Courtesy of Francis Wong







Asian Improv

A FIRESIDE CHAT WITH FRANCIS WONG


Although Francis Wong has been commended for his involvement in advocating reparations for Japanese Americans wrongfully detained in prison camps during World War II, he is also one bad ass tenor player. When I hear him on record, as a leader, with Jon Jang, or Glenn Horiuchi, Wong sounds as committed as Sam Rivers or Joe Jarman. Wong sat down with me from his home in the Bay Area, unedited and in his own words.


FRED JUNG: Let's start from the beginning.

FRANCIS WONG: When I was in junior high, I was kind of taking saxophone. I started out on the violin, but when they cut the budget for the orchestra, I stayed in the band and so I took up the saxophone. My band teacher was a saxophonist and we used to hangout in the band room after school and he used to play us Charlie Parker records.


FJ: Which records?

FRANCIS WONG: I think the Savoy sessions. So I heard those Charlie Parker records and we would learn stocks. People might not be familiar with stocks, but stocks is a stock chart for big bands and all that. We used to play things like "Stuffy," the Coleman Hawkins tune and the swing stocks. This was in junior high. So that kind of got me started. Later on, that was the Seventies, early Seventies, so the area, the Bay Area was pretty rich with people who were around, Woody Shaw, Julius Hemphill, Oliver Lake, all these people were in this area and so that kind of influenced the atmosphere and so I got involved.


FJ: With such notable originals around, finding one's own voice is made easier.

FRANCIS WONG: Well, I think when I think about from Charlie Parker through John Coltrane through these guys, guys like Julius and Oliver and stuff like that, they are very themselves, originals and so it was all about finding one's own voice. That calls to mind that Monk quote that people quote all the time saying, "Be yourself in the music." I think that really helped me in terms of it wasn't trying to copy styles, but about trying to find myself in the music.


FJ: Have you reached that apex?

FRANCIS WONG: I think we are always trying, but, yeah, because being yourself is more of a process as opposed to a product. I think it is more like it is a practice. So you could say, "Well, I think that is what I am trying to do all the time."


FJ: Let's talk about your latest recording, Gathering of Ancestors.

FRANCIS WONG: Well, that came together as part of me and Elliot (Elliot Humberto Kavee) played together on lots and lots of projects. John-Carlos (John-Carlos Perea), who came out of San Francisco, who is very active in the American-Indian music area, he was a student of mine at San Francisco State and we had wanted to work together and so the three of us made a recording in a church. The whole idea is that we actually all grew up in San Francisco, but we are also from various, different ancestry and in some ways, getting together in a church and playing our music and bringing our heritages into the music. We were in some ways calling our ancestry forward and so that is where the whole idea of Gathering of Ancestors came from.


FJ: Let's touch on your involvement with the Asian Improv label.

FRANCIS WONG: I'm a co-founder and I think most importantly, I've guided it, Asian Improv, over the past, at least ten years and kind of developing it as a presenting organization and a resource for musicians and oversaw the growth of the roster and the number of titles that came out. The overall vision for Asian Improv has to do with promoting leadership by Asian Americans and that's why we have as a tagline "new direction in music by Asian Americans."


FJ: Are the voices of Asian Americans being heard?

FRANCIS WONG: I tend to not promote that idea because it makes it sound like there is this Asian American sound and actually, I don't believe in that is what we're trying to do. I think people have specific kinds of performance practices and music making practices, which is really diverse from musician to musician. I don't see it quite that way. I base it from my own involvement, which is all about a movement for leadership to tell our story, the story of Asian Americans through the music.


FJ: And Justice Matters (www.justicematters.org)?

FRANCIS WONG: Well, Justice Matters is an organization that was founded by my brother, Andrew Wong and Steven Phillips, who is a political, well, he is on the school board here. That was started as a training program for leaders, kind of grassroots, community leaders. We take folks out of college, coming out of college and give them a certain amount of skills and also training in organizing in communities and mentor them.


FJ: Asian Americans are notorious for sticking within their own and creating a functional cell within the community at large.

FRANCIS WONG: That's true, Fred, but our thing was never about Asians staying with themselves and playing music because the first record, Asian Improv 0001, the core performers were Jon Jang's 4 in One Quartet, which was Jon as the leader, myself, Eddie Moore, and James Lewis, two African Americans, so I think from the beginning, it was all about cross-cultural unity, but recognizing the individual identities of those performers.


FJ: You mentioned Eddie Moore, who has since passed. Moore is a Bay Area folk hero of sorts, but tragically is rarely recognized on a national level.

FRANCIS WONG: Well, I think that the first time I met him, even before we even shook hands, when I came to rehearsal, he just started playing and then I started playing and we all started playing and we kind of communicated that way. At the end of the rehearsal, this was '85, '86, we were just talking and he said, "One thing you ought to know is that there is never going to be a replacement for us live musicians." He just had that very strong mastery of playing music and also he was just a very big-hearted musician. He was so generous to us. So one week, he would be gone and playing with Sonny Rollins or Dewey Redman and the next week, he would come back to the Bay Area and he would be playing with us. He had a generous, magnanimous spirit toward carrying the music on.


FJ: What made you stay loyal to the Bay Area and not pack your bags for New York?

FRANCIS WONG: Well, I think part of the thing for me was that my growth in the music was tied a lot to my growth within the community here, the Asian American community or the broader Bay Area community. I think in general, I've been responsible for different kinds of activities, whether they be political or cultural and that my music making came out of that. So going to New York meant leaving that behind and I decided that I would rather stay here and do what I have done.


FJ: Being as politically involved as you are, what are some of your concerns regarding today's social climate?

FRANCIS WONG: Well, at least since we are talking today, I think there is a blatant lack of democracy and a blatant mockery of democracy. The whole situation in Florida is a reflection of that.


FJ: Having worked for a couple of Congressmen, a Senator, a Presidential hopeful, and a partridge in a pear tree, let's talk shop a moment.

FRANCIS WONG: Well, I think that Bush or Gore, I think the whole thing in Florida is throwing the stuff away, throwing the votes away because they may or may not influence the outcome. They are throwing away thousands and thousands of ballots and they are not really wanting to deal with the issues of basically barriers to basic voting rights and how those voting rights are restricted or disrestricted, depending on who you are.


FJ: Does it hammer home the creed that every vote does count?

FRANCIS WONG: Well, I think that once again, kind of referring to my musical thing, it is just the practice of it, in the sense that I think that the folks that are out there demonstrating at the courthouses and all that, they are making their vote count now. It doesn't end when someone goes in and casts their ballot. It is actually before they go into the voting booth and after. And I think what is great about all the activity that is going on and that people are flying in from all parts of the country to help out is, to me, that is the part about making the vote count. I guess to answer your question more directly, Fred, I guess it shows that every vote doesn't count.


FJ: As a musician, what do you lose sleep over?

FRANCIS WONG: I guess my feeling today has to do with continuing the artistic and spiritual integrity of what has been given to us by those who played the music before us.


FJ: Those who played the music before us made great sacrifices and often times were never rewarded for their labors. As a co-founder of an independent label, do majors just not get it?

FRANCIS WONG: No, but I don't know if that has really been the major label's responsibility in the first place anyway. It would be nice, but that is not why those major labels exist. It would be great if the major labels support it, but I think what, well, I don't have control over a major label so all I can do and what I try to encourage my colleagues on is that we're the ones making the music. We have the responsibilities on us to the extent that major labels make it difficult for us, well, OK, that is part of the trade.


FJ: Asian Improv has also fostered a working partnership with the Chicago based Southport label.

FRANCIS WONG: Well, I first met Bradley Parker-Sparrow when I visited that city as part of Jon Jang's Tiananmen project. I made a recording with Tatsu Aoki and Sparrow sat in and we recorded in Sparrow's studio. That was the beginning. We made some music together in Sparrow's studio and that record was released on Asian Improv. A lot of it grew out of the local partnership that Tatsu and Sparrow have in Chicago. It's about the common desire to promote the work of resident artists in Chicago and I think we in the Bay Area resonated with that because a lot of what Asian Improv is about is promoting leadership and work of resident artists in our community to a broader public.


FJ: And your hopes for the future?

FRANCIS WONG: I would like to see more compassion in the world.


Fred Jung is the Editor-In-Chief and crossing guard. Email Him.