Joe Lovano: Cleveland's Ultimate Jazz Titan

AAJ: What you said about Herbie Hancock made me think of the keytar! [Laughs]

JL: Yeah, and all the different instruments at the beginning of that whole thing with Miles. Those cats didn't want to play the Fender Rhodes or any of those keyboards. Keith Jarrett was totally against that, but then he went there and laid down some incredible music; Live-Evil (Columbia, 1971) and some of the dates he did with Miles playing more keyboard stuff; him and Chick together with Miles and Herbie at the very beginning with the Fender Rhodes and the Wurlitzer. Stevie Wonder I think influenced a lot of cats because he was one of the first people that really embraced that and made it have its own voice in the orchestration and the sounds and things. If you really get into that history, you could see how it's evolved to today.

For me, that's when I was just first starting to come on the scene, so all that technology was there. I was totally into the acoustic and that's why my first dates in the '80s were all with European labels that embraced the acoustic jazz that was happening. In the '70s, the more fusion music was more electronic on all the labels in the States, but Soul Note/Black Saint, Enja Records, SteepleChase, some of the European labels that really embraced the acoustic and the concepts of the of the music, too. The acoustic part of it was a part of it, but it was the way of playing, also, that was really creative and more exploratory. Spontaneous explorations rather than written fusion kind of music that was playing a score and repeating that when you played live. The acoustic side of things was more free and that's the world that I was in, in my early recording as a leader and that's really brought me into today, into my music today.

AAJ: Have you have you played EWI at all?

JL: I've never played the EWI, no. I've played some electronic effects on my horn, but more through a microphone, but going to hear Steps Ahead and hearing Mike and the way he developed on that, at his pad, also, was amazing! His whole thing was he wanted to be able to play anything that Chick Corea could play, and he did. He developed a way of playing on the EWI that covered the complete orchestra from the contra bass into the altissimo and was a virtuoso on that horn. He spent a lot of time working on it.

AAJ: He sure did.

JL: Oh yeah and set the pace! I heard him live a few times with Steps Ahead and some groups where he was just so full of ideas and could play them for you. He played what he wanted you to hear, which is what it's about! To be an improviser and to be creative and to develop a way of playing. He developed a way of playing on a saxophone for sure, but on the EWI, and in his music.

AAJ: He was probably the first EWI artist that I really heard, I think.

JL: Oh yeah, that really took it somewhere. Eddie Harris and certain cats did things with effects and electronics that inspired all of that. Eddie Harris was a virtuoso on the saxophone, but also in the effects of harmonizing and doing things on the horn with certain technology. Yeah, Eddie Harris was very influential.

AAJ: I've seen videos of you playing the Aulochrome. What do you think of that?

JL: Yes, the double soprano saxophone. Okay, so this is a new instrument that is two soprano saxophone bodies with two necks, into one mouthpiece with two chambers. You have two reeds. So, when you play full body down the two horns, you can harmonize. Francois Louis made this instrument. There's one keyboard down the center, okay, two saxophones; two sopranos with one keyboard. Now, each key is split in two parts. So, you have the top part and the bottom part. If you play the center of the key, you close both holes. Let's say you're playing an F, okay? You're playing in the center of each key, so you're playing an F on both horns in unison. You have two octave keys, so you could split octaves. That's first. Now if I lift up the bottom part of the F and the G, it opens tone holes on this horn. So now, I'm playing an A on this horn and an F on that horn, and you could do that on every note with all these intervals.

AAJ: That's pretty neat.

JL: If you're playing down the center of each key you're playing in unison. As you release the bottom parts, this body is the main note and the other body you're opening holes that's harmonizing with that. So, that's a deep study right there! I had the horn for about five or six years, and I recorded a bunch on it, but there was a long time I just stared at it didn't even touch it! Started trying to, you know, you're learning it. You're seeing what it is and what the possibilities are. The harmonics that happen and the way you use the octave key, there are all these tones that happen.

Then, if I turn the horn this way [motions to the right] and I'm only vibrating on one horn, I got one soprano sound. The other reed I'm not playing on, so that horn is silent. So, you could turn it and play on one horn. Then just by changing the position, you have the two reads, now you're vibrating on the other. Then you could go back. So, I started to develop a way of playing one tone: one single soprano. So, a lot of ideas there. Then at a certain point, harmonize inside the phrasing. So, it's all about phrasing, how you could breathe, and how you could develop your chops to be able to do things.

AAJ: You seem very comfortable on it.

JL: Well, yeah, it became real natural and almost second nature, because I was practicing and playing on it a lot. At first you think you're dealing with a piano. Once I played with Scofield, I realized it was like the guitar! He's playing on one thing here [mimic's Scofield's right hand] and he's changing things here [mimic's Scofield's left hand]; two and three notes. You don't have to play big voicings like on a piano. You could play two and three note voicings, little things that harmonize inside the melody, right? More like a guitar, you know. Once I played with Sco and we got a sound together with the Aulochrome and the guitar, it was like, "Whoa, dig that! That's something else, man."

You develop ideas and you start to learn how to approach stuff. So, I started to learn how to approach that instrument and I could play any tune, now. I could play "Stella by Starlight." I could play "Cherokee." I'm playing on those harmonies, I'm playing melodies, but now I choose which tones to harmonize in my line. It's all about the line and the phrasing. Once that started to happen, I was starting to develop something.

AAJ: Is that a standard soprano mouthpiece?

JL: Francois made two mouthpieces fused together; two soprano mouthpieces.

AAJ: It looked like it was wider.

JL: Yeah, it is, it's wide. It's as wide as two mouthpieces, but somehow together. They're not separate, but when they fit on the two necks, it holds it together.

Now, Adolphe Sax would have been 200 or something or there was some anniversary that I brought it back to Belgium, and it was in the Adolphe Sax museum and Francoise is showing it at certain exhibitions and things, so I don't have that horn right now. I don't have it, it's in Belgium. There's only one and he has it and he's been showing it.

AAJ: Is he going to give it back?

JL: I want to get it back! Well, it took him five years to make it, so he would need some financier. He would need some backing to make another one or make a few that he could lease out or rent. Let's say if I wanted it to do a record date on it, right now there's only that one horn. He meets me in Europe sometimes and I play it on a concert here and there, but he has it and I don't want the responsibility of having it really, it's the only horn. Well, just insurance-wise it was starting to be a little pricey to just be responsible for this instrument, you know. Francoise is a genius, man, and he's developed an instrument that's playable to harmonize on, and it's incredible.

AAJ: That sounds incredible.

JL: I feel so happy I was able to document it on some of my important recordings with a couple of my bands. I miss it.

AAJ: Well, perhaps you'll see it again.

JL: Yeah, no, I will and actually I'm going to call him about it when I play Ghent. Maybe he'll bring it and I could touch on it; I could vibrate on some tones on a concert [laughs]. He's made all my mouthpieces for my saxophones, too, since the early '80s. My wooden tenor saxophone mouthpiece I first got in 1985 and I'm playing on maybe the third or fourth one he's made for me right now. They're all beautiful instruments in and of themselves.

AAJ: You play on a wood mouthpiece?

JL: Yeah, it's a grenadilla wood like a clarinet. It vibrates with the reed instead of a reed against a mouthpiece. So, there's a certain airiness and a certain thing you can do with your notes that you can't do on a metal mouthpiece or other mouthpieces. Just in the air and the way you can vibrate on it from triple pianissimo to triple forte with the same color and sound.

AAJ: Interesting.

JL: Oh yeah, it's beautiful man. It's a really incredible experience. Francois really puts a lot of love and passion into what he does, making his reads, also, and ligatures and mouthpieces.

AAJ: His ligatures are famous. A lot of my colleagues use them.

JL: Oh yeah, he's made me a couple silver mouthpieces that I'm playing on, also. They're really beautiful. They have their own kind of dark brilliance.

AAJ: You've been playing the Borgani saxophones for quite some time. Why did you start playing those?

JL: Now, around 1999 I was approached by this company Orfeo Borgani. His great grandfather started the company in Macerata, Italy, near Ancona. It's a beautiful instrument that's hand-pounded brass. Jan Garbarek, the curved soprano that he played, was made by Orfeo's grandfather or great-grandfather in the '20s. His father didn't want to deal with Selmer so much, so he made more student model horns I'd say in the '60s and '70s. Then I hooked up with Orfeo when he took the company over. He wanted to really make an instrument that could be on the marketplace. They make some beautiful horns. So, I've been playing on Borgani saxophones now for quite some time, but I also play my Selmers and my Buescher and my King Super 20. I have a nice collection of different beautiful instruments that I love to play.

AAJ: How many saxophones do you have?

JL: Well, I don't even want to go there! I have a good 12 tenors right now, but I have a lot of altos and different horns. I had a G mezzo-soprano made for me in 2010 by this instrument maker Peter Jessen in Copenhagen. It's in the key of G, it's up a fourth from concert and it's beautiful. I've been documenting some things on this mezzo in recent times since then. So, I have a collection of a couple of special horns that were made for me.

My model on the Borgani is brushed silver with gold keys. The way the neck and palm keys are bent and certain things they've done for me that that I feel really comfortable with and wanted as far as how it feels. It's made more like a Conn or a King than a Selmer, which I like. The Selmer is the Rolls-Royce of the saxophone, so I wanted a Bentley. Not to compete with the Selmer, to have it feel different, so it's more straight action like a Conn or a King. It vibrates beautiful and every horn plays different because it's hand-pounded brass, it's not machined. So, each horn has its own feeling to it. I've documented a lot on the different Bonganis throughout my recorded catalog.

My main horns are still my Selmers. My Balanced Action that my dad bought new when he came back from the service in the late '40s, '47 maybe. The horn that he had when he was in the service was a Buescher 400 that my grandfather bought my dad when he was in high school. When he came home from the service, he gave that horn to my Uncle Nick who was ten years my dad's senior. He was a beautiful saxophonist in his own right. He played that horn his whole life. When he passed in his early '90s, my cousins gave me back that horn that my dad had given to my Uncle Nick. So, I have a couple saxophones that are from my family. My dad's Balanced that he bought new and a Mark VI that he bought in 1966. I got his Balanced when I was 14 or 15 and I have his Mark VI, too, that he got at that time. So, I have three of my dad's horns, which is great. They vibrate beautiful and I'm feeling the spirit in it.

I just feel really proud to live in the world of music and it's such a blessing to be able to share the blessings like this throughout these years and looking forward to being more expressive in the future.

AAJ: Joe Lovano thank you so much. I appreciate your time.

JL: Thank you, all right.

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