David Friesen &John Stowell with Paul Horn Back in the U.S.S.R. I said, How can I hate you? How can you hate me? Ijust shared music with you, and here we are talking and eating food together. We aren,t enemies. Ifs_ the leaders, ifs their conflict, not ours. Talking with David Friesen David Friesen: We had between 2500 and 4000 people every night. Eighteen concerts. Every night it was just jampacked. In Moscow we played six nights at the state concert hal l. Six nights in one town, and filled it up every night. Like a club date, only you're playing major concerts. It's just unbelievable. We had two interpreters, and they traveled with us for the duration of the tour. They were right there when we entered through immigration and customs. Whenwe left [the country] they were right there till the very end. They kept a wall between us and the audience. They only allowed really important people backstage to see us: composers, jazz writers, historians. We were like a real major event. It'd be like the Bolshoi Ballet coming here to America. We were the first free world jazz group to perform in Leningrad in public, for the public, for the man and woman on the street that could buy a ticket, come in and view a jazz group from the free world. We were the first group in years. Since Earl Hines. Since the 60's. There's a reason why they're so excited about the music and why 2500 to 4000 people turn out to listen. It's not just because there's a jazz group in town. They've had all this oppression. When this is taken away for a moment, everything just surge$ forth. There's a book here in America that was just written called RED AND HOT: [The Fate of Jazz in the Soviet Union, 1917- 1980}. I came in touch with two or three people whose names and pictures are in the book, and who had supplied a lot of information for it. I won't mention any names, because I was advised not to in America, but they said 90 percent of it was wrong. It was like an open letter to the KGB (the Soviet equivalent of our CIA and FBI). There were some people that were arrested because of things that were written in the book that weren't true. So here's this book from America-and you know the KGB is all over America and Canada-they use these things to . incriminate people in the Soviet Union. They want to use anything they can to incriminate people. They want order and control. They don't want anyone disloyal to the government. A very famous jazz critic and writer, well respected, told me one night after a concert: he was born in prison, raised in B By Deborah Lee assist David Friesen and guitarist John Stowell are well known to regional jazz enthusiasts. Jn nearly a decade of collaboration, they've logged numerous performances on the national and international circuits, including many of the major jazz festivals here and abroad. Extremely prolific, Friesen has recorded numerous LPs as a leader, composer and arranger. Stowell met Friesen in his native New York in 1 976. Friesen lured him to the Northwest and he's stayed eight years. Stowell now finds he works in New York "more often than when I actually lived there." Friesen is an intense p layer with a style that bears little resemblance to other jazz bassists. His emotional attack on bass blended with Stowell's lyricism and somewhat abstract harmonics adds up to a unique jazz sound. Friesen and Stowel l toured Russia as members of the Paul Horn Quartet in August. Horn and Friesen earlier worked together as a duo which resulted in a concert series and the recording of Heart to Heart. When the Russian tour came up, Horn wanted Friesen as bassist, who in turn suggested his partner Stowel l. They were joined by Horn's 23-year-old percussionist son, Robin. In the U.S.S.R. , the sound crew had to adjust to conditions quite different from what they are used to; the consoles in Soviet concert halls are very old. Once the equipment was set up, the sound system was used effectively, as Friesen related: "Paul would open up each concert playing a solo flute piece, walking through the audience in the rear of the hal l. Using a radio mike, he could play the flute from the rear of the room as it's coming out all the speakers. People wouldn't know what was going on. The spotlight would be on the stage and nobody would know where he was. Finally you'd hear people clapping 'cause they'd see him walking down the center aisle." Interviews with Friesen and Stowel l were conducted separately, due to their busy schedules. prison, and three times near suicide. And each time he heard some jazz over the "Voice of America"-each time it gave him hope and encouragement and saved his life. And he said, "I suspect that in America"-he spoke very good English-"this music is taken for granted." And, yeah, I had to agree with him. It is taken for granted over here. We're very spoiled. Clinton St. Quarterly: It just isn't respected here as it is in other countriesin Europe or Japan. Those countries appreciate it a lot more. OF: They do appreciate it, I think for different reasons. Europe is more classically-oriented. They really understand the artist; the same in Japan. But there's a different reason why they like it in the Soviet Union. Europe and Japan are tree; the Soviet Union's not free. And - it's like this critic was saying-every note is like life to them. It's not just going out and drinking, having a jazz society meeting, a good time, meeting friends; I mean, they live on every note. I met people waiting for us at the back door of the auditorium-there was one woman who had to be in her early 80s, tears in her eyes, whose hand was touching my face, expressing all the words she knew: "wonderful" and "beautiful ," that's all she could There are some wonderfuljazz musicians in the Soviet Union, wonderful players. And theJlrewell aware of the music of the West. say about the music. See, I've alway!. believed this about the music. I've always taken it very seriously. I've never really pursued anything other than what I felt was very necessary for the spirit of the music. CSQ: From what I've listened to of the kind of music you, John and Paul do, I think of it as kind of a classicaljazz-not mainstream. OF: We play mainstream, we're all coming from that background. But some of the music that we played over there was just straightahead mainstream jazz. I'd say 80 percent of it was straightahead mainstream. They're really into that over there. But they're also into the solo things that we played. Some of my compositions were classically oriented perhaps. Those were fairly well received, but we felt, just to give them a well-rounded view of the music, that we wanted to incorporate the straightahead thing. But to let you know how much of a reward it was for me personally to play for people that received it with as much intensity and dedication as I've always put into the music; there's nothing worse, or more humi l iating than playing in clubs where there's people talking, drunk, justCSQ: Not paying attention. OF: Right, exactly. And sometimes it's necessary; I have a family to support and that kind of work has been necessary·tor a long time. I hope to weed that out; I'd love to just be able to play concerts, and put the music in a place where it really serves. It's pretty difficult to serve in clubs like that. People don't l isten. I've been to Australia, through Japan, through almost every major country in Europe, al l through America; but I've never, ever been to a place like the Soviet Union. It is far beyond anything I've ever experienced before-ever. Those people are very hungry They're really suffering over there because of the oppression. It's very restricted. Lines everywhere; people lining up for cheap nylons, or a toothbrush, or ice cream, or in restaurants. You might wait an hour or soto eat and not get in to eat. And there's always a doorman everywhere-every store, restaurant, hotel- you don't enter unless you have some kind of identification. Everything has order, rules and regulations, from �he very top of politics to the Clinton St. Quarterly 35 David Friesen and Paul Horn in Lithuania
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