The Nublu Club is a club in
East Village, Manhattan
The East Village is a neighborhood on the East Side of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is roughly defined as the area east of the Bowery and Third Avenue, between 14th Street on the north and Houston Street on the south. The East Villag ...
, New York, that was opened in 2002 by Swedish-Turkish saxophonist
Ilhan Ersahin İlhan is a Turkish language, Turkish male given name and a surname. It is also used as a feminine given name. Notable with the name include:
Title
* Ilkhanate, Hulagu Khan's khanate, title of Hulagu Khan.
Given name
* İlhan Eker, Turkish footbal ...
. On its 10th anniversary the club's namesake festival presented what it calls the Nublu Sound, a combination of jazz, African, South American, Caribbean, electronic, and dance music. Among the bands associated with Nublu are
The Brazilian Girls,
Forro in the Dark
Forro in the Dark is a New York City, New York-based collective of Brazilian expatriates that formed in 2002. The group combines the musical style of forró (pronounced "faw-HAW"), "the percussion-heavy, rhythmic dance music" of their native Braz ...
, Love Trio, and
Wax Poetic
Wax Poetic is a New York-based trip hop band. The band came together in 1997 founded by Turkish musician Ilhan Erşahin, who is still a current member, playing tenor saxophone and keys. The group originated at the now defunct club Save the Robot ...
. Associates who perform there include
Butch Morris
Lawrence Douglas "Butch" Morris (February 10, 1947 – January 29, 2013) was an American cornetist, composer and conductor. He was known for pioneering his structural improvisation method, ''Conduction'', which he utilized on many recordings.
B ...
,
John Zorn
John Zorn (born September 2, 1953) is an American composer, conductor, saxophonist, arranger and producer who "deliberately resists category". Zorn's avant-garde and experimental approaches to composition and improvisation are inclusive of jaz ...
,
Sun Ra Arkestra
The Sun Ra Arkestra is an American jazz group formed in the mid-1950s and led by keyboardist/composer Sun Ra until his death in 1993. The group is considered a pioneer of afrofuturism. As of 2022, the Arkestra is led by saxophonist Marshall Alle ...
,
David Byrne
David Byrne (; born 14 May 1952) is a Scottish-American singer, songwriter, record producer, actor, writer, music theorist, visual artist and filmmaker. He was a founding member and the principal songwriter, lead singer, and guitarist of ...
,
Caetano Veloso
Caetano Emanuel Viana Teles Veloso (; born 7 August 1942) is a Brazilian composer, singer, guitarist, writer, and political activist. Veloso first became known for his participation in the Brazilian musical movement Tropicalismo, which encomp ...
,
Gilberto Gil
Gilberto Passos Gil Moreira (; born 26 June 1942), is a Brazilian singer-songwriter and politician, known for both his musical innovation and political activism. From 2003 to 2008, he served as Brazil's Minister of Culture in the administration ...
,
Norah Jones
Norah Jones (born Geethali Norah Jones Shankar; March 30, 1979) is an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. She has won several awards for her music and as of 2012, has sold more than 50 million records worldwide. ''Billboard'' named her the ...
, and
Bebel Gilberto
Isabel Buarque de Hollanda Gilberto de Oliveira (born May 12, 1966), known as Bebel Gilberto, is an American-born Brazilian popular singer often associated with bossa nova. She is the daughter of João Gilberto and singer Miúcha. Her uncle is ...
.
Nublu currently has two locations, Nublu 151 located at 151 Ave C, and Nublu Classic located at 62 Ave C, as well as a Record Label "Nublu Records"
History
Ersahin had been developing festival programming from New York since moving there from Sweden when he was 20 years old, in addition to packaging performance for festivals in Turkey, his father's homeland. Before opening Nublu, Ersahin had worked for a decade at the
Sweet Basil Jazz Club
Sweet Basil was a jazz club in New York City's Greenwich Village, located at 88 Seventh Avenue South. Founded in 1974 by Sharif Esmat, it was considered among the most prominent New York City jazz clubs of its day. Many jazz albums were recorded l ...
. The musicians he performed with became part of the Nublu collective. Nublu Club grew out of parties he was throwing at venues in Manhattan where friends performed. He came up with the term "Nublu" to convey his eclectic aesthetic.
The club has a nondescript exterior with a concrete ramp to a blank door. The layout of the club was designed to ensure that music was central to the patrons' experience by placing the performers on floor level in the middle of the long club, as opposed to being up on a stage at one end. When the club briefly lost its license, it closed for one year from 2011–2012, during which Nublu events such as Butch Morris and the Nublu Orchestra were held downstairs at Lucky Cheng's on 1st Avenue. Nublu reopened with a new beer and wine license in 2012 at a new location further north on Ave C. The club's return featured one of the Nublu's touchstones, the Sun Ra Arkestra led by
Marshall Allen
Marshall Belford Allen (born May 25, 1924) is an American free jazz and avant-garde jazz alto saxophone player. He also performs on flute, oboe, piccolo, and EWI (an electronic valve instrument made by Steiner, Crumar company).
Allen is best ...
.
Nublu bands and label
The house band was Love Trio, the group Ersahin put together in 2002 with
Jesse Murphy and drummer
Kenny Wollesen
Kenny Wollesen (born 1966) is an American drummer and percussionist.
Wollesen has recorded and toured with Tom Waits, Sean Lennon, Ron Sexsmith, Bill Frisell, Norah Jones, John Lurie, Myra Melford, Steven Bernstein, and John Zorn. He is a foun ...
who had worked with him at his Saturday brunch jams at Sweet Basil's in the West Village. Another band at the heart of the Nublu experience in the early days was
Wax Poetic
Wax Poetic is a New York-based trip hop band. The band came together in 1997 founded by Turkish musician Ilhan Erşahin, who is still a current member, playing tenor saxophone and keys. The group originated at the now defunct club Save the Robot ...
, an improvising collective. Their first performances took place at
Save the Robots Save the Robots was an underground after hours club in New York City's East Village, Manhattan, East Village neighborhood. "Robots," as the venue was popularly known, operated illegally from a nondescript storefront and basement at 25 Avenue B, betw ...
on
Avenue B. The recordings featured
spoken word
Spoken word refers to an oral poetic performance art that is based mainly on the poem as well as the performer's aesthetic qualities. It is a late 20th century continuation of an ancient oral artistic tradition that focuses on the aesthetics of ...
from poet
Saul Williams
Saul Stacey Williams (born February 29, 1972) is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, musician, poet, writer, and actor. He is known for his blend of poetry and alternative hip hop, and for his lead roles in the 1998 independent film ''Slam'' ...
. Its first vocalists include
Norah Jones
Norah Jones (born Geethali Norah Jones Shankar; March 30, 1979) is an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. She has won several awards for her music and as of 2012, has sold more than 50 million records worldwide. ''Billboard'' named her the ...
,
Bebel Gilberto
Isabel Buarque de Hollanda Gilberto de Oliveira (born May 12, 1966), known as Bebel Gilberto, is an American-born Brazilian popular singer often associated with bossa nova. She is the daughter of João Gilberto and singer Miúcha. Her uncle is ...
, and Sabina of the
Brazilian Girls
Brazilian Girls is a band from New York City, New York, United States, known for their eclectic blend of electronic dance music with musical styles as diverse as tango music, tango, chanson, house music, house, reggae and lounge music, lounge ( ...
.
Other Ersahin ensembles that refined their sound at the Nublu club are Wonderland and Our Theory. A key member of the scene was
Butch Morris
Lawrence Douglas "Butch" Morris (February 10, 1947 – January 29, 2013) was an American cornetist, composer and conductor. He was known for pioneering his structural improvisation method, ''Conduction'', which he utilized on many recordings.
B ...
, the creator of Conduction, who led the Nublu Orchestra from the opening of the club until his death in 2013.
References
{{East Village, Manhattan
Jazz clubs in New York City
East Village, Manhattan