All set to steal the show: Christophe Panzani of Thiefs chats about jazz for a new age

Christophe Panzani leads Thiefs, a rebel outfit, iconoclastic, unorthodox and never likely to follow any rules. We got to chat with him about making jazz music for a new age of listeners.
Thiefs
Thiefs

Amidst all the genre classifications that you’re likely to come across for the band Thiefs — a mix of jazz, hip-hop, electronica and dance — the one category you can be most sure of is, ‘experimental’.

That’s what Thiefs is, through and through — led by a ‘no rules’ policy enforced by saxophonist Christophe Panzani, along with bassist Keith Witty and drummer David Frazier Jr.

Ahead of their gig in Chennai, we got to chat with Christophe about their approach to music, and how all art is inevitably political in nature.

On your Facebook page, the band description for Thiefs says, ‘a grammatically incoherent jazz’ debasement. What does that really mean? 
Christophe Panzani:
It is true that it started off as a kind of joke, due to the misspelled name ‘Thiefs’ (for thieves).

But then, thinking about the sentence, it kind of sounds right! ‘Grammatically incoherent’ refers to the fact that we don’t follow the rules, and we try to compose, write and play the music we feel.

Then again, being mixed musicians ourselves — between classical training, growing up listening to jazz music for some of us, rap music, avant-garde jazz, and so on... this idea sounds kind of right too. 

A mix that wasn’t meant to be, or wasn't allowed — something like that. Essentially, we’re mixing the heavily referenced ‘jazz trio format’ grounded in acoustic sounds, with heavy ‘machine’ beats, electronics effects on saxophone and bass — and then having MCs and/or singers. 

Will you be including politically relevant material as a part of your performance in Chennai? 
Art is a political action. Either we want to see it or not. It has a message that is provided to the people who experience it. It has always been a place for resistance.

Our last album is titled Graft (La Greffe), as a symbol of the plant that you can grow by adding a branch from another tree. Then you have new fruits, which couldn’t have existed in any other way.

It’s the same with people. People and the culture they carry. When people move — away from wars, away from poverty, plague... they arrive somewhere, and start again.

But from another soil, in another environment. Their children then grow unique, new and different, but with some things from them.

We wanted to claim to be the result of this process, as human beings and also as musicians. With the idea that we should not fear, but instead wait for the beauty that will come.

<em>Christophe Panzani of Thiefs</em>
Christophe Panzani of Thiefs

What does the term ‘avant-garde’ mean, for you? How did you find hip-hop and electronic music coming together with spoken word?
‘Avant-garde’ is a French term used in English for a specific branch of jazz music, among other things. I’d say, starting from the 1960s, this was related to Free Jazz, with a solid conception of musical composition related to contemporary music.

Some icons of this genre, like Anthony Braxton, were mentors of the founders of the band, Keith Witty (bass player) and Guillermo E Brown (former drummer, singer).

So, it has been a very natural process since the beginning, to evolve between some aspects of free jazz, with composed music... but then, this was made by young musicians, who grew up in Harlem or Brooklyn listening to hip-hop music. I think that’s what it is.

How are things coming along with your other record, The Bad Temperaments? How different is that from Thiefs?
Thanks for checking on that! I’d say, it’s a totally different process, yet there are some common roots in the music I compose for Thiefs, and for this specific project.

The Bad Temperaments is based on the interaction of piano and saxophone only. That is a challenge, with eight different piano players. And, with a piano that has been tuned using the old unequal system! 

Take us through a typical gig by Thiefs. And, what kind of an audience have you got in mind, in India?
There is no typical gig by Thiefs! I remember going on stage once, and starting to sing from the audience, and then we started to play, having already made the audience sing on the first song.

I also remember a gig in Belgium where we ended up playing a last-minute set for an opening at a dance club! We played only improved beats all set!

But we also play big venues and open-air fests with super warm audiences dancing! Or even a quiet jazz audience, listening to every note.

We have played at major jazz festivals both on the West and East coasts of the US, and playing at the most well-known jazz clubs in NYC — Blue Note, Joe’s Pub, Bitter End, Jazz Gallery, NuBLu and so on, apart from touring Europe’s clubs and festivals. As for an Indian audience, I’d say — young, curious, enthusiastic music lovers and adventurers. But it’s our very first time here!

<em>Thiefs</em>
Thiefs

Tell us a little about the balance you guys have struck when it comes to the web space - with digital downloads, and streaming, versus live concerts and the touring route. What would you rather choose - time in the studio, or never-ending tours?
There are good sides and other sides of this. The web has brought every music potentially to everyone who has access to it. 

But then, at the same time, it became almost free for everyone. It changed something in the way that musicians and bands had to go extensively on tour to make money. 

Now, the days where bands - like the Beatles! - could say, we're gonna spend months in studio, and maybe we'll go on tour, but maybe not for some time... Those days are gone. Bands don't spend much time in studios now, and instead, they spend a lot of time on the road. 

We like both!! So it's all good! 

The Thiefs lineup also brings in guest and sessions musicians at times, as with vocals and piano on Graft. Could you take us behind the making of some of these arrangements, which are obviously much larger than of just the three of you playing?
Yes! As a trio, there is a lot of room for guests! And for Graft, we really wanted to have words, in English and French. The piano adds also spaces and sounds that we can't produce with just sax/bass and drums. That's why we had piano guests on both our albums. 

The process of composing and arranging music is different with any musicians I guess. in the band we have different ways of doing it, and even each member has different ways! 

Actually, I have two majors way of doing it. One is to compose, no matter what instrument or guests. Then adapt and arrange to make it sound with a specific ensemble. Another one is to write, compose specifically for different instruments, and/or for specific person/musician.

<em>Thiefs</em>
Thiefs

Are you familiar with Indian music? Would you be keen on learning more about Hindustani classical music, or Carnatic classical music? And if you ever got a chance to collaborate, which band or musician would you pick from India?
No, we are not. I am not, and I regret it. While doing my studies at university, I used to listen to a lot of Indian Classical music from South and North. 

And we had some classes of the very basics of some forms of Indian music. But I've never practised or studied for real. It has always had some feeling of something unreachable, because of so vast, rich and complex that one should be devoted to it. 

We are very fortunate to have guests musicians here for most of our concerts of this tour. And after the first day of rehearsals, I can already say that it's an amazing experience. Cultures are very different, and sounds and melody and rhythm and harmony, everything seems so different and specific... and yet, this is the magic of music, we are able to play together and share musical moments. 

Tell us a little about the new sounds that you're listening to. What's on your iPods or playlists? How do each of you like to wind down by yourself, and what music would you play to entertain your friends, at say, a party or get-together?
There is so, so much great music happening nowadays. It's impossible to follow everything, but I try, like every musician, to catch the news, bands, musicians... 

Now on heavy rotation, I have : 
- Golden Valley is Now by Reid Anderson, Dave King and Craig Taborn.
- Virile by Moses Sumney.
- After Bach by Brad Mehldau.
- In Common by Walter Smith III, Mathew Stevens, Joel Ross, Harish Raghavan and Marcus Gilmore.
- Griselda Ghost.

And for a party... Oxnard by Anderson Paak.

Are there any fantasy concert ideas that you could share? Of all the stadiums in the world, all the festivals and concert stages - where is the one place that you would someday like to stage a performance?
There are many places we would like to visit, and venues we would like to play. I'm personally not a big fan of stadiums... they're too big and scary. 

But I have two dreams - one is to play in the mythical Jazz Club called The Village Vanguard in NYC. The other one is to play in an amazing old Theatre in Paris called Les Bouffes du Nord. 

Thiefs performed with guest artistes Neha Nair (vocals) and Sushin Shyam (keyboards) at Alliance Française of Madras, on November 27. 

— Jaideep Sen
jaideep@newindianexpress.com
@senstays

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