 Helo, helo. Ynma ymlaen i'r ysgrifennidau, roeddfa hi bod agwyl a'r trwm bhwys言. Roeddfa hi i ddim yn ddim yn defnyddio'r ysgrifennidau ac mae gallwch chi wedi'n bwysig yn ddim yn ei wallachu'ch serio, ac roeddfa hi i ddim yn ddim yn wirthu'r ysgrifennidau. Mae'n bwysig leolwydd ymlaenai ar y dyfodol. Mae'n bwysig leolwydd. Felly roeddwnaeth hefyd bwysig ei gallu allan, gan fyddiwyd wedi'i bwysig a fyddwch eu myned iddyn nhw I'm Georgie Pope. I run the concert series and we've got a really lovely line-up of events coming this autumn. We've got two events which are part of the Bloomsbury Festival and the Bloomsbury Festival programme is outside on the table. Do you have a look through that because there's a rich calendar of events happening tours and music and film and all sorts, which bring together all the people and the institutions of Bloomsbury, of which so us is a part. Those two events are going to be a day of South Asian music called Remembering Partition on October 15 and also a concert on October 19 with a duo from Ireland. But tonight, tonight we have a really special guest who's come over. We're very lucky because he's been able to come over from Helsinki where he's partially based between Riga and Helsinki to play for you the music which is contemporary Latin jazz guitar, which is the music of which he's a master. He's able to teach it and he has been really involved in pedagogy of this rarely taught form. In fact, I must take this opportunity to congratulate Neff because we can count this evening also as a book launch because he's actually published this book which is a methodology for Latin jazz guitar, which you'll find on sale outside. And also Faber have given us a 20% off for you lot only. So using that QR code you can get his book at a reduced price. So Neff's incredible composer, he's a performer, he's an educator. He's studied modern Latin jazz guitar with Victor Mendoza, with Steve Kahn and he's performed alongside many jazz greats. He has roots in Puerto Rico and as I said he's based between Riga and Helsinki and we're very lucky that he's come to London and he's managed to amass this all-star band of local musicians who he will introduce to you individually. So without any more ado, I would like to introduce the band to the stage. Please welcome very warmly Neff Irizari. Ladies and gentlemen, I usually wait after the first song to give any type of speech. But let's give a big round of applause to Saws, to Georgie Po, and to the students and the faculty and the administration for making this happen. So let's give them a big applause please. Thank you. As Georgie stated, I'm a little bit from everywhere and today I'm going to define that with a journey that I've provided for you all through my compositions and hopefully I will also define what is contemporary Latin jazz guitar. Unfortunately, contemporary Latin jazz guitar you can't do by yourself. Of course with loop or you can, but you need the help from some great friends and great musicians. On drums we have Davide Giovannini. Please give him up. On bass we have the second half of the Davide duo, you'll see why. Davide Mantovani. And on trumpet I've known him for years and we've been talking on and off over the years to see when would be a chance to play. And because a very good friend of mine could make the gig he was the next one for me and it's an honor to have him here on stage and it's an honor to be with all three of them. So give a round of applause to Graham Flowers please. Thank you. All right, so the first song is entitled, composition is entitled Vitamina R, which is the R stands for relationship. The best ship when the tide is high it raises all ships. All right, so here we go. Next piece will be entitled, got a different name, Lock of Red, but because I said it to an Afro-Cuban Bata rhythm, right, in 6A, then I figured that I should change it to Cabo Rojo to pay homage to the island of Puerto Rico. OK, for them if they're watching. So without further ado, Cabo Rojo. And please if you feel inclined to move and dance on some of the solo sections, please do hint of Irishness in this melody, so check it out. We have someone really important that comes to mind, you all know his name very well. Some of those guys are Juanito Marques, Cuban legend on guitar, right, and you know him, heard of him before, right. There's also Steve Khan, Billy Joel, you've heard him, all the good mentor. Also at Gargo Miranda, a Puerto Rican guitar player. He played on Cape Man with Paul Simon, and there's Carlos Emilio Morales, El Gordo de Cogem from Iraquere, right. There's lots of great guitar players that set the precedent. So I'm just trying to find my way, document it for you all to take it and find something great for yourselves, right. Wonderful. So the next tune of Bolero is called Cuando tú no estas when you are not here, right. So think about this in the A, think about how it is when someone that you love, you care about isn't around. And then in the B you'll hear a melody ascending that'll take you to another realm and then back to the original melody. You see we're in school so I have to give you a little bit of a lecture, right. And then we'll have a cha cha section that might make you think about Carlos Santana, right. Fantastic, without further ado. And you can turn to page 300, I guess it is, or something like that, to 340. Cuando tú no estas. Thank you very much. Cuando tú no estas. Ladies and gentlemen, it so happened that he called me, I called him, we were talking and he mentioned to me, I'm in Australia but I'll be in town because he's actually English so he lives here in London. I was like, fantastic, well you're going to have to play with us. His name is Jamie Harris and the tune we're going to play is entitled El Juego. He was on this record that we recorded with Jimmy Haslip called Nepenthe. You can find the record online. Give him a huge applause for Jamie Harris. So I had a question about this guitar actually while I'm tuning. I'll take just a few seconds. This guitar is made by Theo Sharpach. It's a custom made for me. It's an Opus G. It's an extremely great guitar to play. I really love it and it has actually a British mic. The guitar is made in Holland but the mic is made by John Dickinson. And I'd like to thank Theo greatly for the guitar. I love being part of the family and to John as well. I'd like to thank Vovox as well for the cables and Kurt Mangan as well for the strings. Every little bit helps, right? So check it out. If you've got any questions after this song, we're going to take a brief intermission and you can check out the book and like I said, just pull me aside and ask me something. Or you can save it till after the second set for question and answer. All right? Without further ado, let's do it. Thank you very much. Give it up for the band. Davide Giovannini, Davide Mantovani and Mr. Jamie Harris. We'll see you after a few. Stick around for the second set. More surprises to come. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, students, faculty and administration, it's a pleasure to be back. I hope you enjoyed the first set. The second set will have its surprises as well. I assure you. There will be more page turning for you all as well, if you like that. And I was just told that for the students that were not here for the concert, that it will be required to transcribe all my solos in order to pass your final exam. And then also for the musicological section of your exam, you'll have to tell from where is the origin of all these rooms. And then I will be grading it as well. So the first song of the set will be entitled Cargado. I hope you enjoyed it. By some studies that Mick Goodrich did in the 6-8 territory. Davide Giovannini. The next song called Adelante, a little bomba from you from Puerto Rico. I won't say any more about that, but you're some interesting harmony. Spasiva leons, ddinkw ye. Thank you very much. Lovely, that was Olvidalo. Now we've reached, unfortunately. The last song of the set. I'm going to call up my dear friend, Jamie Harris, to play. The name of the song is O Swing de la Finca. I'd like to thank you all, the sauce, the students, the staff, the admin, to Dr. Georgie Poe, Aunt Pope and the whole team. Thank you so much for having us. It's been wonderful to be here. Hope to see you all soon in the very near future. In the meantime, check out the book, send me a message and have a wonderful commencement to your careers, to your studies, and I wish you all the best, all right? Okay, here we go. There's Swing de la Finca. Davide Giovannini. Davide Mantovani Ombes. Grand Flowers on Flugel and Trumpet. Special guest, Jamie Harris on Tenor Sax. I'm Nefiri Sarri. That concludes our session for today. I'm looking forward to your exams. Most importantly, most importantly, tonight's concert brought to you by a very special friend of mine that was a former sauce student, Lucy Treacher. She planted the idea. She said, Nef, you have to go to sauce. Contacted Dr. Richard, the dean, and then he put me in touch with Georgie and the rest has been magic. Thank you so much for all the support I've felt really well taken care of and in good vibe and good spirit. So if I felt that, you all must have a wonderful, wonderful university and a wonderful program and going to have a spectacular year, right? They see you there in the little apprehension, but yes, you will have. Believe me, I guarantee it. Thank you so much. And I'd like to thank Shara Music for being my publisher, Sharpaq guitars, Vovox cables, Kurt Mangan strings, this wonderful band, and most importantly, all you at Sauce again. Thank you so much. Have a good night. Nef, thanks so much just to extend my own appreciation. What an amazingly cool set that was. Thank you guys. Davide, Davide Graham and Jamie for stepping up. Thank you, Nef. That's really wonderful evening. And I wanted to ask if anybody has any questions for Nef because he is a ffount of knowledge. He's a massive music geek, as you might have noticed. And he has a lot to say on triplets and six eighths and so on. So if anyone has something, a burning question that they'd like to ask him about his work or about his technique, then please come forward because he would love to answer it. And if not now, we can ask him afterwards, out in the foyer, where we're going to just open up the bar and carry on the evening. Well, in that case, I will just... Oh, there is one question indeed. My first influence. Well, my first influence would have to be my brother. And the reason being is that he played 12 string and if it wasn't for that then my neighbor Don fell. He started me playing, he said you should go to Berkeley. When I went there, I fell immediately in love with Jim Hall and Pat Mathini. And then because I'm Puerto Rican, I found out that by learning my music, I get in touch with my... I get reocculturation, I get in touch with who I am. And then I fell in love with Coltrane, John McLaughlin, McCoy Tiner, everything. I'm a lifelong learner and what I'd like to tell you is that no matter who was your inspiration, if you can keep just a broad scope or perspective and just along the years, just keep a diary and keep check, oh, this is what I'm learning now and this is related to what I used to love before and try to piece things together like a huge quilt just like you're doing your master's papers and your doctor's thesis the same way. If you can keep that same type of methodology through your whole trajectory as a musician, you will give more to yourself, to your identity and to the society, right? And just know how to make those tools work for you and the music will come, the music will come. But thank you for asking. And of course, my main influence, Steve Khan. Well, that is the age old question and what worked for me was of course you have to learn all the tools, use them in the correct way, the incorrect way. At the same time, you have to hold yourself accountable so you have to record yourself. You need to seek out knowledge. You need to, a great mentor of mine and that I hold very dearly, he's a jazz legend by the name of Dave Leibman. Dave Leibman says, you've got to pin down your teacher, right? And meaning that every teacher that you have you want to find out what is it that they have to give, how that resonates with you because it might be that what you're learning, it doesn't, it's just like a, it's just like the bass guitar or there are an acoustic bass. The wave needs 50 meters in order for the wave to completely realize itself. You need that as well. So if I answer your question specifically about, and I'll answer it specifically about pentatonics, you need to understand major pentatonics, a minor pentatonic, a dominant 7 pentatonic. Yeah. And you need to be able to do them over vamps, over one chord and try to, and make that work, right? What I can suggest is a great book by my mentor, Steve Kahn. It's called Pentatonic Concepts, K-H-A-N-C-E-P-T-S. It's a great book and Steve breaks it down, right? And on guitar, pentatonics are what we do because it comes from rock and it fits how our guitar is tuned, right? When you start mixing pentatonics with scales, is the PA on? We're not recording this on YouTube, are we? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. We recommend Steve's book, right? But if there's anyone in YouTube land that would like to comment. I mean there's a lot of videos. Mae'r gwnaeth yn ddweud y gallwch... Mae'r gwneud yna'n gyfrofiadau, oherwydd o'r wyf... C7, oherwydd... Mae'r gwneud yna... C pentatonic... oherwydd C dominant pentatonic... ..ynyddu'r pentatonic A minor... See? So all I'm doing is going from A minor to the dominant pentatonic, right? But you can't forget, right? You can't forget what guy can't you forget here. I'm sorry I speak that way, but what I call the pentatonics whatever in that way. It's not good for diversity and inclusion, right? It's good with that. But sometimes you come up with other names that I'm not going to say right now, right? Right? Right? The blue skip. Especially on that last tune that I was doing, right? On the swing of the finca. Right? So if you land on the fourth there, you have to resolve that. So D minor pentatonic, you can do D minor pentatonic. See how that was? And I came back down to C dominant. Anyways, there's a lot of different things and we're not even talking about going outside. So I was going between the C and I was going between the tritone substitute. That's what you heard quite a lot tonight too. The guys did it too, right? So you just play the tritone as a tritone in a way. So anyhow, what's great about pentatonic on guitar is that they fit really... Right? They fit really well. But the good thing is is that if you use... It's just like a soup. If you use too much of turn up, it's going to ruin the soup. Same thing when you're soloing. You want to think of all these tools, like I started the speech. You need to be able to use the tools correctly and incorrectly. So you might do a chorus of just pentatonic and then a chorus of pentatonic makes with the others. So remember, music is all about tension and release. Yes, lounge, exactly. But also keep a diary and keep yourself accountable. Listen to the great guitar players that you love to listen to. Not only guitar, but saxophonists that use it. Everybody use it. Even McCoy Tiner piano players use it as well. Figure out so that it doesn't sound like a pentatonic when you use it. Check out John McLaughlin. You must like John McLaughlin. There is. So just get them over. The best thing is catch them over a vamp, where you know they're playing over simple changes. Slow it down, transcribe it, sing it, and then play it. And play it, go to a jam session. And if you only know that tune, call that tune, play that solo. It's been done a million times again. And then try to do your own solo that's inspired. So you're going to do derivative lines right from those. So you take a lick and do all this motivic development with them. Right? Okay? Now you're going to get it. That's how you get out of the box. But the main thing is that, listen to, try to be cantabile. Everything has to be melodic in a way. It has to make sense, right? And usually your ear will lead you right, but you must know why. That's what Anton Weber used to say to quote him. Okay? I hope I answered your question. Right? Yeah? I'd like to invite more questions, but we're going to set them right off again. So if anyone has any more questions for Naf, I think we'll continue outside. Yeah, that sounds good. You had a question. Do you want to ask me real quick? Oh yeah, we have one more. Go for it. Wow, okay. I grew up in Williamsburg, Virginia. I was the first person in my family born on American soil. My father was in the military 22 years, and he decided to retire in Virginia. And I think someone is in Virginia. And in Williamsburg, how can there be a Puerto Rican family there? Right? So my mother always spoke Spanish at home. We spoke Spanish together. And you know, I was speaking to my good friend Jamie when we got here. And you have to remember that when you think back about a certain time period and a place, you can't always necessarily look at it with the same objectivity or the same process through the same lenses as today, right? You need to have some leeway. But of course, atrocity is atrocity, no matter what. I'm not condoning that. But you need to understand some other things. So about this reocculturation, no, I didn't play Latin music. I listened to it. I danced it. We had, I remember as a kid, my grandparents, they lived in the Bronx. That's another thing, right? I was baptized in the Bronx, right? So, but I grew up in Virginia, which is interesting, like I'm saying. So anyhow, I remember going to parties as a kid. I remember and there would be salsa bands. My grandfather used to hire these musicians to come into the house and play. And my father would have these parties and musics going on. But it never resonated with me. Why? Because I was in Virginia. I was into Led Zeppelin. Yes, and I wanted to play all that. And I used to play all that, you know? And I loved it. However, what had happened was that because of Santana, that always stuck with me as something. That was the linchpin that I had started this whole, the whole concert with, is that he's really important because, you know, he is Mexican, but he grew up in, you know, he grew up in California, right? And he took the blues and he took that Latino music into that and with the guitar, which the guitar in, I do a little bit of history here, the guitar during, before the Cuban embargo, they were using guitar. And what happened was that there was an electrification, right? So the guitar, because there was no electrification, they had to use a piano, the guitar, as a acoustic guitar, will not be able to fill this up. Maybe say, well, I would, but not when a big band, right? Right? So they use piano. So the guitar fell aside. However, in New York, when Dizzy Gillespie and John O'Polso, Juan Di Sol, right, we have this cubop going on, Latin jazz, Latin jazz, we have some guitar players, John Quora, right? Sonny Henry, all right? Edgardo Miranda, some of these names that I'm telling you about. And in the 60s, I won't mention Edgardo because he's much later. He's a contemporary, right? So John Quora, Sonny Henry and Juanito Marquez, they had electric guitars. The thing with the piano was that they were out of tune. So it was the, some band members that you can find out in the book, Quartet and all this, I have a lot to say. This is going back to my original reocculturation. I'm getting there, right? So you used to these long lectures, I'm sure. So anyhow, what had happened was that these band leaders, they used the guitar as something different because of the British invasion as well. These are theories that I've talked with experts about. And the guitar was there. These groups, they did prosper, but it didn't take on enough, right? Because they invented the piano, and it was great piano players at that time. Eddie Paulmieri, Claire Fisher, right? Chico Farrill, big band writers. So along comes Carlos Santana and Woodstock, and the guitar takes a whole different, but it's no longer Latin jazz, but we still have these guitar players that are doing it, right? And so about my reocculturation. Living in Virginia, it was good. I love, I'm American, I love that. I'm Puerto Rican, I love that. I'm Finnish, I love that. I'm European, I love that. Because I grew up in a household that was bilingual, not fully American, right? And because of the time period in Williamsburg, there was good education system and that it respected the differences. What America should be and what it was when I grew up, right? And I'm internally grateful for that, right? Now that, because of where I grew up, because of Carlos Santana, and of course, I can tell you there were troubles. That's normal. This whole situation helped me to understand who I was through the music. It doesn't necessarily have to be the music, right? You see, I'm 48, right? So there comes a time in my life that I want to figure out who I am. I've been living abroad for so long that I know who I am, know thyself, if you're going to be a philosopher, right? Know thyself, which is important. And it's really important in these days that you know who you are. So that when you go to present a book or whatnot, you have that integrity. You know where you're at. You believe in something. And this process of reculturation through the music that I love, it was the access. So if you can find that access point and find like-minded people and see what is the real message behind what people were saying and what is in the books and the information, you're going to do the same thing too. And I know it's a very hard subject and it will always be, you know, for some people, right? But there is hope. It worked out for me. So did I answer your question? Okay. Thank you. Shall we wait in the foyer or is there one more question? All right. Thanks, Neff, for sharing infinite wisdom and also some personal stories. That's really lovely. But yeah, I think we shall move out to the foyer now and continue this conversation. River drinks. Thank you so much.