Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic
Speaker 1: episode was produced by the team at Pandora.
Speaker 2: What's Up, Everybody?
Speaker 3: This is unpaid bill. This week's QLs classic is a
Speaker 3: basis Christian McBride. He recalls attending the same high school
Speaker 3: as a mere playing on some incredible jazz records and
Speaker 3: a Miles David story You did not want to miss here.
Speaker 3: It is episode sixty eight from January twenty fourth, twenty eighteen.
Speaker 4: Pieces Supremo Sun Sun Supremo, roll Call, Suprema Sun Sun Subpremo,
Speaker 4: roll call, subdreama Sun Sun Supremo roll call, Subdrema Sun
Speaker 4: Sun Suprema roll call. Yeah, yeah, yeah, come on, Subrama
Speaker 4: Son Supremeo roll Subrama Son Supremo roll call.
Speaker 2: My name is Spante. Yeah, y'all know I'm filling it.
Speaker 5: Yeah here with two thirds, Yeah, Philadelphia Experiment, Calm Supreme.
Speaker 6: Something something Supremo, role called Suprema something Supreme A roll
Speaker 6: where tune Suprema.
Speaker 2: Yeah we set the pace, Yeah, we got them drums, Yeah,
Speaker 2: we got them face.
Speaker 6: Pray Son so Upbreme roll called Supprema, this.
Speaker 2: Sub frame roll the bones and candy ms. Yeah, turn
Speaker 2: ups Mother steak. Yeah, grits and gravy. Maam cracking bread
Speaker 2: son roll.
Speaker 7: Suprema rolls em yeah, no question, that's right. Yeah yeah,
Speaker 7: Chris McBride.
Speaker 2: Supreme Subra.
Speaker 6: Roll.
Speaker 2: This is you seriously got mem freestyling uppre roll.
Speaker 1: That was the greatest sprovisation of a musician our generation.
Speaker 6: Supremea some Supreme roll call Supra son son.
Speaker 2: Supreme a roll call. Wait. The biggest surprise of that
Speaker 2: all was like you not making our guest her third line?
Speaker 5: Yeah you know, christ isn't it? That's that's the standard,
Speaker 5: like brought my.
Speaker 2: Base, you know. Now you know.
Speaker 1: Next time, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of.
Speaker 2: Christian McBride Diaries.
Speaker 1: This is question of Supreme uh with Team Suprema. Uh
Speaker 1: say hello, guys, how you're doing UH with us today?
Speaker 1: You know, I'll say that we've had many hip hop
Speaker 1: debate on the show, but I will still maintain that
Speaker 1: jazz is probably the most argued and the most debated
Speaker 1: UH genre of music.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: It's it's fans are very passionate, and it's you know,
Speaker 1: all opinions are subjective, but I will jazz arguments are
Speaker 1: my favorite. Yes, indeed, to watch to watch, yeah, because
Speaker 1: you got to have your data. But I I will
Speaker 1: I will say that, in my opinion, I believe that
Speaker 1: our guest today is without a doubt, uh, probably the
Speaker 1: greatest living musician of his generation and prop you know of.
Speaker 2: Currently in jazz right now. I mean, I feel as
Speaker 2: though he is the.
Speaker 1: Spiritual epicenter, one foot rooted and the tradition the other
Speaker 1: foot rooted and experimenting and going outside out of the rim.
Speaker 1: That's all I can say about one of my favorite
Speaker 1: people ever, Christian Lee McBride.
Speaker 2: Welcome to Question Love Supreme. Another homie. Yeah, how sweet
Speaker 2: of you. I never knew you felt that way.
Speaker 1: Come on, bruh, I'm I study you, bro Vice versa.
Speaker 2: I know who I'm messing with. Are y'all the same age?
Speaker 2: Are y'all the same generation? This is what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: This is what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Even at the age of fifteen, Christian sounded like a
Speaker 1: thirty five year old like the way.
Speaker 7: That's why I'm excited, because I want to hear all
Speaker 7: these stories about y'all being young and being the.
Speaker 1: Way that he talks right now, Like I thought maybe
Speaker 1: he was a teacher's assistant. Like in school, he wore
Speaker 1: like like right now, he's wearn't sneakers. I don't think
Speaker 1: I maybe a few times I've seen you wear sneak
Speaker 1: like he always wore suits. Oh wow, and he was clean,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. So I my first day
Speaker 1: of Performing Arts school where we went all right, the
Speaker 1: history of us is that Christian and I went to
Speaker 1: Creative and Performing Arts High School in Philadelphia at the
Speaker 1: same time that Boisteroimen went there.
Speaker 2: Melvue grew theory the same class.
Speaker 1: Same class. He and I are class of Remember I'm
Speaker 1: proud of my age eighty nine.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 7: I know it was I was looking at Christian.
Speaker 1: But yeah, but I'll say that for me, there's a
Speaker 1: point where where I guess in your teens you got
Speaker 1: to get serious about about your craft. And you know,
Speaker 1: I mean pretty much people know the backstory, like I've
Speaker 1: been playing with my parents and all stuff since it's
Speaker 1: like three, four or five years old, you know. And
Speaker 1: then my dad was like, well, you know, there's there's
Speaker 1: going to be a time where it's going to stop
Speaker 1: being cute, Like you know, you're five, six, seven years
Speaker 1: old behind the drum set, playing on like.
Speaker 2: Adult Oh that's good.
Speaker 7: He's so cute.
Speaker 2: But there's a point where you're actually gonna have to
Speaker 2: be good.
Speaker 1: And I will say that my first day of school
Speaker 1: at Creative and Performing Arts was probably the biggest wake
Speaker 1: up call of my life which has me here today.
Speaker 1: Like I consider that first day of the day where
Speaker 1: I was like, oh shit, I didn't know that there
Speaker 1: are other kids that play way better than I do.
Speaker 1: And you know, cause I didn't know that, I didn't
Speaker 1: know any kids, and you know, people my age like
Speaker 1: playing like I played with a bunch of oldies cats
Speaker 1: that were like fifteen s So meeting Chris, I mean
Speaker 1: on the first day of school, didn't Miles. Didn't you
Speaker 1: guys do something with Miles Davis.
Speaker 2: On the That was the I think that was the
Speaker 2: following year, all this something on Miles Davis. One of
Speaker 2: them local channel Bill Boggs, he used to have a
Speaker 2: talk show on daytime television in Philly. Uh, they had
Speaker 2: Miles Davis as a guest, and uh they had this overly,
Speaker 2: this this naive, romantic notion that they would have Miles
Speaker 2: Davis give a live workshop like a masterclass. And he's mad, Well,
Speaker 2: I don't, I don't know if he was stand office,
Speaker 2: but he's he was brutally honest. You know, he's a
Speaker 2: man that had no filter, not even for a child.
Speaker 2: Because you had an Els Marcel's moment. I think Miles
Speaker 2: Davis is thinking, well, like, if you bolted to put
Speaker 2: me on television with a nine year old kid, you're
Speaker 2: gonna have to hear the truth, you know. So they
Speaker 2: had they had the house band, which was myself, Joey D.
Speaker 2: Francesco on on keyboard and uh, Stacy Dozier on drums,
Speaker 2: our old buddy and uh they invited four trumpet players
Speaker 2: from the Philly school system to come and play and
Speaker 2: get Miles to critique him on live television and uh
Speaker 2: uh not a good.
Speaker 7: Idea, Please, what do you what do you say about you?
Speaker 2: Well, he didn't. We weren't featured.
Speaker 1: Were they were the master Like that's what I'm saying, Chris,
Speaker 1: Chris was already at master level.
Speaker 2: I don't know about that. But see, we weren't playing.
Speaker 2: We were just there to back up the trumpet players.
Speaker 2: They didn't. They didn't, We weren't. Who were some of
Speaker 2: the casts that were Fred Goodson was one of the trumplers,
Speaker 2: John Swanna was one of the trumpet players. Uh, dude
Speaker 2: was one of the trumpet players. And Jafar Baron eleven, No,
Speaker 2: he was. Let me see, I would have been sixteen,
Speaker 2: so Jafar might have been fifteen. And I remember Miles
Speaker 2: pushed him in the chest. Wow, my little Miles gave
Speaker 2: him a straight left, right and right in the solar plexus. Man,
Speaker 2: I couldn't believe it. Wait a minute, I know all
Speaker 2: these years I've never heard. I never told you Miles
Speaker 2: pushed him in the chest.
Speaker 7: Well, why did he punch him in the chest?
Speaker 2: Because after it was over, you know, we all went
Speaker 2: up to Miles to you know, say hello, and the
Speaker 2: Miles you know, kind of cased everyone up, you know,
Speaker 2: and he went he saw you far, he went, boom.
Speaker 2: You've been a practice boy. So what year was this?
Speaker 2: How old was Miles around that time? That would have
Speaker 2: been eighty eight, so years old? Yeah, right, your Miles
Speaker 2: was sixty four, maybe sixty two, sixty two. But that
Speaker 2: was on the second day of eleventh grade, right something
Speaker 2: like that. Wasn't that early. I don't know if it
Speaker 2: was that early in the year, but it was sometime
Speaker 2: early in the year.
Speaker 1: I had missed because my parents were on the road.
Speaker 1: I missed technically, I think, the first two days of school,
Speaker 1: so I came in on day three. Yeah, and I
Speaker 1: had already gotten word of Oh.
Speaker 2: My god, Bill found it already. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, wow. Okay,
Speaker 2: I wish I could see what I just saw.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but it was mad Like for me, the whole
Speaker 1: experience is mad attimidating, because every every high school has
Speaker 1: this what what what set you claiming moment? I mean,
Speaker 1: be it an actual what set you claiming moment? Or
Speaker 1: you gotta choose a click? Yeah, And because you're at
Speaker 1: performing arts high school, I mean there's different.
Speaker 2: You know, there's theater, dance, music.
Speaker 1: Creative writing, right, so then once you choose what you
Speaker 1: gotta do. But even inside those clicks, there are other
Speaker 1: clicks and clicks.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And the thing was on on the right.
Speaker 1: Side of things was Christa McBride and Joey de Francisco,
Speaker 1: whom I already knew of, like seeing clips on the news,
Speaker 1: local news, and you know, jazz brought it to these
Speaker 1: Christmas Vien Joey thirteen fourteen, like playing like and I
Speaker 1: don't mean like, oh they're q for thirteen year old men. Yes,
Speaker 1: But then on the left side of it Kurt Rosenwinkle.
Speaker 1: Kurt Rosenwinkle who worked on Q Tips, he was on
Speaker 1: the second abstract Yeah Comala Abstract record. So Kurt Rosenwinkle
Speaker 1: uh is a year older than us, and so he
Speaker 1: has a whole nother click. So basically I'm trying to
Speaker 1: choose which fork in the road I'm not going to
Speaker 1: go because these guys are talking traditional straight ahead jazz.
Speaker 1: But then Rosenwinkle's trying to unteach me everything that they're
Speaker 1: teaching me by like hit me to Frank Zappa, Mount
Speaker 1: Vshu Orchestra, like John mclaughe and and all that stuff.
Speaker 1: And then on top of that, you know, I got
Speaker 1: to survive up in the lunch room and Treiek's with
Speaker 1: the cool kids, you know.
Speaker 7: So it's just and his boys and men over there
Speaker 7: on the side.
Speaker 2: Were they hung with them, well, they had their own.
Speaker 2: They strictly hung with the with the vocal.
Speaker 7: When a hear tells a story, you always say they
Speaker 7: were already likes together and pat no, they were together.
Speaker 1: They were singing, trying to get girls and all that stuff.
Speaker 1: But I mean, just as far as what sets you claiming,
Speaker 1: I definitely. You know, Rosenwinkle was again the jazz argument
Speaker 1: of do we file tradition in the forties or.
Speaker 2: Do we move it ahead to the future. So now,
Speaker 2: But this is why he was such a saving grace
Speaker 2: for me when he came to high school, because I
Speaker 2: had nobody to talk funk with for my first two
Speaker 2: years of high school. I was just kind of in
Speaker 2: my own bubble when it came to funk. I mean,
Speaker 2: I enjoyed living in my own bubble. I could do that.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm an only child, you know, I'm cool
Speaker 2: with that. But then he's leaving out a very important
Speaker 2: part of his first day of school. He was playing
Speaker 2: the bass. He was just kind of new, lying around
Speaker 2: on the upright base. So I knew he was coming.
Speaker 2: And they said we got a new drummer coming in.
Speaker 2: I'm here Thompson. I was like, oh, cool, solid, And
Speaker 2: so I walked in the music room and I see
Speaker 2: somebody on the base and I'm just kind of just
Speaker 2: kind of laying back, just chilling, like all right, who
Speaker 2: was this? And he's playing doing it to death. He's
Speaker 2: playing James Brown on that, and I went, wait a minute,
Speaker 2: So I kind of walked up to him. I was like, yeah,
Speaker 2: what you know about James Brown. He looked at me,
Speaker 2: he said, no, what you know about James Brown. It
Speaker 2: was at that point I man, man, you don't know
Speaker 2: how much how happy I was that you came around
Speaker 2: and for the our last two years of high school,
Speaker 2: it was great to have that that outlet I could
Speaker 2: go and really talk funk with him. Mother. Lowe had
Speaker 2: come out in the jungle groove on him. James Brown records,
Speaker 2: and he studied Jabbo and Clyde Stubblefield, all those Al Jackson,
Speaker 2: all those great R and B and soul drummers the
Speaker 2: same way I would study Ray Brown or Paul Chambers
Speaker 2: or Charles Mingus or Ron Carter and uh to the
Speaker 2: point where till this very day, should I reveal your
Speaker 2: your nickname? Yeah? So I've called him Clyde ever since
Speaker 2: the day I met him, because he's the closest to
Speaker 2: Clyde Stubblefield. Nobody else has studied Clyde Stubblefield as thoroughly
Speaker 2: as he as he has, and can actually play like
Speaker 2: Clyde s Doublefield. So I've never called him quest. I mean,
Speaker 2: you know I do when what I have have to,
Speaker 2: you know, I understand circumstances. Always been Booty and Clyde.
Speaker 2: Booty and Clyde. That's that's what we call each other,
Speaker 2: you know. All right. So Chris, there's.
Speaker 1: Your Your music vocabulary is so broad that I don't
Speaker 1: know whether or not to go with your story and
Speaker 1: your journey in jazz or just your opinions on music period,
Speaker 1: So we can go wherever you.
Speaker 7: Well, we got to find out how he became a
Speaker 7: child genius though yes.
Speaker 1: He will never admit this. So well, I gotta know
Speaker 1: how old were you when you first started playing?
Speaker 2: Nine? Nine years old? Based on because just like you,
Speaker 2: you know, uh, my dad Bee Smith is also a
Speaker 2: bass player. My great uncle Howard Cooper also a bass player,
Speaker 2: and uh so it's a family tradition, you know. I
Speaker 2: I didn't really want to do anything else, maybe pro
Speaker 2: football at one point, uh but it was always about
Speaker 2: the bass. What did you play ball for a little bit?
Speaker 2: Street football? You know? I want you to be old.
Speaker 2: Get on the j bus. It was upright That's what
Speaker 2: I started on on electric base. Yeah, and then I
Speaker 2: started playing the upright base when I was eleven and
Speaker 2: I was going to Pepper Middle school in southwest Philly
Speaker 2: because I had to play in the orchestra. Wait where
Speaker 2: was Pepper Uh now out near the airport? Yeah, you
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. That wasn't Yeah, it was past
Speaker 2: Bartram it was. It was actually like Sharon Hill. It
Speaker 2: was behind Bartram, like past penn Rose Park. It was
Speaker 2: like that. The school the suburbs. Yeah, oh big time.
Speaker 2: What would you take to get a chartered sefter bus
Speaker 2: damn yeah.
Speaker 7: Thing?
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, well we basically took what was the G
Speaker 2: bus and but it was specifically went straight to Pepper. Wow. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I never heard of such a thing. Yeah, man, And
Speaker 2: so the technical uh the the exact address was eighty
Speaker 2: fourth and Lions Avenue. The schools now closed, doesn't exist,
Speaker 2: but it was this. It was the school built on
Speaker 2: top of a swamp. There was always a prediction that
Speaker 2: the school would literally sink at some point. But yeah,
Speaker 2: it was out there near the airport, near Island Avenue
Speaker 2: pass Linburgh Boulevard. It was. It was way out there.
Speaker 2: But they had a great music program. So that's when
Speaker 2: I started playing upright base really yep, and this is
Speaker 2: a public school or yeah, okay, okay, So then you
Speaker 2: went there all eight years of your No, I went
Speaker 2: to Hamilton for for elementary school from first to sixth,
Speaker 2: and then Pepper seventh and eighth, and then Kappa nine
Speaker 2: through twelve.
Speaker 1: So what when you went to Kappa, especially those two
Speaker 1: years before, At what point are you, you know, dedicating
Speaker 1: your life to Jack at least the serious the seriousness
Speaker 1: level that I saw you ass Like.
Speaker 2: What, Well, it's a couple of things that happened. When
Speaker 2: I was in eighth grade still at Pepper, I met
Speaker 2: Joey he was there too.
Speaker 1: No, but.
Speaker 2: My string teacher, you remember, mss Keith. I think she
Speaker 2: was known as Miss Funk back then. Yeah, exactly, so
Speaker 2: I know right, So she was teaching, she was my
Speaker 2: base teacher at Pepper, and she said, I think you're
Speaker 2: good enough to go to Settlement for their jazz program.
Speaker 2: And so I started going to Settlement Music School. And
Speaker 2: that's where I met Lovin Hines and Joey d. Francesco
Speaker 2: and Antonio Parker and Donald Ward, all these all the cats.
Speaker 2: And they were like, yo, you in eighth grade. You
Speaker 2: ain't even supposed to be here till till at least
Speaker 2: next year. But Joey was there, so he was in
Speaker 2: eighth grade too. So uh, once I met Joey, we
Speaker 2: started practicing together. We started calling each other up on
Speaker 2: the phone every day. You know. He you think, look,
Speaker 2: Joey de Francesco was the real child prodigy because he
Speaker 2: was gigging. He was making gigs in Philly when he
Speaker 2: was like nine years old. Yes he was. He was.
Speaker 2: His feet could barely touch the organ pedals. But I
Speaker 2: mean he knew like half the real book already.
Speaker 1: And the fact that to explain, all right, so there's
Speaker 1: a real book and there's a fake book. Why do
Speaker 1: y'all use the fake book more than the real book.
Speaker 2: It's cheaper, it's easier to get get your hands out,
Speaker 2: So it's the real book would be the Wikipedia of
Speaker 2: all jazz songs in book for him.
Speaker 1: So when you're a jazz musician coming up a saxophone player,
Speaker 1: whether were there various books where they just court charts.
Speaker 2: Or well they would have uh you know, B flat key,
Speaker 2: concert key and E flat key, so.
Speaker 7: Yeah, like sheet music.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, but you you basically, if you're a jazz musician,
Speaker 1: it would be who you to least know at least
Speaker 1: eighty of this book?
Speaker 2: Yeah, because the big is it? It was pretty thick.
Speaker 2: I would I would say about that big you know,
Speaker 2: there's two hundred what kind of what songs are? They
Speaker 2: like it? Standard Autumn Leaves Misty, you know, take the Train,
Speaker 2: all those all those standard jazz songs. I mean, because
Speaker 2: the part of the biggest challenge of being a jazz
Speaker 2: musician is learning repertoire. You know, because you get on
Speaker 2: stage with some of those older guys you know, turn
Speaker 2: around and say body and soul. They don't want to
Speaker 2: hear that. Oh I don't know that. Well what you
Speaker 2: up here for? Get off the stage, you know. So
Speaker 2: that's part of the that's the biggest challenge there is,
Speaker 2: just learning the repertoire. So how were you when you
Speaker 2: read music? When I started at Pepper, That's when I
Speaker 2: started learning reading music.
Speaker 1: Uh, anybody can put anything, because that's the thing is
Speaker 1: that I in my experience musicians that are proficient at reading.
Speaker 2: I know cats that.
Speaker 1: Live on the stage, they look at it, they can
Speaker 1: play everything but their feelings off. But then I know
Speaker 1: cats that have awesome feel they can't read a lit So,
Speaker 1: I mean, at what point.
Speaker 2: Well, it was always a myth that, especially speaking to
Speaker 2: a lot of older jazz musicians, they always had this
Speaker 2: thing and they were scared to learn how to read
Speaker 2: because they said, well, if I learned how to read music,
Speaker 2: I'm not going to be able to get the feeling
Speaker 2: into it. But I mean, I think that myth was
Speaker 2: shattered by so many great legendary musicians. I mean, first
Speaker 2: of all, if you played in a big band, you
Speaker 2: had to learn how to read. So Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker,
Speaker 2: all these great musicians. I mean, obviously they knew how
Speaker 2: to read music and write music as well. But once
Speaker 2: I started playing in the orchestra at age eleven, at
Speaker 2: Pepper started taking private lessons, and I had to learn
Speaker 2: how to read music. And you know, of course at
Speaker 2: that time you read music every day, so I was
Speaker 2: really good at it. You know. I think I consider
Speaker 2: myself a moderately good reader now because I don't do
Speaker 2: it every day. But if I don't want to put
Speaker 2: myself on the spot. But there are varying degrees of
Speaker 2: of of of you know, challenge challenge when it comes
Speaker 2: to the music that people give you to read. I'm
Speaker 2: fairly quick still, you know, so just in front of you,
Speaker 2: can you play this and you're looking you know, I
Speaker 2: give it the once over and I write away. I
Speaker 2: just try to look for the problem spots, you know,
Speaker 2: and I'm just like, okay, what is that? Okay, I
Speaker 2: think I got it, you know, and then nail it. Okay.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's kind of where I got off the train
Speaker 1: because reading drum charts is boring. Well, no, it's just
Speaker 1: hard for me. I mean, I'm certain that if I
Speaker 1: seriously applied it, it wouldn't be anything. But I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, just reading drum charts and okay, so this
Speaker 1: is the kick and that represents the snare and this
Speaker 1: represents the like there's so many hours of practice you
Speaker 1: have to put into that, which I don't think.
Speaker 2: And there's so many different kinds of drum charts, like
Speaker 2: you know, sometimes they'll just give you a lead sheet
Speaker 2: with just the melody on it, and you're left to
Speaker 2: your own devices on what to figure out what the
Speaker 2: accents are exactly. You know, some will give you an
Speaker 2: actual drum part where they have all of the slashes
Speaker 2: and all the stuff on top and underneath, and like
Speaker 2: you said, you know, I've seen like drum like that.
Speaker 2: Shit makes no sense at all.
Speaker 1: So when some of the older casts come like Tony
Speaker 1: Bennett comes through. This guy like gave his jrump charts
Speaker 1: like look at each other, he just gave Just give
Speaker 1: us the NP three brother.
Speaker 2: Straight up. Well, you know, speaking of you, you're talking
Speaker 2: about Kurt Rosenwinkle and he was turning you onto the
Speaker 2: Mound Official New Orchestra. Well, I would say that John
Speaker 2: McLoughlin and the mon Official New Orchestra where they had uh,
Speaker 2: legendarily difficult music. None of it was in four you know,
Speaker 2: it was all in nine and eleven, shifting back and
Speaker 2: forth five four, five eight, eleven four eleven eight and uh,
Speaker 2: you know, the I is crossed listening to some of
Speaker 2: this music right now. Imagine reading it. When I went
Speaker 2: on tour with with Chick Corea and John McLoughlin, uh
Speaker 2: in a in an all star group called the five
Speaker 2: Piece Bad p E A C E. I was literally scared.
Speaker 2: I thought, Chick Corea and John McLoughlin together, Boy, I
Speaker 2: know I'm gonna be doing some heavy reading on this tour.
Speaker 2: And Vinnie the Great Vinnie calu to former Frank Zappa
Speaker 2: drummer of all people, played on that tour, and uh,
Speaker 2: John mcgloughlin had this one tune. What was the name
Speaker 2: of this piece? I can't remember, but it was so
Speaker 2: difficult I'll never forget. We had to jump on a
Speaker 2: conference call with Chick Vinnie Call you to Kenny Garrett,
Speaker 2: who played saxophone on the tour, and we're all sitting
Speaker 2: there trying to figure out, now, how are you hearing this?
Speaker 2: Are you hearing it in five or you hearing it
Speaker 2: in ten? Or I mean like what, what?
Speaker 7: What?
Speaker 2: Where? Where's the downbeat? Where's the one The one part
Speaker 2: of me actually was relieved to hear Chick career of
Speaker 2: all people, asked the question. You know, he was like, man,
Speaker 2: I'm having trouble finding out how to count this, and
Speaker 2: I'm like, Okay, I don't feel so bad. Oh man,
Speaker 2: what song was it? And Vinnie Call was like, uh, yeah,
Speaker 2: we'll see. Think of the dotted quarter note. It's like
Speaker 2: that's the actual quarter notes. It's like doom doom, doom, doom,
Speaker 2: doom doom doom. And instead of counting it, uh like
Speaker 2: like with the eighth note groove and to think of
Speaker 2: it as like a super slow five. What was the
Speaker 2: name of that song? Oh, old Blues, New Bruise, That
Speaker 2: that's the that's the recul that's the name of the song.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, Old Blues, New Bruise. Damn. Even even my
Speaker 2: computer's like right, yeah, or New Blues, Old Bruise, something
Speaker 2: with blues and bruise in it, and like so it's
Speaker 2: a slow five and it's got all these accents in
Speaker 2: the middle of it, and I mean, I'm looking at this, going, bro,
Speaker 2: I can't feel this, and I'm thinking, well, we got
Speaker 2: a tour coming up.
Speaker 1: I better learn how to feel it and quit. Oh
Speaker 1: so it wasn't any question of it. Well maybe it's
Speaker 1: too difficult for you guys, let.
Speaker 2: Me No, no, no, we had We had to buckle
Speaker 2: down and figure it out. And I'll tell you the
Speaker 2: whole time we were on that tour when we played
Speaker 2: that song, you can literally see me I'm gonna stay
Speaker 2: this going three, four, five or two. I was counting
Speaker 2: out loud and unashamed. I was like, I ain't getting
Speaker 2: lost in this tourne Wait, what year was this?
Speaker 1: Uh? Eight eight and o nine? We did that tour
Speaker 1: ten years ago? Yeah, I'm thinking like, oh, post high school.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, no, no, no, this was less than ten
Speaker 2: years ago. Really, yeah, so how many years did you
Speaker 2: do at Juilliard. I only stayed for a year. That's
Speaker 2: because I started gigging pretty much right after school started.
Speaker 2: As you well know, I got to know when Marcellus
Speaker 2: toward our last couple of years of high school, and
Speaker 2: knowing that all my jazz heroes lived in New York,
Speaker 2: I said, I got to get to New York somehow,
Speaker 2: some way. So I knew I was going to go
Speaker 2: to college. And well, I knew I was going to
Speaker 2: go to New York. But as cool as my mom is,
Speaker 2: I knew it wasn't going to be simple as hey, mom,
Speaker 2: I want to move to New York and become a
Speaker 2: professional jazz musician. So I went to I applied to
Speaker 2: the New School, Juilliard and the Manhattan School of Music,
Speaker 2: and one of those three. If I can get in
Speaker 2: any one of the schools, at least I'll be here
Speaker 2: in New York. And I started working with Bobby Watson's
Speaker 2: Horizon Quintet probably my first month in town. But that
Speaker 2: wasn't the first gig that actually took me on the road.
Speaker 2: The first time I went on the road was like
Speaker 2: on a steady basis was probably it was both Roy
Speaker 2: Hargrove's band and Freddie Hubbards Band and this is after Juilliard.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so what point did you because I think everyone
Speaker 1: has that thing like I did like half a semester.
Speaker 2: Then it's like I got a record deal, I got
Speaker 2: a gig. So like for you, what was it? I mean,
Speaker 2: did your mom know? Like, okay, I think she knew
Speaker 2: because once, I would say, once May rolled around May
Speaker 2: of ninety, I was working a lot, so I knew
Speaker 2: the writing was on the wall. I said, my school
Speaker 2: work's going to suffer because I'm out playing every night.
Speaker 2: I'm either going to have to make a decision either
Speaker 2: really focus on studies or go gig. So I called
Speaker 2: mom from from a payphone exactly on fifty six then,
Speaker 2: right in front of Worldwide Plaza. I don't know why
Speaker 2: I was there, but I called her from there. I said, Mom,
Speaker 2: I don't think I want to go back to Juliard
Speaker 2: next year. And it was this long, like minute and
Speaker 2: a half paused over the phone, and I was like, Mom,
Speaker 2: you're there. She's like, yeah, I'm here, So what are
Speaker 2: you going to do? I was like, I was like,
Speaker 2: but Mom, I'm gigging. You know, I'm working a lot,
Speaker 2: and you know I'm making money. She said, where are
Speaker 2: you going to live? I said, well, my friend Mark Carrey.
Speaker 2: Mark Carrey, who's yeah, yeah, he was playing in Betty
Speaker 2: Carter's band at that time, and he had a place
Speaker 2: up in Harlem and he had some extra space. He said,
Speaker 2: I can move in with him. Well, I don't know, Mark,
Speaker 2: carry I got meet him, make sure he's cool. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: I was is. You were always an adult to me,
Speaker 2: so seeing you having a yeah, man, Well see man again,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna go back to high school. I've always felt
Speaker 2: that both your parents, you know, even my dad wasn't
Speaker 2: living with us, you know, when I was growing up.
Speaker 2: But I'll never forget how much how tightly knit your
Speaker 2: family was, man, And I always thought of your dad,
Speaker 2: both your parents and and my mom the same way.
Speaker 2: They did not let us get away with too much. Man.
Speaker 2: They weren't hear none of that, none of that crazy mess,
Speaker 2: you know. And my mom always loved you, man. She
Speaker 2: liked the fact that. I think she also liked the
Speaker 2: fact that I now had a funk brother, you know,
Speaker 2: you know, she was like, God, finally somebody else you
Speaker 2: could listen to James Brown with boy. So what was
Speaker 2: you said the first gig you did was with Hubbert. Well,
Speaker 2: I was like, that was like my first major major
Speaker 2: gig after I left Philly. What is that like?
Speaker 1: Like is it intimidating from you know, studying. I know
Speaker 1: that you guys like I didn't realize the point. You know,
Speaker 1: you guys are like reciting solos to each other, and
Speaker 1: I was like, ohh, I gotta now study.
Speaker 2: There's there's one point when you you enjoy were listening
Speaker 2: to I'll Never Forget.
Speaker 1: You had Larry Jung's Unity, not Zultron. That was the
Speaker 1: first that is, but it's the it's the the second song.
Speaker 2: Yes, I think it was Monks Dreamy Monk's Dreams moon Train.
Speaker 1: But you guys were literally reciting every you know. Now,
Speaker 1: I know that's common in jazz music, but I'm was like, wait,
Speaker 1: why did they're studying?
Speaker 2: Man? Soul was like, that's how far I got to
Speaker 2: go into this thing, and.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but you did that man, well see I did
Speaker 1: for survival because it's like if you can't get respect
Speaker 1: from I mean, it's like in jail, like you got
Speaker 1: to hit the biggest motherfucker, Like you see the biggest
Speaker 1: motherfucker that you hit.
Speaker 2: Him like you had to speak their language. No, I
Speaker 2: think it's survival on on that, on and too, because uh.
Speaker 1: Well, y'all used to also if the cat was sad,
Speaker 1: y'all would y'all would let y'all wouldn't even let him
Speaker 1: know he's like, oh, Man's cat's so sad.
Speaker 7: Man.
Speaker 2: I didn't want to be the sad cat that well,
Speaker 2: you know what used to crack me up. Do you
Speaker 2: remember how Joey and Kurt used to see Joey defriend
Speaker 2: to see I feel bad because Joey's not here to
Speaker 2: defend himself. But well, we were in high school. But
Speaker 2: Joey used to mess with Kurt like terribly, yes, because
Speaker 2: Kurt was you know, he was he was super serious
Speaker 2: and he was not a traditional kind of guy. He
Speaker 2: was playing great stuff, but it wasn't like straight traditional jazz.
Speaker 2: So he'd be in the in the practice room, and
Speaker 2: you know, he would be on the piano. I actually
Speaker 2: didn't even know Kurk played guitar because he played a
Speaker 2: lot of piano in high school. Really yeah, so the
Speaker 2: first during freshman and well, I knew he played guitar,
Speaker 2: but I thought that was a secondary instrument because I
Speaker 2: always just see him on piano all the time. So
Speaker 2: he would be on the piano and be playing all
Speaker 2: these all these weird kind of you know, polychords and
Speaker 2: all this stuff, and Joey would come behind and be like, man,
Speaker 2: what is that ship? Man? Why don't you play some blues?
Speaker 2: And Kirk get out of here, man, leave me alone,
Speaker 2: and joe that's some bullshit, get out of here, all right.
Speaker 2: So this leads me to.
Speaker 1: I will say that with as far as Winton is concerned. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you've heard all the arguments. I'm certain that you've heard
Speaker 1: both sides of.
Speaker 2: I've been I've been deep in the eye of that hurricane.
Speaker 2: I understand that now. I mean part of me just
Speaker 2: from where I stand in hip hop. Were we standing
Speaker 2: hip hop?
Speaker 1: I mean, like no one wants to be seeing as
Speaker 1: the grumpy old traditionalist and the guy that's only hanging
Speaker 1: on to the flag and that sort of thing. And
Speaker 1: you know, especially with hip hop, you got older cats
Speaker 1: that need to contextualize their coolness by co sign and
Speaker 1: something young right, some progressive like Quincy's the king of that.
Speaker 2: Quincy always talked about he has a cough drop in
Speaker 2: his mouth. Yeah, you know, I love bro but it's like.
Speaker 1: I've heard everything, and probably the best analogy I heard
Speaker 1: that Winton has more as far as hip hop comparisons,
Speaker 1: I've heard a jazz guy that I respect very much
Speaker 1: say that Winton is the Puffy of the jazz movement.
Speaker 1: In other words, there was a point where, I guess
Speaker 1: in seventy eight where you know, the N Base Collective
Speaker 1: and all those guys were trying to push forward.
Speaker 2: I mean, if you ask a cat like Dave Murray,
Speaker 2: David Murray, I mean, his thing is like, well, you know,
Speaker 2: he came in the suit and killed our movement. So
Speaker 2: but then but I know that win is about tradition.
Speaker 2: And then when he did the documentary with on PBS, yeah,
Speaker 2: that really didn't help his argument. This is true much.
Speaker 2: I mean I appreciated it because there's stuff I didn't
Speaker 2: know about King. People got turned off by that, right.
Speaker 2: So it's like we're including jazz musicians, right, especially jazz musicians.
Speaker 2: So where do you stand as far as what he represents.
Speaker 2: I think when Marcellus was was absolutely necessary for what
Speaker 2: it was that he did. I do think, well, you
Speaker 2: know that that old saying about the you know, killing
Speaker 2: a flow with a rifle. You know, I do think
Speaker 2: that's deep. I do think that in his desire to
Speaker 2: uphold the traditions of jazz, I think he was quite
Speaker 2: divisive and harsh on a lot of musicians that came
Speaker 2: before and in some cases after him, came after yeah,
Speaker 2: who really didn't see things the same way he did.
Speaker 2: I do find an interest in that. You know, you
Speaker 2: look at jazz in the seventies and you look at
Speaker 2: what was hot at that time. You know, the whole
Speaker 2: loft scene that was going on in New York. Uh,
Speaker 2: you know, this this sort of I don't know what
Speaker 2: you would call it, this sort of post online guard
Speaker 2: kind of movement. You know, lest the Bowie was hot,
Speaker 2: Chico Freeman was hot, David Murray was hot, Oliver Lake,
Speaker 2: the AACM was doing great things. And then a lot
Speaker 2: of the jazz ledgends you know, your art, Blakie's, your
Speaker 2: heart silvers, they weren't getting the same kind of attention
Speaker 2: or the same kind of of respect that they had
Speaker 2: been getting in the fifties and sixties. There was this
Speaker 2: sort of unspoken uh this, well, these guys are the
Speaker 2: old school, you know, I mean, they still play good,
Speaker 2: but they're not really contributing anything fresh to the cannon.
Speaker 2: And then here comes this young raw kid from New
Speaker 2: Orleans who can play the hell out of the trumpet
Speaker 2: like no one's ever heard before. And on top of
Speaker 2: everything else, he's brashing outspoken that he pretty much came
Speaker 2: up and said, wait, ho, hold hold of time. Up
Speaker 2: all the stuff that y'all think is great, this is
Speaker 2: all straight bullshit. And even if you didn't agree with him,
Speaker 2: you had to go, whoa, Yeah, this dude, it's got
Speaker 2: some balls on him, you know. And he's backing it
Speaker 2: up with backing it up with his trumpet playing. Now,
Speaker 2: add that he's got a brother almost more outspoken than him,
Speaker 2: but he was he in terms of jazz tradition, he
Speaker 2: was very much on the same page. And I see
Speaker 2: it's interesting that my manager and I always talk about this.
Speaker 2: You really, you do realize who actually changed the course
Speaker 2: of jazz forever in the eighties was not a jazz musician.
Speaker 2: It was Sting. When the police broke up and Sting
Speaker 2: decided to start his dream of the Blue Turtles band.
Speaker 2: The fact that he took two of Winten Marcellus's band
Speaker 2: members that caused a riff in jazz that to this
Speaker 2: day has never really been resolved. I think to think
Speaker 2: about something, in nineteen eighty five, Winton Marcellus had already
Speaker 2: won I think by that time he already won four Grammys.
Speaker 2: He had already he was already already acknowledged as like
Speaker 2: the seminal trumpet player of a of a generation, even
Speaker 2: though he was only like twenty four, a protege of
Speaker 2: Albert Murray and Stanley Crouch, you know, so like so
Speaker 2: he was known as an intellectual on top of a
Speaker 2: great trumpet player, and he was so well celebrated for
Speaker 2: his you know, embracing of the tradition and sort of
Speaker 2: resetting jazz's values. And he's got one of the greatest
Speaker 2: bands in jazz with his brother, the great Kenny Kirkland
Speaker 2: Seann at Mafino based on Jeff Taine Watts on drums.
Speaker 2: Sting comes around and says, hey, Branford, Kenny, y'all come
Speaker 2: with me. And so this almost seemed very much like
Speaker 2: a cane and Abel because like people were like, you
Speaker 2: left your brother to go play.
Speaker 7: On a rock band, what you know, sound fun and right?
Speaker 2: And so people were kind of like, well, but Branford,
Speaker 2: I thought you. How could you do that? You know,
Speaker 2: Branford's like, look, I love straight ahead jazz, but I
Speaker 2: never said I wouldn't play anything else, you know, so
Speaker 2: imagine when he did buck Shot launh. Yeah. So I
Speaker 2: do know that there was a very very bad split
Speaker 2: between him for a long time. They've since made up.
Speaker 2: I know it's been all good, But musically speaking, I
Speaker 2: really don't believe Winton ever really recovered from that. Really,
Speaker 2: I don't think so. I think musically because that band
Speaker 2: was so killing musically, he wasn't going to find anybody
Speaker 2: else to replace, somebody like Bradford or Kenny Kirkin. So
Speaker 2: you're saying, now, here's the word thing I just recently
Speaker 2: found in oral History on Live at Blues Alley. Yeah, and.
Speaker 1: To hear Wint and tear that album apart, I'm in
Speaker 1: an album that I studied.
Speaker 2: You know, that's a great album, So I thought, I think, so,
Speaker 2: I thought, But to hear him and then read further.
Speaker 1: Because the thing is is that with with rock criticism
Speaker 1: and hip hop, as far as journalism is concerned, I
Speaker 1: never delve deep into how jazz records were perceived or
Speaker 1: you know, got a bunch of downbeat back issues to
Speaker 1: see how they were, you know, unless it was like
Speaker 1: looking up on the corner or something, you know, by Miles.
Speaker 1: But I never knew because in my head when Jay
Speaker 1: Mood and sort of his eighty six to eighty eight period,
Speaker 1: I thought that.
Speaker 2: Period immediately after Branford Kenny went was thinking.
Speaker 1: See, but I didn't see that as a down period.
Speaker 1: But if you're trying to compare it, are you saying
Speaker 1: that that eighty six eighty eight period of Winton would
Speaker 1: be the equivalent of post payback James Brown?
Speaker 2: Like, No, I wouldn't say that. I would say that
Speaker 2: just mentally speaking.
Speaker 1: Because I thought he was trying to push even further
Speaker 1: experiment and then when he got to the nineties doing
Speaker 1: like the Little.
Speaker 2: The New Orleans, Yeah, the whole eighty six you know
Speaker 2: those albums he talked about J Mood live at Blues Alley.
Speaker 2: I mean, those are virtually only the two albums he
Speaker 2: made before he turned and kind of went straight traditions
Speaker 2: and went straight to his New Orleans thing. And you know,
Speaker 2: he helped build Jazz and Lincoln Center. So I always wonder,
Speaker 2: like how much of that was because of what happened
Speaker 2: with Branford and Kenny. Like had Branford Kenny not left
Speaker 2: his band to go with Sting, I'm sure Winton's career
Speaker 2: would have been a lot different different just for for context.
Speaker 2: So when jazz musician is referred to straight ahead jazz,
Speaker 2: what is that referring to? Like, who are some of
Speaker 2: the artists most of the time they well, they're referring
Speaker 2: to a style of jazz that is kind of coming
Speaker 2: out of fifties hard bop, you know, l Heart, Silver, Cannonball, Atterley,
Speaker 2: Danceable quote unquote jazz, you know, like blues based kind
Speaker 2: of jazz.
Speaker 1: Saying not bop as in because I knew that at
Speaker 1: a point when they started speeding it up, right, it
Speaker 1: was to discourage the dancing, right, So yeah, fastbat was
Speaker 1: more like, hey just watch us and stop dancing.
Speaker 2: Okay, So they were the DJ of the moment, you know,
Speaker 2: but they were still called that straight ahead you know.
Speaker 2: I think when things started changing, it's like when avant
Speaker 2: guarde movement started coming around, and it became less about
Speaker 2: it became less so much about overt or i should say,
Speaker 2: sort of recognizable traditional melodies or traditional four to four rhythms,
Speaker 2: you know, like on that Coleman kind of blew it
Speaker 2: out of the water. In the fifties and Cecil Tailor
Speaker 2: came around, and Charles Mingus's music started getting a little
Speaker 2: more at abstract, to the point where even some jazz
Speaker 2: fans were like, well, I don't really quite know what
Speaker 2: this is, you know, Andrew Hill.
Speaker 1: And wait you're saying and now I'm like the shape
Speaker 1: of jazz to come was sort of like met with
Speaker 1: because now it's considered or at least beneath the under
Speaker 1: the like those records are like considered.
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, there were a lot of people who initially, yeah,
Speaker 2: they felt it was like heroin music. They were like, well,
Speaker 2: you know, I'm not sure I can get with this
Speaker 2: on that Coleman dude. You know, oh yeah, a lot
Speaker 2: of people felt that way. You know, I think, uh
Speaker 2: the masses did dig it. Uh, but it was definitely
Speaker 2: a musical shift that it took a lot of people
Speaker 2: took some time to adjust to it.
Speaker 1: You came out as a young lion, like when I knew, like,
Speaker 1: oh this means things some article on Time magazine where they.
Speaker 2: Were remember that that was like whoa Jesus Christ, Chris
Speaker 2: this in Time magazine? You know, what I mean. So
Speaker 2: it was like there there was was were young Lions
Speaker 2: only referred to as the class of eighty five? Yeah,
Speaker 2: we were the Winton spin offs. So young Lions were
Speaker 2: referred to as post Winton jazz absolutely, yeah, yeah we
Speaker 2: were you know, we were considered the uh you know
Speaker 2: we we were the Jefferson's two Winton's all in the family.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, all right, So then how do you feel
Speaker 1: about the post generation.
Speaker 2: After us, or like the post generation post Winton, or
Speaker 2: like our generation or.
Speaker 1: From from after Europe period. There's probably two generations that
Speaker 1: have passed right now. I know me personally with musicians again,
Speaker 1: like the the the universal positioning, the universal quest love
Speaker 1: positioning of you know, whatever I represent, it's supposed to
Speaker 1: be all knowing, all accepting, and you know, kind of
Speaker 1: diplomatic about the ship. So I haven't like exactly been
Speaker 1: like there's.
Speaker 2: Some bullshit a lot of right right, But there are
Speaker 2: a few.
Speaker 1: Musicians that are mad at me about my outspokenness of
Speaker 1: gospel chops so in R and B.
Speaker 2: Play everything. But how is that in your world?
Speaker 1: Because there's some cats that I like, I know, not
Speaker 1: the fall for the Okie Doke and the okie doke
Speaker 1: is like, if someone does more fancy ship than they
Speaker 1: do straight ahead ship, then that might be a problem.
Speaker 2: So I think oftentimes, you know, obviously, technique is it's
Speaker 2: a great thing to have. I think it's something that
Speaker 2: one has to strive for it if you want to
Speaker 2: be the best at what you do. Obviously, it's about taste.
Speaker 2: It's about when, it's about when you decide to pull
Speaker 2: your your flash card, you know what I mean. I
Speaker 2: think oftentimes, because not a lot of musicians have a
Speaker 2: lot of great technique, when you find a few that do,
Speaker 2: it can be intimidating. But on the flip side, if
Speaker 2: that person with the great technique just jams it down
Speaker 2: your throat all the time, it's gonna make it really
Speaker 2: bad for the ones that actually have good technique, who
Speaker 2: have taste, Like for me, Wayne Shorter. Wayne Shorter has
Speaker 2: just technically speaking on the saxophone. He has the fast
Speaker 2: He has some of the fastest guns since John Coltrane,
Speaker 2: probably the fastest since John Coltrane. But Wayne always picks
Speaker 2: the perfect spot to hit you with that He never
Speaker 2: that's never his numb. He doesn't come out here. It
Speaker 2: never comes out of the gate where you know, you know,
Speaker 2: it's just you know, you're like, oh, what was that?
Speaker 2: You know what I mean? He makes you want to
Speaker 2: hear it again, you know what I mean? And I
Speaker 2: think the whole thing with the gospel chops. I'm with
Speaker 2: you all the way, bro, because I mean so many
Speaker 2: times I always tell young younger musicians, particularly drummers and
Speaker 2: bass players, Look, that stuff you're doing is great, all right,
Speaker 2: but do you want to have a million YouTube followers
Speaker 2: or do you actually want to work and talk about it?
Speaker 5: You know?
Speaker 2: Do you want somebody to call you for a gig
Speaker 2: or do you want somebody to just pass around YouTube
Speaker 2: videos and tell tell you how fast your chops are.
Speaker 2: I would think in a practical world, you will want
Speaker 2: to gig. And if you want to gig, you're gonna
Speaker 2: have to learn to put put them put that shit away,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean? And I love using you
Speaker 2: as an example, man. I was like, look, listen to
Speaker 2: quest Love. I mean, there's a reason why you are
Speaker 2: who you are. And now I gonna gash you up
Speaker 2: a little bit, man.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: I can honestly say that after having played with so
Speaker 2: many of my drum heroes, just jazz and Funk. You know,
Speaker 2: having played with Bernard Purty, finally got a chance to
Speaker 2: play with Jabbo and Clyde, Mike Clark, Steve gadd Yo, Man,
Speaker 2: you are easily like one of the top ten of
Speaker 2: all time in terms of holding that pocket. Come on, bro,
Speaker 2: who who else plays that pocket like you? Man? Seriously,
Speaker 2: he's not good with though he don't sorry, and I'm
Speaker 2: a homeboy. Little John Roberts, Little John, he just he
Speaker 2: been holding the pocket down. I know how much. I
Speaker 2: don't know how many chops he's.
Speaker 7: Got too, could my my?
Speaker 2: Okay? So part part he was.
Speaker 1: In All City, bab Little John was younger than me,
Speaker 1: so part of me felt like okay, as an eleventh.
Speaker 7: Grader drummer foret guys not yeah yeah right.
Speaker 1: It's funny because the first time I met that little John, yeah,
Speaker 1: back in ninety four, I was like, wait, what happened
Speaker 1: to your hair?
Speaker 2: Like I'm because both of them having to Atlanta, right,
Speaker 2: John Roberts.
Speaker 1: But no, it's funny about John Roberts is because he
Speaker 1: was I think two years younger than me. So when
Speaker 1: I got to All City, I mean he looked like
Speaker 1: his name was Little John Roberts, Like he looked like
Speaker 1: a kid.
Speaker 2: He just so naturally.
Speaker 1: I just thought like, oh, motherfucker's playing the tambourine or something,
Speaker 1: and you know, I'm on the drum set. And he
Speaker 1: was cool like I'm on his drum set, but I'm
Speaker 1: getting athing tuning stuff up the way I want it,
Speaker 1: you know. And then who's the the all City Hi, Yeah,
Speaker 1: mister Whittaker.
Speaker 2: I was like, okay, uh, what's what's his name? Am Omar?
Speaker 1: He was like, yeah, you can play a tambourine on
Speaker 1: Good News or he'll or he gave me throwaways on
Speaker 1: my hill with the Lord Hides or yeah, old Maynard
Speaker 1: ferguson songs whatever, and to.
Speaker 7: Watch this little did you have to get your ass up?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: That was my martin pretty ricky what they call it.
Speaker 7: That was my moment.
Speaker 2: That's when like I was dead serious. I now have
Speaker 2: to shed.
Speaker 1: Five hours, which is like usually the neighbors would start
Speaker 1: bitching around ten pm.
Speaker 2: Yes, right, so you know that leaves me limited space
Speaker 2: from like four to ten pm to do.
Speaker 1: But even then I'm like, okay, practice on my pad
Speaker 1: and all right, don't wait that up, hit hit the bet.
Speaker 7: You know.
Speaker 2: The mattress is something silent, but it was like.
Speaker 1: I gotta get I gotta get some technique and get
Speaker 1: like that pressure came on me at sixteen seventeen, but
Speaker 1: little John Roberts was like he when I saw him running,
Speaker 1: That's when I knew I had to get my ship
Speaker 1: together and get it right. But the weirdest thing about
Speaker 1: it is my approach was to actually do less ycause
Speaker 1: I know every drummer, like, there was a point where
Speaker 1: you know, here's the gospel group what commissioned? Yeah, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: so commission Like those cats started get more technique into
Speaker 1: their playing and stuff, and all, like all Tristate area
Speaker 1: musicians just started following suit. And you know, and you
Speaker 1: know by that point, James Brown like his his music
Speaker 1: was starting to come alive more in Hip Hop eighty
Speaker 1: seven eighty eight. So I mean, it's a lot for
Speaker 1: you to just what I what I would call use
Speaker 1: the force and just damn like, all these guys want
Speaker 1: to show how fancy they are, and I got to
Speaker 1: play less to get attention. And it's it was hard.
Speaker 1: You navigated that brilliantly, though, like for the first four
Speaker 1: years to just do nothing while all these other cats
Speaker 1: are just dancing around me getting all the woo's and
Speaker 1: and stuff, and you know, even now, like no, it's
Speaker 1: the equivalent of in hip hop, the dude that can
Speaker 1: freestyle and get all the oohs and ah's and whatever.
Speaker 2: I can't make a record to save his It's like
Speaker 2: too short.
Speaker 1: It's like too short versus cannabis exactly right in the air. Yeah, man, yeah,
Speaker 1: so it's But I also feel my dad taught me
Speaker 1: a trick. Whenever he would audition a musician, He's like,
Speaker 1: make him play the ballot. Yeah, like the slowest, easiest
Speaker 1: song ever, and I will watch mini musician trip.
Speaker 2: Do you got to go to? Well?
Speaker 1: I mean my dad's songs were ballots, so like I
Speaker 1: would want to do like the fast, funky, you know,
Speaker 1: stuff to see like how they adjust.
Speaker 2: And Dad was like, no, you're you're.
Speaker 1: Gonna find out the truth about a musician. Always make
Speaker 1: him play the ballot. You give him the simplest things ever,
Speaker 1: and they will always mess up because discipline.
Speaker 2: Is one to be hardest things.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, So okay, And I'm not lying about you being
Speaker 1: technically proficient as far as in my opinion, one of
Speaker 1: the greatest musicians.
Speaker 2: Working right now music, How do you.
Speaker 1: I mean, what's the conversation in your head? Because a
Speaker 1: lot of times I'll hear references like it's like you
Speaker 1: still have hip hop techniques to your soloing, right in
Speaker 1: terms of like I'll hear references like oh, okay, that
Speaker 1: was the theme that the Jeffersons.
Speaker 2: Right right, right right, or whatever.
Speaker 1: But it's like, what's in your head? Because for me,
Speaker 1: the pressure of soloing is one of the hardest things.
Speaker 1: It still gives me anxiety to this value. But like,
Speaker 1: do you get anxiety to solo or is it just.
Speaker 2: Like it depends depends on the song, it depends on
Speaker 2: the whole whatever circumstances that happened at that time. I
Speaker 2: still have head trips about playing the electric bass and
Speaker 2: I shouldn't. And I'll tell you why I have hit
Speaker 2: well because even after all these years, I still get
Speaker 2: the I didn't know you played electric.
Speaker 1: Bass, you know, I'm like, damn, so uh wait, even
Speaker 1: after nine albums absolutely yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, no, people
Speaker 1: still see me with an electric bass and they're like
Speaker 1: what really, I'm just like, oh yeah, totally and so
Speaker 1: like and I see like, because I don't play the
Speaker 1: electric bass every day like on GAT I mean, I
Speaker 1: play enough electric bass where I think my technique is
Speaker 1: still respectable.
Speaker 2: But I know that you get like some cats out here,
Speaker 2: like our homie Derek Hodge, who really does it. Uh,
Speaker 2: you know, all these legends like Victor Wooton and Marcus
Speaker 2: Miller and cats who really really really do it on
Speaker 2: a regular basis. And I don't know. Every now and
Speaker 2: then I put the electric base on, I'm thinking somebody
Speaker 2: out there and the audience is going, he's not as
Speaker 2: good as Marcus Miller, which is true, But I still
Speaker 2: get really uptight about playing the electric bass now now
Speaker 2: houses for irony, except when me and you were playing together.
Speaker 1: Well that's weird though, because of the gazillion times I've
Speaker 1: seen you, most of the times it's like you're electric,
Speaker 1: like when your Family Fair project came out, right, I've
Speaker 1: seen you a lot like I always felt that you
Speaker 1: You've devoted half of your projects to That's what I've
Speaker 1: tried to do, tradition and right pushing forward, you know.
Speaker 2: You know, speaking of that that recording a family Affair,
Speaker 2: I think that was when there was a couple of
Speaker 2: things that happened between ninety eight and two thousand and
Speaker 2: one that was when I started to and in retrospect,
Speaker 2: I wonder if if this was wrong of me to
Speaker 2: have or if it was reactionary. But by ninety seven
Speaker 2: it was kind of like, oh, the young lion Christian McBride,
Speaker 2: Ray Brown protege went Marcella's you know, little brother club.
Speaker 2: You know, it's just like you wanted to be your
Speaker 2: old man. I'm like, come on you all, damn. I mean,
Speaker 2: obviously I loved Ray Brown, you know, Ray Brown. For
Speaker 2: me it was like the Muhammad Ali of jazz bass
Speaker 2: of all time, went Marcella's great you know, mentor big
Speaker 2: brother to have. But I knew my musical view was
Speaker 2: a lot wider than that. So I thought, wow, I'm
Speaker 2: getting painted into this corner. I want to do this
Speaker 2: other stuff, and I think they're going to start tripping
Speaker 2: once I decided to do that. So ninety eight I
Speaker 2: knew that I see, I want to do something a
Speaker 2: little more, a little more electric, a little more on
Speaker 2: this side, you know. And so I hooked up with
Speaker 2: George duke Man. A lot of people in the jazz
Speaker 2: world they were like, I took it. Took it like this, Christian,
Speaker 2: we really love you. So we're just gonna let you
Speaker 2: have this one. We're not even going to acknowledge. We're
Speaker 2: just gonna be like.
Speaker 1: Because when I saw the fonts, when I okay, so
Speaker 1: the day the album usually on the first week of
Speaker 1: your album's coming out, Yeah, I'm buying it.
Speaker 2: And when I see in it and saw the font
Speaker 2: at first, I was like, wait, didn't do a funk
Speaker 2: record and not call me, I mean my feeling, so
Speaker 2: you knew from the font it was it was from
Speaker 2: the front, right.
Speaker 1: But then I was like, because I know, I figured
Speaker 1: that your entry into the music world was the same
Speaker 1: as my entry in high school, right, And I was like, okay,
Speaker 1: because I know that you got a side of you
Speaker 1: that wants to reference Bootsy and James Jamerson and Jacobin
Speaker 1: Stores and all these you know, Lewis Johnson, Like there's
Speaker 1: a whole other side.
Speaker 2: Of you that you have you have to express.
Speaker 1: I mean, you'll, you'll, you'll salt and pepper, some ship
Speaker 1: and a cut or two with with with your record.
Speaker 1: But then when I saw that, I was like, Okay,
Speaker 1: he's this is going to be his his flag planting
Speaker 1: right now.
Speaker 2: I never read the reviews of that record. There were none.
Speaker 2: What was the general because again like and what was
Speaker 2: the name of the record? What was the family?
Speaker 1: Which is weird because you you swung and I love
Speaker 1: that interpretation of it. He did a swing interpretation of
Speaker 1: of of Fair of a Slyest song, so it's.
Speaker 2: Also wait, I forgot to tell you. Is that the
Speaker 2: one that opened Sesame? Dude?
Speaker 1: You ever talked to Ronald Bell about that? He loves
Speaker 1: you forever for that, really yes, because he in his
Speaker 1: head he envisioned all that stuff as serious jazz. For
Speaker 1: you to interpret open Sesame the way that you did, Oh, man,
Speaker 1: that made it.
Speaker 2: That made it. I always wanted to know if you
Speaker 2: ever knew that you made his life with that. I'll
Speaker 2: tell you what. After the family Affair, I got a
Speaker 2: call from verdein white and uh, I'll never forget, like
Speaker 2: like almost being frozen for a couple of days, you know, like, man,
Speaker 2: we just wanted to tell you we got your we
Speaker 2: got family, we got getting to it and family affair
Speaker 2: on the tour bus and we're checking you out. Man,
Speaker 2: we love I'll write a song for you. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, Elizabeth, wait, I know, I know
Speaker 1: you have crazy stories. Uh, I know that if she's
Speaker 1: on your record, you have a crazy vested story. I
Speaker 1: was about to ask, I.
Speaker 2: Actually don't, man, she was she was pretty mellow. Man.
Speaker 2: I actually didn't know her. George Duke knew her. I
Speaker 2: brought in these songs that I wanted to record, and uh,
Speaker 2: now Shaka was originally singing, okay, stands we.
Speaker 7: Walked famously and then she'll send her best girls.
Speaker 2: Though that was supposed to do. Don't look any further
Speaker 2: real you mean with with Dennis Edward. Yes, no, kidding
Speaker 2: him up. Was supposed to do the power with them up.
Speaker 2: She's famous, bless her. Penny Ford didn't pretty.
Speaker 7: She said, I'll send the best girls.
Speaker 2: Yes. I met Penny Ford through Shaka. She was singing
Speaker 2: background at that time. Yes, like so George. So I
Speaker 2: brought in these songs, a couple of vocal tunes and uh,
Speaker 2: George said, well who you want? I said, uh, well,
Speaker 2: I want to get Shaka. He was like, you want
Speaker 2: to make the call or you want me to make
Speaker 2: the all. I was like, well, you know I know Shaka,
Speaker 2: but your George du you know, so you make the call.
Speaker 2: So uh he said, all right, I'll call her. He's like, uh,
Speaker 2: shock us down. You know. She wants to do it.
Speaker 2: I guess maybe a week later he said, Man, something
Speaker 2: went down. Shock ain't gonna be able to make it now,
Speaker 2: all right? Uh, He's like, how do you feel about Vesta?
Speaker 2: I was like, oh Ship, yeah great. So Vester came
Speaker 2: in and and nailed it, and Will Downing came in.
Speaker 2: Uh George dude gave him the greatest nickname I've ever
Speaker 2: heard for Will Downing. Just take a while. I guess
Speaker 2: what he called him based on his initials w W
Speaker 2: D forty.
Speaker 5: What was the story behind your tribute for James Brown
Speaker 5: and the aftermath of that?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was gonna say, give it us the tribute. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was your James Brown story is the k Yeah.
Speaker 1: So getting to you finally working with.
Speaker 2: Working with Yeah Brown. Oh man, you gotta let our
Speaker 2: audience here. I know the story, but I'll do my
Speaker 2: best to give you a condensed version because it's long.
Speaker 2: But the gist of it is, we got today, all right,
Speaker 2: we got today. Right on the gist of it is
Speaker 2: that you know, as this man knows. Uh, you know,
Speaker 2: James Brown has been like my bone marrow. So by
Speaker 2: the time I leave Philly to move New York, James
Speaker 2: Brown was in jail, and so I'm writing James Brown
Speaker 2: letters like once a month. You know, I know he's
Speaker 2: not getting them, you know, because I'm sure he's getting
Speaker 2: hundreds of them per day. I was like, it's all good.
Speaker 2: I just want him to know that I love him,
Speaker 2: you know. So, Uh, nineteen ninety three, that's a very
Speaker 2: CHRISTI and so uh in nineteen ninety three, I'm on
Speaker 2: my first tour with Pat mctheeny and uh, We're playing
Speaker 2: the Montreal Jazz Festival and I'm backstage and I'm walking
Speaker 2: around and I didn't look at the schedule. So I
Speaker 2: walked by one of the production doors and it says
Speaker 2: James Brown stage plot what So I knocked on the door.
Speaker 2: I was like, excuse me, Uh is James Brown performing?
Speaker 2: It's like, yeah, when tonight? It's like what he said, Yeah,
Speaker 2: he's coming on after y'all. Oh shit. And so that's
Speaker 2: how you know you're a busy jazz musician. I am.
Speaker 2: We were opening for James Brown. So uh that night, Uh, yeah,
Speaker 2: I see Saint Clair Pinckney and Danny Ray and Martha
Speaker 2: High all the jazz Brown. Is this the first time
Speaker 2: you're seeing them? Yeah? How do you even well, enter
Speaker 2: give me first time.
Speaker 1: I well, I mean, I'm sure that in your travel
Speaker 1: you saw like macy O and hearing that right right?
Speaker 1: Because of your level of stand them, how do you
Speaker 1: how do you approach? How do you nuance the approach
Speaker 1: to let them know right without freaking them out?
Speaker 2: I got lucky, and I'll tell you why. Because out
Speaker 2: of all them guys that were standing in the wings
Speaker 2: ron last year, I knew I knew them all. They're
Speaker 2: standing in the wings and they're watching us, and I'm thinking, oh, man,
Speaker 2: this is my shot. There was one brother who I
Speaker 2: didn't recognize. He was a young dude. It turns out
Speaker 2: he had just joined James Brown's band like three months before,
Speaker 2: and it was obvious that, you know, he had that
Speaker 2: rookie look about him. You know, he was kind of
Speaker 2: like standing by himself and you know, kind of with
Speaker 2: the band but not really you know. And he was like, man,
Speaker 2: you sound great, man, you know, pleasure to meet you.
Speaker 2: I said, yeah, man, you too. What's your name? Brother?
Speaker 2: He said? His name was Robert Thompson, also known as
Speaker 2: MOUSEI Molsie Thompson is his name? He said, y'all just
Speaker 2: started playing drums with mister Brown a couple of months ago,
Speaker 2: and so I think he was relieved to meet somebody
Speaker 2: close to his age that he could kind of roll with.
Speaker 2: So me and mouse started rolling that night. We started
Speaker 2: hanging and talking, and I found a little bit of
Speaker 2: his history. He played with Chuck Brown, He's from DC,
Speaker 2: he played with Chuck Brown, he played with Wilson Pickett
Speaker 2: before he got with James Brown. Uh only because James
Speaker 2: made him. But he is very funky. And so I
Speaker 2: got into the James Brown crew initially through Mouseie.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: So Mousie was kind of, you know, metaphorically, kind of
Speaker 2: took my hand and said, hey, guys, this is Christian McBride.
Speaker 2: Is the brother y'all just saw and said, oh Christians.
Speaker 2: I met Saint Clair and Danny Rain and I started
Speaker 2: kind of working my way in and the the final
Speaker 2: straw came the next year in ninety four, when James
Speaker 2: played the Apollo and he did his final would turn
Speaker 2: out of his final live at the Apollo Record. Uh,
Speaker 2: that's where I met Martha High. Martha High was the
Speaker 2: mother hen of the entire James Brown crew, and so
Speaker 2: Mousey introduced me into Miss High. And then once I
Speaker 2: met Miss High. That was pretty much you know, here's
Speaker 2: your VIP pass, you know. And then do they know
Speaker 2: you're Christian Bride? They did shortly after the Apollo gig
Speaker 2: Getting to It came out, and so then they started
Speaker 2: putting two and two together. They were like, well, wait
Speaker 2: a minute, Oh, that's that's who that is, you know.
Speaker 2: So ninety five, I'm on tour with this Verve Records
Speaker 2: All Star band with Jimmy Smith. Would you say stand
Speaker 2: up my level? So I knew that one of James
Speaker 2: Brown's jazz heroes was Jimmy Smith, great jazz organist. Jimmy
Speaker 2: Smith was on this Verve All Star our tour. So
Speaker 2: I said, uh uh, James Brown. We were all playing
Speaker 2: the Vienna Jazz Festival and James Brown was staying in
Speaker 2: the same hotel. And I said, if I ever get
Speaker 2: to meet James Brown today, I'm a drop that I'm
Speaker 2: playing with Jimmy Smith. And so by that time I
Speaker 2: knew mister Brown's bodyguards and he says, hey, man, you
Speaker 2: just plotted yeah, oh man, dude, slow and methodical. I
Speaker 2: knew it was a little smooke SI don't like all right, right,
Speaker 2: and then once you heard the track you were like,
Speaker 2: wait a minute, that's good at it right, right exactly exactly.
Speaker 2: So uh yeah, So Reginald Simmons was his name. Mister
Speaker 2: Simmons introduced me to James Brown and uh, it's like,
Speaker 2: mister Brown, how you doing. I briefly met you at
Speaker 2: the Apollo last year. I'm friends with Mouses and a
Speaker 2: oh that's right son, Yeah, yeah, you're the bass player, yes,
Speaker 2: sir said, I'm playing with Jimmy smith tonight. Like what, well,
Speaker 2: you know, I love Jimmy smith Man and so, uh,
Speaker 2: you know, we just he just sat there and wrapped
Speaker 2: and just talked about jazz. And still then it was
Speaker 2: still not like you know, just I was just geeking out.
Speaker 2: We didn't really have any real meaningful conversation. So I
Speaker 2: think everything finally took shape. H Right after that, I said, okay,
Speaker 2: I got to stop all this all this fan stuff
Speaker 2: and actually come up with something. What do I want
Speaker 2: to do with James Brown? What's my dream? I said? Well,
Speaker 2: I know I'm not going to ever be in his band.
Speaker 2: He's not going to ask me to do that. I'm
Speaker 2: not sure do it. I don't know, man, Just just
Speaker 2: I've heard too much. Yeah, I mean I'm like, you know,
Speaker 2: I mean, it was almost like you told me, because
Speaker 2: I remember once asking you had you ever met MJ.
Speaker 2: And You're like, yeah, nah, I'd rather just right. Well,
Speaker 2: I thought, if I have, if James Brown actually ever
Speaker 2: in the in the unlikely event he actually did call
Speaker 2: me to join his band, I'm thinking, what would I do.
Speaker 2: I was like, I just don't know, man, I don't
Speaker 2: want to be putting on them red red tails every
Speaker 2: night and in blue times and uh ms High asked
Speaker 2: me that one time, and she said, would you join
Speaker 2: the band of James Brown? Asked you? And I went,
Speaker 2: she said you better not yes, ma'am okay. So anyhow,
Speaker 2: I said, I want to do a jazz project with
Speaker 2: James Brown because I know how much he loved jazz.
Speaker 2: He's always name dropping the jazz cats. Uh, maybe we
Speaker 2: could do that soul on top record live he did
Speaker 2: this really uh with it soulo and something. Yeah, because
Speaker 2: I figured I would. I figured he wouldn't do it
Speaker 2: unless I let him do that. You know, that's right,
Speaker 2: no matter what song on the actual key is in
Speaker 2: you know, so down, I said, let me ask James
Speaker 2: Brown if he'll be interested in doing soul on Top
Speaker 2: with a big band. You know. I would write new
Speaker 2: arrangements of his favorite jazz standards and he could play
Speaker 2: organ and sing, you know, and uh, it would be
Speaker 2: like a soul on top two point Oh. You know,
Speaker 2: so I'll go back to writing letters, you know, so
Speaker 2: writing on these letters, send them to his office. I'm thinking, okay, yeah,
Speaker 2: I know letters are kind of kind of effective, but
Speaker 2: not really, you know, keep sending the letters, keep sending
Speaker 2: them letters. And uh, finally he came to New York.
Speaker 2: This is in ninety seven, and mister Simmons sees me again.
Speaker 2: I'm backstage head Radio City and uh, mister Simmons says, oh,
Speaker 2: mister Brown, mister McBride is here. You remember mister McBride, right,
Speaker 2: And James Brown said, yes, I do, mister soul on Top.
Speaker 2: And that's when I realized he had started getting these letters,
Speaker 2: and so he invited, uh, he invited me out to
Speaker 2: dinner with his entourage that night. So now now the
Speaker 2: rubber's hitting the hitting the ground, you know.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: Oxtails, that's right, the Oxtails and Champagne. I love it,
Speaker 2: I love it, I love it. We went to Victor's
Speaker 2: Cafe on fifty second and Broadway. He ordered oxtails all around.
Speaker 2: He ain't ask anybody what they want. Everybody that's the
Speaker 2: song say, oh man. So uh, that night we actually
Speaker 2: started talking about maybe doing the Soul on Top project.
Speaker 2: And uh a couple of months later, actually a couple
Speaker 2: of weeks later, because this was Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving to ninety seven,
Speaker 2: I'm sorry ninety six. He invited me down to Augusta
Speaker 2: for his Christmas party and I said, oh man, I
Speaker 2: can't believe how good this is going. I'm like, I'm
Speaker 2: in the James Brown crew. This is trippy. And things
Speaker 2: went really bad at the Christmas party. Wait, let me
Speaker 2: get it ready right there you go. Yeah. So I'm
Speaker 2: sitting there at the party, hanging with Mouseie because that
Speaker 2: was my dog. He was my entry into the James
Speaker 2: Brown What year is this? This was? This was Christmas
Speaker 2: of ninety ninety six. Oh wow, And I'm sitting there
Speaker 2: at this table with Mousie and Martha Hyde and Danny
Speaker 2: Ray all these people sitting at the table, and James
Speaker 2: was he was cool. You know. When I got there,
Speaker 2: he was like, Miss McBride, wasn't an Augusta glad to
Speaker 2: have you his son love everything you do, you know,
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Get to the end of the party,
Speaker 2: we're all taking pictures and I'm sitting there posing with
Speaker 2: mister Brown and Miss High, and just before the camera clicks,
Speaker 2: James Brown leans over. He says, so I'm empty you son.
Speaker 2: I know what you're doing. You can't fool me. I said,
Speaker 2: what are you talking about, mister Brown? Nah, I don't
Speaker 2: get me that. I know what you're doing. I got
Speaker 2: my eye. You trying to infiltrate my organization. Oh you
Speaker 2: trying to take Miss High and my drummer from me?
Speaker 2: Mister Brown? What you're talking about? You know? And then
Speaker 2: he like kind of walks off, like pisted right, And
Speaker 2: I thought he was playing right. And so I looked
Speaker 2: at Martha How I was like, uh, you want to
Speaker 2: help me out, you know. She was like, I don't.
Speaker 2: Don't pay him no mind. You know, he's just tripping.
Speaker 2: I was like, I don't know, he looks he looks
Speaker 2: really mad, and so, uh, I tell Malsie what happened.
Speaker 2: I'm freaked out, like my childhood heroes. Pissed at me, right,
Speaker 2: And so he was like, oh, man, don't worry about Brown,
Speaker 2: you know, see you're just getting in too close. I said, yeah, apparently,
Speaker 2: so you know. And so I call him on the
Speaker 2: phone a couple of weeks later. We're in the new
Speaker 2: year now, and uh, I said, mister Brown, you know,
Speaker 2: I just wanted to check back in make sure everything
Speaker 2: was cool about that incident at the party, and you
Speaker 2: know about those letters I sent you with the sold
Speaker 2: on top thing. He's like, uh so, let me explain
Speaker 2: something to you. I was like, oh oh, I could
Speaker 2: just feel it coming. I was like his voice was tense,
Speaker 2: you know. He was like, first of all, I ain't
Speaker 2: making no record with you. He's like, I think you
Speaker 2: got some mixed up son. If we're gonna make a record,
Speaker 2: that it's gonna be my record. I don't make no
Speaker 2: guest appearances on nobody's record. You understand this is gonna
Speaker 2: be a James Brown record. I ain't singing on your record.
Speaker 2: Who you think you are?
Speaker 7: I was like, what your stomach feel like at this moment?
Speaker 7: Like you on the phone, what do you I.
Speaker 2: Was like, I was, well, I was I was too
Speaker 2: shocked to feel anything, you know. And he was just like,
Speaker 2: uh uh, you think you're gonna write some arrangements for me,
Speaker 2: So I don't need nobody write no arrangements for me.
Speaker 2: I ain't doing no record with you. Secondly, bullet, yeah,
Speaker 2: he was like, I listened to your record all the
Speaker 2: way through, and uh, that record ain't nothing. No no, no,
Speaker 2: you can't play you can't play no bass. You got
Speaker 2: everybody telling you a great bass player. You can't play
Speaker 2: no bass. In fact, I'm gonna sue you forgetting to it.
Speaker 2: I would have well. I was about to break out
Speaker 2: in tears until he until he went here he says, uh.
Speaker 2: He said, you just like everybody else, you're stealing my
Speaker 2: music and and and trying to get rich. And then
Speaker 2: I was like I had the audacity to stand up
Speaker 2: for myself. I was like, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,
Speaker 2: wait a minute, mister Brown, he said. I said, sir,
Speaker 2: do you have the CD? Because he was like rambling,
Speaker 2: you know, I was like, sir, do you have the
Speaker 2: CD handy? He say, nah, I don't have it nearby.
Speaker 2: I said, look, when you get the CD, will you
Speaker 2: please open up the liner notes and read the entire
Speaker 2: paragraph I wrote about you, And you know how much
Speaker 2: you've been in inspiration to me and how much Get
Speaker 2: It Together inspired this tune and you know, all this
Speaker 2: other stuff. And it's weird because he paused, he went,
Speaker 2: you wrote about me in the line of notes. I said,
Speaker 2: mister Brown, all you have to do is read it.
Speaker 2: He was like, he was like, well, in that case,
Speaker 2: I still love you, but I ain't making no record
Speaker 2: with you. So but see, all of this is so
Speaker 2: strange because a couple of days later, I get a
Speaker 2: call saying mister Brown wants you to perform at his
Speaker 2: birthday bash. And I'm like, yo, this is trippy, and
Speaker 2: I'm thinking I should say no because I don't want
Speaker 2: this drama, you know, but I'm an idiot. So I
Speaker 2: took the gig, right. I said, I'm gonna go down
Speaker 2: and play with James Brown for his birthday bash because
Speaker 2: he asked me, right, and so I go this. This
Speaker 2: is May of ninety seven. He had me play with
Speaker 2: some house band down there and at the Bell Auditorium
Speaker 2: where the Sex Machine album was made. And so when
Speaker 2: I get there, Mossie, you know it was it was
Speaker 2: funny because like the whole band was like, yo, man,
Speaker 2: we heard what happened. Sorry, you know, we told you
Speaker 2: he's crazy man, you know, And so U Mossie said,
Speaker 2: Man Brown is backstage, you want to say hi, wish
Speaker 2: you may happy birthday. I was like, all right, I
Speaker 2: guess I'll go with torture. I know, right, So I
Speaker 2: go back to say say hello and wish my happy birthday.
Speaker 2: I was like, happy birthday, mister Brown, Miss McBride, great
Speaker 2: to see you. So what song you're gonna play tonight?
Speaker 2: You're gonna play that song you stole from me? And
Speaker 2: so I was just like, you know what, I should
Speaker 2: go to the airport right now, but no, but no, right,
Speaker 2: I gotta I gotta be loyal. And so uh I
Speaker 2: played my one little song. And at the end of
Speaker 2: the night, James Brown on the stage he says, uh, ladies,
Speaker 2: y'all want you to give a big round clause all
Speaker 2: of the performance this evening. Uh, let's hear it for
Speaker 2: the Blues Brothers.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: Let's hear it for Kenny Wayne Shepherd. Uh Kenny Wynd
Speaker 2: and the Blues Brothers. Is here for Eddie Floyd, brother
Speaker 2: Eddie Floyd. Uh let's hear for mother of two? Uh
Speaker 2: what yeah it was out. Let's hear for my daughter Yama.
Speaker 2: Uh let's hear for Roosevelt Johnson. And so he left
Speaker 2: me out. And so this is when I knew that
Speaker 2: Martha Hyge and and Mousie were real friends. Mousie I
Speaker 2: was waving the sticks like even as herd as I
Speaker 2: am at this point like beyond insulted, like I donet
Speaker 2: got got cussed out by the man, threatened to be sued,
Speaker 2: told me I couldn't play. Toy wasn't shit. Even with
Speaker 2: Mouseie going like this, I'm backstage looking at Mousie like,
Speaker 2: don't don't you get yourself fired? No, stop it. So
Speaker 2: Molseie's playing, He's like mister Brown, mister Brown. Martha High
Speaker 2: physically walks up to James Brown in the middle of
Speaker 2: his ranting and like James b said, oh Lord, have mercy,
Speaker 2: I forgot How could I forget the great Christian McBride,
Speaker 2: Oh please forgive me the fugus bass player in the world,
Speaker 2: And and Martha Hyde looks back, She's like, you know,
Speaker 2: I got you. I was like all crazy. And so
Speaker 2: at that point I had no contact with James Brown
Speaker 2: for nine years. I ran into him on the road
Speaker 2: somewhere and I was just kind of like, yo, what's happening?
Speaker 2: You know, kept walking, But in two thousand and five,
Speaker 2: I was named the creative chair for the La Philharmonic
Speaker 2: for their Jazz series. My job was to curate twelve
Speaker 2: jazz concerts every season, eight at the Hollywood Bowl and
Speaker 2: for at Walt Disney Concert Hall. And so I said,
Speaker 2: with this new position, I got to at least see
Speaker 2: if I can make this happen. I said, nine years
Speaker 2: should be long enough. And so I called Charles Bobbitt,
Speaker 2: the late Charles Bobbitt, and I said, mister Bobbitt, you
Speaker 2: know I'm doing this thing with the La phil Harmonic.
Speaker 2: I'm curating shows at the Hollywood Bowl. And you know,
Speaker 2: I won't know if mister Brown would be interested in
Speaker 2: doing a jazz big band concert. And he's like, oh yeah,
Speaker 2: I don't know. You know, it might be hard to
Speaker 2: make that happen, but let me put the word in
Speaker 2: and see what happens. By the week later, Charles Bobbitt
Speaker 2: called me back. He said, mister Brown said it's a
Speaker 2: green light. What did you believe it? I actually did
Speaker 2: believe it, because when he came to New York, mister
Speaker 2: bob says, we want to meet with you at at
Speaker 2: our hotel. It's hard for me to say what hotel
Speaker 2: they stayed at. It starts with a T but uh
Speaker 2: he said, yeah, you know that that guy in the
Speaker 2: White House. Yeah, but yeah, come by there and uh
Speaker 2: and we'll talk about it. So that's when I knew serious.
Speaker 2: I said, man, James Brown, we're actually going to do this.
Speaker 2: So on September sixth, two thousand and six, three months before,
Speaker 2: months before he died, yep, we played at the Hollywood Bowl.
Speaker 2: James Brown, how much rehearsal went into that. We had
Speaker 2: pretty much just one one full day of rehearsals at
Speaker 2: Center staging out in Burbank, and we only wound up
Speaker 2: doing I think he sang five songs, five or six
Speaker 2: songs with the big band, and then he did Man's World,
Speaker 2: I Feel Good and Sex Machine with his own. So
Speaker 2: it was the stage was was packed because his entire
Speaker 2: band was on this side of the stage. The big
Speaker 2: band was on this side of the stage, A string
Speaker 2: section was in the middle, and we had a drum
Speaker 2: perch for Louis Belson because we had him come out
Speaker 2: and play one song with us since he was on
Speaker 2: the original song on top album. So you love Risks Man,
Speaker 2: There's there's a risk with older cats that you know,
Speaker 2: Lord knows, I know that. I mean, you got a
Speaker 2: nuance it perfectly. It's not hurt their feelings even when
Speaker 2: they're wrong, they're right. That's so. And he never sued
Speaker 2: you though he never you didn't even remember the angels talking.
Speaker 1: All right, So I nominate Chris the second to h
Speaker 1: D Nice to be repeat guests because I knew.
Speaker 2: You got yeah, this is this is gotta be it.
Speaker 2: We have not yeah, we even cracked the surface. Well
Speaker 2: see bro, you first of all, I will always say
Speaker 2: it on the record and off the record, but Man,
Speaker 2: so proud to call you my homeboy and my friend. Man,
Speaker 2: you you breaking barriers left and right. Man, so proud
Speaker 2: of you. I'm trying to keep up with you. Man,
Speaker 2: and I still and I still remember. One of my
Speaker 2: favorite slang terminologies was one of his dad coined, uh
Speaker 2: and that was cake cake. I never heard anybody use
Speaker 2: cake for money.
Speaker 1: Money before that was that was your pop can white man.
Speaker 1: I got nineteen jobs, Man, you're going and get some cake, yo, Chris.
Speaker 2: I thank you for coming on the show, Man, thanks
Speaker 2: for having me.
Speaker 6: Man.
Speaker 2: Yo, Man, this only beginning. I got shared on my
Speaker 2: freestyle and next time, next go around you.
Speaker 1: Would have it yes or v Apple font Tickelos unpaid
Speaker 1: and uh boss Bill Yes, Well, I wanted to say
Speaker 1: very paid Bill and Sugar Steve. This is Questlove Quest
Speaker 1: Love Supreme and we'll see you on the next go round.
Speaker 2: Thank you, West.
Speaker 1: Love Supreme is a production of My Heart Radio. This
Speaker 1: classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora. For
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