Percussionist Extraordinaire
Meet Jason McKenzie, a world music percussionist who has wowed many an audience with his versatile talents. From the tabla to the kanjira, drumset to doumbek, Jason is the master of rhythm. He is also a member of the world music band Atash. In a small café in South Austin, we chatted about his early Florida days, his hopes for the future, and eating squirrels.
Nazar: Why did you choose music as a career?
Jason McKenzie: Not sure. My older brother had an old drum set in the attic. I used to climb up and look at it. I took piano lessons but he was the only one that was a musician. I would take a stick or a broom and stand in front of the mirror, singing Beatles songs.
Nazar: How did you end up playing an instrument like the tabla?
Jason: I moved down to Austin with a rock band even though I was studying jazz at the time. This was ’96. I saw posters of this tabla performance at Casa de Luz - they used to have local world music there. I met Oliver Rajamani1 there and Mohammad Firoozi whom I later joined in a band. It took me a while to buy a set of tablas, because I had moving expenses. Eventually I bought a set and took lessons every week for nine or ten months. There was a great ethnomusicology program at UT led by Stephen Slawek, and there was enough interest to bring Indian artists here. I would talk to the tabla players after performances; they were easy to approach. They would say “Sure, if you want a lesson come by 8 in the morning; my flight is at 10!” I keep a pretty late schedule, so I would force myself to get out of bed for those lessons. I met Gouri Shankar and took a few lessons from him as well. In 1999 I was really looking forward to going to India, but I couldn’t afford it then.
Nazar: I hope you eventually did get to visit India…
Jason: Yeah, I did. This whole time while I was learning the tabla, I was doing gigs with this country music artist, Billy Joe Shaver. We played a lot of Texas gigs on the weekends but eventually I moved on to another band that I thought was going to go somewhere. It went nowhere. A few months later I got a call from Billy and he said he had really important gigs in Nashville and would fly me out. When I came back in November 1999 I had enough money to buy a ticket to India. I went to India in 2000. My original plan was to stay with my first tabla teacher, Aloke Dutta, but this was the one year he wasn’t going to be there.
So I called Gouri Shankar. He was extremely polite and enthusiastic. I lived with Gouri for two weeks. I was in India for a month. For one week I explored. Got on a train, went to Delhi, the Taj Mahal, came back to Calcutta for the Doverlane Festival2, a prestigious classical Indian music festival. They played rare ragas, complex taals. They don’t do that here. I was given the opportunity to meet Swapan Choudhuri at his home after he taught a class consisting of mostly Americans from California. It wasn’t until I visited San Rafael, CA that I was able to study from him, though.
Nazar: What were your early days of Atash like?
Jason: In 2001, we changed our name from The Gypsies to Atash. I had the idea that I wanted to learn in Ali Akbar Khan’s School of Music where Swapan Choudhuri teaches in this tiny town north of San Francisco. I felt this strong urge to go out there and a couple of guys in the band wanted to tour there as well. So we took classes and toured together. We went out there in a van. Our bass player had a brother there so we slept on his couch.
Our first show was in California, way out in the airport away from the entertainment area. It was fun. There were some students who came and invited us to be on their radio show. In another show in California, there were only three people in the audience, one of whom was an actress. After that show, we made the journey home, drove straight through for twenty-four hours. We got back the morning of September 11, 2001.
Other musicians you played with, did they share an appreciation for non-Western percussion instruments?
Not all of them. I lived in California for three years, found this gig with a pop singer. I played the tabla for him, thought he’d be into it. You know what he said? “Sounds too PBS.” I was kind of speechless. When something’s too artistic, it’s “too PBS.”
Nazar: Tell me about your childhood days.
Jason: I grew up in Tallahassee, Florida. My parents never quite understood my change into world music, they listen to country. My dad grew up in Kentucky, pretty poor. I should mention that he went on to get a doctorate degree in psychology–an accomplishment my family is very proud of. I would go fishing and duck hunting with him. It would be a quick hunt; you’re standing in the water with waders by 6 am and by 7 you’re done. He always said if you shoot something you have to eat it. Ducks were too fast. I was a kid so I wanted to do something. So I shot a squirrel. It was really tough, the squirrel was.
Wow…you ate squirrel. How was that?
A little rubbery. When I was in California, I was walking on the streets of Hollywood laughing to myself. I thought, I’m probably the only person on these streets who has eaten squirrel before.
Nazar: What does the future hold for Jason McKenzie?
Jason: The most popular median I have seen tabla in America is electronic music. It is still a small genre. Tabla Beat Science3 was popular with Zakir Hussain, and Karsh Kale was involved with that as well. And then there’s Cheb i Sabbah4.
Since I’ve moved back to Austin in 2007 I’ve been learning electronic music. I want to be more than a drummer and tabla player. I want to become a producer now, bring in singers and do the arranging. I still play with Atash but Project Sunray5 is my own thing.
Nazar: So we know you love music. What else are you into?
Jason: I really like swimming. That’s another thing that drew me back to Austin. For some reason I’m a really good swimmer. But I’ve never competed. My parents enrolled me in lessons during summer camp every year at the YMCA. They had different achievement levels named after fish. I think I made it up to shark. I like camping, I like nature. Campfires in the winter - I’ve found that really grounds me. I feel better if I can swim once a week during the warm months. And I can have a bonfire in my backyard once a week during the cold months.
I think having fires in your backyard might be illegal…
Jason: Maybe, but I am going to buy one of those bowls firepits, and they have covers.
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You can learn more about Jason’s work and shows by visiting his website: http://jasonraymckenzie.com/
1. http://www.oliverrajamani.com/
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dover_Lane_music_festival
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabla_Beat_Science
4. http://www.chebisabbah.com/
5. http://www.myspace.com/jsunray
Photo Courtesy: jasonraymckenzie.com
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