RARE THESE DAYS IS A ‘MUSICAL FAMILY” IN WHICH, LIKE JS BACH, A GROUP OF SIBLINGS CAN FORM THEIR OWN BAND. LAST YEAR, LA BARBERA BROTHERS JOE AND PAT JOINED FORCES WITH TONY AND PETER LEVIN TO TOUR AROUND AS A SWINGING “BAND OF BROTHERS”, WITH SPECTACULAR RESULTS.
BROTHER JOHN HAS JOINED FORCES WITH HIS BROTHERS IN NUMEROUS STUDIO RECORDINGS, MOST NOTABLY HIS OWN BIG BAND CHARTS, AND A NUMBER OF YEARS AGO THE THREE WERE IN TOWN FOR A BIG BAND BASH.
THE MOST IMPORTANT ASPECT OF THE FAMILY, HOWEVER, IS THE FACT THAT THESE BROTHERS REPRESENT A GENERATION THAT IS A LINK TO THE PREVIOUS ERA, ONE OF BIG BAND AND SWING, AS WELL AS THE VOICE OF WISDOME FOR TODAY’S ARTISTS WHO HAVE NOT HAD THE EXPERIENCE OF PLAYING IN A BIG BAND.
LIKEWISE, THE COLLECTED WISDOM OF PAT’S TOURING WITH DRUM LEGEND ELVIN JONES, AND JOHN’S STINT WITH BUDDY RICH FORMS AN ENCYCLOPEDIC SURFEIT OF MUSICAL INSPIRATION.
WE HAD A CHANCE TO GET BOTH BROTHERS TOGETHER VIA ZOOM, AND THE COPIOUS AMOUNT OF SAGE ADVICE WAS PALPABLE
JOHN, YOU DON’T COME OUT TO LA VERY MUCH
JOHN:I come out to visit Joe a couple times a year.
I normally record there. The last three of my albums were done in LA, but this year I decided to record in New York. At Christmas time, my two boys that are out there come out to East every other year, so we didn’t make it this year
, HOW DO YOU KEEP YOUR CHOPS IN SHAPE AS YOU GET OLDER?
JOHN-I don’t play anymore; I’m mostly composing and arranging now.
PAT-I’m still working all the time. I’m doing a Stan Getz tribute and then three nights in a row with bands of my own. I have a trio and a quartet
ONE OF THE THINGS I FEEL THAT IS MISSING IN TODAY’S GENERATION OF MUSICIANS IS SOMETHING TAKE FOR GRANTED WHEN YOU GREW UP-PAYING YOUR DUES IN A BIG BAND
WHAT IS THE ADVANTAGE OF PLAYING IN A BIG BAND, AS YOU DID WITH HERMAN AND RICH
PAT-I started playing as a kid in high school. They had what we called “dance bands” in school. That’s where you got introduced to jazz.
The stage band was also a big thing back then. We’d do stage band festivals.
When I went to Berklee, there were recording bands with Herb Pomeroy. It was part of the basis of the school.
I was always a small group player, but when I got the job with Buddy Rich right out of school, I spent seven years with him. Then I played with Louis Bellson, COunt Basie, Woody Herman and the Glenn Miller Band.
It teaches you a lot of things.
First of all, you learn about the road and how to get along with others. Eighteen other guys hanging out!
Musically, you learn how to back singers, and we backed all of the great ones: Ella Fitzgerald, Nancy Wilson, Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett. So, you learn about repertoire, production and how to program a set of music. How to work the audience and get a response from them. Buddy Rich taught me that
You’re not necessarily aware of it, but you’re sensing it when you’re playing. So when you go on to do your gigs, those thing wear off on you.
********
“Buddy Rich taught me…about repertoire, production and how to program a set of music. How to work the audience and get a response from them”
********
To this day, when I do my own gigs, I still use the formula that Buddy Rich did, where you get up and talk to the audience. Elvin Jones would also get up and explain the tunes. This is what you learn through osmosis
You learn how to play in a section, so you learn about intonation, timing, when to come in, balance and dynamics. How everything floats in a big band. All of that stuff is taught in school, but when you get on the road, you actually get to sense it.
JOHN: First of all, in a big band you build up your chops like crazy, and you learn how to be in time
The point is that we do have all of these great jazz ensembles in colleges today, but there’s no place for them to go. There are no big bands left to join.
The fact that all three of us, myself, Pat and Joe, could go on a major league big band and learn our craft is fantastic.
Sure, you can get your experience in college to a certain degree, but you miss a lot until you get out there in the real world and make your money doing it while doing your laundry, cleaning this and that and being on time for the bus. Unfortunately there are no more bands to go to
********
“You learn how to play in a section, so you learn about intonation, timing, when to come in, balance and dynamics. How everything floats in a big band. All of that stuff is taught in school, but when you get on the road, you actually get to sense it”
*********
WHAT WAS THE BIGGEST ADVICE A BAND LEADER GAVE YOU?
PAT: It would be from Elvin Jones. I was coming from a big band and was used to having only a short segment of a chart to play. When you stand up to play in Buddy Rich’s band you can’t expect to think about developing a long solo. I’d just have to go right there and “Bang” as I only had a short amount of time. That’s how I played for the seven years with Rich.
Elvin Jones told me “You’ve got to take your time to develop your solo; you have to play longer. You’re not playing long enough solos”. I was used to playing short clips; if I got 32 bars I was lucky. He taught me to think about developing my solo and to take my time doing it.
I realized that I had to start thinking about I started my solos, so I began thinking about Lester Young and others like that who used whole ideas of development.
JOHN: It was Buddy.
We were England with Tony Bennett and Buddy’s band, I was playing trumpet. We were playing “Love For Sale” and the song had a drum break that had this drum roll.
Buddy totally blew it this time. He stopped the band, and Pat gave him the number to start the tune again to lead to the solo. This time he nailed it.
Years later, I’m in his apartment in New York, writing arrangements for him. I said “Buddy, do you remember that time when you blew the drum break on “Love For Sale”? Did you do that so you could do it again just to get the applause?
He almost took my head off. He yelled “Don’t EVER shortchange the music. I never shortchange the music. I ALWAYS play 100%”. It took a long time to cool him down!
I’ll never forget that, as I really thought that he did that for show business, as he’d been in the business all of his life
That’s what I learned from Buddy, never short-change the music; always give it your all.
********
“in a big band you build up your chops like crazy, and you learn how to be in time”
********
WHAT WAS YOUR BIGGEST BAPTISM BY FIRE?
JOHN: It has to be with Buddy. There was an open call for new arrangements as Buddy had just signed with RCA Victor. Everyone in New York went to Philadelphia because Buddy was playing a gig at Randy’s Wharf.
All of these guys, like Don Sebesky, brought in these charts. I took a bus from New York and brought my charts with me. I put my charts up along with all the others. He plays them and says “OK, I’m recording your stuff on Tuesday. Be in New York”
That’s scary when you’ve got all of these other guys around you and you bring yourself to Buddy Rich. It was the first time I had ever put something in front of him.
PAT: Both bands, Elvin and Buddy.
I met Buddy on a Sunday afternoon. I came from Berklee and met him at the airport. All week I had been rehearsing the fourth tenor book. Jay Corre look up was the lead tenor player, but he never showed up for rehearsals as he was the star.
I knew all of my parts and had everything down. I flew to Minneapolis/St. Paul, with our first gig backing Frank Sinatra.
Jay Corre missed the plane, so I had to play the lead on “West Side Story” as well as the solo. I had never played nor even seen it before
Same thing with Elvin. He called me and asked me to come and join his band in New York. He said “Come down on Saturday, and we’ll rehearse”. So, I come down; no rehearsal. He said to come Sunday for rehearsal. I come; no rehearsal.
He says, “Just show up Tuesday night; you can play it” At the Vanguard!
Luckily he had Frank Foster at the gig to teach me the tunes in the kitchen by ear before each set. I knew some of the stuff that he did from Coltrane, but that was it. Opening the Village Vanguard with Elvin Jones without any rehearsal. BANG!
*******
“Opening the Village Vanguard with Elvin Jones without any rehearsal. BANG!”
********
WHEN DID YOU FEEL LIKE YOU “MADE IT”?
JOHN: When I was in the RCA studios, and we were recording my new music, I said “That’s it!”
WHO HAVE YOU WORKED WITH THAT IMPRESSED YOU MOST WITH THEIR MUSICAL MIND?
PAT; For me, it would have to be Elvin. I learned so much from him about time, feel and the development of a solo; the emotion behind the solo itself and how to dig into it. I also learned a lot from Buddy, but more from Elvin
JOHN: It would have to be Buddy, because after he fired me as a trumpet player, he hired me as a writer (laughs)
I shadowed him for almost 17 years. He’d call and say “Come to London, or Texas. I want new charts”
I would be constantly be in the background, in the wings, watching him play, and his choices of music and how he read the audience. I still use his jokes!
I learned so much from how he would deal with musicians. I don’t want to get into it, but he was a pretty savvy guy. He was in so many bands himself; he knew the dos and don’ts of the music business.
The other guy I learned a lot from was my attorney Joe Zynzak, who took me on as a client and nurtured me, along with Willard Alexander (the booking agent), how to deal with the business end of it.
*******
“(Buddy Rich) almost took my head off. He yelled “Don’t EVER shortchange the music. I never shortchange the music. I ALWAYS play 100%”. It took a long time to cool him down!”
********
YOU GREW UP IN A GENERATION OF BIG BANDS AND HARD BOP. WHAT IS THE BIGGEST DIFFERENCE THAT YOU NOTICE IN TODAY’S GENERATION OF MUSICIANS AS OPPOSED TO THE GENERATION THAT PRECEDED YOU?
JOHN: The generation that preceded us learned music by doing. They were the first generation of jazz and they learned by talking to other guys, making it up by themselves, and mostly using their ears and not chord changes
The generation that came after us is mostly schooled, and yet they don’t listen to music. They don’t actually sit down and listen to music.
They have some ear buds, and they talk during the music, but they don’t sit down and analyze. It’s the difference between learning by doing, and Pat, Joe and I learned by copying, and the new generation just going off and getting schooled.
PAT: One of the biggest things that I see is that all of the other generations that proceeded us, and up through my time, is that musicians would and could go in and sit with other bands, and the repertoire would be a something common that we all knew. You cannot go in and sit with any of the younger bands today unless they are playing standards, as they all have their own songs and time changes like, 5, 7 or odd meters. It’s very intricate with the charts.
It’s a different way of presenting music now. The idea of people coming to sit in with your band is gone. Unless it’s a jam session, it has to be a rehearsed band.
I remember with Elvin’s band, even at the Village Vanguard, people would come in, sit down and play. Elvin would invite them up.
*********
“Elvin Jones told me “You’ve got to take your time to develop your solo; you have to play longer… He taught me to think about developing my solo and to take my time doing it”
“*********
ALL OF YOU HAVE ALSO BEEN IN BANDS THAT WERE “POPULAR”, EVEN TO THE GENERAL PUBLIC. WHY DO YOU THINK JAZZ ISN’T AS POPULAR AS BACK THEN.
PAT: With the social media, there are just so many places to go nowadays. It’s not just either buying an lp or turning on the radio. Each individual person has so many choices as to what they want to do
You also never see jazz portrayed or played in any media like television. When we grew up it was always on TV. When rock and roll came up, it favored that a bit more, but jazz was still around. You just don’t hear it anymore.
Even when the do the Grammys, they do it off the air. They may toss jazz a bone here and there, but that’s it
JOHN: Before the internet, there were filters. Today there are no filters
Back then, you only had three television stations and three major record labels. RCA Victor owned NBC, Columbia Records owned CBS. The record companies owned the television stations. Now it’s the reverse
Back then, the record companies were the filter. You couldn’t buy a bad jazz album, because what was released was controlled by the record company. There was a limited number of records that would come out every month1714 and we would go out every week to buy jazz albums
Today, with the internet, the democratization of music as it all over the place and there is no filter. There is so much garbage out there that you have to wade through a lot of garbage.
It’s a double-edge sword. It’s great that you can promote your own album, but the music is so diluted today
******
“Back then, you only had three television stations and three major record labels. RCA Victor owned NBC, Columbia Records owned CBS. The record companies owned the television stations. Now it’s the reverse”
*******
WHICH OF YOU THREE BROTHERS WAS THE FIRST TO “MAKE IT” IN TERMS OF A BIG NAME BAND OR RECORDING
JOHN: Pat
PAT: Going with Buddy Rich in 1967 was the first big thing. We did the Ed Sullivan and Johnny Carson shows, so people back home could see us on TV
****Once my father saw me on The Ed Sullivan Show he stopped worrying about if I’d have a career as a musician. At that time, everyone was saying “Get a degree and play jazz on weekends”.
YOU GREW UP WHEN JAZZ WAS POPULAR, BUT BY THE TIME YOU MADE IT A CAREER, YOUR TYPE OF MUSIC WAS GOING OUT OF STYLE, WITH ROCK AND ROLL OR FUSION BEING THE MOST LISTENED TO SOUNDS. HOW DID YOU SURVIVE DOING THOSE YEARS
JOHN: As a writer, I was working for Woody Herman’s band, Buddy’s band and Basie’s band. It was a joy, but we were up against all of this “popular” music. I started doing radio ***and TV commercials, and with two kids, that paid the bills. Jingles and commercials and films. Things like that. In order to survive, I had to keep putting notes on paper
PAT: I’ve always managed to have a playing situation in jazz, but I wasn’t unwilling or afraid to play pop gi play with a symphony or play with a rock act. I liked the versatility of playing different stuff. It helped my jazz playing because it gave me a more rounded outlook.
I played Jewish weddings Italian weddings and parties,; I play all of those songs
********
“The generation that preceded us learned music by doing. They were the first generation of jazz and they learned by talking to other guys, making it up by themselves, and mostly using their ears and not chord changes…The generation that came after us is mostly schooled, and yet they don’t listen to music. They don’t actually sit down and listen to music”
********
YOU GUYS HAVE PLAYED WITH BUDDY RICH, LOUIS BELLSON AND ELVIN JONES. HOW WOULD YOU COMPARE THEIR PLAYING TO YOUR BROTHER’S?
PAT. Buddy and Elvin are great, and stars; Joe is right up there with them. Joe is such a great listener. He has the power to play a big band, of course he can play trios. But it’s his sensitivity
Joe also played saxophone in high school, and he has pretty good piano chops, too.
He’s well rounded musically, and he brings that to the table when he plays the drums. He’s always listening and knows when to put up the power behind you and also when to back off.
I just did that tour with him and the Levin Brothers (Tony and Peter). He knows how to play behind solos just like Buddy Rich, and he can develop his own solos beautifully
JOHN; The drumming styles are apples and oranges
Buddy really admired and respected Joe without reservation
Joe knows all of the changes to the tunes. On my last recording, he got on my case because I didn’t write the chord changes on the drum part
When he was with Bill Evans, the book was a lead line with chord changes. Joe knew all of the changes to every Bill Evans tune. He knew where Bill was all of the time. So that is what sets him apart from a lot of other drummers of our generation. A lot of those drummers didn’t’ read or even know the chord changes.
A lot of them may have known the form of the tune, but not the actual changes.
Joe was a saxophone player, and that helped him a lot.
*******
“It’s a different way of presenting music now. The idea of people coming to sit in with your band is gone”
*******
WAS THERE ANY SENSE OF A FAMILY COMPETITION BETWEEN YOU THREE WHEN ONE WOULD GET A GIG 2308
PAT: I never felt any
BESIDES THIS LAST TOUR OF YOU AND JOE, WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME THAT YOU ALL PLAYED TOGETHER?
PAT: On John’s record, last March.
JOHN: That one is on Origin Records
IS IT HARD TO FIND GUYS THAT PLAY BIG BAND?
JOHN: Not in New York and LA. You can put anything in front of those guys and they can play it. And they want to play it.
Right now, in New York the best gig is doing Broadway shows, which people wouldn’t even look at 20 years ago. Now, they would kill to play jazz recordings and gigs.
PAT: It’s the same in Toronto
******
“after (Buddy Rich) fired me as a trumpet player, he hired me as a writer(laughs)”
********
WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO LEARN FROM THE YOUNGER GENERATION
JOHN. Diversity. They are eclectic; they listen to everything. Not just to jazz but to everything else and they kind of combine it. That’s a good thing
For me, and maybe for Pat, I’m more focused on a certain narrow path. I can think time changes, but I don’t want to write time changes; I want things to go straight ahead
The younger kids today are not swinging; they are more orchestral. They don’t come from a blues background, especially the European writers and players. They come from a totally different upbringing which doesn’t include the 12 bar blues in their foundation.
PAT: That’s what I enjoyed about teaching; the young people would come up to me and ask “Have you heard this yet?” and I would go check it out, put it on my phone and listen to it.
They have their ears to the ground on everything that’s going on.
IS THERE ANYONE IN THE YOUNGER GENERATION THAT REALLY EXCITES YOU?
PAT: They do all the odd time things
JOHN. Etienne Charles is a great trumpet player. I listen to Sirius XM radio all the time and there are some excellent young players.
John Beasley’s a good writer, although he’s a bit older. There’s a lot of good talent out there.
PAT, WHERE YOU SURPRISED BY THE ENTHUSIASM OVER THE BAND OF BROTHERS, WITH YOU AND THE LEVIN BROTHERS PLAYING STRAIGHTAHEAD JAZZ?
PAT; Yes, we got a lot of great feedback, going up the coast all of the way to Vancouver. They want us to do more with the band, but I don’t think so. Maybe once in awhile.
A thought they’d know who Tony Levin was, but I didn’t think anyone knew who I was, since I’ve been off the scene since I left Elvin’s band
Still, people came up to me to talk about Buddy Rich, so my days with him still holds something
The younger kids today are not swinging; they are more orchestral. They don’t come from a blues background, especially the European writers and players. They come from a totally different upbringing which doesn’t include the 12 bar blues in their foundation
********
“The younger kids today are not swinging; they are more orchestral. They don’t come from a blues background, especially the European writers and players. They come from a totally different upbringing which doesn’t include the 12 bar blues in their foundation”
*********
IT’S VERY RARE TO HAVE THREE BROTHERS SUCCEED IN MUSIC. WHAT DID YOUR PARENTS INCULCATE TO YOU? 2808
PAT: There was a work ethic there, for sure. We started working at 10-11. I was helping my dad build stuff at that age. He knows more about tearing cars apart and electronics.
The music was there also. We had to have lessons; as soon as we came home from school my father gave us music lessons. A lot of times we didn’t want them, but back in those days you didn’t argue. (laughs)
JOHN: First of all, we had a close family unit, being very Italian.
The work ethic was there. I would be six years old, Pat was seven and Joe is five, and we’d come home from a wedding gig at one in the morning, and “No! You can’t leave the instruments in the car”. So, we had to unload them and take them down to the basemen.
“You can’t leave your instrument at the club; you take it home with you” even though you’re playing there again tomorrow night. That was a very important lesson.
*******
“We had to have lessons; as soon as we came home from school my father gave us music lessons. A lot of times we didn’t want them, but back in those days you didn’t argue. (laughs)”
*******
WHAT ADVICE DID YOU GIVE YOUR SONS ABOUT MUSIC?
JOHN: Don’t go into music! (laughs)
They actually got most of it through osmosis, through the telephone calls and the arguments. They understood how the business works.
One of the best pieces of advice that I gave them was “get your business stuff together first, and then do the music”
********
“get your business stuff together first, and then do the music”
********
DID ANY OF YOU HAVE AN “AHA” MOMENT WHEN YOU REALIZED WHAT YOU WERE DOING?
PAT: When I played with Elvin and McCoy (Tyner) and Richard Davis, I’m looking around **and think to myself “I’m standing in the same spot that Coltrane stood. I never thought I’d get here!”
JOHN; The night Pat got me on Buddy Rich’s band. I was with a territory road band when I got the call. I flew to Las Vegas on New Year’s Day. We opened at The Sands on New Year’s Day. There I was on the stand with Buddy Rich in Vegas for a month and I thought, “Man, this is IT!”
I had been working at Holiday Inn lounges and the like, so that was a big “Aha” moment
AT THIS STAGE IN YOUR LIFE, WHAT GOALS DO YOU STILL HAVE?
PAT: Just keep on playing the best that I can the music that I enjoy so much. I don’t have to do anything just to make money; I don’t have to worry about that. I will take something if I’m helping somebody out. But, mostly playing jazz gigs.
JOHN: I just finished my fourth cd. I just love the luxury of being able to write the music that I hear, and have the money to pay the musicians which is what they’re worth. And that’s not cheap.
PAT: Nope! (laughs)
JOHN: I want to continue doing that. This last album was a major chunk of change; I don’t cut corners. My aspiration is to continue doing that and keep my music out there.
WHAT GIVES YOU THE MOST JOY IN LIFE?
PAT: Family and grandkids. Watching my family progress.
JOHN: Same thing; I’ve got two boys. They’re both in music, which I didn’t want them to do. It’s fun to see the evolution of our musical gene and see them succeed. They’re not living in my basement! (laughs)
********
“There I was on the stand with Buddy Rich in Vegas for a month and I thought, ‘“Man, this is IT!’”
********
ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT AND YET UNDERAPPRECIATED REQUIREMENTS OF A SUCCESSFUL MUSICIAN IS THE ABILTY TO LISTEN TO THE OTHER MEMBERS OF THE BAND.
THE WISDOM OF THE AGES FROM THESE TWO MEN WHO HAVE SEEN AND HEARD SOUNDS FROM THREE GENERATIONS MAKES FOR MORE LESSONS THAN A YEAR AT ANY ACADEMY OF MUSIC. SAVE SOME MONEY, AND SPEND TIME IMBIBING KNOWLEDGE OF THE MASTERS