A CONVERSATION WITH FARUQ Z. BEY

Enable frames

A CONVERSATION WITH FARUQ Z. BEY
Scott Baker Talks With A Legendary Michigan Jazz Icon
and Music Theoretician Finally Receiving Due Respect

By Scott Baker

While improvisational jazz music may still be the final frontier when it comes to the skills of a continuously growing musician, it remains the pinnacle of the jazz world itself.

Requiring in-depth listening skills, sharply honed chops, and the ability to imagine on the fly, it is not uncommon to find something personally deeper in those musicians, which drives their musical intentions, or search for something more personally profound.

That is, if you are lucky enough to actually meet or come to know one of those rare musicians.

The history of the music style has its few names which shed light on this subject, ranging from the likes of John Coltrane and Miles Davis, to Sun Ra or Pharoah Sanders (who still continues to play occasionally) - each of which had such an individual style, there was always an open canvas for them to paint music upon.

There are remnants of those musicians that still make music today, but of the original batch of improvisational heavyweights, Michigan is home to saxophonist/poet/musical theory author Faruq Z. Bey, who is finally getting his due some 30 years later.

With the recent release of a live 1983 show from the artsy Detroit troupe
Griot Galaxy, Live at the D.I.A.’ (ESR 001), Bey is at the apex of the
sound and formation behind this somewhat forgotten band, which has been
touted as arguably the greatest jazz band to ever come out of Detroit.

With his current role as a feature soloist fronting Mt. Pleasant's own
Northwoods Improvisers  (who have over 25 years of their own historical
legend in improvisational jazz) Bey has been a hot topic in the music world
this year, at the age of 61.
Griot Galaxy with Bey came to an end after a motorcycle accident put him in
a coma for over two weeks back in the fall of 1984. It wasn't until his
slow return to the stage with the Improvisers a few years back, that
history has caught up with his legend in Michigan and the scope of his
output on the international improv scene.

Together with the Improvisers, Bey has taken his music to another level yet.
"Essentially, you're talking about 20 years of experience and actually a
continuing revolution of the principal ideas in what I was trying to
accomplish in my music," said Bey during a recent phone interview. "So the
difference is like 20 years of crude knowledge."

Bey is continuously in a search for something deeper in his music, which he
hopes to shed light upon for future generations to discover. With the
recent release of the historical Griot Galaxy concert and his two releases
with the Improvisers, 01s 19 Moons (ESR 011) and Ashirai Pattern (ESR 013)
which became available this past March (along with the Griot CD), Bey has
never felt stronger about his creations, especially his work with the
Improvisers.

"Northwoods - that's a beautiful group of people man," said Bey.  "They're
totally responsive to the music itself and the different inputs. These
cats, you know, are all on center levels. We're the same mindset about
improvisation."

The Northwoods Improvisers, vibe/marimba/cheng player Mike Gilmore,
drummer/percussionist Nick Ashton, and bassist/percussionist Mike Johnston,
opened their trio to Bey around 2000.  Bey's saxophone and poetry took
center stage in 2001.

"As I remember it, they knew Len Bukowski. He knew them. He was in a
student/teacher relationship with me. He's the one that introduced me to
them," explained Bey regarding the current collaboration.  "And the fact
that Mike Johnston expressed a desire to want to get with me and do some
stuff. "

"He reminded me later that they had opened up for Griot Galaxy as the
Northwoods Improvisers some 20 years ago when we were touring North
Michigan."

"I don't remember (much) of anything from that time, you know, for several reasons," he slowly laughed. "The accident put a dent in my memory anyway. There was so much going on. A lot of times we get a date and it's like when, where is it, what's the band, what time do we have to be there? And I'll come in there out of a fog and start playing and then go back into my fog and leave and go home and go to sleep or whatever. It's very intense."

The time period with Griot Galaxy came with a mix of alcohol, women, and his own unique musical spirituality, which surrounded the gigs and his own musical creation. While he never got to play with them, Bey did experience John Coltrane with Pharoah Sanders live in Detroit, which set him on the path that he still is discovering today.

"Oh, heck yeah--they were like masters and I was like the worshipful
accolade, or whatever."

"Actually, I played acoustic bass in high school. That was my first
instrument. That and singing. I used to sing in one of the do-wop groups.
So I was always into the music, but at a certain point, after seeing Trane
and all that kind of thing, you know, I decided I had to have a saxophone.
So I finally got one in  '67-'68, somewhere around there.  And started
playing it."

He gave up playing bass at that time, but figures it somehow still sticks
with him to this day, especially in how he and Johnston click together on
stage.
"It sounds factitious, but it is a fact that bass players kind of think
alike," laughed Bey. "I guess I think like a bass player, but you know."
Bey is happy with his expressions on both of the Northwoods CD's, feeling
he is heading in the right direction.

"Oh for sure. I'm totally pleased with all of it. I mean actually, those
cats present the maximum playing environment, because they're so
responsive. And they don't crowd the arena. There's a lot of space in what
they do. They're open cats, so they don't push you."

From the brotherhood of the original Northwoods trio to bringing in one of
Bey's long time musical partners, saxophone/flute/
spoken word Mike Carey into the mix in 2002, Bey can bathe in musical
expression.

"Each player produces another dimension to this stuff--another unit of
measure."
When Bey first became interested in exploring the improv jazz world in the
early '70s, there was an attic of a drummer named Tariq in Detroit where
players like Bey and Carey would gather and where the original Griot Galaxy
was born.

"Mike (Carey) and I and Skeet Shelton and a couple of other people who go
back many, many years to a time when we were going to this place, this
drummers place, on the west side.
You know Charles Miles used to come there an awful lot. "

"Charles Miles is a guy from Chicago. He came over here and was a
phenomenon. He was just amazing, because the cat could play anything.  Any
instrument. He's just one of them kind of musical beings I guess. If he
walked in a room and saw an instrument he had never saw before, he started
tinkling with it. And you'd go away and come back in a half-hour (and) he'd
be playing it. He'd be getting ideas out of it. "

The Attic as it was called, was where musical discipline started to
formulate. "So there's a group of us. And we would go there everyday. You
know, some high discipline stuff. We developed a whole lot of our approach
from those meetings."

"And Charles taught us a lot too, because he's brilliant, he's a totally
brilliant cat. And he has some different ideas, because we do a lot of odd
meter things and a lot of modal things. Plus we were, if you had to group
it—classify it, I guess we used to say we (were) avant garde types. And I
don't care for those terms, because as far as I'm concerned, I'm just
playing music."

It was the direct learning from Miles, predominantly a sax player, along
with the energy and spirit of Coltrane and Sanders, which propelled Bey
into his direction.

"He's the catalyst of my whole development as a performer and a musician,
you know. He died. He just came in and just started playing around. Most of
the old heads around there remember him. I saw him play with Harold
McKinney, those kinds of people, because he played straight ahead.
Excellent straight-ahead cat. He knew that stuff inside and out. He worked
around a lot. We don't believe that he ever got the respect that he
deserved, but you know. They were giving him gigs every now and then - that
kind of thing."

"Mike would come up there, Skeeter would be up in there, and some little
people. It was a little enclave, because we all lived in pretty much the
same neighborhood. That was definitely a Detroit sound for sure."

While none of it got recorded, the Griot Galaxy took its first steps out of
the Attic.
"Actually Griot Galaxy kind of developed out of that, because one of the
bands I was playing with was one of those total improvise bands. Totally
spontaneous. That's the only way we could play," laughed Bey.  "I don't
know. I got to the point where I just wanted to develop some ideas. Writing
compositions and see how they develop and that kind of thing. Get more
disciplined in the stuff I guess. That's when I came up with Griot Galaxy."

About once a month or so Bey performs on the side with Speaking In Tongues,
a sort-of pre-Griot Galaxy group of cats, most out of the Attic.
On top of the Improvisers and Speaking In Tongues, Bey also performs with a
woodwind ensemble.

"When I'm not doing that, we do a thing called the Conspiracy Wind
Ensemble, which is like a collection of reed instruments - flutes,
clarinets, oboes, (and) all that kind of stuff. But I guess the apparent
concept would be a saxophone quartet, but it's bigger than that,  (with)
clarinets and everything."

"I found out that conspiracy means  'to breed together.' It doesn't have
that negative connotation that has become associated with it. It shocked me
when I found out. It's like, wow! I was always brought up to believe that a
conspiracy meant the communist party and all that stuff. Sneaking around,
planning and scheming against the good guys and all that."

There are no current releases from The Conspiracy Wind project as of yet.

While Bey keeps busy, there is always a chance that there will be a Griot
Galaxy reunion someday, especially now due to the current archive release.

While Bey will continue to create with his three outlets, as a personal
goal in his musical evolution, the sax man currently wants to continue
writing theory's on the language of music.

"The way I'm approaching it now, is like a living thing (that) is
constantly evolving - kind of something different every time you look at
it. But right now, I was reading an encyclopedia of theory or whatever and
it mentioned this French intellectual  (who) defined his approach to the
thing as phonocentric, which is pretty close to where I am.  I'm concerned
with the music as a lingual expression."

"(Music) started out as a language. I'm trying to look into those languages
in the so-called third world, in Africa, India, China in all those places
where an interval or tone has a grammatical function. And that is what
interests me now, being a musician in this time zone. We play interval
sequences and stuff, but we can't attach a specific meaning to them.
Because I've noticed that even in English, like I'm sure that there's
meanings attached to the vernacular language. The meanings are attached to
(the) interval, but they aren't codified. The meanings aren't fixed. They
aren't the kind of thing where you say, 'this interval means this."

"But I've noticed that when a question--meaning this is pretty much
universal among people who speak in English -when there's a question,
people usually go to a tri-tone. The interval of a tri-tone. That's like an
auditory question mark. I've noticed that. I see that happen over and over
again."

Bey has found a new search with his revelations.

"What I want to do before I leave the planet is catalog as much of that
stuff as I can and get a general world wide assessment of the different
meanings attached to intervals. Because some intervals are, as we know from
music theory, the principal behind that is tension and release.

"Some intervals, the tension (is) relaxing, like the so-called fifth. Those
intervals signify relaxation of tension, where the flat-five of the
tri-tone implies high-tension and stability, because the flat-five actually
challenges the tonic. In terms of the frequencies, they challenge the tonic
for primacy. Those are the things that I'm caught up in now, so I'm busy
writing stuff down and getting ready to publish."

"I think there's a lot of substance to it, because for one thing, those
grammatical functions are really kind of subconscious in humans and they've
been in us for a long time through our history.  Its like you don't have to
teach a kid about gravity. The kid knows if he walks off the porch, he will
fall and hit the ground if he isn't careful. That stuff is pre-literate,
pre-cultural, pre-determined, really. I think that the function of the

interval in language is one of those things, but it remains to be
demonstrated, so that's my next job."

You can find all of the mentioned releases exclusively at New Moon Records
in Mt.  Pleasant, 1901 S.  Mission, (989) 773-1370.
www.northwoodsimproviers.com

Enable frames