Portland’s Albina district was once a center for Black musicians in this country — producing some classic jazz, soul and gospel albums and bands. The newest record in Albina Music Trust’s catalog features Portland-based producers remixing some of the city’s historic music. Music producer Tony Ozier and DJ Jumbo join us to share some of the music and talk about the collaboration.
The following transcript was transcribed digitally and validated for accuracy, readability and formatting by an OPB volunteer.
Dave Miller: This is Think Out Loud on OPB. I’m Dave Miller. For the last few years, Albina Music Trust has focused on celebrating, restoring and finding new audiences for the classic jazz, soul and gospel that was made in Portland in the 1960s and 1970s. The nonprofit has done that through events and exhibitions, record re-releases and oral histories. Its latest effort is a remix album. Five Portland-based producers are given access to the AMT catalog to come up with their own spins on classic Portland tracks. The new album is called “Soul Assembly,” it comes out on Friday.
I’m joined now by two of the producers who are a part of this project. Tony Ozier and Jumbo, welcome.
Jumbo: Good to be here, Thanks for having us.
Tony Ozier: Thanks for having us.
Miller: Tony, how did this project come to be?
Ozier: It started off some years ago with me coming and doing a radio show with Bobby, and he started playing me all of these funk records that had come up through the Albina Music Trust. I thought it was interesting that none of the musicians in town knew about this whole funk episode of Portland.
Miller: You mean none of the younger musicians?
Ozier: Younger musicians and musicians that I was working with in the city at the time.
Miller: You didn’t grow up in Portland, right?
Ozier: No, I didn’t, I grew up in Texas.
Miller: But Jumbo, you did.
Jumbo: Born and raised.
Miller: But you’re a different generation from the folks who were making music in the ‘60s or ‘70s, right? You were a kid of the ‘70s and ‘80s.
Jumbo: That’s right, ‘70s baby.
Miller: So how familiar were you with these musicians from people around you?
Jumbo: Very familiar. It was just people from around the neighborhood. Uncle Ray, Uncle Rick, my Uncle Charles put me up on all of them. As a kid, they used to take me over their basements when they rehearse or sneak me into the after hours joint. And that’s what pretty much made me pay attention to all the music and the musicians.
Miller: Did you know Janice Scroggins?
Jumbo: I did.
Miller: The amazing pianist who is a part of this, I saw some of her work was sampled. She’s a teacher too, right?
Jumbo: Yes.
Miller: Why did you want to take part in this?
Jumbo: I look at it as the term like Sankofa, pay it forward. Tony brought the vision, and Bobby and Tony both talked to me about what’s a good way to be a bridge towards not just keeping this music alive, but educating folks on the shoulders of the giants that we stand on. Because some of this music was never released. And this is a way where we could actually educate people that this is not just the past. Portland is not just this hidden gem or this secret that people know about, that it has had its own scene, we were listening, developing, the arts, theater, life, culture has been thriving, and we’re here to stay.
Miller: Tony, can you give us a sense just for the diversity of the music that Albina Music Trust has – I was going to say rediscovered, it’s not like it was lost – brought back to the attention of a lot of people?
Ozier: Yeah, it was brought back to the attention of a lot of people because of Bobby, man. Bobby has really seriously been pushing this catalog since it was handed over to him. And the catalog, it’s pretty large. Even with the project that we did, because I’ve been involved with it so long, I didn’t realize that there’s still more stuff that I have that’s not even out, that’s in the archive, but it’s not like on an album, it’s never been released. So there’s still more music that has not been released.
Miller: Let’s listen to one of the tracks, Tony, this is one of the ones that you did. It’s called “PDX FUNK.” Let’s listen to it first and we can talk about it.
[”PDX FUNK” by Tony Ozier playing]
Miller: So what are we hearing here besides your producer magic?
Ozier: This is probably one of the first tunes that I made after I got the archive, and I was specifically looking for something with Janice on it. So the pianos that you’re hearing in this music, it’s Janice Scroggins.
Miller: Oh I didn’t realize that.
Ozier: Yes, that is Janice Scroggins. And then I’m a musician as well, so I’m playing bass and different instruments on it.
But this is kind of how it started. And from here, it just branched out. I started handing out the music to the homies, and now here we are with the Soul Assembly record, and we’re really looking forward to the party on Saturday.
Miller: Jumbo, I should mention that not all of the Albania Music Trust albums are from the 1960s and 1970s. You and a bunch of other producers remixed songs by Roman Norfleet and Be Present Art Group.
Jumbo: That’s correct.
Miller: Who are they?
Jumbo: If you know the name Sun Ra, if you are into any type of “spiritual jazz,” free jazz, or whatever you want to call it, Roman and the Be Present Art Group is our modern day, basically. Specifically speaking, there was parts in their catalog that is very spiritual. And so my idea is gravitate, sample towards the spiritual part, and that’s the part where the reimagination could come from. There was a chant with symbols, and just you can hear the vulnerability and the pain. And so I gravitated towards that, and decided to put an arrangement around it. And that’s what became one of the songs.
Miller: So I want to play a couple clips, portions from one of their original songs, “Something’s Happening.” We’ll hear two different parts. Let’s hear first one of the pieces of the original.
[”Something’s Happening” by Roman Norfleet and Be Present Art Group playing – saxophone and tambourine music]
Miller: And here’s another part. This is from “Something’s Happening,” the original song made just a couple of years ago by the group Roman Norfleet and Be Present Art Group.
[”Something’s Happening” by Roman Norfleet and Be Present Art Group playing – saxophone music with vocals and a toddler voice in the background]
Miller: So Jumbo, there’s just two parts of this long track because they showed us different things. So you heard this, did you hear dozens of songs when you were looking for the raw material?
Jumbo: I’d say over a hundred.
Miller: But this is one of the ones that you zeroed in on. Why? What did you hear that made you say, “I want to take this, chop it up and make it my own?”
Jumbo: I heard a plethora of emotions. I heard sadness, I heard pain, I heard triumph, I heard tragedy. I heard a baby, I heard family.
Miller: Literally, there’s a toddler that you can hear.
Jumbo: Yeah, in the room.
I felt like this is a record that, when I’m when I’ve journeyed on, the ancestors will be proud of that. I feel like that’s where it came from. So the track begins with this beautiful sort of simple piano arrangement, and then it morphs into, I had to pull out some of my Moog synthesizers and my little trademark synths that Tony loves. And that became “Something’s Happening.”
Miller: Let’s have a listen, this is your version.
[”Something’s Happening” by Jumbo playing – faster tempo track plays, incorporating synthesizers and previous tracks]
Miller: This is “Something’s Happening,” a remix by Jumbo.
Tony, I want to squeeze in a little bit more music, starting with an original song by the group Youthsound. This is something we talked about on this show three or four years ago because it blew me away. It’s a 100-person choir, with elementary school students all the way up to high school students. The recording was made at Jefferson High School in May of 1982, with something like 1,500 people there. And then they had some adult musicians, some young people playing as well, soloists.
We’re gonna hear a little bit of the end of the performance, it’s called “Be Grateful.” This is one of the tracks that was turned into a remix. So let’s have a listen to part of the original. This is recorded at Jefferson High School in 1982.
[”Be Grateful” by Youthsound playing – lively track, with saxophone solo and large youth choir]
Miller: Tony, what do you think about this song?
Ozier: Oh man, I love this song. This is Mr. Barry’s baby right here. I feel like that’s part of the reason why the record is called the “Soul Assembly.” The “Be Grateful” track is amazing. We were just sitting here talking about how like three or four of us all did something to “Be Grateful.” But this one is the one.
Jumbo: This was our favorite.
Ozier: Yeah, this was the favorite.
Miller: So let’s hear that, the TROX remix. He called it “Portland Ain’t Dead.”
Ozier: That’s right.
Miller: Let’s have a listen.
[”Portland Ain’t Dead” by TROX playing]
Ozier: Man, TROX, boy.
Miller: Have you guys had conversations yourselves with any of the original musicians whose work you used?
Jumbo: Yes.
Miller: What are those conversations like?
Ozier: I’m gonna be honest, I haven’t had a whole lot of conversations with them since we’ve done this. But I know them. Like, I know Randy Monroe. I knew Janice Scroggins, Linda Hornbuckle, I know these people. And as somebody that’s not from Portland, those are the people that took me under their wings and brought me in.
Jumbo: Yep.
Miller: They welcomed you?
Ozier: Yes, with open arms. Janice Scroggins, Linda Hornbuckle, LaRhonda Steele. Those three right there, for sure. And then they introduced me to all of the other musicians in town. That’s how I’m even known here, 100%.
Jumbo: A lot of people don’t know this, Calvin Walker is very impactful to my musical journey. Still consider him a friend and a mentor. We talk regularly. He was actually my first manager for the group Lifesavas. So much history was given to me at a young age from him as he was navigating through his musical career as well.
And speaking to, back to “Be Grateful” and the title of the record “Soul Assembly,” why it’s super important for people to understand – this was in the wake of the aftermath of what had happened to Dr. King in the late ‘60s. And at that time, the newspapers weren’t super friendly to the arts, music and education at the time. So here you have Jefferson High School having not just a talent show, but a full on production with theater, sermons, full on play musicians, the elders, some of the younger talent that became Pleasure, The Legendary Beyons and so many others. And it was so successful that other high schools – at that time, Beaverton – wanted them to come and perform. And then it ended up landing at what was the Civic Auditorium that’s now been renamed, they played it there.
Ozier: Keller Auditorium.
Jumbo: Yeah, the Keller. So it’s such an excess just to prove how education, music and why the arts is important. And I’ve heard people say that art imitates life. I’m gonna say back then, life was imitating art.
Miller: Tony Ozier and Jumbo, thanks so much.
Ozier: Thanks for having us.
Jumbo: Thank you.
Miller: Tony and Jumbo are two of the five DJs who did remixes for the new Albina Music Trust album, “Soul Assembly,” which is dropping on Friday.
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