Terrace Martin says his SFJazz gigs will go ‘to a place where we’ve never been’
Rising star producer, composer and musician Terrace Martin is teaming with Butcher Brown at SFJazz, and there will be dancing and surprises.
Most of the concerts presented by SFJazz feature finely honed acts. Improvisation plays a central role in the music, and the spontaneity flows from a foundation of familiarity and shared experience on stage.
Terrace Martin has something else in mind. The Los Angeles multi-instrumentalist, rapper, actor and producer is a master of designing creative conflagrations, like bringing together many of the artists responsible for the sonic collage of Kendrick Lamar’s epochal 2015 album “To Pimp a Butterfly.”
Opening a four-night run at SFJazz on April 18, Martin has engineered an epic jazz/funk forum with the Virginia-based combo Butcher Brown, a rising quintet that thrives in the swirling rhythmic currents where jazz, funk and hip-hop converge. Miner Auditorium’s dance floor will be open every night.
“They’re an amazing collective of young musicians that I really admire,” says Martin, 40. “I’ve been them following for a long time, and I figure it’s in my best interest to develop with these cats. We’re going to take it to a place where we’ve never been.”
Featuring Marcus Tenney on trumpet and tenor sax, guitarist Morgan Burrs, keyboardist DJ Harrison, bassist Andrew Randazzo and drummer Corey Fonville, Butcher Brown has performed around the Bay Area in recent years, playing the Black Cat, Elbo Room, Café Van Kleef and other venues. It takes a considerable degree of moxie to bring them to the SFJazz Center’s big room for an initial encounter.
The rambunctious frisson generated by figuring it out on stage is what Martin is all about. He spends a good deal of his time in the studio and sounds positively raring to “take my living room on the road in a live atmosphere,” he says. “We’re on the stage, I may pull someone up. Make it what America’s supposed to be like, full on freedom. I’m tired of doing everything the regular way.”
He’ll be on the road this summer with Herbie Hancock and Kamasi Washington, in a tour that was announced last week.
Whatever other wild cards he might add into the mix, Martin has already invited a different guest artist to join the proceedings each night, starting Thursday with Nicholas Payton. The New Orleans trumpet maestro is an ideal choice, as he’s long championed Butcher Brown, even featuring the band on his 2014 album “Numbers” (Paytone Records).
Butcher Brown drummer Fonville was 19 when he met Payton as a student at the Brubeck Institute. “He came out as a special guest, and a few weeks later called me to make some dates, my first major gigs,” Fonville says. “He started seeing Butcher Brown videos pop up, and he was the first musician who took a liking and sought us out.”
Friday’s special guest is Alex Isley, a rising Los Angeles singer/songwriter who happens to be the daughter of the Isley Brothers’ lead guitarist Ernie Isley. In the midst of producing her next album, Martin says “her voice is amazing, her production is amazing, and her spirit is amazing, She’s my secret weapon. She’s able to sneak in evil places and kill the bad guys. You’re going to be hearing a lot of great things from her.”
Taylor McFerrin, another multi-instrumentalist and master producer who thrives in live settings, joins the fray on Saturday (“ He takes us to a whole other planet,” Martin says. “He builds sound out of nothing and understands the structure of songs.”) And Oakland trumpet star Ambrose Akinmusire closes out the run on Sunday.
“Ambrose is a local, but he’s a worldwide giant, a beautiful man, and one of my best friends,” says Martin, who’s known the trumpeter since they were in high school. “He’s one of the most progressive musicians and artists that I’ve never known. I wanted to honor these cats and give them their flowers now.”
Martin’s lifelong friendship with Akinmusire embodies his deep ties to the Bay Area music scene. Oakland guitar great Calvin Keys, who came up with Martin’s father (drummer Curley Martin) on the Omaha jazz scene, is his godfather. Berkeley pianist Kito Gamble introduced him to Akinmusire, and Oakland pianist, producer and M.C. Kev Choice is another friend from childhood.
But Martin traces his love of the Bay Area back to the first time he heard Oakland rapper Too Short’s gritty, streetwise “Born to Mack” when he was 7 or 8 “and my cousin played it for me,” Martin recalls. “He said, ‘We’ve gotta wait until your mom goes out.’ I couldn’t believe somebody had the courage to say those things. I couldn’t stop laughing That led me to the great Bay Area hip hop. E-40 was one of my heroes.”
Contact Andrew Gilbert at jazzscribe@aol.com.
TERRACE MARTIN WITH BUTCHER BROWN
When: 7:30 p.m. April 18-20, 7 p.m. April 21
Where: SFJazz Center, 201 Franklin St., San Francisco
Tickets: $25-$50, 866-920-5299, www.sfjazz.org