Bass Musician Magazine - SPECIAL August 2014 Female Bassist Issue | Page 104

fusing classical elements with a variety of other genres…said
another way, the performances and compositions on this CD
compel my need to say, a genre-less masterpiece.
Her penchant for a less traditional approach puts Esperanza
Spalding in a class of her own. In her own words, what’s important
is “the people who are learning now, and creating new things
right now”. This is her focus, her mantra, and obviously her
first love musically. I used a rather bold statement on the cover
of this months issue, referring to her as the 21st century’s first
lady of jazz, and from this players point of view, she’s earned it.
Jake: First off, tell me what inspired the compositional direction
you took with your newest release, “Chamber Music Society”.
Esperanza: Well, how it came about was last spring I was
collecting my mind on a repertoire that I wanted to release for
my next record. We started doing the preliminary organizational
stuff for the album because I knew it was going to be a big
project. So I’m writing down these songs, and I’m thinking
of what kind of sound palette I want instrumentation wise for
the compositions, and I started to realize, god, this is such a
mishmash of stuff that didn’t seem to match. And eventually I
saw that the music kind of fell into two families—these tunes
had this type of vibe, and the other tunes had that type of vibe,
and I started to realize that maybe I should be breaking this up
into two records. I felt I couldn’t justify putting all this music
into one recording.
A couple of years before this process I was on this trip where
I started writing for strings. I think I was listening to some
Shostakovich and was just tripping on his writing. So I decided
it was time for me to learn how to write for strings. I had all
these sketches and string parts that I had written a while ago,
and when this repertoire started revealing itself, I thought wow,
it would be wonderful to blend the sound that was still in my
head from my years as a violinist to the sounds of being a bass
player now, like in a jazz combo setting, to see what my version
of that would be. I was familiar with chamber music, and I was
thinking, jazz is in many ways is like chamber music. So this
became a culmination of forces. It was a repertoire that I felt

needed to be unique to be able
so happens that some of the tune
writing strings for were exactly w
needed. Once the sound of the e
most recent songs started to tak
music had been written over the
I decided to record with and wi
strings, a piano trio, and a backup
were concerned, I didn’t want to
or pads. I wanted to musically in
typical setting. We also wanted t
the improvisational side of the m
I wanted to share, and wanted to
to really use their whole instrume
bigger sound and to create more
this movement and this commun
the jazz world is trying to unders
world, and vice versa. I believe c
more and more interested in im
few months there have been a fe
that have gone this direction. W
Quartet, and Bill Frisell just did
I’m beginning to see that this is
and I think it’s becoming a valid p
now, and whether people are jum
is not my problem…(Laughs)…

Jake: Jumping on some of you
my next question. I read a statem
noteworthy, that being, “The m
most important time is right now
learning now, and creating new t
doesn’t help this music in any w
thoughts on that for me?”

Esperanza: Sure! Implied in the
young musicians, all people purs
They’re taking a look at how to ge
And beyond that, it’s really impor
are part of a genre, or a style, or
and the bravery, and the confid