Song for Sonia

Sotomayor and Obama (not O'Farrill, sorry)

This morning brought news that pianist Arturo O’Farrill has been commissioned to write a piece for judge Sonia Sotomayor, premiering in November. ~~To the best of my knowledge~~, this will [NOT] be the first time a jazz musician has composed new music inspired by a Supreme Court Justice nominee -- though I suppose Don Byron could have an acerbic “Clarence Thomas Suite” stashed in a drawer somewhere. [Oops. See comments below.]

The selection of O’Farrill for this commission makes all kinds of sense from an institutional perspective. He has experience with arts commissions, and a former affiliation with Jazz at Lincoln Center. His Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra is one of the city’s eminent large ensembles, with resident status at Symphony Space, which is sponsoring the new work in partnership with the Bronx Museum of the Arts.

But unlike, say, Eddie Palmieri, who has also been known to roll out a dynamic big band every now and again, O’Farrill doesn’t share Sotomayor’s Puerto Rican heritage. Born in Mexico, he hails from a different substratum of Latino culture. So while there are in fact jazz musicians forging rigorous new hybrids out of Puerto Rican music -- the best examples are saxophonists Dávid Sanchez and Miguel Zenón -- O’Farrill holds a less literal (i.e., ethno-political) claim on Sotomayor: La Celebración. (Need I point out he’s also not a woman?)

Identity politics, to borrow a fashionably loaded term, might spin this into, y’know, a thing. But the truth is that Sotomayor appears to be first and foremost a New Yorker. (Well, an American. But you know what I’m saying.) It’s likely that her notion of Puerto Rican music has more to do with salsa than with the bomba and plena that Zenón has recontextualized. (Again, I claim no authority here. The good judge could in fact be a reggaetón fan -- or, as she has been forced to insist repeatedly in other areas, dispassionate on the subject.)

In any case, Palladium-style mambo, a serious specialty of the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra, and about as New York a product as there is, does seem well suited to this moment of jubilant goodwill. “I just feel a lot of noise inside my head,” O’Farrill told NY1, “a lot of brass, a lot of explosions of sound, of just pure unbridled energy [and] joy.”

And in a sense, the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra handily represents both the polyglot reality of New York City and the panoramic social ideal of the Obama administration. The group, which recently won a Grammy Award for Song for Chico (Zoho), does include a handful of Puerto Ricans, along with musicians of Central American, Caribbean and Caucasian descent. (Bassist Rubén Rodríguez is among those born in Puerto Rico, as is saxophonist Ivan Renta, whom I recently mentioned here.) The “Afro-Latin” in the band’s name is not only prescriptive, but also basically inclusive.

O’Farrill has the diplomatic instinct to encourage this reading of the statute. Speaking with NY1, he was downright diplomatic in his stated intention “to pay tribute to a woman who has shown incredible, progressive judicial prowess, somebody who has actually distinguished herself on so many levels -- let alone come out of the Bronx, out of a housing project, and done such incredible and amazing things.” Her confirmation, he was saying, is a win for us all.

To which I would heartily agree, with the further observation that O’Farrill doesn’t have the exclusive rights to this occasion. It could be fascinating to hear his piece alongside companion works by Palmieri, or Maria Schneider, or any number of other jazz musicians -- Latino or non-Latino, male or female -- who are equally down for the cause.

Relevant Extras:

Arturo O’Farrill Interview at the Jazz Session (podcast).
Wise Latina? - Carolina A. Miranda, journalist, blogger and friend, sounds off at Time.com.
Another Interview at NPR's A Blog Supreme.

2 Comments

That is too funny. I should have known that my pairing of Byron with Thomas was not, in fact, random. Haven't listened to Music for Six Musicians in a bunch of years, but I'll revisit it today.

It's nice to know that even when my personal fact-checking apparatus is on holiday, my subconscious is on the case, trying to keep me honest. (You too, Darcy. Thanks.)

Posted by: Nate Chinen | 07/21/2009 at 07:37 AM