By Nils Jacobson
Although, on this new Leo duo disc with Xu Fengxia [Distance], you're doing some vocals straight up.
Yeah, I'm actually doing some singing. I like that. I was trying to sing some part--I don't know what it was--but I was making something up, my version of Pavarotti or something. That's just being comfortable with the process of singing. I've played in a lot of blues bands and I've done a lot of singing, even though I'm not a singer. But I'm comfortable with letting that go. Maybe it's connected, too. I'm comfortable with letting the sound come out of my mouth. I have become comfortable with that, so I use it. I use it in all my groups now. The Fonda/Stevens group--I got the guy singing some songs. And Conference Call--there's a couple of songs on this new CD [Final Answer] where we were singing. So it's part of the music. I'm glad that I got to play with enough bands, probably the blues bands, where we sang.
You mentioned Braxton, and the sonic field he shares with you. A lot of people think he's just crazy--and that doesn't include me--because a lot of his music is so abstract. People don't get it. I'm curious what you think about that. You've played a lot with him. What's going on in Braxton's music?
I'll tell you what's going on. First of all, he's a genius. This is how I see it. Second, Braxton is a channel for creativity. He is so connected with that. For me it's like the universe sending him the information so that he can put it out there for the rest of us. He's one of the artists that the universe is sending the music through. For me it's never been abstract. The first time I heard it, I understood exactly what was happening.
Imagine if you took the layperson into outer space. And you just let them experience how things happen in outer space, where these chemicals come together, and this asteroid comes by. That stuff ain't organized in 4/4, it ain't organized on a C major scale. It's just the universe and its sounds and its elements coming together, mixing, and creating these wonderful colors and these wonderful gases. And then they evaporate... That's the music of the universe. So to me, that's what Braxton's music is all about. He gives that to us.
I'm trying to explain why I think folks might not get it. A lot of folks have gotten it, because he has a huge audience in the world. But the average guy might not get it. Why not? Not that everything's for everybody, but... I don't know. I would say the people who don't get it are shut down. I'll phrase it that way. If you don't get Mr. Braxton's music, my opinion is you're probably shut down. Somewhere in your life you've been very shut down. Beause if you weren't, and you were open, and you were moving in a natural and healthy way, the music would touch you.
So it's a matter of expectation. If you're looking for something specific, and you're not open to all the rest, you'll miss out.
Expectations are dangerous in all contexts, and this one as well. He's constantly moving and changing. I remember some people, when Anthony started the Ghost Trance Music, weren't even ready for that. They were still trying to ingest the stuff he did ten years ago. It's funny... they talk about him like they did with Coltrane. Coltrane moved so fast that people couldn't keep up with him! Before they ingested the stuff he did at this point, he was already on to something else. Coltrane and Braxton travel in a similar path, in terms of how quickly they move and how the information is coming through them, you know.
So how do you relate, or react, to that? Playing in a duo setting, for example [10 Compositions (Duet) 1995].
I find it inspiring. People like Anthony bring the best out in you. They're able to take you places, and able to help you find things in yourself that you couldn't find on your own. I remember Miles [Davis] would talk about that, too, in interviews. He was able to bring something out in people that they couldn't find in themselves, just because of his mastery. So when I was playing with Anthony, things would happen that would only happen with his guidance. I see it all the time. When he's playing with his students, I see things happen with his students where it's obvious that they're on the ship and he's taking them with him. Because it's his journey, you know. He can bring you places where you can't go on your own! But then once you learn it, you can go on your own. So I find it inspiring. I would like to play with him for the rest of my life. There's very few cats like that. The guys who are true masters. They give you something that's so powerful. Imagine all those cats staying with Sun Ra all those years. They only did that because Ra had something very powerful and very special, and they were all taking this journey together. That whole orchestra stayed together for all those years because of Ra's power. He could take them places. It's so priceless.
Who else belongs in that category?
Leo Smith also had that quality. Those are the two that I've worked with who have had that quality. But I've played with all sorts of great musicians. Anybody you play with who knows more than you, who is functioning on a higher level, can raise your consciousness. That's why that tradition is so important--where the older musicians play with the younger, and pass this thing on. That tradition is such an important one because that's part of the process. When I played with Bill Barron, it was the same thing. He was able to take us places we couldn't go, because he was aware of that. And when I played with Charlie Persip and Kenny McIntyre, I was much younger and they had this thing already fine-tuned. And when the music started, you held on to their tail. You jumped on their boat. You did your thing the best you could, and you traveled with them. And if you do that for a long enough time, then you get your strength, and you can do the same thing with some younger musicians, folks just learning.
I guess the idea is not to ever let go of your humility.
I agree. It's an important element.
I wanted to get back to something you said earlier about texture, and how it's a different matter when you're playing by yourself. One of the more interesting records I heard recently was a solo disc by Mark Whitecage [Turning Point] where he does the electronic thing.
Yeah, I heard that one too. I loved it!
A lot of musicians (even straightforward acoustic jazz musicians) are turning toward electronics for the ability to achieve texture. What's your experience with that?
I haven't really done that... maybe in the future. But I love that record. I heard that too. That thing that Mark did was fantastic! So it does open you up to some other possibilities. But I haven't done anything like that on my own. I've done prepared bass stuff, where I put things between the strings and stuff. It was not like adding some electronic pedals to my bass, but the concept is the same: altering the natural sounds so you can find an alternative sound. Who knows, maybe on the next record I'll be wired up!
You talked about blues-oriented music, or stuff with a groove. In that style you have to make more of an effort to be "literal." There was a period when you indulged heavily in the blues. How does that belong in the style you're playing now? There are a couple points on the Fengzia duo record [Distance] where you've got a pretty obvious groove going on. But there are lots of other places where it's not so obvious.
It's funny, because there are some places on the record with Xu... She's also played rock music in China. She was a drummer and a guitar player in a rock band in China. She used to play Hendrix and stuff. She told me that. We actually did our first gig before I knew that about her, but I heard that in her playing. It was so interesting--I couldn't figure out how she was getting it. Because I figured, OK, she's from Shanghai... the stuff from Shanghai made sense to me. But when she did these other things, man, I was like "Where does she get that stuff from? It's so funky!" And then her husband told me she was doing this stuff in China...
There's the so-called blues sound, or the blues feel. On that record we did it, but it never got really literal. It never got right into [sings] boom-ba-chinga, boom-ba-chinga. Going for that thing you get from playing with James Cotton. It was implied. It still had a sense of mystery about it... are they doing it, or are they not really doing it?
How do you imply that? Is it a feeling, or some kind of ambivalent harmony? How do you play the blues when you're not really playing the blues?
You take the blues and take the music that she brought from Shanghai. We dump it in a jar and we shake it up, so you've got these little pieces of blues stuck inside this traditional Chinese music, you know. So all of a sudden, this little thing pops out and says, "I'm the blues!" that lasts for two seconds. Then all of a sudden this thing pops up that says, "I'm from Shanghai!" And you hear that, and it goes on, goes back and forth. So you've got these little snippets of things that imply this or imply that, but don't stay around long enough to become literal. So you hear a question, but you might not get the answer. And if you've got a question and then you don't get the answer, then there's some mystery... like you're still thinking, "I heard this question, but what's the answer?" I would say it's something like this: if you've got just the blues or just the music from Shanghai and you play that, it's very clear what it is. This is a way of keeping things not so literal... disguised, in some way. Which creates the mystery. I love things that are literal also, but with the other kind of music that's some of its special power.
So that's how you do it. By knowing what it is, and knowing the point where it becomes literal, or knowing the point where it stays more open. Once you get too literal, then it's not too open any more. You could be grooving so hard you can't sit in your chair. But it's no longer open in the same sense of having freedom. When you don't define it completely, then you have more room to move. That's what the free music, and the stuff that came up in the '60s and '70s, was about, in my opinion. It was about a way of incorporating composition, and then playing music, but finding a way of keeping it open--so it could easily move. Because once you hit that thing, if it's [sings] be-bang-shang be-bang-boom ba-chang ba-boom, you know, you're right in it. It doesn't allow you the same movement. That's why you just gotta groove it. That's where the power is, at that point. Does that make sense?
Yeah. The larger question, which I implied but did not state, is what is this so-called essence of the blues? You said it was a thing about question and answer.
Like that call-and-response thing?
Yeah. And that's definitely an element. But it's also interesting how you break it down into different parts. And certain parts assume more weight, or get carried along when the other ones get left behind.
Definitely. That's why I can hear the blues in almost everything. I hear this call-and-response thing in Braxton's music. I hear it in Albert Ayler. I even hear it in Webern, and I hear it in Stockhausen. This call-and-response thing--I hear it in the birds! The call-and-response thing is everywhere. It's all the blues, then, I guess. I heard some Portuguese blues the other day. It was called Fado. When we were in Portugal, someone played some Fado. And man, this was the blues. This was the Portuguese blues. So I think we're inundated with the blues. It's everywhere. I think folks just gotta open up their ears a little wider to hear it everywhere.
There's this relationship between a formally structured music, and amore open kind of music. A lot of the stuff you do, especially with the Fonda-Stevens Group, is kind of in-and-out. You can pick out parts there that are pretty straightahead, and other parts that are free.
Yes, very true.
But that's also something that causes people trouble. People who are in tune with the straightahead don't dig the other stuff, and people who dig the other stuff think it should be separate.
We've run into that problem with the Fonda-Stevens Group. But that's what that band is about. It's about a group of guys who straddle the divide, so to speak. It also has to do with Michael's music and my music. We compose the music for the group, so those are the vehicles we use. And Michael, being a pianist, really draws from the piano. He writes a very harmonic-melodic type of music, although he allows the group to open his stuff up. I'm a little farther out, you might say, in my compositional sense. We mix these two things together, because we're interested in playing with each other, and we end up with this group that has all of that stuff together.
And for me it works, because I have a relationship with all of that. I might not do it in my own group. I might not do it in the same way the Fonda-Stevens Group does it. But it's partly the result of Michael Stevens's reality and mine, combined, that creates that musical diversity. It's pretty extreme. We go from the innest thing to the outest thing, and everything in between. And those who like it--they can have it. Those who don't--they can stay home! That's what that group is about. I like that, actually. That's one of the unique things about that group.
It definitely makes things more interesting. If you take somebody like Anthony Braxton, he'll do standards or he'll do his own compositions, and there's a world of difference. It's very rare that you go from "Stella By Starlight" into Composition #173. It just doesn't really happen.
That would never happen. He'll always keep that very separate. You buy a Braxton record and it'll be a record of standards, if he's playing standards. It won't be a record of "Stella By Starlight," then Composition #90, together. Which the Fonda-Stevens Group might do. They might do #90 by Anthony, but the next tune is some version of "Stella By Starlight." Pretty eclectic, you know? And it could drive some people nuts.
Absolutely. I'm sure it does. If more people bought that record, it would probably drive more of them nuts. But these things are hard to get. It's not in your local chain store bin.
Well, Leo has some new distribution, so I'm hoping... I can't remember who it was, but it's a good American distributor, so hopefully his stuff might start making it in there.
You were talking about composing. That's one of the fun things about jazz. There's a very fuzzy boundary between composition and improvisation. How do you go after things differently when it's your composition? How do you justify composing, when you could be simultaneously composing and improvising?
For me, one of the important factors of writing music and bringing that to your group, or to your situation--instead of just leaving it open for improvisation--is it allows, or directs the music. It gives you other possibilities. I think that when I'm playing totally free, there's a certain area where I usually go. But when someone gives me a composition to play, and still allows for things to happen, I can use the material in the composition to try to go to places where I wouldn't go if I was just going to improvise. That's one of the things I like about playing compositions is that it keeps us from just going to the usual places we would go if we were just improvising totally, just making music that was completely improvised. But at the same time... that record with Xu [Distance] was totally improvised, but we thought very compositionally.
You know, it's true that it does change the direction of the music and give you some other possibilities. It takes some strong cats to get up, night after night, and play totally improvised music. I remember what Sam Rivers, David Holland, and Barry [Altschul] used to do. They were so great. It's not easy to pull that off. For me, the other element is that it's another creative process, composing. It's just another way of getting your creative ideas and thoughts and emotions to come together in some form of expression. I guess it's just different ways of trying to get to the same thing...
I still believe that the improvisation comes first, and composition is second. It's like for me, almost, that the composition is born out of the improv. The music of the universe is already happening. It's already going on, so us humans composing is about taking all that-- and the more open you are, the more information you get--taking the music of the universe and trying to organize it in some way. Or trying to put it together in some personal and new way, and see what happens. So for me, the music is already there. The improvisation is connected to that. Composition came after that.
On to part 3 of the Joe Fonda interview
