Gilles Peterson suggested that we might like to work together, so he introduced me to Maisha. I liked what they were doing, because they were a band, and the industry has kinda put a dampener on bands because they can’t control ’em! It was their suggestion [to play Bartz compositions “Uhuru Sasa” and “Dr Follow’s Dance”]. The fact that it’s different musicians means it’s always gonna be different. They’re younger and they’ll bring a younger feel and spirit to the music. When you play a song every night for years, it has to grow anyway, or you stop playing it. So it’s always a work in progress.
The Night Dreamer studio is amazing. I had never done a recording like that, direct to disc. Every mistake is gonna be on there! Which is how it should be anyway, because nobody’s perfect – you just have to know how to clean up your mistakes so that no-one knows it was a mistake.
That’s part of the artform. We played about eight shows together, and before the pandemic hit we were getting ready to go to China, of all places! I look forward to us doing more, because I have some really good ideas for places we could go musically.