Trombonist Ryan Keberle has spent much of his career moving between musical worlds. He's played in Broadway pits, big bands, jazz combos, countless recording sessions, and just about every other kind of ensemble you can imagine.
But for the past decade, one musical world in particular has captured his imagination: the music of Brazil.
In 2016, Keberle traveled there to study the role of the trombone in traditional Brazilian music. While he was there, he found himself drawn into the extraordinary catalog of Brazilian popular music from the 1960s and '70s.
He's been going back ever since, developing a working band with musicians based in São Paulo, and recording a series of albums devoted to some of Brazil's great composers.
The latest, Here Is Donato!, celebrates the music of pianist and composer João Donato, who died in 2023 at the age of 88. It’s a noticeably joyful record.
Keberle syas, "In so much of the Brazilian music that I have fallen deeply in love with [from] the '60s and early '70s in particular, even when there was overt protest lyrics, they were almost always extremely symbolic and subtle and witty and not at all obvious ... and still, in many cases, humorous and lighthearted."
Speaking on The Third Story podcast in 2017, Ryan Keberle explored the idea of jazz as protest music, and the ways musicians could respond to the political climate of the time.
These days, he’s equally interested in what music can offer us in the face of that climate — not only as a form of protest, but as an antidote.
He explains, "I think that idea of music as beauty, music as joy, as a balm for the soul is exactly what this record is all about."
Keberle's Brazilian group has previously explored the music of Milton Nascimento, Toninho Horta, Edu Lobo and Ivan Lins.
There's something about these composers' melodies that seems especially well suited to the trombone. Ryan explains the deeper historical connection.
He says, "The trombone is a folk instrument in Brazil.”
Over the years, Keberle has become more and more interested in the act of listening itself. As a performer, as a bandleader, and as a teacher, he believes that the ability to hear more deeply is fundamental to making better music.
And it's an idea that has also changed his understanding of jazz as a form of protest.
He says, "Jazz is protest music because it forces the audiences ... if they're actively listening, to become better listeners. [...] You have to listen more deeply. You have to become more focused and more aware of all those experiences."
Ryan Keberle's new album with Collectiv do Brasil, Here Is Donato!, is out now on Alternate Side Records.
Tonight, November 11, he'll celebrate the release with a performance at Smalls in New York.
