Sonja Carter: Enzo, you are a journalist, author, jazz aficionado, jazz champion, raconteur, unofficially or maybe quite officially Italy's Ambassador of Jazz in New York, and more knowledgeable about NYC than maybe anyone I've ever met.

Enzo Capua: You forgot one thing - I am a romantic playboy - I am a player. (laughs)

SC: Duly noted! I've had the pleasure of attending your new book's coming out party in NY, "New York: Night & Day" where the many sides of Enzo Capua were revealed to some of us for the first time. I guess it shouldn't be surprising that you're now presenting jazz here in NY: Enzo's Jazz at The Jolly Hotel Madison Towers. Not an easy feat, but the room is a wonderful venue - surprisingly so. And you've created an ambience here that has transformed a hotel lounge into a viable jazz destination. You've got a terrific roster of artists you're presenting, and I have to say a great place to hear them. You've produced concert series both here in NY as well as in Italy - Is this the first time you're presenting on such a regular basis?

EC: Yes. As you know, I represent in the United States the Umbria Jazz Festival. That means that once every two years we do a big event here in the United States. In 2006 we'll do a week at Birdland in March. And in between, of course, I take care of the bookings and contacts with the producer and musicians for the Umbria Jazz Festival. And also I'm producing concerts and other events with The Italian Cultural Institute. I did Italian Women in Jazz in March, for example. But they are not regular. This one is the first regular thing. I am really they accept my idea at The Jolly Madison to do this series. We started in the middle of October, twice a week. We're planning to continue this. It's not the first time they're doing this in the hotel - they did it in the past, 2-3 years ago they had a few bands come in, but it was different. Bands came to play in the bar for the people that came in there. This is different - I want to create a real jazz club where you pay a cover charge, you get in, you can have food or drinks in a wonderful place, comfortable, comfortable...and listen to wonderful music. We have a lot of clubs in NY - you know that - but few of them are really comfortable. You can relax, sit, listen - you know - not wedged in between other people. This is the difference.

SC: It's definitely needed in NY - we could always use another club that's a viable venue. How did this actually come about - did you approach them or did they approach you?

EC: I know the manager of the hotel very well. She is my friend, Mrs. Rosanna Coscia and we talked about this idea one year ago. I don't know who started the conversation, she or I, but when I saw the room I said this a perfect place for a jazz club. And at that time she told me that she wanted to renovate the interior of the hotel - the lobby and the back. After that the owners in Italy - you know the Jolly Hotel belongs to a chain of hotels, the main one of which is in Italy. This is the only one in NY. The owner didn't want to spend money for renovation because maybe they're making money now. So at the end of September, while I was booking the rooms for the Umbria Jazz event in March - we had to book 80 rooms in the hotel for that event - we had a lot of people coming. We start talking again, "OK - let's start again in the middle of October". So in 15 days, we did it.

SC: You pulled that together very fast!

EC: Yes - it was easy for me because I love the people who play in NY. They know me - I just had to make a few phone calls.

SC: How do you go about choosing the artists?

EC: Ah - choosing the artists...because I love music and because I love the good artists. Some of them I think they deserve more attention.

SC: So you're looking specifically for artists that are deserving of wider recognition?

EC: Mostly. I cannot ask some of my friends Joe Lovano or John Scofield - they are close friends of mine - to perform there. They will probably say yes, but I don't want to ask them. It's a smaller place, you know, there's a limited budget. So I want to devote myself to discover new talent. This is the most important thing. And certain kind of music, you know - the room is a bar. We cannot do free jazz. I love free jazz - contemporary jazz. It is not the room for that.

SC: Maybe midtown is not the place for free jazz...

EC: No - it's inside a hotel. If I had a venue myself I would do that, definitely. Because I love any kind of music. If you are a free jazz musician and you are really good, for me - it's OK.

SC: Absolutely, but there areas in NY where free jazz fares better...downtown...

EC: But believe me - you can find a lot of fake musicians anywhere - in any area.

SC: One of the things I really like about the series is that, although you're not really booking free jazz artists, you are bringing in very creative artists who push the envelope.

EC: Yeah - I want to have in my room artists who are really good, and even someone who is not really into jazz, can listen to. You cannot expose someone who doesn't know jazz, to free jazz. This is a fantasy, an imagination. Because to listen to free jazz you have to know what happened before, you have to know the music very well. You have to understand what is to change the harmonic connection and the melody. You have to know that, otherwise you cannot listen to it. Not everybody knows that. It is what I think.

SC: So where do you see the series going?

EC: Well I love voices. I would love to discover new voices. And also the voice is a warm instrument. That means even for people who don't know about jazz, etc., to listen to a voice - a good voice - is something nice. And also instrumentalists. We'll have Grant Stewart, for example. I'm planning to have a young guitar player, Amanda Monaco. Mostly saxophone, trumpet and guitar players as leaders. I Love the guitar trio, for example. I did it twice - with Sheryl Bailey and with John Hart - two great guitar players. And Larry Newcomb - do you know him?

SC: No I don't.

EC: He's fabulous. In trio with saxophone and bass. Really, really good - wonderful musician. This kind of music, and also soul music. Like for example, I was so proud to have K.J. Denhert, which is for me one of the best singers around, in soul music. The best in town for soul - believe me. She will be there again in February. She calls herself a folk/jazz musician, but she's more close to soul music. For me she has the best band in NY for that style of music. If I see musicians I like, I will book.

SC: Are you looking to bring musicians over from Italy to play in the room?

EC: No - it's too expensive. You mean if they're already coming here?

SC: Yes, if they're already coming here, as a stop on their tour, perhaps.

EC: Yes. Definitely. But it's not related to nationality...musicians from anywhere can find a home here if they are good. Music is for everybody, and everybody, if they have talent, they can do that. I listened to - believe it or not - a blues singer from North Europe. White, from the North. But once you have the blues inside, definitely it's connected to the black culture, you know. Mostly from the south of the United States. But when you invent something, this thing flies - all around. And during the years, it can happen that someone born in Norway can keep it inside and give back. It could happen.

SC: Getting back to your book and all the elements that went into your book. You wrote about architecture, about art in NY, about culture in NY - not just jazz and not just music.

EC: In the book is everything I love in my life. When they asked me to write a book about NY, I said, "if you write a book about NY, it would be really a pretentious thing", because I know a lot of people wrote about NY - in history. So it's better to start from yourself, and tell the people what you think; what is your relation with the city. Because definitely it is a love relation - I told you. And when t is a real love, you love and you hate sometimes, but you cannot live without. So I cannot live without NY. When I go outside NY I miss it. So I decide to talk about myself in the city and of course, at the same time speak about and write about the city itself. How it was born, etc., etc. But also about my personal stories, and the things I love. That means music, art, women, whatever. And I put everything inside, architecture, strange stories. I'll tell you one thing - very interesting, very nice. When I did the presentation on Milan, the first one - the big one - there were more that 100 people in the room, with two important journalists who introduced the book with me - they read the book. My parents were there as well. At the end of this conference, the journalist asked the people if someone wants to ask a question, and my father stands up. And I was like "what happened?" "I want to tell something." I said Oh my God, what is he going to say? "I am the father of Enzo. I want to say that tonight I learned something about my son I didn't know" (laughs). You know, when you talk about your personal life - and I exposed myself a lot in this book - a lot of intimate things, some people - and this could happen to you. A lot of your friends and relatives, they know only one part of you. They don't know the whole thing. If you ask two different people that know me, they can say two different things about me. Some can say I'm really introverted, some can say I'm really extroverted. But nobody but you knows who you are.

SC: I was talking to one of your other guests at the presentation and we were marveling at the fact that there are so many facets of you, and we've both known you for years, respectively.

But we had no idea about all these other sides!

EC: Yes - you don't know my past lives in Italy also.

SC: Tell us some more!

EC: No - I don't want to tell you not because we will finish tomorrow morning if I speak to you about my life in Italy, you know. But at a certain point in my life I decided it was the right time to come to live in NY. You need change.

SC: How long ago did you move here?

EC: Six years ago, I came to NY to live.

SC: But you visited before that.

EC: Visiting - the first time was a marvelous trip, in 1979.

SC: '79. And did the bug bite you then?

EC: No. But there's something from 1979 in the book. I used to stay with a friend in a loft in SoHo. At that time SoHo was totally different than it is now. But believe it or not, the first time I came to NY, I said to myself, "this is the city I will come to live in one day." And then exactly 20 years later - even if I tried during these 20 years to plan this trip and organize it, it didn't happen. And as I always say you have to go through the fire before really doing something important in your life. You cannot wake up in the morning and say "I'm happy, now I change."

You have to suffer. But change is important in life. It's the most important thing. Because when you're young, it will open your eyes and your heart to new experience, you live better. Even if you suffer more than the others. But why live a flat life, that you know nothing will happen in the future? Unless you discover one day your wife is cheating on you, or the opposite - this is nothing for me. You have to change your life. Otherwise you don't live. But I think some people are born for that, some not. And they don't understand each other. Because people who were not born for change would say "How can you live this way? You don't have a family, you don't have kids, you don't have a regular job." And you can say to the other one ""How can you live this way? You wake up every morning at the same time, you live a miserable life, you work at the same place every day, you go back to your family, you watch the TV, you cannot go out in he night..." But some people are born for some kind of life and others not.

SC: It's about knowing yourself.

EC: It's about knowing yourself, exactly. This is the most important thing in life - and the most difficult. You gotta know yourself. If you know yourself, you love more the others. Look at the people that don't love other people - it's because they don't love themselves. If you don't love yourself, how are you gonna love someone. They hate the others because they want to take from the others what they're missing. They cannot give if they don't love. And the hope of the artist is to give to people the things they don't have. Some people understand. I met two ladies in my bank branch two weeks ago. Nice ladies who have normal lives. And I told them, come to see the show at the Blue Note I was producing, two jazz bands from Naples. And they came! And then afterwards they said, "We had a wonderful time! I woke up this morning singing...!" This is the feeling of life!

SC: You said the hope for artists is...

EC: There are two kind of hopes - to be really rich and famous - no matter what they say. They can tell you everything but they want to be rich and famous. And the second is to be popular. That means that people love them. Because the struggle in life for the artist is to be recognized by others - to be loved.

SC: Well you don't want to play to an empty house, that's for sure!

EC: That's for sure, of course.

SC: And what is your goal as a presenter of this music?

EC: To be loved. This is the thing.

SC: So you're an ambassador of love!

EC: You told me that I'm an ambassador - you create this thing! (laughs)

SC: I like to call you the Ambassador of Jazz! (laughs)

EC: Call me The Ambassador of Love from Italy! Ok - call me that way, call me that way! (both laugh)

SC: And on that note - that's a good way to end. Thank you Enzo!

EC: And thank you.