Blue Note Records

Photo by Sophie Leroux







Photo by Michael Wong







Courtesy of Greg Osby







Courtesy of Mark Shim

A FIRESIDE CHAT WITH THE BLUE NOTE NEW DIRECTIONS BAND
FEATURING STEFON HARRIS, JASON MORAN, GREG OSBY AND MARK SHIM


Stefon Harris, Jason Moran, Greg Osby, and Mark Shim (in alphabetic order) are blue chippers, well, with the exception of Osby because he's just old. They are the foursome that make up the frontline for Blue Note's bright future. Our candid conversation with the New Directions Band is about as good as it gets. Osby can smell the bullshit from a mile away, but if you are honest with him, he gives that respect right back to you, and frankly, that is why I dig the guy. He is all about the music and so are Stefon, Jason, and Mark. I present to you, Stefon Harris, Jason Moran, Greg Osby, and Mark Shim (in alphabetic order), unedited and in their own words.


FRED JUNG: Let's start from the beginning. (All members)

STEFON HARRIS: Well, I'm originally from upstate New York, from Albany. I wasn't exposed to straight-ahead jazz there, but I was exposed to a lot of classical music. So I actually started out focusing primarily on classical music and then when I got to college, that's when I first heard Charlie Parker and Dexter Gordon and people like that and just sort of stumbled onto it. I came across the vibraphone because I was a classical percussionist and as a classical percussionist, that's just one of the instruments that you have to learn how to play. So when I first heard jazz, I had to decide am I going to play vibes or drums or piano or whatever and I heard Milt Jackson that first year also, so he was a big inspiration for me.

JASON MORAN: I began when I was seven years old. I started playing classical piano as like a disciplinary issue with my parents. Myself and my two brothers were put into music lessons. My older brother played violin and my younger brother and I played piano. We did that for about seven years and when my older brother quit, we decided to quit also because we didn't see any joy in it. There was no joy in practicing over and over and over again, trying to get something perfect when we didn't even like it, so we ended up quitting all together and I was very happy. So I quit piano about a year. Then I came back to the piano when I heard like a Thelonious Monk record. That was like my rebirth. Ever since then, I went to a performing and visual arts high school in Houston and that's where I learned a lot of my harmony theory and the basics of improvisation and that's when I started to study the masters of the piano and of jazz in general or improvised music. I studied people like McCoy Tyner, Thelonious Monk, Herbie Hancock, Bill Evans, you know, those type of players. Right when I was graduating from high school, I was coming to New York to study with Jaki Byard, so I knew that I would have to study some other type of piano players because I knew he was a true historian. So that's when I went back and started studying Art Tatum, Erroll Garner, Earl Hines, James P. Johnson, Teddy Wilson, those type of piano players with a stronger left hand is what I call it, people like Duke Ellington. When I got to New York and started studying with Jaki, he imparted his knowledge and from then on, I was I think destined to go into a different direction rather than the normal direction. What I call normal is where somebody is repeating vocabulary from thirty or forty years ago without trying to create their own. I was influenced by him a lot and all the knowledge from four years that I was under his wing. After I finished, well, he passed away recently, right before he passed, I guess maybe a year and a half before, I had started to have an affiliation with Greg Osby and from then on, Greg kind of gave me that extra push that I needed to spur the music in a further leftist direction. From then on, I guess, you can look at everything else, the records, and you can chart the progress I hope, Fred.

GREG OSBY: I started playing in 1972. My first instrument was clarinet. I'm from St. Louis for those that don't know. I graduated to alto saxophone, I guess a year later. I started to play in local R&B groups, funk bands, and blues bands throughout high school, I guess between 1974 and 1978. I got a scholarship to Howard University in 1978, transferred to Berklee College of Music in 1980 and moved to New York in 1983. Then I started to work with a host of jazz elders and notables, namely Dizzy Gillespie, Woody Shaw, Lester Bowie, Herbie Hancock, Muhal Richard Abrams, Jon Faddis, Jack DeJohnette, Joanne Brackeen, the list is pretty extensive. That's it in a nutshell. There's a lot more detail.

MARK SHIM: I guess starting back in high school, my mom told me that I needed an extracurricular activity to do, just as a change of pace from the other things I did like playing sports with my friends or whatever. She told me that I should just try to be in the band and so I decided, "OK, why not?" It will just give me something else to do and I ended up playing saxophone once I started out in the middle school band. I didn't choose to play that instrument. That kind of was chosen for me, but the more and more I started playing with the band, I got more interested in it. I started getting better at it. I continued through high school. I first started listening to jazz when I was in tenth grade in high school and I decided to take private lessons then, I think when I was in eleventh grade from the saxophone teacher who was teaching at Virginia Commonwealth University. That's when I started getting really interested in jazz. Throughout middle school and in high school was when I started getting into the music. It just got more serious once I got into my later years toward high school in terms of listening to jazz. I just carried that on through to college. I eventually moved to New York and here I am now.


FJ: Influences? (All members)

STEFON HARRIS: There are a lot of people. I think because I came to the music a little later than a lot of other people, I ended up just being a scatterbrain and just taking a little bit of information from everybody. Of course, Milt Jackson was one of the first people that I really dug off on the vibes, as far as playing straight-ahead jazz, then Bobby Hutcherson and Lionel Hampton. Those are my three main influences at the vibraphone. I learned a lot from checking out Red Garland and some Charlie Parker, John Coltrane, and conceptually, listening to those great ensembles of Miles Davis. Those were some of the influences, compositionally, Wayne Shorter.

JASON MORAN: Well, there are people that I admire as far as how they lived their life like Jaki, how he lived his life. He lived to be about seventy-six, seventy-seven. There's something about an older cat like him and Andrew Hill and Muhal Richard Abrams. They have like a different spirit even in their old age, they're like steadily searching or trying to create new ideas or they're more interested in what I am trying to figure out in music than what I'm asking them about. I go over their house or I speak to them on the phone and they are just as interested in what I'm doing as in what I'm asking them about like, "Oh, how are you approaching blah blah blah?" And I ask Andrew about how does he approach solo concerts and he says, "Well, I look at the audience and I determine what I play by how they feel or how I think they feel." So that's a different direction just to think in rather than, "Well, I'm going to play this because this is an up tempo song that I'm going to format my set according to styles or pieces." He'd rather react from the crowd, his vibe towards them. It's people like that, that I consider are true artists in how they live their life like my uncle was an artist, a visual artist, so I just watched how he lives. He lives out in Louisiana. He lived out in the country. He's lived there for I guess the past twenty, thirty years maybe, I don't know. He built his own house. He's right next to the river and he built his own studio that he could paint in. I mean just like really self-sufficient cats. He has a family and then everybody like loves his art. He's like a photographer. It's just that drive that I really latched onto. That's a really good life trait to have, is to have that drive to where you don't ever get satisfied by anything or you don't get satisfied by success or a review or whatever else. You get satisfied from making your art and that's about it. Those are some of the life traits that I've picked up on from the people that I have met over the years.

GREG OSBY: Actually I draw from more eclectic types, people that have a real personalized view, off kilter if you will to the average person, but actually I think they are brilliant, people like Andrew Hill, Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Art Tatum, Miles Davis, people that have a really broad and reaching and expansive perspective on a solid group concept and personalized compositional message and aren't afraid to harness whatever is necessary to get to the next level, to develop the next sound. Always looking forward, not living for the moment or in the moment, but are always in transition and developing. People that are perpetual students of live and the arts, those are the people that appeal to me.

MARK SHIM: I guess for music, it's been several, several people. I can't even narrow it down to probably three or four. It's been a lot more than that. I guess you can say I have gone through phases too, where I like somebody for like a phase, whether it's like for a month, six months, or a couple of years. The ones who were a couple of years long were not too good for me, not that they were, of course they were great musicians, but that is not good, I think, for anybody to be that attached to somebody for that long. Fortunately, I was able to get out of those phases. There are several people. I think the first main person was Charlie Parker, because that's the first person who I started transcribing their solos. It moved on to other people like Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane and I eventually started getting back into people like Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis, Joe Henderson, several different people. And there is all sorts of other people who I listen to that maybe not a lot of people are familiar with, but I really checked out because they had something distinct to my ears like Jimmy Forrest, who when I first heard him, I was really amazed at his sound and his flexibility on the saxophone. There's definitely a lot of people along the way who definitely had some sort of influence in terms of what I wanted to do. I don't know how many saxophone players have even heard of him. He's an amazing player to me.

FJ: Eric Harland has played a role in projects of that the four of you have been involved with, but many people may not be hip to his groove. (All members)

STEFON HARRIS: Oh, he's a very unique musician. He has his own sound and his own approach to playing. He's a very sensitive musician, so he knows how to color and he's very subtle. And of course, he has a solid groove, which nice if you're a drummer now a days, somebody who can really lay it down. He's a special musician, Fred. He has this one special gift that no matter what is going on, if Eric Harland is on the stage, you're going to feel good. It doesn't matter what kind of music you're playing, he has such a warm, beautiful spirit, it just makes you feel good to be on the bandstand with that cat.

JASON MORAN: Yeah, he's unbelievable (laughing). It's his touch. He has like a touch thing that I really enjoy and a lot of different colors too. When we were in high school, he was like really into the Elvin, Art Blakey bag. So he was well rooted in what I call a big beat. It was like really heavy and it was always well defined. I think when a drummer has that, every musician should have that, just to be able to follow when a drummer starts, or when the other rhythm section players start to not play on the beat, you should always be able to clearly hear where the beat is. He had that developed already so he just added on top of it, different layers and different layers. And I think the best point in his career, one of the better moments was when he got with Betty Carter, because to play with a singer is a different type of bag in many situations. And so when he got with Betty, he really started to master his colors and he started to master his dynamics and he started to master his time also. She would do things at blazing speeds and she would do things that would slow to a crawl. After he came out of there, he was like all, what he wanted to add to it. He's developed this type of thing where he talks about a person's speech as in correlation with what he plays on the drums and how he forms a solo and how he supports the rhythm section when they play. So he's a well-studied musician and he has all types of influences as far as music. He has a strong gospel background, which is what a lot of drummers have who are coming out of this New Orleans second line thing. Idris has what I call a big beat also, Idris Muhammad. I term him with that type of drummer, who is well versed in many, many styles of music and that's what he is. He's become like a master.

GREG OSBY: He sounds like himself and he's readily identifiable. I can hear him play and I would know who it is and that's remarkable for a young drummer to do who doesn't have an incredibly extensive track record or recording history. A lot of it has to do with, a lot of these young people, they're coming up in the hip-hop generation and a lot of people thumb their nose at hip-hop and other types of music, but these musics are mosaics of a whole bunch of different types of music. Anybody that into that type of music, they get a chance to listen to a whole bunch of different types of music without being aware of what it is, and so they've developed this broad mindedness that people of my generation didn't have. People in my generation were either funk musicians or hardcore jazz musicians or blues cats. There was very little this and that. It was either this or that. You had to make your choice and that's it. That's the course that you take. I'm cut from a different cloth and I was ostracized for it, even so still. These cats are more like me in a sense and that' why they appeal to me. I can make a reference to a hip-hop record. They won't even know who the original artist was or what the original recording was but they will be able to reflect on something that might have been a hit and me being a fan of that, I can relate to them on even ground. Eric displays a looseness with a real stylistic sophistication. He's very colorful and very complementary. I have really good kinships with great drummers and I really enjoy playing with them because it's like walking on a tightrope.

MARK SHIM: A lot of people aren't aware of who he is and that's a shame too. He's a very diverse player and just don't think that a lot of people realize it. I think it's weird because a lot of his contemporaries or people that know him well really don't realize that he could play the type of music they like to play very well. I think what's scares them is that he does a lot of things that they are not even capable of playing. He plays a lot of different styles that they are not even capable of playing. They probably don't think he can do the basic stuff that they like to do. He's very diverse when it comes to his playing and it's a shame that he hasn't been recognized much for it up to this point, but I think that will change in due time though. Everybody who has sat down and really tried to check him out live or wherever has really realized how amazing he is.


FJ: There are artists, Dave Liebman and Herbie Nichols are examples, whose albums do not do justice to their place in the lineage of the music. Keeping in mind that most albums were recorded one to two years before its release, does the media and the industry place too much emphasis on an artist's recordings? (All members)

STEFON HARRIS: Well, it's almost a different beat for me, making a recording compared to playing live. When I record, I'm looking to make very clean documents of the compositions as sort of a point of reference, so that when people hear that record and then they come to hear us play, they're going to hear what we're doing to that music. It's a little more structured when I do a recording. Whereas live, it's very, very spontaneous and it's different every single night. Of course, we have some spontaneity in there, but I like, and this is just my personal opinion, I like to have a very structured environment when I record. It's a tough balance. It's a tough balance. But performing is, live performance is an art form in it of itself. We're on stage and we're trying to communicate something to people. If people are sitting there and they're smelling the atmosphere and watching what's going on, we have to be a part of those senses also. It's not just the ears. It's not just the sound. So performing, there's a certain presence that you have to carry to articulate certain emotions and there's a certain intensity that needs to build throughout your body so that people can get involved with the music visually, not only sonically. Whereas, when you listen to the CD, you don't have that element. It's just different. Jazz is a live art form. You have to go see it live. There's some great recordings, but the spontaneity and the sense of democracy is only captured live, when you are there watching it.

JASON MORAN: It's hard to say because I don't know what the emphasis was on the records in the '50s, '60s, or even before then, like what would they think about John Coltrane's Giant Steps when it came out or Andrew Hill's Smoke Stack when it came out. It's a totally different approach, which I think is involved with making money now, than it was before. It is very evident when you look at record covers. Record covers aren't as artistic as they used to be. You can't see a cat sitting on the cover with his horn in his hand. It's like real unartistic in many senses of the word. I think that the record companies and the media are starting to put a lot of emphasis on what they think a good record is and why they think it is good. When you read reviews in the times like about classical music concerts, you rarely read reviews about classical music that is on CD because some of it is great and some of it is just standard repertoire that has been re-recorded. Some of it is new music, like Pierre Boulez did a string of concerts over the weekend and they talked more about the concert that he just did and the speeches that he gave. I went to see him on Friday and it was just interesting to see a cat of his stature talking about his development. I think a lot of the artistic means have been lost and I don't fault anyone but the musician most of all. I just think that the state of our music, jazz music, it's starting to revive itself, but I really think that it's in a shallow state right now. Things change and some people don't even care about their album cover, but I just think that in the entire picture of what you're trying to depict about your music, than the cover is like a very important facet. Everybody has their own agenda. My agenda is art for now and hopefully forever.

GREG OSBY: Absolutely. Absolutely. Especially with the grading system, these three stars or five stars or three or four mikes or however they judge records. It's kind of ridiculous and subjective and it's based upon a writer's framework of reference at that moment. I'm sure a lot of writers have dissed the record and then gone back later and after they have listened to a lot of stuff, say, "Yeah, I was wrong." But a lot of people own up to that or they won't own up to the fact that they just don't understand what they're hearing. It's above their level of comprehension. All it would take would be a phone call. You could grill a cat into the ground, "OK, what were you doing? What were you trying to do? What was your resources? How much research did you do?" They can get it straight from the horse's mouth. Then if they really don't like a recording, then it just doesn't appeal to them. I would agree a lot more with a bad review. "It doesn't touch me or it doesn't move me." They could use a disclaimer, "This is just my opinion. I don't mean to take money out of a cat's pocket or make his child starve or prevent him from paying his rent. This just isn't happening." Humility is key here. Everybody thinks they know everything. They have all the answers. They use all the superlatives and same type of words and descriptions that everyone else has used. That's another big problem I have with jazz criticism and things is just like there is just a ten-word list about the same type of descriptions (laughing). It's like they had to do a multiple choice in critics' school or whatever and if you fail you can't be a critic. You have to use the word acidic, acerbic, left of center, off kilter, edgy, stuff like that (laughing). Young lion, that's at the top of the list. You have to call somebody a young lion. I'm like, "Man, don't these cats own thesauruses?" I would rather they use like an eight syllable word that nobody has ever used than use those words.

MARK SHIM: It's all within the ears of the beholder. I try not to because I try to put everything into perspective. It depends on who is looking at it. Some people think the contract is the big thing and what record label that you're on is a big thing. Everybody on every record label is all on different levels and just because I'm on the same record label as whoever, like Joe Lovano or Greg Osby, doesn't mean that we're all on the same level and that we're all at the same level of creativity because everybody is in their own little circle as to where they are and the directions that they are going. I don't really read into those things. Everybody, at the same token, has the ability to change what they are doing whether it's negative or positive or the direction that they're going in at the drop of a dime. It's hard to do, but everybody is capable of doing that if they really want to, if they realize that what they're doing may not be saying something. I never really take that too seriously, maybe some people do blow that out of proportion. I'm always liking to check out people's records and see the progress that they have made over the years from record to record, but also live, in live performances to see they are doing after a couple of years to notice their progress.


FJ: You have been coined as a young lion and you are not young at all. (Greg Osby only)

GREG OSBY: It is funny to me. I look at the Downbeat list and I see people who haven't had a current release in years or even if they did, I sounds like the same thing they put out in the fifties. There's nothing new or adventurous, exciting or innovative. It's almost like you get points for being a survivor, for having been a junkie or something, alcoholic, and, "Well, he's still kicking." I got like two votes and this cat got like two hundred and his record sounds real lame or it sounds like some smooth jazz. I'm like, "What is this?" I guess well they figured the cats gonna die or something. I don't know what the criteria is and I don't mean to disrespect or diss anybody because people, in the final analysis, you can only be judged by the work that you do and hopefully, everything I do will stand on its own. If they don't get it today, maybe they'll grow some intellectually and in a couple of years and listen to it and say, "Awe, man, this is happening. I was wrong." I've done this as an artist. I said, "Awe, this cat can't play. He's not offering anything. What he's saying is not credible. It's not valid." And then after I grew a little bit and I wasn't such a hothead youngster and I was patient enough to turn off the phone, the pager, and sit down and actually listen to some, I said, "Wait, this guy was killing." You have to be humble and that's what it's all about.


FJ: The hype surrounding you guys is kind of this Blue Note for the new millennium, if you believe your own press, it must be a tough cross to bear? (All members)

STEFON HARRIS: I don't really think about it too much. I've tried not to. That is a lot of pressure, but you know, Fred, I'm just trying to write some music man. I'm just trying to play and I really love to be on stage and to perform. It's such an incredible thing to have a piece of music come through you. You write it down on a piece of paper and a couple of months later, you're on the bandstand and you hear this magic that just started as a tiny cell, three notes, and you hear it come to life. Wow. I just love that so much. If I can communicate some of that love to people and that means that we're helping jazz, than OK, that's great.

JASON MORAN: That is, but I don't even think about it because there is nothing to think about. You can't compare me to Herbie Hancock, or McCoy Tyner, or Andrew Hill, those guys are masters of the instrument. I have an affiliation with them and I rap with Andrew and there's much love and respect for them. People are going to hype up whatever they want, when they want. I can't change anything that they do. As far as I'm concerned, like Andrew says, "You don't read your press, you weigh it." He means that it is just a piece of paper with words on it, written by some writer, so you can take it for what it's worth. I've gotten reviews from Italy where a cat just ripped the record apart. I was like, "Well, great. That's fine." Because I don't expect everyone to love the record. It's not for everyone to love. If people want to say, "They are the next coming." That's a little premature because we are all very young. I may decide to quit when I'm twenty-seven, although I know I won't. You never really know what will happen. I'm just going to keep going. I don't really think about that at all.

GREG OSBY: Not necessarily. It's great. I'm also standing in good company. It's like some of the hippest cats that thought to do something new, they've done it on that label. It's kind of awkward for me to be kind of cast with a lot of cats that I'm almost old enough to be their father. It's cool because they're mature and well spoken and representative of a class value system and they have a lot to say and they are doing really good work and they are putting a lot of effort and a lot of thought into it. I would rather be lumped in the same class as, you know, Fred, they don't mention me and Wynton in the same sentence or me and Branford in the same sentence or people like that. I'm a year old than Wynton. But it's cool, because like I said, these cats are doing good things.

MARK SHIM: For me, personally, I'm not thinking that way. If people want to look at it that way then I think they are going about looking at it the wrong way. To me it's not any kind of pressure. I know who was on the label back in the '60s and they were great in their own right of course. They did their thing, but the only thing you can do is worry about yourself and not worry about who came before you and what they did before you. I try to worry about what am I going to do to define myself and my playing. Hopefully, my peers will do the same thing, to define themselves and not try to copy other people and just try to be original. I'm not worried about, "Will I make a record as good as Blue Train?" I never think like that. I don't think that is the way to think.


FJ: Let's talk about the New Directions record. (Mark Shim only)

MARK SHIM: Honestly speaking on the album, we did it in two days, what is it, two days in the studio and most all the tunes we did, we rehearsed on the spot and just recorded them. Fortunately, everyone in that band is very professional and very talented that we were able to pull it off. Honestly speaking, Fred, if you want my honest opinion, I wish we did some live recordings or they used some of the live recordings that we did on the road. I think that was a much better representation of what the New Directions band was all about. I guess people want to hear, or certain people demanded for certain tunes to be on the record in a certain style, I guess, to be thrown back so it will just try to carry on in the tradition of Blue Note and try to recognize the stuff that came before in our own way, but I thought we represented the stuff much better on the road though. It didn't come out bad though. I still like what we did because fortunately, as I said, we're very talented musicians or everybody in that band was talented enough to make it work. I really was impressed with the stuff we did on the road though.

FJ: What are some of the things that people do in the audience that rubs you the wrong way when you are on the bandstand? (All members)

STEFON HARRIS: Wow, that's a tough question, Fred. I've never been asked that question. Well, I don't like smoking (laughing). Hey, Fred, the scent gets all in your clothes. I just came back from Germany and there was like a lot of smoke in the clubs. Twice it happened, where my eyes, I started to cry. Smoke got all in my eyes. It irritates me. That's like a physical distraction to me, so if I'm trying to concentrate and I can't, I literally had to stop because I couldn't open my eyes. I don't know what other people would say. That's one of the things. I tend to play off of the people's energy. I just think that you can come to people and you will have them there. They will be there with you. And then some people you lose and that sort of changes the energy of the room, which affects the way you perform, so I don't know if I dislike it. I don't really put a judgment on it. I can put a judgment on the smoking. I don't like that. As far as attitudes about the music, it's real so I don't really judge it. Just take it for what it is.

JASON MORAN: One is somebody sitting right behind me and I can hear their conversation more than I can play. That's one, especially if it is about a hockey match or something. I usually don't get frustrated unless like the talking is really, really out of hand. That's what I get irked about the most. I just really try to make do. I usually tune out what's going on in the audience. We played in London over the summer with Greg and there was this guy, he was talking loud. I couldn't hear him. He was a little further back in the club and somebody said, "Could you calm down?" Sure enough, the guy kept talking and so a guy picked up a bottle and cracked him over the head with it. It started like a brawl. We had no clue, until afterwards, I see this cat sitting outside with a bloody shirt and blood coming out of his head and I was like, "Hold up. What happened?" And he was like, "While you all were playing, somebody tried to calm someone else down and so they started a fight." That's Ronnie Scott's, which is notorious for being a very loud club. It's a place where a lot of people go just to go, kind of like Blue Note in New York. But that's about it, if they are just sitting right up on m and they're really loud. Because I have played in places where people don't pay attention, I don't mind that. I don't mind it at all. You come in here to waste your money or you just come in here to talk with your friends, that's fine. If you come here to hear me and you talk while I'm playing, that's a different issue. I can't even name another one, but watch I remember it next time I get on the bandstand like, "Oh, man, I should have told Fred this."

GREG OSBY: Smoke. Smoke right in the front row. I don't mind smoking, but not people like blowing stogies, smoking cigars. I play a wind instrument so that's the problem. During ballads and people are totally ignoring it and they're talking right in the front row. I dig the ambience. I dig chatter, but if it is in respect to the music, if somebody is explaining to their wife what's going on. They are telling somebody the title or something, but if they are talking about their stocks. Like in New York, a lot of people come to the shows and they're into jazz. They're not into music at all. They're having a business meeting. They're entertaining their wife on their anniversary. That's kind of a drag. When the talk isn't related to the music, that's kind of a drag. There's very little that bugs me. Oh, another one, Fred, when people come up and have requests. You're standing on the bandstand. You rehearsed the shit out of your band and you have all this high concept music and you hope people get it and you hope that if they don't get it that it will kick in later when they get home, "Oh, that's what they were trying to do." But not when they come up and they're like, "We're having a birthday. Can you play 'Happy Birthday?'" Something real dumb that it makes me want to backhand somebody and pimp slap them. I don't come to you when you are behind your word processor or whatever. Don't come up here. I'm working here. But very little bugs me because it's part of the game.

MARK SHIM: I guess the basic things that you can ask for is that people show interest and be respectful and not talk or try to keep the talking down to a minimum. In a perfect world, I would like everybody not to smoke, but that's the way the world is, people smoke, especially in Europe. It's hard to play when people smoke and smoke is blowing all over the place. As far as I'm concerned, I just play the music and if people are going to embrace it the music and like it then they are going to like it, if not, you can't force them to like it.


FJ: What is the greatest misconception about jazz musicians? (All members)

STEFON HARRIS: That we're old. Yeah, that's the biggest misconception, and that we're dead (laughing). We're either really old or we're dead. There is not this sense that the music is alive and that it moves, it's growing, continuing. You don't get that sense of that cycle. I don't get the feeling that the average agile thinks of jazz in that sense. And then the misconception about the music is that they think you have to know a lot of stuff, which is very untrue. That's purely the ego of musicians, critics, and the jazz elite. It makes us feel good if we know something that other people don't know, but what do we really know? It's emotion, Fred. We all know love. We all know fear and compassion and reverence. We all know those emotions. We are not empowered by this music. So you can play a couple of notes in a certain order. That doesn't empower you as a human being. It's coming through you. That's a misconception that a lot of people have, that you have to have this great knowledge of jazz to get it. Sometimes someone who has never heard that before, they go hear something and they don't like it. It might be because they don't like it. You're not going to like everything that you hear. All it requires is a little patience.

JASON MORAN: That they're cool (laughing). Most of them really aren't. Most of them are some really corny individuals. They mostly seem pretty corny to me. I deem myself a relative outsider because when I was growing up, me and my brother, we just used to sit around and look at people who thought they were cool. There's a difference between people who think they are cool and people who are just cool because they have like a different type of walk. They wear like maybe some different type of clothing, like Henry Threadgill. I can look at him and I'll be like, "Man, he's like really cool." I don't even know him. His music is real happening, but every time I hear him speak or have seen like interviews with him, he's just like really deep. I'm just like, "Man." He's a really cool individual. He lives in India for half a year. That's like an alternative way of doing things. Then I see a lot of musicians and I'm just like, "Naw, you a bit corny." It just seems like they know a lot, but it's just the presentation, I just think that most of them are corny. They are a lot of cool one, but there are just as many corny ones. I think that's the biggest misconception that everybody's real cool or they're laid back, when everybody is uptight about their music and egotistical, just as egotistical as some of those cats sitting in an investment banker's office worried about his sell.

GREG OSBY: That they are pompous and intolerant of other types of music. Now there are some people that are steadfast in their distain for any other types of music, but they're just people and they happen to be jazz musicians. I know a lot of classical musicians that don't like anything other than what they're into. They are like a horse with blinders on. They don't see anything but what they want to see. They don't see the world revolving around them and they're not influenced by it. Whether they are like fifteen or fifty years old, they're playing the same thing with no development and no progress. So it's not exclusive to jazz musicians. I know a lot of jazz cats that are actually living a lie. They really like hip-hop and they like a whole bunch of secular music or popular music but they don't say so because it's not politically correct and they don't want to get dissed by their peers and stuff. They think it chips away at their validity if it's made public that they have synthesizers and sequencers and stuff at home or they have turntables. They like a whole lot of hip-hop and stuff and I know a whole bunch of them that do but say they don't (laughing).

MARK SHIM: When people say mainstream jazz, all of America thinks it's boring music, but that is not necessarily the case with a lot of us that are playing music or our own creative, improvised music. Many younger generation people may think that certain jazz may not be up to date with all the other types of music that are going on like hip-hop or R&B or even heavy metal. That's a misconception.


FJ: Any New Year's resolutions? (All members)

STEFON HARRIS: Patience, I want to be patient with myself, patience and humility. You have this intensity like, "Man, I really want to work hard. I really want to be great." But sometimes that forces you to go into a certain direction.

JASON MORAN: Oh, man, Fred (long pause). It's to do more work. It's to do more work. Recently, I've been reading, I've gotten back into this Eastern philosophy books like Miyamoto Musashi (famous Japanese samurai) and watching a lot of these samurai films by Akira Kurosawa. Watching the, they call it the bushido. It's the way of the samurai. It's just how focused they are. They talk about not surrounding yourself with others that are not making any contribution to your life. Limiting who you are associated with and it says that you must study diligently and I don't. I'm trying to pump myself up to really taking advantage of the time that I have on my hands and to try and do something with it. Trying to really develop and really study different compositional techniques. That's my resolution, but I'm starting like today. I'm not waiting until the first of next year. In the past couple of weeks, that's what I'm trying to concentrate on.

GREG OSBY: Oh, yeah. I'm kind of embarking on a self-imposed study period, a sabbatical of you will. Just to kind of tighten up a lot of loose ends and kind of rethink a lot of conceptual properties. Finishing up things that are as yet unformulated that I've given a little thought to but haven't like really saw them through. Doing a lot of writing and basically a whole lot of musical self-improvement. I really want to re-establish my place in this whole music. I will be forty next year. I don't want it to just come and go without a bang. I'm going to have to do some landmark work so that I will be satisfied. I have a high criteria that I have to follow, that I have to meet for myself.

MARK SHIM: To get a whole bunch of chops. That's about it (laughing).


FJ: What are some of the essential recordings you have in your collection? (All members)

STEFON HARRIS: Miles Davis, Filles De Kilimanjaro (Columbia), Shirley Horn with strings, Here's To Life (Verve), Stevie Wonder, Songs in the Key of Life (Motown), Beethoven Symphony No. 7.

JASON MORAN: Andrew Hill, Smoke Stack (Blue Note), the two basses are just phenomenal. What's the Trane, Dear Old Stockholm (Impulse) with Roy Haynes. Little old Roy Haynes was playing behind Trane and it was like amazing drumming, I think. Bjork, Homogenic (Elektra), that record is a classic as far as I'm concerned from start to finish. There is not a flaw in it at all. What else do I steadily play? It's hard because I don't really steadily play anything. On the hip-hop genre, I just pick up what is new and spin it and spin it and spin it for like maybe a couple of months until something new comes out. Right now, I just got some West Coast stuff, Sa-Fire, Pharoahe Monch, Raekwon, those guys, that's what I'm really listening to. That Bjork is really like a staple though. That has been around for a couple of years and I always rock that. What else? Marvin Gaye, What's Going On (Motown). That's probably about it.

GREG OSBY: Anything by Bjork. She's like my favorite pop artist, hands down. I actually dig Madonna too, to be honest. I dig Sting, D'Angelo. I'm reinvestigating a whole lot of Charlie Parker recordings and dissecting them and taking them apart. I am just really taking them and breaking them down. I'm listening to a whole bunch of Duke Ellington.

MARK SHIM: Lately none. I kind of just hear what's out there. I honestly haven't just went to the collection and picked out one and said, "Let me listen to this." I haven't done anything like that for a long while. It's been a while since I've done something like that.

FJ: I was at the newsstand the other day and saw that one of the magazines had a poll for who was the artist of the century, is that an unfair question to ask? (All members)

STEFON HARRIS: Well, I guess it's kind of unfair. Yeah, that's a tough thing to say, Fred. All those types of lists and categories are unfair. They are just estimate testaments. If I had to pick somebody, I might have to think about Louis Armstrong. Just thinking about the fact that he didn't have all of this information before him. His idea to just go ahead and check it out and explore. John Coltrane is right up there also for me because of the level of articulation that he achieved. When you hear his music through the years, it's a chronicle of the experiences he was having in life. You don't have to read these books. You get a sense of who he was as a man from just listening to his sound. That's the ultimate goal for myself as a musician. I really, really admire what he was able to achieve.

JASON MORAN: No, I didn't answer that. To even put one down is to put one over the another and they've all made such significant contributions that I can't even put one over another, so I didn't contribute to that poll. I saw that though.

GREG OSBY: I would have to say, Charlie Parker. That's an easy one but I would have to say Charlie Parker because the cat, like so many great musicians before him, he totally redefined the way music was conceived, performed, and composed. I'm sure he didn't do it single handily. He had some influences that we probably don't know about that are totally unsung. Just his delivery and his portrayal of music, it was just a major milestone in the evolution of contemporary expression.

MARK SHIM: I honestly don't think you can answer that with just one person. I think there are stages of the century and there are people that are very important to it. Off the bat, I can automatically think of like two or three people in improvised music that are very important. I can't pick one above the other. Of course, you can start off with like Louis Armstrong and take that all the way up to someone like Miles Davis and you can put Duke Ellington right in the middle of all that. Of course, Louis Armstrong is very important because he started it all, but who knows if we would be sitting here without Miles Davis? I can't think you can put it all on one person.


FJ: Is jazz capturing a young audience? How crucial is achieving that task? And what are you doing individually to bring a younger audience to the music? (All members)

STEFON HARRIS: I'm not sure right now. I think that the alternative is, you see, Fred, the problem that I think we have is that the term "jazz" is used very loosely right now. You have some groups who are capturing young audiences. They are really like rock groups that have jazz influence. I don't know if I would call it jazz per say. So then you get people expecting the jazz musician to capture the audience of the groups that are playing basically rock or dance music for the teenagers. I don't know? That's a really tough question. I think it's possible for us to capture a younger audience. I don't know if we are doing that right now. Part of that has to do with the fact that I don't think we have any control or we're not controlling the image of jazz. We're letting people think of jazz what they will. Whoever thought of the term contemporary jazz for that style of music, that's pure genius, because the way I see it is, you have like this whole hip-hop generation, I grew up in the rap generation also, but you reach a certain age where you kind of outgrow a lot of that music. You're not going to be fifty years old playing Lil' Kim for your grandkids. That's probably not going to happen. Once you reach a certain maturity, you start to search for other styles of music. And then socially, jazz has this hip thing about it. So now, based on the term jazz on that music, people can listen to that music, which is, I call instrumental pop music because to my ear that's what it sounds like. They can listen to that and call it jazz and they get the whole feeling that I'm intelligent or I'm hip because I'm listening to jazz. I think that was pure genius. Part of what we're going to have to do is control our own image, what is jazz. Not even to define it narrowly, but just, if we're going to have a younger audience, just visually, we have to be a little hipper. Like the young cats, we all wear suits. It's not necessarily what the average cat our age would be doing. My take on it is, what I would like to do is I would like to present options to people. I think that they will come to the music when they're ready. Like to go out and present the music, like I was saying about the people who are in college. You go to colleges now, that's when kids are reading literature that they've never even heard of. They are reading Middle Eastern philosophies that mom would never approve of. They're minds are wide open, so why don't we go there and just introduce them to the music so they know it's an option. Because to compete with Puff Daddy, you're going to have trouble. They are dealing with sex. There hormones are going and if you are a guy, you want to have sex. To go dancing and to get the woman sweating and you get the beat going, you have a drink, you talk a little, they create an entire atmosphere, which is conducive to what someone in their age category is thinking about. Now, jazz can be thought of in that way if we put the image like, "OK, you want to take your lady out to a jazz club, she's going to think you are really hip." It's a marketing thing. I would like to go there and just introduce them to the music. In hopes that one day they are going to grow out of "You Remind Me of My Jeep." They are not going to say that to their wife. You can say that to a kid, but at a certain point, you're not going to want to say that to your wife. She's probably not going to appreciate that. You're going to be looking for "My One and Only Love," lyrics like "Lush Life," Billy Strayhorn. It's going to go to a whole other level. I can't compete with Puff Daddy. More power to him.

JASON MORAN: Yeah, I think it is capturing a young audience, slowly but surely. Two was how important. It's very important because who is going to buy music thirty years from now, or who is going to come to our concerts thirty years from now, after the old folks have come and gone. It is very evident because I played for four days at the Knitting Factory last week with the trio and a lot of young people were there. They were just as interested in it as anybody else. That was also very evident on the New Directions tour that we did. It was a very well mixed crowd. And the third part was what am I doing. Mine is to invite every young friend that I know to my shows, just to see live music on a higher level than a Toni Braxton concert or a Wyclef Jean concert, which I am personally not a fan of because the music is banal and it's not as in depth as R&B music was twenty years ago. Even in the seventies, it was a lot hipper. They still had live bands and they were making their own grooves. Now it's starting to revive itself, so I think people are starting to have more of an affiliation or they are trying get acclimated with live music again. I try to invite as many young people as I can to the clubs. Usually when they come, they're like, "Man, that was great." Especially last week, I was playing Rhodes instead of piano and some people got to see, not really a different side of my music, but Rhodes made like its rebirth in a lot of R&B music, a lot of rap music, so people can hear the Rhodes and be like, "Oh, I know that sound." That's the sound of a sample that they heard on a Tupac song. Usually when they come, they are just blown away. That's what I'm trying to do is to get all my friends who are halfway interested in something, rather than going to a dance club every night and sitting at a bar, trying to pick up on some woman or trying to be picked up by some man, but come to this club and check out some live music, which I don't want to say is better, but it's another alternative.

GREG OSBY: I will answer that in reverse. What I'm doing is I'm hiring young people and so in turn, people look at my bandstand and they see young people. That's appealing to a lot of young people. They walk by. They come into a club and they don't know that kind of music it is really. They see young people that are their age on the bandstand and they say, "Wow, they must be hip to be into this, because they are my age. They look like me." That's been a repellent in jazz for a long time. They look on the bandstand and see these fat, potbelly, unattractive, out of shape cats that just don't reflect anything but the notions and tendencies of a person's grandfather. The music sounds old too. It's almost like a you are what you eat thing. I know a lot of young jazz musicians that are younger than myself that actually look thirty years older than I do because of the way they think. It's kind of a debilitating thought process. I stay youthful by being into contemporary trends and everything that's happening now and I listen to my band members. I don't go out seeking young cats, but I dig that image because a lot of people in my peers are just set in their way and they won't change. They're not interested in any new concepts or new directives or any kind of thing like that and I can't break that and I'm not trying to corral somebody into doing something they don't want to do. These younger cats are not jaded or callus or anything. Plus, they are really willing to do new things. They want to be there. It's very important to capture a young audience because the music has to move on. It has to move on. I don't want the music to die with a generation. I would like to capture an audience and have those audiences grow with me. "Yeah, I saw him back in '88 and then I saw him again in '98." I want it to continue and they turn me on to their kids and the kids hear the music in the house. That's how people get hip to the music. That's why I got hip to music. I would hear music in the house that my mother played. I'm still into that music. It reminds me of something. If parents played for their music right now, this disposable pop music that is being produced, than those kids won't have fond memories of their youth. It will be like an erasure of their period. I can remember where I was and what the social climate was when I hear certain songs from the '60s and '70s and it's like, "Yeah, I was there." It's like who shot JFK or where were you. I can't predict but I don't think they will be humming Jay-Z tunes. I doubt it. I think it is capturing a young audience and I think it can. It's just proper marketing or proper placement or whatever. Earlier this year, we toured with a group called the Blue Note New Directions. It was a group of Blue Note signers that I put together that I thought would represent the label. We did a tour that was sponsored by Camel cigarettes and Esquire Magazine. The group was myself, Jason Moran, Stefon Harris, Mark Shim on tenor saxophone, Nasheet Waits, and Tarus Mateen. We toured all over the United States and we played in these alternative venues that weren't jazz clubs. We played in like retirement homes. We played in a cigar bar. We played in like a strip joint. We played in a line dancing place in Texas. We played in all these wild, we played in restaurants where they actually had to erect a bandstand. It was great and it was overwhelmingly and unanimously received. A lot of people that frequent these places, they didn't even like jazz. They didn't know anything about jazz. They didn't even know that we were going to be there. We got a lot of walk by traffic people that were just curious seekers. They stopped by and saw these young cats on the bandstand and they stayed. That's the only way they would have been introduced to that music by it being displayed at their frequent haunt. We sold a lot of product. We sold a lot of CDs at these places, much more than any of those local record chains and CD establishments would have because we were selling them at the door. People saw the group and they were able to buy it right there. We were selling them by the box load. It was just a great marketing tool. It just showed me that a lot of these corporations have what they probably look at and regard as disposable income. They can sponsor these groups and but them on the road. They paid for our accommodations. They paid for our travel. They paid salaries and it was like a write off for them, but it was beneficial because people got turned onto their product for whatever it was, smoking, drinking, or whatever. But it was wonderful for them to be tied in a business sense to this youth market and a wholesome entity like Blue Note and young jazz musicians. It was refreshing in that respect. It can be done. I think every jazz label would do well to establish a leg or a division in their company of people that actually seek out corporate sponsorship or actually seek out trying to route their young signees or any signees on that label to alternative venues. I mean, we played in like heavy metal bar. We played in like some grunge clubs where they actually do stage diving and people would have spiked hair and holes in their jeans and the whole nine yards. But they were bobbing to the jazz. I was floored. This cat's a surfer dude (in his best surfer dude imitation), "Yeah, man. Man, this is fucking jazz. Hey, man, you got anymore CDs?" They would buy CDs and they would come by the hotel the next day with an armload of your CDs and you are signing CDs for these surfer dudes, skateboard rats, the whole thing. I was like, "Man, this is out." There's a whole lot of potential patrons and lovers of the music out there. You just have to tap into it.

MARK SHIM: I think it is capturing some of them. It's hard though. The way this country is set up, it's not easy to capture all the young people. There's so many other things for them to be aware of before they're aware of jazz. You can't fault people for that. It's just the way this country is. I think it gets to some people and some people out there are aware of it and captivated by it, but not that many. It's definitely important though, for us to try and reach as many people as we can. That is the future when all these great giants who started this whole music are gone. All that's left is us. The older audience too, once they are gone, all that's left is us and if we don't do anything, at least garner some kind of attention with our generation, then the music is just not going to survive. We're not going to have an audience for it. I always think that there is enough for everybody. You can like all sorts music. You don't have to hate other music to have your music be enjoyed. You don't have to downplay hip-hop or metal or country. I think that there is enough for everybody, but at the same time, we definitely have to do something to at least get people interested in the jazz music that is being played by the younger musicians in the market today. As far as what I'm doing, it's kind of tough for me, Fred, because I haven't been out there that much as maybe some of my other contemporaries have. I haven't been fortunate enough to have my own full-length tour at this stage in my career. Hopefully, I will. I just have one record put out under my name and I've been a sideman in several bands and on several records. It's not like I have been single-handily been able to do something on my own to get the attention of younger people and get them interested in jazz.


FJ: What were some of the most influential bands in the history of the music? (Stefon Harris only)

STEFON HARRIS: Miles Davis with Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, and Tony Williams, the group before that with Bill Evans, I mean, Miles Davis had group after group in terms of being a leader. Yeah, I'd say all of Miles's groups were very influential. Yeah, because they influenced, this generation, we're big on that era, like there are a lot of pianists who sound like Herbie Hancock, a whole lot. The whole dynamic thing with the drums, drummers are just, it's like, you don't hear too many cats laying it down like Philly Joe. Tony's influence is a little heavier on the cats of my generation for whatever reason. I'm not saying it's good or bad, it just seems like his influence is a little stronger. The guys from that era, Coltrane's band, you've got a lot of McCoy, piano players who sound like McCoy and of course drummers, just dynamically alone, you've got them trying to deal with what Elvin was dealing with. My take on it is that hey, that was that era. They were expressing a certain energy of their time and I don't really know if that's what's going on right now.

FJ: I know you are big on films, what was the last good movie you saw? (Jason Moran only)

JASON MORAN: The last movie that I actually watched, I saw last night. It's called Happiness. Oh, Fred, that is a bugged out movie. Oh, man, I had to tape it because it's that far out. I like Todd Solondz's movies, Welcome To the Dollhouse. What was the last really great movie? It's got to be Seven Samurai, which is the one that made the most profound affect on me. I haven't seen too many new movies out because in New York they are just too damn expensive. It's like nine or ten dollars. I want to see Bringing Out the Dead, Scorsese's new film just because his artistry is unmatched. Being John Malkovich, I want to see that. The Matrix was really, I really thought was a really conceptual movie, just as far as what the mind achieve, so I really dug that.


FJ: I know you like Takeshi Kitano films, have you had a chance to see VIOLENT COP, I got the screener for it a couple of weeks ago.
(Jason Moran only)

JASON MORAN: That's that Takeshi movie. No, I haven't seen that yet, but I've been reading about it. I've got to pick that up.


FJ: You remarked about how you and Wynton Marsalis are practically the same age and yet I never see your name mentioned as his contemporary. (Greg Osby only)

GREG OSBY: I agree. A lot of people don't see it that way, even though we kind of deal from opposite sides of the fence. We agree on virtually nothing. I think the value system is in tack and I think that there is a mutual respect and also a desire for excellence and progress. So in that respect we have a lot of similarities.


FJ: Because jazz accounts for so little of this country's entertainment dollar, the economics of the industry results in an artist like Greg Osby doesn't get more viable national recognition, simply from lack of exposure.
(Greg Osby only)

GREG OSBY: It's not like the money isn't there, but because of the eclecticism of my art, it just doesn't lend itself to the ears of people that are in the position to push the buttons at my record label and at other record labels. A lot of these people are exaggerated fans with a suit. So they have the power to sign people and drop people that they consider necessary. At my label a lot of the attention attuned to people who don't need that exposure anymore. She's my good friend and I love her dearly, Cassandra Wilson, she's over. Everyone loves her and everybody is aware of her, but she gets a full-page ad. She gets the endorsements, the spread, the modeling contract, the movie roles and things like that. That's not to sweat her because she deserves everything. She can sing pages from the Bible and still sound good. She can sing anything, stop signs. This isn't even selfishly speaking, I'd like to see some of that attention and some of that financial consideration go to some of the young cats who could use it to great advantage. They are not on the road with established elders like Art Blakey and Max Roach and Elvin Jones and Betty Carter because these groups don't exist anymore. People are coming to me, trying to be in my band because they are looking at me of being in that gray area of young cats and old cats. People send me CDs, emails, I'm flooded with cats. "I want to audition. I want to be in your band. I think I fit." And I don't even work that much. It's a sad state of affairs. People want to work with me and I don't even work that much.


Fred Jung is Jazz Weekly's Editor-In-Chief and knows who killed Baretta's wife. Email him.