South African jazz pianist Abdullah Ibrahim performs at the Berklee Performance Center on

Saturday November 16presented by Celebrity Series of Boston. Al Davis and Va Lynda Robinson, hosts of
Jazz on 89.7spoke to him before the show, reflecting on his Cape Town roots, formative years in New York and his new trio.

Al Davis: Abdullah Ibrahim, welcome to Boston!

Abdullah Ibrahim: What an honor! Thank you very much.

Al Davis: You are welcome. Tell us a little bit about the show coming up on November 16th.

Abdullah Ibrahim: It’s a trio, with Cleave Guyton on alto flute and piccolo. Cleave Guyton is a journeyman, he was with (Duke) Ellington and Lionel Hampton. He comes from the wellspring of that wellspring of our tradition. We’ve been together for at least 40 years.

And we have a young man, Noah Jackson, on cello and bass. He is a newcomer. It’s not the usual combination of drums and piano in this trio, but the format is a platform for all of us to expand our basic concept of music without being anchored to a beat.

Will Lynda Robinson: I want to go down in history, if you’ll let me. You’re considered a major figure in Cape Jazz, but you grew up listening to Duke Ellington and Thelonious Monk.

Abdullah Ibrahim: Yes, that last part is correct. The first part, this idea of ​​Cape Jazz… somebody gave us that label, but we’re just musicians. But: Ellington and Monk. When I was in Cape Town we used to listen to Ellington on a radio program and some of the people in our community had some records. He was never American to us. He was always the “wise old man of the village”. Did you have a problem? You would go to him. No matter what you try, Ellington was there!

With Monk, it was truly a unique experience. I flew to New York and heard he was playing, so I decided to see if I could meet him.

Al Davis: Good.

Abdullah Ibrahim: So they managed to get me backstage with his musicians and other people…And Monk! I walked up to him and introduced myself, I said “I’m from South Africa and I was inspired by your music. Thank you very much.” And he looked at me questioningly and went to the other side of the room. Well, I heard about Monk and how he reacts. (Ibrahim laughs) But he came back to me several times and then he came back to the other side again and then he came and said, “You’re the first pianist to tell me that.”

Al Davis: Interesting!

Abdullah Ibrahim: Yes! And I was a bit surprised, but then I realized that there were so many musicians I met who were very negative about Monk, saying he couldn’t play, he didn’t have technique. But I immersed myself in his music at that moment.

Al Davis: Did you get to spend time with Ellington?

Abdullah Ibrahim: Absolute. We met in Switzerland, in Zurich. They used to come every year on tour and I would hang out with Ellington. It was an honor to spend time with the master. I had a lot of questions to ask, mostly not about music. One night we talked about water.

Al Davis: ok…

Abdullah Ibrahim: Because he had composed a ballet about water. He said to me, “The stones of the lake, the meander of the river, and the sea.” He took a drop of water and I think he created a ballet… but I don’t know if it was ever performed. (Ed.: This concept later became Ellington’s “River Suite,” which is still part of
The Alvin Ailey repertoire.)

Will Lynda Robinson: I know you studied at Juilliard in your early days in New York, but you also interacted with many of the progressive musicians like Don Cherry, Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, Cecil Taylor and Artie Shaw. Tell me about it.

Abdullah Ibrahim: Those were exciting days in New York. An era of liberation. We felt the need to improve some of the music and make it more relevant to people. That’s the beauty of the kind of music we play because something always comes up and makes it move in a different direction. At the time it was pretty incredible. They had these lofts in midtown Manhattan where we could play until dawn. Ornette would keep a place where we could play 24 hours a day.

Al Davis: I was wondering, in all the years you’ve been performing, do you see a difference in your audience now? Younger, older?

Abdullah Ibrahim: A lot of young people, about 60-70%. We have young musicians coming backstage all the time. That is what is quite exciting. Young people stay engaged. Everything changes. So you have to adapt.

Will Lynda Robinson: Many of us old folks know you for “
Mannenberg,” which became a notable anti-apartheid anthem. What do you think about the legacy of that song?

Abdullah Ibrahim: When we recorded this, we didn’t think about what it would be. I was in Cape Town, some younger musicians and myself. I had four or five songs to do. I did two and had a break. I was playing a grand piano, but when I took this break, I saw the little upright piano sitting in the corner. I played it and it had this weird sound. And what they used to do in that town, was to put clamps in the hammer of the piano. Get that metallic sound.

And so the first notes I played were (Ibrahim sings). I called my musicians over coffee and we figured it out about 17 minutes in when the engineer said, “Come and listen to this record,” and we were pleasantly surprised. Because we realized we captured the music we wanted to play, traditional music.

Always when you were recording, the engineers would suggest or tell you what to play. And that was us.

Well, when we took this record to all the record companies, nobody wanted it. But I had a friend who had a smaller record store in Johannesburg. It was at the bus terminal so it was full of people. I played it over the store speakers and sold 20,000 copies. It was a real shock. But it was the sound of the community and what was happening in the community. Then it was played everywhere.

Will Lynda Robinson: It became an anthem.

Abdullah Ibrahim: Exact.

Al Davis: Well, it was great talking to you, Abdullah Ibrahim! We look forward to your performance at the Berklee Performance Center on November 16th. Music like this keeps us strong and keeps us together. So we really appreciate that.

Will Lynda Robinson: Thank you.

Abdullah Ibrahim: Well, thanks so much for listening. Thank you!

The Abdullah Ibrahim Trio is at the Berklee Performance Center on

November 16.