Nass­er Khan

April is jazz month in­ter­na­tion­al­ly, and here in T&T there have been sev­er­al cel­e­bra­to­ry events.

At one such event ear­li­er this month, the Sun­day Guardian caught up with the ever-smil­ing and af­fa­ble jazz vo­cal­ist Vaugh­nette Big­ford while fol­low­ing her scin­til­lat­ing per­for­mance at the band­stand in the Pres­i­dent's Grounds at a con­cert cour­tesy the Unit­ed States Em­bassy and the Uni­ver­si­ty of Trinidad and To­ba­go's Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts.

Billed as "an evening un­der the stars...bring your blan­kets and chairs," the au­di­ence was treat­ed to an ar­ray of en­joy­able per­for­mances, in­clud­ing those by Big­ford and ace pan­nist Len "Boogsie" Sharpe, as the beau­ti­ful sounds of jazz res­onat­ed through­out the botan­i­cal gar­dens and be­yond.

In her late 30s, Big­ford's rich, warm, earthy tones draw you in, as she de­liv­ers ef­fort­less­ly on some of the most time­less stan­dards and bal­lads. She de­buted on the jazz cir­cuit at the Steel­pan & Jazz Fes­ti­val in 2004, grac­ing the stage lat­er that same year at the San Fer­nan­do Jazz Fes­ti­val, where she al­so ap­peared in 2005 and 2006. Many still re­call her mem­o­rable so­lo act at the YW­CA's Sis­ters in Song, a Caribbean Jazz Con­cert in 2007, fea­tur­ing lo­cal well-known ex­po­nents Mavis John and Chan­tal Es­delle.

Her fo­cus and hard work paid div­i­dends in 2008 when she be­came one of few Caribbean na­tion­als ever to be award­ed a schol­ar­ship to at­tend Boston's pres­ti­gious Berklee Col­lege of Mu­sic Sum­mer Per­for­mance Pro­gramme.

She has par­tic­i­pat­ed in and suc­cess­ful­ly com­plet­ed Berklee Col­lege of Mu­sic's five-week Vo­cal Sum­mit and Stage Per­for­mance Work­shops, and more re­cent­ly, in 2010, be­came a full-time stu­dent of the col­lege and com­plet­ed the 12-week full cred­it sum­mer pro­gramme.

Her list of ap­pear­ances keeps grow­ing as she show­cas­es her vo­cal met­tle: Jazz Artistes on the Greens, Trinidad; La­dy Got Chops Women's Jazz Fes­ti­val, New York, USA; Earth­sound CD Re­lease Par­ty, Ryles Jazz Club, Cam­bridge, Mass­a­chu­setts, USA; Berklee Sum­mer Con­cert Se­ries, with Ron Reid and Sun­steel, Boston, USA; the Louis Arm­strong Birth­day Jazz Con­cert, with Jazz singer Gwyn Jay Allen, New York, USA; and the Bean­town Jazz Fes­ti­val, Boston, USA with Gabrielle Good­man and Nona Hendryx.

She has al­so suc­cess­ful­ly pro­duced two full-length con­certs called "Shades of Vaugh­nette" which have re­ceived rave re­views and con­tin­ue to be shown on lo­cal tele­vi­sion.

Vaugh­nette Big­ford con­tin­ues to charm her lis­ten­ers wher­ev­er she per­forms.

Q: When and how did you get in­to the busi­ness of en­ter­tain­ing?

A: I al­ways sang, all through school, al­ways been on stage, from the age of sev­en con­sumed by the arts, even per­form­ing at the San Fer­nan­do Arts Na­pari­ma Bowl at the San Fer­nan­do arts fes­ti­val. I think it was just a nat­ur­al thing af­ter be­ing prod­ded a bit by my hus­band. I start­ed off singing pro­fes­sion­al­ly with Carl­ton Alexan­der and the Coalpot Band and start­ed do­ing my own stuff af­ter a while.

Is this your full-time "work"?

I do so wish, how­ev­er, it's tough try­ing to sur­vive and make a con­sis­tent in­come as a jazz artiste. I work in the oil and gas in­dus­try as a health and safe­ty prac­ti­tion­er.

Where were you born and where did you grow up?

I was born and still live in La Brea, nev­er moved...I love it!

Who were the peo­ple who have in­flu­enced you the most in your ca­reer and in life in gen­er­al and how did they?

I was in­flu­enced by many; my fam­i­ly, my hus­band are all very sup­port­ive. Mu­si­cal­ly, I lis­tened to a lot of the song­book singers: El­la, Car­men, Louis, Sarah. I grew up on this mu­sic and it was a nat­ur­al thing for me to progress in­to jazz. Lo­cal­ly, I've been sup­port­ed and in­flu­enced by most of those who are still around–Theron Shaw, Ron Reid, Ming, Zan­da, Pat­ti Rogers and a host of oth­ers.

At what schools/in­sti­tu­tions did you re­ceive your ed­u­ca­tion?

Brighton An­gli­can School in La Brea and the Point Fortin Col­lege, both of which were re­al­ly in­stru­men­tal. I stud­ied voice with Chris Bal­bosa and Jes­sel Mur­ray in Trinidad, how­ev­er, when I was ready to take the leap in­to jazz I left the coun­try to study with a few artists abroad. I even­tu­al­ly end­ed up at the Berklee Col­lege of Mu­sic in Boston for one year where I gained most of my knowl­edge, in­for­ma­tion and in­sight in­to this genre of mu­sic and en­ter­tain­ment busi­ness in gen­er­al. I con­tin­ue to study pri­vate­ly with dif­fer­ent mu­si­cians from time to time.

If you could pick any singer and/or band to per­form just for you (non-West In­di­an), who would you choose?

Sur­pris­ing­ly, right now, it would not be a jazz group. I am heavy in­to Steely Dan these days.

What dai­ly mot­to/cre­do do you live by and in three words, your recipe for suc­cess?

"Say what you need to say," and my recipe for suc­cess will have to be the in­gre­di­ents of love, hu­mil­i­ty and con­sis­ten­cy.

What are your most prized pos­ses­sions: one tan­gi­ble, one in­tan­gi­ble?

My iPAD and my smile.

Of all your shows, con­certs, per­for­mances, which would you like a first-time au­di­ence, lis­ten­er, view­er to ex­pe­ri­ence?

I did a con­cert many years ago called "Sis­ters in Song". This con­cert fea­tured Chan­tal Es­delle and Mavis John and was pro­duced by an amaz­ing group of peo­ple. To date, I still think it's my best vo­cal per­for­mance ever.

Tell us about your in­spi­ra­tion to do the type of 'work' you do.

I love be­ing on stage, I think it's such a gift to be able to move peo­ple with your in­ter­pre­ta­tion and ex­pres­sion via song. I tell peo­ple that I am al­ways more con­cerned with whether some­one was touched af­ter a per­for­mance than how "good" I sound­ed. I think that's what makes it spe­cial, that peo­ple are moved.

Of all your ac­co­lades, prizes and awards which do you rate as ex­treme­ly spe­cial?

I did a con­cert in Ju­ly of 2010 as a trib­ute to Louis Arm­strong at the Louis Arm­strong Mu­se­um in Coro­na, Queens. It fea­tured a cou­ple of duets with Gwyn Jay Allen of Sier­ra Leone, where we sang some "Louis and El­la" duets. Af­ter the per­for­mance, an el­der­ly la­dy who hap­pened to be per­son­al friends with Louis Arm­strong said to me, "Whoo child, El­la would have been proud!" Man, I felt like ah mil­lion dol­lars!

If you had to per­form for an au­di­ence who had nev­er heard or seen you be­fore and you had to per­form one song, which would you?

Who God Bless by Ras Shorty.

What goals and or am­bi­tions do you still have?

A lot. Com­plet­ing my first record­ing, trav­el­ling the world play­ing my mu­sic, head­ing back to school, hav­ing a fam­i­ly...and the list goes on.

What is an in­ter­est­ing facet of your per­son­al­i­ty that most peo­ple do not know about you?

I am ex­treme­ly sen­si­tive, I cry quite eas­i­ly.

What is the best com­pli­ment you have every re­ceived?

I've been told that my smile lights up a room, gets me every time.

De­scribe your­self in two words one be­gin­ning with V, the oth­er with B, your ini­tials.

Ver­sa­tile, Beau­ti­ful.

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