Heather Maxwell
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"Heather Maxwell Teaches and Informs with Her Music"


By Jeanne Nicholson

Music notes icon 04_Kenya_Ji_Live_2005.mp3
Maxwell Sings

Not too many U.Va. professors are likely to turn a Monday afternoon lecture into a dance party in order to get their point across, but then ethnomusicologist Heather Maxwell knows from experience that music makes for a powerful teaching tool.

As a Peace Corps volunteer in Mali educating rural villagers about the hazards of deforestation and infant disease, she used years of classical voice training to compose songs with a message. While some volunteers spent free time drinking tea and talking with local residents, she found herself learning to sing and playing their music -- both contemporary and traditional African sounds. Incorporating Afro-pop rhythms and playing time-honored instruments like the balafòn (a wooden zylophone) and a stringed gourd outfitted with modern tuning pegs, Maxwell composed a song about the importance of polio and tetanus vaccines; another piece urged African mothers to use oral rehydration mixes when children have diarrhea. The villagers responded enthusiastically to an American who sang in their language, and Maxwell has gone on to record several hit albums with other African musicians, making a name for herself in Malian music culture.

"Talking through song," she says, may not be an especially new concept in places where much of the population cannot read, but Maxwell notes that musicians can share progressive ideas that might otherwise not be politically popular. "You can say a lot in music that can slide by because it's a song."

She shared her experiences and her talents in Charlottesville during an October performance lecture that was part of the 2005-06 Environment, Conservation, and Culture Series sponsored by the University's Office of the Vice President for Research and Graduate Studies. The series is meant to examine the unique relationships between the environment and human activities, according to the vice president, Dr. R. Ariel Gomez. One of Maxwell's original pieces, "Gwa Kuru" or "The New Stove," encourages Malian wives to build wood stoves rather than open fires for cooking as a means of conserving precious firewood. Presented in rollicking dance rhythms with hip-and-shoulder shimmying moves by the trio of dancers in Maxwell's Africa Soul Ensemble, the piece was hardly hum-drum environmental fare. Wearing colorful bogolan, or mudcloth, wrapped as mini-skirts over tight blue jeans, the women even presented a visual combo of modern and traditional ways.

As a visiting lecturer in the University's Music Department, Maxwell taught four semesters of students "hot" new forms of African jazz, classical mbqanga tunes like "Pata Pata," and the basics of Afro-Pop. She shared the stage during her October performance lecture in the Satellite Ballroom on the U.Va. Corner with U.Va. music professor and jazz drummer Robert Jospé, Richmond keyboardist Charlie Kilpatrick, Charlottesville drummer Darrell Rose, dancer and singer Marthe Talita Bolda, and several U.Va. students, including Seth Green on bass, and vocalist/dancers Nana Flor Guerengomba and Malaika Schiller.

Maxwell, a native of Flint, Mich., studied opera during high school and as an undergraduate before switching majors to music and anthropology and pursuing her lifelong affection for African music. Her subsequent Peace Corps experiences, performing arts studies in Ghana, field research as a Fulbright-Hayes scholar and eventually a Ph.D. in ethnomusicology and African studies from Indiana University have only added to that love: "I grew up singing in church, so I was always singing some kind of message. I like to perform and to know that my music is bringing people together in some way." - UVA Today


"Students bring music with a message to Mali"


By Jane Ford

Afrika Soul, started by ethnomusicologist Heather Maxwell, was the only performance group from the United States invited to participate in Mali’s multi-day cultural festival this year, which featured almost 20 African music groups of international acclaim.

U.Va. student Malaika Schiller said she was nervous and excited as she performed on stage in front of a crowd of about 1,500 at the “Festival sur le Niger” in the Mali city of Ségou in western Africa.

The audience included Malians from all over the country, dignitaries and foreign visitors. And the event was covered by the BBC, Radio France International and Africable.

Schiller, a psychology major, and Seth Green, a philosophy major, accompanied Maxwell to Mali for the festival. Schiller is a back-up singer and dancer with the group. Green plays bass. Both fourth-years have a passion for music.

Heather Maxwell Malaika Schiller Seth Green

“African music is in my background and in my blood,” said Schiller, who was born in Africa, and plans to go there again after graduation to teach English in Benin as a Peace Corps volunteer. Green, who started a “basement band” in seventh grade, plays with a variety of groups and plans to pursue a career in music performance. The two said they jumped at the opportunity to go to Mali and perform with Maxwell, who has a deep knowledge of Malian culture, having been a Peace Corps volunteer there from 1989 to 1991 and Fulbright Scholar from 1999 to 2000.

Songs the group sang touched on community issues of deforestation, black magic, love and poverty, and women’s issues of nation building, as well as youth and the role popular music plays in encouraging participation in the community.

Mali is among the poorest countries in the world. Life expectancy is 48 years, and only 46 percent of the population can read or write. Infant mortality is also a major concern. One song Maxwell wrote about this issue during her time in the Peace Corps, “Keneya-Ji,” became a hit. The title of the song means “Health Water,” and the lyrics instruct mothers on how to make an oral re-hydration mixture that combats the effects of diarrheal diseases.

Schiller said they were repeatedly stopped on the street and requested to sing “‘Keneya-Ji’ on the spot.”

Many of Afrika Soul’s songs were in Bambara, the local language of the region, and Maxwell played the Kamelan n’goni, a native traditional guitar-like instrument made with a gourd and six strings that are plucked.

“It’s a traditional male instrument. Everyone really respected her as an American playing a traditional Malian instrument,” Shiller said.

Green said, “They loved it when she sang in Bambara. Not many whites can speak their language.” He also noted that Maxwell sang a song in the native language of the people who live in the north desert region, which she learned phonetically. “The language was a real ear-catcher.”

As a musician, Green’s ear is tuned to music — its varied rhythms and messages. Immersion in the Mali music experience and exposure to high-caliber musicians, who play in a mix of styles, was the high point of the trip. Green was able to work with great musicians, who joined Afrika Soul on stage.

“We were not isolated in any way. We interacted with everyone,” Green said.

Music was the language of communication for Green, who speaks neither Bambara nor French, the official language of Mali. ”You can bridge cultural and language barrier gaps with music — playing it and hearing it,” he said.

Green saw first-hand the integral part music plays in everyday life when he attended a birthday celebration for Habib Koite, a Malian guitar player, who is famous in Europe and one of the festival performers. The partygoers feted him in the griot musical tradition, which originated with an ancient caste of people whose job was to sing the praises of the king, Green said. Although he could not understand the lyrics, “the context was like a free-style at hip hop parties. It was out of this world.”

In addition to sharing the joy music brings to Malians and witnessing the power of music to communicate serious messages, the two students were given traditional names by the Malians. Schiller’s is Maimouna Coulibaly. Green’s is Ngolo Diara. The names have a lot of tradition and a story attached to them, Schiller said. The Coulibaly are known as the cousins of everybody, and Diara are considered the founders of Mali.

“The students flourished in the environment,” Maxwell said.

The group had been invited to participate in the February festival in Ségou and a second one in the capital city Bamako, after performing for the prime minister, ambassador to the United States and other Malian dignitaries on a November visit to Richmond, Va.

Schiller and Green applied for numerous grants to defray the African trip’s cost. Just weeks before departure, they secured funding to cover all expenses from the Southern Africa/Virginia Networks and Associations, a research consortium of which U.Va. is a member.

“I see it as our role to educate students and provide diverse learning experiences and to take expertise that we have here at the University and use it for good,” said Robert Swap, a U.Va. research associate professor in environmental sciences who oversees SAVANA. “It’s a great example of the use of the arts to get messages across to local populations about health and stewardship of the environment.”

The students also participated in discussions with Maxwell, the minister of culture and the prime minister that explored ways to formalize an interdisciplinary program between Mali and the University that would be focused on the arts.

Afrika Soul has been invited to return to perform in next year’s festival.


- UVA Online


"Robert Jospe"

"Robert Jospé has one of those clean, spirited and tight-sounding jazz combos, with peppy assuredness, radiating enveloping healthy vibes ... an exercise in eye-catching, pan-rhythmic-intertwined jazz ... Recommending Jospé and associates is a rather undemanding task; they do that well by themselves." ~ JazzTimes


www.robertjospe.com
www.myspace.com/robertjospe

Drummer, percussionist and composer Robert Jospé is known for his inventive use of rhythmic styles incorporating salsa, samba, swing, funk and African rhythms into his own unique and distinctive style of contemporary jazz.

Jospé, leader of his own jazz and world beat instrumental ensemble, Inner Rhythm, has been performing at festivals, concert halls, college venues, clubs and private functions throughout the mid-Atlantic region since 1990. (See Performances)

Jospé began his career in New York City. After attending New York University he became an active player in the New York jazz and rock scene for 15 years until he moved to Charlottesville, Va. A member of the University of Virginia's music department's performance faculty since 1989, Jospé teaches jazz drumming and is a member of UVA's highly acclaimed faculty jazz ensemble, The Free Bridge Quintet. Since 1992 he has received an ongoing touring grant from the Virginia Commission for the the Arts for Inner Rhythm and his educational lecture/demonstration The World Beat Workshop.

In 2006 Random Chance Records, released Heart Beat Jospé's fifth Inner Rhythm CD and second on the label. Heart Beat features Jeff Decker on saxophones, Bob Hallahan on piano, Randall Pharr on bass, Elias Bailey on bass, Kevin Davis on percussion and special guest vocalist Heather Maxwell.

Jospé's 2004 CD Hands On features the same powerful group of musicians including Kevin Davis on percussion, Jeff Decker on saxophones, Bob Hallahan on piano, John D'earth on trumpet, Pete Spaar on bass, Royce Campbell on guitar and Elias Bailey on bass.

Jospé was nominated for a Governor's Award for the Arts in 2000. He was featured on Black Entertainment Television's program "The Jazz Scene" in February, 2001. In 2003 he was featured in Modern Drummer Magazine and on www.jazzweek.com and was an Independent Music Award Jazz finalist. He is also featured in the June 2004 issue of JazzTimes Magazine.

Jospé has performed on CD's and/or in concert with Michael Brecker, Pat Metheny, Dave Matthews, Joe Henderson, Dave Liebman, John Abercrombie, Tim Reynolds, Carter Beauford, John D'earth, Jeff Decker, John McCutcheon, Willie Nelson, and Robin and Linda Williams. He has also performed on numerous soundtracks for PBS, The Discovery Channel and independant film projects. (See Discography) His first album of original compositions entitled 'Inner Rhythm' also featured Michael Brecker, along with Dave Liebman, John D'earth, and John Abercrombie. - Discover Virginia


"FRIDAYSUPDATE- In on it: Jospé and Maxwell team up"


By VIJITH ASSAR
Published June 12, 2008 in issue 0724 of the Hook


Robert Jospé
Publicity Photo
For years now, Robert Jospé has been known as one of the leading voices in local jazz. That's ironic, in a way, since he hasn't actually had a vocalist all this time. His Inner Rhythm band has been largely the same for the last 15 years or so, he says, doing its well-traveled and worldly take on jazz strictly through instrumentals.

"In keeping with the identity of world music, Inner Rhythm draws on a lot of different styles-- African, Afro-Cuban, R&B, straight-ahead, blues and Brazilian jazz," he says. And for years, that was the project in a nutshell-- an unidentifiable hybrid that combines a dozen exotic pilis and macadamias, perhaps, but a nutshell nonetheless.

At the Afropop festival hosted by UVA in 2004, however, Jospé ran into singer Heather Maxwell, then at the tail end of a University residency, and he immediately began to reconsider.

"Heather is so rhythmically oriented and has spent so much time with African percussion instruments as well as with vocals that when I first met her, I felt like it had so much potential," he says. Later that year, they went into the studio together to work on Jospé's latest album, Heart Beat, and their performances around town have tended to involve one another ever since.

That includes this week's Fridays After Five show: "The collaboration with Heather is the focus," says Jospé. "Heather has had a big influence; the whole band takes on a different function when supporting a vocalist."

He's mostly referring to repertoire; Maxwell gave them the ability to perform more vocal jazz as well as conventional pop and R&B material, and her presence combined with the more accessible nature of the post-Heather tunes was one of the things that made the band so much more appealing as a Fridays act this time around. It's the first time Jospé has headlined in about 10 years.

But Maxwell didn't just up the pop appeal of Jospé's band-- she also seized the opportunity to do the same to her own material. Inner Rhythm will also be performing a handful of her songs, which she says have been reworked to fit the Fridays crowd.

For starters, she's stopped singing in Swahili. And Portuguese. And French, and Spanish, and Bambara.

"People like it when I sing in those languages, and it's exciting and different, but after one or two songs, it just becomes an interesting sound or timbre," says Maxwell. "I do thrive on communicating, so hopefully now the new versions, being in English, can maximize that relationship.

"I think Jos is looking forward to that a little bit with his band as well," she adds.

Maybe so. He can still talk for hours about Afro-Cuban flavors in 12/8, but this time there's also a parallel conversation that practically anyone can follow.

Robert Jospé and Inner Rhythm perform at Fridays After Five on 6/13.

# - the Hook


"MUSIC REVIEW- Mélange: Afro-pop's lovely loose vibe"


Published July 21, 2005 in issue 0429 of the Hook

BY DAMANI HARRISON DAMANI@READTHEHOOK.COM

It was almost a year ago when UVA asked me to cover their Afro-pop Festival for the Arts and Sciences Online magazine. I jumped at the privilege to have access to all the events. Representatives from all over Africa came to perform and hold forums with the student body.

The one thing I learned for sure from the experience is there really is no such thing as Afro-pop music. The term Afro-pop was invented by westerners who don't have the will and patience to understand the rich and deep heritage and culture of the thousands of individual styles of modern music from all over the continent. But I guess we all have to start somewhere, so if giving the music a blanket term somehow gets people to listen to it, then it can't be all bad.

The professor emcee was a woman named Heather Maxwell. She proved to not only be knowledgeable about the musicians and the culture, but she's also an accomplished musician herself: she sat in on few jam sessions, playing many of the traditional instruments.

Fast-forward to the present (or shall I say, "very recent past") when Maxwell brought her own take on Afro-pop music last Wednesday to the Gravity Lounge. Performing with her as accompanying musicians were three-fourths of Robert Jospé's Inner Rhythm, back-up singers, and a dancer.

Maxwell can give me 20 lashes with a wet noodle if I'm wrong, but I'd stake my freelance wages that much of her show is derived from the traditional West African griot or story/history-telling culture of music. Inherent in that nature is a loose, carefree vibe even when the singer is dealing with serious subject matter. The inviting songs evince the same spirit as camp songs or minstrel tunes, but with a much more primal rhythmic vibe.

Maxwell successfully evoked that loose, relaxed vibe out of the players, singers, and audience. She incorporated skits into the songs to help illustrate the meanings behind the words. There was comedy, dance, call and response, and improvisation. In between songs, Maxwell shared her vast knowledge of the language of the songs by explaining their meaning. All that flavor was being served up on a hot plate in the form of Inner Rhythm's cosmic chemistry.

Some of the songs seemed unrehearsed, but Inner Rhythm's experience layered on Maxwell's poise and direction turned potential disasters into fun forays and missed cues into jubilant jams. In all, the spontaneity helped with the relaxed vibe. Everyone seemed to seize that human element of the music.

The 90-minute performance went by almost too quickly. The ensemble ended the night the same way they started, with a song that means both hello and goodbye. I left the experience thinking that it really didn't matter what one calls the music. Afro-pop or no Afro-pop, it was really the spirit of Africa that mattered: the spirit of truth, rhythm, soul, and community.

Next week: Jay Pun and Morwena Lasko bring the new heat.

# - The Hook


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