Pianist/Composer Bobby West Releases Big Trippin’, His Second Compilation on Soulville Sound Recordings

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For nearly all of his four-decade career, the Los Angeles-based pianist/composer Bobby West was an unheralded scientist of sound: well-known and respected in his community, but largely unknown beyond it, with no recordings of his own as a leader. Like so many jazz artists, West went abroad in 1993, mostly to the Middle East, North Africa, Europe, Asia and Taiwan for better opportunities, with occasional visits back home.

All of that changed in July 2021, when West released Leimert Park After Dark, his first record as a leader, with bassist Jeff Littleton and Mexican-American drummer Daniel Bejarano. No longer a best-kept-secret from the West Coast, West's fluid and formidable pianism was praised by jazz fans and critics, including Josef Woodard of Jazziz magazine who wrote of West's "elegant … organically flowing energy …" and his "unpretentiously impressive" musicianship."

West's impeccable musicianship is on full display on his new release Big Trippin'. The title of the CD was inspired by the madness West sees in recent world events.

"I never thought I would see what I was seeing on my TV, " West says from the CD liner notes. "People [dying] of COVID and the attack on the United States Capitol, I was shaken to my core at what I was seeing and what was happening. So, all of that had me tripping hard … big trippin'!"

Those kinds of headlines would give anyone the blues, but the armor of art West wears enables him – in the elegant words of novelist/essayist Albert Murray – to "stomp the blues, " and keep them at bay. Like his previous recording, West performs in the trio format on this CD, and is supported by local drummer Jerrell Ballard, who has worked with Kamasi Washington, Azar Lawrence and Chico Hamilton, and the late bassist, James Leary. "Jerrell and I were just in awe of James Leary, " West says. "He played with Count Basie, Bobby Hutcherson, Nancy Wilson and George Duke. After befriending him over the years, he became a teacher that I held in high regard. We did many gigs over the years … I dedicate the album to his memory."

The 10 selections on Big Trippin' exhibit the swing-at-the-speed-of-sound improvisations and trio telepathy we've come to expect from West and his cohorts. That's apparent on the CD's selections of standards. "Only a Rose, " a ballad dedicated to pianist Rose Gales, wife of bassist Larry Gales, who played with Thelonious Monk, and, "was a second mom" to West, and the Latin-tinged, Tin Pan Alley song "Say Si Si, " were originally recorded by the California pianist Pete Jolly (1932-2004), an early influence on West. The trio's treatment of "I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face, " is a moving meld of Erroll Garner's rhapsodic rapture and Bill Evans' twilight-toned harmonic textures.

Osvaldo Farris' "Tres Palabras" is a Mexican standard West heard when he was growing up in Los Angeles and inspired to play it when he heard pianist Brad Mehldau perform it. West adds an Afro-waltz rhythm to Henry Mancini's "Charade" that is situated between 3/4 and 6/8 time. West's D-minor solo piano rendition on the Beatles' "Michelle, " recalls the Gallic glamor of the French movie music of the fifties and sixties.

The rest of the selections are composed by West. They include the title track, an angular, Thelonious Monk-like, 12-bar blues. "Right Here, Right Now" is a funky, Lou Donaldson kind of blues that would be sampled on a hip-hop track. Of special note are two spontaneously-created solos by West. The first is "Mode for Morpheus." "I went to the studio with a blank canvas, the way Keith Jarrett would do a solo concert, " West recalls. It's kind of free-form and has a modal kind of character to it."

The second is "Variations of Various Faces, " one selection of West's sound portraits of key individuals in his life. This first variation is dedicated to Horace Tapscott, who as West proclaims, was one of his "early mentors and a surrogate father, who taught me that this music is Black, proud, and powerful. When I was a young musician, Horace told me that this music, jazz, could make you a man. I heard this manhood he was talking about in the music. I heard the struggles, the pain, the ferocity. He told me that the music is not frivolous. It's serious, man. And it's spiritual."

This recording is the latest journey in West's musical and personal life. He was born in Louisiana, where his family has deep, ancestral roots that go back five generations to New Orleans, and to newly discovered lineages to Caribbean and West Africa. West got his gift for music from his father, whom he barely knew, but was a very fine blues and gospel singer.

West moved to Los Angeles when he was eight years old during the Great Migration, and grew up hearing jazz on Central Avenue, and the city's piano pioneers from Hampton Hawes to Tapscott. He started playing piano in the church and took private classical lessons.

West attended Jefferson High School, and studied with teacher Patsy Payne, who encouraged him to go to college. West traveled back to Louisiana, graduated from Grambling State University with a degree in composition in 1977, and furthered his compositional studies at Louisiana State University. He lived in Baton Rouge and New Orleans for two years, led a band that featured a teenaged Branford Marsalis, and returned to Los Angeles in 1980. He led his own ensembles and worked with local musicians including Leary, vocalist Dwight Trible and flutist Cyril Carr. West left L.A. in 1993 and worked and lived overseas and settled in Taiwan. On July 31, 2021, West went back home and received his Jazz Living Legend award at the 11th Annual Leimert Park Jazz & Blues Society Founders Awards.

Big Trippin' is the latest chapter in an ongoing musical book authored by West's amazing aural artistry that gets better with time. "For me, it's all about evolution and growth, " West says, "I'm two years older. Hopefully, I'm two years better, and I'm two years closer to my destiny. And what we hear from this record are the results of a life on this planet for 66 years. Everything that I have strived for, is encapsulated in this music."

Big Trippin' is available now on all streaming platforms and at www.soulvillesoundrecordings.com.

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