By Josef Woodard
Jazz has found its way into cinema only on rare occasions, and usually in compromising or demeaning ways. For every respectful example, such as Bertrand Tavernier's 'Round Midnight and Clint Eastwood's Bird, there are too many cases of jazz being used as window dressing, appearing in shabby clothes, or worse in the film medium. This, despite the family and historical connection, both art forms having been spawned roughly 100 years ago.
One of the more surprising recent cases of jazz given due respect on the big screen-and in a major Hollywood film, no less-was recent Steven Spielberg's summer release, The Terminal. At the risk of spoiling the plot's premise, suffice to say that Benny Golson, the one and only composer-saxophonist legend, is woven into the very fabric of the story. The script also revolves around Art Kane's famous 1958 all-star photograph. That amazing Who's Who gathering of jazz greats on a stoop in Harlem in 1958, originally published in Esquire magazine, was later memorialized in Jean Bach's 1994 documentary A Great Day in Harlem.
In The Terminal, starting Tom Hanks, Golson plays a ghostly driving force in the storyline, and the real Golson and even has a token bit of onscreen time, playing his classic "Killer Joe" and has a brief speaking role. Jazz never gets it this good, especially in a relatively mainstream film.
If the Spielberg connection helps to push Golson's career upward and outward, it will be a matter of poetic justice served. He is one veteran deserving of greater recognition, even if he has been a constant voice in jazz through his classic, real book-dominating compositions "I Remember Clifford," "Killer Joe," "Along Came Betty," "Moanin'" and "Blues March." But, if Golson's writing has represented a pillar of the jazz repertoire, his presence has been more phantom-like.
Born in Philadelphia on January 25, 1929, has had a luminous career, but also a highly syncopated one. He was a critical member of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, helping to bump Blakey's long-standing group into a much higher public and artistic profile. But it was not to be. Insecure about his playing and also eager to nurture his compositional yearnings by moving to Los Angeles in pursuit of film and television work, Golson effectively dropped out of the jazz scene just when he should have nudged up in the jazz world in the early '60s. It would be decades before he gave into his "itch" to play the horn again, and he has been slowly expanding his live and recording work, reminding listeners of his gifts.
As of the summer of 2004, that mission has an ally in a certain high-placed Hollywood friend. In the midst of his newfound acclaim this summer, the amiable Golson spoke about his musical life, including the Spielberg factor, but more importantly, his all-important work with his employer and soul mate Blakey.
Jazz Hot : Has your schedule bumped up this year, given the higher profile provided by your presence in a Steven Spielberg film?
I'm getting a lot of calls from everywhere. I called Steven's office and I said "tell Steven he's always been my hero, but now he's become my shadow warrior. He's opened a lot of doors for me." She said "yes, he's opened the door for a lot of people." Both he and Tom Hanks are really nice men. You'd never know who they were, unless you recognize them. They've got nothing to prove. They talk to you, straight on, looking you in the eye.
Has this all happened within the last year? When did you first get the call?
It was back in October of last year. It's been only about ten months from the time I got the first call. I didn't believe it. I just missed it when the office called me. I was in Europe. They said Steven Spielberg called and is interested in having you have a small speaking role in his new film. I didn't believe it. Woody Allen called twice. I went down there and they had twelve guys there each time, and I didn't get the part. They said "no, I think he wants you." That what it was. He wanted me.
The plot is about Tom Hanks getting my autograph. That's why he called me. Then I said "well, look, pertaining to that picture, Sonny Rollins is still alive, Horace Silver, Hank Jones, Johnny Griffin... why did he call me? I found later, after it was all over, I sent him a serigraph of "I Remember Clifford" with my picture on it and what it's about, a copy of the original manuscript that I wrote it on. I sent a little note, and it's about 18 inches by 22 inches and beautifully framed.
Each one sent a letter back and that's when I got it. Steven said "thanks for the lithograph. `I Remember Clifford' has always been one of my favorite tunes from your body of works." By saying "body of works," he knew. And in Tom's note, he wrote "I've always liked 'I Remember Clifford.' The next time I play it, I'll try to follow the music." Now, I don't know if he meant he was playing some instrument, or the next time he puts the stereo on. When it was all over, he said "gee, I would like to come and see you play somewhere. When I come, I'll pay." I said "yes, Tom, they're going to charge you at the door to come in..." (laughs).
Between the shots, he said "Benny, you don't know what an honor it is for me to be doing this with you." And when it was over, Spielberg said to me "Benny, I really appreciate your doing this for me. I'm saying "wait a minute, I should be thanking these guys." That's how humble these guys are. Really, if you didn't know it was Steven Spielberg, you'd just think you were talking to some guy.
It was such an unusual angle. Jazz doesn't get its day very often in movies, or pop culture, especially.
I know. We're flying blindly.
But it does creep in, thanks to artists such as Woody Allen and Clint Eastwood. They're diehard fans, naturally. Does this mean that we'll be hearing more jazz in Spielberg's films?
I have no idea. It's wherever his creative mind takes him. I worked with him all day and he's a real genius, and not once did he raise his voice about anything. All those people were working behind the camera, the script girl and all, they all would have gone to the wall for him. I could see that. I told him "we have a mutual friend, Quincy Jones." He said "oh, let's call him." He called and Quincy wasn't there. He said he'd call him after lunch.
When I got back to New York, I got a call from Quincy. Quincy and I used to be roommates years ago. I called him back and he said "hey, Steven called me and told me what you guys are doing," just like buddy buddy stuff. Steven Spielberg doing some epic, just like guys, you know.
Did the experience of doing this film and the subsequent instilled in you any sense of nostalgia, maybe thinking back to that fateful 1958 photograph by Art Kane?
Yes, of course. When I was called to be a part of that photograph by Nat Hentoff, the jazz critic and now political writer, I wondered when I got there and saw all these personalities, most of whom I didn't know, I wondered why the heck was I there? I was a little boy in town. I knew Art Farmer, I knew Dizzy Gillespie because I was playing with his band. I knew Horace Silver, Johnny Griffin and Gigi Gryce, but I don't think I knew anybody else. Everybody else was a stranger to me. I figured I was the least-known on there.
After I got this call from Spielberg and discovered that photograph was involved, I thought "well, how fortuitous that turned out to be, that day when I showed up, in my own mind, as a nobody and now to be in this position in a Spielberg film. Talk about a quantum leaps. Well, it did take quite a few years (laughs).
Did you have any particular concept behind your new album, Terminal 1?
Absolutely. His picture was The Terminal. I wanted to commemorate it in some way, without it being the exact title. The closest I could get to it was by calling it Terminal 1. With the title tune, I portray what happens in the airport, by the nature of the tune. The drums become the voices of the people, the crowd murmur. "Did you lose my ticket? What do you mean, the flight has already left? What do you mean I've got to pay-he's only three years old? Where's the men's room? Where's the restaurant? You mean I've got to wait three hours for a connecting flight?"
That murmur that you hear is always there, at any hour. So the drums start out as the crowd murmur. We join him and what's different about this tune is that, where the drums usually accompanies the music, the music is accompanying the drums, because he's a character throughout. When we play the melody, you hear a quasi-solo going on under the melody. This is going on, as usual, in the airport. No matter what's happening in the periphery, people have these questions and complaints and whatnot.
We start the solos, and it's still going on, with this quasi-drum solo going on. Then in the second chorus, we go into a beat, but we keep coming back to this conversational thing, as it were, metaphorically. When we end the tune, we play the very last note, but the drums continue to play, as if the airplane is pulling away and the crowd noise gets lesser and lesser. The plane goes off into the heavens.
So yes, it definitely had something to do with The Terminal.
Do you often think cinematically or in terms of other artistic media when you write music?
Not necessarily, but with this one, yes. I did work out in Hollywood for awhile. It was an episodic thing going on, because that's what I did. The music had to go with or against what you were viewing on the screen. For example, if it's a sad scene, you expect the music to be sad. But, if subliminally, you want to bring out something else, even though it's a sad situation, you might be reflecting back to a happier time. The music becomes aberrational and that is happy.
It gets to be a psychological and a subliminal thing, ideas that you intuitively grasp. So I had this kind of approach in mind as I wrote this particular tune. But the other tunes are not at all cinematic. They're entities unto themselves.
The new album, your first for Concord Records, is a nice mix of old tunes and new ones, which presents a broad portrait of what you do. Was that your goal?
I thought that would be a good idea, especially "Cherry," and old one I used to hear in the black neighborhood as a kid growing up. I didn't know what it meant or what the words meant, but I remember every note of it. I decided to do it. When I did it, I found out that a lot of white people liked it, too. They didn't know the history of the tune, but they liked it.
I told the drummer "brushes, all the way through." To the bass player, "just keep the 2/4 beat. We're not going to swing, we're not going to the 4/4 thing on the cymbals. Keep the beat. That's what the piece is all about." Don Redman, the saxophone player and bandleader, wrote that many years ago. He's been dead for many years now.
Then I did "Sweet Georgia Brown." Before the advent of "Cherokee" as a test to one's mettle, it was "Sweet Georgia Brown" played at the speed of light. I decided to slow it down, to where it was originally. Plus, I gave it some different chords under the melody, although going to the traditional chords on the solo. Nobody plays it that way anymore. It was just a choice, that's all.
You do "In Your Sweet Way," which you did before, right?
I've done it twice now (also on 1991's Domingo). This version turned out much better. I sound a little strange on that CD. As a matter of fact, I rarely listen to things that I've done in the past. I'll listen and listen and listen when I initially do it, and then that's it. Years will go by. This morning, I happened to listen to Domingo, and that track. I thought "oh boy, I could have done that better."
You know, you're never really satisfied with yourself creatively. If you become too satisfied, that's the kiss of death.
Then you become smug, right?
Right. You're a man overboard and you're treading water for as long as you can.
Of course, the new album is in the classic quintet format, and you were in two of the finest quintets ever - the Jazz Messengers and the Jazztet, with Art Farmer. Is the quintet a setting that's especially comfortable for you?
It is very comfortable for me, because the fewer instruments, the more individual expression I find can come out of that group. If you're in a 15-piece band, then you've got to contend with blending together with others, this section and that section, and you can't just get up and play five choruses. You can, but it would be boring, as people are sitting there holding their horns while you're playing.
But if you've got four or five men, maybe even six men, you can stretch out with the improvisation a little more. In jazz, it's mainly about improvisation. Nobody comes to hear the melody over and over and over. After they play the melody, intuitively, you say "ok, now what's he got to say?" That's what it's about. If you play the melody for three or four choruses, I don't think you'd have much of an audience, live or on a recording.
The only time I ever heard anybody get away with that was Miles Davis, when he recorded Wayne Shorter's "Nefertiti" and played the melody over and over. That's the only time I heard that. The only reason I think it worked was because Miles did it. If I had done it, they'd say "that Golson's gone crazy." And Wayne is a genius in his own right, so it really worked.
Miles only did one of my tunes, but he did lots of Wayne's.
You have a strong Art Blakey connection in your history. How did that start? Where did you first meet him?
It was back in 1958, right around the time that photograph was taken (from A Great Day in Harlem). I went in as a sub and then became permanent. In fact, when I went in as a sub, he asked me whether I'd consider joining the group. I told him I couldn't because I'd just come to New York and I was trying to establish myself here. When you move, you lose. Out of sight, out of mind. I told him I didn't want to risk going out of town on a permanent basis and traveling, and not getting myself established.
I wanted to write for radio and TV commercials, for singer, for big bands and groups, and appear playing myself, and things like that. I wanted to establish Benny Golson in New York City. So he let it go.
As time went on, I wondered if this guy ever got a degree in psychology, because he roped me into this band, slowly. I was going there for one day, and he asked if I could show up for the second day. I'd heard him and loved him on recordings and I was ecstatic about playing with him. Of course, I'd lay the second day. And then he finally asked me, would I finish the week out. And then he asked me if I'd become a permanent member and I told him I wouldn't be able to, because of what I wanted to do.
And then, this is where his psychology went to work, he said "I know you want to stay in town, but we've got one week in Pittsburgh. That wouldn't disrupt your plans too much, would it?" I'd played five days with him and was loving it, so the "yes" came quite easily. "Yeah, I could go to Pittsburgh for one week." While in Pittsburgh, he said "didn't you go to Howard University in Washington, D.C.?" I says "yes, it's like a second home to me." "I bet you know a lot of people there, don't you?" "I know a lot of people there." "If you ever saw those people again, you'd really have a great time, wouldn't you?" "You bet." "Well, you know, after this, I've got two weeks in Washington. That's not going to hurt you." I said "well, yes, ok."
So I'm playing two weeks with him and the "yes" comes easier. After that, there was no question. I was a Jazz Messenger.
That's one prerequisite of a good leader, using psychology, right?
Yes, absolutely. The greatest drummer I ever played with was Art Blakey. There were others who followed him, like Roy Haynes, Kenny Clarke, Arthur Taylor and Al Carlisle and Joe Farnsworth. But with this guy, it was like a college. He had such so much intuitive knowledge about things, he was didactic. He had the ability to teach without knowing that he was doing it. It was only because he was drawing on his many years of experience.
He didn't know how not to swing. He'd be sick, tired, tooth extracted, face twice as big as it should have been on one side, and playing his brains out. It was the greatest experience I ever had, and I learned a lot from him.
When I joined him, I had this smooth, flowing style, kind of quiet, I guess. He'd play these drum rolls going into another chorus, these press rolls. It would get loud and come down with a crash at the beginning of the next chorus. Well, he'd go into those press rolls and I'd disappear. I wasn't getting it.
One night, we were down at the now-defunct Café Bohemia, and he'd lay one of these press rolls on me, not two bars but four bars before the next chorus. It got louder and louder and came down on the crash, to set up the first beat of the next crash. Then he gave me a second crash and a third crash and a fourth crash. I was thinking "my God, what's happening?" Then he hollered over at me "get up out of that hole." I got it. I finally got the message (laughs).
My style had to change. Otherwise, I'd just be pantomiming.
I don't think of you as a mild-mannered player.
Yeah, that older saccharine, flowing, velvet style was not working with Art Blakey. He was something else, that guy. I loved him.
He also drew on your compositional skills. Did he bring you out in that way?
Well, he gave me the opportunity. I suggested "Art, what you're playing now, these are not really arrangements. Everybody plays these. You're the leader, the drummer, and you play your solos at the end of what's been happening on the bandstand when everybody else has played and played, ad infinitum, and then you come in with a drum solo at the end. You should be different. You're the leader. You need something where you're playing from the beginning, like `Straight, No Chaser.' You remember you started that intro off with Thelonious Monk, one hand and then the second hand and a foot and the other foot. It was brilliant."
I said "let me go home and think of something. Oh, you haven't played a march." He said "are you crazy? Nobody plays a march in jazz." "I'm not talking about the typical military style march. I'm thinking like Grambling, that black university in the South where they've got grease and funk and are hip..." "It will never work, Golson." "Well, let me try it."
I went home. I was living in Harlem, on 116th Street at Seventh Avenue, seventh floor. I put my window up on the weekend, and you could hear pimps berating their women and automobile accidents and sirens and people screaming. I thought "ah, now I can sit down and write." I came up with this melody. I went back to rehearsal the next day and said "we're going to try this march." He said "Golson, this is not going to work. How do I start it?" "Remember when the American Legion used to come through the neighborhood playing. When the bugles would stop, the drums would keep playing. Start off like that, just play some drum patterns and things." "How will you and Lee know when to come in?" "Play a roll-off" (sings the familiar drum set-up).
We were working at Smalls' Paradise at the time, and I said "let's see what the reaction of the crowd is." We played it that night at the club. There was no dance floor in the club, but they were dancing in-between the tables, knocking the drinks over. He saw this and turned to me and said "I'll be damned."
He played that tune until the time he died. No matter who came in that band, they had to play "Blues March" and "Along Came Betty."
So suddenly, the groove became hip, a groove which he had deemed unhip?
Yeah. What happened with the tune was that we landed in Europe once and they were playing it on the loudspeaker system. In France, they had it as a theme song for one of the jazz shows over there. I was looking at the "Super Bowl" one day and what do I hear? "Blues March."
Would you say that working with Blakey was an important catalyst for finding you find your musical voice?
Absolutely. It was encouraging. I think I would have done it anyway, but it added intensity and urgency because I saw possibilities through what he was permitting me to do, and how the people were accepting. It was like beating the old barrel hoop down the street. You just beat it, and keep it from wobbling.
Thinking historically, did you have a sense that you were onto a new style at the time? That was the birth of "hard bop," wasn't it?
No, I didn't have any idea like that. All I knew was that there were things in my mind, fighting for freedom, as it were, trying to get out. I was trying to give it that freedom, not knowing where it was going and not even purposing where it was going. I just knew that I had to get it out and express it. I wrote "Whisper Not" before I joined Art, but then with him, I wrote "Along Came Betty," "Are You Real," "Blues March." Those things were born when I was with him.
And he was very encouraging. I could do anything I wanted, musically. And he let me run that band. I collected money. I paid him, I paid the musicians. It was crazy, because nobody knew who I was. I told the booking office what I wanted-"we must go to Europe." I told the Shore Agency "I want a concert in town, at Carnegie Hall and Town Hall." He gave it to us. "We're dressing up in full dress, in tuxedoes." He though I was crazy. I got the money up. The money was down and I got it up.
When he used to introduce us, when we'd go out with the regular band, and bring along Jackie MacLean, Curtis Fuller and me as an adjunct, he would call it the "all-star Jazz Messengers." They would play the first half and then we'd play part of the second half and they'd we join in the finale. When Art would say "Benny Golson was the one who started it all," people didn't understand what he was saying. I didn't start the Jazz Messengers. That was Kenny Dorham, Horace Silver, the bass player and whatnot. But he was talking about the time that I joined. That's when the band took a change. The money came up and everything changed.
When I was in the band, I told him, "the way you play, you should be a millionaire." He looked at me with those sad cow eyes and said "can you help me?" I said "yes. Get me in this band and get a new band." That's when he let me bring in Lee Morgan and Bobby Timmons and Jimmy Merritt. I wrote "Moanin'" and "Blues March," and I told Alfred Lion what picture I wanted on the cover. Everyone went along with me. It was crazy. Nobody knew who I was. But everybody went along with what I asked for, and it paid off (laughs). Incredible.
You obviously have the inner fortitude to pull it off.
Well, I thought I did. But there was no proof. Nothing had been kitchen-tested. I just had desire and a felt strong enough about him. It was all about him as a catalyst. It happened because of him. And it did.
Smalls' Paradise said they never wanted the band in there again before I joined. They would take intermission and disappear. People were walking out. I said "we have to set goals for ourselves" when I joined the band. I told Art "we're going to wear uniforms..." "Uniforms? We aren't wearing uniforms..." "People see you before they hear you. You've got to let them know what you think of yourself before you walk out on that stage. Our first goal is to have Smalls' Paradise to ask us to come back." He said "you're crazy, they never want us back in there. They're sick of us."
Don't you know, we did the Moanin' album and the phone rang. It was Smalls' Paradise. I said "I'll be damned. That proves we're doing something right." I set goals for us to show that we were moving in the right direction, and we were. I stayed with them for a year, and when I left, I said "I'm leaving, but do all the things that you've been doing that have led to your success." Nobody knows this, but after I left, he used to call me and ask "Benny, what do you think about this or that, what should I do?"
So you were an ongoing consultant?
I guess so. A member emeritus.
Wayne Shorter took your place, right?
He took my place, yeah. A good replacement. Freddie Hubbard took Lee's place, eventually.
Horace Silver always gave his group an identity. You always knew it was Horace Silver, because he controlled things from the piano, which is not too hard to do. But it's hard for a drummer to give a group an identity, because he's just playing rhythm. But this man was so strong and dynamic that he did it. He had a certain sound when he played those drums that he added when his group played. Somehow, you knew he was the leader, intuitively. He could sit down to anybody's drums and make it sound like Art Blakey. He'd get up and the drums took on another sound.
This is the way he was. He was like a Nostradamus on the drums (laughs). That was a great experience for me, like going to college. I learned a lot from him, and he never knew he was teaching anything. It was just intuitive, but he was right on the money.
Did that stint led into your band Jazztet, with Art Farmer?
There was just a little time in-between, but more or less, yeah. When I left that group, I had difficulty for six months playing with any other drummer. A terrible time. I happened to mention to Freddie Hubbard this problem and he said "you, too?" He had the same problem. You got used to this high level playing every night and then go into another situation and it sounded like the drummer was warming up all night, trying to get ready to play. You're going crazy, thinking "come on, come on." It just wasn't Art Blakey.
You were spoiled?
Yeah, I was spoiled. I loved that guy. Incredible drummer.
As you said, one of the many virtues was that when he played, he was always "on," no matter what. Is that right?
Yes, no matter what. Sick, tired, sleepy... We did a date for a Japanese label and they brought him in on the Concord from Paris, I think. He hadn't had any sleep and came in with his little bowtie still on. He sat down and played his fanny off. Nothing stopped this guy. There was never a "oh fellas, I'm tired, I need a break." Nothing. He was like a tank.
"Killer Joe" is one of your tunes which is a classic standard now. It has a fascinating structure, between the simple, two-chord vamp in the A section and a more exploratory B section. It takes you briefly away into the cosmos, and then we're back to the earthy groove. Was the key for you when you wrote it?
Yeah. It was like renewing itself, like starting over, and with even more intensity, with the unexpected. Jazz should always have that, some element of anticipation in it. "Oh, what's going to happen next?" You need that element in it. And the more you do a thing, the less it needs. So you have to give it something. If you do the same tune many times, it should be different, somehow, rather than "oh, part two of the same thing." That's what it was.
It was a symbolic thing. Let me tell you the story behind it. Traveling around, I used to notice these pimps--it was usually black guys--who would come in with their silk suits and the black shoes with the white stitching around the sides, and maybe a black shirt and a white tie-not always, but that was sort of symbolic. They'd have their hats and their fingernails manicured, and with their Cadillacs at the curb, that their attendants would park for them. Maybe there's a lady on their arm, or maybe a lady on each arm. These are ladies who work for him, if you get my drift.
Somehow, years ago, I remember back in Philadelphia that the guys who were illicit, the number riders or whatever, many times had the name "killer Johnson" or "killer this or that." This "killer" thing sort of became symbolic, for me, with the pimp. That's what "Killer Joe" was all about. I did a little monologue in the beginning, which sounded horrible, where I said "Killer Joe, he doesn't like to work, but he's always pocket full of money. He likes donations from the ladies..." Things like that.
Killer Joe became representative, or symbolic, of all the pimps in the world, wherever they were, whether black or white or in Chicago, Los Angeles, New York. As Quincy (Jones) said "'Killer Joe' is the theme of the street, but it's the night life and the dark side of the street." The pimps are out, berating the chicks and sitting at the bars. The (Cadillac) El Dorados are now Mercedes. This is what "Killer Joe" is all about. The Killer is on the scene.
That vamp in the beginning is announcing his presence. He's on the scene. Here he comes (laughs).
So there was no specific Joe?
No. Some people used to think it was about the Joe who used to go to the Palladium, the Latin place that used to be next to Birdland. I said "no, it's not about him." Some other people said it was Philly Jo, but no. That's just like "Along Came Betty," which people thought was about Betty Carter. But no, it's about Betty Pritchett, from Dayton, Ohio, long since out of my life.
Speaking of a tune whose subject we are familiar with, "I Remember Clifford" is certainly a great tune, and one of those well-known memorials for a jazz legend.
That's the one tune I wish I'd never written. It's obvious why. If he had not been killed, I wouldn't have written the tune. It was a sad thing for me to write that tune, and it was the longest amount of time I've ever spent on any tune I've ever written, whereas I wrote "Whisper Not" in twenty minutes. "I Remember Clifford" took two full weeks. Usually, I write a tune in two or three days at the most.
I wanted every note to be representative of Clifford and the way he played. The melody became more than the melody. To me, it became Clifford Brown. I'll tell you, I had tears in my eyes a lot of the days I was writing that tune, because he was a dear friend and I hated that he had gone that way. It broke my heart.
That's why I say I wish I never had the occasion to write it. If he was still with us, what would he be doing now? What would have happened. We can only imagine, because of what he had done. What he was doing was a harbinger of the future, but his future was cut short.
It's easy to speculate how he might have shifted the course of jazz in some way.
Yeah, like Dizzy and Bird did. And the guy got a college scholarship in mathematics.
It's a swinging requiem, like Charles Mingus' "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat." There is a tradition in jazz of paying homage to those who have passed.
That's right, and there's also Wayne Shorter's "Lester Left Town."
You checked out of the jazz scene for many years, when you went to Hollywood. What led you to make that major shift in venue and direction?
I ensconced myself in the art of film writing. That's what I wanted to do. At that particular time in my life, I didn't like the way I was sounding and I didn't like what I was playing, so that decision was pretty easy. In fact, I thought I had given up. I thought I would never play the saxophone again. I gave away my flute, I sold a soprano and one of my tenors. I thought I'd never play again, and would just stick to writing. But then, years later, I got the bug again.
I concentrated on the writing. I got called for gigs when I first went out there and I wouldn't take any gigs. I didn't want to play anymore. Then they stop calling me, so I thought "well, I guess it's really over now. Nobody's calling me to play." I didn't want to do that anyway. Then, a strange thing happened. As much as I looked forward to writing for film, which I loved, I got the itch again to play. In coming back, you have no idea how long it took me before I was comfortable again on my horn. It took me ten full years before I was comfortable again on the horn. If I'd known it was going to take that long, I might not have come back. It was painful.
I didn't like the way I sounded when I stopped, but when I picked my horn up again, during that interim, that lapse, some thinking process was going on. When I picked the horn up again, I didn't sound the way I sounded when I put it down. It was different. I had to refine. You know how Picasso went through Cubism and these different styles. I was experimenting with vibrato and this and that. It took me ten years before I was comfortable again.
When would you say you got the itch again?
It was in the early '80s. We put the Jazztet together for the second time in '83. There was almost a 25-year lapse between the first Jazztet and the second one. McCoy Tyner was our first pianist.
Touching on your Hollywood period, wasn't that kind of a heyday for jazz musicians in the film and television music scene? I'm thinking of Quincy Jones, Oliver Nelson, J.J. Johnson...
I'll tell you how that happened. Quincy was the first one out. Henry Mancini bid him to "come on out. I'll see if I can help you." So he went out. I remember when he left. Then Quincy called Oliver and said "you should come on out." And then I got the call, from Leonard Feather, the late critic. He said "you ought to come out here. It's great." Following me, J.J. Johnson came out a few years later.
Yes, we did some things, but what I was trying to avoid when I came out was just being the hip jazz writer. I wanted to write for other kinds of things, for dramatic shows and comedies and things like that. As a result, I wouldn't orchestrate for this or that composer. I was dying the death of a dog because I wanted to be known as a composer. I didn't want to be known as a ghost writer for somebody. My nest egg fell like an elevator out of control (laughs).
But it paid off. I did some deeper studies with a fellow named Henry Brant. He was my teacher. Man, this guy taught me a wealth of stuff. I used to go to his house for lessons when he'd come from Bennington College every weekend and none of his kids had clothes on. Everybody was nude. He looked like a guy who might have a newspaper stand on the corner, with those crepe sole shoes. But he was brilliant. He was charging $50 an hour. Brant was something. I don't care what we were doing. When that hour was up, he'd stop, right in the middle of something. "That's it. See you next week."
He's the one who turned me in the right direction with film writing. In the first opportunity I got, Quincy Jones threw something my way. I went to Europe and did a German film. I used everything that Brant taught me. They put the orchestra together for me over there, we recorded and I came back and he wanted to hear some of it. I used everything he taught me.
See, I didn't want to do any ghost writing. Eventually, I was able to do my own things, like "Room 222," "Mission: Impossible," and I even got my own show, which didn't go. Karen Valentine got a show after "Room 222." Then I got another show that didn't go. Remember "The Waltons?" They came up with a black version, starring Brock Peters, but that didn't make it.
But I did a lot of work out there. I did the Academy Awards, a lot of radio and TV commercials, worked with singers, including Peggy Lee, Mickey Rooney and his Vegas act, by virtue of being out there. I also worked with The Monkees, who had something going on, and Eric Burdon and the Animals...
What would you do with them, arranging?
Yeah. It was a different kind of music, so you'd have to be broad. I had enough experience being broad that I could swing from one side to the other. As a result, I was able to do those kinds of things. I worked with Mama Cass, from the Mamas and the Papas, and did the whole album for her for RCA. Then I got into rhythm and blues things.
Well, that doesn't surprise me. You have the feel. So you really delved into varied musical worlds while you were out there?
Extremely varied. Fortunately, about eight years ago, I got a chance to display my classical chops. I did a thing called "Bass Concerto," which was performed here in New York at Lincoln Center. We did it with the orchestra and with the orchestra in Louisville, Kentucky. Then I did a Violin piece for Itzhak Perlman, which we premiered here. Then, Lincoln Center gave me two nights of my works. I'd written a classical piece and they brought a pianist in from Los Angeles. She had memorized it. I used an orchestra, a string quartet, a small group, and it was great.
And now, next year, I'm having a performance of some of my piano music in San Francisco. I've written a lot of piano pieces. You know, Chopin wrote all piano pieces. I've written a series of those, to be performed up there.
I like the classical stuff. I started out to be a classical pianist. That was my first instrument. When I was nine years old, I wanted to be a classical pianist. I went at if hard, seriously. By the time I was 13 or 14, I had a repertoire. My teachers used to send me out to play at these fashion shows for women and teas on Sunday and recitals and things like that. I can still read and play. I've done a few gigs on piano, too, but not very well.
But when I heard the saxophone, I was 14, and that was it. The six years I had under my belt disappeared. When I went to college, I had to take two more years of piano. It was mandatory. I can still read. I read pretty good at the piano stuff.
Would you say this is one of your main interests now, reviving your classical chops and expressing yourself in that mode?
Yes, because I've written a lot of piano pieces. I haven't written orchestral things, because I don't' have the time to sit down and do it. The one that I did do, I'm revising now because there might be a possibility of the Chicago Symphony doing it. Over the next few months, I'm going to have to change it around a bit. As time goes by, you hear different things.
When you did re-enter the atmosphere in the '80s, so to speak, the timing was probably ripe. Wynton Marsalis had shaken up the jazz world and made it safe for mainstream acoustic music again. It must have felt like an artistically accommodating place again for you.
Well, he wasn't on the scene yet when I came back. He came a little after that. But he came with impact. A lot of people put him down, but this guy is brilliant. He did a Concerto by Haydn, and this guy knows how to think. He knows how to look beyond the surface and get under into things. He's smart. Maybe he's come so far so fast that many people are jealous. I wrote an article about him and Down Beat printed it, called "Go In the Other Direction." Somebody called him and said "hey, Benny Golson's got your back, man."
Some say he's arrogant. Well, if he's arrogant, maybe it's only because he had to mellow out a bit with time. When Lee Morgan came on the scene, you couldn't find anybody who was more arrogant. He mellowed out. That comes with youth.
And it can also be a defense mechanism, can't it?
Sometimes, yeah.
Do you feel like things are coming together for you in a particular way lately?
Well, actually, they've been together for a long time. It's a little more intense now. I'm able to live comfortably now. When I went out to Los Angeles, all my horns were in the pawn shop, and all my wife's jewelry and fur coats. Half of what we had was in the pawn shop. I was thinking "what have I done?" But now, we live comfortably. We have an apartment out here and a place in Europe.
I'm not rich, but comfortable.
Artistically speaking, do you feel that things are cohering into a new phase, a new creative energy?
Well, I'll tell you, it feels like new things are constantly popping their heads up. When they stop popping their heads up, I'll feel like that's it. I will have had it. But these new things keep popping up and begging for a place in the sun, for life. I try to, as Dr. Frankenstein did, give them life. I try to get them up off the table.
Look, that's part of the adventure. We go to the same forest every day, but we don't go to the same trees, you know? I'm in the realm of jazz. Primarily, that's what I do. I do other things, too, but I'm known as a jazz composer. And I love it. I used to be a truck driver. I hated it. The day I went in and told him I wouldn't be back, on the last truck driving job I had, they said "well, what are you going to do?" I said "I'm going to be a jazz musician." They laughed, saying "you'll be back."
I never went back. I've been fortunate.
Well, it's a lot more than being fortunate. You've got a powerhouse talent.
Well, I've been working on it. My wife doesn't let me get a big head. She tells me to put the trash out. She keeps me in my place.