Shez Raja
This Brazilian cultural matrix positions Shez Raja globally...
Curation
CURATION
-
from this page:
by Matrix
The Integrated Global Creative Economy
-
Name:
Shez Raja
-
City/Place:
London
-
Country:
United Kingdom
Life & Work
-
Bio:
Shez Raja was born to an Asian father and English mother, on the Wirral, in the North-West of England. Classically trained on the violin from the age of 9, a few years later he traded the instrument for electric bass and hasn’t looked back since.
Educated at Leeds College of Music, Raja toured the UK with various groups before becoming a highly sought-after session musician.
He then went on to perform at Glastonbury Festival, the prestigious Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club, Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, Shepherd's Bush Empire, Islington Assembly Hall and the London Forum, as well as touring Europe with platinum-selling hip-hop artist MC Lyte. Shez has appeared on BBC 1, MTV, national TV in Germany, Switzerland and New Zealand and has featured on BBC Radio 1, BBC Radio 3 and Jazz FM.
In his formative years, Shez went on trips to the Punjab region of the Indian sub-continent with his father and immersed himself in the musical culture of his South Asian roots, learning tabla drumming.
Shez’s mission as an artist is to be authentic with his emotions, develop his own unique voice and to explore the language of music to become fully self-expressed. He concludes, “I believe the ultimate goal for a musician is to make music that is raw, real and from the heart, that moves and inspires people”.
More
-
Quotes, Notes & Etc.
"Shez Raja personifies the modernisation of jazz. He is fearless as a musician" - All About Jazz ★★★★+
"Vivid and highly engaging" - BBC Music Magazine ★★★★★
"A tailor-made festival band with a unique identity" - The Guardian ★★★★
"Multi-layered and imaginative" - Manchester Evening News ★★★★
"I thought my head was going to explode. It sounds like it's come from the future!" - Bradford Telegraph ★★★★★
"Chic, contemporary and groove-laden" - The Musician
"Mahavishnu Orchestra with Jaco Pastorius in charge" - The Guardian
"Shez Raja is a maestro in the classical sense of the word, marrying profound themes with stunning bass technique -- and putting on a hell of a show at the same time!" - Joel McIver, Bass Guitar magazine
"Shez Raja, the lean, theatrical, and thunderously skilful electric bassist, likes nothing more than turning Indo-jazz crossovers way up to eleven" - John Fordham (Guardian writer)
"On "Epiphany", an eclectic mix of cultures come to play, and the result is a beautiful and groovy jazz record that will transport you into tranquility . The song is by British-Asian bass player Shez Raja and features celebrated percussionist Trilok Gurtu and renowned guitarist Wayne Krantz" - Aipate Magazine
"British bassist Shez Raja is back with a fantastic, innovative jazz fusion album. It takes talent, courage and an incredible amount of creativity to write an album like Gurutopia. Jazz fusion has never been so alive!" - Erminia Yardley, Kind of Jazz ★★★★
"This UK bassist has been all over the press in the last few months and within the first few bars of the opening song I understood why. The performance was a fiesta of highly charged funk, fusion with an eastern flavour" - Jazz In Europe
"Entertainment was always on the cards at the Gurutopia launch party. A Shez Raja gig is an event. Virtuoso bass playing, a tight, funky band, backward hats, basses thrown in the air. There’s a lot going at a Shez Raja gig and audiences always come away from his shows energised and thoroughly entertained" - Rob Mallows, Kind of Jazz ★★★★
"Inventive bassist gives jazz fusion a good name. Raja turned Indo-jazz on its head with everything from funky bass to freestyle rap" - The Guardian ★★★★ (live review)
"Shez's music draws heavily on his love of funk and fusion. He's collaborated with the likes of Soweto Kinch, American guitar hero Mike Stern and trumpet giant Randy Brecker and when you see him in action you understand why he has such a loyal following for his groove-drenched music. A masterclass in performing for an audience" - Julian Joseph, BBC Radio
"Another impressive showing from Raja. This album is a rewarding summation of their considerable combined abilities" - The Jazz Mann
"It’s hard to imagine jazz/funk on the current scene with quite such the invigorating edge and retro passion of the Shez Raja Collective. Raja’s no-holds-barred grooving is redolent of the seminal and psychedelic jazz/rock fusion of The Mahavishnu Orchestra, the hypnotic energy of the Zawinul Syndicate and legendary bass genius of Stanley Clarke and Marcus Miller" - Adrian Pallant, AP Reviews
"A heady brew of bass-driven funky jazz and world fusion that takes you to another place" - Guitar & Bass magazine
"Shez Raja is a seriously talented electric bass player whose work in a fascinating mix of Indo-jazz, funk and groove settings has propelled him to the forefront of the UK jazz scene. His energetic and extremely fluent playing, combined with his innovation as a bandleader, have drawn comparisons to the style of electric bass legend Jaco Pastorius" - Jazz FM
"Really cool stuff, really funky and fun!" - Mike Stern
"Shez Raja personifies the modernization of jazz. He has taken his power-bass imbued sound well past established parameters, merging diverse inflections of raga from Indo-jazz, into the funk/groove format with intense consequences. Raja is fearless as a musician. Gurutopia is a prime example of musical vigor achieved at a high level" - James Nadal, All About Jazz ★★★★+
Clips (more may be added)
There are certain countries, the names of which fire the popular imagination. Brazil is one of them; an amalgam of primitive and sophisticated, jungle and elegance, luscious jazz harmonics — there’s no other place like it in the world. And while Rio de Janeiro, or its fame anyway, tends toward the sophisticated end of the spectrum, Bahia bends toward the atavistic…
It’s like a trick of the mind’s light (I suppose), but standing on beach or escarpment in Salvador and looking out across the Baía de Todos os Santos to the great Recôncavo, and mindful of what happened there (and here; the Bahian Recôncavo was final port-of-call for more enslaved human beings than any other place throughout the entirety of mankind’s existence on this planet, and in the past it extended into what is now urban Salvador), one must be led to the inevitable conclusion that one is in a place unique to history, and to the present:
Brazil absorbed over ten times the number of enslaved Africans taken to the United States of America, and is a repository of African deities (and their music) now largely forgotten in their lands of origin.
Brazil was a refuge (of sorts) for Sephardim fleeing an Inquisition which followed them across the Atlantic (that unofficial symbol of Brazil’s national music — the pandeiro — was almost certainly brought to Brazil by these people).
Across the parched savannas of the interior of Brazil’s culturally fecund nordeste/northeast (where wizard Hermeto Pascoal was born in Lagoa da Canoa — Lagoon of the Canoe — and raised in Olho d’Águia — Eye of the Eagle), much of Brazil’s aboriginal population was absorbed into a caboclo/quilombola culture punctuated by the Star of David.
Three cultures — from three continents — running for their lives, their confluence forming an unprecedented fourth. Pandeirista on the roof.
That's where this Matrix begins:
Wolfram MathWorld
The idea is simple, powerful, and egalitarian: To propagate for them, the Matrix must propagate for all. Most in the world are within six degrees of us. The concept of a "small world" network (see Wolfram above) applies here, placing artists from the Recôncavo and the sertão, from Salvador... from Brooklyn, Berlin and Mombassa... musicians, writers, filmmakers... clicks (recommendations) away from their peers all over the planet.
This Integrated Global Creative Economy (we invented the concept) uncoils from Brazil's sprawling Indigenous, African, Sephardic and then Ashkenazic, Arabic, European, Asian cultural matrix... expanding like the canopy of a rainforest tree rooted in Bahia, branches spreading to embrace the entire world...
Recent Visitors Map
Great culture is great power.
And in a small world great things are possible.
Alicia Svigals
"Thanks, this is a brilliant idea!!"
—Alicia Svigals (NEW YORK CITY): Apotheosis of klezmer violinists
"Dear Sparrow: I am thrilled to receive your email! Thank you for including me in this wonderful matrix."
—Susan Rogers (BOSTON): Director of the Berklee Music Perception and Cognition Laboratory ... Former personal recording engineer for Prince; "Purple Rain", "Sign o' the Times", "Around the World in a Day"
"Dear Sparrow, Many thanks for this – I am touched!"
—Julian Lloyd Webber (LONDON): Premier cellist in UK; brother of Andrew (Evita, Jesus Christ Superstar, Cats, Phantom of the Opera...)
"This is super impressive work ! Congratulations ! Thanks for including me :)))"
—Clarice Assad (RIO DE JANEIRO/CHICAGO): Pianist and composer with works performed by Yo Yo Ma and orchestras around the world
"We appreciate you including Kamasi in the matrix, Sparrow."
—Banch Abegaze (LOS ANGELES): manager, Kamasi Washington
"Thanks! It looks great!....I didn't write 'Cantaloupe Island' though...Herbie Hancock did! Great Page though, well done! best, Randy"
"Very nice! Thank you for this. Warmest regards and wishing much success for the project! Matt"
—Son of Jimmy Garrison (bass for John Coltrane, Bill Evans...); plays with Herbie Hancock and other greats...
I opened the shop in Salvador, Bahia in 2005 in order to create an outlet to the wider world for magnificent Brazilian musicians.
David Dye & Kim Junod for NPR found us (above), and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (he's a huge jazz fan), David Byrne, Oscar Castro-Neves... Spike Lee walked past the place while I was sitting on the stoop across the street drinking beer and listening to samba from the speaker in the window...
But we weren't exactly easy for the world-at-large to get to. So in order to extend the place's ethos I transformed the site associated with it into a network wherein Brazilian musicians I knew would recommend other Brazilian musicians, who would recommend others...
And as I anticipated, the chalky hand of God-as-mathematician intervened: In human society — per the small-world phenomenon — most of the billions of us on earth are within some 6 or fewer degrees of each other. Likewise, within a network of interlinked artists as I've described above, most of these artists will in the same manner be at most a handful of steps away from each other.
So then, all that's necessary to put the Brazilians within possible purview of the wide wide world is to include them among a wide wide range of artists around that world.
If, for example, Quincy Jones is inside the matrix, then anybody on his page — whether they be accessing from a campus in L.A., a pub in Dublin, a shebeen in Cape Town, a tent in Mongolia — will be close, transitable steps away from Raymundo Sodré, even if they know nothing of Brazil and are unaware that Sodré sings/dances upon this planet. Sodré, having been knocked from the perch of fame and ground into anonymity by Brazil's dictatorship, has now the alternative of access to the world-at-large via recourse to the vast potential of network theory.
...to the degree that other artists et al — writers, researchers, filmmakers, painters, choreographers...everywhere — do also. Artificial intelligence not required. Real intelligence, yes.
Years ago in NYC (I've lived here in Brazil for 32 years now) I "rescued" unpaid royalties (performance & mechanical) for artists/composers including Barbra Streisand, Aretha Franklin, Mongo Santamaria, Jim Hall, Clement "Coxsone" Dodd (for his rights in Bob Marley compositions; Clement was Bob's first producer), Led Zeppelin, Ray Barretto, Philip Glass and many others. Aretha called me out of the blue vis-à-vis money owed by Atlantic Records. Allen Klein (managed The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Ray Charles) called about money due the estate of Sam Cooke. Jerry Ragovoy (Time Is On My Side, Piece of My Heart) called just to see if he had any unpaid money floating around out there (the royalty world was a shark-filled jungle, to mangle metaphors, and I doubt it's changed).
But the pertinent client (and friend) in the present context is Earl "Speedo" Carroll, of The Cadillacs. Earl went from doo-wopping on Harlem streetcorners to chart-topping success to working as a custodian at PS 87 elementary school on the west side of Manhattan. Through all of this he never lost what made him great.
Greatness and fame are too often conflated. The former should be accessible independently of the latter.
Yeah this is Bob's first record contract, made with Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd of Studio One and co-signed by his aunt because he was under 21. I took it to Black Rock to argue with CBS' lawyers about the royalties they didn't want to pay (they paid).
Matrix founding creators are behind "one of 10 of the best (radios) around the world", per The Guardian.
Across the creative universe... For another list, reload page.
This list is random, and incomplete. Reload the page for another list.
For a complete list of everybody inside, tap TOTAL below:
TOTAL
Ex Terra Brasilis
Susan Rogers
Julian Lloyd Webber
Clarice Assad
Kamasi Washington
Randy Brecker
Matt Garrison
RÁDIO MATRIX