/ 3 September 2010

Polishing rough diamonds

What’s the real added value of ­festivals for communities?

“Move your chairs,” says ­saxophonist Ravi Coltrane. “Let’s make a circle so we can talk to one another.”

It’s mid-morning in a small school hall in Daveyton and Coltrane, the son of iconic players John and Alice Coltrane and now a jazz star in his own right, is getting down to business in his workshop at the Music Academy of Gauteng (MAG). The workshop is part of the Standard Bank Joy of Jazz Festival and the artists have agreed to conduct development activities as part of their contracts.

The academy was founded by trumpeter Johnny Mekoa in 1994. He describes it as his way of giving back to his community and keeping alive the music tradition that nurtured him during apartheid. Mekoa played with and was mentored by Victor Ndlazilwane of the Jazz Ministers, the first South African jazz outfit to play the Newport Jazz Festival.

Pulling the chairs into a circle isn’t just a gesture — communication is important to Coltrane and a vital part of his music. “Jazz should be like a family conversation. We’re all speaking at once but there’s no confusion, because we all ­understand one another and where we’re coming from.

“Music is speech like, it’s conversational. I want to speak when I play.”

He demonstrates the notion of talking in music by taking his quartet (pianist Luis Perdomo, bassist Drew Gress and drummer EJ Strickland) through a series of “conversations” — saxophone and bass, bass and drums, drums and piano, piano and saxophone and finally the rhythm trio without him.

In the fervent, almost worshipful listening, it’s easy to see what Steven Mabona, the academy’s deputy director, means when he says “music is a calling”. Mabona himself is a product of the school.

“We had our own traditions too,” says Mekoa, “but walk down the street in the township during the struggle and you’d hear [John Coltrane’s] Naima. That music sustained us.”

The dialogue is a long-standing one because Ravi Coltrane credits a South African, the late Bheki Mseleku, as an important influence on him. He knew the pianist in New York where “Bheki had a spirit and energy that let me know that it’s not only about music”.

But now, after two hours of performance and discussion, it’s time to close this particular circle. To end, Coltrane chooses the most famous of his father’s songs, Giant Steps, and invites the students to join in. Perdomo and Strickland cede their seats to youngsters and there are powerful three-way sax conversations between Coltrane, Mahlangu and Oscar Rachabane. Coltrane has already set the ground rules. He’s not expecting copycats: “It’s easy to learn how to play like this guy. It’s much harder to learn how to play like myself.”

Most of Mekoa’s students are recruited from the RDP housing areas and informal settlements around the school. “I tell you,” he says, “there’s talent like diamonds in the townships. You spot a rough diamond, you don’t have to cut it up, all you do is clean it up.”

The students don’t have the funds to access glittering stages and hear performances by international stars like Coltrane, but Mekoa beams as he watches his students up on stage conversing with the elders.

“When you hear these young musicians playing, you can take your hat off and say: ‘Thanks, O Lord, the future is taken care of.”