Melanie Charles says jazz, by definition, is in vogue.
Inspired by Nina Simone’s view that it’s “an artist’s duty to reflect the times,” multihyphenate Melanie Charles interprets the modern day with moxie.
photo courtesy of Jack B. Siegel Photography.
Melanie Charles has declared herself on a mission to make jazz trill again. She strutted on stage in an emerald green dress, gogo boots, and a bespoke headwrap at Logan Arts Center on Friday, Oct. 18. Backed by a tight rhythm section (Diego Ramirez on drums, Jonathan Michel on upright bass, Zacchae’us Paul on keyboard and vocals), she and saxophonist Rogerst Charles communicated through motivic repartee possible only between family members. The siblings, she later told me, began collaborating as kids in the church.
As part of the Logan Center’s Jazz Series, Charles stopped in Chicago to perform the original set she has been touring on for the past two years. She has established herself as a progressive voice in jazz, receiving praise for her major label album debut, “Y'all Don't Really Care About Black Women,” and in 2021 featured on NPR’s Tiny Desk Black History Month series. That the musical acts she collaborates with—Wynton Marsalis, SZA, The Roots—cannot be classified under one genre reflects her dismissal of categories unfit to house the identities she holds.
During the concert, she invoked her New York roots and Haitian heritage, paying homage to voodoo traditions in “Damballa Wedo,” which touched on mental health struggles in a hyper-productive world. Her truth was not bleak, though. She took to the keys for “Jazz School,” which began as a lament (“I want my money back.”), proof that the risky investment of a music degree returns at least a song’s worth of creativity. In her remix of Betty Carter’s “Jazz Ain’t Nothin’ But Soul,” she privileged neither past nor present, rejoicing in their encounter; dancing over her mixing console, her fingers flew, her dress fluttered.
I had the opportunity to talk with Charles about the church, Sonny Rollins, and where she’s taking her music next. Her new compositions will be a departure from a corpus until now rooted in the jazz tradition. Bored of the Great American Songbook’s love songs, she stands on the shoulders of pioneers—Abbey Lincoln, Nina Simone—unafraid to author a narrative that stretches across musical, cultural worlds. If she has reservations, she’s forging ahead anyway.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Celeste Alcalay: How do you incorporate new influences and what you take from the tradition when you're developing your own sound?
Melanie Charles: It has evolved through the years. When I was a student at the New School, I asked my teacher, “How do I find my voice? Like, how do I get my own thing?” And she told me to imitate everyone that I like. To me, that seemed really counterintuitive. But years later—That's part of the assignments in jazz school. You have to transcribe, regurgitate the thing—But in hindsight, I realized that I was developing a vocabulary and building up my color palette like a painter. So now I have all these different colors, and then with all of these at my fingertips, or in my head, or in my spirit, in my ear, right? When I go to say what I have to say, it's going to be my true expression, which is a combination of all of these different languages and ideas and sounds that I've accumulated.
I desire to sound like me, even off the stage. The way that I dress, the way I present, the way I think, move in the world, that is very important to me. Having my own personal identity. It definitely does translate in the music.
I'm from Brooklyn. Like, I'm from Bushwick. I took the “L” train to school. I heard gunshots at night. But then, I did go to one of the most prestigious youth choir programs in Park Slope. I kind of spent time in different worlds. And so sometimes the way I am delivering a song, you might hear that Brooklyn girl, but, then, you might hear—They say Black people how to code switch—You might hear that different approach. You might be like, “Oh my god. She sounds like Sarah Vaughn in this moment.” Then I'll turn around, and it'll sound different.
photo courtesy of Jack B. Siegel Photography.
CA: Do you think about storytelling in the music that you create? It's satirical and biting sometimes. You don't seem to be afraid to say what you want. It’s different from, you know, the jazz tradition where some of the song lyrics on standards can be outright misogynistic.
MC: I guess I have to acknowledge people like Abbey Lincoln. Because she is a, I guess you could say, “jazz vocalist,” but I think she'd be offended if I called her that, because she expanded even past the tradition of jazz in her songwriting and her performing and her singing. Her lyrics are super honest and reflective of her time. You know, I think about Nina Simone. When they asked her, “What was jazz?” She said jazz was a reflection of the time. And so I really took that seriously as a songwriter and composer…I don't want to be bored. How many love songs can we sing? I mean, there was a time where the [Great] American Songbook, which is where a lot of the jazz standards come from, a lot of those songs come from musicals. And the storylines of musicals are love and war…That's the basics of life, right? Love and survival, and we need that. That's great.
But I think that with the evolution of people like John Coltrane, Abbey Lincoln, Max Roach, and Miss Simone—the Civil Rights Movement, Marvin Gaye…Lately, I've been thinking a lot about the war that's going on right now, and how I have peers of mine who are calling out musicians for performing in this time of war, right? Like, “How could you perform at this festival when you know that they probably are supporting the war?” …My meditation right now is that I have to put it all in the music. I'm not a politician. But I exist in this world, and I see what is going on, and if I just fuse that in the music, then that's really all that I can do at this time, and remain true to that. I think that's the role of the musician. Shout out to those who are writing articles and making posts and raising the conversation in that way. That’s all so important…But when we go back to the recorded music, we look at Bob Marley and how he brought people together. That to me, that’s the stuff.
photo courtesy of Jack B. Siegel Photography.
CA: Are you ever concerned about going in a new direction in terms of what the response of the audience is going to be?
MC: I’m in that stage right now. I’m working on a new album and it's definitely not like anything like “Y’All Don’t Care About Black Women” or “Jazz Ain’t Nothin’ But Soul.”
I feel like I've kind of created this storyline of “She's the jazz girl that's cutting edge, doing different jazz things, and pushing the tradition.” But there's still this underlying of the tradition in the sound thus far, or at least with this project that I've been touring for the past two years, which is what you heard. But now this new music is definitely even more original…This newer project is really not sample-based. I'm nervous, but I have faith that it's consistent with what my artistry has always been, which is true to me and true to where I am…I keep talking about this book that I'm reading by Sonny Rollins. He talks about how you can't be concerned about how the audience will receive you. That’s not your job. You just make the sound as best as you can, in the highest quality that you can, and then you let it go. And so I'm dancing back and forth between those two places right now as we speak.
CA: In a live setting, how does the audience response influence your performance? Do you find that you feed off the audience and they affect the direction of the performance, or do you do your own thing on stage?
MA: I grew up in the church. My first solo as a singer was in the church choir. In church, if you are doing the right thing as the soloist that equals, people are like, they are inspired. They're feeling something. They are getting amped up. Like, that means you are doing your job, which is to bring in the spirit of the Lord into the room. That's your job!
As a performance artist, I think my natural instinct is to feed off of that in my shows. You know, as a vocalist. Like, be with me. If you're clapping, I'm clapping. I'm feeling good. We’re having a good time. But aside from what Sonny Rollins said, I also have to understand that we come from different cultures. You know, I perform in Europe a lot, and Japan. I love Japan, my favorite place in the world. The people will sit like this. Frozen. And you're like, “Okay, they hate the show. They hate me.” Then afterward, they're crying and they want to give you their firstborn son. They're telling you that you changed their life! So I've learned that people receive art in different ways, and even though they're not receiving it in the way that maybe I'm used to it coming up in church, doesn't mean that they are not receiving it. And so once again, it's the constant dance of like, I don't want to be concerned with them, but also—Are you with me?
photo courtesy of Jack B. Siegel Photography.
CA: I’m wondering about what being a jazz artist is—and I know that you are more than a jazz artist, right? Like, you're sort of trans-genre. What do you think is difficult about being labeled as a jazz artist in the industry today?
MC: That’s such a loaded question in so many ways. I think first, what must be acknowledged in the conversation is to address how now we're in a time where more than ever jazz musicians are rejecting the term “jazz,” and they're interested in it being more acknowledged as Black American music. And I understand that because jazz as we know it is born out of the Black American culture here in America. But it gets complicated for me because I also understand that it is a fusion of the immigrants, of the Latin culture…You have the African drums…The New Orleans sound. A huge influx of Caribbean people into America is why we have the second line…All that stuff are all pieces of what makes up jazz, but if you want to make it even bigger, Black American music. So there's kind of a slight division in the jazz scene of people who are team calling their music “jazz” versus people who are like, “No man, I don't even say that. I'm not doing that stuff.”
So it's a very interesting culture right now, and I think it's good. That's what this music is supposed to do. But also, we're in a time where jazz music is hitting a little bit more. It's kind of cool again. It’s a little bit viral in a way. We have people like Laufey. She's found a way to do jazz music in a way that has a pop sensibility, it’s accessible to younger people. That hasn't really been done in that way…For me, I desire for jazz music to be popular. I think that it has all of the makings. Because what's pop music? Pop really just means popular. Because, let's remember, Michael Jackson was pop at a time. Louis Armstrong was pop at a time, you know. But now when we say pop music, it's tethered to a sound. But it doesn't have to be…I have a friend that said, “If there's a musician who's doing something wack, but they're really popular and famous, they're the musician you need to look at.” And I think that's the deepest thing to say because obviously they doing something right!
Also, I think jazz musicians in this era are challenged to think beyond the music. You know what I mean? Like, how are we showing up? What type of spaces are we performing in? Are we rejecting the system that says you have to be like Wynton Marsalis and wear a suit and a dress to do a show? Can we challenge that? Does our hair need to be slicked down and pristine? Can we have crazy locks and be free and wild?
photo courtesy of Jack B. Siegel Photography.
CA: Have you always been comfortable band-leading? Can you talk about your journey and how you've changed as a band leader through time?
MC: I was always a leader. Like, I don't know what it is, it kind of gets me into trouble. I know how to get people on board. If I wanted to be a politician, I could because the people just be like, “Okay, Mel. What are we doing?” My mom said, when I was in preschool, the teacher called her and was like, “Melanie is like, ordering the kids around and telling them what to do. She can't do this.” So that's always been me.
But I do remember when I was in college, my friend—He's my friend now, Anthony Coleman. I love him so much. But I remember that he and a few other guys in my band said that I was a bitch as a band leader. Because I was really adamant about “I want it this way. This is rehearsal time, you guys.” Ruling with an iron fist kind of approach. But still, they was in the band though. Y'all calling me a bitch, but y'all still in the band because, you know, it's dope!
[laughter]
Now I think I've learned how to lead in a way that is just a little bit [pause] to be honest, as a woman band leader, for it to really go across in a way, you have to butter up the band a little bit. If I was a male band leader. I do believe that I could be a little bit more cut and dry, you know? I laugh about what those guys are saying, but it is kind of because I'm a woman. That's what it is.
I don't really lament and stay in that place. I've been brought into other people's bands, great band leaders, like Mark de Clive Lowe and recently the Makaya McCraven band, and even Chris Bodie. On stage, he was cheering me on from behind me. He reminded me how it's important to affirm your band. As a Haitian American, that's another thing in our culture. Mom doesn't say she loves you. You know she loves you, but she is not going to be saying, “I love you.” And if you got a B plus, she's going to tell you, you should have gotten the A plus. If you got an A plus, you should have gotten an A plus plus! So there's not really a culture of compliments. So I don't always feel like I need that, and therefore, I don't think to give it. But I've learned throughout the years that affirming your band is also really important. So I'm a work in progress, Celeste.
edited by Greta Irvine.
photos courtesy of Jack B. Siegel Photography.