Abdullah Ibrahim — a tribute to a living legend

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There is something truly magical about hearing songs that were part of the soundtrack of your childhood and coming of age in faraway South Africa, playing in a popular jazz club in the heart of Manhattan. Not just hearing the songs, but rather, watching the legend who was born under the same skies as you, tinkling away at his piano on stage to an enraptured audience that has waited two years to see him play. 

The Blue Note Jazz Club is one of those live music joints that will cram you into shared tables with strangers — Omicron, Delta and crew be damned. You happily share a table with a US couple, a family on holiday from Paris and two Mexican men. When they have the same depth of appreciation that you do for your compatriot, the jazz master that is Abdullah Ibrahim, they aren’t strangers but rather new friendships waiting to be forged and cemented by beautiful notes. 

Ibrahim, the brilliant and unstoppable pianist and composer who turns 88 next month, was booked for a six-night concert residency from August 23 to 28 at Blue Note. He played two sets a night, accompanied by his magnificent six piece band, Ekaya. Ibrahim had been booked to play the same venue in 2020, but the world shut down due to the Covid-19 pandemic before he could fulfil that obligation. Many of the jazz enthusiasts who enjoyed the six nights of performances had bought tickets for the cancelled show two years ago and snapped up this year’s tickets as soon as they went on sale.

Watching Ibrahim coming on stage, flanked by band member Cleave Guyton Jr, and his manager and partner, Dr Marina Umari, gave the same feeling you would get seeing an adored relative you have not seen in years. The crowd’s cheering died down as he sat himself at the Yamaha piano and played the first note of Blue Bolero

Before he came on stage, the host had told the audience that they were welcome to take pictures and videos, but no flash photography would be allowed. When Ibrahim played, especially the two solos during the one-hour set, you understood why he could not be interrupted by flashing cellphone cameras. 

He sat alone at the piano under the spotlight as the other six musicians shrank to the background of the small stage until it was their turn to rejoin the maestro in the song. He seemed to go into a meditative state, taking the audience with him on this spiritual journey. His hands shook a little bit, not surprising considering his age, but he was still as masterful at his art as he was in his younger years. 

He played a medley of songs that includes crowd favourites like Blues For a Hip King and District Six, which melt into other breathtaking, soulful melodies that are difficult to accurately identify for their embellishment but are just as transcendent, if not more, than anything you can identify on his records. Ibrahim’s concert playing style is reminiscent of another legendary jazz pianist, Keith Jarrett, whose famous solo live piano recording The Köln Concert is a supernatural masterpiece. 

At this stage in his career, when Ibrahim gets on stage it is more than just a performance, he does not need to impress, as younger artists are wont to do. He is familiar with his followers and what they want to hear and transports the whole venue to another plane, inviting us into the inner sanctums of his soul. He is not just playing the songs you know, he expertly goes from one movement to the next, one tonality to another, like the beautiful chapters of your favourite book. 

A generous bandleader, Ibrahim did not hog the audience’s attention. In fact, aside from his two solos, for the rest of the show he played the song’s introduction and a few extra bars and then faded into the background, allowing his band to join in while he took the backseat. While the band played, Ibrahim quietly mouthed the tune while bobbing his head up and down. The band, much younger than him, interpreted his music brilliantly as though they had played with him for his entire career. 

Guyton, who plays flute and alto saxophone, evokes memories of Zim Ngqawana when he blows into his flute. Another band member whose solos stood out was Lance Bryant on tenor saxophone. The rest of the band is made up of equally talented musicians: Josh Lee on baritone saxophone, Mark Johnson on trombone, Noah Jackson on cello and bass guitar, and Will Terrill on drums. 

Ekaya’s members, mostly from the US east coast, have come and gone over the 39 years since the band’s inception in 1983, but the name remains. Ibrahim calls on whichever musicians are part of the band at the time whenever he has gigs or studio projects in the US. Four of the six current Ekaya members recorded his 2019 album The Balance with him over a one day session in London. 

Ibrahim has a long relationship with the US. He first moved here in the early 1960s, after meeting Duke Ellington and making a memorable impression on him in 1962 in Zurich, Switzerland. He would go on to play and record with Ellington, and has performed at the best jazz venues in the country and been invited over and over to play legendary festivals such as Newport Jazz Festival. So rich is his relationship with the American jazz community that in 2019, The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) presented him with the US’s highest honour in jazz by naming him an NEA Jazz Master for that year.

Although he has not lived permanently in South Africa since going into exile in 1962 and he is revered in the west, South Africa will always be home to Ibrahim. His AI M7 Communities Project, an academy he founded 60 years ago to mentor young musicians in Cape Town, has been going on and off over the years and relaunched in July this year. The academy’s seven pillars, the seven Ms that make up M7, are: music; medicine, meditation; martial arts; movement; menu and masters.  ensure that his legacy lives on in the country, as he passes on the mantle to younger musicians. 

Wherever he bases himself, South Africans still claim Ibrahim as our own with fervent conviction. He is part of our heritage and is as much a national treasure as Miriam Makeba or Ibrahim’s friend Hugh Masekela. His music is still a staple for many South Africans and resounds across South African radio stations on any given Sunday afternoon. 

While others who are soon to be 88-year-olds are long retired, Ibrahim shows no signs of stopping. In 2021 he released Solotude: My journey my vision, a piano solo album with a mix of new music and a revisitation of tunes from previously published works we know and love. It is presented with a fresh energy, with melodies from different songs flowing into each other. Solotude was recorded during Covid lockdown at Hirzinger Hall in Reidering, Germany, with no audience members, just a genius and his piano. He also played a critically acclaimed NPR Tiny Desk Home Concert in March this year from his German residence. These past few months he was on tour in the US and is now currently touring Europe. His touring schedule is full well into April 2023.

If life was a nine-minute jazz tune, Abdullah Ibrahim would probably have just finished playing the bridge, but he would not have reached the outro yet. 

For more information about Abdullah Ibrahim’s tour dates, please visit abdullahibrahim.co.za/tour.

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