As a musician who first played piano, how did you settle on the upright bass?
The bass is an instrument that found me as much as I found it, and it became my voice, instrumentally. I’ll never know exactly why. But something really true happened with the upright bass, and it has become my extension.
What is the bass’ role in your music?
Whatever it can be and wants to be. As the anchor and the foundation of the whole thing, bassists have a soft and quiet power that requires a certain maturity and depth. Without the bass, there’s no soprano, or upper register, and no middle, so you have a big responsibility—and you have to be cool with that.
Your compositions typically incorporate jazz, classical, and Middle Eastern influences. Do you make a conscious effort to mix genres?
It’s never conscious. I’m an emotionally charged person, and the mix is the result of the flow that comes through me. I combine a musical urge with the ability to express what I hear with musical vocabulary and language. The music is a migration of many things coming into one. It’s a very natural process for me. I don’t see barriers between different styles of music; as long as you are expressing your true emotion successfully through your music, the genre doesn’t matter.
Is there any particular tone that you try to get on the upright?
I like Charles Mingus’s and John Patitucci’s sounds. I’m also drawn to Latin bass players, like Cachao and Andy Gonzalez. But I’m also interested in other sounds, like Jaco Pastorius’s electric sound, the oud [an Arabic lute], and Paco de Lucía’s flamenco guitar. I try to pull all of them together, with other earthy influences that have a connection to nature.