Avi Agababa tends to spread things around. He has been a mainstay of the ethnic music scene here for over 30 years, but has also enjoyed long stints with seminal singer-songwriter Chava Alberstein, and says he is not exactly averse to knocking out some rock-oriented beats on a regular drum set. That eclectic ethos will be in evidence at the drummer- percussionist's show at Confederation House on Thursday (8:30 p.m.), when he takes the stage along with saz and tar player Yuval Tobi and guitarist Idan Armoni. Together they make up the Aga Babot Trio. Agababa has certainly paid his dues, too. In addition to ensuring that Alberstein had a solid rhythmic substratum on which to base her captivating musical tales, the skin pounder and tapper has also toured the world at the side of acclaimed oud player and violinist Yair Dalal, and was also a member of popular cross-cultural band East-West Ensemble, led by veteran multi-instrumentalist Israel Borochov. Now, in his mid-50s, Agababa is keen to get his own musical message out there. In fact, he has harbored a desire to do his own thing for a while. “I have written stuff over the years, and have had an urge to do work of my own,” he observes. “It was a really long process. I feel that now is the time, and that I have reached an age that I really don't have any choice. I just have to express all these things, and to put my thoughts and feelings into my music.” The result is an alluring mix of textures and stylistic sensibilities that appear to feed off the mind-set and skills of Agababa's cohorts, in addition to the percussionist's own compositional skills and intent. But while Agababa is the principal mover and shaker behind the group's output, the name of the band suggests that all the players have their say in the way things pan out on stage. “The title, really, teaches me all kinds of things,” he says. “First of all, it reflects the lack of imagination of the person who thought it up in the first place,” he notes in a humorously self-deprecating manner, “and maybe it indicates that I have a bit of a narcissistic side to me.” The latter was also proffered tongue in cheek, but – if we can get a little more serious here – there is a general sense in the trio that the end product is the sum of all the instrumental and creative parts. “If we ignore the narcissistic element,” Agababa continues, finally segueing into a more sober line, “there is some kind of statement in this, even if this was not necessarily intentional, I'd say it is accurate – that we all contribute to what the band does.” Having caught Agababa on stage numerous times over the last 20 or so years, I can testify to his silky musicianship, and the fact that he does not have a natural tendency to push his ego boat out there. It took quite some toing and froing, in our chat, to get the man to finally own up to being the leader of the threesome, while, naturally, taking pains to credit his pals for their ongoing contributions to the musical bottom line. Although Agababa is best known for weaving his percussive magic on various Middle Eastern frame drums and darbukas, he started out thinking along more visceral rhythmic lines. “At some stage, in primary school, I started dreaming about having a drum set, when I'm rich,” he recalls with a chuckle. That may have been fired by a legendary Sixties Californian rock band. “I really like The Doors. I basically listened to what my elders were into. And when I saw bands doing covers of songs by, say, The Beatles, that left a very strong impression on me.” This was at a time when Israel was just waking up to the fact that there was something going on over to the west, predominantly in the UK and the US; and in pre- TV Israel, local bands sent Israeli youngsters wild with their own versions of the pop and rock hits of the day. “There were groups like The Churchills and Uzi and the Styles who played that stuff,” says Agababa. “That was really exciting for me.” The youngster's musical die was cast, and he was going to do everything it took to get his hands on some skins. After three years of doing a paper route, he finally amassed the wherewithal to make good on his boyhood musical dream. “Someone I knew showed me an ad in a paper about someone in Jerusalem offering a drum set for 650 lirot. I went to my dad and I told him I was going to get on a train and go to Jerusalem to buy the drums and, if he wanted, he could come along and help.” But the determined youngster had not counted on his father's generosity. “He looked at me and smiled his Iraqi smile, and said: 'How much does a new drum set cost?' We checked it out, and a new set cost around 1,200 or 1,300 lirot.” The upshot of that paternal inquiry was that Agababa Sr. paid for the drums, and the youngster paid it off in easy installments. With the equipment to hand, Agababa really got stuck into musical timekeeping – strictly, pop and rock – taking lessons with a gent by the name of Uri Nadir but, largely, learning on his own, as he went along. As he traversed that self-fed learning curve, Agababa came across all sorts of artistic epiphanies, such as discovering how to make the transition between rock and swing rhythms. Over time he managed to get his drumming up to par, and even got into an army band where, he says, he became more professional. “That's when I really learned how to play – to play with other musicians,” he notes. Agababa's musical military experience also led him back to his cultural roots and to ethnic music of various stripes. “I played with Israel Borochov when I was on IDF reserve duty and, one day sometime later, he called me up and said he had a cross-cultural band, which played new music, and he was looking for a percussionist. I told him I was a drummer, not a percussionist, but he said it was just what he was looking for. If he had been looking for someone authentic, who knew all of, say, the Arabic music rhythms, that wouldn't have been me. But he said he was looking for something experimental. That suited me perfectly.” Agababa duly went off to the shuk with Borochov to buy a darbuka, and that was that. During his 10 years with the East-West Ensemble, Agababa was gradually drawn ever deeper into the realms of ethnic beats and sounds. That was complemented by stints with Dalal, who also hails from an Iraqi family, and others such as celebrated father-andson team Piris and Mark Eliyahu, and there was the odd pop and rock venture with people such as pop singer Gali Atari in between. Over time, as he delved further into non-Western material, childhood memories of haflot – jam sessions – with his parents' friends and relatives also began to surface. Today, with the Aga Babot Trio, and top musicians such as ney (wooden flute) player Yagel Haroush, who will put in a guest appearance on Thursday, Agababa roams across wide expanses of genres and styles, taking in flamenco, Indian and Persian music, and more. “It is has been a slow burner, but I think that gradual process has helped me, and the band, to accrue a distinctive flavor. We all pitch in.” For tickets and more information: (02) 624-5206 and www.confederationhouse.org
(photo credit: SHMULIK BALMAS)