Before the advent of formalized jazz education, the learning process for young musicians included listening to recordings, developing their ear, and finding a mentor. There are numerous examples of the mentor-student relationship staying right at home. Famous father-son combinations include Duke and Mercer Ellington; Tony “Big T” Lovano and his celebrated son, Joe; Dave Brubeck and his sons; and Bucky and John Pizzarelli. I’ve been fortunate to get to know both Bucky and John, and through their interviews conducted for the Fillius Jazz Archive we can gain an insight into how their working relationship developed. In these first excerpts, they both describe the musical atmosphere that each experienced in his youth.
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| Bucky Pizzarelli |
BP: [During
the depression] my folks had a grocery store in Paterson, New Jersey … and we
struggled through the whole thing. And everybody ate, we had a good time, and
we struggled right into World War II. You know we struggled out of the
depression into the World War. But we had a lot of fun in between. We listened
to a lot of big band music and we had a lot of music within the family circle.
My uncles played guitars and banjos. My father played a little mandolin. And
that was our entertainment, to take our minds off the depression. Then we also
had the big bands on the radio, and we heard broadcasts from all over the
country at different times. Sometimes four different bands the same night.
MR: Did
you have a reputation in high school as a musician?
BP: Small
really. I’d play weddings. I had a few guys I would call and I’d make two or
three dollars, which was big money in those days.
And from John’s perspective:
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| John Pizzarelli |
JP: I
wrote a lot of pop songs and I thought maybe there was a chance along the way
there was going to be some pop music in my future, of performing my own songs
and being Billy Joel or James Taylor. And it’s interesting because I never
realized that I was making a living doing what I was — I was playing with my
dad, and I’d be getting these six hundred dollar checks and thousand dollar
checks, or getting twenty-five. And that was like wow. If we had fifty for the [rock
band] gig we were going crazy. And I still had the rock band, because we had
fun doing it, and we’d have stretches of down time and I was playing solo gigs
and then on the weekend I’d take a rock gig with my band, just playing four
chord songs, three chord songs. And my father said, “you’re the only guy
playing jazz to support his rock & roll habit.” And he was right. I mean
I’d be playing gigs and I’d be giving the money away. Ah we’re having fun here.
Doug had the van, give Doug the gas money. I’ll take five bucks, and I’ll have
another beer. And the drummer had to come alone. Give him toll money.
You get the impression that both Bucky and John would
have been playing music whether they had been paid or not. This is a very
common theme, and almost a requirement for a musician — if you don’t love it
for the sake of playing it’s best to find another line of work.
Some of my favorite interview moments have come about
when two different interviewees talk about the same incident. Here Bucky and
John each share their memory of a particular duo situation one summer at the
Pierre Hotel:
BP: Every
one of my [four] children play something … [John and I] played one summer
together at the Pierre Hotel. I was playing there with a trio and in the summer
they cut down and said “can you just come in with two guitars and make it
easy?” And John did it with me and then he got his baptism of fire there with
me giving him dirty looks when he hit the wrong chord, and he gave them to me
when I did. But fortunately he can sit down with a tune and come up with a good
set of chords for it. That’s what I like about him.
JP: From
1980 to 1989 we worked everywhere and anywhere — house parties, concerts, we
would play clubs out in Jersey. The Cornerstone out in New Jersey in Metuchen
and nobody would listen, everybody would be talking away you know, and we’d sit
and play for two hours, just talking to each other. “Okay, what do you want to
play, okay.” Boom. Ear training 101. Well we’ll fake that song, okay, and he’d
play melodies. And the best example of that is my first gig with my dad. It was
eight weeks at the Pierre Hotel in 1980, the summer of 1980. July and August.
And the first night I knew about eight songs, and we had to play four hours. I
remember him saying “Mountain Greenery.” “What?” He’d go [scats] and he’d look
at me and he’d be pounding these melodies out, and wouldn’t tell me anything.
And maybe once in a while he’d hit a G7 like “you didn’t hear G7?” Oh and it
was the longest eight weeks. But I mean I learned, started to learn songs. And
it was the best — I figured it out
along the way that the way he learned was by watching Joe Mooney rehearse at
this club in Paterson. And Joe Mooney was blind and he had the accordion with
Andy Fitzgerald on clarinet and Jack Hotop on guitar and Gate Reeger. And they’d
be playing and Joe would say “here’s how it goes,” and he’d go [scats] and
here’s what you play, and this is what you play. And that’s how he taught me.
He’d go zip, zip, zip and that’s what you’d do. And then he’d say, “let’s fake
this tune.” Rehearsals? There was never written out music. And it’s the best
thing, and it was the hardest thing.
You can hear John and his wife Jessica Molaskey on
their PBS radio show entitled “Radio Deluxe.” Read more about John at our
previous blog entitled Nice Guys Finish First, and we have quoted some of
Bucky’s advice for the New Year which also may be interesting and timely
reading.
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