The Salsbach Jazz Trio

Etzel Provence:

Fifty years ago, Etzel Provence began his career as a music teacher at Akademia di Músika Edgar Palm. He started giving a general musical education and recorder lessons, and leading a children’s choir. The basics.At this moment, he gives cuatro lessons. The cuatro is a stringed instrument similar to the guitar and the ukulele, and is originally from Spain. It showed up in Venezuela, and its fame spread to the Caribbean. “It’s really my favorite instrument, and I have played it since I was eight years old,” he says. “I come from a very musical family, everyone played something.” Despite the fact that he is nearly 77 years old, Etzel Provence is still passionate about his instrument and about music in general. “I won’t quit working, and I will keep going until I really can’t go on anymore. For as long as my health will permit me.” As long as he can remember, Etzel has been part of a choir; it was his basis for learning to read music. The school where he now teaches, then called the Curaçao Foundation School of Music, was located in Hoogstraat. Later, the school moved to Scharloo, where Etzel started his studies. He played the piano already, but at the age of 24, he decided to take up the study of music. “I learned a lot, but I also had a lot of unlearning to do. I did a lot of things the wrong way, and learning is easier than unlearning.” When he was 40 years old, he moved to Ghent in Belgium to study the piano at the Royal Conservatory of Ghent. “Actually, I only went there to take exams. After one year I graduated,” he laughs.

Etzel Provence still performs regularly with the Salsbach Jazz Trio. “I started with Angel Salsbach, and we made beautiful music. We were also the first jazz trio on the island. We recently performed at Bistro Le Clochard, but we don’t perform regularly.” He currently gives cuatro lessons to adults, and has had students of all ages. He also has two choirs under his leadership, and guides individual singers, as well. “I mostly train young children, I also coach and assist them. I try to start with children’s songs, but given the music on Curaçao, these children are not familiar with songs from outside the island. What they do know is the popular music, and I am not familiar with it myself,” he chuckles. This is the reason why Etzel would like to give his pupils a broader perspective on the world of music. An education by Edgar at the Akademia di Músika is also a stepping stone to prepare for a conservatory abroad. In addition to his studies, Etzel Provence wrote three settings of the Mass and ballet music. But it will be no surprise that he also wrote a musical about animals. “It starts with a girl walking her dog. Arriving at the forest, the dog sees an iguana and starts chasing it. The girl loses the dog and starts searching for it. Walking through the forest, she sees and hears all kinds of animals. Their particular sounds are translated into music.” But that’s still not enough. He also wrote musicals that were staged at Centro Pro Arte.

It is clear that Etzel Provence has made a great contribution to the development of music on Curaçao. And he’s not done yet!