Nublu Club

The Nublu Club was opened in New York's East Village in 2002 by Swedish-Turkish saxophone player, composer, bandleader and entrepreneur, Ilhan Ersahin.^[1]

On its 10th anniversary the club’s namesake festival was able to showcase the loose collective of bands whose eclectic aesthetic, reflecting Ersahin’s own, has come to be known as the Nublu Sound, a mix of improvisational jazz with African, South American, Caribbean, electronic and dance sounds.^[2][3][4] Many of these artists had either formed or built up their fanbase performing at Nublu. Among the bands most closely associated with Nublu are: The Brazilian Girls; Forro in the Dark; Love Trio and Wax Poetic. Close associates who may sometimes jam or conduct gigs there include Butch Morris, the creator of Conduction and conductor of the Nublu Orchestra; John Zorn; the Sun Ra Arkestra; David Byrne; Caetano Veloso; Gilberto Gil; Norah Jones and Bebel Gilberto.^[5][6]

Ersahin's background in event and club promotion

Ersahin had already been developing festival programming from New York since moving there from Sweden when he was 20 years old, and packaging performance for festivals in Turkey, his father’s homeland. Prior to opening Nublu, Ersahin had worked for a decade in various capacities at the venerable West Village jazz haunt, Sweet Basil Jazz Club. There, he secured a steady Saturday brunch gig, and the musicians he performed with became the nucleus of the Nublu collective. Nublu Club grew out of parties he was throwing at various spaces round Manhattan, where friends would perform.^[7]

Nublu Club and the Nublu Sound

When Ilhan Ersahin opened Nublu as a late-night hangout, in 2002, the Lower East Side still retained the bohemian atmosphere that has inevitably largely been lost along with “development”; still, around the world, Nublu is known as the area’s creative, independent-minded nightlife survivor. “My aim was not to do a big club; my first aim was to do a little café and have friends hang out and play,” Ersahin told Christopher Port of JazzTimes. “One day I just saw this space that was for rent in the East Village. It was a perfect space: the rent wasn’t too expensive, it had a beautiful garden, it had this organic club feel to it.” He later came up with the term “Nublu” to convey his eclectic aesthetic. “I just thought Nublu was the proper name for the type of music we were doing,” he said. “It comes from the thinking of jazz — the Miles Davis-type thinking — using New York City elements, being open to different types of music.”^[8]

Since it began, the club has been known as a haven for jamming musicians. The excitement of seeing musicians improvising across contemporary cultural forms such as electronica, South American, African and Caribbean music, notably the dub sensibility that infuses trip hop; jazz and experimental free music, and turntable/DJ culture.

Many well-known jazz sidemen made Nublu their regular haunt, provoking repeated comparisons between Nublu and the legendary cutting sessions at clubs like Minton’s in the bebop era of the 1940s. Its underground atmosphere was enhanced by a nondescript exterior; a concrete ramp up to a blank door, remarkable only for one bare blue light.^[9] This anonymity, in an age of showbiz celebrity worship, was often noted by writers as giving Nublu an authentic, truly musical personality. The layout of the club was designed to ensure that music was completely central to the patrons’ experience, simply 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. This meant that the audience and the artists were not separated, and functioned in the same space, breaking down the fourth wall of traditional stagecraft and democratizing the creative process. This uniquely intimate ambiance in a club that holds 150 people, made it the favorite hang-out of artists who otherwise play in giant stadiums or warehouse danceclubs. Producer and DJ Moby told XLR8R magazine in 2008 that he "had more fun DJ'ing records for 75 people at Nublu than going on tour and performing in front of 10,000 people a night.”^[10][11][12]

Opening in Downtown New York in 2002 presented its own set of challenges, in the area still immediately traumatized by the impact of the 9/11 attacks. As Ersahin told the Village Voice’s K. Leander Williams, “Do you remember how dismal it was downtown after 9/11? I'm from Sweden and it was my dream to be in NYC, but at that time I contemplated leaving the States. Nublu was started as more of a rehearsal space. It was always open to the public, but I got the first wine and beer license basically so my friends could have a drink while hanging out between jams and stuff. The club was only supposed to be open a couple days a week, but then it just kinda took off. I think it became a more serious place before even I was ready for it to become one.”^[13]

As the area gentrified around it, Nublu continued to be a haven for the Nublu sound. The spirit of its community is such that even when the Club briefly lost its license, the Nublu family continued to function. After a closure of 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.^[14]

Nublu reopened with a new beer and wine license in 2012. The club’s return featured one of the Nublu’s key touchstones, the Sun Ra Arkestra headed by 88-year-old Marshall Allen. During the shift, Ersahin was setting up Nublu Club in Istanbul and touring the Nublu Festival in Brazil.^[15]

Nublu family of bands and label

The late-night jams at the heart of the Nublu vibe became a crucible for a family of bands. Some featured founder Ilhan Ersahin. Effectively the house band was Love Trio, the group Ersahin put together in 2002, featuring Jesse Murphy and drummer Kenny Wollesen who had worked with him at his Saturday brunch jams at Sweet Basil’s in the West Village.^[16]

Another band at the heart of the Nublu experience in the early days was Wax Poetic, an improvising collective with a trip-hop flavor. Their first performances took place at one of the last of the original late night after hours haunts that made the East Village infamous, Save the Robots on Avenue B. The sound was mellow cool jazz tinged, and their recordings featured spoken word from poets including Saul Williams and others.^[17] Different groups of Wax Poetic continue to perform and they are acknowledged Nublu ambassadors, frequently performing at their international Festivals.

Its first vocalists include Norah Jones, in some of her earliest recordings; Bebel Gilberto and Sabina of the Brazilian Girls.^[18][19] Such as Wax Poetic fed into the collectives that found a home at the Nublu label. 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, the creator of Conduction, who led the Nublu Orchestra from the opening of the club until his death in 2013. Of Butch, Ersahin said, “I was playing with his orchestra before I opened up Nublu,” Ersahin says. “Butch is a huge influence on all of Nublu and Nublu bands. He’s such an open-minded master. He’s like the hidden master behind the whole New York City downtown scene." ^[20]

The club became particularly known for its Wednesday night Brazilian sessions, featuring the modern Brazilian sound of Forro in the Dark and DJ Kaz.^[21] Brazilian artists like Gilberto Gil and Caetano Veloso stop by Nublu to jam or relax when they are in New York. David Byrne, a prominent aficionado of music from South America, can be seen on YouTube performing with Forro In The Dark.^[22] All the musicians on the Nublu Records roster, such as the edgy Brooklyn dance-pop trio Kudu, like to make the Nublu Club their home from home.

References