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Marlon Simon

One of the most unique drummer composer of his era.

About Me

Marlon Simon – Biography

Marlon Simon is the oldest in the latest generation of three musicians bearing the illustrious

“Simon” name. The eldest son of Hadsy Simon, a philosopher with a deep understating of the

spiritual and the metaphysical realms, and author of the book Consciousness Is All There Is: God

Is Consciousness. To the young Marlon, growing up in Punta Cardón, Falcón state, Venezuela,

however, Hadsy Simon was more than that. He was “Dad”, of course; as well as a passionate lover

of traditional Venezuelan music who played guitar and sang exceedingly well. Marlon recalls

vividly how “Whenever we has a visitor my father used to take out his guitar, tune up and herald

his guests with his unique interpretations of traditional and popular joropos, waltzes and – at

Christmastime – aguinaldos as well. He also used to invite me to join him, playing on a little

bongo.”

It was hard not to be seduced by the rhythm of that music and the young Marlon also showed

considerable skill in accompanying his father; so much so that Hadsy bought him a pair of

timbales when he was just 15 years old. This event set Marlon on a path of discovery; one that

would not only challenge him to master his newly acquired instrument but ignite his curiosity

about Venezuelan music and the music of all the Americas, which had heard at home and also

through like-minded friends. He taught himself most of the rudiments of timbal playing and

about all Latin music from salsa, merengue and other South American dance music styles. Within

three years, when he was just 18, he felt ready and compelled to perform in public. Turning

professional, Marlon put together a band and began to book himself gigs at concerts and local

clubs.

A year later, a friend brought him a video which featured Dizzy Gillespie, Chick Corea, Miroslav

Vitous and others and his love for Jazz was born. Marlon became seduced by the exciting and

eloquent expressions of music that melded elements of African rhythms into concepts that arose

out of western-style counterpoint. The magical melodies and harmonic conceptions that Jazz

musicians displayed in everything he watched on video and listened to on records, tapes and

radio was the final piece in his mental musical puzzle. Such was the lure of this music that

Marlon emigrated to the United States in 1987 first to study and later to stay on and make a

living in music. But in 1987 he applied for and was accepted into the University of the Arts in

Philadelphia. A year later he was awarded the Philadelphia Music Foundation grant. This enabled

him to move to New York in 1989 where he enrolled in the New School for Social Research and

began working towards a Bachelor of Arts degree in Jazz and Contemporary Music.

The lure of performance continued to remain strong and quite soon Marlon got busy working as a

musician in and around the city bringing his singular Venezuelan-inflected drumming and

percussion colourism to the groups that employed him, as well as the many others who simply

invited him to sit in after they’d heard his magical music and naturally become entranced by his

new voice. This encouraged him to work on finding his voice and building on his highly emotive

style that combines the elements of Venezuelan traditional forms, Afro-Caribbean rhythms

including clave with the highly improvisatory styles he acquired from listening and mastering the

art of syncopation in all its Jazzy glory. Such was the respect accorded to him by some of the

great luminaries in Jazz, Latin Jazz and Afro-Caribbean music that he soon became a choice

rhythmist for Hilton Ruiz, Dave Valentin, Jerry Gonzalez, Chucho Valdes and Bobby Watson and

crossing borders as percussionist with Aretha Franklin and Peter Cetera.

Within a short time this luminous list began to grow exponentially. It was this acceptance and

belief in his artistry and vision that compelled Marlon to make the first moves towards forming

and leading his own ensemble. Lessons learned from Hadsy Simon and the influences in the

realms of the spiritual and metaphysical meant that Marlon’s musical vision was deeply

influenced by those elements. It is no wonder then that whatever he did under his own banner –

including even name his ensemble – had to reflect those influences. He had also ready Carlos

Castaneda’s iconic books including The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge, A

Separate Reality: Further Conversations with Don Juan, the Fire From Within and, probably most

importantly, Magical Passes: The Practical Wisdom of the Shamans of Ancient Mexico. It seemed

natural to bring all of these influences bear in the name of his band: The Nagual Spirits.

“Nagual,” he explains, “Signifies the magical part of the human experience, the spiritual part that

cannot be explained by the local thoughts of everyday life,” he says. He began to write more and

more music which soon took on a character that was unique so much so that today there is no

music that sounds like it anywhere. “Whenever I write, I have to be in a certain state of

consciousness – a “nagual” state,” he opines. “It has nothing to do with peyote,” he is quick to add,

noting that Castaneda was known for his experiments with peyote while writing his

masterpieces, “But I have to get into that side of things. I use meditation to get me closer to that

state of being. I wait until a melody gets into my head and begins to live and grow there. I begin

to sculpt it and shape it and make it grow until it is ready to be born as a song. Only then do I

apply all the theory I learn in college – the chord changes and harmonic theories and

conceptions that I was taught. First, however, the music must be born of the mysticism and magic

of the “nagual”,” he says.

It is just this kind of mysticism, magic and mystery that flavours the recordings that Marlon has

made as leader – although his unique voice is heard on many more recordings while working

with scores of other artists. His first venture as leader was The Music of Marlon Simon (K-Jazz,

1999); this was followed up with Marlon Simon and The Nagual Spirits Rumba a la Patato

(Cubop, 2000). He was joined here by his younger brothers, pianist Edward and trumpeter

Michael, along with a constellation of other stars including trumpeter Brian Lynch, tenor

saxophonist Peter Brainin and the legendary alto saxophonist and one-time Jazz Messenger,

Bobby Watson, pianist Luis Perdomo, bassist Andy Gonzalez and percussionist Roberto Quintero.

While paying homage to the legendary Afro-Cuban, Patato, the recording marked Marlon’s debut

as one of the new generation of percussion colourists and held promise for the great things that

were to follow.

In 2004 Marlon made a recording Live in Bolivia (Intrigue Records) which was followed up by

another musical adventure, In Case You Missed It (Jazzheads, 2006). His ensemble The Nagual

Spirits was bolstered by the presence of trumpeter Alex Norris and, on one track, also included a

full bata drum contingent with the iconic Cuban Santeria priest Roman Diaz and Diego Lopez

joining Roberto Quintero to form the trio of bata drummers. Marlon completed a long-felt need

to follow his impulses and also write and arrange music that incorporated a string quartet,

something that also created a magical soundworld that was mellifluously added to the

soundscape that Marlon had already created with the core of The Nagual Spirits. This

His next recording was perhaps the most ambitious he had attempted up until then. Racines

(2011) was his first trans-continental recording and followed the two he made with the Nagual

Spirits. However, the mystical leaning is evident even as the music attempts to intertwine the

roots of Venezuelan music with those of the European (French) tradition that informs the music

of his collaborators on that recording. This was also the first to feature an all-French group of

musicians and included the inimitable Gilles Chabanat, who brought his hurdy-gurdy (a

centuries-old Celtic stringed-instrument that has a magical sound brought about by the winding

motion of the crank-shaft that creates a high and lonesome pedal-like sustain).

This last album is a timely reminder that Marlon Simon and his unique concept of melding the

styles of the traditional folkloric styles of Venezuelan music with that of Afro-Caribbean idioms

and the African-American Jazz idioms is not only confined to the North and South America.

Marlon and The Nagual Spirits have traveled worldwide playing club dates, in concert halls and

on the biggest festival stages on both sides of the Atlantic. He has been a worldwide musical

ambassador and has visits at the behest of governments from Bolivia to France. His music has

also been heard to great appreciation and applause in Canada, Poland, Australia and the

Netherland Antilles.

As a teacher Marlon has dedicated his time to conducting numerous workshops, master classes

and seminars at Temple University, Penn State University, Rutgers University, and the New Jersey

ABC Conference for Public School Teachers, the University of the Arts and Perkings Center for the

Arts. He has also served as Artist-in-Residence at numerous institutions both in the United States

and abroad. In 2000 Marlon was named Distinguished Teaching Artist in recognition for the

decades of dedicated work in music and his history of commitment to preserving and furthering

excellence in the Arts and Education, receiving the highest honor among his peers from the New

Jersey State Council of the Arts.

In 2001 he received the New Jersey Governor’s Award for Arts and Education. In June of that year

Marlon also performed as guest soloist and conducted seminars at The Ultimate Drummers’

Weekend – the largest drumming event in the Southern Hemisphere held in Melbourne,

Australia. In 2003, as a special invitee of the US State Department Marlon Simon and The Nagual

Spirits were selected to present two international concerts representing the US as an ambassador

for excellence in artistry developed in the United States. Marlon Simon is the recipient of the Jhon Simon Guggenheim Foundation fellowship in jazz composition 2203.

My Jazz Story

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