American jazz trumpeter and Blue Note records artist Ambrose Akinmusire had visited Russia with performance on the “Jazz Seasons” festival in Gorki Leninskiye not far from Moscow. Our correspondent Nata Mikhaylova had a conversation with him.
Nata: Is it your first time in Russia?
Ambrose: Yes, It is my first time in Russia.
Nata: Who is your favorite classical or jazz musician?
Ambrose: That’s Joni Mitchell. Maybe she is not a jazz musician or classical. Maybe she is both. Well, let’s say Joni Mitchell and then maybe John Coltrane and then Bjork.
Nata: And what about classical musicians or composers?
Ambrose: There are many -— I love Ravel, Satie, Bach. I really love people whose music you feel like you can live inside of.
Nata: What about baroque music?
Ambrose: Oh, I don’t know. But you know I saw thisreally beautiful concert years ago with Cecilia Bartoli, she is my favorite opera singer. I don’t know if you call her an opera singer, but there were all baroque instruments, she performed many pieces, and it was amazing.
Nata: What is your opinion about the future of jazz? What interesting things do you see on the American stage? Which trends, alterations are going to take place?
Ambrose: I think what’s happening in America is the same thing that is happening all over the world. The younger generations are erasing a lot of boundaries and genres and there is a lot of mixing going on. You see a lot of collaborationsbetween hip-hop artists, jazz artists and classical.
Nata: Do you like it?
Ambrose: And it is happening internationally and I think it is really good.
Nata: As I know you had a collaboration with Kendrick Lamar? When was it?
Ambrose: Oh... maybe 4 years now. It was on “To pimp a butterfly”. 4 or 5 years ago. Wow, so long time ago now.
Nata: Tell me about your professional plans. Maybe you want to visit Russia again?
Ambrose: I just love meeting people and going to new places and hopefully getting experience. The more people you can relate to and the more people you can emphasize with — the better your music is. I like to go and have any action with people like eat the food, listen to the language and music, and then go on stage and play music after experiencing all that. Often jazz musicians tour the same places all the time. I started touring a while ago. I havebeen to Paris a hundred times and to London a hundred times..Here in Russia it is my first visit. I would likejust to travel to places I have not been yet.
Nata: Are you going to make a new album?
Ambrose: Yes, I am working on an album right now for Blue Note label, it’s gonna come out in October. It has a string quartet — drummer, keyboards and rapper. It’s called “Origami harvest”.
Nata: What music should people listen to?
Ambrose: Should? I don’t know. I think there is music everywhere to listen to. That’s a hard question for me. There is always interesting music going on. I’m really into Arca. Do you know Arca? You should check him out. He did some stuff, I think he produced most of Bjork’s last album Vulnicura. His own stuff is also really amazing.
Nata: What can you call bad music?
Ambrose: Music that’s only made for money, for commercial reasons. Music is a spiritual thing and we can really start to change. It sounds very corny but I think music has ability to change the world. At least to make people stop and think. It is becoming more and more rare that people actually think what they are doing, what they are saying. Music has the ability to stop you and really make you see what is around you. I guess music that’s not trying to do that.. I don’t want to call it bad, but it may be music that I don’t like.
Nata: Do you have a hobby?
Ambrose: Hobby? No. If I’m doing something I want to be great in it. There’s something about hobby that means you’re ok with being bad at it. There are things that I do — I box, I workout, I read, I used to play a lot of chess, I used to go fishing a lot. But music takes quite a lot of time.
Conversation, text — Nata Mikhaylova
Text — Paul Bocharov, Natalya Barskova, Elena Oganesyan
Photo — Natalia Sergeeva
