Victor, Alex, and I were brought in as guest artists for this first Zawinul music tribute, with Scott Kinsey playing keyboards, to be joined by a very-much alive Joe Zawinul for the concert. Joe showed up the evening before the concert, after the band and guests had been rehearsing the music for close to two weeks. This is my first chance to revisit the music of Weather Report, to experience that “if I’d known then what I know now” opportunity, and I’m making the most of it — shading the music the way I like and the way Vince’s excellent arrangements invite me to do. We’ve been firing on all cylinders the last few days, and so playing the music for Joe should be fun. Studio 4 is packed with guests and members of the press. Zawinul arrives from the airport, and he’s been drinking. After a few words of welcome, Vince counts off “Night Passage,” which starts off in a Marty Paich-like/West Coast small big band feel, intimate, relaxed, and swinging. Joe immediately comes over towards the drums and reaches towards me with imaginary drumsticks, saying, “No, Peter, this is not a Weather Report beat; play more like this, man!” Instead of my smiling and telling Joe to fuck off, or even just thinking “fuck off” while smiling authentically at the ridiculous picture of his staggering swagger, I react like a long-lost relative who has returned home for a Thanksgiving dinner fully expecting that things will be different between him and his family now that he’s grown-up and become successful on his own. But NO! Aunt This or Uncle That or Grandma or even Mom or Dad knows exactly which button to push, and it gets pushed no matter what, and you’re young and stupid again. Everything is all self-conscious and I can’t play, and I don’t know whether to be more upset with Joe or with myself for feeling like this. I’m back in the middle of having just joined Weather Report, and Joe is telling me how to play. It’s embarrassing, but I don't wish to make it more so by saying anything, so I just stew until I get back to my hotel room after rehearsal. “I can't believe what just happened,” I begin in an email to my wife. Mutsy is really upset with Joe and very supportive and understanding of me. Vince drops me a nice note. I don't know how I’ll be able to stand seeing Joe the next day at the concert, much less make music with him.
And, of course, when I run into him outside the concert hall the next afternoon, he merely says, “Peter Erskine! You sounded great last night, my friend!”
Aaaaaaarrghhhhhh!
Am I Charlie Brown, and is Zawinul Lucy in “Peanuts,” pulling away the football whenever I go to kick it? The concert, by the way, was great.
The ultimate Joe-got-me-angry moment, by the way, occurred on tour with Weather Report when the band was playing in a number of venues where the lighting rig was closer than usual to the bandstand, resulting in hotter than normal stage conditions, especially at the end of the show. Those lights got really hot and we’re finishing up an almost three-hour show, playing loud and in double-time, i.e., really fast. So I asked Joe if it would be okay that I show him the sign for us to agree onstage for the “last time around on this vamp” so I could give it all I had and not run out of whatever little bit of steam was left. He smiled and shrugged, and I was foolish enough to take that for a “yes.” So that night we’re playing this end piece, and I’m giving it all I’ve got, and I make eye contact with Joe and give him the sign to end the vamp this time around. He just smiles and leans into his keyboard rig, and I hear him get really loud. We don’t end the tune, which means we have to play this vamp for another couple of minutes full steam ahead. Now I’m really angry. Pissed. Smacking the drums and cymbals as hard as I can, cursing Joe and shouting out epithets in rhythm as I pound the skins. And when Joe is satisfied by all of this, he signals, “Okay, NOW we end the tune!” and he does, and the rest of the band follows — but I don’t. I keep hitting away, cursing, and I wind up on the snare drum alone, smacking it and still cursing Joe. The show is supposed to be over and I know this, but I can't stop and, besides, what I’m doing actually sounds pretty cool. Just then I sense a presence in front of me, so I open my eyes and look up, and there is Joe’s face mere inches away from mine. He has climbed up onto the drum riser and is perched precariously on edge, and now when our eyes meet he yells, “Yeah, Yeah, YEAH, YEAH, YEAH, YEAH, YEAH!” And I finish.
I’m not sure what has just happened. He comes over to me backstage, extends his hand, and says, “Thank you, man.”
The next day Joe proclaims that I have graduated.
photo: Shigeru Uchiyama
Interlude
A well-known German musician who played the Lyricon — one of the early electronic wind-controlled synthesizers — came backstage to visit Weather Report in the band’s dressing room before a concert in Europe, circa 1980. This fellow had particularly long hair and a full beard, all the more striking in appearance because he was a midget — a German hippie midget. He must have been a good player because Joe and Wayne both greeted him with a sincere and smiling welcome, and they conversed with him for several minutes while the rest of the band was getting ready to go onstage. Finally Joe suggested to him, “Listen, why don't you go out to the front of the house now and get into your seat so you can enjoy the pre-show music and we can get ready for our concert.” The Lyricon player smiled most agreeably as he said his goodbyes and bounded out of the dressing room. I was impressed by their congenial hospitality to this guy.
Zawinul waited a few beats after the door closed, then began to take a sip of cognac with a plastic cup in his left hand while making a cutting motion, waving his flattened right hand towards his beltline telling us, “You know, I’ve had it up to HERE with that motherfucker…”
photo: Shigeru Uchiyama
61. Quasthoff
I received an email that began, “Dear Ladies and Gentlemen, We are a music production company from Germany and will be producing a jazz album with the classical singer Thomas Quasthoff. Thomas Quasthoff has won three Grammys up to now and is about to record his first jazz album with German trumpeter/producer Till Brönner.”
“Who is this Thomas Quasthoff?” I wondered, and so I asked a couple of classical music colleagues for input. Their replies were over the top in terms of enthusiastic respect for this singer. Wow. He must be good; but a classical singer making a jazz album?
Thomas Quasthoff describes himself as follows (taken from biographer Michael Harder’s television documentary): “1.34 meters tall, short arms, seven fingers — four right, three left — large, relatively well formed head, brown eyes, distinctive lips; profession: singer.” This apt description leaves out a few details, the first and foremost being that Quasthoff possesses one of the finest voices of this or any age. He is a remarkable man with musical knowledge and abilities par excellence. He was also born a Thalidomide baby; that is, his mother took Thalidomide while she was pregnant. The drug was sold and prescribed during the late 1950s and ’60s to pregnant women as a sleep aid and medication to combat morning sickness. Inadequate testing was done regarding the drug’s safety, however, with the devastating results that nearly 10,000 children were born with severe malformations. Thomas is more than just a bit sanguine about all of this: “I am lucky. Everyone can see my disability.” He elaborated in an interview: “For me, my disability is a fact and not a problem. I’m not living the life of a disabled person. For sure, I have to handle some things differently from other people. But it’s not so different from the life of someone who is not disabled. In any case, who is really not disabled? I am in the lucky position that everyone can see it. But if you are never happy, if you are only concerned about money or success, this is, in my opinion, also a kind of disability.”
But all that I really know about him musically as I enter the recording studio in Ludwigsburg, Germany is that he is a singer with a great reputation. As I’m preparing the drumset for recording, I notice a smallish figure approaching me; my peripheral vision suggests that a young child had entered the studio. Imagine my surprise when the richest of baritone voices emanates from that tiny body: “It’s good to meet you!” We shake hands, and thus begins an adventure that I ca
n honestly say changed my life.
The next morning began with my watching a DVD documentary about Thomas, by filmmaker Michael Harder, titled The Dreamer. Harder had given it to me the evening I arrived; he was there to film the recording sessions. Watching the story of Thomas’ life and art, I was moved to tears by the beauty of his voice and the triumph of his spirit. Hailed by leading conductors and loved by audiences worldwide, Quasthoff is a star in the realm of lieder (art song), oratorio, and even opera. He also seemed like a person with a terrific sense of humor. But could he sing jazz, and could he hold up to the rigors of making an album in the studio (a different process from performing a recital)?
I met Thomas and the band — which included my old Steps Ahead buddy Chuck Loeb on guitar, Dieter Ilg on bass, and pianist and arranger Alan Broadbent — for breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Producer and trumpeter Till Brönner was also there, along with his brother Pino, who was coordinating everything. I was glad to be able to sit next to Thomas, and he told me some of his story: of how he was denied admission to the music schools in Germany because he could not play an instrument (singers must also play an instrument, such as piano, to gain acceptance into the music studies programs there), and of various prejudices he had encountered in his homeland. He has a high regard for the open acceptance that he finds in America; nice to hear something good about our country for a change these days.
The true test in the studio, however, is in the music. Hidden from one another by sound-damping walls, connected only by means of microphones and headphones, we began to play the program of American standards chosen for this album. Great songs. How would Quasthoff sing them? To be honest, most classically trained vocalists tend to sound pretty stiff and out of their element when they attempt to sing jazz or popular music. Perhaps this is the key to Thomas Quasthoff: he apparently does not accept the notion of being “out of his element,” in life or in music. Simply put, he made the songs his own, with enough of a stylistic debt to some of the great jazz singers like Johnny Hartman (whose album of standards with John Coltrane set THE standard for male vocal ballad renderings in jazz; some wonderful playing by Elvin Jones on that recording, by the way!), Billy Eckstine, Ella Fitzgerald, even singers like Bobby McFerrin and Stevie Wonder. Quasthoff knows his stuff, and it was immediately apparent that he was not just visiting these songs, but that he had lived them.
Alan Broadbent fashioned some terrific arrangements that had me playing sticks, brushes, easy swing, and New Orleans-style second-line grooves. On the first day, we cut some basic tracks along with Thomas for an orchestra to dub onto, arranged by Nan Schwartz. Gorgeous stuff. The second day featured a smallish big band comprising of some of the best horn players in Germany and Holland. We covered a lot of musical ground in two days’ time, an arduous task for the most robust of singers. That Thomas could manage this without having had the prior experience of working in a studio with headphones, working with musicians whom he’d only gotten to know at breakfast, and to get all of his takes “live” with the band (almost no fixing afterwards) is a testament to the guy’s talent and guts. One outstanding feature, thanks to his classical training and vocal excellence, is that his pitch was always spot-on. Speaking frankly, most singers I have worked with in the studio — and these are famous vocalists who have thousands of hours of studio time under their belts — tend to sing “flat” a fair portion of the time when they’re wearing headphones. Not sure why this happens, but it sure didn’t happen with Thomas. This man can sing.
He did his homework, that’s for sure. Stylistically, rhythmically, melodically, he covered it all with nuance and perfection. Perhaps the song titles, chosen by Thomas, reveal the affinity between the singer and the stories he was telling: “There’s a Boat That’s Leaving Soon For New York,” “Watch What Happens,” “Secret Love,” “You and I,” “Ac-cent-tchu-ate (the Positive),” “I’ve Grown Accustomed to Her Face,” “Can’t We Be Friends?” “Smile,” “They All Laughed,” “My Funny Valentine,” “What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?” and “In My Solitude.” Thomas told me that he chose the songs for their relevance to his life. The CD, Thomas Quasthoff, The Jazz Album, was released by Deutsche Grammophon. We toured in March of 2007, beginning with a concert in New York’s Carnegie Hall.
Postscript to the session: After a celebratory dinner in an Italian restaurant outside of Stuttgart, we met back at the hotel where Thomas was doing a little jig or dance, cracking everyone up by his singing and dancing “Oh — I’m — a — little motherfucker, I’m a little motherfucker, I’m a…”
Shortly after this project, Zawinul called me up at home asking for Vince Mendoza’s telephone number. As I looked it up on my computer, I told him all about Quasthoff, ending with my little epilogue about the song and dance. Zawinul’s last spoken words to me, before thanking me for the info, were, “That’s right, he is a little motherfucker.”
62. The End
Following a sold-out and triumphant concert in the Philharmonie Hall in Köln with singer Thomas Quasthoff, Annette Hauber, the production coordinator for the WDR Big Band, tells me without warning that “Joe is dying of cancer.” I walk back to the hotel in the cold dark of night and terrible news, numb and in pain all at the same time. Not knowing what to do next, I stay up for most of the night listening to one Zawinul composition after another, missing the man while charting my own growth as a musician, which happened to parallel the growth of a new music beginning in the early 1960s and continuing up to the millennium and beyond.
And I think of a poem, sent to me by an unknown female correspondent via postcard when I was an 18-year old drummer with Stan Kenton:
There’s a drummer,
beating,
amidst all this America.
There’s an Annie Green Springs drinker —
drunken over time thinker
underneath this America.
There’s a line somewhere, I know,
from all people to all people
from all suffering to peace…
And the circle, just like the music, keeps going ’round and ’round.
63. Last Letter to Me from Joe
Peter
Thank you so much for your message; you are indeed a good brother -
I will survive my illness, as a matter of fact I am touring all the time and haven't missed a day of work. Unfortunately my beloved wife's situation is much more serious.
She is on Life support, cannot speak, being fed through tubes, very very sad --
but all of us have to live with or overcome obstacles.
Don't cry that it is over, smile that it was ---one wise man said --- I feel blessed to have had the fortune to share 44 years of my life with a wonderful person, the center of my Universe, my Maxine.
much love to you and your family
it is a great pleasure to know you
always your friend
zawinul
photo: Mutsy Erskine
The End
Appendix 1: People
Herein people mentioned in the book but not given enough due verbiage, or folks missing in the narrative altogether. For any sins of omission or indiscretion, my apologies. The names appear in alphabetical order, by first name.
Aaron Serfaty
Aaron is a great drummer from Caracas, Venezuela. I met him when he was drumming for Cuban trumpet virtuoso Arturo Sandoval. He came and paid me for some jazz drumming lessons; I stopped that arrangement pretty quickly and we began to trade information — swing for salsa as it were. He has since become a colleague professor at USC — a favorite among the students! — the most reliable and expert of drum tuners, a favorite at my house, and a dear friend. He’s also my first-call sub when I cannot make a gig in town.
Alan Broadbent
Pianist and accompanist par excellence, music devotee nonpareil. We were working together on an album for singer Dianne Schuur that was being co-produced by Barry Manilow and Eddie Arkin. Barry is a big-star entertainer and hit-maker
while Eddie is a well-respected film music guy in town, and their synergy seemed to be more or less in sync, though Barry displayed a tendency right off the bat on this project to over direct everything that was going on. Not a great idea when you’re dealing with jazz musicians and you’re hoping for jazz musician results. Anyway, we’re at day number two or three on this thing, and Barry wants us to try a ballad in a sort of Fats Domino/triplets-on-the-piano “On Blueberry Hill” style. We give it a shot, but the results are not impressive and so we call it a day. Well, the next morning Eddie Arkin asks us to play the same song in Bill Evans trio style — out of earshot of Barry, of course — so when we begin the rhythm track take and Barry hears this, he runs into the studio and more or less physically assaults Alan in the form of making body contact while reaching over him from behind and screaming “No! I…want…it…like…THIS!” banging out triplets on the keyboard like a madman until Eddie can catch up to all of this and try to pull Barry off of Alan and away from the piano. Silence. Broadbent looks over at me in the drum booth and I see the face of The Incredible Hulk just before he transforms into his scary self. I could have sworn he was going to slug Barry right in the kisser. Oh, Mandy!
No Beethoven: An Autobiography & Chronicle of Weather Report Page 21