This Is My New Jersey

While my husband and I never had children of our own, we have thousands of kids. How you may ask? Decades of students taught by my husband. From marching band during his college years to 25 years as a public school band director. No matter what our kids decided to do professionally, we were always proud. Several over the years, aspired to become band directors and professional musicians. One such musician is Jose “Jay” Oliva.

This past week we were especially proud of Jose, as he premiered his first album. What makes this even more special is he completed this project with his father, a world-class musician at the young age of 88.

Recently, I sat down with Jose to discuss his album.

When did you first start working on the music for this album?

Although we first stepped into the studio in late summer 2020 to begin recording, I’ve been mentally preparing to record this album for over 20 years! Titled “1966,” this album contains music arranged for my father Tomas Oliva and performed by him and his band throughout the 60s. The arrangements in this recording also include some Herb Alpert originals like “A Taste of Honey” and “Green Peppers”.

What was the motivation to do this work?

I grew up listening to these very songs and have been humming them in my head since grade school. My father and I always talked about me re-recording this project and bringing back, even for a moment, this once popular style of music. Beware though, one listen, will have you tapping your number 2 pencil and whistling along with a nice smile on your face. If ever a bad day, queue up our album…bad day…gone!

What was the best part of working on this project? What was the worst part?

The absolute best part of working on this project was being in the studio with my father. He recorded the 2nd trumpets in the album. He toured many countries playing this music and having him step back into the studio 55 years later at 88 years old to re-record his album was absolutely priceless for me.
Another absolutely amazing experience is a guest appearance by my wife on clarinet. There was a small solo part that was written as a “whistle.” While my father and I discussed on the phone who would be the whistler, a sudden light bulb going off as my wife entered the room humming songs as she always does around the house. She played the clarinet in high school and after much convincing, she dusted off that old gem for a super cool solo on “Caliente”.

Who are your musical influences? What music styles are you drawn to the most?

I’m mainly a contemporary style trumpet player who got pulled into the Latin salsa world because it was in my blood and that was the style of music my father was heavily involved in during the later part of his career. He got me a lot of great salsa gigs with many of the top bands in NYC when I started playing professionally. We got to perform together for many years. My true passion however was to become a classical trumpet player. Nevertheless, I would trade being a classical trumpet player if I could play jazz solos like Chet Baker!

My father is a classical trumpet player with an astonishing musical career. He was principal chair in the “Orquesta Nacional del Perú”. He was also part of the World Symphony Orchestra in 1971 under Conductor Arthur Fiedler from the world famous Boston Pops. His amazing career was a huge influence on me as a musician.

If you could collaborate with any musician, who would you choose?

If I could collaborate with any (other) musician it would be Chris Botti. Trumpeter Rick Braun is also on that list.

Where can people find your album?

Even though “1966” is now available on Spotify, iTunes, Amazon, iHeartRadio, and Apple Music, my plan was never to launch it to the public under a record label. Initially, I thought I was just going to put this on a cd and hand it out to my immediate family and friends. My vision after we completed the recording was my dad and I sitting back and listening to the tracks while having a beer on a Sunday afternoon.

After listening to the awesomeness of my band “The Oliva Brass Project” which include Jordan Rose on drums, Mike Bono on guitar, Juan Lukunza on trombone, Adrian Moring on bass, Julio “Chino” Moreno on marimba, my father Tomas Oliva, who is still a world class trumpet player at 88, guest appearances by my wife Katlyn Oliva on clarinet and Kevin Rodriguez, piano on “Green Peppers”, I knew this needed to be bigger than originally planned.

Proud and humbled to say that today, I get to share some great songs that are very special to me and my family. 1966 was the year my father introduced these songs to the world and 55 years later, we get to do it all over again.