If You Ain’t Got That Swing, You Ain’t Got

Boplicity

 

By Nancy K. Crevier

Anyone familiar with jazz will recognize “Boplicity” as the name of the standard made famous by jazz great Miles Davis, in the early 1950s. Anyone familiar with jazz in Newtown, though, will recognize Boplicity as the name of the Newtown jazz sextet that has been making itself heard at various venues this past year.

Humbly calling themselves “just some guys, playing jazz in Robert’s basement,” the group is made up of Newtown residents Robert Rabinowitz on flute and alto saxophone, Greg Baimel on tenor saxophone and clarinet, Paul Fadus on trumpet, and Michael Paes on Bass. From Oxford, Bob Paquette on drums gives the beat to Boplicity, and from Shelton, Warren McGuire joins them on guitar.

All of the men have a background in music, but not all of them came to Boplicity with a background in jazz. Boplicity got its start nearly three years ago, when Mr Rabinowitz, Mr Baimel and Mr Fadus met as members of the now defunct Newtown Community Band. When that band folded, the three continued to play — in Mr Rabinowitz’s basement. With strong jazz music backgrounds, Mr Baimel and Mr Fadus soon had Mr Rabinowitz, a classically trained music composer, swinging and be-bopping with them.

Meeting with The Newtown Bee on Wednesday, August 1, Mr Rabinowitz and Mr Baimel discussed the genesis of the band, and its induction into the community.

 “We probably practiced for two years before we decided it was time to get out of the basement,” said Mr Rabinowitz. By then, other musicians had joined them.

“We just seemed to find each other,” said Mr Baimel.

The six musicians have developed an extensive repertoire of over 60 pieces, many of them jazz standards that are instantly recognizable by audience members of all ages. The original form of a piece is always apparent, but the band members do their own arrangements, and there is an element of improvisation with each song. They play everything from “be-bop to fusion, swing to Latin, and cool jazz to hot blues” said Mr Rabinowitz. What makes jazz stand out from other styles of music, he said, is the interpretive nature of a piece.

“You can interpret and move around the melody, the tempo, the feel; and do that to almost any piece — not 100 percent, true. It’s got that swing to it,” he said.

Even with dozens of songs in their repertoire, it would be easy to get bored, Mr Rabinowitz said, so the group is always looking for something new.

“Even with improvisation,” he said, “we switch our sets around, for our sake and for the audience who may have heard us play before.”

“Stylistically, we like to shake things up,” said Mr Baimel. There is always music they stumble upon that is new to the band, he said, and adds to the enjoyment of playing with Boplicity.

The other aspect of Boplicity they love is playing for an audience. “There’s something about playing for an audience,” Mr Baimel said. “Jazz is such a free and open art form. You really feed off the audience. The nice thing is, when something works way better than you thought it would, and the audience eats it up,” he said.

Mr Rabinowitz agreed, and added, “I personally believe you only get better when you play in front of people. You take extra steps to make sure it’s the best you can do.”

It is the feedback from the audience that fuels the group, they said.

“Looking around and seeing how much the audience is into it, and hearing the applause, and seeing the recognition light up people’s faces gets us going,” said Mr Baimel. It is especially exciting, he said, to see young people in the audience who are into the music.

“They might not know the name of a song, but when you start playing it, you see them nodding their heads and that expression of ‘oh, yeah! I’ve heard that before!’” Mr Rabinowitz said.

Their first aboveground gig was as the pre-show entertainment for a Flagpole Radio Café at Edmond Town Hall. That was followed by a stint at the September 2011 Harvest Festival at the Fairfield Hills Victory Garden, and then at the Artful Bras and Boxers fundraiser at Edmond Town Hall the following month.

“We play pretty regularly now at My Place and have played at Stone River Grille” in Sandy Hook, Mr Rabinowitz said. Boplicity was the featured band on opening night of the Parks & Rec summer concert series at Dickinson Park this summer.

“None of us is a professional musician. We all have our day jobs,” said Mr Baimel, so a once-a-month date to play is generally all they can fit into their schedules. Mr Baimel does forecasting and sales metrics for Cycling Sports Group; Mr Rabinowitz is information security and business control manager for IBM; Mr Fadus has his own house painting company; and Mr McGuire is a computer specialist and teaches, guitar, bass, violin, cello, and banjo. Michael Paes is a lawyer in Sandy Hook, and Mr Paquette works at Newtown Car Care. Nonetheless, Boplicity has managed to fill up a number of weekends in August and September.

On August 26, from 3 to 4 pm, they will perform for opening day of the Richter House summer/fall concert series in Danbury (Danbury.org/richter). Two weeks later, on Sunday, September 9, Boplicity takes the stage at McLaughlin Vineyards on Alberts Hill Road in Newtown, from 1 to 4 pm (mclaughlinvineyards.com).

The next week, Boplicity will perform at the Newtown Arts Festival at Fairfield Hills. The band has a set scheduled during the first day of two-day event, on Saturday, September 15, from 3 to 3:45 pm. They will be joined that day by special guests Peter Ferreira on violin, Aurora Marin on piano, and Richard Gosney on trombone (newtownartsfestival.com).

The group will then takes a month’s break, before providing their sound to the Ann’s Place Artfull fundraiser in The Alexandria Room of Edmond Town Hall on Saturday, October 27, beginning at 7 pm.

“Jazz is for all ages, and we play anywhere we’ll fit into,” said Mr Rabinowitz. “We’re doing this for fun. It’s about playing jazz, because we enjoy it.”

Cutting a CD is a maybe thing, somewhere far into the future, said Mr Baimel, but to hear clips and for contact information for Boplicity, visit reverbnation.com/boplicityjazzband.