The South African pianist Abdullah Ibrahim is a major personality of our time. At 87, he continues to let himself be carried away by the rhythm of life. With rare humility, he does not claim to have invented a musical genre or revolutionized the art of instantaneous improvisation. However, after six decades of a prestigious epic, he is revered and inscribes his destiny in the great book of Afro-planetary music. His last album Loneliness is a new demonstration of graceful virtuosity of which his many admirers are so fond. Exclusive interview!
Although he crossed paths with the greatest instrumentalists of our time, Abdullah Ibrahim cherishes this status of eternal student which prohibits him from pretentiousness or self-celebration. From the top of his 60 years of artistic journey, jostled by the pangs of racial segregation in South Africa, he has managed to preserve this candor that identifies sensitive souls. His modest view of his various encounters and collaborations inscribes his spirituality in African traditions. For him, Duke Ellington, Billy Strayhorn, Thelonious Monk are the chiefs of the village that we consult to find our way. Beyond the respect that these legends of yesteryear impose, you have to know how to ignore their notoriety to take advantage of their teachings. This is one of the lessons that the young Abdullah Ibrahim learned very early in contact with his heroes.
“When I first met Thelonious Monk, I said, “Thank you for inspiring us!” He looked at me for a few moments and replied: “You are the first to say such things to me”. I then realized that everything that was said about Monk, all the criticisms concerning his very particular acting, his iconoclastic personality, were unfounded. Music doesn’t have to be a complicated art. It must be an accessible form of expression even for a child. We adults complicate things. Let’s just do what we have to do on this earth. Let’s be honest with ourselves. It is a long and difficult process because our ego is constantly trying to convince us that we are intelligent men. You have to surrender to primary emotions, accept mistakes and failures. So your ego won’t expect anything in return.” (Abdullah Ibrahim – January 2022)
Abdullah Ibrahim’s musical spirituality is strongly expressed in each of his performances. The Scrapbook Loneliness is no exception to the rule. This disc is all the more serene as it was recorded during the period of generalized confinement that Europe had to undergo in 2020. As he was preparing to give, as every year, his anniversary concert in the pregnant at the Hirzinger Hall in Riedering in Germany, sanitary restrictions transformed this celebration into an intimate piano improvisation. Alone, without the cheers of the audience, Abdullah Ibrahim let his inspiration guide him, playing with the melodies of his repertoire of yesterday and today. This musical offering was filmed and became one of the maestro’s most moving performances.
“There is no nostalgia in this record. I live here and now. Defining the passage of time creates confusion. We have to think about the present moment. my scrapbook Loneliness is only the expression of a moment that I experienced at the time. So it’s not nostalgia. And I can’t project myself into the future either. Everything happens in the present. Even if this disc was recorded several months ago, it is the expression of what I felt at the time. This is also the reason why I decided, very early in my career, to record my own music. Yes, I studied Bach, Beethoven or Prokofiev, but I considered that it was useless to play their music because it was the emanation of their present. By the time I breathed, it was no longer relevant. She no longer represented my breath of life. So I had to follow my own rhythm, the beat of my heart. Breathing is a rhythm that identifies you in time. It’s part of your memory. All the works that I have composed belong to a moment that I was living at the time. Therefore, the music I perform is never the same. Each breath is never the same. During my first appearances in Europe, some journalists thought that my music was primitive. I was just following my heartbeat. Every day is different, but your heartbeat is the same.” (Abdullah Ibrahim on Joe Farmer’s microphone)
► Blue Bolero (Loneliness), Abdullah Ibrahim