John PIZZARELLI (Jazz Hot 625)

Swinging The Melody


Le guitariste-chanteur est issu d’une tradition proprement américaine d’entertainment qui voit se mêler virtuosité et swing, dans un contexte spectaculaire où la facilité se mêle à l’exigence musicale. Quel que soit le contexte, il fait preuve d’un grand professionnalisme, entendu comme exigence et comme respect, de la musique comme du public.
S’il y a parfois un peu de sirop dans sa voix ou certains choix de répertoire, c’est un authentique guitariste de jazz et il a joué avec rien moins que Clark Terry, Milt Hilton, Connie Kay, Dave McKenna (p), Johnny Frigo (vln), Butch Miles (dm), Ron Carter, Ken Peplowski (cl) ou Randy Sandke (tp). Il a également travaillé avec des arrangeurs comme Johnny Mandel, Clare Fisher, Don Sebesky, Ralph Burns, Michel Legrand, John Clayton. Son quartet régulier est désormais composé de Ray Kennedy (p), Martin Pizzarelli (b) et Tony Tedesco (dm) et produit une musique chaleureuse, dont l’enthousiasme emprunte souvent aux envolées d’un Oscar Peterson, évoqué par Ray Kennedy.
John Pizzarelli possède une personnalité cordiale, voire charmeuse, pleine d’humour… et sa musique lui ressemble, simple mais travaillée, brillante mais sans prétention.

Propos recueillis par Jean Szlamowicz


John Pizzarelli : I was born in Paterson NJ, 6th April 1960-St Joseph Hospital! My father was from there and my mother worked in the hospital so we all ended up being born there although we were living in another town. I grew up in Saddle River, NJ (?). It was very bucolic, very nice, it was a real farm town. My parents are still there. It was a lot of farmland, very quiet, everybody knew everybody. And then all the farms became million dollars homes. It’s become a very affluent community after that. Our family were the first Italians in that town. We were really anybody there. My mother used to tell a story: once my father had a big party with Milt Hinton, everybody came over - and it was such a big deal in the town, everybody heard about it! “Who is this man who moved into town?”
The reason why he moved there was that it was close to my mother’s parents, two towns over and my father had lived in Clifton NJ and he knew he could go to New York easily, get in and out of town. My parents’ parents’ were already in New Jersey so I’m really like fourth generation. My mother’s mother came over from Hungary - that’s the only story in the family of someone coming over on a boat, otherwise everybody was already here.

Jazz Hot : Did something remain truly Italian?
They gathered on Sundays, they would go to my father’s uncle’s house to eat Italian food and then play music after dinner. They kept that sort of tradition. We don’t speak Italian though. Everybody learned English because they wanted to be Americans, that’s the way it was in those days.
We went to local schools and a private catholic high school, Don Bosco High School. And I went to the University of Tampa for three semesters and a couple of semesters at William Patterson. But I never really got the analytical part of music. I knew I could play the guitar, I knew what I liked. And Xmas of ’79, my father said “come on, let’s play together”. I could play the seven-string, I learnt a few tunes. I would go to school during the day and play gigs at night.
I was ten or twelve when I started. I played rock ‘n roll songs, read the tablatures. My dad showed me a couple of duets when I was 16. My father says that what changed my attitude towards music; unbeknownst to him me and my buddies a friend of ours played very good trombone and at a talent show he wanted toplay Chick Corea’s “Spain” and heard us rehearse. “How did they learn this?!” And he suggested we tried Django’s “Rose Room”, one of his favourites. That’s when he realized it could work.

What music was around when you were growing up?
Everything. I have two older sisters so they were listening to the Beatles, Elton John, the Allman Brothers, Traffic, Jackson Browne, James Taylor… Great music. And we were also going to gigs to hear my father play with Benny Goodman, Urbie Green, Clark Terry, Zoot Sims, Les Paul… And I thought these guys were great to me ! I liked all the music. In my teens, I loved Jackson Browne, James Taylor because it was very emotional, something I’d never heard in the Beatles. What I liked about the jazz guys was the camaraderie. I’d see my father hanging out with Zoot and I thought they were interesting people, really fun. I realized that the way to get to know these guys was to learn their songs. You have to play with them if you want to talk with them.

Did you want to get serious about the music?
I was just having a good time playing music. When I came up from college I would play some gigs with my dad and I would make fifty dollars. I had my own little band playing weddings or I would play all by myself in a restaurant, singing and playing. That was all. I never really thought about it.

What kind of an influence was your father, was it educational, aesthetic, or just getting you acquainted with the business?
Wherever we went, there was always a musician. He would point to you why this guy was the greatest guy - he always had little biographies about everybody. If you were at a recording session with Al Cohn, he would just tell you ‘that guy can write”. That was it but he would tell you about these things. Or the differences between Zoot and Al - he walways liked Zoot ‘cause he played with him with Benny (Goodman). These guys were always coming in and out of our house so you start to take notice! (laughs) even realizing who my father was - it was all natural. Someone would tell me that he played with Gene Ammons and Dexter Gordon, and yeah, that’s true but that was sort of take for granted. For him it was just something that was part of everyday life, like “I got to do this today”… and here’s Miles Davis! (laughs) He even played with Charlie Parker once in a club in New Jersey!

What about your approach of the guitar?
In the summer of 1980, we got together for eight weeks at the Pierre Hotel. I would just accompany him, rhythm guitar and a solo once in a while - I’d sneak it in while he was looking the wrong way! I got to hear him a lot, solo and everything, and now I realize everything I play has been influenced by the way he plays or is in direct relation to something he introduced me to, or someone that he played with. He’s responsible for everything.

Has the music of Django Reinhardt been important for you?
I think so. My father used to learn a lot of thoses songs, like “Sweet Chorus” “Nuages” and “Tears”. I have that famous picture of Django at my house with his hand, I think it’s by William Gottlieb. Also I got to play with Stéphane Grapelli with my dad. My father had an understanding of that music, not that he copied it or anything but he always loved it. Stéphane was very excited about the way we played that night, we had a lot of fun.

This tradition is not really prominent in American jazz guitar, you can hear in Howard Alden, George van Eps, Marty Grosz…
Oh, sure. It’s there, you know. That comes out of the rhythm playing too. That’s a very predominant stroke on the guitar, it makes you jump out of your seat.

The melody is takes precedence on the blues in that genre…
Django could make it happen in just one chorus, just because of the melody. Bucky’s music was always based on the melody and the swing: swinging the melody is his motto.

How did you get on the scene professionally?
I was working around New Jersey with a singer I went to high school with and his sister introduced me to “Straighten Up And Fly Right”. So my father said I should check out Nat King Cole. I’d never heard that and he said I would love that material. So I started listening to that stuff. I remember he would sing along all the tunes, asking me to put on “Body and Soul”, “It’s only a Paper Moon”, “Sweet Lorraine”, “Sentimental Reasons”… I started to play that on my gigs, and my father would ask me to sing some of those during our gigs.

So you discovered Oscar Moore after it had already been filtered for you in your father’s playing…
Everything was backwards! The other guy I liked was George Barnes ‘cause y dad had worked with him. So I learnt a lot of George’s things on the two records he made with my father. So I would say my main influences are George Barnes, Django and my father. And then later on I discovered other guys, Joe Pass, George Van Eps… that school.

It’s basically a white swing school…
It’s just the way it worked out. Playing in that style was never a conscious decision. And I got to play with Milt Hinton and Slam Stewart. Slam Stewart stayed over at our house two weeks because he had a gig in New York. After dinner he’d pick up the bass and play “Sweet Georgia Brown” or something and we’d play along or just stare because it was so beautiful! It’s just whoever was in our house. There was never any concept of this or that.

Have you evolved since that initial starting point?
I really studied George Van Eps and then I just love all the guys who played with Nat, Oscar Moore, John Collins… Oscar Moore’s “Body and Soul” is so great: if you could do that, play just one chorus on a song like that in your life - that’s what you strive for as a musician. I probably added a bit of Joe Pass, Herb Ellis… and a lot of Bucky too! And some Brazilian guys, Toninho Horta and Joao Gilberto. Also Tal Farlow, who I got to play with.

And still you have a different way of playing in that style, with a more aggressive phrasing…
It was always there with Django or George Barnes - really diggin’ in on the guitar and Bucky does that too, you know, he really hits the guitar. You always hear the beat going. It’s always moving forward. George plays the guitar like a lead trumpet to me. And I love the way Zoot Sims plays, like hanging on one note and driving it home.

You seem to add a form of craziness to it…
Well, that must be part of my personality. I’m a little insane some time (laughs). We hope there’s something personal coming out of that bunch of influences.

That’s something that you’ve been reproached with, playing standards, playing in a specific genre…
I’ve been lucky to play songs and I’ve been successful at it. Last night is a good example (during his four night gig in Vitoria) - when you get a situation where all the guys are around - I felt good because, I thought “This is what we do” and there’s nothing else that we can’t do. We play songs. And so, you know, there’s no real answer for that. You can analyze it to death but there’s something to be said for playing great songs. And apply your idea to it. I think that’s what we do, we have an idea of what to do with each song. We know what style we’re playing and we’re not a caricature of the style, we’re trying to move forward with that. That’s what everybody is doing - using their influences and trying to make something out of it. It’s all about interpretation. Within that framework, that’s what we do.

Your music is more about interpretation as opposed to creating a new language…
Yeah! Exactly. If you heard me on a record, you’d know it was me. I think I have a sound and a style I project on the guitar. That’s what it is, definitely using that framework. We’re not trying to reinvent the wheel.

Which is not trendy - everybody is supposed to be an innovator nowadays… What do you say to those who criticize that?
I just play what I play. I just got to move ahead. I can’t be told to do something else - that would be unnatural for me. My father has been playing “Honeysuckle Rose” since the beginning of time! (laughs) People love what he does and that’s it. He’s still doing it, it still works for him. And the guys that he played with over the years! Zoot Sims is almost forgotten now but he used to call those same songs, like Benny Goodman. They made great music, you’d tap your foot to it ‘cause all these guys was swinging. What’s wrong with that?
Chick Corea passes by and they chat a bit. Turning back to me, with an embarrassed tone) That happens a lot to me. (laughter)
I played a concert at Carnegie Hall three weeks ago with Dave Brubeck. And Dave Brubeck let me close the show!… because he wanted to get home! I’ve been opening for him for years. The preview in the NY Times summed it up with a single line: “They entertain without condescending.” Dave Brubeck! They didn’t even review the concert. I was so happy because it was a good concert, actually it would have been horrible to read a bad review of it. I mean, we make great music! Harry Allen to me is one of the best tenor saxophone players I’ve ever heard. He’s taken from the guys that we love. He plays some great stuff - great melodies and great solos! We learnt from the same great guys, this is what they did and that’s what we do. I replied to an interview in Singapore and I was asked “do you feel you want to use synthesizers to make your music more contemporary?” I’m sorry but my music is contemporary. It’s happening right now! It is sometimes frustrating to a degree to have to face that all the time but I know we’re doing what we do really well, on a high level. It’s not a caricature. We treat it the right way. We never copy everything that’s on a record and play it back for you. We homage a lot. I like the fact that we do that, that we try and include something that Count Basie or Nat played. That’s our roots.
It all depends if it’s done well. Otherwise any style can be boring. It’s not a matter of what genre you’re playing. Dixieland when it’s played right is as exciting as anything. When you hear Yank Lawson or Bob Haggart play that, it’s exciting! But when you hear those Dixieland festivals - imitations bands - a bad trumpet player will kill you! It’s like bad Django.

Entertainment seems to have become forbidden as an artform…
It’s about presenting the music. The thing that I try to do is to find good material. On the last album we do “Say it over and over again”, “If it’s the last thing I do”, “Pick Yourself Up”. Larry Goldings created a nice arrangement for God only Knows, which is a Beach Boys song. Reharmonizing is something important. I’ve heard how people do that all my life. I’ve heard Jimmy Rowles, Johnny Mandel, or Dave McKenna - he makes me weep. He can play songs all night and every song is beautiful. I’ve done a whole Beatles album with Don Sebesky arrangements. We try to take what we know and vary it around. Michael Bublé did a Come Fly With Me album and it’s the Sinatra arrangements he’s singing to - at this point it’s karaoke! You’re not moving anything forward with that stuff and still everybody is going crazy for that. You want to ask “what are you doing? You’re a caricature, you’re a copy”. You’ve got to at least keep things fresh, for the listener and for you too.
I still think Count Basie is one of the greatest things I’ve heard in my life. So what happened - Thad Jones created his band, taking the Basie idea and going another way with it. But it still got that spirit. That what happens when it develops. Maybe we’re not breaking any new ground but we’re making good music. And that’s as important as anything.
If you can break new ground, great. What we prefer to do is to try and express it within that framework. We’re trying to swing as hard as possible. If someone comes out of our concert saying “geez, these guys can swing”, that’s perfect! You know a good bebop band when you hear it, when the guys get really fiery - and you know when it’s really bad.
Harry Allen got laughed at in college. All he wanted to do was play like Scott Hamilton. They asked him “what do you play that shit for?” I’ve known him for years and we’ve made some great records together over the years. He’s the classic example of a great musicians but he loves Paul Gonsalvez, Ben Webster, Lester Young, so what’s the problem with that? (laughs)
When Harry Allen played on my record this year, I stopped at the end of the take and I said, “it sounded like Flip Philips”. It was beautiful and that’s as difficult as anything. It’s a work of art to be able to do things like these, like to play eight bars behind somebody. People tend to miss that, it’s like seeing a painting and missing on the details.
What does “modern” mean anyway? We’re all here making music, now. It’s stupid to look at music with a time frame in mind - Charlie Parker died before Lester! That doesn’t make one more modern than the other!

Jazz used to be the popular music of a certain era. Do you think jazz can still build a strong following?
The thing is, people are attracted to a song but they don’t know the songwriter, they know the musician who presents it to them. A lot of that comes through the movies. Harry Connick started out like this. People get fascinated through that medium. And also, you have kids now, they go to schools and they know everything - it’s disgusting. (laughter)

How different is jazz from other types of music?
Again, it goes back to the idea of camaraderie. Yesterday, we were sitting here for dinner and Benny Green was playing for his sound check. It was the greatest feeling. We knew the songs, they were sounding great - and just the idea of theses three guys on three acoustic instruments. I can sit down with my father and play a song and it’s like having a conversation. It’s a language that we all have. Even if we don’t speak English, if we step on the bandstand, we can speak more just by playing and looking at each other than when we’re speaking. You get even more understanding of someone through music. When you hear somebody play, you can get an idea of who they are. You’re doing a jam-session in Japan, you can’t speak to each other but you can play “Tea for Two” together! It’s like Chick Corea saying hello to me. He knows what I do and I know what he does… We certainly have our own language but we share something.

Do you think your band is making a difference keeping or attracting people in the jazz seats?
I hope so. I think we choose an interesting way to present the material. When we recorded the Beatles songs, we knew that it was jazz at the helm. That’s the way records are supposed to be made. We had an arranger, talked about it, he wrote the arrangements and then we play. He who knows what I do, I know what he does. We don’t need to ask someone else what it sounds like, if it’s gonna sell, if we need more flutes and so on.

Do you still play as a sideman?
Occasionally. If someone asks me I do. I’ve done that mostly for my wife’s records which I produced. She debuted the Algonquin this year with me and Larry Goldings. Some people asked how I could do that, just accompany - well, I’m a guitar player so that’s what I do, chunking away! My father’s been doing that for all his life!

There’s something special about the guitar, it seems to always be the most prominent instrument.
When I used to play with rock band in my 20’s. I had two sounds, clean and distorted. I finally got to the point where I thought “why do I have all those pedals?!” So finally I would just plug and play. And that’s the way you get your own sound. When my father played my guitar, I said “How come my guitar sounds like your guitar?!” There’s something challenging in just plugging it in.
I love Pat Metheny’s sound. But you get so many people sounding like him, they need their delay boxes and chorus otherwise they’re lost - they plug them all in and hope it sounds like the original. It’s like a recipe - “page 47, how to sound like Pat Metheny”. (laughter)
The guitar is so orchestral. There’s so much you can do with it. I can only do like 8% of what you can do with it. A great classical player or Brazilian player or Van Eps or Django, you can hear everything that can be done. Freddie Green driving a whole band!

How do you describe your music?
Swing jazz. It’s very simple. We have a Count Basie rhythm section, we’re playing standard songs. The other half is we’re adding the Nat King Cole Trio and the Oscar Peterson Trio and we put them together. And the guitar is hopefully all the good things that Bucky told me about, Freddie Green, Django, Les Paul, George Barnes and Bucky Pizzarelli. I hope it’s a convincing mixture.

What contemporary music do you relate to?
I listen a lot to the Brazilian guys, Toninho Horta in particular. He makes me cry. We did an in-store thing last year in Sao Paolo. He played first; it was amazing. I was really moved. It was gorgeous, and it’s a contemporary as anything you want. There’s a lot of beauty and simplicity - sorry to use those words! (laughs)

Are there things you wanted me to ask you?
The funny thing is these are things that I talk about to myself. There’s a place along the way when you say: what good is all this? Are we really going anywhere? I worked with Ray Brown and Slam Stewart over the years and all they did was pick tunes put a group together and they went to play. That’s all we know what to do. So when I think about all that, I think all we gotta do is go out and do it. Because as you travel, there’s always someone who doesn’t speak English who comes to you and manages to say “I like your records”. That’s what matters. Whether there’s six people or a whole crowd.

Discography

Leader
1983. I'm Hip, Stash
1985. Hit That Jive Jack, Stash 2508
1987. Sing, Sing, Sing, Stash
1990. My Blue Heaven, Chesky 38
1991. All Of Me, Novus 90619
1992. Naturally, Novus 6351-22
1993. New Standards, Novus 63172-2
1994. Dear Mr. Cole, Novus 63182-2
1995. After Hours, Novus 63191-2
1996-97. P.S. Mr. Cole, RCA-Victor 09026-63563-2
1997. Our Love Is Here To Stay, RCA 67501-2
1998. Meets The Beatles, RCA-Victor 7432161432-2
1999. Kisses In The Rain, Telarc 83491
2000. Let There Be Love Telarc
2002. The Rare Delight of You, Telarc (avec George Shearing)
2003. Bossa Nova, Telarc 83591
2003. Live at Birdland, Telarc
2004. Knowing You Telarc

Sideman
Erich Kunzel/Cincinnati Pops Orchestra, Got Swing!, Telarc 80592


www.jessicamolaskey.com
www.johnpizzarelli.com