The theme of this year’s 11th annual Jazzing Fest in Barcelona, hosted as always by the Sant Andreu Jazz Band, was dubbed “The New York-Berlin-Barcelona Connection.” Among the guest musicians and bands who participated this year were The EarRegulars, out of New York, The Jungle Jazz Band from Berlin (specializing in Dixieland), and of course the SAJB itself, along with a few special Barcelona guest musicians long associated with the project.
To those of you unfamiliar with the SAJB, it was founded in 2006 by musician/music educator Joan Chamorro and has for nearly two decades produced a long line of some of the most popular and sought-after young jazz musicians in Europe, including Andrea Motis, Joan Mar Sauque, Rita Payés, and Alba Armengou, all of whom made names for themselves while still teenagers in the band. Even more astonishing, especially to those hearing the SAJB for the first time, is that the musicians range in age from roughly eight to 21 years old. Under Chamorro’s direction, they play straight jazz, swing, be-bop, Dixieland, bossa nova, and other styles with the skills and sounds reminiscent of the great American bands from decades past, including the big bands of Duke Ellington, Count Basie, you name ‘em.
Within a few years of the SAJB’s creation, audiences began to see more local Barcelona and American jazz veterans taking the stage as guests, even if most of the American musicians hadn’t been familiar with the project before receiving the invitation to make the trans-Atlantic visit. A number of top-rate American musicians have either experienced the SAJB first-hand or have played and recorded with them in the past 18 years, including Wynton Marsalis, Scott Hamilton, Alan Vache, Joe Magnarelli, Joel Frahm, Dick Oatts, Terrell Stafford, Wycliffe Gordon, and Jesse Davis.
The EarRegulars were of special interest to the Jazzing audiences this year, as this was a return trip for two of the longtime members of the New York group, Jon-Erik Kellso and Scott Robinson. As for the group’s founding, Kellso explains, “Matt Munisteri, who is the only other “regular” EarRegular, suggested the idea of us doing a steady weekly gig at the Ear Inn to management there. I had been playing there for about 8 years with his group “Brock Mumford” once a month. They gave us Sundays since it was a slow night, and it quickly turned into a well-attended night.”
The group has been performing weekly at the Ear Inn on South Street in Manhattan on Sunday nights since 2007, and have recorded three albums so far, the most recent being Jon-Erik Kellso & The EarRegulars — Live at The Ear Inn (Arbors Records). Joining Kellso frequently are Scott Robinson on sax, John Allred on trombone, Matt Munisteri on guitar, Neal Miner on bass, and other musical friends who come and go as part of a revolving-door stable of musicians who take part in the weekly jams on an ‘earregular’ basis (the establishment has been a tavern of one sort or another since 1817).
Robinson was the first of the group to be invited as a guest of the Sant Andreu Jazz Band back in 2009. He returned in 2012 and 2014. During the 2014 visit, he said, “You know, it’s unbelievable. Joan Chamorro has got kids who are eight years old not just playing their instruments great, but playing really with the right feeling, and the right kind of swing. It’s incredible, it’s very rare to see that in America, which is the birthplace of jazz, so to see it here in Cataluña is something breathtaking…so for me it’s just an honor to be involved in any way with something like this.”
A decade later, despite the band being comprised of different musicians, his feelings remain the same. “It’s amazing what he’s accomplished with these kids. It’s breathtaking. There’s probably not much more I can say! Sometimes with a venture like this you have a good year, where you have a good bunch of kids, then you have some dry years, where you don’t have that much talent. But somehow he keeps this thing going at a very high level.
“That’s been a pretty constant thing in Joan’s band, having these little kids who don’t look like they’d be doing anything but riding a tricycle and then they get up and play all this music, on multiple instruments, they put the trumpet down and pick up a sax, and then they sing—it’s really something! Joan told me that I’ve been one of the inspirations for that kind of thing.”
Jon-Erik Kellso first played as a guest of the band in 2015. “I don’t exactly remember, but I think Joan Chamorro came to see us play at the Ear Inn when he was in town, perhaps to see Scott Robinson play, since he knew him previously. We were fast friends. And yes, it could well be that he had initially seen me and the cats on videos posted by Michael Steinman Jazz Lives.
As for his first impressions then of the SAJB and the musicians’ skill level, “I was blown away! I was somewhat familiar with them via their videos and on-line presence, and from friends telling me about them, but seeing them in person was another thing.”
He had played with younger musicians before, but says, “On average these kids are way above the curve. Joan does an amazing job with them.”
When asked who in the band at that time made a particular impression on him, he says, “All of them! I was especially intrigued by Rita Payés. She’s excellent, really emotes. Andrea was already fully formed, terrific.”
The EarRegulars’ trombonist John Allred was unable to join his bandmates for this trip to Barcelona, due to a new gig in the orchestra for an upcoming Broadway show. He did, however, speak of his previous visits to play with the SAJB in our interview in late 2021. Renown clarinetist Allan Vache, who had been invited by Andrea Motis and Chamorro to play with the SAJB, was a major factor in Allred’s first visit.
“Allan had gone over there and done a concert and master class, and he referred my name to Joan, who contacted me out of the blue. Allan hadn’t warned me — he just dropped my name. But I looked Joan up online before I went over there, and was very impressed with the organization, for one, and just the city supporting that kind of educational program, just blew me away. So, he hired me to come over there. We did a rehearsal the first day I was there, and then played a couple of performances.”
The band had a little surprise for Allred after that first concert for his birthday. “We went to this piazza, and they brought out a cake and we had a little party. That’s the kind of guy Chamorro is. He’s just very thoughtful and accommodating, and all the kids showed up! They were all really into it, which was really neat.
“I was very thankful to Allan for mentioning me to Joan, because I’m interested in that, I do clinics here & there in the States, but it’s rare to find kids of such varied ages so completely immersed in the music like they are, and really picking it up and becoming very talented players in the process.”
A few years later, in 2018, Andrea Motis invited Vache and Allred to return to Barcelona for more concerts with the band, including one at the Palau de Musica featuring Andrea. “She was marvelous,” Vache recalled, “singing and playing both trumpet and soprano sax. It was great concert and it looked like it was almost completely sold out.”
The next day, he and Allred got on a bus with the band and headed to seaside resort of Platja d’Aro, where a stage awaited them for an outdoor concert.
Allred picks up the story: “We did a concert with them at this gorgeous beach, and it was just amazing. We actually had to ride a couple of hours or more with the kids on this big bus,” where he got to know and observe his young fellow musicians on the trip.
“We were thrown right in the middle of them. Normally, in the States, you’d get thrown in with a band of kids and they just clam up, ya know, and they don’t know what to say to the ‘old guy,’ but these kids are very open and curious about everything, and ask questions, just having fun, using their English, telling jokes, and I think they get that personal relation with people through music, and most importantly through Joan Chamorro, ’cause he’s taught them that. He impressed me very much that way. When the kids are messing around on busses and stuff, they’re talking about a solo they played, or something about music… this is not your typical band of teenagers!”
He naturally gravitated toward his fellow trombonists Rita Payés and Joan Codina. “They were like my buddies, we’d be hanging out in the background, and I was teaching them licks and stuff like that. But I was taken aback, listening to Rita play a solo, I’d go, ‘Man, I would have played that…oh, and I would have played that, too!’ It was like she was playing all my licks, which is like my ultimate compliment to another musician, you know. ‘Wow!’ Something that I would have considered difficult to play, even now, was like something she was doing, ’cause she just learned it. She can do it. It was like, ‘Wow, okay, you’re way ahead of the game!’”
He was equally impressed with the band’s professionalism onstage. “One thing that you don’t learn in the music business — until you just do it — is how to present yourself onstage, and how to focus your attention on the person playing a solo…I noticed that right away that the kids showed a pretty advanced professionalism as musicians for someone their age… It’s so amazing, that diverse age group, all the people playing with like mind. It’s pretty impressive!”
The New York-Barcelona connection continued in the autumn of 2021, when Joan Codina, having left the SAJB, spent several months in New York as part of a student exchange program to learn music arranging from trombonist/music educator Ed Neumeister at The New School.
Allred made Codina feel especially welcome during his stay, inviting him to sit in with The EarRegulars, and even welcoming him to his house for Thanksgiving. “We invited him to come over,” he said at the time, “he’s been at the house a couple of times and we played, and a couple of weeks ago my father, who’s a trombone player, [Bill Allred, who passed away early in 2024], was up from Florida, so we played with Jon-Erik Kellso at the Ear Inn, and Joan came in, so we had five trombones sitting in with this little quartet. So, he’s here and just taking off, he’s learning like crazy, his mind is a complete sponge, and he’s a pleasant person to be around.”
In October of 2022, Chamorro and Elia Bastida took a trip to New York to visit as many of the city’s landmark jazz clubs as they could—which, of course, included a visit to The Ear Inn to see their friends again.
“It was incredible,” Elia says of the visit. “I’m very happy to have done this trip, for the jazz inspiration, listening to all these amazing musicians — John Allred, Jon-Erik Kellso, Joe Magnarelli — and also the historic clubs. It was really nice for me.”
As for the Jazzing Fest 11 that has just come and gone, The EarRegulars not only played their own set onstage, but also lent support for the select SAJB musicians who are currently preparing for their respective CDs as part of Chamorro’s “Presenta” album series. As each featured SAJB member achieves a level of skill and experience —and approaches the endpoint in their time with the band—they begin recording tracks (both in concert and in Chamorro’s home studio, known as The Jazz House) for eventual inclusion on their debut CD. For instance, in the past few months, lead trumpeter Elsa Armengou, who began her time with the SAJB when she was six years old, has been working toward her Joan Chamorro presenta Elsa Armengou CD. The superb trombonist/singer Claudia Rostey, saxophonist Lola Penaranda, and multi-instrumentalist Pau Garcia have also begun work on their respective Presenta CDs. At Jazzing, each performed and recorded a number of tunes with The EarRegulars in concert and at The Jazz House. And, as is the custom, a CD preserving the highlights of the festival will be released next year as Jazzing 15.
“The Jazzing Festival this year has been wonderful,” Chamorro says, “It really exceeded my expectations. Especially Jon Erik Kellso & The EarRegulars, who were great. Their concert was wonderful. The concert with the Sant Andreu Jazz Band was very, very good. The four musicians from New York were really very generous in their respective songs, together with the SAJB. The songs we did in the concert on Day 1 to the end of the festival will be part of the Jazzing 15 CD. Also, in the recording session for Joan Chamorro presents…by Elsa, Lola, Pau and Claudia, they were also very good. We played 12 songs and the four musicians played really very well.”
Neal Miner adds, “It’s great, it’s a very unique concert. I’ve done concerts that were recorded but I’ve never done a live recording session with stops and starts in front of an audience, which I’m sure is entertaining and fascinating to an average listener. I loved how there wasn’t a lot of rehearsing, it was just bang, here we go.”
He was also impressed with the number of girls in the band. “It was really nice to see that a lot of the star top players are females. I’m 54 and when I was coming up playing jazz, there were very few female players.”
Scott Robinson considers the set with Claudia as one of his stand-out memories. “The very first girl that Kellso and I recorded with plays trombone and sings, as others have done there. She was quite impressive.”
Claudia offered her perspective of the experience as well. “I recorded three songs for my Presenta CD and one for Jazzing 15. It was an absolute pleasure sharing a stage with them and playing with them. They are so friendly and nice that I didn’t feel as much nervousness as I’m used to feeling. They would joke around with us and between them. I was amazed with the beauty of Scott’s solos. I was really lucky to play with them and I hope someday I can talk and play with them again. I wasn’t able to go to their concert because I had work but everyone talked wonders.”
Robinson reunited with former SAJB saxophonist/singer Edu Ferrer, whom he recalled from his 2009 visit. “He was, I think the very first of the kids that I met, playing alto saxophone. He came up to me and mustered up his best English and proudly said to me ‘I have nine years!’. He was just an adorable kid with an alto and now he’s a grown young man and he sang some numbers we recorded. So, to see the kids grow up is really kind of special also.”
Like his New York bandmates, Matt Munisteri was knocked out by seeing and hearing the SAJB in person for the first time.
“It was incredible,” he says. I had been aware of their program a long time because my mother had been sending me videos of them, saying, ‘Look at these kids doing this incredible stuff!’ It was impressive to see the videos years ago, and then I got to know who Joan was…But being there, and getting to hear the full scope of jazz that he’s teaching these young people and that they’re all mastering, it’s just astounding. To see 10, 11, 12-year-olds playing stuff that’s really difficult – technically they’ve mastered it and they’re interpreting it with emotion.”
He enjoyed hearing siblings Lola and Gerard Peñaranda in particular. “The moment I heard Lola playing, it was like, sounds from an ‘old’ person, she just has that beautiful warm sound. There was a beautiful moment in concert with the two of them going back & forth soloing.”
Neal Miner shared more of his impressions of the week. “I just was very knocked-out by Joan and everything he’s done and continues to do. It’s very unique. I grew up playing jazz as a young guy too, and I was in some very good schools and in a Pennsylvania all-state jazz band when I was 16, so I’m familiar with high-level young kids, but there was something even more special about – well, obviously talent is talent, but these guys are so well trained and well-rehearsed, playing great tunes and arrangements, it’s amazing.
“I saw a little kid who could barely touch the piano pedals and there was this one young trumpet player [Martí Costalago] who’s very short and looks like he’s about 10 or 11, and I saw him earlier in the day playing with a toy robot or something, and then he took a solo on a blues and Jon-Erik and I were looking at each other, and he was really blowing some be-bop blues, improvising…I had never seen anything quite like this, what Chamorro has done, so I think he’s an amazing man, and I can tell it’s his life’s work.
“And I was knocked out by how kind and giving everybody was. There was so much love, everyone was very friendly, and all the meals they took us out to…The guy who picked us up at the airport, Tobias [Theuns, father of band members Sander and Nils], he was super kind and his sons were great, and I had a wonderful time.
He concluded with a sentiment shared by many past musician guests at Jazzing. “It’s not like any other festival I’ve played before. I was happy to be a part of it and I hope to do it again sometime.”
