Tell us about your new single/ album/ tour?
“Yakiya” is the band’s first album together. It demonstrates the deep and eclectic interests we have in the music of North and South India, Bali, Brazil, Cuba and many other musics from around the world. We use jazz, improvisation and composition to find a dynamic, playful and respectful place to experiment and innovate with these genres.
What’s your favourite work at this point in time? (your own or your group’s work)
Rather than a single tune – because they are all favourites – the process we are most wanting our audiences to be aware of involves the fact that every performance is a spontaneous mash-up of the repertoire we have developed. We are working on an increasingly complex and flexible cueing system that allows any member of the band to cue and overlay any aspect of any tune over another. This guarantees and fresh and exciting experience for our audiences!
Tell us a quick, on the road or studio, anecdote.
The band members are all multi-instrumentalists. Two play trombone, and we all play hand-drums belonging to different cultures – Adrian plays mridangam and other South Indian percussion; Jonathan plays tabla from North India, and Adam plays kendang from Indonesia.
What, or who, inspires you?
We are continuously inspired by the musics of non-Western cultures, as well as contemporary art music of the West, jazz, and all its contemporary hybrids. There are endless practitioners of these genres – past and present – who continue to inspire. Some of Tripataka’s early inspiration stems from M-Base and the music of Steve Coleman.
Which song do you wish you wrote?
That’s a funny question, because we’re all conscious of the fundamental principle of process in creativity. Ownership of songs in a lot of musical traditions is a bit tangential to the point, as songs are considered to be in service of some higher purpose. As creative artists our goal is to invent and reinvent ourselves, to improve, to express what is true, and to discover and create. Having said that, if I wrote Sting’s “Every Breath You Take” I think I would have more financial independence!
How would you describe your sound in food form and why?
Hot, spicy, and full of textural surprises. Mango lassi with a few chilli peppers inside? Rhythmically-charged and cyclical – always returning renewed for more!
What’s next for you?
We have stacks of repertoire and would like to record more of it to document our work of recent times. We’d also like to tour interstate to Sydney and Brisbane again.
What’s your scene?
Our music requires a lot of practice, so we like to practice regularly. We’ll be in the practice room, and out sharing our discoveries every month or so with the public.
The Tripataka Sound
Tripataka performs original compositions by the band members and unique arrangements of jazz repertoire. Adrian, Jonathan and Adam nd endless inspiration in the music of North and South India, Bali, Brazil, Cuba and many other musics from around the world. Trained in these intercultural forms as well as jazz and European classical music, the breadth of their combined experience and instrumental resources far surpasses that of a typical contemporary jazz trio.
Listening to Tripataka is a journey; a journey not only through worlds of music, but also through contemporary processes of blending and layering, where improvisation and xed compositions nd a nexus fuelled by rhythmically-charged cyclic forms.
About The Tripataka Name
Tripataaka is a Sanskrit term used in Bharatanatyam, the classical dance form of South India, and translates to mean “three parts of the ag”. It refers to a mudra (hand gesture) used by dancers. The mudra can represent a crown, an arrow, thunder or ames of re. The association with the monk Tripitaka who featured in Monkey, the Japanese television cult drama from the late 1970s is a happy tangent, as is the association with the Melbourne vegetarian restaurant Trippy Taco!
Who Is Tripataka?
Tripataka was formed in early 2013 in Melbourne, Australia. The group consists of:
Adrian Sherriff – bass trombone, morsing, bata, percussion, voice
Jonathan Dimond – 6-string and fretless electric bass guitars, percussion, voice
Adam King – drums, voice