Nov. 9: John Medeski talks songwriting and collaboration ahead of Fire Jelly’s show in Portsmouth

Through his immense skills on keyboard and his avant-garde approach to music, John Medeski has been a central figure in the world of jazz for over 30 years. His repertoire is also fairly diverse with the funk fusion he’s created with drummer Billy Martin and bassist Chris Wood as Medeski, Martin & Wood as well as the collaborations he’s done with the likes of bluegrass icon Béla Fleck, guitar savants John Scofield and Marc Ribot and sax wizard John Zorn. These days, he has a new project that’s going to be performing a few shows, including November 9 at Jimmy’s Jazz & Blues Club in Portsmouth. It’s called Fire Jelly and it has him being joined by guitarist Dave Fiuczynski and drummer Calvin Weston. Starting at 7:30pm, folks in attendance will get to experience top-notch jazz fusion with an experimental and improvisational flair.

Medeski and I had a talk ahead of the show about how Fire Jelly came to be, what makes this band different from others that he’s been in and a debut album that’s going to be out sooner than later.

Rob Duguay: How did you, Dave and Calvin go about starting Fire Jelly together? Have each of you known each other for a long time or did you all get introduced to each other through a common friend?

John Medeski: Dave and I went to music school together 8,000 years ago at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. We met there, we played together a bunch there and we had different classes together there. He started a band around that time called Screaming Headless Torsos that he did for years after that and I played with him in different situations. He had a bunch of tunes that he did with Screaming Headless Torsos that were a little too jazzy for their first record, so we did a record together back then called Lunar Crush back in 1994, which was on Gramavision Records. We both went our separate ways after that, I was doing Medeski, Martin & Wood and he was doing his thing with Screaming Headless Torsos.

We actually did a tour together where they opened up for us, it was a double bill and it was amazing. Ever since those days, I just had this idea of an organ trio with him and Calvin Weston, who I played with as part of The Lounge Lizards during the ‘90s as well. I love Calvin, we’ve crossed paths at different times and I’ve played with him in some of his projects and he’s played with me in a lot of situations. John Zorn with his book of music called The Bagatelles came to me and asked if I could put together an organ trio, which made me think of Dave and Calvin. That’s kind of how this band came together and we’re going to be playing both Zorn’s music and our own music at these gigs that we have coming up.

To go back a little, when Dave and I were making Lunar Crush, we were talking about doing a sequel for it called Fire Jelly. We joked about it, talked about doing it and we agreed to do it, then 30 years later this project came up. I wanted to use Calvin and Dave to do The Bagatelles, so we did that and then we took the opportunity to go to Applehead Studio in Halifax to do something they called “The Woodstock Sessions”. We had people come in, we did a masterclass, we played a little concert that night and we spent a couple days there to do some recordings, which we’re going to have coming out very soon as Fire Jelly. Dave has also been exploring the microtonal world, he runs the program for it at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, so a lot of the music that we do are his microtonal pieces along with The Bagatelles and some new music each night.

RD: When it comes to making original music as a trio, how much as The Bagatelles fueled and influenced that aspect of Fire Jelly?

JM: It’s different, it’s very different. Most of the original stuff we do is from Dave’s compositions that have a microtonal component. They’re funky, I don’t really know how to describe it but it’s instrumental and just amazing music. With The Bagatelles, it’s a very specific musical language, there’s 300 hundred of them and they’ve been played by all different kinds of bands to show how these pieces can be played in so many different ways. He had different people doing different sets of songs in all very different styles, so ours is very heavy for lack of a better comparison.

RD: For the songwriting process and the art of collaboration, what stands out to you the most when it comes to making music with Dave & Calvin versus other bands that you’ve been involved with?

JM: For me, it’s really important that everybody in any group that I’ve played in you play with for who they are. I don’t come in with a concept and everybody is supposed to do my concept, I play with Dave and Calvin because I want them to be themselves. Calvin is such a powerhouse, he’s a force and he’s legendary. He’s played with Ornette Coleman, he’s got a certain style and when the three of us are playing together, we’re all being ourselves and it’s this conversation we’re having that’s coming together.

RD: With this conversation being put forth into a live performance, what can people expect from Fire Jelly when you guys come to Jimmy’s Jazz & Blues Club? Will there pretty much be a balance between The Bagatelles and the original material?

JM: We’re going to do some of The Bagatelles along with some of our own music, I guess there’s two different styles that’ll sort of go on in a relative sense. It’s us playing the music, so there’s always going to be that thread of us being ourselves. We’re also going to be creating music in the moment, so each performance is going to be a little different.

RD: It sounds like it’s going to be very improvisational, that’s awesome.

JM: It’s more of a combination of a few different things. Everything has improvisation in it, but in songs and pieces there’s a lot of composition. Within that, there’s space for everyone to be themselves and improvise while creating their own parts. There’s chord changes, there’s melodies and it’s music in the way that jazz is. There will also be some completely free music in the moment, but it’s going to be wild, powerful and grooving.

RD: You mentioned that Fire Jelly has an album of original music that’s coming out in the near future, so what’s the status of it? Does it have a name? Is there a target release date?

JM: It’s going to be self-titled and I think we might actually do a thing where we’ll release a tune every Friday on Bandcamp or something like that. We’ve been toying around with ideas on how to put it out, so we’re probably going to release a new tune each week for a period of time and then it’ll all be out as an album.