This is my first term teaching a big Jazz History lecture class at PSU, so I've been a bit occupied with that, amongst other things. But I am determined to keep jazztruth going, regardless of my schedule. I was just thinking back on some cool gigs I had in mid and late December, as well as a few cool hits this month. As a full time university professor, I'm not playing as many gigs as in past years; however, when I do play, it's more meaningful and I appreciate it more. I hope I never lose my love of playing jazz! I'm lucky to be fortunate to play with a variety of different players.
Pianist Kerry Politzer
A few blogs back, I mentioned that I toured Japan in December. The day after I arrived home, I had an amazing concert at the Mission Theater in Portland. This was my debut as a bandleader, and it was, I daresay, a big success. The turnout was great, the audience was enthusiastic, and the musicians were well prepared and interactive. The ensemble included Portland residents Eric Gruber on acoustic bass, Todd Strait on drums, and the veteran Dan Balmer on guitar. Our special guest of the evening was pianist Kerry Politzer. I had Politzer on hand so that I could mix it up(translation:show off)and play some melodica, trumpet and drums. Our presentation was somewhat unique; the first half of the show was my compositions, and the second set was mostly the music of pianist, composer, and former PSU professor Andrew Hill. I had never played any of Andrew Hill's music in the past, although I had been curious about his stuff for a while. It was a great return to Portland and hopefully, it will enable folks in town to get to know my music and even more importantly, get them to come out to some of my other performances!
Marianne Matheny-Katz
A short handful of days later, I boarded a plane once again, this time bound for the East Coast. I had three performances booked; a house concert in Baltimore, a restaurant gig and a trio gig at Cornelia Street Cafe in New York City. The Baltimore gig was at Jazzway 6004, which is actually the home of jazz singer Marianne Matheny-Katz and her husband, Howard Katz. It's one of my favorite venues in the world for a variety of reasons. First, the Katz' are VERY cool people; they are really down to earth jazz fans, and extremely easy to deal with. Secondly, the space is wonderful and really supportive audiences always come out. Third, the Katz' always serve delicious desserts after every show! This was a real celebration of Baltimore in that I had three Baltimore natives in the band; my longtime associate Josh Ginsburg on bass, alto saxophonist Tim Green, and wunderkind multi-instrumentalist Warren Wolf on drums. We had never played as a group, or rehearsed, before the gig(Josh asked me before the gig, " Have we EVER had a real rehearsal?" I make no secret of the fact that I HATE to rehearse, probably because I've made so many rehearsals in the past 20 years. I figure if I get great musicians together on the bandstand, then the music will come together. I don't worry about little glitches or a few wrong notes here or there.). Nevertheless, the gig was really lively, and it felt like we had just been on a three week tour. I had never really played with Tim Green, except for one gig with Orrin Evan's big band. I felt like he interpreted my music perfectly, and on a tune where I played trumpet, we had a great musical chemistry. I'm hoping to have some kind of repeat of this band soon.
That weekend was also quite eventful in that my mother, during the Jazzway concert, said she had a terrible earache. (I thought she was joking, as in , wow your music gave me an earache.) To make a long story short, she ended up in the hospital the next day with a very serious infection. Luckily I was staying at her house, or God knows what might have happened. I had to drive her to the hospital. Fortunately, intravenous antibiotics saved her. It seemed like she was doing OK, so I took the train to New York.
Bassist Greg Ryan
A trio gig with bassist Greg Ryan had come in last minute. The restaurant Hillstone, which used to be Houston's, can be challenging to play in , since it seems to be a sort of after work let's drink somemargaritas crowd, not a listening audience. However, Ryan is a superb bass player, and he had hired Joe Strasser, a really superb underrated New York drummer. So I was excited to play with this trio. Ryan is a real team player, as is Strasser. They both know a lot of tunes and a lot about how to play really authentic jazz. The "audience" continued to bug me, since I felt that the great music we were making was sort of wasted on them. Still, I tried not to let it prevent me from having fun. Ryan spent some time playing with the late great James Williams, so he knows a lot of tunes by Williams, Mulgrew Miller, and Donald Brown, tunes that a lot of musicians don't know. Plus, he knows tons of R&B tunes and tons of standards. It was another instance where I wished me had more gigs with this configuration!
Linda Oh
Ted Poor
My third stop was Cornelia Street Cafe. I had booked a trio with two more musicians who I have barely or never ever played with. I had played once with bassist Linda Oh, and had never even met drummer Ted Poor! But I had a hunch that this might be an interesting combination. And my hunch proved to be more than accurate! In fact, it was a really magical experience; Oh and Poor took me places that I don't normally go. This can be an advantage of playing with a new group of musicians; even if you are playing sort of old music, it's nice to get a new perspective. One audience member and jazz fan said that it was the best jazz concert she had ever been to! I decided that this would be another group which needed to play more than just one gig.
Jack DeJohnette
I headed back to Portland the next day. The holidays were kind of quiet. I had a New Year's trio gig at a bar/restaurant called Olive Or Twist with guitarist AG Donnaloia, which was fun and low key. I had a one set engagement a few days after with Philly native-turned Portland resident David Watson;I got a chance to play some trumpet with Watson on some bebop tunes and originals. Finally, I headed back to New York for a really momentous performance with the great Jack DeJohnette. It was a 70th birthday celebration at the famous Blue Note Jazz Club in Greenwich Village. On hand were some regulars in DeJohnette's current band: Rudresh Mahanthappa on alto, David Fiuczynski on guitar, and Jerome Harris on bass. We also had some special guests: Luisito Quintero on percussion, Tim Ries on tenor saxophone, and a young up and coming trumpeter named Ambrose Akinmusire. Both sets were packed and the energy level was super high; it always seems to be when DeJohnette is musically involved. I was made aware that, because of the APAP Conference being held that week, a number of promoters and presenters were attending our concert. Hopefully, this will translate into more gigs! But hey, I'll take one night at the Blue Note with that band over nothing.
Liam, NO! It's a #9, not a #11!
There's more gigs past and future to report on, so stay tuned for more. In the meantime, enjoy this photo of me trying to sit in and my son trying to get in on the action....
"Jazz Heaven" at first reminds me of a scene from one of my favorite Woody Allen films called Stardust Memories; in the film, Allen plays a filmmaker who can longer make funny films because of all the suffering he perceives in the world. He is working on a film which is very moody and Fellini-esqe. The producers of the film edit in a scene where the passengers on a train, who look very depressed and sad, end up in, you guessed it, "Jazz Heaven".
But this blog is regarding a brand new site which drummer Falk Willis has set up. It took him a few years to get it going, and it's now up and running. It's here:
It's full of instructional videos with many of the greats of jazz who are active today. Kenny Werner, Ralph Peterson, Ari Honieg, Jean Michel Pilc, and many others, have made videos which are informative and entertaining. The site is clearly in it's infancy, but it looks like it can be infinitely useful. I've just peeked into a few of the lessons; it's great to hear viewpoints from today's masters, young and old. There are also interviews, and there is a chat room to discuss the various materials contained herein. There are separate forums by instrument as well.
I believe that this type of online teaching studio is another way that musicians are taking back the control of their art and careers. Willis is a great drummer in his own right, and he is someone whose taste and musical viewpoint I respect. I think you will also. Check it out for yourself!
I've worked with a fair number of jazz vocalists in my career, including Cassandra Wilson, Vanessa Rubin, and Claudia Acuna, among others. A vocalist whom I have admired for years and always wanted to work with is Carmen Lundy.(She actually called me once a few years ago, in an emergency situation where she needed a last minute sub, but I was booked! Drat!)I remember Vanessa Rubin taking me to hear Lundy at Sweet Basil's, and I was floored! Lundy seems to have it all: a great voice, unbelievable musicality, stage presence, plus she writes and arranges her own music, and knows tons of classic tunes as well. The mystery for me is why she isn't a household name! Well, maybe this is a start; at least my readers will know about her.
She was born in Miami, and started piano at age 6. She joined the church choir when she was 12, and decided then that she wanted to sing. Lundy got her degree in opera from the University of Miami. In 1978, she moved to New York City, and worked with the great Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Big Band. She then started putting her own groups together, employing the likes of John Hicks and Kenny Kirkland.
She also spent some time touring with the musical "Sophisticated Ladies", a revue of Duke Ellington's music(and many known jazz musicians toured with this show, including Kenny Garrett. Also, I saw this show in the 80's.)
I went to see Lundy perform at Ronnie Scott's when I was in London a few years ago. She did a song called "Walking Code Blue"; the performance was so deep, the audience at Ronnie Scott's, which can actually get kind of noisy, was completely silent. They hung on her every phrase. And she also did one of my personal favorites, "Vu Ja De", which has some very cool and creative lyrics.
One of her recent albums features Lundy as a one-woman show: she wrote much of the music, mixed the CD, and played every instrument on the CD! It's called "Solamente", and it's impressive. Here's a sample:
Lundy's website has many of her recent albums available for sale: Here's the link: http://carmenlundy.com/
There is some news about her upcoming release, "Changes" which features pianist Anthony Wonsey and bassist Kenny Davis. There's a lot of things available on the site:sheet music, downloads, and even some of her wonderful artwork. Lundy is a true Renaissance Woman. Here's another one of my favorites: "In Love Again".
"Listen Honey!" The Reflex" by Duran Duran! Their Playing Our Song!"
I suppose every generation looks at the younger generation and says, "Ahh, kids today.....they don't know what good music sounds like. They listen to crap! In my day, we listened and danced to that wonderful old-timey singing group called Duran Duran...Now, THAT's music!" Well, now that I'm middle-aged, I guess I'm no different in wondering what these young good for nothing whipper-snappers are listening to. I've said before that much of today's music sounds, to my ears, like a bunch of people shouting over a car alarm. And I realize that's unfair and there is a lot of good music out there. But I think oftentimes these days, you have to really seek out good music. Good music might not find you on it's own. I think that's because the split between MUSIC and COMMERCIAL MUSIC has really widened. There has always been the commercial element in American Music. But now, because of the breakdown of the conventional model of "release an album and people pay money to buy it at the old-timey record store", the remaining Record Companies(do we even call them that anymore) are hyper-concerned with sales. Unfortunately, the focus is lopsided towards LOOKS, SEX APPEAL, IMAGE, SCANDAL, and SHOCK VALUE. And then market it towards children, who easily succumb to peer pressure and don't want to be out of the loop.
Don't get me wrong; many artists in previous generations were good looking and had a certain image working for them. But they could, when all was said and done, really PLAY or SING! Now, that aspect of being in "music" seems like an afterthought:
I love Katy Perry. I heard that she also is a singer.......
Listen, we got this hot young talent, she's beautiful, she's got tattoos, she can dance, she can do naked backflips- we want to send her out on a world concert tour!
Uhh, what does her music sound like?Can she SING?
Listen, Music, SHMUSIC! We'll worry about that later. We have AUTOTUNE! Singers today don't actually sing! Why would they? We have the technology! You don't use a typewriter anymore?What, Mr. types on his Ipad? Whadya worried about, with the music and the singing?
Some of you might remember the "controversy" of Esperanza Spalding receiving the Best New Artist Grammy last year, beating out that handsome young Canadian Justin Bieber. Many Bieber fans were outraged, and thought that Spalding should "Go Die In A Hole...", amongst other choice insults. The issue the Bieber fans seemed to have with Spalding was that she didn't sell as many CDs, therefore, she must not be as good! It's amazing how the people have been brainwashed into believing the hype: Sales equals Good, No Sales Equals Bad. I wonder how many of the Bieber fans actually went and listened to any Esperanza Spaldling. I wonder if any of them said, "Well, she is a really good singer, plays upright bass, writes her own music, and seems to be poised for a career beyond Bieber, who, once he hits puberty, people will get tired of, and he'll have to move back to Canada..."
Enjoy your hair while you can, Bieber, cause in 20 years you got NOTHING!
Now, I would never tell Bieber to go die in a hole. After all, he's Canadian, and whenever he's at death's door, his hospital stay is totally covered by the Canadian single payer system. But, if he were to win any more awards, I take serious issue, thanks to a band called Dirty Loops. This trio from Sweden has become an internet sensation with their cover of Justin Bieber's "Baby". I'm hooked on this performance! There's a lot of slick re-harmonization, gospel chops drumming, advanced funky bass playing, and phenomenal singing by Jonah (can't seem to find his last name...). If you haven't heard it, I guarantee you'll be walking around you house singing a falsetto "Baby, Baby, Baby..." (Everytime my son hears me do that, he goes, "David, David, David"! Ha Ha!)
What's not to like about that! But I think what's funny is that I really didn't know the original Bieber song; that's because I'm 42 years old and have very little time to listen to Bowl Cut Headed Freaks from Canada. However, I decided to check out the original and see where Dirty Loops got their "inspiration":
OK, so the guitarist can't tune his guitar, and Bieber can't sing in tune, but other than that, it's CLEARLY AWESOME. At least, judging by the screaming teenagers, it must be awesome, right? What am I missing?
I'm being sarcastic, of course. The song sucks, the performance sucks, the music sucks. The singer from Dirty Loops could out sing Bieber with one vocal chord tied behind his back!
If Bieber has any Grammies, or even any money, he should just send it all to Dirty Loops. Come on, Bieber, do the right thing. I won't say go die in a hole, but maybe you should go sit in a hole and think about making some better music....
I recently got a letter from a former student. Here's an edited version of what he asked:
If you don't mind, could I ask you a few questions (and I'm sure many more will continue to arise) that have come up while working on some concepts?
When we would talk about transcribing solos, and you said that just those little parts of solos were enough, did you mean, for example: taking a line from that solo and playing through the keys, both hands and then maybe modifying it to personalize it? Would it be advisable to spend a lot of time really learning one song inside out while working on repertoire, or to spread the learning of concepts over many different tunes?
Also, when you said you were practicing 8 hours a day in your younger days, how did you make that work? Were you alone, where nobody could find you?! or just waking up really early?
This is a version of how I responded:
You are exactly right, take any part, big or small (smaller to start) of a transcribed solo and move through the keys, through tunes, any place you think it might work. And modifying it will also be good. In a sense, it's more the rhythms and the shapes that are important, more than the notes. If you know which notes to use from scale and chord awareness, then you add rhythms and linear shapes to that, and you are there!
The info can work on any tune, and certainly, you need to always be adding to your repertoire of tunes, but I think it would be good for you to spend one session on one tune. Monk said to take a tune and play it for 2 hours, or 8 hours, or a whole day, and then you really worked through ALL the possibilities. Try it! And then , obviously, you condense that into a 4 chorus solo. At this stage, it's hard to see overnight progress, but it's a sort of everything-at-once approach. If you start out with abstract concepts, like chords, scales, voicings, licks, rhythms, shapes, whatever, and then make it all work inside of a tune, or 2 tunes, or 3 tunes, then you are on the right track.
And it's true: between 1991 and 1994, I practiced around 4 to 8 hours a day, every day. I wasn't in school, and my only other responsibilities were eating Chinese food every day and playing gigs on piano. I wasn't traveling much either. My best friend is a bass player, and we were roommates for part of that time; all we did was listen to CDs, go to Tower Records (which was right across
Our apartment was actually behind this Tower Records in Rockville, MD
the street), buy CDs, transcribe, play tunes, and watch the cockroaches take over the apartment.
I think it's hard in a smaller city or town to get pushed in the right way. I was a mediocre trumpet player due to my lack of good embouchure, and my teachers probably were too lenient with me because they had sympathy for my frustration. But when you are on a bebop gig, especially with older, crusty players, there is very little patience for young cats. So that's where I got my ass kicked:playing with older cats on the local scene. I wanted to learn all the tunes and all the styles so I could be THE BEST, at least in Baltimore and D.C. And then when I went to New York, I wanted to be THE BEST in New York, and maybe the World. Well, that's all subjective at a certain point, but I can say that at least I've rubbed elbows with THE BEST on occasion.
Speaking of getting up early, I remember complaining to my trumpet teacher, Wayne Cameron, in college about how I had a hard time practicing in the morning because my lips were puffy and it took a while to warm up properly. " Well, get up at 5 AM, then..." he snapped. "How bad do you want this?" I said, " I want it bad!" He said, "Well, remember, there's always somebody out there who wants it badder than YOU...somebody who WILL get up at 5am so that he can practice."
So this is motivation. What's motivating you? How bad do YOU want it? And there is no right answer. I'm 42 and part of me STILL wants to be THE BEST . Part of me just wants to take a nap and sit in the hot tub. I think you have a lot of potential and I would love to see you do this at the higher levels. But it will be hard to get pushed in a smaller town, unless you can push yourself. I always had a lot of motivation within;sometimes I think, even if I lived in Regina, I probably would have still practiced a lot.
The name Jack DeJohnette is synonymous with Modern Jazz Drumming. Many know him for his years spent with the Keith Jarrett Trio, but he first came to prominence with Charles Lloyd and Miles Davis in the 60's. He's always in demand as a sideman, although you wouldn't call Jack DeJohnette to merely be a sideman; his musical contribution to any project is such that he is always a collaborator. He has many albums as a leader; His most recent release is "Live at Yoshi's" a project which yours truly is privileged to appear on along with Rudresh Mahanthappa, David Fiuczynski, and Jerome Harris. (We will be appearing at the Blue Note in New York on January 8th, if you are interested in hearing the band live.) This interview was done while we were touring Europe in May of 2011. I think e were in the airport, waiting for one of the many flights we took during our three week excursion.
GC: So you were talking about how you develop your foot technique…
JD: Ok, For developing the bass drum technique, at least for my type of practicing, I play with ride cymbal beats, letting the right foot follow the right hand, practicing slowly, always practicing slowly and gradually build it up. You determine what speed and intensity you can do it, so you don’t overdo it. You have to develop this technique utilizing the spastic muscle . You’re doing this off of your toe, so your heel is up. You can also try and do it flat footed, heel toe heel toe heel toe, doing it that way, or doing both ways. But you get more power out of it when the foot is up, using the heel toe. And then the other thing to do is play triplets, utilize the triplets, and then playing with accents, you can either use your ride cymbal to follow, and just play independently. Then the next thing to try is to play things, ideas that you know, between the hand and foot, or play ideas with the foot that you normally play with 2 hands, or one hand. It takes some time to build it up. I’m still working on developing it. It depends on the solo I’m doing whether I’ll utilize… sometimes I’ll take a whole solo with the foot. And you know that’s a whole other kind of concept, but doing it in the way so that it communicates something musically…. Yeah, its a challenge, but fun.
GC: How would you describe, if there was a way to describe it, your general concept of drumming?
JD: I would describe it like I did in a video recently: it’s called musical expression on thedrum set. That’s what I do. I see myself as a colorist, not as a drummer, per se…I always thought…”I wanna do on drums what somebody like Keith Jarrett does on the piano”.The drum set is a musical instrument like guitar and everything else; you tune them, you tune the set, like you tune a guitar or bass, and I tune my drums in such a way so that no matter what I play, whatever I hit on it is a melody and that makes me think differently, it makes me think more melodically. And you know, you play drums, so you’ve played my set …so when you play it, no matter what you play…
GC:Sure…
JD: You’ll always find melodies… I find melodies. It leads me to compose melodies…. like if I’m soloing or whatever, I tune the drums differently every time. The 8 and 10 inch drums really sound more like a high bongo and then I have 12, 13, 14, and 16 inch between mid and low you know so it makes for an interesting array of tones. Any drummer who sits down at my kit is automatically playing melody.
GC:It’s true… I heard EJ Strickland one night play on your kit, that time after the set at Birdland. You remember that?
JD: Yeah! And there was Jeff Watts, Billy Drummond, and all of those cats sat down and each one of them because of the way my drums were tuned, they sounded different, and they played different because of the way they are tuned. Oh, it makes you think, it really makes you think, because you could be more aware of melody, melodic structure, you cannot get away from it because you will be playing melody anyway.
GC: What made you decide on your current cymbal set up? You have the hi-hat, two crashes on the left, and then on the right the one ride and then the china cymbal.
JD:Yeah, I might be retiring that china, and maybe I’ll put another 3 point ride in it’s place. I mean right now I’m using the 3 point ride series, which is a Sabian-Jack DeJohnette cooperative undertaking, and it’s under the Vault series of cymbals. It’s geared more toward more of a mainstream drummer.It can be wet and dry cymbal- so its hammered and lathed, but not lathed in one place like by an inch; you play with the stick on that unlathed part, you get a flat ride cymbal sound, a drier sound. You play beneath it towards the edge of the cymbal you get more overtones. You play above- you get sort of in between a little. I also now have 3 point crashes and hi-hats in research and development at Sabian. They’re not available publically, but the ride Vault 3 point ride is available to the public now. The hi-hats and crashes …hopefully we are introducing them next year. We’re having a marketing meeting about that. There is a quite a bit of excitement about that… so these rides… the crashes… you can ride them too, there’s 3 point Vault crashes, so they’re great because most crash cymbals when you try and ride them, they open up too much. These crash cymbals, don’t do that. When you lay into the crash, it gives you that crash you want, and they come down fairly quick so you don’t obscure the rest of the band.
GC: I personally was a fan of the original Jack DeJohnette Signature Cymbal series. I have one of those, a 20-inch ride that I actually put tape on it…..
JD: Really?
GC:Yeah!
JD: That’s already a really raw, dry cymbal!
GC: Yeah, it’s already dry, and I made it drier!(laughter) And then I have a DeJohnette Encore 20- inch that is wetter. I also have a Zildian 16-inch crash that I like, but those are basically the cymbals that I play and I feel like some people you know, they think, “oh this is too dry for me”, but I’ve also had drummers who use those cymbals on recordings and EJ Strickland was one of them.
JD:Oh, really?
GC:And he loved the way they sounded!
JD: Really?!
GC: Yes… he was thinking about trying to buy the cymbals from me. I didn’t want to sell them… While we are on the subject, why do you prefer dry cymbals?
JD: I have a very defined stick beat, and so when I first came out playing drums, I wanted to have a cymbal that emphasized that rather than get obscured by overtone buildup. It’s funny, because it was who I was I introduced a whole range of sets high hats crashes china type for the signature series, and they were a hit they took off and then Bob Zildian said to me, “I‘d have to see it to believe it”, he said, the only way these took off is because I played them.
GC: Ha ha!
JD:And a lot of drummers bought them, I made a good taste in royalties and they made a good sale. It was easy to produce them because they didn’t have to hammer and lathe them. They were basically a raw cymbal, but the way they were cut, they were bowed and shaped that made a big difference. I used those quite a bit, and then we had variations on those. We did another prototype of hammered but not lathed raw cymbal, which I have at the house, and they’re pretty nice too, but eventually I moved to Encore to move to a wetter sound. Those had a satin finish and they opened up a little bit more. Now I’m moving to more of a mainstream cymbal with the Vault 3 point series cymbal because I wanna appeal to a drummer who is working more diverse musical settings.
GC: When I first started teaching at the University of Manitoba, I had to teach 8 drummers, , and I was trying to give them something concrete to practice… like some rudiment exercises. We did the Alan Dawson Rudiment Ritual first semester; I was just trying to feel out what works for them. and then we played that gig at Birdland in January of 2010. It was like really our first time playing together for an extended period of time. But the whole week I was thinking about my students, because what you were playing was so musical, and it was so free… and it just made me think, “wow, how can I get my students to do THAT!” Because rudiments are one thing, but rudiments is not music , in the same way the scales are not music or arpeggios are not music.
JD:Right.
GC: So what would you say if you had a bunch of students in a room - you know, drum students - that want to know, “How can I go to that next level where I’m thinking like a musician?”
GC: I would encourage them to take up a melodic instrument. Although the drums themselves are melodic, if you learn how to tune them in such a way that they are melodic. But I would advise them to learn harmony… play guitar or piano or vibraphone, and develop their reading skills. Learn the basic rudiments but then learn how to play music. The whole idea is that rudiments and scales are merely tools to help you develop your own language, and the possibilities are only limited by your imagination. It’s unlimited… the biggest thing is to challenge yourself to come up with something different that you never placed before that you won’t play again. I realize that everybody has their vocabulary and voice and kind of lines that they play or rhythms that they play that you can tell their signature, but in that you come up with something different if you try.
GC: There are so many jazz students that are learning jazz only in a school environment, but earlier generations didn’t learn everything in a jazz program. They learned by playing local gigs or hanging out with older cats, listening to records . Do you think that the esthetic of doing your own thing was part of the environment back then?
JD: Well, that’s what was inspiring, hearing those guys like Sonny Rollins and Miles Davis and John Coltrane and the freshness with which they played. Ahmad Jamal, Herbie Hancock, etc… They’re continuously coming up with new ways of expressing their creativity through the music and I think that’s still present today… I think the challenge for musicians is to have the courage to maintain their own voice. Now people can get more work if they play like somebody else.
GC: Right.
JD: And they might work less if they play like themselves and that’s when I think musicians have to be more courageous. It’s your voice, you know? That’s how you sound. That’s you. That’s your identity, and try to develop THAT and make THAT work in different situations… and that’s how you get hired.
GC: Is that something you always had, that confidence? You were always comfortable with your own sound? I think that’s how a lot of younger players understandably have problems with that. It’s not being like an egomaniac; it’s just sort of being comfortable on stage, comfortable with your own voice.
JD: Well, it has to do with your environment, like the environment I came up in; we hung out at each other’s houses. There were a lot of jam sessions, so you got a lot of on the job training playing before an audience, getting feedback from musicians and the audience as to whether you were doing good. I spent a lot of time with a tape recorder; that, and a mirror helped me a lot…. a tape recorder playing the records and listening back to myself and then doing research and development on myself .
GC: Interesting.
JD: Like “Oh, that’s too harsh, oh let me change that, oh my touch is too harsh, its too forceful.. So that helps, you know, you’re listening back to yourself for critical analysis. I think that’s important, as far as playing the drums , any instrument, just watching how your body is when you play, see where the tension is. Because the whole thing is to have the right balance of relaxedness, relaxation and tension in your body when you play and be totally there in the moment, and not somewhere else, but focused on the moment. And, if you’re focused, you don’t have to make yourself be focused. In this band, everybody’s focused because this is a player’s band, and it’s a listening band, so everybody really listens intently to each other, and I think that’s what helps. Everybody in this band has their voice, which becomes a unified collective voice in the music. Although it’s my compositions, but it’s our music because everybody’s bringing their ideas.
GC: That’s why you assembled this band of myself, Rudresh Mahanthappa, David Fiuczynski, and Jerome Harris:you wanted everybody to contribute in their own way?
JD: I got that from Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock, to get musicians you can trust to govern themselves. I think the one thing that made musicians play well for Miles, and for Herbie; the musicians always knew Miles was listening to them, so they were playing for him..
GC: Many of the musicians who played with Miles that I have been around say that Miles rarely said anything about the music.
JD: No, unless there was something specific he wanted to hear. Otherwise, everything was cool if he didn’t say anything. And he expected you to come up with something different every night, not play the same licks. You were expected to play what you don’t know, not what you already know…It’s easy to sit home and play all kinds of great ideas, great, but then when you’re playing with an ensemble, you can’t play that shit. You gotta react with the musicians, and sometime that may require you just keeping time and not playing all the hip stuff… it doesn’t work, because now you are part of a team.
I'll leave you with two links to a performance we did for German radio in Hamburg during our tour.I also included a video of the cymbals DeJohnette was talking about, as well as a promo for the Yoshi's gig we did in 2010, from which the recording was taken.
