An interview by Stijn Buyst
We had to wait a long time this year, but when the first 2024 terrace arrived, we were able to share the joyous moment with Antwerp trombonist and composer Nabou Claerhout. She inspired our conversation: Claerhout is taking her place in the Ha Concerts residency chair for the '24-'25 season to surprise us with new projects for a year.
Tell us how you ended up with the trombone?
Nabou Claerhout: "I started playing the trombone very young, at the age of eight. My mother allowed me to go to music school, but her condition was that I had to fall in love with an instrument first.
Then I started watching my sister's music DVDs - YouTube didn't exist yet. My first idea was the bassoon, but my sister's boyfriend at the time was a musician and he thought the bassoon was anything but cool.
Trombone has something warm, but you can also get that crackling sound of trumpet out of it. That whole search did take a year. My mother apparently dreamed all her life of a son trumpeter, but a daughter trombonist was fine with her too.
Nabou Claerhout
'I thought about drums and harp for a while, but suddenly there was this trombone - I had seen one at a concert of Music in the District (summer concerts in Antwerp, sb) and immediately knew that it was the instrument for me: the specialness of the slide, the sound... I love the trumpet, but it is in the higher register.
The trombone has something warm, but you can also get the crackling sound of the trumpet. This whole search took a year. My mother apparently dreamed all her life of having a trumpet player as a son, but a trombone player as a daughter was fine with her.
I was a very poor student at the music school: I hardly ever rehearsed at home. Only at the Kunsthumaniora did that change, and at the Rotterdam Conservatory I had to, of course.'
When did you know jazz was going to define your path?
"I think I was twelve when my sister gave me a Maceo Parker DVD for Christmas. That's when I first saw Fred Wesley play, and that's when I realized there was more to life than classical music. My sister bought more DVDs. For example, I saw Beyoncé with an all-female band, including an all-female horn section.
But I didn't know I wanted to do this professionally until I was 22 and studying at the conservatory, after a period of doubt. Composing followed. I soon realized that my musical friends never needed a trombonist. So I had to start doing it myself. "
THE TWO OF YOU
You lost your trombone last year. How disastrous is that for a trombonist?
"First of all, I want to say that I was sober. Because people think: if you lose your instrument, you must have been drunk. Not so! I had to play in the Bimhuis and in the evening I drove back from Amsterdam to Antwerp. Somewhere between those two points it happened.
But losing your instrument is catastrophic for any musician, in my opinion. A pianist plays a different instrument every night, but I had never played a different trombone. It's also emotional: I'm not very spiritual, but that instrument is literally the only thing that's been with me through all these musical moments.
That trombone sometimes just chooses for me how something is going to come out. It's not necessarily always fun, but it's something that we both do. I haven't quite regained that feeling with my new trombone."
I did blow on a bassoon once, and I find it very special, such an instrument that connects directly to your lungs.
'It's an extension of your voice. I do miss it. I certainly hope someone uses it.'
I know a few guitarists who did not find good examples in jazz and mirrored themselves on saxophonists. I can imagine that it is not easy for a beginning trombonist to find a reference point for his or her own sound.
'(laughs) "Well, I'm the trombonist who mostly listened to guitarists. Even when we had to study bebop at the conservatory, I noticed that bebop wasn't that accessible on the trombone, and I started looking at other instruments. So I listened a lot to John Scofield, Bill Frisell and Pat Metheny. Gilad Hekselman, Kurt Rosenwinkel and Lionel Loueke are other personal favorites.'
'Later, when I was already composing, I turned to the trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire. From him I learned that there are more possibilities than just playing a dry or a warm tone and that you can manipulate your instrument in different ways.
And Robin Eubanks in the 1970s was also doing things with his trombone that were new.'
During my research, I went through my record collection and found very little trombone music. Apart from a lot of Sun Ra records with many different trombonists, I only found one record by Roswell Rudd. And of course Wolter Wierbos with ICP.
'I like that kind of music, but it's still pretty far from the genre I lean toward.
With Ictus we do play compositions by Anthony Braxton, which also goes a bit in that direction.'
I also saw a video in which you - in the hemicycle colonnade of the KMSK - go solo with a row of effects pedals. Is that something you do more often, playing with effects and the acoustics of the room like that?
"I started using these effects when Snarky Puppy came to do a whole week of workshops at the conservatory. Their horns also work with effects, and I spent a long time asking about them. What you have to prepare for at home is that if something goes wrong, you know exactly how to fix it.
Every sound sounds different in every room anyway. So the sounds I like at home I have to adjust from room to room. With the N∆BOU quartet I also play a lot with effects."
NABOU-IN-RESIDENCE
Can you tell anything at all about your residency at Ha Concerts?
It is very early to say much about my residency. We have some outlines, but all the schedules have to be coordinated. We are going to put together an international quartet with (bassist) David Bowen, (drummer) Michel Meis and (saxophonist) Norman Willmore.
And with Lynn Cassiers, I'm going to do something for children. Playing with Lynn is always a big party anyway. I will probably also curate an evening with different duos. I always find duo lineups very intriguing, because you have to fill all the space you have with, say, a quartet, with two musicians.
I really look forward to trying all these things. Often a surprising amount of those trials and tribulations remain during a residency. And then there's a guitarist whose name I can't really say yet because we still have to see if we can find a slot in his schedule.
Claerhout - Bowden - Meis - Willmore
Artist in Resident in quartet
Grooves and soundscapes
20:15 TicketsI greatly look forward to trying all those things. Often a surprising amount of those try-outs remain during such a residency.
Nabou Claerhout
And then there is also a guitarist, whose name I can't actually say yet, because we have yet to see if we can find a slot in his schedule.
Waw, that's the great thing about jazz, that young people like you can sometimes collaborate with musicians who have played with absolute greats.
It is still a very small world. But when I first sent an email to this man, it was still with a very small heart.
The trombone ensemble Nabou Claerhout, with five trombonists and a three-man rhythm section, does not play? Which made me wonder: how extraordinary is such a trombone ensemble?
"There are many of them. There's even one with twenty-one trombones. In my ensemble I wanted ten at first. Now it has been reduced to five, which is still an expensive affair.
But for the time being we won't be playing with the ensemble in Belgium. We've played almost everywhere, it's time to see if we can go international with this project. At the moment I'm concentrating on my quartet N∆BOU."
The quartet recently changed lineups?
'The original line-up was blissful, but I'm also very happy with the new version. Roeland (Celis, guitar) and Mathias (Vercammen) left N∆BOU. We came from very different musical worlds, which I think also determined the unique color of the quartet at that time - it is not four voices you would quickly put together. In recent years we have had the opportunity to do a lot together, but in the meantime we have all moved on in different directions.
The quartet continues with Gijs Idema - our first guitarist - and Daniel Jonkers on drums. Both also play in the trombone ensemble. By the way, our wonderful bassist Trui Amerlinck is staying. My compositions remain the starting point, so I don't expect much difference there. But it might be a line-up that looks for a little more freedom in the tracks.'
'We rehearsed new music for the first time yesterday. I always hand these compositions off with a scared heart, but it's wonderful what these three are making of them. I'm already mega-hardly looking forward to playing live with them.'
