When he was growing up on the South Side of Chicago, Kahil El’Zabar was immersed in the sounds of black culture.
In storied venues such as McKee’s, the Pershing Room and the Regal Theater, the young man heard visionary artists who would set the tone and direction for his life.
“If you could imagine going to the Regal Theater in 1958 and ’59, you could see (trumpeter) Lee Morgan, (singer) Jerry Butler, (comic) Dick Gregory, the Staple Singers when they were still doing gospel, the Ramsey Lewis Trio when it was just starting out — it was almost overwhelming,” recalls El’Zabar.
“In my own neighborhood of Chatham, I would see (tenor saxophonist) Von Freeman and his brothers George (a guitarist) and Bruz (a drummer), as well as Herbie (Hancock) and Jack (DeJohnette) and many more. The musical culture was prevalent everywhere you turned, and it didn’t matter if you were talking about jazz or gospel or blues or soul or whatever.
“It was all great music presented as a class act by performers who dressed well and spoke well, and it taught me as much about excellence as it did about music.”
El’Zabar must have learned his lessons well, for in addition to developing an important career as bandleader (he heads the Ritual Trio and Ethnic Heritage Ensemble) and percussionist (he has worked with everyone from archetypal Chicago tenor saxophonist Gene Ammons to innovative multi-instrumentalist Roscoe Mitchell), El’Zabar has brought the freewheeling spirit of South Side experimentation to an unlikely location: Steppenwolf Theatre.
The Traffic series, which El’Zabar curated last year at Steppenwolf (where it reopens Oct. 27), represents something more than just a provocative lineup of musical experimenters. By bringing to a single stage poets, actors, dancers and avant-garde instrumentalists — often in unexpected combinations — El’Zabar has drawn upon the freewheeling creative spirit of the South Side in which he was raised.
It is a part of the city that made jazz, blues and gospel into musical idioms that would be embraced around the world, thanks to the work of artists such as Ammons, Pops Staple, Thomas A. Dorsey, Louis Armstrong, Earl “Fatha” Hines, Muddy Waters, James Cleveland, Mahalia Jackson and hundreds more. Though the heyday of the South Side may be past, the fact that so many of the world’s great musicians still live there (or maintain ties to those who do) has given El’Zabar the essential elements with which to build Traffic.
By featuring legendary and emerging South Side artists, in tandem with performers from other parts of the city and far beyond, El’Zabar has created an arts series that speaks volumes about Chicago and has no counterpart anywhere in America.
Last year, for instance, Traffic presented poet Ntozake Shange reading her evocative writings in a beguiling, sing-song fashion, while El’Zabar, trumpeter Lester Bowie and others riffed brilliantly alongside her. On other Traffic evenings, legendary Chicago guitarist David “Honeyboy” Edwards sang haunting, turn-of-the-century repertoire and reminisced (with Studs Terkel) on his friendship with blues pioneer Robert Johnson; and up-and-coming Chicago guitarist Fareed Haque collaborated with several comparably cutting-edge players in the most exciting show Haqhe yet has played in his hometown.
That all of these performances were broadcast on WBEZ-FM only added to the impact.
“When we were first thinking about starting an interdisciplinary arts series, everyone said we should check with Kahil,” remembers Martha Lavey, Steppenwolf’s artistic director. “They said he’s the guy who has connections with the major artists, and, boy, were they right.”
Indeed, because El’Zabar has known all of these players for longer than he probably cares to remember, he was able to persuade them to appear in risky, unconventional settings they might not have been willing to explore otherwise.
As a teenager, after all, El’Zabar was playing in a sextet led by Muhal Richard Abrams, a towering pianist-composer who was one of the founders of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians. Thereafter, El’Zabar came to know and work with Henry Threadgill, George Lewis, Chico Freeman, Douglas Ewart, Malachi Favors, Fred Hopkins, Anthony Braxton and dozens more, all pioneering artists who helped redefine avant-garde jazz during the past three decades.
Inevitably, each had to make a choice: Stay in Chicago or move on to the East Coast (as Abrams and Freeman did), the West Coast (Braxton) or beyond (Threadgill, who lives in India).
For El’Zabar, the choice was a simple one — continue to flourish in Chicago.
“I stayed for a lot of reasons, but mostly because I had seen so many great musicians stay here and still become known around the world,” explains El’Zabar. “Ramsey Lewis, Malachi Favors, Gene Ammons, George Hughes, Eddie Johnson and so many others stayed rooted in Chicago, while great players like Malachi Thompson and Fred Hopkins moved to New York but eventually returned home.
“I think they all knew the same thing that I found out early on: There’s this incredible creative well in Chicago, and it runs extremely deep. Deep enough, in fact, to nourish a musician for a lifetime.”
What often was lacking here, however, was an adequate number of places where musicians could learn and perform, particularly with the demise of dozens of jazz clubs beginning in the mid-’60s. From this vacuum came the AACM, which was created on the South Side, in part, as an organization that could help musicians stage concerts, exchange ideas and educate new generations of musicians.
One of these students was El’Zabar, who remembers that his AACM mentors taught him something more than just new approaches to harmony, theory and instrumentation.
“Roscoe (Mitchell) always emphasized listening to Bird (Charlie Parker), and Muhal (Abrams) constantly talked about Fletcher Henderson and King Kolax,” says El’Zabar.
“They taught us about Earl `Fatha’ Hines, how he ran a band, and the unusual voicings that he used that led directly to bebop. You had to learn all those things, how to put on a combo, how to play blues, soul, bebop, whatever.”
That training enabled El’Zabar to survive as a working musician, but like many AACM alums, he also worked as cultural activist, staging concerts and arts festivals across Chicago and elsewhere in the States. The Underground Festival that he has presented periodically over the past decade often has outshone the Chicago Jazz Festival it was meant to complement; the Express Yourself Fest he presented last year brought to Chicago such estimable players as New York saxophonist Murray and New Orleans pioneer Kidd Jordan, each collaborating with some of the most sophisticated avant-gardists in the city.
None of these efforts, however, had the kind of financial and marketing muscle required to make a major impact. Instead, they were quixotic projects that El’Zabar and a few colleagues staged despite the odds.
And that’s what made the emergence of the Traffic series so fortuitous — for Steppenwolf, for El’Zabar and, most of all, for music in Chicago.
“I know what it’s like to muscle a production into existence, and I know how hard and how draining it is,” says Steppenwolf’s Lavey. “Give an artist like Kahil the support he needs, however, and you would be amazed at what can happen.”
That’s precisely what Steppenwolf did with Traffic, giving El’Zabar a first-rate performance space and the kind of marketing and advertising support he hadn’t seen (or probably dreamed of) in his life. With the help of Lavey and Steppenwolf marketing director Tim Evans, El’Zabar last year put together an eight-event series that took off “like no one really imagined it would — we were astonished,” says Evans.
Indeed, most of the events were sold out; the rest reached about 90 percent capacity, remarkable figures for a series featuring unexpected collaborations among artistic innovators.
The success led Steppenwolf to expand Traffic to 10 events this year, with all on the mainstage (a few last season had been in the studio). But it’s the nature of the programming that captures the imagination, with El’Zabar and friends having come up with a series that seems — on paper, at least — even more adventurous than last year’s. That the season will open with a “Tribute to the AACM” featuring three major bands (on Oct. 27) and continue with a concert appearance by the Art Ensemble of Chicago (Dec. 15) and a new version of Stravinsky’s “The Soldier’s Tale” (with new libretto by Kurt Vonnegut) suggests that Steppenwolf is becoming the epicenter of bold new ideas in Chicago music.
“This is just the beginning,” says El’Zabar, whose words might seem boastful, if not for the achievements of last season and the promise of the new one.
“If we can get audiences this excited about new music after just one season, imagine what we might be able to do after three, or four, or five.”
One hardly can wait to find out.
TRAFFIC STOPS
Following is the complete schedule for the second year of Traffic at Steppenwolf Theatre, 1650 N. Halsted St. For details, call 312-335-1650.
Oct. 27 — “Tribute to AACM,” featuring the Ernest Dawkins Trio, Samana and the Kahil El’Zabar Quartet.
Nov. 17 — “(Dramatic and Musical Interpretation of) The Works of Leon Forrest,” with saxophonist Ari Brown, multi-instrumentalist Henry Threadgill and actress Catherine Slade.
Dec. 15 — “Art Ensemble of Chicago.” with Roscoe Mitchell, Lester Bowie, Malachi Favors and Famoudou Don Moye.
Jan. 26, 1998 — “Tribute to Allen Ginsberg,” with Martha Lavey, Frank Galati, Kurt Elling, Kahil El’Zabar and the Laurence Hobgood Trio.
Feb. 23 — “Music in the Word,” featuring Amiri Baraka, Oliver Lake and Steve Colson.
March 30 — “Dance and Jazz Summit,” with Robert Henry Johnson and the Von Freeman Quartet.
May 18 — Igor Stravinsky’s “The Soldier’s Tale,” with new libretto by Kurt Vonnegut, featuring David Miller, Rachel Barton and Orchestra X.
June 8 — “Cultural Odyssey: The Performance Group,” with Rhodessa Jones and Idris Ackamoor.
July 20 — “Night of Performance Art,” featuring Guillermo Gomez-Pena.
Aug. 17 — “The Divas of Dance,” featuring Maria Tallchief and Carmen de Lavallade.
