David Sanchez Prefers to Mix It Up

David Sanchez arrives at the Jazz Bakery Tuesday night on the crest of a busyyear’s activities. A management change, extensive touring, gigs as a soloist as well as with his regular sextet, and activities supporting his latest Columbia album, “Melaza,” have kept the Puerto Rican saxophonist on a hectic schedule.

So it was no wonder that he was sneaking in a nap earlier this week shortly before he was scheduled to perform at Yoshi’s in Oakland.

“Oh man,” he grunted sleepily into the phone, “these time zone changes can really be tough. But, you know, I’m happy to be busy, and to have the chance to do so much playing.”

Sanchez’s West Coast itinerary takes him to the Jazz Bakery for a six-night run. A good part of the program will be devoted to the heady mixtures of roots and jazz on the new album.

“What I was trying to do in that album was to basically take things that came from the folkloric traditions of Puerto Rico and combine them with jazz,” he said. “Mix up the loose rhythms and harmonies of jazz, the rhythms of the bomba and the plena. It was my way of paying a little tribute to the Puerto Rican people who developed the music that I inherited.”

Sanchez, 32, heard the music at an early age. He started on conga drums--which he often plays on stage in between his saxophone soloing--before turning to the tenor. Although his father was a professional baseball player, his brother was a percussionist.

“He played with a group that included members of the Rafael Cepeda family, a very famous family in Puerto Rican music,” said Sanchez. “They were basically a bomba and plena group that used to play in the barrios, and I checked them out every week. But I always found myself drawn to a wide variety of music too.”

Which probably explains why Sanchez has worked throughout his career--and specifically in the music from “Melaza”--to find linkages between the traditional music he heard as a youth and the jazz that has been his focus for most of his adult life.

“When I put the album together,” he explained, “I realized that even though there are many similarities in phrasing, there is a real difference between Puerto Rican bomba and Afro Cuban rhythms. Bomba rhythm is not based on a two-bar phrase like salsa and other musics that come from Cuba that are based on a clave. Bomba is maybe closer to African music in that it is based on a one-bar rhythm, instead of two, which makes it possible to do a lot of interesting things--especially for a jazz artist--things that sound like they’re in seven, or something out of meter, but that are just based on repetitions of one-bar rhythms. And that’s what is at the heart of ‘Melaza.’ ”

That and more. The English translation of the title is “Molasses,” and the album’s subtext relates the efforts of the black workers who harvested the sugar cane to the process of making music.

In the album’s liner comments, Sanchez notes that “you work very hard and sacrifice a lot for something that surprises you as a sweet, rich result.”

The sweet surprise, in the case of the music on the album, as well as the music he will bring to the Jazz Bakery, is a set of works that manage to integrate their disparate elements without sacrificing any of their individual qualities. Sanchez’s band has been together as a unit for more than a year, and the extended tenure shows in the easy interaction between players--especially the two-saxophone front line in which he pairs with alto saxophonist Miguel Zenon.

“I like the two saxophones,” he said. “I’d been listening to a lot of different music, from Mingus to Ornette, before I did the album. Combining what I heard there with some of the Puerto Rican rhythms I knew and the melodies I was hearing led me to two lines, in a way that made rhythmic polyrhythms synonymous with melodic counterpoint. Two horns were perfect for that, and saxophones seemed way more flexible in terms of what I could do with harmony, whether it was close or open, or with fast passages, or with really slow sounds. Saxophones were definitely right for what I was hearing.”

The other members of the Sanchez sextet are Pernell Saturnino, percussion; Hans Glawishnig, bass; Antonio Sanchez, drums; and Edsel Gomez, piano.

“It’s a great group,” Sanchez concluded, “basically reflecting what I want to do with my music. And that makes me happy because I like to feel that honesty is what my music is all about--an organic expression of what happens in the moment.”

* The David Sanchez Sextet at the Jazz Bakery, 3233 Helms Ave., Culver City. Tuesday through Sunday at 8 and 9:30 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday, $22; next Friday through Dec. 17. $25. (310) 271-9039.

Holiday Jazz: If you’ve got a jazz fan in your family who can’t stop recalling the glory days of West Coast jazz in the ‘50s and ‘60s, here’s the perfect holiday present: The Hermosa Playhouse on Dec. 16 is holding a celebratory evening titled “A Jazz West Coast Christmas.”

The showencompasses a virtual all-star line of musicians, including Pete Rugolo, Conte and Pete Candoli, Howard Rumsey, Jack Sheldon, Jack Montrose, Dave Pell, Bill Perkins, Pete Jolly and numerous others. The program will be based on three holiday works: “June Christy and Pete Rugolo’s This Time of Year,” a collaboration from the early ‘60s recorded for Capitol Records; Shorty Rogers’ “Swingin’ Nutcracker”; and Stan Kenton’s “A Merry Christmas.”

The Christy/Rugolo collaboration, a set of original holiday songs, will be conducted by Rugolo, “Swingin’ Nutcracker” will be presented in its entirety, and the Kenton effort, from an early ‘60s recording featuring his mellophonium orchestra, will include all the music from the album, performed by an ensemble that will include numerous Kenton alumni.

* “A Jazz West Coast Christmas,” Dec. 16 at the Hermosa Playhouse, 710 Pier Ave., Hermosa Beach. All seats reserved: $50 and $35; special VIP package including preconcert dinner at the Lighthouse Cafe, $75. Tickets by phone at (909) 593-4180.

Women Jazzers on the Web: The Global Music Network--https://www.gmn.com--is re-Web-casting the events from the company’s June Women in Jazz programs. Most of the events took place at the Kennedy Center’s Women in Jazz Festival, a few at jazz clubs and other locations.

Today’s Web-cast--available throughout the day--features Sherrie Maricle and the group Five Play. Deborah Weisz will be heard on Saturday, Marian McPartland on Sunday, Nnenna Freelon on Monday, Flora Purim on Tuesday, Joanne Brackeen on Wednesday, Stacey Kent on Thursday and Kitty Margolis next Friday.

The programs continue on a daily basis through Jan. 4, with performances by the Sharp Five Quintet, Trudy Pitts, Jane Monheit, Maria Schneider, Judi Silvano, Sylvia Cuenca, Jane Ira Bloom, Carla White, Nicole Yarling, Sheila Jordan, Ann Patterson and Maiden Voyage, Deanne Witkowski and Claire Daly.

GMM and 32 Records are combining to offer a special promotion, making available MP3 downloads of music from vocalists Sheila Jordan, Chris Connor, Morganna King, Etta Jones and drummer Cindy Blackman.