A deep bass line, a brush on a snare drum, quick piano notes and languid ones, sometimes a passionate singer, but always lots of improvisation – these are some of the elements of Jazz. April is National Jazz Appreciation Month and while celebrations take place across the country, there is only one place in the Bronx keeping the music alive.
Every Sunday from 6-9 p.m., George Nazos and his wife Tamuz Nissim play Jazz at the Bronx Burger House in Van Cortlandt. The two are classically trained musicians and met nearly 15 years ago at Codarts University for the Arts in Rotterdam. They have performed together ever since and have been living in the Mosholu neighborhood of the Bronx for the last six years. As professionals musicians, they searched the borough for venues to listen to Jazz and perform, but soon realized, “The Bronx is a desert,” said Nissim.
The husband-and-wife team, who also go by the stage name “Liquid Melodies,” are able to perform at the Bronx Burger House with financial help from Keyed Up! — one of three programs of Jazz Generation, which is an education and performance initiative to create playing opportunities for children and adults. Keyed Up! works by supplementing the income of live Jazz performers in venues from New Jersey to Long Island and the five boroughs. Musicians must secure a venue willing to provide the space and compensation for them to perform. If the venue is unable to meet the industry pay-rate, which varies greatly according to location and band size, Keyed Up! will supplement the difference on a case-by case-basis. As it stands, the nonprofit has paid approximately $2 million to Jazz performers since its founding in 2014.
The Bronx Burger House is the only location in the borough that Keyed Up! has contributed to and is believed to be perhaps the only location in the whole borough playing Jazz, according to conversations with performers and research.
“We want to expand access to the music to more disparate neighborhoods and places so people don’t have to go to West 4th Street to hear good music,” said Rob Duguay, chief operating officer of Keyed Up! and professional Jazz bassist and composer.
Because of the funding provided by Keyed Up!, Nazos and Nissim have also been able to bring on an extra musician from the community since they started in January and have successfully employed more than a dozen performers for their Sunday jam sessions.
Jazz music traces its roots to New Orleans in the late 19th century and is an amalgamation of sounds deriving from West African songs due to the slave trade, church hymns, French colonialist influence and the diversity of people that lived in the area at the time. The sound then travelled north via the Great Migration and experienced a boom with the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and ‘30s.
The genre immortalized names like Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Charlie Parker and Billie Holiday. It influenced other genres of music like Bebop, Latin Jazz, Rhythm & Blues and Pop.
“We’re always happy to integrate a lot of musical elements from different genres. That’s why I think [Jazz] appeals so much to the whole world,” said Nazos. “I mean, music is important because it’s the only international language.”
Established by the Smithsonian National Museum of American History in 2001, National Jazz Appreciation Month celebrates the American-born music genre while maintaining a focus on its origins. “Jazz history is black history,” the Smithsonian website reads.
Reach ET Rodriguez at etrodriguez@gmail.com. For more coverage, follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram @bronxtimes
