Island Jazz Chat Nigel A. Campbell

Michael Boothman is the personification of excellence in the arts in Trinidad and Tobago. Pioneering, innovative and consistently successful as a performer, composer, arranger and recording artist, Boothman continues his 50-plus year career that showcases a number of firsts and milestones in the development of modern music in Trinidad and Tobago. He discusses his kysofusion innovation, and chats about his career from his teenage combo years through to his label deal with the Clarence Avant helmed Tabu Records for his Heaven album. His new move into label ownership and new production has resulted in an upcoming album in 2021.

Elan Trotman, Boston-based contemporary jazz saxophonist from Barbados discusses the business of jazz with Jazz in the Islands. In 2019, he released his new album Dear Marvin, a saxophone tribute to the late great Marvin Gaye on the Woodward Avenue label. We get the Caribbean-American perspective from this Berklee College of Music alumnus about the significance and possible advantage of label distribution in enhancing the brand via radio and physical sales. This year also marks the sixth anniversary of his Barbados Jazz Excursion, a major destination festival in the islands where contemporary jazz meets the sun, sand and sea

The father of modern kaisojazz, Trinidadian pianist Clive Zanda recounts a career spanning from his days in England in the 1960s innovating with the fusion of calypso in the language of jazz, to his return to Trinidad and his collaboration with Scofield Pilgrim, Bajan-born kaisojazz theorist and pedagogue and beyond. The explorations of this new fusion exercise was given "proof of concept" in 1976 with the landmark album, clive zanda is here! "With dat kinda ting": Calypsojazz Innovations. His continuing efforts to create a philosophy for our understanding of jazz and kaiso music in the Caribbean are told with his development of a new book on the music and how to apply music theory to make kaisojazz music more than a niche music but a legacy.Fri, 25 Jan 2019

Composer, producer and recording artist, Michael 'Ming' Low Chew Tung is called by Jazz in the Islands, "the architect of the new calypso jazz in the 21st century in Trinidad and Tobago" for his band/brand Élan Parlē. In this in-depth and revealing chat, 'Ming' gives an oral autobiography that gives clues to how he became the major influence in modern jazz fusion in Trinidad and Tobago, and puts into perspective the trials and tribulations of the native artist in the music industry in the Caribbean. With eight CDs of original music and innovative covers under his belt and a handful of important albums by others on which he is the producer and label host, "Ming's" position and role in the jazz music sector is secure as a high benchmark for a new generation of musicians and singers to match, if not surpass. Calypso jazz and the jazz fusion in these islands is secure in the hands of 'Ming'. Wed, 9 Jan 2019

Pioneering steelpan jazz musician, Rudy "Two Left" Smith chats with Jazz in the Islands editor, Nigel A. Campbell, about his career. His beginnings in Trinidad, his sojourn into Europe to perform and ultimately record are discussed. Landmark albums like his Otinku with the Modern Sound Quintet are put into context as a steelpan jazz first. Now resident in Denmark, Smith's career spans more than 50 years playing and recording music on the steelpan, being among the few still alive who made recordings on the Cook Records label here in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago. A bebop musician who uses the steelpan as his instrumental voice in the jazz conversation on the band stand, Smith continues making albums that still garner rave reviews from jazz critics and stand as benchmarks for a new generation to strive towards. A major influence on a number of new steelpan jazz musicians, Smith is modest in his recognition of the deserved accolades. Mon, 19 Feb 2018