Sydney-based Kiwi pianist Steve Barry talks about discovering jazz.
Q: Tell me about the musicians in your quartet for the Queenstown Jazz Festival.
A: Roger Manins was a big mentor for me as a teenager. I had a trio in high school with a couple of mates, and as 15-year-olds we used to trek out to Roger's place in West Auckland for a band lesson/jam session.
Having studied in Sydney himself he was one of the first to suggest I look at moving across the Ditch and doing my degree at the University of Sydney Conservatorium of Music.
After nearly a decade of playing together, making music with Rog is always pretty easy - it also helps that he's one of the finest saxophone players I know. James Waples and I have played together in countless different bands since I moved to Sydney, but funnily enough more often than not when I'm playing Hammond organ, often in trio with a guitarist.
James has a very organic, supportive approach to the drums, but he can really hit hard when he wants to. [Double bass player] Brett Hirst and I haven't played too much in the past, but we've recently started playing together in a quartet with Andrew Gander, one of the legends of Australian drumming.
Q: Steve, you relocated to Sydney in 2009 to further your career, from growing up in Auckland. How did you get into jazz music? And how has the move helped your career?
A: My first introduction to jazz was through the ABRSM (Associated Board of the Royal School of Music) jazz piano syllabus which was released in the early 2000s. I'd been playing piano since I was about 5, but somehow it hadn't ever resonated with me and I was a pretty poor student.
With the new jazz syllabus came my first exposure to improvisation ... and I was hooked. I eventually started a trio with a couple of high school mates; we picked up a regular gig at a little cafe near the beach in Auckland where we'd play Saturday and Sunday afternoons.
In 2007 I was ... at a bit of a loss as to what to do with music. That year I made a trip to Australia to see the Wangaratta Jazz Festival, and was blown away by the standard of the music and the infrastructure of the scene - there were jazz clubs everywhere. I ... made the decision to apply for the Sydney Conservatorium and complete my degree in Australia.
Since then I've had the opportunity to play with and learn from many world-class musicians around the country, people like Dale Barlow, Jamie Oehlers and James Muller - opportunities which are a little harder to come by in New Zealand given the size of the scene. - Craig Sinclair
The show: The Steven Barry Quartet plays on Saturday, October 25 at 6pm, at the Queenstown Memorial Centre.
The Queenstown Jazz Festival runs from October 24-26.
