“In this photo you can see Elsa Armengou with her trumpet next to Jesse Davis at the Palau de la Música,” says saxophonist and double bassist Joan Chamorro, pointing to one of the many photographs hanging on the walls of his soundproof studio in Barcelona’s Sant Andreu del Palomar neighborhood, where he lives and works. He calls it “the jazzhouse,” and it’s a semi-detached house probably from the early 20th century that serves as the headquarters of the Sant Andreu Jazz Band (SAJB), his life’s project.
The fact that a young girl appears alongside the great American saxophonist should not come as much of a surprise, since many established musicians travel through Spanish cities and play with their local colleagues. However, if it is specified that in the photo Eva Armengou was only 9 years old, things change. What does this girl do? The answer is clear and concise: he played in the Sant Andreu Jazz Band.
He no longer does it because he is an adult and has his own career. “They enter the SAJB at 7 or 8 years old and at 21 they have to leave because it is an orchestra school, it is not conceived as an Operation Triunfo type company and we have to leave room for other musicians,” explains Chamorro, who emphasizes that in the SAJB talents such as Andrea Motis, Eva Fernández or Rita Payés have developed, jazzmen already consolidated in the state panorama.
Others, like Koldo Munné, even if they remain in the orchestra, are already ready to take the step to professionalism. “Koldo arrived very young and did not know how to read scores; at the SAJB, he did not need to, he learned by ear and now he is an exceptional singer, a high-level trumpet player and a great improviser,” explains Chamorro.
Munné, like Motis, Armengou, Payés and many others before him, had his album Joan Chamorro presents a… It is a recording that will become the final work of the SAJB musicians, a gateway to launch themselves into professional life. They have already recorded countless songs on the SAJB albums that Chamorro regularly releases. “The albums and concerts that come out are a great stimulant for the members, so they are motivated to learn and thus fall more and more in love with jazz,” explains the father of the orchestra who emphasizes: “At the time of ” Elsa had recorded more than 50 albums.
The Chamorro Method
Sitting in an armchair in his office, Chamorro casually explains his teaching system. Behind him, a small Buddha stands out on one of the shelves filled with CDs. “I have a lot of patience,” he says, smiling at the reference to the statuette. He explains that his method is to make the student fall in love with jazz, and to do that, it requires repeatedly listening to pieces and pieces of jazz melodies. “It’s an immersion,” he observes.
They are selected according to the profile and age of the student so that he can imitate them with his instrument; Over the months and years, the young members of the SAJB learn increasingly complex melodies until they master them. They do not use sheet music and Chamorro explains why: “When you learn to speak a language, you do it by listening to others and little by little you imitate them better and better; Grammar is much better if you already master oral expression.
“I filled them with melodies, listening to records, CDs and Spotify so that they get used to their ears and get excited when they see that they can play the pieces,” he adds, specifying that “the songs we play allow the students who are members of “The orchestra develops their talent, it is not about frustrating them with challenges that are difficult for them but, on the contrary, to ensure that their improvement is always a joy and not a suffering.”
Quote the movie Whiplash as an example of what teaching should not be, but emphasizes that his students are constantly exposed to challenges through SAJB album recordings and live performances in venues like the Liceo, the Palau de la Música or Madrid jazz venues like the Café Central, where they go frequently.
The SAJB as a unique case
“The money earned from the SAJB records and concerts goes entirely to the project, the musicians don’t charge anything,” reveals Chamorro, who nevertheless specifies that “according to the presentation of the records and concerts that we do outside of the SAJB, of course, they charge their share.” “Next year, Wynton Marsalis has invited us to play in New York, at the Lincoln Center, during the Ellington Essencial festival, which is celebrating its 30th anniversary,” he comments and adds: “we’ll see how we get there.”
He doesn’t give much thought to the fact that an accomplished musician like Marsalis, artistic director of jazz at Lincoln Center, invites a big band that includes girls and boys who have not yet reached adolescence. “They play like jazz musicians, even though it’s true that we play pieces that all the musicians in the orchestra can play,” he assures, boasting that “we are unique in the world.”
He says that there are many big bands of young people but none with minors. In addition, playing alongside big names, when they collaborate, is a great incentive for students, who thus improve at great speed. Chamorro illustrates this in the following way: “Traditional teaching says: ‘You will enjoy it when you leave the conservatory’, but at SAJB the pleasure begins from minute zero, what matters is to be happy while learning.
Chamorro emphasizes that his method is an excellent training for normative teaching, in schools and high schools, because “it improves memory, hearing and concentration in addition to the understanding of mathematical structures, since music is fundamentally a mathematical bitch.” Regarding the entry system to the SAJB, which Chamorro calls “the Masía of jazz” (in reference to the school of FC Barcelona players), the musician assures that it works like the tests to enter the minor categories of football clubs.
“I give them tests, they perform them and depending on the evolution that takes place, I judge whether or not they can enter the orchestra,” he explains. He adds that now a 13-year-old student and a 14-year-old boy have just joined, who have been undergoing tests for two years. “If they continue to progress at the rate they are, they will be two extraordinary ones,” says the musician and teacher, who has taught for decades at the Taller de Músics and the Sant Andreu Music School.
Sant Andreu Jazzing Festival, the other “son” of Chamorro
Joan Chamorro has another professional project that steals his heart. It is the Jazzing Festival, the Sant Andreu jazz festival that has been held for 11 years. This edition, which was about to not take place, according to Chamorro due to the lukewarm support of the institutions for the initiative, will take place in the performing arts space of the Fabra i Coats building, a former factory now recycled into a neighborhood cultural center.
“We started organizing it in 2013 in order to bring the different musicians we met on the tours of the SAJB, which in turn was born in 2006 and gradually gained consistency and international impact.” The initiative was born from the film A film about children and musica documentary by Ramón Tort and Borja Duñó about the SAJB, nominated for the 2014 Goya Awards. “It encouraged me to create our own festival,” he says.
Since then, countless personalities have passed through the festival, which this year includes jam sessions between the participants and the personalities who come. Names such as Jon-Erik Kellso and Scott Robinson will be present, as well as the Berlin-based Jungle Jazz Band and the Catalan trumpeter Ricard Gili, founder of the big band. The Black Locomotive in the 70s of the last century.
The Jazz Festival takes place from August 28 to September 1 and, in parallel with the shows and jam sessions The no less interesting educational scene of Jazz is developed, “where musicians from all over Spain and also foreigners come to learn and share the experience of the SAJB”. During this, Kellso, Robinson, Gili or the members of the Jungle Jazz Band will give master classes.
