{"id":2445609,"date":"2019-06-22T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-06-22T06:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/?p=308000"},"modified":"2019-06-22T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2019-06-22T06:00:00","slug":"jazz-aspen-snowmass-june-experience-etienne-charles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/jazz-aspen-snowmass-june-experience-etienne-charles\/","title":{"rendered":"Jazz Aspen Snowmass June Experience: Etienne Charles"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Etienne Charles will play two sets at the Jazz Aspen Snowmass June Experience on Sunday.<\/strong>
Courtesy photo<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Etienne Charles is bringing his upbeat, dance-friendly calypso band back to Aspen for this weekend\u2019s Jazz Aspen Snowmass June Experience, returning after a memorable run at the JAS Caf\u00e9 during the World Cup finals here two years ago.<\/p>\n

The Trinidad-born trumpeter, 35, has established himself among the greatest living improvisers, playing a lively brand of jazz that mixes the rhythms of Afro-Caribbean folk music and calypso with New Orleans brass.<\/p>\n

Coming from a long line of musicians, Charles first picked up the trumpet at age 10. By 13, he said, he knew he needed to devote his life to music. When he moved to the U.S. for college at Florida State University, he dug deep into the American jazz tradition. By the time he was in graduate school at Juilliard, Charles was making a name for himself as an improviser and composer, developing a style that recalled contemporary mainstream trumpeters like Wynton Marsalis but that also incorporated the rhythms and traditions of the Caribbean.<\/p>\n

\u201cI try to write in different ways so that it all doesn\u2019t sound like it\u2019s all coming from one side,\u201d Charles said before the World Cup shows.<\/p>\n

Charles approaches jazz with both intellectual rigor and a pop-music sensibility.<\/p>\n

His \u201cCreole Soul,\u201d which topped the jazz charts in 2013, is a musical exploration of the Caribbean that\u2019s steeped in its history. For 2016\u2019s \u201cSan Jose Suite,\u201d Charles took on an anthropological study of different San Joses \u2014 in Trinidad, Costa Rica and California \u2014 looking for common ground. He\u2019s a musician that likes to ask big questions, and look for answers in jazz.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith \u2018San Jose Suite,\u2019 it was an idea based on trying to figure out ways to connect different places in the new world and connect them based on their colonial experiences and the differences between them,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was the first time I went out to meet and interview and record people to learn about their history, to then write music. It was a fascinating process.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shaping \u201cCreole Soul\u201d was a less academic pursuit, but still imbued with big ideas.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith \u2018Creole Soul,\u2019 it was similar but it was a little wider because I was digging into Haitian voodoo and calypso and reggae and a little bit of New Orleans funk and Thelonious Monk,\u201d Charles said.<\/p>\n

But his two evening shows Sunday on the rooftop of the Aspen Art Museum will be all about the calypso sound and dancing.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ll start cooking with the dance material,\u201d Charles said. \u201cAny time you groove with the music, it\u2019s fun \u2014 especially when you see people having a good time.\u201d<\/p>\n

With his intense interest in history and in jazz\u2019s role to both reflect and shape culture, Charles is uniquely prepared to respond to the tumult and bitter division currently gripping the U.S. and other nations around the globe. He\u2019s been traveling extensively in recent years to perform and has seen a global society aching for music to unite it.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a weird dynamic going on worldwide right now,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat I\u2019m seeing is that people are turning to music to get more than the music right now. \u2026 You see all of the tense times in American history and you see that music has been the impetus to make change happen. So hopefully our job helps bring people together who have similar ideas, or people who have different ideas that might not converse but who the music brings together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Charles pointed to the story of Louis Armstrong\u2019s 1960 tour of Africa, when warring tribes sat down together to watch his concerts in peace, as an example of his loftiest goals for jazz: \u201cI always think about that when I play, because you don\u2019t know who is there, you don\u2019t know their story, you don\u2019t know what their relation is to the person next to them or across the room. I\u2019m always hoping to find solutions and connections.\u201d<\/p>\n

atravers@aspentimes.com<\/a><\/p>\n

via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Etienne Charles will play two sets at the Jazz Aspen Snowmass June Experience on Sunday.Courtesy photo Etienne Charles is bringing his upbeat, dance-friendly calypso band back to Aspen for this weekend\u2019s Jazz Aspen Snowmass June Experience, returning after a memorable run at the JAS Caf\u00e9 during the World Cup finals here two years ago. The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2445609","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-20 02:43:41","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2445609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2445609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2445609\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2445609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2445609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2445609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}