Delgres is singer, songwriter, and guitarist Pascal Danaë, Baptiste Brondy on drums, and vocals, and Rafgee on sousaphone. (Photo courtesy of Remy Serre)

The Creole blues of the Paris-based power trio Delgres suggest the earthy sound of Mississippi blues reimagined with an African and French Caribbean accent. Featuring electric guitar, drums, and sousaphone, a brass instrument of the tuba family in place of a conventional acoustic or electric bass, the trio can hit like a heavy blues-rock group one moment and then hint at a New Orleans street parade the next. The lyrics, sung mainly in Creole, may tell personal stories or speak of matters such as poverty, social justice, and the plight of the immigrant.

It’s an old blues sleight of hand: a spoonful of reality in a serving of a good time.

“This is probably a Black music thing that’s universal,” says singer, songwriter, and guitarist Pascal Danaë, the founder and leader of Delgres. “The blues is not sad music. They might be talking about terrible conditions, they might be talking about terrible losses, but the bottom line is hope. That hope comes from when you pick up your guitar and start singing about your problem. They’re going to hear the problem — but the music is for having a good time and will also give them the cure. We get the trouble and medicine at the same time.”

Comprising Danaë, Baptiste Brondy on drums and vocals, and Rafgee on sousaphone, Delgres headlines the Fête de la Musique at the North Beach Bandshell Tuesday, June 21, at 8 p.m. The show is presented by the Cultural Services of the Consulate of France in Miami and the Rhythm Foundation, in partnership with Make Music Miami and with the support of Miami Beach Arts in the Parks. The event is free, but it does require RSVP.

The group has released two albums “Mo Jodi” (“I’ll Die Today”) and “4 AM.”  Sang in Creole and English, “Mo Jodi” addresses issues such as freedom and slavery. It served notice about the direction of the music while paying tribute to the historical figure the trio has taken its name.

Louis Delgrès, a Creole officer in the French Army, died in Guadeloupe in 1802, fighting against Napoleon’s Army, which had been sent to the French Caribbean to re-establish slavery. The follow-up, “4 AM,” speaks of immigrants dying for a new beginning, joblessness, and slavery, but also family stories such as the anguish of separation when parents emigrate and children are temporarily left behind.

“I’m doing a bit of my own therapy with all this,” Danaë once said about the themes in his lyrics.

“Growing up in France as a French person, but of Guadeloupean roots, not completely French, … just led me to wonder later on in my life: So, who am I exactly?” elaborates Danaë now. “You start scratching that surface and start going deeper and deeper. That’s what’s in those songs. Even when I play like fierce rock and roll or very heavy, heavy guitar, it’s a release from pain and things that I have to cope with.”

Born and raised in Paris by Guadeloupean parents, Danaë grew up listening to a variety of music, from Cuban Son to Congolese rumba to jazz and English rock. He got his first guitar at 15, a gift from his brother-in-law to pass the time one summer. He started playing American folk music at home and eventually graduated to playing jazz and fusion in clubs around Paris. In 1997 he moved to London, where he lived for eight years, and then to Amsterdam, where he spent three years before returning to Paris. Along the way, he worked as a studio musician and performed and recorded with artists such as Peter Gabriel, Youssou N’Dour, and Harry Belafonte.

While in Amsterdam, he discovered the Dobro, a resonator guitar with a distinct sound that, says Danaë, “comes with the history of the blues.” The find had a profound impact on his work. “You must let it resonate  . . .  so you start listening to yourself. It becomes a dialogue with the instrument. It was like learning to walk again. I use an electric guitar on stage because it’s more practical, but when I get back to the Dobro, it’s like, okay, this is the blues, this is roots.”

He was at the time “at a crossroads between different professional pathways,” he once said in an interview, and the find led him to play blues. He said his writing acquired a new depth, and he went back to singing in Creole, “like my ancestors had in Guadeloupe.”

Danaë is working on a third album with Delgres, speaking about new battles he once felt had long been settled.

“When we did “Mo Jodi,” some people looked at it like ‘well, that’s something in the past,’” says Danaë. “But you look at the world now, and it’s all coming back. It’s not a thing from the past. The fight about freedom, dignity, equality, and injustice is now. We have to keep our eyes open and keep talking about these things because there’s still a lot of work to be done. So, I feel that we as artists must do our part. It’s a small one, but we need to keep going, keep singing those songs and get people together as much as we can.”

This story was first published by Artburst Miami, 16 June 2022

Danilo Pérez photo by Tito Herrera ©

Crisálida, the new recording by Panamanian pianist and composer Danilo Pérez, is among his most ambitious projects. It addresses broad, complex, and emotional social issues utilizing various musical tools and strategies and interdisciplinary work while referencing an assortment of musical traditions interpreted by an unusual ensemble.

It is not an easy listen — and perhaps it shouldn’t be.

“Crisálida, to me, means a protected space of human development. To continue confronting these crises humanity is facing, like immigration issues and climate change, we must reverse path, reimagining a new society,” told me Pérez in a phone conversation in February from his home in the Boston area. “I am betting on music, on the arts, as a way to unite us and humanize us.”

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SFJAZZ Collective, at the Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, Miami, Friday.

The SFJazz Collective, the composer’s workshop and resident ensemble at SFJAZZ, the San Francisco-based non-profit organization dedicated to jazz, usually interprets original, newly commissioned pieces and arrangements by each of its members reflecting on the music of a master artist. But then the turbulent past couple of years made the collective set aside exploring the music of Joni Mitchell and, in a time-honored jazz tradition, address some of the social issues of the day.

Comprising vocalists Gretchen Parlato and Martin Luther McCoy; saxophonists Chris Potter and David Sánchez; trumpeter Etienne Charles, pianist Edward Simon; vibraphonist Warren Wolf; bassist Matt Brewer; and drummer Kendrick A.D. Scott, the Collective performed at the Arsht Center, Miami, Friday, Reflecting the Times. The program, which included classic songs (new arrangements of “Lift Every Voice and Sing” and Marvin Gaye’s classic “What’s Going On?”) and new compositions, focused on the past year’s events, most notably the fight for racial justice and the Black Lives Matter movement.

Turning music into a blunt instrument for change sounds like a noble idea, but it’s fraught with perils. More often than not, and for many reasons, it’s a process that produces uninteresting music — which then makes it an ineffective tool.

Social and political statements were rarely made more clearly and forcefully Friday than by the sheer beauty of the music and the quality of the playing.

The most compelling moment might have been Simon’s tender “8:46,” its title a direct reference to the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer. But then, Potter’s medley “Can You See” and “Mutuality” took us from anguish, anger, and frustration (the first part was written on January 7, 2021, the day after the failed insurrection) to hope, the second half of the piece having been inspired by Rev. Martin Luther King’s “Birmingham Letter.”

If someone expected fiery calls to the barricade Friday, they might have left disappointed. What we heard instead was a thoughtful, heartfelt meditation on where we are, how we got here, and which direction might be forward. If there was a clear message, it was in the music-making.

The better jazz players are, first, great listeners.

Listening might not be a bad place for all of us as a society to start.