Grant Stewart - New York Tenor Saxist talks to Coljazz
Me, being the Mr Hip of Rainham, Kent, look I was raving about the late lamented pianist Michel Petrucciani when he was 16 and the "public" had never heard of him, so I thought I knew of most of the important jazzers on the scene. I was then amazed and delighted a year or so ago, to hear this new to me, tenor saxist Grant Stewart on an album with one of my favourites of the "younger" tenor players, Eric Alexander.
Who was this guy I'd never heard of? Well it just proved my ignorance, beacause Mr Stewart has been on the New York scene for a number of years but because he had flown under my "jazz radar" he was an exciting new saxophone voice to me. After that initial musical introduction I was so knocked out that I sought out his other recordings, of which there have been quite a number, both as a leader and a sideman. On all of them his playing has been tough, tender, melodic, swinging and musically satisfying.
I was not the only one who was knocked out with his playing, that legend of the trumpet Clark Terry said " "Be prepared to hear from this young man. I think he's going to be one of the big boys--he IS already one of the big boys-- and you'll hear a lot of beautiful playing from him. Grant is what we call in the trade a 'sleeper.' A fantastic player, but not too many people know about him--yet! Once they do hear him they say, "WHOA!"---and that's what I said when I did a recording with him. (And what I have to say to Grant is, "Keep on, keep on playing!")
I got in touch with Grant and asked if him if he would do an interview for our website and I was really chuffed that he agreed to do so.
I would also recommend Grant's website which he mentions below and which also has an excellent example of his tenor playing.
Coljazz: I asked Grant how he got started in jazz
I grew up in Toronto , Canada. My father was a full time high school English teacher and part time musician, he plays guitar , piano and a few other instruments as well. He got me started on the alto at age 10. My first teacher was actually from England, his name was Pete Schofield and he was an excellent saxophonist and big band leader. He gave me a good solid start learning all the basics, arpeggios, scales ,reading , learning standards as well as studying classical saxophone as well. At the same time my father was transcribing solos from Prez, Wardell Gray and writing out songs (standards) that he liked and playing duets on piano with me, teaching me to play by ear and play melodically, I was very lucky, he's a great musician and a great father, he was extremely patient with me as a kid.
After a couple of years Pete Schofield started me rehearsing with his big band(it was a professional band , the next youngest musician to me would have been in his 30's) and at age 14 hired me on my first professional gig. That same year I took a lesson with Pat Labarbera and that's when I really started to get serious and began practicing about 4 hours a day, and by the time I finished high school I would sometimes practice 8 or 9 hours a day. As a teenager I had a quarttet and used to play gigs around Toronto . Around 17 or 18 I met up with the great saxophonist Bob Mover and he became a sort of mentor to me , he was never an official teacher but he taught me a lot about music and was a big influence. At 19 I moved to NYC and I've been there ever since( I'm 38 now).
Coljazz: I hear a number of influences in your sound and style but you seemed to have managed to have acquire an original approach out of those disparate influences. Can you tell us who your musical heroes are, and who has influenced your tenor playing?
My main influences would be Bird, Hawk, Prez, Dexter Gordon, Don Byas, Sonny Rollins(of course) Sonny Stitt and Coltrane. I would say Bird is the most important, seeing as with the exception of the Hawk , Prez and Byas the rest are descended from him. I've never sat down and tried to conciously sound different , I just try to play melodically and not say the same thing the same way twice. I love the tenor sound of Hawk and Byas and have tried to capture the core of their sounds as best I can. Bird is so complex and advanced that I think I'll spend the rest of my life taking things from him, it's been 28 years that I've been listening to him and I still hear it different every time I go back. I always loved Coltrane,, but not for the same reasons most players do, which is for his more outside stuff and his recognition as being an innovator, for me it was his deep lyricism and almost operatic melodic sense that attracted me,there was always something so melancholy about his sound, Kenny Dorham has that quality to me as well, that attracted me, as well as his sense of abandon and what I like to call the way he "rocked" , that same raw energy Bird and Basie and all the greats had.
Coljazz: You’ve made a number of excellent albums under your own name and with others, I'm thinking your albums with Eric Alexander and one of our favourites with guitarist Dan Adler. How do feel about them and do you feel any of them capture the “best” of Grant Stewart.
Over the past 19 years I've recorded quite a few albums, I think 11 or 12 as a leader and a bunch as a sideman. I don't listen to myself very much , just as much as is necessary to pick takes and mix. It's a funny thing when I listen to myself I pick up on the mistakes and then have them in my head the next time I play the song and if I do play something on a recording that I like( which is usually by mistake) I try to recreate it the next time I play the tune and that ruins the moment. I can't properly judge my own work, I do it and then move on but if you wanted me to suggest one of my CDs it would usually be my most recent one( in this case Grant Stewart Plays the Music of Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn), or any of the three I've made for Sharp Nine Records in the last 3 or 4 years. However I do feel that recording in the studio effects the sound and feel of my notes ( at least me personally) and if you search on YouTube for "You Go To My Head" at Smalls or some of the other live stuff on there it may give a better idea of my sound.
Coljazz: You do not appear to be a “doubler” on other horns, is this a deliberate decision on your part to stick to the tenor or have you dabbled with other woodwinds.
I don't really play any other horns. I started on alto and have one at home that I play for my own enjoyment sometimes and I studied flute and clarinet as a teenager and could double on them if I needed too but tenor is plenty of work for me and I'm content with just playing the one horn.
Coljazz: In our humble opinion jazz has become truly international with a large number of musicians, from Europe in particular, becoming major figures in the music we love. How much does music from non-US sources either influence or even impact at all on the US scene. Have you any particular favourites from the overseas scenes.
NYC is a magnet for jazz musicians from all over the world and in my time there I've played with great musicians from everywhere, many of them permanent residents of NYC and many staying for a few years and then going back home. There are plenty of great European players like Mark Taylor(from the UK but a permanent New Yorker) Dado Moroni( Italy) Perico Sambeat( Spanish alto player) Rosano Sprotiello( Italian pianist in NYC) Anthony Kerr(UK vibraphonist) there are tons of world class musicians in Europe, too many to mention, I work regularly with a great pianist in Spain named Fabio Miano,there's a great young drummer there named Esteve Pi Ventura . There's a fantastic 19year old alto player in Bologna named Luiggi Grasso and his brother Pasquale. Then you have all the great musicians out of Israel in the last 15 years like Omer Avital, Avi Shi Cohen, Avi Leibowitz, Ofer Landsberg, Anat Cohen and her brothers ,the list goes on. There's a lot of great players out there in the world but most of them spend some time in NYC.
Coljazz: Thanks for talking to us here at Coljazz, we really appreciate it and we will continue to tell everyone we know how much we admire your superb playing and how we hope you make it to the UK to play sometime soon.
Thanks so much for having me on you site and be sure to stop by and say hello if you you're visiting NYC from the UK! You can see my schedule at my website www.grantstewartjazz.com
Thanks again Don and I hope to see you soon.
Don Emanuel
3 July 2009
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John Donaldson answers our
questions..........
Here at Coljazz we wanted not to just run a website that advertised our next gig, but also put out some ideas, articles and links on jazz that you, our readers, might find interesting.
To that end we thought we would highlight some of the world class musicians that the UK is lucky enough to have.
We therefore thought it appropriate to focus our first article on a pianist who wowed us who saw him at the Steve Waterman/Matt Wates Quintet gig, John Donaldson. More about that particular gig in our Review section.
Don Emanuel, our website guru, asked the questions.
John Donaldson started by playing keyboards and piano in various bands in the 70's including a stint with Viv Stanshall's 'Big Grunt'. Jazz gigs started when he was a student in 1978, being part of the Cambridge Modern Jazz Club’s resident trio along with Chucho Merchan and Nic France and backed visiting guest soloists in the city.
In 1980 he won the prize for best soloist at the San Sebastian International Jazz Competition In 1982 he moved to California. He studied with Joe Henderson, played with Paul Contos, Stan Poplin, Kenny Stahl, Tim Jackson, Randy Masters, Larry Grenadier, Jeff Ballard, Donny McCaslin, Eddie Marshall, Kenny Wolleson, Ben Goldberg, Daniel Sabanovich and gigged with notables including Eddie Henderson, Red Holloway, John Handy, Richie Cole, Paul Jackson, David Baker, Steve Turre, Laurindo Almeida.
Since returning to London in 1993 he has been active on the UK scene playing in groups led by Iain Ballamy, Art Themen, Clark Tracy, Alan Barnes, Don Weller, John Etheridge, Dick Pearce and Norma Winstone. He has also accompanied visiting soloists, Art Farmer, Conte Condoli, Freddie Hubbard, Buddy de Franco/Terry Gibbs, Scott Hamilton, Ingrid Jensen, Jon Gordon and co-lead the band 'Septpiece' with Dave Mattacks and Andrew Cleyndert.
In 2006 he was the winner of the piano catagory at the Marstons Pedigree British Jazz Awards. 'Live at the Appleby Jazz Festival' was on the Irish Times list of essential CD's of 2006.
He currently leads a trio featuring drummer Asaf Sirkis, has a piano duo with Mark Edwards and also a two keyboard/percussion trio with Mark Edwards and Asaf Sirkis.
We thought we’d ask John about
his career.
Q: John, thanks for talking to us at Coljazz, firstly when did you actually start playing piano and was it formal studies.
MY AUNT RAN A PUB IN SOUTH LONDON, WHEN SHE GAVE IT UP THERE WAS A PIANO THAT NEEDED A HOME –WE GOT IT AND I STARTED PLAYING IT. I HAD PIANO LESSONS AND WENT THROUGH THE ‘GRADES’. I STARTED WHEN I WAS 9.
Q: Why jazz, with your undoubted keyboard skills weren’t there other musical areas where you would have probably made a better living. Not that we are complaining of course that you chose jazz, just that it’s a great way to stay poor.
I PLAYED IN A COUPLE OF ROCK BANDS-- DIDN’T MAKE MUCH MONEY THERE EITHER. WHEN YOU GET THE JAZZ ADDICTION--THAT’S IT. FIGURING IT OUT IS A NEVER ENDING PROCESS. YOU JUST KEEP CHIPPING AWAY.
Q: Very few British jazz musicians ever made a move to the States, I can only think of George Shearing, Victor Feldman, Ralph Sharon, Peter Ind, Ronnie Ball, Bob Efford and Ben Clatworthy but I see from your biography that you went to California in 1982 and played with a whole bunch of top American musicians, what prompted the move, was it just initially to study with tenor saxophone giant Joe Henderson, or did that come later?
I BELIEVE THERE ARE QUITE A FEW BRITS IN NEW YORK THESE DAYS THOUGH—WHAT HAPPENED WITH US WAS THAT MY OTHER HALF HAD A JOB OFFER. WE WENT FOR A YEAR AND ENDED UP STAYING FOR TEN. FOR MOST OF THAT TIME WE LIVED ON THE WEST COAST IN THE SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA AND MOST OF THE MUSICIANS I PLAYED WITH LIVED THERE. JOE LIVED IN THE CITY AND TAUGHT AT HIS HOUSE. I WAS AMAZED THAT SOMEONE LIKE JOE WOULD BE TEACHING. I WAS VERY LUCKY DURING MY TIME THERE AND GETTING TO KNOW HIM WAS A REAL HIGHLIGHT.
Q: Apart from studying with Joe Henderson you played with such “names” as Richie Cole, Donny McCaslin, Steve Turre, Eddie Henderson, John Handy and Laurindo Almeida, a pretty impressive bunch of musicians. From my experiences of US Jazz Website Forums, there appears to a marked ignorance of any jazz from outside the US amongst American jazz fans, musicians and critics. How did they take to this “limey” being on their scene and how did you get to work with such an impressive bunch of musicians. Was it word of mouth once they’d heard you play and of those you played with, who impressed you particularly.
THEY’RE USED TO ALL SORTS OF ACCENTS AND LIMEYS ARE TEN A PENNY OVER THERE. LIKE ANYWHERE YOU GO YOU MEET ONE MUSICIAN AND HE’LL RECOMMEND YOU (OR NOT) TO ANOTHER AND SO IT GOES ON. WORD OF MOUTH. JEFF BALLARD LIVED NEAR ME AND WE PLAYED IN THE SAME BANDS. DONNY McCASLIN LIVED NEARBY TOO. I REMEMBER DOING A LIVE BROADCAST WITH EDDIE HENDERSON, DONNY AND JEFF A FEW MONTHS AFTER I ARRIVED IN CALIFORNIA. IT WAS JUST THE LOCAL SCENE NO DIFFERENT TO HERE REALLY. YOU’D TOUR WITH MUSICIANS FROM OUT OF THE AREA TOO.
Q: You were over in the States for 11 years, what made you decide to return to the UK?
JUST FAMILY REASONS.
Q: When you got back did it take long to re-establish yourself on the UK scene or was it back to immediate gigs with a bunch of guys you had played with before you left, or was it tough to get back on a scene that had obviously changed considerably in the 11 years you had been away.
I HAD TO RE-ESTABLISH! I KNEW IAIN BALLAMY FROM BEFORE—HE GAVE ME A WEEK AT RONNIE’S. I STARTED TO MEET PEOPLE THROUGH DIFFERENT GIGS. I DID GIGS IN SOUTH LONDON WHERE I WAS LIVING AND WAS IN A REHEARSAL BAND THAT USED TO PLAY ONCE OR TWICE A WEEK. THAT WAS GOOD BAND, GEOFF GASCOYNE, TRISTAN MAILLOT, DAMON DROWN, AND CHRISTIAN BREWER. I MET DICK PEARCE ON A SOUTH LONDON PUB GIG. I PLAYED IN CLARK TRACEY’S BAND WITH GERARD AND ARNIE, ALSO WITH NORMA WINSTONE FOR A COUPLE OF YEARS WHICH WAS GREAT, THEN WITH DON WELLER, ART THEMEN, AND I’VE PLAYED WITH MANY OF ALAN BARNES BANDS OVER THE YEARS.
Q: You’ve been back for 15 years now, any regrets about returning to the UK.
NOT REALLY.
Q: You also gigged over here with an impressive bunch of US musicians like Art Farmer, Buddy de Franco, Freddie Hubbard and Conte Candoli amongst others, any memories/standouts about these experiences that you’d like to share with us.
PLAYING A TOUR WITH ART FARMER WAS GREAT. COLIN PURBROOK COULDN’T DO THE GIGS AND CALLED ME. SAME WITH TERRY GIBBS AND BUDDY DE FRANCO. IT WAS WONDERFUL TO BE PLAYING WITH SUCH LEGENDARY MUSICIANS FROM THAT GENERATION.
Q: You’ve made some impressive records in your career, any that you are particularly proud of. I particularly liked the recent Music Box Trio one but there were some other impressive albums both under your own name and as a sideman, like your “Meeting in Brooklyn”, recorded in New York with Brit Iain Ballamy on tenor and soprano and Americans Ray Drummond and Victor Lewis on bass and drums respectively. “Sing the line” with bassist Andy Cleyndert and Dave Mattacks on drums which had some lovely string writing from you on two tracks. Sideman duties were heard on one of my favourites the live Alan Barnes/Don Weller “Cannonball” which had a particularly storming solo from you on Azule Serape on which I heard some similarities to the original “Live at the Lighthouse” album which I felt paid a lovely tribute to one of my favourite jazz pianists, the late Victor Feldman. Plus some inventive and stomping piano on two Alan Barnes albums “Swingin’ the Samba” and his tribute to Horace Silver “Yeah”.
I LIKE BITS OF MOST OF THEM AND I’VE ENJOYED MOST OF THE STUFF I’VE DONE WITH OTHER MUSICIANS.
Q: There are some excellent tunes written by you on your albums, like “Sing the line”, Unrelated Incident”, Chanterelle, Big Loss in Lewisham”, “Petruccianni”, “Pearl’s Song” and “Music Box” but not that many. Is this because you are a reluctant writer or is it because there are other peoples tunes that you want to play.
I’M GETTING BETTER AT PLAYING MY OWN TUNES THESE DAYS. I HOPE MORE OPPORTUNITIES TO DO THAT WILL COME ALONG. I’M PUTTING TOGETHER A NEW QUARTET FOR SOME GIGS THIS SUMMER INCLUDING BRECON—I HOPE TO BE DOING SOME OF MY TUNES WITH THAT NEW LINEUP.
Q: My feeling as a jazz fan for some 59 years is that the best jazz musicians in the UK are the equal to any in the world now, which I felt wasn’t always the case. Certainly in my opinion the standard of British jazz in the fifties and sixties, with exceptions of course, Scott, Tracey, Hayes, Harriott, Wellins, Seaman and a few others, wasn’t as high as it is now. As you have been on the scene yourself since the late seventies, do you feel the standards have risen in your time on the scene, or do you feel there is a still gap between our guys and the Americans.
THE MUSIC HAS BECOME INTERNATIONALIZED AND THERE REALLY ARE FANTASTIC PLAYERS EVERYWHERE BUT I THINK GREAT MUSIC HAS ALWAYS BEEN MADE BY PLAYERS OF VASTLY VARYING TECHNICAL ABILITIES. THERE’S ROOM FOR PLAYERS ON ALL LEVELS.
Q: What music do you listen to at home. Coleman Hawkins, certainly in his later years only listened, I understand, to classical music. You seem to have catholic musical tastes, so what gets on the CD player in the car or in the house.
I HOPE I’M NOT IN MY LATER YEARS DON, BUT BESIDES JAZZ I LISTEN TO CLASSICAL MUSIC TOO--STRAVINSKY, IVES, ZAPPA, RAVEL. I LIKE THE ENSEMBLE MODERN –I’VE GOT A GREAT RECORD OF THEM PLAYING MUSIC BY CONLAN NANCARROW AS WELL AS FRANK ZAPPA. LATIN MUSIC, IRISH MUSIC. FOLK MUSICS. LOTS OF DIFFERENT STUFF
Q Well I’d just like to thank you for your time and your patience and wish you all the best in your career, may you long continue delighting us with some of the most sparkling and inventive jazz piano being played today.
THANK YOU DON.