DaJubilus - Kum Ba Yah

Topic: Jazz - Modern
Music is more than virtuosity. Repertoire and technique can be taught, but the aesthetic that allows an individual to perpetuate a tradition - be it jazz, Southern gospel, or girls’ camp songs - is absorbed through exposure and participation. The post for 26 February 2018 suggested how colleges were providing the rudiments for musicians like those who played with Terell Stafford; if they attracted a talented group of students, the youthful interactions replicated the sort of music sessions at Minton’s Playhouse that gave birth to Bebop in the 1940s. [1] But, as Derrick Lewis discovered, absent that peer group one could graduate and still not be fully initiated. [2]

Carlos Alexis Caraballo was exposed to a musical instrument when he was eight-years-old in Puerto Rico, [3] and "grew up listening and playing music among his friends and family." [4] He said he wanted formal training, but "life and parents brought me through a totally different path and professional career not related to music." He finally got some training as an adult at Miami Dade College in south Florida. [5]

When an interviewer asked Caraballo what songs first influenced him, his list didn’t include the founders of Bebop and other forms of modern jazz. Instead, he said they were:

"The version of ‘A Night in Tunisia’ the musical composition written by Dizzy Gillespie and Frank Paparelli in 1942, performed by Papo Lucca and La Sonora Poncena [6] and ‘Watermelon Man’ by Mongo Santamaria a 1962 arrangement [7] of Herbie Hancock’s 1961 original composition of the same name." [8]

Caraballo had heard enough music to recognize his own limitations. He remembered the time he had spent in Miami Dade’s Commercial Music Ensemble had "built confidence in me, self-assurance during on stage performance and musical projection." However, instead of making a record of his own playing, he used his entrepreneurial instincts to apply the classes that taught the skills needed to produce a recording with modern equipment [9] to hire more skilled musicians to realize his vision.

He took some songs from David Arivett’s Jazz in Church series to Puerto Rico. He didn’t say if the men in DaJubilus read the sheet music or listened to the tape that came with the score. What was clear was they Hispanicized Arivett’s "Latin jazz arrangement" of "Kum Ba Yah."

Arivett’s arrangement was rooted in the modern jazz tradition that employed a piano as the backbone instrument and saxophones as soloists. Instead of the usual drum and string bass, Arivett used percussion instruments associated with Latin music, and augmented the piano with a low drone played by the electric bass. Among the exotic instruments he suggested was the Puerto Rican güiro, a ridged gourd rubbed by a stick. [10]

Like Lucca and Santamaria, Caraballo found the common areas in the African-American jazz style and his own taste, and modified the rest. [11] Arivett’s piano had the timbre of ragtime, but the Puerto Rican keyboard had a more piercing sound like that of a harpsichord. DaJubilus made the rhythm obvious with a steadily beaten cymbal. Caraballo used drums in the instrumental interlude, then added a whistle in the final iterations.

Like Lewis, Averitt devoted more time to iterations of the basic "Kumbaya" melody than to pure instrumental music in his arrangement than did Stafford. This may be one of the compromises artists make who try to perform jazz for conservative religious audiences. His main variations were giving little time to "my" and extending "yah" in the first three lines with staccato tonguing of "by" each time. In the final line, he used a turn on "kum."

While Dancing in the Spirit was described as "Christian" on Amazon, [12] Caraballo said the record of gospel songs was intended to honor his parents and "it encompassed a number of songs from his childhood." [13]

Performers
Averitt
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: alto and tenor saxophones
Instrumental Accompaniment: piano

Rhythm Accompaniment: electric bass guitar, drum set, side stick, guiro, congas, timbales, cowbells, shakere

DaJubilus
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: two saxophones

Instrumental Accompaniment: primarily keyboard; accents by trumpet, whistle

Rhythm Accompaniment: primarily cymbals

Credits
Arivett
Negro spiritual
Arranged by David Arivett
© Copyright 2009 Songs Of David Music

DaJubilus
(C) 2011 DaJubilus Latin Ensemble
"Music composed and arranged by the David Arivett" [14]

Notes on Lyrics
There were none

Notes on Music
Arivett
Time Signature: 3/4
Tempo: Latin beat, quarter note = 75 beats per minute

DaJubilus
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Tempo: fast

Basic Structure: ABA, with A the melody

Notes on Performance
Location: Puerto Rico

Notes on Performers
Arivett was raised in Ontario, California, [15] where he began playing violin and viola. He started mastering the piano as a teenager, [16] then majored in music at California State University-Fresno. [17] After graduation, he directed church choirs and bands, eventually becoming a clinician. [18]

He said he was first exposed to jazz in church, [19] and has written: "My main goal is to celebrate the miracle of existence as well as savor and enjoy the beautiful gift of music...Celebrate today!" [20]

Caraballo rarely used his full name, preferring his given names. However, his production company was his name spelled backwards, OllabaraC.

Availability
Arivett
Sheet Music: "Kum Ba Yah." Songs of David website. The PDF came with an MP3 file. The website included a sample from it.

DaJubilus
Album: Dancing in the Spirit. MP3. 6 October 2011.

YouTube: DaJubilus version uploaded by CDBaby on 23 August 2015.

End Notes
1. Wikipedia. "Thelonious Monk."
2. Derrick Lewis was discussed in the post for 4 March 2018.
3. "Dajubilus." Radio Swiss Jazz website.
4. "DaJubilus Latin Ensemble." Facebook.
5. Radio Swiss Jazz.
6. Sonora Ponceña. New Heights. Inca Records JMIS 1074. 1980. (Discogs entry for album).

7. Mongo Santamaria and His Orchestra. Watermelon Man. Battle BM 6120. 1963. (Discogs entry for album).

8. Radio Swiss Jazz.
9. Radio Swiss Jazz.
10. Wikipedia. "Güiro."

11. In an interview, Hancock said he had created the rhythm for "Watermelon Man" from the sound of horse-drawn wagon wheels on cobblestones in Chicago. He added, when he first played it for Sanatamaria, the Cuban-born Congo player said "that’s a Guajira." ("Herbie Hancock - Watermelon Man." Unidentified tape of televised concert with British interviewer uploaded to YouTube by path0610 on 7 January 2012.)

12. Amazon page for Dancing in the Spirit.
13. Facebook, DaJubilus.
14. Facebook, DaJubilus.
15. "About David Arivett." Facebook.
16. "Bio." Songs of David website.
17. "David Arivett." LinkedIn.
18. Songs of David.
19. Songs of David.
20. LinkedIn.