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Poetry, song at Village Café
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Poetry, song at Village Café
published: Friday | January 19,... Bookmark Jamaica-Gleaner.com
Poetry, song at Village Café
published: Friday | January 19, 2007
Mel Cooke, Freelance Writer
Left: Keisha Patterson gave 'Fever' reggae treatment. Center: Chandis started off the night with poetry. Right: Brahyhan Art performs at the Village Cafe, Barbican Road, St. Andrew, on Tuesday night. - photos by Colin Hamilton/Freelance Photographer
The attempt to get the most recent edition of live music at the Village Café, Barbican Road, going at 10:00 p.m. fell to a couple late band members.
However, when things got going at a few minutes to 11:00 p.m. they moved briskly enough.
There were chuckles when Chandis announced she is from the Pum Pum Posse, her first of three poems, all done without music, reaffirmed this as she encouraged Pum Pum Speak. It did, 'unashamed by daylight, candlelight and streetlight' before she got in touch with Me ('my fingers are never long enough to find where I end'). She closed with Raindance, eyes closed and locks which blended with her brown dress swinging, to applause.
Nina Karle started Knocking on Heaven's Door, supported by the Raging Fire band and a pair of female harmony singers, in original fashion, but changed to reggae, complete with lovers' rock lyrics, after the first go-round of the chorus, hips swaying under long black skirt as she sang 'if you would only tell me baby/tell me how you really feel baby/maybe I would stay with you'. One was delivered as U2 recorded it, part of a red bracelet dangling from her wrist as Karle pointed her right forefinger for emphasis.
And she pointed out that 'in the midst of having fun we have to take care of our children', ending with the reggae message 'pray until they kingdom come, our children must be loved'.
Keisha Patterson sprang the surprise of You'll Never Get To Heaven (If You Break My Heart) in reggae, urging a handclap as the music, a twirl and a slight skip coming at the end.
"You have to have a song about a man," Patterson said, laughing, delivering the original This Feeling. After What About Me Patterson said 'this next song you should be a little more familiar with'. Those who were expecting Barrington Levy's Teach the Youth when the music for that song started got a surprise, as Patterson flicked her hair back, sprang from both legs on the spot and fit Fever neatly on the reggae rhythm. A heated audience demanded more and Patterson delivered Etta James Again in reggae style for her encore.
It was back to Raging Fire for closing performer Brahyhan Art, who encouraged 'put your hands in the air if you really don't care' to a 'forward' as he came out.
Moving around on the small stage, Art went streetwise with 'de soun' a string up', sang for the ladies 'when your eyes meet' and rocked the house mightily with Dennis Brown's Love's Got a Hold on Me, followed by Beres Hammond's They're Gonna Talk.
He asked 'why you never give it to me long time?' and a long leg flicked toe first in the air as Revolution hit the spot, Art sticking in a part of Barrington Levy's Here I Come to good effect.
Chrisopholis was a well appreciated guest before Art closed with Get It close to 1:00 a.m., his return to stage for another song coming before the music was turned down shortly after the arrival of a group of policemen.
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Bryan Art performs at the recent 'St. Mary Mi Come From'
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Bryan Art determined to 'Get It'
published: Friday | August 19, 2005
Bryan Art performs at the recent 'St. Mary Mi Come From' concert at the Gray's Inn Sports Complex, Annotto Bay, St. Mary. - ROGER CHUCK/FREELANCE PHOTOGRAPHER
"I am a very serious individual, but with a lot of humour. Its not a facade or anything like that. When I feel happy it will come out, but I am a serious man, very spiritual.
BRAHYHAN ART sings 'get it, get it' on his breakaway single Get It and the singer, after years in the background, is 'getting it' a lot these days.
The attention has been pouring in for Brahyhan Art since the release of the single and accompanying music video, but for the man named Bryan Grant at birth, it is his due, as he has been in music for ages.
Grant grew up in St. Ann, but left for Portmore, St. Catherine, as a teenager. After high school he enrolled in the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts, where his plunge into the arts began.
"That's how I actually ended up with the name 'Art', because I was always involved in some form of art. From martial arts, to visual art, to photography, I did it all at one point," he said in a recent interview.
TRAINED GUITARIST
Grant was trained as a guitarist at Edna Manley, but studied Caribbean-Latin-American Jazz music as well. During his tenure there, he was spotted by musician George Miller, who brought him on board the Firehouse Crew band, which then backed Luciano. He toured with them, and later co-founded and then led Bushman's Grassroots Band, with which he toured as well. Outside of that, Brahyhan has freelanced with a few other bands over the years, recording an entire album with the band Abbassani.
While some would be content with the steady income and relative stability of such a musician, Grant felt he needed to take a risk and push forward with his singing.
"I just reverted to where my dream was all along," he explained. "I wanted to become a singer who knew music and not just someone to do it blindly. I did not get a lot of vocal training while at school, but I got training in classical music and jazz as well. Music was just what I wanted to do."
He started with Fiwi Music, but has recently branched out with the Junction File Label.
FOREIGN ARTISTE
"They used to have me as this uptown or foreign artiste. I don't know where they got that from; I am just Brahyhan Art. My music is what people can relate to it ... Entertaining and relaxing music is what I do. It is reggae, but it is universal."
"I am a very serious individual, but with a lot of humour. Its not a facade or anything like that. When I feel happy it will come out, but I am a serious man, very spiritual. I guess that adds up to me being a regular person," he said.
Brahyhan Art said he is enjoying the present vibe he is getting from the public, but for the future, he wants to venture out even further.
"I am trying to get on more overseas shows. The immediate plan is to release the album, for which we are adding material now, but we want to branch out into new markets," he said.
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Bryan Art Album review
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April 22, 2010
HOMEPHOTO GALLERY EVENT GUIDE MUSIC/VIDEOS DISCUSSION FORUM BLOG
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April 22, 2010
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Bryan Art sees renewed acceptance for singers
Contributed - The back cover of Bryan Art's album to be released this summer.
❒ Debut album 'Bryan Art 20Ten' for summer release
Mel Cooke, Star Writer
Bryan Art has a full slate of promotions lined up for his debut album 'Bray Art 20Ten', set for release on June 1. That includes music videos, interviews and a strong Internet presence.
However, Art is not leaving out heading "into the streets" in the flesh to plug the 16-track set, which includes Get It, Murder Them a Play (featuring Queen Ifrica), Rock and Come In, Somewhere, Second Class (with Hawkeye), the acoustic track Taxi, Anyway (which he describes as "a raw track, just me and a guitar"), Sweeter Love, Ready or Not and Beautiful.
dance and sing
He says that "I find going on the street is even easier. You used to think that songs like mine would not fit in, but I can go to a dance and sing at 3 a.m. We go dance and find that even inna hours when the almshouse a gwaan, the people still listen to we," Art said.
He had that experience recently at a dance named Chicken Back Wednesdays, held in Spanish Town, St Catherine. While he waited to perform, it got later and later until he was called "in the heart of the almshouse; we almost give up". He did not have any fear about performing, though, "'cause me notice a little trend a gwaan". So he says "me never feel no way", even though he did not get to hold the microphone until 3:30 a.m.
He says that a few years ago a singer would not be welcomed after midnight and it was strictly dancehall. However, he says that "I realise that some things like Rising Stars where people sit in them yard, in them living room, and see people a do songs", there has been a change in music appreciation. And, in terms of the music that is being created, he hears chords and syncopation, as well as "a new one drop that is half one drop and half R&B".
"A few years ago, the music had to be very skeletal, just rhythm. It was just 100 per cent rhythm. Now a wider variety of music is being played in the dancehall, wider than a few years ago," Art said.
Art speaks from a background as both musician and singer, having been trained in the guitar at the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts. He played in the band that supported Luciano up to 1997, then up to 2000 was band leader for Grass Roots, the backing unit for Bushman, which he co-founded with Rupert McKenzie.
However, he stopped his band work when he decided to divert his career path.
"I wanted to focus more on my solo career and I realised that people would not take you that seriously if you were doing that (playing guitar and singing)," he said. "Then, is a kind of move that would remind me each time what I am really about and not to confuse things. I decided I was going to stop all these gigs, focus on this and start thinking like a solo artiste and not a backing-band musician."
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Bryan Art album review
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Bryan Art 20Ten
Published: Wednesday | April 21, 2010 3 Comments and 0 Reactions
The back cover of Bryan Art's album to be released this summer.- Contributed
1 2 >
Mel Cooke, Gleaner Writer
Bryan Art could have made his full-length solo debut nearly a decade ago. Then, the guitarist-recently-turned-singer was doing phonetic pretzels with his name and was known as Brahyhan Art, part of the Fiwi Music outfit along with Yogi (now Courtney John). That album would have been released in about 2002. Then, there was another 'almost album debut' nearly three years ago, this one to have been distributed by Tads International which, again, was never released.
He is certain of getting out of the blocks this time, though, having marshalled his own affairs to release the 16-track Bryan Art 20Ten on June 1 on the Junction File (his own) and Jah Chin labels.
"Things always seem like it will happen and it never happen because of procrastination and we just decided that now must be the time. Come what may now is when we are going to release the album. Now is when we going to step up our game. Now is decision time," Art told The Gleaner.
The title comes from the 'now' frame of mind as well, "because for a while, we've been waiting on the album and it's like, really, everybody's been dragging them feet. It was really a drawn-out thing".
Some of the songs on Bryan Art 20Ten would have been on the previous albums, although different versions of two (Get It and Murder Them a Play) would have been released. So the original version of Get It is on the summer 2010 set, while Queen Ifrica makes a guest appearance on Murder Them a Play. Rock and Come In and Somewhere were also on the unreleased albums and Art points out that for his album debut, "the popular songs were drawn from other labels".
Relative success
Other tracks on the album are Second Class (with Hawkeye), Taxi (Art playing acoustic guitar to a drum and bass), No Malice (a techno, rub-a-dub fusion) and Anyway (which he describes as "a raw track, just me and a guitar"). He is encouraged by the response to the singles Sweeter Love and Ready or Not, saying "they are doing well" - then he pauses, laughs and adds "relatively". Beautiful was released some years ago as a single, but Art says he has done a "totally different production" for the album.
Now that he is on the verge of having an album of his very own, Art said, "I feel much relieved. I was really under a lot of pressure to have it done and just to have an album. Is a lot of opportunities I missed because I don't have an album. It makes you feel like an artiste, ready for the road. Without it, you feel like a tradesman without him tools."
"It's not that you feel like that you reach. You feel ready," he added.
Trading talent
Being 'ready' has taken not only time, but a few very bold steps and trading of Art's talent with the strings to get his vocal chords heard. He played in the band that supported Luciano up to 1997, then up to 2000 was band leader for Grass Roots, the backing unit for Bushman, which he co-founded with Rupert McKenzie.
However, he stopped his band work cold turkey when he decided to divert his career path.
"I wanted to focus more on my solo career and I realised that people would not take you that seriously if you were doing that (playing guitar and singing)," he said. "Then, is a kind of move that would remind me each time what I am really about and not to confuse things. I decided I was going to stop all these gigs, focus on this and start thinking like a solo artiste and not a backing-band musician."
There were cash consequences, as Art said "though it was gradual, I did not catch on financially before I made the decision finally. I made the decision bravely".
It was not his first bold leap, following his heart towards an uncertain future and not the aspect of art that was putting cash in his pocket at the moment. He enrolled at the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts part-time to do photography and graphic art, having started to establish himself in the field and earning an income. Then, "I just switched cold turkey to music".
'Sing your own songs'
He had some prior experience with the guitar, playing when he was about seven or eight years old. "I used to just improvise on primary chords for a while until I got bored with that and packed it up. I did not play for years at all," he said. So he was very nervous when he was required to play at the Edna Manley entrance exam, "but it was easier than I anticipated. What they were looking for was more potential".
He kept writing songs and doing demos to pitch them to artistes, but was told that he has a decent voice and should sing them himself, Art saying that Yogi was the last person to tell him so before he took the plunge.
Then the trading began. In England he exchanged guitar work for studio time to do recordings that turned out to be demos. In Jamaica he got his first drum track from Sly Dunbar at Cell Block studio; at Star Trail he exchanged his guitar chops for studio time, called in Chris Birch to do keyboards and had his first single Soon Come Back, which was also his first production.
He produces five of the songs on Bryan Art 20Ten. And, as for being a guitarist, "I only do it in the studio with, like, a friend. I don't do it for hire".
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20ten by Bryan Art
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Terms like 'sleeper' and 'dark horse' are thrown around in reference to people or things which strik...Terms like 'sleeper' and 'dark horse' are thrown around in reference to people or things which strike up with little or no warning and when they do, the effects are great. Well, in terms of Reggae music albums, the sleeper for 2010 may have just been found in the form of the outstanding Bryan Art's debut album release, '20ten'. The album may prove to be one of the strongest of the year and if it does, it would certainly offer a wonderful coming out party for the former Brahyan Art.
'20ten' is essentially a compilation of singles from the soulful singer from St. Ann and it will also be a very healthy introduction to newer fans and a reigniting of the flames which older fans have come to know. Highlights include previous big single Get It, Sweeter Love, the pristine Taxi, as well as guest spots from the incomparable Queen Ifrica and veteran Dancehall DJ, Hawkeye.
Potentially a big album, '20ten', is currently available from Junction File and Jah Chin. It has been released on CD and also digitally via Zojak Worldwide.
supersonic
Get It
