Jazz interview with jazz saxophonist and fluteist Fabián Araya. An interview by email in writing.
JazzBluesNews.Space: – First let’s start with where you grew up, and what got you interested in music?
Fabián Araya: – I was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1986, My father was from Spain and my mother fom Bolivia and we lived in a squatted house. My father left us when I was a child, so my mom had to work night and day because we where in a very poor economical situation and I didn´t have many toys so I think that´s when music entered in my life, I was just playng with chopsticks and singins all day.
JBN.S: – How did your sound evolve over time? What did you do to find and develop your sound?
FA: – At first you listen a lot of unreachable musicians and practice a lot of rutines and, in some way, you would like to sound like this or that “instrument hero” and I think it´s normal but maybe the biggest step is the acceptance. This is me, this is my sound, this is my speech, this is my way to express things.
JBN.S: – What practice routine or exercise have you developed to maintain and improve your current musical ability especially pertaining to rhythm?
FA: – I have four different routines for sound and fingering and I change them every twelve days. I love to play with irregular copasses so in all of those routines I improvise over a drum loop using only two or three notes (in different octaves) to practice rhythm.
JBN.S: – Which harmonies and harmonic patterns do you prefer now? You’re playing is very sensitive, deft, it’s smooth, and I’d say you drift more toward harmony than dissonance. There is some dissonance there, but you use it judiciously. Is that a conscious decision or again, is it just an output of what goes in?
FA: – Actually this new album might be the most consonant work I ever made. I use tonal and modal harmonies and the melodies are built in fourths. Until this album I´ve always worked with dissonance, I enjoy them very much I use them every time I can.
JBN.S: – How to prevent disparate influences from coloring what you’re doing?
FA: – I don´t think that there is something to prevent or avoid about that. We all have influences and it´s there and one way or another it´s part of what we do. I just flow with the composition process and if I realice that there is some influence, I just smile.
JBN.S: – What’s the balance in music between intellect and soul?
FA: – Maybe a sort of balance that work for me is using the soul for an initial idea, the seed, the germen. And then, use the intellect to let it grow, to build around it.
JBN.S: – There’s a two-way relationship between audience and artist; you’re okay with giving the people what they want?
FA: – No, I´m not okay with that but, I do think that a lot of not so popular compositions have to befriend with massive audience changing some composition parameters, or at lest just one, to help the audience to enter in their code and let them feel something.
JBN.S: – Please any memories from gigs, jams, open acts and studio sessions which you’d like to share with us?
FA: – Actually I have a very fresh one. We´ve been working a lot with the quintet in the reharsals and were ready to record. So I booked a ver big studio in the middle of a green field and with a great view to a river and horses, cows, sheeps, and I hired video team and a photographer, everything and just hours before the recording, a street dog attacked our drummer and bit him in the arm very badly so we had to cancel and wait about two months to make the recording. We cannot believe that luck.
JBN.S: – How can we get young people interested in jazz when most of the standard tunes are half a century old?
FA: – I think that a good way would be making focus on the jazz spirit of the stage. Going to live concerts, watch and apreciate the improvisation and the sharing that is happening there. The live experience is essential, especially in the youngest.
JBN.S: – John Coltrane said that music was his spirit. How do you understand the spirit and the meaning of life?
FA: – I don´t understand it yet, but I´m still trying.
JBN.S: – If you could change one thing in the musical world and it would become a reality, what would that be?
FA: – I would like to change the registration systems of the music. Is so much burocracy and hours and days wasted in those formalities and most of the requirements are so outdated.
JBN.S: – Who do you find yourself listening to these days?
FA: – I´m listenning Max roach`s “It´s time” album with Abbey Lincoln.
Leon Bridges, Marcus king, Julia Holter, Shabaka Hutchings and I like to listen what`s in the ProvocativeEducative! youtube channel.
JBN.S: – What is the message you choose to bring through your music?
FA: – I try to make focus in the paralelism of the spoken voice with a concret message and the melody, besides it´s texture. I play with it a lot and I find a very interesting relationship.
JBN.S: – Let’s take a trip with a time machine, so where and why would you really wanna go?
FA: – As an Argentinian and a fanatic of tango, I would like to be in Buenos Aires in 1920 and get into that tango world.
JBN.S: – I have been asking you so far, now may I have a question from yourself…
FA: – Sure! I would like to know what do you think about music groups that are not performing on live stages and start using live streamming shows. Do you think aesthetic experience is disappearing with this modality?
JBN.S: – Thanks for answers. Tha bad, yes, of course …
JBN.S: – So putting that all together, how are you able to harness that now?
FA: – I believe I´m doing it. It´s an endless learning process and I enjoy tryng to get the best of it.
Interview by Simon Sargsyan
