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Speaker 1: Pushkin. Before we get started, let's talk about Pushnick. Pushnick

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Speaker 1: You can try it for free for seven days. Sign

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Speaker 1: up for Pushnick and Apple Podcasts subscriptions. Archie Shep's been

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Speaker 1: a leader in what's known as avant garde jazz since

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Speaker 1: the nineteen sixties. He famously played tenor sacks alongside John Coltrane,

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Speaker 1: Lee Morgan, and the great free jazz pianist Cecil Taylor.

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Speaker 1: But like some musicians who are consider jazz artists, eighty

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Speaker 1: four year old Shep doesn't consider the music he plays

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Speaker 1: jazz at all. He calls it African American music to

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Speaker 1: acknowledge the Black Americans who created the tradition. Shep has

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Speaker 1: been politically engaged for his entire sixty year career. Every

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Speaker 1: one of his dozens of albums touches on African Americans

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Speaker 1: struggle to attain equal rights In some fashion one of

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Speaker 1: my favorite albums. For instance, Attica Blues takes a critical

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Speaker 1: look at the Attica prison riots of nineteen seventy one.

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Speaker 1: On today's episode, I talked to Archie Shep about how

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Speaker 1: an assignment he received in the third grade sparked his activism.

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Speaker 1: Shep also talks about his relationship with Coltrane, who he

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Speaker 1: says never took his horn out of his mouth, and

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Speaker 1: he also recalls the rhetorical power of Malcolm X and

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Speaker 1: the lasting image of seeing him speak to a sea

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Speaker 1: of blackheads on the streets of Harta. This is broken

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Speaker 1: record liner note for the digital age. I'm justin Richmond.

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Speaker 1: Here's my conversation with Archie Shepp. I first heard your

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Speaker 1: music when I was probably fifteen years old. Sixteen years old,

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Speaker 1: I discovered Attica Blues, Yeah, and it was at this

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Speaker 1: time when I was just developing a love of jazz

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Speaker 1: music and I heard Attica Blues and it changed my

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Speaker 1: whole idea of what people were doing then and what

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Speaker 1: jazz could be. And obviously there was a journey to

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Speaker 1: that album, but I thought it could be a good

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Speaker 1: place to start one because it was my starting point

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Speaker 1: with your music that I've since dived real deep into

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Speaker 1: and fallen in love with. But it also really matches

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Speaker 1: sort of the tenor of the present time here in America. Well,

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Speaker 1: the idea was given to me by my drummer at

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Speaker 1: the time, Bieber Harris, who suggested that it might be

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Speaker 1: a good idea to commemorate what it going on in Attica.

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Speaker 1: And I thought it was a good idea, and at

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Speaker 1: that point I began to write music and put together

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Speaker 1: the idea for the album. One of the reasons that

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Speaker 1: it really kind of opened my eyes to what jazz

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Speaker 1: could be because there's these kind of incredible vocals on

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Speaker 1: that album that are unlike other vocal jazz. It's not

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Speaker 1: like a vocal jazz record the way you might think

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Speaker 1: of an Ella Fitzgerald album sounding right, And I know

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Speaker 1: your drummer wrote those lyrics. Did he come to you

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Speaker 1: with the lyrics first? When he had the idea, Well,

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Speaker 1: he didn't actually write the lyrics. I wrote the lyrics,

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Speaker 1: and I gave him credit for it because at the

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Speaker 1: time he was trying to become a member of BMI

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Speaker 1: and he had to have some document recorded, and I

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Speaker 1: gave him cridit for the words the lyrics, though I

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Speaker 1: actually wrote the lyrics. Did you write them before you

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Speaker 1: compose the music? Well, at the same time, some of

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Speaker 1: the lyrics were suggested to me by him and just

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Speaker 1: in conversation. He had a worry of describing things about

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Speaker 1: the natural forces and various things that he would say

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Speaker 1: that gave me an idea of what I wanted to put.

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Speaker 1: I wanted to construct the lyrics only when the natural

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Speaker 1: forces told the world it's getting old. Do I worry? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I worry? Can you dig it about the human soul?

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Speaker 1: So some of some of his conversation influenced my writing

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Speaker 1: of the lyrics. Was it common for you or uncommon

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Speaker 1: for you you to sort of derive inspiration for a

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Speaker 1: song or an album from political happenings of the time. Well,

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Speaker 1: I've been politically engaged just about all my career. All

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Speaker 1: my albums have some make some illusion to struggle for

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Speaker 1: African Americans to attain equal equal rights. So it was

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Speaker 1: not unusual that Nattica Blues was dedicated and focused very

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Speaker 1: intensely on the on the civil rights struggle. Because I

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Speaker 1: was an activist on the streets with a very Baraka

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Speaker 1: and people Calvin Hicks, people like that, and we were

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Speaker 1: frequently on the streets of Harlem, with handing out the

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Speaker 1: handbills and occasionally making speeches on the street to the people.

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Speaker 1: So it was not unusual that Attica was so focused. Well,

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Speaker 1: when did you first become politically aware in terms of

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Speaker 1: the African American struggle for dignity, equality, freedom. There's a

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Speaker 1: very young man I remember in the third grade the

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Speaker 1: teacher asked us to write a paper about anything. Couldn't

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Speaker 1: write about much at that age, but I wrote a

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Speaker 1: paper about the struggle of black people to be free.

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Speaker 1: And she was really quite amazed, and she asked me

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Speaker 1: where did I get those ideas from? And I said

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Speaker 1: from my father and the man upstairs. It was Billy Myers,

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Speaker 1: who rented an apartment in my family's house. My father

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Speaker 1: and he used to on the weekends would discuss political events.

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Speaker 1: So I was very early inversed in in the civil

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Speaker 1: rights dialogue. That would have been maybe mid forties. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I would say a lot of people now don't think

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Speaker 1: about there being a robust civil rights movement. You know,

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Speaker 1: doctor King and Salma and all that is in you know,

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Speaker 1: the fifties. Maybe ten years after this, well, there was

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Speaker 1: no movement, but black people were very aware of the

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Speaker 1: contradictions in the society, and my father and a man

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Speaker 1: upstairs just to frequently discuss the inconsistencies that existed in

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Speaker 1: black life, visa be the struggle to be freedom, which

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Speaker 1: which was almost continual after the end slavery, we've continually

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Speaker 1: fought to extricate ourselves from oppression. Your dad seems like

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Speaker 1: you must have had a pretty big influence on you.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you're citing him as as a person would

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Speaker 1: kind of opened your mind and was you would always

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Speaker 1: hear him talk about the struggle for black freedom, and

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Speaker 1: I know he also played banjo. Yeah, it was. He's

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Speaker 1: an influencer who playing music. And also his mother, my grandmother,

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Speaker 1: Mamma Rose, was very active in civil rights affairs and

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Speaker 1: and the Baptists. Black Baptists were very committed in the

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Speaker 1: in the South, so they had what might have had

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Speaker 1: amount to pre civil rights organizations. And then my grandmother

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Speaker 1: frequented and she she read quite a bit, she ran intensely,

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Speaker 1: and and her daughter, my aunt Advis was a school teacher,

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Speaker 1: so I was frequently acquainted with was going on in

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Speaker 1: the black community. Did your dad teach you to play

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Speaker 1: your first instrument. Well, my first instrument was the banjo,

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Speaker 1: and he taught me a few chords on the banjo.

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Speaker 1: I later took piano lessons formerly and clarinet, and a

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Speaker 1: studied a bit of saxophone with Tony Mitchell. And in

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Speaker 1: the early days when you were learning banjo with your dad,

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Speaker 1: what would you have been listening to or playing? Well,

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Speaker 1: what he was playing? In fact, he played. He taught

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Speaker 1: me the first few bars of the Charleston. The Charleston

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Speaker 1: like the dance Charleston, Charleston dumped up up Babe, Dub

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Speaker 1: dub d dot dot. That's James P. Johnson's. It was

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Speaker 1: a dance, and it was a dance that was inspired

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Speaker 1: by the music The Charleston. That's so cool. How did

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Speaker 1: you end up settling on sax Well, I was a

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Speaker 1: boy in school. I heard play well, we had quite

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Speaker 1: a couple of very good musicians, Brinkley Blackwell, Norman Satchel,

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Speaker 1: and a white white boy, George Obuletski. I believe it

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Speaker 1: was quite adapted the saxophone. So I was, you might say,

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Speaker 1: influenced by all three of them, especially Satchel, who one

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Speaker 1: day he played for the Art in the Assembly a

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Speaker 1: piece of Sunny Stitt stringing the jug and I went

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Speaker 1: home and I told my mother I want to get

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Speaker 1: a saxophone. I was about fifteen at that age. After

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Speaker 1: that time, I had been studying piano and clarinet. Philadelphia

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Speaker 1: is a rich jazz town. When did you start listening

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Speaker 1: to jazz? When did you become aware of it? And

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Speaker 1: when do you start becoming aware of the musicians who

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Speaker 1: were in your city? In Philly, first, I became aware

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Speaker 1: of the music, and that was from the beginning because

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Speaker 1: my father played what you called so called jazz music,

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Speaker 1: I called an African American music. From the very beginning,

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Speaker 1: that was all I listened to. He had recordings of

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Speaker 1: Duke Ellington, count By See a lot of blues recordings.

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Speaker 1: So through him I became aware of what was going on,

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Speaker 1: thinking about the people who are you're in your town,

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Speaker 1: the Heath Brothers, Coltrane. Yeah. I heard Jimmy when I

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Speaker 1: was seventeen. I believe I'd go into a concert of

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Speaker 1: stand Getz. He was playing at a place called Reynolds

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Speaker 1: Hall in Philadelphia, and he was there was Jimmy and

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Speaker 1: Rainy and the place was packed. So they played the

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Speaker 1: first set, but Reynolds Hall had a number of rooms

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Speaker 1: that they rented out to private affairs, and a friend

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Speaker 1: of mine who I was with at the time, Eddie Ford,

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Speaker 1: we started wandering around the building and we hit on

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Speaker 1: this room where there was some kind of affair going

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Speaker 1: on and Jimmy Heath was playing, and I remember we

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Speaker 1: were so attracted by what he played that we never

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Speaker 1: went back to hear the stand guests after the intermission.

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Speaker 1: And I asked Jimmy when I took the liberty to

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Speaker 1: asked him if he would give me some help on

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Speaker 1: the saxophone, and he said he would. I remember going

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Speaker 1: to his home the following week and I found out

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Speaker 1: he didn't own a saxophone. In fact, he'd been playing

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Speaker 1: on a borrow at horn and I brought my sax

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Speaker 1: with me and he played it. I couldn't get much

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Speaker 1: shout of it, but I remember after he played it,

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Speaker 1: it seemed like a ticket the life of its own.

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Speaker 1: It's the color had changed the who He sort of

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Speaker 1: warmed it up and hung out with him all that

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Speaker 1: That afternoon he went to his jam session and played.

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Speaker 1: And the next week I was going back from my

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Speaker 1: lesson and his brother two d Albert answered the door

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Speaker 1: and he said, Jimmy's in the joint. He was in

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Speaker 1: jail and he stayed in jail for six years. WHOA,

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Speaker 1: I didn't. I didn't know that part of the story. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: he had. They had caught him with smoking jan on

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Speaker 1: the back of a car and he was imprisoned for

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Speaker 1: six years. So I never got the second lesson. Wow.

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Speaker 1: So he had one lesson with him, Yeah, And that

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Speaker 1: was really listening to him play, and that was quite

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Speaker 1: informative by itself. But I never really formally got to

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Speaker 1: study with him. I know. Not too long after that

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Speaker 1: you had you were in a band with Lee Morgan. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I met Lee as a kid. I was a year

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Speaker 1: older than him, but he was very advanced and he

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Speaker 1: was playing with really professional music. He was a professional

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Speaker 1: when I met him. He was playing with guys like

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Speaker 1: C Sharp and Coltrane. He was known even though he

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Speaker 1: was only fifteen or sixteen years old. I asked him

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Speaker 1: to give me some help on the instrument, and he

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Speaker 1: consented to do so. The first session I made with him,

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Speaker 1: I had only heard stern gets really on the saxophone,

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Speaker 1: and I tried to create my stand get sound, and

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Speaker 1: he and his friend who were observing me. They seemed

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Speaker 1: to be somewhat They thought it was rather peculiar. They

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Speaker 1: didn't I don't think that they They accepted my offering.

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Speaker 1: So finally he asked me to play something with him,

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Speaker 1: to play a blues and I learned the blues from

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Speaker 1: my father because I knew the blues instinctively. When I

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Speaker 1: finished playing this my solo, he said, man, don't ever change.

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Speaker 1: And that's how we developed a very lasting friendship. And

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Speaker 1: when he would have blues gigs, he would call me

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Speaker 1: to play with him. Because he played standards in Ballot,

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Speaker 1: he had a very wide knowledge of music, but I

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Speaker 1: was sort of limited to the blues. But I could

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Speaker 1: play the blues. So it's like you went back to

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Speaker 1: the source. Well, yeah, I used the sound that I knew.

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Speaker 1: I'd heard a lot of Bevin Webster prayers through the

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Speaker 1: recordings of my father, and I suppose that sounded a

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Speaker 1: little bit like Ben. That was my natural sound and

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Speaker 1: the sound that I later made my own. Yeah, Ben

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Speaker 1: Webster's quite a quite a soulful cat man. His sound

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Speaker 1: is oh yeah, soulful brother. We'll be right back with

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Speaker 1: more from Archie Shep after a quick break we're back

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Speaker 1: with more of my conversation with Archie Shep. So you

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Speaker 1: had a bean with Lee Morgan and Carl Holmes called

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Speaker 1: the Jolly Rompers. Well, in fact, I was with the

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Speaker 1: Jolly Carl and John Holmes. They had a band out

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Speaker 1: in Mullagrove, Pennsylvania. But I kept bugging, bugging them too

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Speaker 1: to get Lee Morgan in the band. So when they

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Speaker 1: got Lee, they fired me. You know, so much for

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Speaker 1: trying to do a good thing, Arn'tie. Yeah, yeah, trying

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Speaker 1: to help my friends get a gig. You mentioned that

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Speaker 1: Lee Morgan was a year or two younger than you,

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Speaker 1: but when you look at his career compared to yours,

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Speaker 1: you know, his was much more sort of straight ahead.

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Speaker 1: So it's funny to me that you two coming from

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Speaker 1: the same town, that you, being the older of the two,

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Speaker 1: kind of had this much more from the start, this

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Speaker 1: very adventurous career where you were really exploring and stretching out.

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Speaker 1: And not that Lee wasn't Lee was incredible, but his

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Speaker 1: sound was much more in line with the hard bop

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Speaker 1: sound tradition. Yeah that was because I seemed up the

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Speaker 1: Cecil Taylor. Really, I went in a direction I never

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Speaker 1: thought I would, in fact so called free jazz reimprovisation

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Speaker 1: that was encouraged by Cecil, and he kind of opened

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Speaker 1: my ears to another direction. And Cecil was a piano

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Speaker 1: player and maybe also like a poet from New York. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it was one of the first to really completely dispensed

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Speaker 1: with traditional harmony and tempe. And after Ornette came to

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Speaker 1: New York. And I don't know, Ornette was probably doing

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Speaker 1: the same thing out in California, but ct was the

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Speaker 1: influence in New York. When did you first hear Cecil

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Speaker 1: Taylor and what made you when you heard him gravitate

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Speaker 1: towards that sound? Well, I didn't really like the sound

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Speaker 1: I heard him on record, and I wasn't very impressed.

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Speaker 1: My background was, as you said, very much oriented towards

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Speaker 1: lee and the kind of music he played. But his

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Speaker 1: bass player heard me at a jam session in New

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Speaker 1: York and Cecil was looking for a saxophone player, so

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Speaker 1: he recommended me to Cecil, and Cecil hired me without

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Speaker 1: having really heard me, on the advice of his bass player.

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Speaker 1: I met him one night on the streets in New

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Speaker 1: York in the West Village, and somehow he seemed to

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Speaker 1: know me though I had never been introduced to him.

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Speaker 1: So you're Archie Shepp. He said, you want to make

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Speaker 1: a record, and I said yeah. Almost immediately after I

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Speaker 1: met him, we started rehearsing for a recording which we

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Speaker 1: made the World of Cecil Taylor and I was with

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Speaker 1: his man that We didn't work much for about two years,

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Speaker 1: and he was quite an influence on me ideationally in

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Speaker 1: terms of my ideas. And he was the first time

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Speaker 1: I heard of Malcolm X was through Cecil really and

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Speaker 1: we used to have discussions after rehearsals went on for hours.

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Speaker 1: So he was quite quite an enormous influence on my

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Speaker 1: political and social ideas. Did you ever see Malcolm speak

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Speaker 1: in those days? Oh? Yeah, I heard him at Temple

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Speaker 1: Number seven and then on the streets of Harlem. He

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Speaker 1: spoke when one afternoon the street was crowded with the

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Speaker 1: people or you could see his heads black heads, and

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Speaker 1: and the police at that time were mostly white. They

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Speaker 1: were in the crowd. They were read with with probably fear.

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Speaker 1: And Malcolm he mounted the podium and at that time

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Speaker 1: you had to have the American flag when you gave

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Speaker 1: a speech. You'd probably still do, and he had this

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Speaker 1: little flag that you get from Wolvers. You could hardly

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Speaker 1: see it from where I was, and he planted it

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Speaker 1: on the podium and he said, you see that flag.

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Speaker 1: Your mother was raped under that flag in the crowd,

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Speaker 1: and oh yeah, he says, your father was murdered under

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Speaker 1: that plague. And the police were really visibly frightened by

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Speaker 1: intimidated by his language. But he was a probable speaker,

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Speaker 1: and I was immediately attracted to his discourse. Around the

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Speaker 1: same time, you not only fall in with Cecil Taylor,

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Speaker 1: who's ideologically expanding your horizon, but musically be expanding not

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Speaker 1: only your vocabulary but the way you think of the

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Speaker 1: framework for the music you play. And then you're also

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Speaker 1: hearing Malcolm X speaking Harlem and at the time, no

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Speaker 1: one else was framing the struggle for African Americans the

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Speaker 1: way Malcolm was. He had a great way of making

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Speaker 1: you understand your own condition yeah and still just sense

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Speaker 1: of identity, and made you proud of your African heritage

300
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Speaker 1: because he would often talk about the anti sdents of slavery,

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Speaker 1: and it was an awakening. It broughtened my horizons in

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Speaker 1: a way that I never imagined coming from Philadelphia. So

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Speaker 1: Cecil Taylor was a big influence on sort of your

304
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Speaker 1: journey to avant garde music. But also from your hometown

305
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Speaker 1: is Coltrane, who we were friends with and played with,

306
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Speaker 1: who was also a person who really moved things forward

307
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Speaker 1: with in terms of where jazz could go, along with Ornett,

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Speaker 1: along with Cecil. Did you pick up any of that

309
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Speaker 1: from Coltrane as well? Well? John confirmed the direction I

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Speaker 1: was taking. He came out of the tradition, and like

311
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Speaker 1: Hornette and Cecil, he didn't start on the fringes of

312
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Speaker 1: the music. He began right in the center of it.

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Speaker 1: And he was an improviser par excellence. And I was

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Speaker 1: very influenced by primarily by his work, and as I say,

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Speaker 1: he convinced me that by by example, that I was

316
00:24:38,836 --> 00:24:43,396
Speaker 1: right in terms of what my search because he did.

317
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Speaker 1: He later recorded with Cecil Taylor, and he was a

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Speaker 1: close friend of Hornett's, and so when I met him

319
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Speaker 1: at the Five Spot, he was playing with Monk and

320
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Speaker 1: he never really took the horn out of his mouth

321
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Speaker 1: from the time he started on the intermissions, when when

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Speaker 1: the other guys would be at the bar, he was

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Speaker 1: he went into the kitchen and he was practicing the

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Speaker 1: pieces that he that he had learned from Monk he

325
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Speaker 1: was refining them. And so after I heard him one night,

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Speaker 1: I asked him I was I was at the club

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Speaker 1: of your night to hear him. I asked him if

328
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Speaker 1: he would help me with the saxophone, and he graciously conceded,

329
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Speaker 1: and I was at his house the next morning at

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Speaker 1: ten o'clock. Of course, he didn't get home until four

331
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Speaker 1: in the morning, and then he usually practiced, so he

332
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Speaker 1: went to sleep, and so he probably hadn't gone to

333
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Speaker 1: bed and sleep until about six, and I was there

334
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Speaker 1: at ten. So his wife at the time, Naima, told

335
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Speaker 1: me that he was asleep, but I could wait for him.

336
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Speaker 1: So at about one o'clock he got up and he

337
00:26:06,236 --> 00:26:09,756
Speaker 1: went right to the saxophone, which was on the sofa,

338
00:26:10,796 --> 00:26:15,276
Speaker 1: and he played about fifteen minutes and under rooted something

339
00:26:15,396 --> 00:26:19,716
Speaker 1: like I imagined was giant steps, of which later became

340
00:26:19,876 --> 00:26:24,756
Speaker 1: Giants Steps. Then when he asked me to play for him,

341
00:26:25,276 --> 00:26:29,356
Speaker 1: and his advice to me was to keep my hands

342
00:26:29,436 --> 00:26:33,356
Speaker 1: closer to the keys so I would be able to

343
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Speaker 1: move faster. And he didn't really formally teach me. I

344
00:26:40,836 --> 00:26:45,516
Speaker 1: just had conversations with him. I remember talking with him

345
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Speaker 1: one day, and he spent the whole afternoon talking about

346
00:26:49,716 --> 00:26:54,556
Speaker 1: Monk and Miles and I'll teatum. And he explained to

347
00:26:54,676 --> 00:27:00,036
Speaker 1: me how he resolved chords, maybe starting a fifth away

348
00:27:00,116 --> 00:27:05,356
Speaker 1: from the tonic and coming down and half steps playing scales,

349
00:27:06,156 --> 00:27:09,876
Speaker 1: something that I later tried to adapt to my own style.

350
00:27:10,476 --> 00:27:17,636
Speaker 1: But really basically it was a communion of my appreciation

351
00:27:17,796 --> 00:27:26,476
Speaker 1: for him, and more than actual saxophone lessons, we became

352
00:27:27,876 --> 00:27:34,596
Speaker 1: conversant and and I really, I guess because I appreciate

353
00:27:34,676 --> 00:27:37,476
Speaker 1: it him so much. I look looks up to him

354
00:27:37,676 --> 00:27:41,156
Speaker 1: as an older brother. I had been an only child,

355
00:27:41,356 --> 00:27:44,876
Speaker 1: but an older brother that I wish I had had

356
00:27:45,676 --> 00:27:51,276
Speaker 1: and probably wish you had more time with him, sure too, Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely.

357
00:27:51,596 --> 00:27:55,796
Speaker 1: And John Coldman helped you get your recordy with Impulse, right, yeah,

358
00:27:56,156 --> 00:28:01,436
Speaker 1: he was essential in my getting that recording. I had

359
00:28:01,476 --> 00:28:06,356
Speaker 1: been calling Bob Theel, the A and R Man Impulse.

360
00:28:07,076 --> 00:28:10,196
Speaker 1: I call him frequently. At the time. I was un

361
00:28:10,276 --> 00:28:13,356
Speaker 1: welfare and I used to take a dollar a day

362
00:28:13,476 --> 00:28:16,636
Speaker 1: and change it to dimes custom dime to make a

363
00:28:16,716 --> 00:28:23,116
Speaker 1: phone call, and I would call his office, his secretary Lillian,

364
00:28:23,516 --> 00:28:27,796
Speaker 1: whom I got to know later on fairly well. But

365
00:28:27,996 --> 00:28:32,356
Speaker 1: I always say Bob is out to lunch or he's

366
00:28:32,396 --> 00:28:38,036
Speaker 1: gone for the day. Finally, I asked John, on the

367
00:28:38,116 --> 00:28:42,756
Speaker 1: advice of Bill Dixon, who was working together. He said, well,

368
00:28:42,836 --> 00:28:45,836
Speaker 1: col change your friend, why don't you ask him to

369
00:28:45,996 --> 00:28:49,116
Speaker 1: get you a record date. So I kind of gave

370
00:28:49,196 --> 00:28:53,116
Speaker 1: me enough of a nerve to ask John the people

371
00:28:53,156 --> 00:28:57,716
Speaker 1: to help me talk to Bob Thield. And he looked

372
00:28:57,756 --> 00:29:00,836
Speaker 1: at me very hard, and he said, you know, a

373
00:29:00,916 --> 00:29:05,356
Speaker 1: lot of people think I'm easy. And I said, John,

374
00:29:05,436 --> 00:29:10,476
Speaker 1: and that's not where I'm coming from. I'm serious. And

375
00:29:13,076 --> 00:29:16,756
Speaker 1: he knew I respected him, so he said, well, I'll

376
00:29:16,796 --> 00:29:19,596
Speaker 1: see what I can do. The next day, I called

377
00:29:20,676 --> 00:29:25,636
Speaker 1: and Lee and the secretary said, Bob's he's out to lunch,

378
00:29:26,476 --> 00:29:30,356
Speaker 1: but he's expecting your call. In that way, I arranged

379
00:29:30,716 --> 00:29:33,996
Speaker 1: a recording date. He tried to talk me out of

380
00:29:34,076 --> 00:29:38,036
Speaker 1: him by saying that you guys are avant garde and

381
00:29:38,156 --> 00:29:41,396
Speaker 1: you want to play your own music, you will have

382
00:29:41,516 --> 00:29:45,156
Speaker 1: to play the songs of Coltrane. But I had already

383
00:29:45,236 --> 00:29:51,236
Speaker 1: been rehearsing. I knew that that was his line, and

384
00:29:51,436 --> 00:29:56,796
Speaker 1: I had already been rehearsing with Roswell Rudd a repertory

385
00:29:57,196 --> 00:30:01,116
Speaker 1: of John's music. So I said, yeah, I know, and

386
00:30:02,276 --> 00:30:07,236
Speaker 1: I'm ready. So that the date was arranged and when

387
00:30:07,316 --> 00:30:12,076
Speaker 1: we arrived at the studio, Rudy Van Yelder's Bob, but

388
00:30:12,316 --> 00:30:15,556
Speaker 1: he really was he didn't want to do this recording

389
00:30:15,596 --> 00:30:18,396
Speaker 1: at all. He has his back turned to me and

390
00:30:18,556 --> 00:30:21,756
Speaker 1: all I could see was smoke coming out of his pipe.

391
00:30:22,396 --> 00:30:27,076
Speaker 1: And by the time we did the third recording and

392
00:30:27,236 --> 00:30:31,116
Speaker 1: so he said, hey, this stuff is great. I'm gonna

393
00:30:31,156 --> 00:30:33,196
Speaker 1: call John and ask him to come and hear you.

394
00:30:33,956 --> 00:30:37,676
Speaker 1: So he called Sharane out on Long Island. We were

395
00:30:37,716 --> 00:30:45,116
Speaker 1: in New Jersey, and Shane very graciously conceded to come

396
00:30:45,236 --> 00:30:48,276
Speaker 1: to the recording date. It was late at night, and

397
00:30:49,836 --> 00:30:54,316
Speaker 1: so when he arrived you will see on the album

398
00:30:54,516 --> 00:30:58,836
Speaker 1: cover he doesn't have on any sucks. But I later

399
00:30:58,916 --> 00:31:06,156
Speaker 1: heard that John didn't wear socks anyway. So and he

400
00:31:06,316 --> 00:31:09,196
Speaker 1: played Bob. Theeld played some of the examples of the

401
00:31:09,276 --> 00:31:12,596
Speaker 1: recording for Train and the only one that he didn't

402
00:31:12,636 --> 00:31:15,356
Speaker 1: like was the piece that I had written. It was

403
00:31:15,396 --> 00:31:20,756
Speaker 1: a piece called Rufus Swung is back at lasted the

404
00:31:20,836 --> 00:31:24,996
Speaker 1: win in his next step. It was a title. It

405
00:31:25,236 --> 00:31:31,476
Speaker 1: was a bit lengthy and political in nature, and he

406
00:31:31,596 --> 00:31:33,756
Speaker 1: didn't wanted to use that, and he said, I don't

407
00:31:33,796 --> 00:31:37,796
Speaker 1: like this recording, and uh, he played it for John

408
00:31:37,916 --> 00:31:40,876
Speaker 1: and John said I like it, Bob, so they left

409
00:31:40,916 --> 00:31:44,916
Speaker 1: it him. So that's the only piece that I wrote

410
00:31:44,996 --> 00:31:50,396
Speaker 1: that's on the recording. It's the recording. It's war for Train, Yeah,

411
00:31:50,436 --> 00:31:54,876
Speaker 1: and it's a Those are some beautiful renditions of of Coltranes. Yeah.

412
00:31:54,956 --> 00:31:59,796
Speaker 1: I thought we we nailed it. We got it wasn't

413
00:32:00,116 --> 00:32:02,836
Speaker 1: exactly the way he would have played it. That's what

414
00:32:02,956 --> 00:32:07,116
Speaker 1: makes it great, though, Thank you. And you also played

415
00:32:07,396 --> 00:32:10,916
Speaker 1: on the Love Supreme sessions with Coltrane and then also

416
00:32:10,996 --> 00:32:14,996
Speaker 1: on the Ascension record. Yes, how are those sessions with John?

417
00:32:15,676 --> 00:32:21,276
Speaker 1: I was always overwhelmed by the presidents of John Coltrane,

418
00:32:21,316 --> 00:32:26,516
Speaker 1: and I always tried to do my best and to

419
00:32:26,676 --> 00:32:32,156
Speaker 1: present my work as originally as possible. I Love Supreme,

420
00:32:32,516 --> 00:32:38,356
Speaker 1: I was, I suppose somewhat intimidated, though he didn't mean

421
00:32:38,476 --> 00:32:41,796
Speaker 1: for me to be. But I had a problem just

422
00:32:42,756 --> 00:32:48,796
Speaker 1: expressing what I really might have done, because I could

423
00:32:48,836 --> 00:32:54,316
Speaker 1: have really approached the song more moodally and gotten into it.

424
00:32:54,556 --> 00:32:59,036
Speaker 1: But I wanted to do something that was somehow different,

425
00:32:59,596 --> 00:33:03,876
Speaker 1: and so the first takes I don't know I don't.

426
00:33:03,916 --> 00:33:06,436
Speaker 1: I didn't feel like I got into the music like

427
00:33:06,596 --> 00:33:11,956
Speaker 1: I really wanted to. But as we did several other

428
00:33:12,076 --> 00:33:16,236
Speaker 1: ticks they've released them recently, I can see that I

429
00:33:17,716 --> 00:33:22,956
Speaker 1: relaxed and I got into the music more intensely. What

430
00:33:23,116 --> 00:33:26,156
Speaker 1: did you think of the music he was making on

431
00:33:26,196 --> 00:33:28,156
Speaker 1: A Love Supreme and Ascension too at that time? I mean,

432
00:33:28,276 --> 00:33:31,916
Speaker 1: was it surprising to you that that's what he was composing? No, no,

433
00:33:32,236 --> 00:33:37,796
Speaker 1: not at all. In fact, when we did Ascension, he

434
00:33:37,956 --> 00:33:40,796
Speaker 1: had a set of chords that he gave to McCoy

435
00:33:41,236 --> 00:33:45,316
Speaker 1: to play as the sort of interludes, and he would

436
00:33:45,436 --> 00:33:49,156
Speaker 1: play on the interludes. I often wish I had asked

437
00:33:49,236 --> 00:33:52,636
Speaker 1: him what were the chords that he gave McCoy to play,

438
00:33:53,076 --> 00:33:56,436
Speaker 1: But I didn't think to do that. After a quick break,

439
00:33:56,556 --> 00:34:03,036
Speaker 1: we'll be back with more from Archie Chep. We're back

440
00:34:03,076 --> 00:34:06,596
Speaker 1: with the rest of my conversation with Archie Chap. There's

441
00:34:06,636 --> 00:34:10,516
Speaker 1: a lot of Latin influence in your music, even songs

442
00:34:10,596 --> 00:34:15,316
Speaker 1: that might not even maybe harmonically or melodically sound Latin.

443
00:34:15,436 --> 00:34:18,836
Speaker 1: There's a there's a you know, like a three over two,

444
00:34:19,116 --> 00:34:21,876
Speaker 1: or you know, there's a rhythm sometimes going on and

445
00:34:21,956 --> 00:34:25,076
Speaker 1: through your music. Where did born in the South, move

446
00:34:25,156 --> 00:34:29,276
Speaker 1: to Philly, Dad plays banjo, slot of blues, going on

447
00:34:29,556 --> 00:34:32,836
Speaker 1: jazz music, of course, Where did this Latin influence coming?

448
00:34:32,836 --> 00:34:36,516
Speaker 1: At what point did that enter your consciousness? Well? When

449
00:34:36,556 --> 00:34:39,636
Speaker 1: I moved to New York, I played in the Puerto

450
00:34:39,756 --> 00:34:45,836
Speaker 1: Rican band with a guy called Chito Castro. He features

451
00:34:45,956 --> 00:34:52,956
Speaker 1: that marengue and rhythms like that, which I quickly and

452
00:34:54,196 --> 00:34:58,996
Speaker 1: it became attached to. And I still like those rhythms.

453
00:35:00,156 --> 00:35:03,596
Speaker 1: What is it about those rhythms that appeal to you. Well,

454
00:35:03,676 --> 00:35:07,716
Speaker 1: there's sense of dance and the dances they do are

455
00:35:08,316 --> 00:35:13,076
Speaker 1: really quite exciting. And it's interesting too, because by the

456
00:35:13,196 --> 00:35:17,756
Speaker 1: time you start recording records the sixties, jazz has really

457
00:35:17,796 --> 00:35:21,516
Speaker 1: gotten away from the idea of jazz is being dance

458
00:35:21,636 --> 00:35:24,956
Speaker 1: music is kind of gone or out of favor, and

459
00:35:25,596 --> 00:35:29,276
Speaker 1: you're bringing this element back into it. It's kind of interesting. Well,

460
00:35:29,436 --> 00:35:34,996
Speaker 1: I did, and I always consider dancing and essential fund

461
00:35:35,116 --> 00:35:40,836
Speaker 1: of African American music expression. This is a good chance

462
00:35:40,876 --> 00:35:43,516
Speaker 1: to talk about why you don't like the term jazz.

463
00:35:43,556 --> 00:35:46,916
Speaker 1: I read at some point the word art you said

464
00:35:46,956 --> 00:35:50,716
Speaker 1: you felt is a passive word. There's no function to

465
00:35:50,836 --> 00:35:52,836
Speaker 1: the word art. Art. It's not a functional thing, and

466
00:35:52,956 --> 00:35:56,156
Speaker 1: you consider at least your music, or maybe music in general,

467
00:35:56,236 --> 00:36:00,196
Speaker 1: to be functional. Is that still something you believe? Is

468
00:36:00,236 --> 00:36:03,996
Speaker 1: that something you ascribed to still? Yeah? Absolutely, And dance

469
00:36:04,156 --> 00:36:09,796
Speaker 1: is a function of music. So yes, I do feel

470
00:36:09,876 --> 00:36:15,516
Speaker 1: that the word art is a rather abstract unless it's

471
00:36:15,556 --> 00:36:19,596
Speaker 1: connected to something that has meaning. I think a lot

472
00:36:19,636 --> 00:36:23,636
Speaker 1: of people would say avant garde, and you, you know you,

473
00:36:23,716 --> 00:36:26,916
Speaker 1: I think you do consider the music you play avant garde.

474
00:36:27,716 --> 00:36:35,116
Speaker 1: That drings up an anecdote Duke and the Max and

475
00:36:35,396 --> 00:36:42,956
Speaker 1: Charlie Mingus but recording Money Jungle, and the story goes

476
00:36:43,116 --> 00:36:49,156
Speaker 1: that mister Mingus asked mister Ellington, why don't we do

477
00:36:49,356 --> 00:36:53,436
Speaker 1: something avant garde Duke, and Duke said, oh, Charles, and

478
00:36:53,556 --> 00:36:57,316
Speaker 1: let's not go back to that. So that's sort of

479
00:36:57,356 --> 00:37:00,996
Speaker 1: how I feel about avant guard because when I was

480
00:37:01,076 --> 00:37:04,316
Speaker 1: a younger man, they called me the leader of the

481
00:37:04,436 --> 00:37:07,676
Speaker 1: avant guard, and now they call me a veteran of

482
00:37:07,796 --> 00:37:13,036
Speaker 1: the avant guard. Duke's idea was, when you name the music,

483
00:37:14,156 --> 00:37:19,116
Speaker 1: you date it in time. So avalant guard is a

484
00:37:19,236 --> 00:37:22,876
Speaker 1: way of describing the music, but it doesn't fix the

485
00:37:23,036 --> 00:37:28,276
Speaker 1: music in a block of time. Imagine you feel the

486
00:37:28,356 --> 00:37:31,316
Speaker 1: same way about the term jazz. The label jazz, well, yeah,

487
00:37:31,396 --> 00:37:34,876
Speaker 1: and then I think the jazz is really a term

488
00:37:34,996 --> 00:37:41,036
Speaker 1: that limits the expression and the true meaning of African

489
00:37:41,076 --> 00:37:45,276
Speaker 1: American music, so that somehow blacks are left out of

490
00:37:45,356 --> 00:37:48,756
Speaker 1: the equation. They have made a part of the equation,

491
00:37:49,836 --> 00:37:54,636
Speaker 1: but in fact they're never given credit for the creation

492
00:37:55,676 --> 00:38:00,116
Speaker 1: of the music. It wouldn't exist without without our people.

493
00:38:00,836 --> 00:38:04,396
Speaker 1: Not to say that white people can't play that music,

494
00:38:05,196 --> 00:38:11,556
Speaker 1: but that's defined by African American innovations. Going back to

495
00:38:11,676 --> 00:38:16,676
Speaker 1: Louis Arms Show up to Coltrane, all the key innovators

496
00:38:16,756 --> 00:38:21,716
Speaker 1: have been African Americans. In fact, that the word jazz

497
00:38:21,876 --> 00:38:26,476
Speaker 1: is a French word, in my opinion, it's not in

498
00:38:26,916 --> 00:38:33,196
Speaker 1: the American lexicon English lexicon. There is a word in

499
00:38:33,356 --> 00:38:39,716
Speaker 1: French jazz a, which means to talk light batter, And

500
00:38:41,156 --> 00:38:45,516
Speaker 1: there's a town in France called Jazz, which is the

501
00:38:45,676 --> 00:38:51,836
Speaker 1: way jazz was originally spelled j ss. Yes, so it

502
00:38:52,036 --> 00:38:56,236
Speaker 1: seems to me to confirm the origins of the word

503
00:38:56,436 --> 00:39:00,196
Speaker 1: to the French people who settled in New Orleans and

504
00:39:00,316 --> 00:39:03,196
Speaker 1: who gave it the name jazz. I mean, yeah, that

505
00:39:03,436 --> 00:39:05,156
Speaker 1: would done to make sense. Then that would be the

506
00:39:05,236 --> 00:39:09,476
Speaker 1: French connection, Yeah, the French connection. Yeah. Yes. Do you

507
00:39:09,516 --> 00:39:13,596
Speaker 1: have a composition of yours that you return to most often,

508
00:39:13,716 --> 00:39:17,116
Speaker 1: either in your mind or and you're playing something you

509
00:39:17,236 --> 00:39:20,516
Speaker 1: think about most often? In other words, a favorite composition

510
00:39:20,676 --> 00:39:23,116
Speaker 1: or one that you just, for whatever reason, returned to

511
00:39:23,956 --> 00:39:31,116
Speaker 1: most often. I have a piece Ima, which is dedicated

512
00:39:31,156 --> 00:39:34,436
Speaker 1: to my daughter. I played that quite a bit, and

513
00:39:35,636 --> 00:39:41,276
Speaker 1: another piece I dedicated to Alma Hope Hope too, which

514
00:39:41,476 --> 00:39:44,676
Speaker 1: I have played quite a bit. I'll ask one last question.

515
00:39:44,996 --> 00:39:47,996
Speaker 1: When Quincy Jones put out Back on the Block in

516
00:39:48,116 --> 00:39:51,636
Speaker 1: the early nineties, I remember that you weren't the biggest

517
00:39:51,716 --> 00:39:54,876
Speaker 1: fan of it because it put people like Dizzy Gillespie

518
00:39:55,036 --> 00:39:59,276
Speaker 1: and surrounded them by these different trappions, these different idioms.

519
00:39:59,556 --> 00:40:02,916
Speaker 1: So I was curious, you know, how your views have

520
00:40:03,236 --> 00:40:06,036
Speaker 1: changed since then. You've never seemed to be a person

521
00:40:06,116 --> 00:40:09,796
Speaker 1: who felt restricted to one style music, So I'm just

522
00:40:09,956 --> 00:40:15,196
Speaker 1: curious how you felt collaborating with your nephew Who's Who's

523
00:40:15,236 --> 00:40:20,236
Speaker 1: a rapper, rap poetic. I feels very close to rap

524
00:40:20,556 --> 00:40:26,676
Speaker 1: because I did would would would be called a slam today,

525
00:40:26,836 --> 00:40:32,436
Speaker 1: I guess and tribute to my grandmother Murmur Rose back

526
00:40:32,476 --> 00:40:40,476
Speaker 1: in the sixties, and I did another poem set to

527
00:40:40,636 --> 00:40:46,836
Speaker 1: music called the Wedding when Elsa in California. So I

528
00:40:47,556 --> 00:40:50,396
Speaker 1: feel that in a way, I'm kind of one of

529
00:40:50,516 --> 00:40:57,436
Speaker 1: the originators of rap music, along with the Last Poets

530
00:40:57,636 --> 00:41:03,436
Speaker 1: and Lengths and News and Melbourne Van Trifles. I was

531
00:41:03,676 --> 00:41:09,916
Speaker 1: very early into mixing words and music, So playing with

532
00:41:10,156 --> 00:41:15,756
Speaker 1: my nephew was really a privilege. I enjoyed it very

533
00:41:15,876 --> 00:41:20,396
Speaker 1: much because it's like getting back into something that I

534
00:41:21,316 --> 00:41:26,876
Speaker 1: had been explored many years before. Well, Archie, I don't

535
00:41:26,916 --> 00:41:28,836
Speaker 1: want to keep you from your practice. I know you're

536
00:41:28,836 --> 00:41:31,796
Speaker 1: gonna be practicing now. Thank you so much for doing this.

537
00:41:31,916 --> 00:41:34,596
Speaker 1: It's really an honor, and it's been an honor to

538
00:41:34,636 --> 00:41:36,596
Speaker 1: listen to your music all these years as well. Thank

539
00:41:36,636 --> 00:41:39,956
Speaker 1: you so much, Thank thank you. You've asked some very

540
00:41:40,076 --> 00:41:47,716
Speaker 1: interesting questions and this is a very interesting interview. Thanks

541
00:41:47,876 --> 00:41:50,876
Speaker 1: Archie Chip for sharing stories with us from his incredible career.

542
00:41:51,516 --> 00:41:53,596
Speaker 1: Do you hear our favorite Archie Cheps songs? Tad to

543
00:41:53,676 --> 00:41:57,116
Speaker 1: Broken Record podcast dot com. Be sure to subscribe to

544
00:41:57,116 --> 00:42:00,796
Speaker 1: our YouTube channel at YouTube dot com slash Broken Record Podcast.

545
00:42:01,316 --> 00:42:04,316
Speaker 1: We can find all of our new episodes. You can

546
00:42:04,396 --> 00:42:07,316
Speaker 1: follow us on Twitter apt broken Record. Broken Record is

547
00:42:07,316 --> 00:42:12,196
Speaker 1: produced helpfully Arose, Jason Gambrell, Martin Gonzalez, Eric Sandler, and

548
00:42:12,316 --> 00:42:16,236
Speaker 1: Jennifer Sanchez, with engineering help from Nick Chafee. Our executive

549
00:42:16,276 --> 00:42:19,836
Speaker 1: producer is mil LaBelle Broken Record is a production of Pushman.

550
00:42:19,876 --> 00:42:23,676
Speaker 1: In his stuis also consider becoming a Pushnick. Pushnick is

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00:42:23,676 --> 00:42:27,236
Speaker 1: a podcast subscription that offers bonus content and add free

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Speaker 1: uninterrupted listening for four ninety nine. An look for Pushnick

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554
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Speaker 1: please Rember to share, rate, and review us on your

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Speaker 1: podcast app. A team musics by Henny beats Down Justin

556
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Speaker 1: Richmond