Returning songbird’s chorus of opportunities

Jazz vocalist Tessa Quayle’s music journey has taken her around the globe, where she’s performed, taught, and learned from jazz legends. Now back in her hometown of Nelson, Tessa is busier than ever – leading bands, performing across diverse genres, and sharing her passion for jazz with students and audiences alike. With a career rich in international experience, she’s discovered Nelson’s thriving music scene offers all the inspiration she needs, blending family life, teaching, and performing in a harmonious balance.

Words: Alistair Hughes

Professional jazz vocalist and teacher Tessa Quayle has taught and performed in Australia, Europe and Britain, and taken lessons from her own jazz heroes. She has also appeared at major jazz festivals and on television in New Zealand, while her debut album Whisper Not was a finalist for New Zealand Jazz Album of the Year in 2010.

But Tessa is now very happy to be living in her hometown: Nelson, and in terms of music, has discovered, to her surprise, that she is probably now busier than ever.

“I was a little bit worried coming from Wellington, which is quite lively and happening. But Nelson really surprised me, actually.”

Tessa recalls that in Wellington she was mostly performing jazz, whereas living in the Top of the South again has provided her with an almost endlessly diverse range of opportunities, including her own jazz band.

“I’m also singing in an eight-piece soul band and have been performing bossa music (a South American blend of samba and jazz). I've performed as a soloist with a choir combining classical and jazz elements, and even sang with a brass band doing cabaret style.”

Tessa was four years old when she first began studying music in Nelson. I actually started with the violin when I was four, and learned that as my first instrument throughout my school years. I think the recommended starting age is eight, but my sister, who is four years older than me, was beginning violin and there was no way I was going to let her start without me.”

Tessa eventually had to travel all the way to Waimea when she reached college age, taking two buses en route because her parents believed it would give her the best musical education. But more significant learning was already taking place at home.

“My mum was always playing different kinds of music and she loved jazz. What she was listening to always intrigued me, and I became more interested in singing.”

Tessa joined the school choir, sang in a few school productions, and by the end of college had decided that singing was what she really wanted to do.

“Even though my poor parents had spent all this money on violin lessons,” she laughs. “Instead of my last year at school, I took a contemporary course at the Nelson School of Music.”

That course solidified Tessa’s decision to pursue singing, and she spent the following three years studying vocals at the Christchurch School of Jazz, part of the Polytechnic at the time.

“That was the start of everything,” she says. “After that I studied for a music teacher’s qualification in Wellington, mainly as a ‘ticket’ to travel overseas, because I knew that you could do relief teaching work on a two-year working holiday.”

Tessa had to teach for two years to become registered, and ended up head of a music department, until she was ready to travel.

“I wanted to experience the music scene in London, so I was based there, doing relief teaching work and going out every night to music concerts. I did a couple of courses, managed to get myself a few gigs, and even lessons from some really amazing musicians.”

These included the late English jazz vocalist Tina May and Australian-raised singer Anita Wardell.

“Learning from some of my favourite artists and seeing them perform live was incredible and really invaluable.”

Tessa recalls travelling around Europe meeting musicians and performing with them as an amazing time in her life. “I don't know why, but they just took me under their wing, and I still think about it today, although it was only two years, it made such an impact on my life.”

She says that this kind of generosity is common in jazz, with performers passing on their knowledge to the next generation.

“And that's what I love to do as well, to get people excited about music and about this style so it doesn't fade away. I don't think it ever will, but you do need people that are willing to pass it on for that to happen.”

With jazz appearing to be such an improvisational style, does Tessa find it to be more difficult to teach and pass on than other song genres?

“It can be a lot more difficult, and people tend to lock up and shy away from improvising because you're putting a little bit more of yourself on the line.”

Her particular philosophy is to imagine a hat, which is gradually filled with the skills and tools a singer learns along the way.

“It takes time, but when you improvise you might have little licks and lines that you put in your hat, which you pull out and piece together in a new way. And if it's an okay performance, if the pieces fit together, it sounds fine. But the magic really happens when, all of a sudden, you've created something new alongside the tried and tested techniques you’ve learned.”

Achieving this can give a performer an immense high, but Tessa pragmatically cautions that the low can be just as strong when something doesn’t work.

“A lot of people think jazz is just making it up on the spot. But if you did that without the backing of knowledge or skill, it wouldn’t sound particularly great. Musicians spend many years filling that hat with sounds and tools, and it's about jigsawing it together on the night.”

On her return to New Zealand, Tessa’s experiences so far had helped her to decide what she really wanted to do.

“I decided to try and focus on my performing with a little bit of private tuition on the side to boost my income. When you start out, and all you want to do is perform more, you sort of wonder if teaching is something that you just do if you can't perform. But as you get older, you realise that's not true. There are many great musicians who teach, but classroom teaching can be very challenging.”

Tessa had found the rigid curriculum she had to follow in the school system somewhat disheartening and not in the spirit of what she wanted to teach.

“I really didn't think I could become a full time classroom teacher again, because I just wouldn't have the time and energy to perform. So, having some private students meant it was completely up to me what I taught. They were coming to me because they wanted to learn, and I could teach them jazz.”

Tessa found something of a dream job teaching jazz vocal at the New Zealand School of Music in Wellington. But after a few years her daughter arrived on the scene, and that changed everything. “We moved from Wellington to Nelson because I grew up here, and I thought it would be good to bring up my daughter around family. I think it was probably one of our best decisions.”

After some time away from performing to raise her daughter, Tessa re-emerged on the Nelson music scene in a very big way, teaching, performing and even serving as an arts coordinator at Nelson College.

Until recently, she was both the president of the Nelson Jazz Club and the musical director of the Nelson Jazz Festival.

Tessa is also balancing family life and admits that this can make performing challenging as it’s all done in the evening. But her daughter is now eight and showing some definite interest in following her mother’s footsteps.

“She loves dancing, and anything to do with music. She'll compose some songs at home, at the moment she's writing a Christmas song, and she does a little bit of music with my mother. Music is definitely in the family, it's all around her. So I'm pretty certain that she'll end up doing something with it.”

As for Tessa, she continues to expand her own horizons. “I’m even involved with a little neoclassical group, called the Nile Street Project.” A relatively late trend where composers looked back to the restraint and order of ‘classicism’, Tessa describes it as “quite sparse but symmetrical, calming and almost meditative.”

The recent Mass in Blue concert with the Chroma chamber choir encouraged her to explore her vocal range, while Nelson’s Opera in the Park enabled Tessa to sing with the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra.

“I've been quite surprised at the opportunities that I’ve had here. There's gigs every weekend, and because it's such a beautiful place, we get lots of visiting artists as well, and that’s what is great about Nelson. And also, it's easy for me to head off to Christchurch or Wellington for a weekend or a gig.”

Tessa admits that she might finally have found the balance between teaching, performing and family that she’s been looking for and is very happy to stay put for a while. But she also has plenty of projects planned for the future.

“I feel Nelson has always been a creative place, and I think there's a great little music scene here.”