For our foreign readers, baso tahu is one of the common food from West Java. Fried dumpling is probably the closest way to say it in English. It’s bluesy, boppin’ and full of free-flowing improvisations. The audience became a part of this song too as Juan asked everyone to repeat his made up lyrics. Jason just laughed at that attempt while still twisting his fingers above the keys. They had lots of fun with “Winter Wonderland” which became the last drop of their show. Loud cheers and applause were thrown to them.

We simply love the way they tell stories. From inspiring message, daily life experience to funny stuffs to Christmas songs to fit the theme, all served effortlessly in the free improvising spirit. It’s like they let us go into their dialogue which is fun to follow. There’s no doubt that these young fellas are outstanding musicians, and when they join forces, they always come out with something different. Just two players playing pure jazz, but it was fascinating and pleasuring. A very great start for the Swingin’ Christmas courtesy of Juan Jason Project.

In the second session we presented the students of well established music school with international curriculum along with their teacher. The school is ME Music Centre, formed by pianist/teacher Michelle Efferin in 2006, just a year after she graduated from Sydney, Australia. This school uniquely accept students as early as 2 years old and allow kids at the age of 4 to join the music and vocal classes. No wonder the ME Music Centre is able to present kids who could sing and play jazz really well.

Just a week earlier the school has just held their Christmas concert where not only showcased good quality of kids and youngsters from ME but also marked the reunion between Michelle Efferin and violinist Ammy Kurniawan. We manage to bring a slice of it. The combination of teachers : Michelle (piano), Oggie Samuel (guitar), Iwan (bass) and Richard (drum) with some of the best ones today among the students: Kevin Chrisandy (vocal), Madeleine Abigail (keys and vocal), Patricia Angelica (vocal), Christopher Emmanuel (vocal), Sydney Gabrielle (vocal) and Michelle’s daughter, 6 year-old Kezia Alexis (vocal) brought the Christmas joy into this event for around half an hour or so.

The teens quickly stood in straight line facing the audience and sang “Mas Que Nada”. This song immidiately spread the joy. The happy samba mode, the lovely vocal harmony and the substantial works from the teachers in providing music. The solo run by these teachers were fascinating.

Then all the singers left the stage except Madeline. She felt quite nervous at first, but after Michelle hugged her and calmed her down, she’s able to control her tense. She sang “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” really, really well. She clearly has better singing skill and control over her voice now comparing to the last time we got her in our event back in the Braga Jazz Night some months ago.

Madeline then moved to the keys and her sister Sydney came in. Together they took on a Disney classic from the movie Pinocchio, “When You Wish Upon A Star”. Madeline didn’t just play the keyboard but she sang as well. These talented sisters were backed by some the teachers during their appearance.

Then came the time to have the youngest performer in this event, the daughter of Michelle Efferin and Richard Sirait, 6 year-old Kezia Alexis. She ran to the stage giggling when she heard her name being called, making the audience laughed for her cuteness. On stage, accompanied by her mom she sang “O Holy Night” in complete lyrics. She did really amazing. Not only she memorized all the lyrics, she’s pitch perfect and effortlessly hit the high notes. Imagine a little girl like Kezia able to face the audience and sing, no sign of having any pressure, for us that’s really remarkable. For your information, she has been gracing our stage a couple of times since last year so we know how good she is. Another note, she also plays piano, violin and great in drawing. What an amazing girl she is. If she makes us proud, we can imagine how proud she makes her mommy and daddy.

The rest of the teens came back to the stage for one last song, “Winter Wonderland”. For us, this one is an epic due to the high level of difficulties. They chew complex vocal harmony and perfectly done each of their part. Little Kezia also joined them creating a spectacular kids vocal harmony group. It was unbelievable, how kids their age could do it, but ME Music Centre did it.

How many ensemble of kids could give a good-flowing jazz performance? Based on our experience in collaborating with the ME Music School, they do have and can provide so many. Look at the kids and teenagers, blending with their teachers as one team and brought happiness to our hearts. Having the founder and teachers who share the same dream with us, we believe we could continue and even extend our cooperation in order to see more and more skillful musicians from today’s generation. Always proud of the students and everyone in ME Music Centre. Great curriculum plus great teachers plus talented students equals great success.

The final performance got a dynamic acoustic guitar-vocal duo, Ael/Hardi. This duo is consisting of jazz guitarist/teacher Hardi Suryana and old soul vocalist with classical background, Putri Rahel Sihombing. If you are following our articles, you should already be familiar with them since we have featured the duo a couple of times in just a short amount of time.

It’s not difficult to figure out why we love to bring them in. The duo plays and sings really well. They like to take us into a journey of time, visiting some of the best moments of jazz through smart selection of songs. They are capable to bring any concept alive and make it special. Look at how good they were when we challenged them to sing Disney. It was job well done, much much better than our expectation.

Ael has a sophisticated but strong jazz vibe in her voice, and she has a crystal clear pronounciation too, which is remarkable knowing that she came from classical background as a part of a world-winning choir. As for Hardi, this man is outstanding when it’s about spoiling jazz lovers with his delicate play.

Just like we thought, they started with a song not many thought of bringing for a jazzy Christmas. It was a very old hymn from year 1849, “It Came Upon The Midnight Clear.” The crisp voice of Ael with Hardi’s waltzin’ guitar work was perfect to bring this song back again on stage. Then Ael took another song not many remember anymore eventhough it’s from not too distant past, a song mostly associated with the great Tony Bennett, “Christmas in Herald Square.” This song totally fits her like a puzzle piece found its exact place.

Next was a song from 1953, a tongue-in-cheek look at a woman who made a Christmas list full of royal, extravagant gifts adressed to Santa Claus: “Santa Baby”. It was Eartha Kitt who sang it for the first time but then so many singers have recorded it throughout the years, including the likes of Madonna, Kylie Minogue and Ariana Grande. Cute and notty nature of this song was captured nicely by Ael/Hardi. For the last tune, they played one of the most popular song for Christmas, “The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire)”.

We may probably enjoy the big band, full band or combo for Christmas songs, but a beautiful acoustic approach certainly works for this specific theme as well. Especially when it lies in good arms. Good teamwork, good play, good sing, good songlist once again came from Ael/Hardi. They made it looks simple, but what they bring is actually classy. We still have many ideas for this cool acoustic old-soul jazz duo (including “Sings Disney part 2”), we hope they would agree to be a part of our event again in the near future.

That was the end of all performances, but then since there were many of the audience wished to be a part of the show, we opened up the jam session. Dr Ervina Pasaribu who came with her husband quickly positioned herself on stage, followed by Jason Limanjaya (piano), Eleazar Yoshua and Anjuan Julio (guitars), Christ Kevin (bass on keyboard) and Oce Kamlasi (drum). This group sang “All of Me”, and then “Just the Two of Us” with Jason and Christ exchanging role.

One of the audience, Mrs Poppy then replaced Ervina to sing “Days of Wine and Roses”. In this song, Anjuan surprisingly moved to drums while his place was taken by Jabez Bezaleel Chan. The surprise became even bigger when Mr Hari Pochang joined the crowds with his cool harp for “Route 66”. In this song Juan went to keyboard to play bass while Jason now became the drummer! What a scene, what a jam session! Since it was really late already, the event reached the end.

We are happy to be able to bring a swingin’ Christmas celebration into the cool, cozy lounge of TP Stage. From kids, teenagers, young adults to experts, from students to teachers, all gathered together to make one of our Christmas events this year felt merry and bright. Thank you to all participating artists, the Papandayan, supporters and certainly to everyone who came. Remember, we can’t hope to see the successful regeneration of jazz musicians and the development if no one comes. So, we really appreciate your coming.

We still have another Christmas event coming just in a couple of days: The Braga Jazz Night : Christmas Smoothies at the Braga CityWalk (Read the article here: http://jazzuality.com/jazz-events/braga-jazz-night-42-christmas-smoothies/ ). A totally different concept and lineup will be there to bring their own version of Christmas gig. We hope you join us again this Thursday. Merry Christmas to everyone who celebrate it. Let there be peace on earth, keep spreading positive vibes and love to one another. Our nation needs it more than ever. God bless you all.

See more pictures:

Reporter and photographer: Riandy Kurniawan

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Ever since we started running the community-based jazz event, we have presented 6 Special Christmas Edition. Specifically in this event, the BRAGA JAZZ NIGHT (previously known as Braga Jazz Walk), this special show comes every year since 2014. This year once again we dedicated our December edition (it’s the 42nd edition by the way!) to celebrate Christmas, jazz style. We give the theme of “CHRISTMAS SMOOTHIES”, referring to our intention of presenting wide variety of jazz styles performed by the combination of young talents to pros.

Appearing first was a group of high schoolers with unique name: The Paradox. This new group was formed by a student of ME Music Centre, Kevin Chrisandy due to our offer for him to be in the lineup several months ago. Kevin has been here once with other students and teachers of his music school, but now we wanted him to stand on his own. We know he can, we know he’s talented, and we want to give him a push so he could be ready to face the real world as a musician faster than he thought.

As The Paradox, he brought in some of his high school friends including Keane Christopher (bass), Johnson Japp (drum), Nathanael Jofan Oetomo (saxophone). I brought these fellows in so they could learn together with me and got the same chance given to me.” said Kevin to us. Yes, that’s a really good spirit and the reason of why we created this event in first place. This is their first ever event.

These high schoolers began with a selection far from easy, Chick Corea’s “Spain”. They did the tutti part well and had fun running the song until the end. From there, they went swaying with “Quando Quando Quando”. Kevin sang in this one while playing the piano. Two Christmas songs came from these boys to fit the theme, “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” and “The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire)”.

It’s quite interesting that Kevin chose The Paradox as the name. with every struggle he’s in, it’s remarkable that he could become who he is today. In some ways, it’s a paradox. With all his progress especially in the field of self confidence and how he utilizes what he has learnt, we are proud of him. We are also proud of his teachers, Michelle Efferin, Othep and all teachers in ME Music School for equipping this boy more than just music skill. We hope these boys keep practicing and exploring together. One day they will be ready to step up onto the higher ground, and we certainly will invite them to see each and every progress they make.

The second act was a duo of young singer who has started her career at least 7 years ago, Luis Anastasia Sinaga and a long time guitar teacher, Jhonny Edwin Sitompul. The name of this duo is simply taken from their first name, Luis & Jhonny. Both of them are no stranger to us. Luis has graced our stage several times either with her successful vocal group established in 2010, Puella or with her church friends by the name of MY Kids. While Jhonny who has been teaching for 17 years in Purwacaraka Music Studio has brought his own project and supporting his friends too. We never saw them together, so for us it’s interesting to see how they would do as a duo.

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A nice acoustic vocal-guitar work directly filled the venue as they sang two famous Christmas carols: “O Holy Night” and “The Christmas Song”. On the first one Luis sang calm and peaceful with deep emotion, while on the second one she demonstrated how good she could bring a chillax mood along with a fine work by Jhonny on guitar.

Smooth, sweet, simple yet on target, that’s the impression we got from their gig. An acoustic duo is always nice to bring something intimate, and the combination of smooth, sweet vocal of Luis with a good fingerworks of an experienced guitar teacher make it works real fine. Acoustic jazzy Christmas feels delightful. We hope the duo will be kept, so we can invite them again some other time.

Now, how about a solo piano jazz recital for Christmas? We thought it’s going to be cool if it’s played by a really good one. Well, for this idea we featured a specially gifted 11 year-old girl who could already play like a pro, Nadine Adrianna.

This little girl is not even a teenage just yet. But remarkably she has gained lots of experiences from playing with and learning from some of the best jazz musicians in this planet, national and international. She has landed on the Java Jazz Festival and some other prestigious ones. She just came back from Bali to learn more from the iconic jazz figure, Indra Lesmana.

Nadine has two active bands: the BFG Trio and her own band, Nadine Adrianna Trio. She has more than enough original compositions to fit into an album, all were made based on what she has, see and feel around him but if you listen to her compositions, you wouldn’t believe that they were made by a little girl her age. And what makes us feel blessed is that her very first performance was here in this event more than 2 years ago, when she was still 8!

If we invited her trio two months ago, this time we let her do her thing alone. She carried 4 songs consisting of 2 Christmas songs, one Disney that’s also taken as a Jazz Standards and one song composed by her current teacher.

What’s interesting is that Nadine played all these famous songs in her own way, making them as if her own. Look at how cool she played “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” in pure jazz with all its complexity. Her fluent jazz speaking continued on in “Someday My Prince Will Come” from Snow White. Both of these songs redressed in a whole new fashion by Nadine. The Christmas spirit was well kept with another fine interpretation of “Jingle Bells”.

For the fourth and last song, she surprised us by taking a masterpiece of a group called JavaJazz (not to be mistaken with the huge jazz fest), written by Indra Lesmana titled “Moon Over Asia” aka “Bulan Diatas Asia”. If you remember, this song captured all the greatest moment in jazz performed by jazz gods that would make any listeners tranced in a fantasy of watching the moonlight falls on the glittery Asian sea, jazz way. We have never heard the song played solo, as it’s very risky due to the high level of difficulties both in playing and capturing the imaginary scene. But Nadine actually able to bring it. A straight tour-de-force by this wonder girl that’s not only will make her teacher Indra Lesmana proud but also us all.

You know, Nadine played just as good as if you have a long time experience pro in charge. She has done solo Christmas Jazz piano recital two years ago in this event, but now she’s enhanced in skill, control, technique and variety. She owns the stage now and takes her time patiently in building the perfect momentum on each song. “Uncle Indra told me that I have to enjoy my play in order to make my audience enjoy it as well.” she said smiling. And yes, now she clearly is doing exactly that. We can’t be more proud of her, and certainly, we wish to keep supporting her. As amazing as she is now, we know we ain’t see nothing yet. We will keep on bringing her for sure to be updated with her progress and movement. What a beautiful and triumphant solo performance it was.

For the final session, it’s a privelege to present another phenomenal kid – this time is a boy – who debuted in our event but now has been enjoying his success in the higher ground, Philip Manfred Pincencia. He is still in mid-teen, but his soul resonances jazz louder than boys his age, even older ones. The evidence is found not only with one instrument but two, because we can capture his jazz soul perfectly with saxophone and piano just as good. But lately it seems like he is focusing more on saxophone, which in fact delivers him to the certain stage where he’s at right now.

We say he is phenomenal not just because of his very special God-given talent but also because how fast he’s climbing in the jazz scene, or even music scene in general. Just a couple of months ago he made a surprising move by being sharing the same spotlight with two of the mega stars today: Tulus and ISyana Sarasvati. He keeps on climbing from there, from being the opening of Tulus’ concert to another blast alongside saxophonist Ricad Hutapea at iCan Studio, Jakarta. Step aside of these fast rising with top stars, he is found in a band of young wizs, The New Blood.

For this event, we let him chose who he wanted to play with. And it turned out to be surprising, because he came up with real-life jazz couple, the senior bassist Rudy Zulkarnaen and the standout female drummer Adisty Zulkarnaen. While Rudy has many bands in different colors, shapes and sizes like simakDialog, Rudy & Band Listrik and 4Peniti just to mention a few, Adisty places her feet solidly on Jazzy Juice and the famous pop band SHE other than being busy as sessionist. Oh yeah, the name of the trio is PHIL TRIO.

A surprise came in as Phil Trio was reinforced with another player on piano, Philip’s piano teacher Mr Yahya Salam. From trio to quartet, in front of so many audience this marvelous team spread the joy with “Feliz Navidad”. Philip’s sax bites was a big attraction, so did the swaying senior bassist Rudy Zulkarnaen and wife Adisty who dressed up glowingly colorful. Mr Yahya Salam sat calm behind the keyboard, but his fingers danced merrily with the trio.

For the second song, still in the format of four Philip led his stellar cast to play “Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!”, not in the usual way but delivering it with funky blues approach. “I decided to play it this way so we won’t get bored”, said Philip. So, again, we got interesting rendition of a Christmas song we all know so well.

A composition by Clifford Brown which taken by many as his signature song was next, “Joy Spring”. For this one, Philip left his saxophone and took Mr Yahya’s position on keys. Rudy teased him in some parts with his provocative bass, making Philip ran wilder and bolder. For the last song, interestingly they covered one of The Beatles’ famous gem, “Blackbird”. What they played was based on Brad Mehldau’s version. Still on keyboard, Philip and the jazz couple Rudy and Adisty gave a standout performance just as good as the Mehldau’s trio that recorded this song back in 1997. Sharp, clean and tight, they delivered it chilled right until the end. Philip thanked everyone and then left the stage with his team.

Rudy and Adisty has began their professional career much earlier than Philip, but we know that with someone like this boy wonder, the trio would work in the best way possible. It’s proved to be right. They created a rock solid trio where sky is the limit. Plus Mr Yahya Salam on keys, the group became a dream team with 5-star performance. What a joy to be able to have them enhancing our Christmas edition of Braga Jazz Night.

Since we still got time, we opened the jam session. The boys of The Paradox: Kevin, Johnson and Keane gladly jumped in, also Nadine. They called Philip back to play some more with them. Hence, we got all-young musicians ready to jam. They took Charlie Parker’s “Billie’s Bounce” as they playground where they joyfully shared the fun like being in an amusement park. It’s really a great moment to see two of the very young musicians who began on our stage but now achieved huge success playing together, along with the younger ones who probably just tasted their first ever jam session experience.

Many of Luis’ friends from the church, GKI Maulana Yusuf, came tonight. Two of them took part in this late party, including an alumnus of NEZ Academy, Cindy Tambunan who sang “L-O-V-E”. The Paradox happily served the melody for her. Then Rachmat Hulu sang Burt Bacharach/Hal David’s hit popularized by The Carpenters, “(They Long to Be) Close To You.” A group photo session became the last drop of this edition.

That’s how the 4th Christmas event we made at Braga CityWalk goes. From a band of high schoolers, a duo consisting of college student and long time guitar teacher, a wonder girl’s solo piano and a trio consisting of rising star and a super jazz couple made this year’s Christmas edition of the Braga Jazz Night shone bright. We feel happy to close our service for year 2017 with this edition.

We will be back again in 2018. New year, new chapter, new opportunities. Can’t wait to enter it! Thank you to all participating musicians and all of you who came. We really appreciate you support. We wish all of you who celebrate Merry Christmas and to everyone, Happy New Year. Many people say that 2018 will be even more difficult to walk through, but let’s walk with faith so we can go pass it as a winner. Another message is, the world has already enough troubles. Let’s relieve the tense by spreading peace and love so this world can be a better place to live. Happy holiday to you guys, see you again in 2018!

Watch the highlight of Braga Jazz Night #42 : Christmas Smoothies

See more pictures:

Reporter/Photographer: Riandy Kurniawan
Video Editor : Vierna Mariska K .

The seventh annual Mahindra Blues Festival (MBF) wrapped up in Mumbai in fine style with a star-studded lineup including Shemekia Copeland, Quinn Sullivan, Janiva Magness, Billy Gibbons, and Blackstratblues – and ending with a final jam featuring many of the performers.

Blues giants at earlier editions of the festival include Buddy Guy, John Lee Hooker Jr., Taj Mahal, Jimmie Vaughan and Keb Mo. There was also a talent hunt for the best new blues band in India, and the winners for 2017 were Delhi-based group Blu. See also my writeup on MBF 2016, and interview with guitarist-composer Warren Mendonsa.

The two halls at Mehboob Studio in Bandra were packed with blues fans of all ages, as well as the outdoor performance stage, lounge, and vinyl store (also check out the festival art here). The blues, commonly regarded as the mother of all modern Western genres ranging from jazz to funk, has a large following in India as well.

Day One

The first performance was by festival regular Blackstratblues, a blues-rock ensemble led by guitarist, songwriter and producer Warren Mendonsa. The drummer at their MBF performance was Gino Banks. Warren’s early influences were bands like Cream and Led Zeppelin (at MBF he also played ‘When the Levee Breaks,’ with Shazneen Arethna on harmonica).

The group is named after Warrens’ black Fender Stratocaster guitar, and their albums include `Nights in Shining Karma’ and ‘The Last Analogue Generation’. The group played a range of mostly instrumental tracks of blues, rock and psychedelia.

An international star kicked off the next performance: singer-composer Janiva Magness, winner of the Blues Music Award and Contemporary Blues Female Artist of the Year. Her latest album ‘Love Wins Again’ was nominated for the 2017 Grammys. After the legendary Koko Taylor, Janiva is the second woman to win the highly coveted B.B. King Entertainer of the Year award – and she showed her mighty vocal prowess at MBF 2017 to loud rounds of applause.

The final act on Day One was guitar prodigy Quinn Sullivan, all of 17 years old, who has already shared concert stages with Buddy Guy, Eric Clapton, and Los Lobos. He has also opened for B.B. King who later invited him play his treasured ‘Lucille’ guitar.

At MBF 2017, Quinn endeared himself to the audience by plucking some notes on the sitar before commencing his stellar set. He was accompanied by the talented Tom Hambridge on drums. His most recent album is ‘Midnight Highway;’ his first two albums were ‘Cyclone’ and ‘Getting There.’

Delhi-based quartet Blu, the winners of The Mahindra Blues Band Hunt 2017, performed on both nights in the outdoor theatre between the main acts. The musicians, hailing from Northeast India, played a mix of delta-inspired songs along with blues-rock. Members include Pranai Gurung (lead guitar), Kapil Chhetri (guitar, vocals), Rahul Rai (bass) and Chewang Lama (drums).

Day Two

The second day kicked off with Grainne Duffy Band from Ireland. Grainne is a guitar player, singer and songwriter, drawing on the blues traditions of Memphis and Chicago. She was influenced by Aretha Franklin, Rolling Stones, Peter Green, and the three Kings – BB, Albert and Freddie.

The charming singer showed off her wide range of vocals and guitar riffs at her first performance in India, with the audience shouting out to her to keep coming back. Grainne’s albums include ‘Out of the Dark’ and ‘Test of Time,’ and she has won a number of awards in Europe as best female vocalist and best live performer.

Vocal powerhouse Shemekia Copeland then took the stage, belting out a fiery set of blues, soul and rock. The ‘gale force’ three-time Grammy Award nominated singer does her father proud: Johnny Copeland, ace blues guitarist. She has produced a range of albums such as ‘Turn the Heat Up’ and ‘Outskirts of Love,’ and has performed in festivals across the world.

Shemekia has sung with Eric Clapton, Bonnie Raitt, B.B. King, Buddy Guy, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Carlos Santana, and James Cotton. She drew a thunderous ovation for the songs ‘I am a Woman’ and ‘Ghetto Child’ — some of which she sang without the mike, and powerful voice still cut right across the hall.

Shemekia showed why she truly deserves the title ‘Queen of the Blues,’ passed on to her by Koko Taylor’s daughter Cookie. She also endeared herself to fans in India by sharing that she had left behind her newborn son so that she could perform in Mumbai.

The festival ended in rousing style with Supersonic Blues Machine featuring the legendary Billy Gibbons (of ZZ Top) and Eric Gales. The group was spearheaded by Texan guitarist-singer-songwriter Lance Lopez and bassist-producer Fabrizio Grossi, along with Indiana drummer Kenny Aronoff.

In other interviews to the media, Fabrizio said that blues is like pasta – “you can add bolognese, tomato or clams, but the main ingredient is pasta!” Tennessee guitar virtuoso Eric Gales has also played with funk pioneer George Clinton.

They played a range of classics like ‘La Grange,’ much to the audience’s delight. The scorching guitar solos leapt to another dimension when the musicians were joined on stage for a memorable final jam by Warren Mendonsa, Quinn Sullivan, Graine Duffy and Shemekia Copeland.

The Mahindra Group also organises the Kabira Festival in Varanasi, a tribute to the great poet-saint and promoting his message of equality and dignity across religions. The corporate group has a won a number of CSR awards for its initiatives, which also includes the Mahindra Excellence in Theatre Awards (META).

Anand Mahindra, the automotive group’s chairman and managing director, is a blues lover himself. “The festival shows that you’re a real believer, and you’re not just supporting another festival in New Orleans. You’re such a believer, you’re taking it across the world. That’s how you create empathy, trust and admiration,” explains Anand, in a Live Mint interview. We all look forward to the next edition of the Mahindra Blues Festival already, in 2018!

Written and photographed by Madanmohan Rao
Editor & DJ, World Music and Jazz;
Bangalore Global Correspondent for Jazzuality.com .