Jazz trio Catfish are a mainstay of the buzzing Melbourne cafe scene.
Guitarist Sam O'Halloran explains where the band's distinctive jazz-manouche sound comes from. “It’s kind of a mixture between Django Reinhardt, some modern jazz and to some extent more popular music. We like to see how many styles and grooves we can get out of the traditional 'two guitars and double bass' manouche trio format. That's been one of the main challenges; navigating without drums and getting different textures and timbres happening.
“One of the great things about jazz manouche is that the guitars are very percussive instruments. We take a fair amount of influence from modern gypsy bands as well, such as a french band Les Doigts De L'homme.”
The style of music Catfish play is well suited to the local circuit of restaurants and cafes. “Traditionally the music is played in a social setting, even someone's living room, and it's basically whoever's got an instrument, which makes it maybe a little less definitive than a rock & roll band. The trio is popular more than anything because it is so versatile. You have to be a soloist and a rhythm player and it fills all the registers.”
“I've played the OzManouche the past two years — it's such a great festival and such a welcoming environment.”
Sam, bassist Sean, and second guitarist Adam are formally-trained musicians who bonded over an enthusiasm for jazz. “I was on a music course with Adam, we connected well and decided we needed to make a bit of money so started playing around a bit. He's been along for the journey since about 2010. We've played together every Monday night for the last three years. Sean joined us in 2013. He was new to the style at the time, so he was really thrown in at the deep end.”
Sam explains one of the pitfalls of the manouche style. “We've really tried to avoid making 'background music'. I think it draws on a broad range of emotions. That’s one thing we have been very aware of is not being a background-music band, but there is that side to jazz manouche where it does fill that gap remarkably well, probably more so than any other style of music.”
Catfish will soon release there self-titled first album. “It's mostly standards, but there's one original on it. Most of it is more trad repertoire and there’s one or two gypsy songs. There's a modern one by Mike Stearn on there too. We recorded it as a trio over a couple of days at a friend's recording set-up, all done live. It was great to really define our sound. And also take the opportunity to mix in some other things that we haven't really thought about in the more casual setting.”
The CD will be ready by the time Catfish play OzManouche in late November, a festival focussing mainly on the manouche jazz style. “It's a big date in our calendar. The trio has been on the slow boil for the last three years, it’s been a fairly organic build-up of our repertoire. OzManouche has kind of been a catalyst to getting us off our arses. The Monday night gig is great, but it's a restaurant-y kind of alternative place. The kind of thing we want to move into now is more ticketed events. I've played OzManouche the past two years and it's such a great festival and such a welcoming environment. There are a lot of punters down there and they get really into it, so it's a good spot for us.”
Written by Nicholas Atkins
Catfish play OzManouche Festival at Brisbane Jazz Club on Friday 28th November.
