Oscar-nominated Artist Jon Batiste Talks Influences, Culture, and his Latest Album
Article by Darby Vandeveen
PHOTO BY LOUIS BROWNE
If Jon Batiste isn’t a name you know, it’s time that you learn who he is. Fitting with our upcoming issue’s theme of new beginnings, musician and bandleader Jon Batiste talked about his growth, how he ended up with an Oscar-nominated movie, Soul, and his latest album, We Are. Throughout the interview, the energy was high and Batiste punctuated his answers with jazzy improvisation on his piano.
Born into a family of musicians, Batiste was taught to appreciate the power of music and his southern culture, beginning with his dad playing bass around the house. He explains, “I grew up in New Orleans. My father’s a musician. I have uncles that are musicians. My cousins, obviously, are musicians. It’s a very musical city. It’s a hub of black culture and world culture colliding all in these ways that are influential and inspiring.” From there, he described the food and architecture and how such small things can have such a big impact on how you acknowledge the world around you. “You have all of these different ways you are being taught to appreciate culture, appreciate tradition, and appreciate community.”
He took the values of culture, tradition and community and applied them to his studies at Julliard, and later during his professional career. The importance of music and passion in all of that was never lost. That passion is clear to see whenever Batiste put his fingers to the keys. They danced around the instrument, and expertly played melodies that lifted the spirit in the room, providing a good atmosphere for conversation.
“Music has always been a glue - a social glue - if you get people together and you make people feel the same emotion at the same time, it’s a lot easier to have nuanced conversation and it’s a lot easier to have dialogue.”
His latest album, We Are, is an extension of that dialogue. Infused with all types of culture, Batiste incorporates everything from hip-hop to jazz in an expansive and genre-less body of work. Even the name of the album has a spiritual meaning and outlook behind it. “We are - that’s it. A lot of times and we wait and we look around for the answer and we are. We look around for somebody to save us. We look around for somebody to understand who we are. And I look around at the times that we’re in and it’s the question and it’s the answer. We are? We are.”
Recorded in New York, Los Angeles, and New Orleans, each environment seeps into the album. Batiste revealed that a lot of We Are was recorded in his dressing room at The Late Show. After talking about the history of the room and venue, he added “I like to believe that all of that energy is just there and you don’t have a choice. That’s why you have to choose carefully where you want to capture your material and where you want to create.”
Outside of music, it is Batiste’s outlook on life and his role in it that makes him such a captivating speaker. He doesn’t believe in good and bad, he believes that everything is one.
“I look at my role as an activist and musician under the one umbrella of being a human...I just try to be the best version of myself and it creates opportunities for activism. It creates opportunities for creating music, it creates opportunities for everything in between and that’s it it’s all one.”
Batiste’s newest album, We Are is now available on all platforms.