Rus Nerwich

Rus, Benny Green and Chris Burbank after the Jam Session

I had decided before I arrived at the Festival, that I was going to play at one of the jam sessions, for those of you who are not hip to the music lingo. A jam session is an opportunity for musicians, who mostly don’t know each other, and ordinarily would not have a chance to play together, to do just that. It is often a highly competitive musical scenario, with musicians trying to cut each other, or show who is the most accomplished, capable and articulate. There are an unspoken set of rules and etiquettes that need to be observed, the most significant being, if you cant handle the heat, stay out of the kitchen.
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Arriving in Vitoria, Spain at 12.30 am would ordinarily have been a normal affair, for any traveller, gypsy or wandering jew, arriving at night, when the rest of the world is asleep affords you the opportunity to establish your place under the guise of dark. When they awake, you are there, as if it had always been that way. In this case however, I arrived completely and absolutely exhausted, having returned home at 3 am the night before. after discovering cookin Quartet playing on one of Paris’s main streets, I quickly got a cab home, fetched my horn and made my way back to the club, the factthat I had to get a train at 5 in the morning at that point didn’t deter me, neither did the fact that I had to get 5 trains, 5 trains I hear you ask yourself, or is it me, once again trying to make sense of how its possible to play hop scotch all over the French country side. With anything from a 4 min to a 4 hour wait between trains, I imployed all primal instincs necessary to fight my way through the mob of frenchies, also trying to find which of the 40 trains all leaving at the same time, they were supposed to be on.
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How incredible, for a week in the summer, a small city, big town in the Basque country in Spain, becomes a haven for some of the greatest musicians on the planet, and in turn a large crowd of supporters. The festival started on monday, with parades in the streets, the most exciting was a 20 piece funk band, complete with tubas, 10 horns, and a bunch of drummers. They marched round the city collecting a troop of followers and ended in the city square, where they proceeded to groove hard n kick some serious ass. Ever seen 60 year olds boogie down? I have!
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On the up n up, so here is a welcome to my travel blog, being a blog virgin im a little nervous, but like the first time, ill go slowly n hope that I satisfy, keeping you entertained n of course cerebrally stimulated. So I guess of critical importance is that you down with the program. Worst case scenario, I don’t have one, best case scenario, you come visit, yes, you!  So right now im sitting on the Euro Star to Paris. It all seemed like it would be a civil affair, the day I mean, got up at 7, way to early considering the late night, but that’s what you goto do when bags aren’t packed n your apartment needs to be cleaned, so moving on, blah blah blah, went on a whole lot of missions between 7 and 9 got back feeling very impressed with myself, I was on time, my mother would be so proud, anyways, get into a cab n head down to the station from which the Euro rail leaves, Its called St Pancreas, good god, how can a saint be called Pancreas, Its just not cool! Imagine how unpleasant Saint school must have been with a name like Pancrreas, anyway, IM LATE! How, I don’t get it, everything was planned, organised n there I was sitting in the back of a cab, having a mild asthma attack, brought on by a raging panic attack, I just wanna be a grown up! I get there with 5minutes to spare, n head to security, now for any of you who are familiar with my little stint in an incarceration facility in Atlanta airport, you will know that security, passport and border checks, strike fear into my very heart, anyways, how bad can it be, I don’t have crack, live amphibians, raw meat or a mad cow, but I did have two condenser microphones that look like Bin Laden spent 2 years studying at the Phillip Starckes design school, only to come out with a new range of  air surface missiles stylish enough to make Mr Starcke wanna go out n get a day job, So there I was, my entire bag being unpacked, me again feeling like the 6 foot 6 hairy jewish guy that looks on a good day like a sophisticated Italian lover boy and on a bad day like a Afghani rebel on vacation, standing with a well trained Eastern European lady, who I would have asked on a date had the circumstances been different. Any ways after a short time and some unfortunate glares from members of the public, the word member here meaning genetalia, I was on my way and was shortly to be told I missed my train, isn’t that a nice story children? No, not at all, ill save you the details n fast forward to 30 minutes later, where I find myself travelling under the ocean in coach number five n seat no sixty two. Having spent two days in London, im quite happy to be on my merry way, I guess it would just not be fitting for a gentleman like myself to rob you good readers of the opportunity to have the low down on my little London stint, so below are a couple of high n low points. Please dip in and out of this as you wish, and if there is anyone still reading, keep on trucking.

High Points

Paying R345 rand for a Pie, Mashed Potatoes and a Cranberry Juice.

Going to Play at Jam session at Ronnie Scotts with a bunch of the most unfriendly kick ass motheryentzers I have ever heard, there wasn’t a whole lot of love in the room, and for these cats it was about chops, I have since realised that im a boerewors kinda guy, anyways,  after taking a couple of choruses on rhythm changes I packed my horn n took to the streets, I guess not everybody gets that as well as all the technical ya ya and the obvious levels of competancey needed to have a satisfying aural discourse,  the music is about the connection and the sharing, no im not a care bear, but I do feel that it is important to make musicians feel welcome and be open to the new energy visiting musicians from other planets bring.

My battery is bout to kick it, meaning im signing out, please send me any responses, questions or whatever else you have, like cold hard cash, keep the peace, rus 

An artist of high integrity and sensitivity, Rus Nerwich has a reputation for being an innovative and dedicated musician. Committed to using music as a vehicle to uplift, communicate and empower, Nerwich is highly regarded by both musicians and the listening public, his album “Beyond the Walls” is recognized to be one of the most interesting and daring musical works to come out of South Africa in recent years. Nerwich recorded his last album in Buenos Aires in 2005. Recent highlight performances were at the Cape Town International Jazz Festival as well as The Spier Arts Festival.

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The SA Rock Digest recently spoke to Rus Nerwich about this important release:

Rus Nerwich - Beyond The Walls

The album’s title, ‘Beyond The Walls’, explains how these timeless melodies, born in pain and tragedy, have been sensitively re-interpreted in a contemporary jazz idiom and given a new life. This serves to capture the essence of their composers’ creative expression, amidst great horror and pain, and stands as a testament to the power of music and to the enduring power of the human spirit.

On the album Rus Nerwich plays soprano and tenor saxophone and is accompanied by his group, which includes Andre Peterson on piano, Dominic Peters on bass, and Kevin Gibson on drums.

The Interview:

SA Rock Digest: Having released a mostly traditional jazz album debut called ‘As Above So Below’, what caused you to take this different direction for your second album?

Rus Nerwich: In May last year, after finishing my debut album, I spent a lot of time thinking about what kind of role music played in my life and what kind of contribution I thought I could make to the world of music….a very overwhelming thought. I realised that the only way to make an authentic and sincere contribution was to deal with themes, subject matter, and music that was part of who I am, my heritage. I had spent much time playing standard jazz compositions and as beautiful and engaging as that experience was, there was something missing - this was not my story. As an improviser I felt I was reflecting on a reflection, as opposed to being the reflection.

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Hi, I’ve just launched my new web space and would love it if you have a look around. There’s some Media in the form of galleries to keep you busy and some info on my Current Projects and my Released Albums.

If you would like to make a booking or see where you can find my albums, please head over to the Contact page. If you don’t mind, It would be nice if you could comment on this exact blog post and let me know what you think of it.

Thanks
Rus

P.S. Our video section will be up and running very soon.