A Conversation With ... Jane Siberry

Jane Siberry is that Toronto/Montreal connection that owes much to Joni Mitchell and those coffee houses, nights at the Riverboat and Leonard Cohen – artists who paint with words.  Too often those who practice the gruelling art of songwriting are accepting of a lesser phrase and common lyric and charge on. Not the case with a Siberry, Mitchell or Cohen. The written word is as precious as the fluids we drink, the air we inhale and food we depend on for survival. I caught up with Siberry this week and posed a few questions.
Bill King: Where are you with the recording situation now, you said in the past you’ve abandoned the traditional ways?

Jane Siberry: I’ve just finished recording and haven’t gone on to any new stuff. But what I will do when I have time and inspiration – I will just do one song at a time. I like the idea. It’s not so daunting as doing a whole recording and get it all out. It was a long process to make the last recording.

B.K: You went a different route on … crowd sourcing to raise funds, and it went very well.
J.S: Yes, and to add to that – that was about 25% of the full cost of it. It was over five years and I had Peter Kiesewalter, a Canadian producer who did a version of the record too. It’s been a circuitous route.

B.K: Does it take a long period for you to advance songs from the written page to a recording?
J.S: It can. I’m pretty particular and can’t tell till I hear it. If I have ideas for people to sing with me I don’t know until I hear it and if it’s not right I just keep trying. I often write right in the studio and what I use is what I first come up with.

B.K: Do you favor a particular backing instrumentation?
J.S: I love it – playing around with songs and particular instrumentation and I love working with real musicians.

B.K: The touring?
J.S: I have been touring and found oddly, that’s the only way I can support the recording was to keep going out and touring. I may have preferred just concentrating on the recording but it got me out of the malls. It also keeps your different set of skills up which you use in the studio too. You just probably don’t hear about it because it’s mostly in the States is part of the reason. I continue performing – I do birthday parties, bar mitzvahs.

B.K: What would you do for a request like that?
J.S: People invite me to the strangest things and I tend to do them because I really enjoy it. I’m doing like a girl’s birthday party and she has a tattoo of one of the lines in my song and her sister wants to do a surprise thing for her. I’m going to go to her party and play two songs. I quite like it.

B.K: The Globe & Mail asked me last year to name a couple epic concerts I was moved by. I often point to two I have actually teared up in. One was yours at Massey Hall back in the 80s’. I can’t explain why – but I wasn’t alone in that room. It was the voices, the ethereal sounds and high emotion.

J.S: As I started to find my footing as a musician and even in the beginning I would find people, when they tuned in to the emotional part of it – that’s what people seemed to really like. I started noticing that and Massey Hall was another leap for me because it was the first time I could actually hear myself when playing with a band. I could get super quiet and hear it come back like a crystal from the back and thought, this is what music is supposed to be, not struggling to play with a band and get through the songs. I’ve kept that and when I play with bands, to get that clarity where people can hear every word – I can feel them and they can feel me – I can hold space for the listener if you know that term, I think that’s where a lot of magic happens. So when I arrange stuff with a band I never let the drummer play any cymbals when I’m singing. I usually don’t play with drums anyway – I’m just sort of sick of drums. It used to be just tapping my foot and then it exaggerated into this assault and battery. It just means musicians have to groove better with no drummer. It all works. I like how it works without drums.

When you drink you really like loud drums. I don’t drink anymore, maybe that’s why.
What I’ve learned as I continue learning and doing salons – about 100 of them all over the world in people’s living rooms, unamplified - I’ve even got where I don’t play guitar when I’m singing live. I stop a lot. You really sense the circle frayed when they can’t hear the words. That circle of connection. It’s made me play guitar and piano differently.

B.K: Has the subject matter in your songs changed much over the years?
J.S: It’s a relief to talk about music, Bill, instead of personal details. I like to talk about this.
It has changed a lot and I at a certain point, probably when I changed my name and wanted much, much less talking with people and many fewer possessions. I also decided I didn’t want to smokescreen people with my lyrics. I’m much more direct in who I write to so the songs aren’t as abstract without anchoring them to you, the person I’m listening too. It just seems super important to connect more than ever these days. Beyond that there is a whole kind of music in my head I haven’t even got to – the kind of music I’m supposed to write? I haven’t even got near and can’t even say what it is but it has to do with the lyrics.

B.K: “I thought I was holding the music hostage because of the money” – do you still feel that way?
J.S: If someone had a sore shoulder and I could make you feel better if you’d pay me, you have to let go of all of that. You just have to be of service. I haven’t sorted out the debt thing. That’s been like an albatross around my neck for like fifteen years. I don’t know how to do it but as far as music goes, I’m not going to hoard it. I hope the universe will draw music out of me in a way and not make me feel heavy from debt. Debt is energy. I don’t want to think how I’m going to make a living from music. I’d pay way more than I do to make music.

B.K: 2006 you pared things down and got to the essentials.
J.S: That was my hope. My understanding of that is – that’s the exterior version of what’s within me and what I really want is to pare down the possessions inside me.  It’s a discipline. They should have martial arts courses about this.

B.K: You have a fine fall touring schedule.
J.S: Yep – beginning here, then the UK –North America November – December. I’ll have a proper release of this recording Ulysses Purse sort of like a slow motion release. That’s what my hope is, to play concerts with a collective of musicians. I remember when I released When I Was a Boy it took a long time to mature in the air – it was sort of like a sleeper. I don’t know how to really say it. You can tell when it’s too new and hasn’t put down any roots or something. It feels that way with this one too.
I give my music to people up north where I am, I have a cabin in Northern Ontario. I’ll give it to the guy that owns a gas station or someone else or the people in the church and their reaction isn’t instant like, oh I get it yet it’s meant for everybody. It takes a longer time for cables to hook up with people when hearing my music. 

B.K: I remember the great conductor/pianist Andre Previn when he had a television show in the 60s’ telling the audience don’t listen to a recording one time and turn away – listen five, ten, twelve times and let the music sink in. Do you think that’s required today as we pay less attention?
J.S: I think it takes a while for one to hook up with the artist. I like repeated listening too. It’s with remorse I often don’t do that. At least when I do listen to music I try and turn down the lights and honor their music. It’s so easy to be careless with something so precious.  

John Lennon, The Toronto Rock ‘N Roll Revival and the Phone Call

I arrived in Canada a month after the Toronto Rock ‘N Roll Revival, which took place September 13, 1969. The city was still buzzing from the visit of music royalty that included John Lennon, The Doors, Little Richard, Gene Vincent, Alice Cooper, Jerry Lee Lewis, Chuck Berry, Chicago Transit Authority, Screaming Lord Sutch, Doug Kershaw, Tony Joe White.

It really seemed to me as that this was Woodstock North – the second coming of Haight Ashbury, Greenwich Village. Time would reveal Toronto was very much a bar band town, still beholden to Vegas style booking agents and under the extreme influence of rhythm & blues, due mostly to its close proximity to Detroit.

You had to be a visionary and reckless to pull off a feat such as the Revival, and the coming Festival Express, of which I was to become a participant.

Promoter John Brower and I hooked up during the Canadian production of Jesus Christ Superstar  where I assumed the role of co-musical director.  We reconnected again recently when he dropped by my radio show and shared his side of the massive rock concert story. Enjoy!

                                                    
This was a Hail Mary call by (American cult pop producer) Kim Fowley. You know the Eatons (family) financed us at that time – on an as needed basis. The Toronto Pop Festival in June was a huge success. We did 30,000 people with Sly & the Family Stone, Steppenwolf coming back to Toronto, Johnny Winter, The Band. This was enormous – two months before Woodstock. But for some reason The Toronto Rock & Roll Revival did not take off. A week Monday of the show we had 2,000 tickets sold. We needed 8,000 to break even and the numbers were not going happen even though we had The Doors as a headliner.

Morrison had just been arrested in Florida for exposing himself. Toronto was a pretty staid community and kids needed their parents to give them money. Thor Eaton called and said, “you know what, we are just going to pull it. Cancel everything, we are going to write off our losses on this one.”
(Partner) Kenny Walker and I had no choice; we weren’t in control of the money. Kenny said, “you better go tell (emcees) Kim Fowley and (US DJ) Rodney Bingenheimer at their hotel. They might as well go back to L.A. , let’s save some hotel money.” I went to the hotel and Kim Fowley -- a legendary guy from L.A. , wrote “Alley Oop” and was in the Hollywood Argyles -- said, “you can’t pull show, it’s a classic. If this was in Dodger Stadium this would sell out.” I’m like thinking, can we move this to Dodger Stadium – what are you talking about?

He then said you have to call John Lennon first thing in the morning and tell him you need Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, Gene Vincent, and Bo Diddley and ask him and Yoko  to come and be the emcees. John Lennon loves all those bands. The Beatles opened for Gene Vincent at the Star Club in Hamburg. These were John’s heroes. Don’t tell them about The Doors, or any other bands. It may scare him off. Just tell them about the rock n’ rollers.

In my inimitable fashion I was the guy who had to make the call. I called information and got the number for Apple Records and this girl answered and I said, “this is very important – this is John Brower calling from Canada and I need you to write these names down. I gave her the names and told she had to tell John Lennon all these acts are playing on Saturday in Toronto and we are inviting John and Yoko to come be the emcees. So she goes, “Brilliant” and puts me on hold. Literally moments later John Lennon comes on the phone and goes, “who is this, what can you tell me about these acts?”

 I give him the story and tell him we’d like him and Yoko come be the emcees. He pauses for a fraction of a second and says, “we wouldn’t want to come unless we could play.” I go, “you mean the Beatles?” he says “no, me and Yoko and we’ll bring a little band.” That began the odyssey of that week, which was insane. Everybody went crazy except CHUM radio. They didn’t believe us. Kenny and I had pulled a fast one earlier in the year when we were promoting the Beatles Magical Mystery Tour  movie. We sold it out at the O’Keefe Centre – at Kleinhans in Buffalo, sold it out in Montreal – in Ottawa it was a stiff.

The night before I got a little waitress at the Chateau Laurier to call the radio station and tell them she just saw George Harrison having dinner there with some friends and they went on the air with it. It was in the paper and we sold the show out that next day. We came back to Toronto telling people this story so when we go to CHUM with ‘John Lennon’s coming on Saturday.’ Duff Roman goes, “the Beatles must just really love you guys. First George Harrison shows up down there in Ottawa for you, and now John Lennon is coming to Toronto. Get out of here.”

I told John I had to call the next day to get the names of the band members. We had to get visas and plane tickets. So we call, put a tape recorder on the phone and say I need to speak to John Lennon about the plane tickets. She goes, 'fine'. On comes Anthony Fawcett, John and Yoko’s personal assistant, and he gives us the names including Eric Clapton. We take the tape up to CHUM and now they are so mad they literally throw us out of the place. Duff says, “we’ve been promoting shows for you for two years. How could you come in here with a phony tape with a guy with a pretty good English accent and make this stuff up and want us to go on the air with it. Eric Clapton; that was a nice touch.” We are really dead now.

Russ Gibb in Detroit, the promoter of the Grande Ballroom, had a radio show every night from seven to midnight in Ann Arbor and he and I were friends. I called him and said, “Russ. you’ve got to help me here.” So he listened to the tape and said one thing, “Brower, I have to ask, did you talk to John Lennon yourself?” I said yes, and he says, “OK I’ll go with it.” We sold 10,000 tickets in Detroit and Ann Arbor in three days. People couldn’t understand how every car around Varsity Stadium had Michigan plates.

I wanted the Vagabonds and their president, Edjo, to escort John and Yoko in and by this time (filmmaker) D.A. Pennebaker had called up wanting to film everything. He didn’t even know Lennon was involved. He was coming in with a crew and this was to be the third in a trilogy; Don’t Look Back, Monterey Pop and now the Toronto Rock n’ Roll Revival. 

Edjo had done security at the Rockpile for us and fought off the Scotty Mods--but that's a whole other story. So he lines up eighty bikes, this is the crème de la crème – bikers are coming in from all over Ontario to be in this ride. Rumblings all over town is, this is bull shit and not going to happen. Brower has made it all up to sell tickets and there’s not going to be John Lennon here and you guys are going to look like idiots hanging out at the airport on your bikes.

Edjo comes to me the night before and says, “Look man, now is the time for you to tell me this is all bullshit because tomorrow if there is no John Lennon you better move.” I tell him it’s happening. George Eaton put the tickets on the credit card, its happening.

4 o’clock in the morning I get a call from Anthony Fawcett saying he’s at Heathrow Airport. It's nine in morning their time and he's with Eric Clapton, Klaus Voormann, Alan White, Mal Evans - the Beatles tour manager - and he’s just talked to John Lennon at
Tittenhurst Park and John Lennon says he and Yoko can’t make it, send flowers. It’s like I I just got hit with a cattle prod. I jump out of bed like the springs have broken through and I see the flowers that Edjo is going to be putting them on my grave. I said no, - no – no – no put Eric Clapton on the phone.

I had brought Blind Faith in to town in July, and lost $20,000 when the record didn’t come out (when it was supposed to). Kenny and the Eatons didn’t want to do it with me so I did it with some guys in New York. We lost our ass. So I say, “Listen Eric, you probably don’t remember me but I lost $20,000 in July on Blind Faith; great show but the record didn’t come out on time. I said, you need to help me, if John Lennon doesn’t come today I have to leave my city, I have to leave my country, in fact I’m coming to England and moving in with John Lennon. Edjo would not find me at John Lennon’s place.

Clapton starts yelling, he’s upset, he doesn’t get up at this time of the morning and come to the airport and wait around for somebody to send flowers, so I say would you get John on the other payphone please, and tell him he has to come. They get Lennon back on the phone and Clapton starts yelling at him – you’ve dragged us out to the airport, the other guy on the phone is ruined. We find out from Fawcett later than Lennon was mortified Clapton was mad at him because Clapton was God.
They did get out of bed, came and caught the next plane.

Then a few months later we bring John and Yoko back to announce the Toronto Peace Festival, which was a very bad idea during the Vietnam War. Try doing a peace festival on July 4th. The White House really cranked up some opposition to that. That went down like the Titanic but regardless, John came back and held a press conference at the Science Centre and we rented a private railway car to take Lennon to meet Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau.

Little Richard: Bronze Liberace

I woke up this morning to a great shot of Little Richard rocking the piano and ‘bop a lula’in’ - “Long Tall Sally” back in ’56, courtesy all those clip-diggers on Facebook. What’s remarkable about this vintage black and white is the band is solid African American - front loaded with saxophones and scattered about - a “bippy crowd” – corner to corner smiley white folks. Those be the days my friends. This got me thinking about a gig I dig back in the early seventies at Queen’s University when my band was the opening act.

It's been decades since I've smoked a bowl of hashish, and none finer than the one I shared in January of 1971 with Little Richard, the Bronze Liberace.

At that time, I was the keyboardist and vocalist with Homestead, a Toronto act that had caught the attention of Guess Who producer Jack Richardson in 1970.

Our Homestead concerts were testimonials against the Vietnam War and protests over degradation of the environment. I wore more Canadian flags than springtime on Parliament Hill. Jack understood my position and my opposition to the war. He just rolled with the situation, doing all he could do to rectify it--although I made his task nearly impossible.

We were invited to do a 7:30 pm set at Queen’s University, opening for Little Richard. The stage was outfitted with humongous Traynor speakers. Back then they were cheap, with a sound quality like stampeding caribou when fully exercised.

So we play our opening set, which at first is received as if we’d been sentenced to an embalming. Then I gave my 'save the planet' pitch, and things warmed up. Round one: we scored.

Now we are downstairs in the dressing area; Little Richard has yet to show, due to a bomb scare somewhere over Cleveland. Richard refuses a chartered flight to London, Ontario, apparently fearing the plane would crash. At 11 pm, he finally arrives by car, half an hour after the second show was due to start.

On my own, I'm killing time with a quarter ounce of Lebanese hashish. Suddenly, Little Richard's band arrives and catches the action.

“Hey bro,' what's that you smoking," says the horn section.
“Hashish,” I reply.
“Les have some.”

Smooth talkers. So I cut a couple grams loose and the horn guys disappear in the john to find a toilet roll, unravel foil from a cigarette pack, punch a few holes--et voila. Big high.

I'm shooting the breeze with the promoter when Little Richard walks in and demands his pay. The promoter tells him to play first. Richard's bodyguard is close at hand, packing heat and a sinister look.
“Pay me, motherfucker, or I don't play,"says Richard.

The promoter pauses. “Well, I have to go up to the box office and count the money, I hope they’ll agree to do this."
“Get moving," urges Richard.

I'm sitting, staring at this rock & roll icon, in heavy pancake makeup, not knowing what to expect. In a huff, he starts lecturing about “taking care of business.”
Then the lead horn man returns, and says, "Give me more of that good shit."
I can't believe the audacity of this snake. Quickly, Little Richard jumps into the conversation. "What shit?”

“The hippie got some bad hashish," says viper man.
Richards looks at me. “Is that so, I ain't never smoked hashish - is it any good?"
I look at him, thinking: fucking Little Richard! "Yeah man, this is Lebanese. It's got a nice froth on it."

“Light me some, hippie guy - I need to get high." I do just that and LR gets his love on. "This shit is outrageous."
The next 30 minutes, we continue bowl lighting. "What's your name? It's Bill! Your band? Homestead, huh? Tell you what Bill - I like you, man. Paul McCartney is playing on my next album and me on his - then I'm playing on yours."

I'm young and cynical and don't give a shit. Little Richard is in the house. And he's playing me for my remaining gram.

The promoter returns, Richard collects half his pay, hits the stage, and rocks the room. Next to Little Richard, I feel like a stage figurine, a miniature entertainer. This is big bold history and I'm a witness. The amplified sound is horrible but who gives a damn. Richard's foot hits the floor like a sledgehammer and he sings in ungodly tones: first “Lucille,” then “Blueberry Hill,” “Bebop A Lula,” “Good Golly Miss Molly,” “Midnight Special,” “Tutti Frutti” and on and on.
Three years earlier, I'd rocked with Chuck Berry but in no way did it compare to this jam.
Half time! We're back in the waiting room.
"Hey B, got anymore of that killing shit?”
“Sure do.”

“Then light me a bowl." That I do, and the band quickly shows up with a chorus of “give us more."
Are you kidding? I'm with the man and I ain't blowing more on no greedy horn section.
Little Richard is seated when the paymaster shows up again. This time he says, “Sorry, Mr. Richard. We have to wait until closing time to pay you.”

Richard: “What are you saying? Get my money or the night is over.”
The paymaster dude reaches down and touches Little Richard, who says, “Get your fucking fingers off me, queer.”

Smoothly, the bodyguard moves in, clutching his hidden gun.
Richard nods, saying to the paymaster, “You get the message? Get my money.” The Bronze Liberace looks over at me and says, “Fill the bowl, Bill---looks like a long night. You say that shit is Hebanese?”

Eventually, the promoter pays up front and Little Richard does the second show.
Afterwards, we're on our way home and stop at one of those unfriendly late-night diners. I walk in with Kris and the catcalls start. “Hippie, dick sucker, fuck face...”
Suddenly a tall and lanky black dude in a pimp suit strides in and heads for the can. It’s Little Richard’s enforcer. All talk ceases.

Everyone hesitates. A few minutes pass, and the guy reappears. You can see a gun under his short jacket. He taps it, swings around, giving me one of those stares that freezes the fearful, then exits.
The last words I heard that evening were: "Fuck me, who was that?”
“Shaft!”

Looking out for Little Richard and other black musicians of the time was a full-time job. If you wanted to get paid, you had to have someone with a cold, cold look, an intimidating bulge under the vest and willingness to use it.

Books vs eBooks - Jim Norris of Canadian Musician speaks out!

Don’t tell my partner hard cover books are dying off like Ontario ash trees. She seems to frequent Indigo/Chapters twice a week and returns with a thick volume of something that takes three or four days to consume and then shivers with delight as she flips the pages inside. It’s more than a ritual, it’s an obsession – a grand obsession.

I love reading but these days I spend more time app traveling on the iPad. I have my favourites and they rarely let me down. I also have a dozen books stored just in case I’m in for the long read.

Much like the LP, I love the shape and size of a good book. I get a buzz looking at words on pages, a classic font, and knowing within those well-groomed paragraphs much thought and time has been invested into bringing those pages to life. This is why the premature declaration – print is dead - is absurd.

Ride the subway. Rarely do I see people engrossed in a Kindle or iPad these days. The victor – the book! I still get overwhelmed walking into the big box book stores. I think I know why I’m there but most times I leave with a copy of Mojo, Wax Poetics, Oxford Musician or something related to my passions. Not much in the way of fiction going down with the dude at the moment!

This from The Guardian:
The Bookseller magazine says that each of the five biggest general trade publishers in the UK – Penguin Random House, Hachette, HarperCollins, Pan Macmillan and Simon & Schuster – saw their ebook sales fall in 2015. At Penguin Random House, the UK’s largest trade publisher, ebook totals slipped by 0.4% in 2015, down from 16.17m to 16.1m. At Hachette, they were down 1.1% to 14.5m, while at HarperCollins, when sales from Harlequin Mills & Boon are excluded (the company was acquired halfway through 2014), ebook sales were down 4.7%. The slip at Pan Macmillan was 7.7%, and at Simon & Schuster it was 0.3%.

The recent downturn in eBook sales is partially blamed on the decline of the Kindle, also digital sales of fiction and non-fiction have been slowing as people revert back to traditional ways to consume books. If a book is good, like great music you want to own it – not lease from a tablet.

Recently, I caught up to Canada’s most successful contemporary music book publisher Jim Norris and cornered him for a brief chat:

Bill King: There was speculation that  Kobos, Kindles, eBooks would usher in the decline of print. It hasn’t happened has it?

Jim Norris: No. It’s interesting that with all the new media, digital seems to get more publicity than anything else. You hear there’s no more print, no more newspapers, no more radio, no more television, no more anything – none of it is true. Around 2008 and 2009 there was a little bit of a shift with book sales – even advertising. But most of those people have gone back to some sensible position where you introduce all the new digital products and services and everyone has to move over a bit. It doesn’t mean they are going away any bit. Newspapers have had to change because they are not the fast source of information anymore. They have to cover things more in depth than they did. Even CNN isn’t fast anymore. When they killed Osama Bin Laden the first reportage came via a Tweet. The fastest news is Twitter now. The downside – it isn’t vetted and a lot of things aren’t necessarily true. Even CNN jumps the gun a bit.

There are lots of options now to get information. There are the traditional sources, lots of news sources – combinations. I’m reading a book now and there are QR codes that take you to a page on a web site with further information on that chapter. That’s a great use of technology. If you can’t get it all in a book you can sure get it all on a website.  So tying them together makes a lot of sense.

B.K: What are the most popular selling books from Norris-Whitney Communications?

J.N: From Music Books Plus, songwriting is the number one category. Business books – a lot of guitar books. All the instruments – drums – but songwriting is number one.

B.K: People are looking for answers.

J.N: Yes, there’s so much to know and so many good books that come out. We have maybe 300 titles at CMW but on the website we have 16,000. We sell in 90 countries and ship out of Niagara Falls, New York. We do a lot of school business, a ton with colleges and universities, professional schools. There is so much knowledge available. An author who is smart is going to have a blog, do podcasts and is going to have a book, write for magazines and try and use every medium that they can. We certainly do all of that.

B.K: Did you hire an outside source to expand social media?

J.N: No, I have a person who came on board and she’s kind of insatiable. The read rate on Facebook is very low. If you have 1,000 likes only 3 – 6% of those show up on a feed. Facebook says that 3 – 6% are reading your posts, no they aren’t, they are just showing up on your feed. A lot of people get all excited about Facebook and are there posting like crazy but don’t realize almost nobody is seeing those.

B.K: They limit the amount of reads.

J.N: Absolutely. What they are pushing towards is paid advertising and boosted post. My prediction – in a year or two nothing will be free on Facebook. That’s OK – people get all crazy about that like they own it. No, Mark Zuckerberg owns it and can do what he wants with it. That’s how I feel about media. They can do what they want. If they can get more people to pay for it – more power to them.

B.K: You have online sessions too.

J.N: Yes, we have webinars and those have been going very well. So far they have been business subjects but we are going to be doing a lot of technical ones with our clients as well - product demonstrations, product introductions. It’s a great medium for that. We have the technical part of it together well now. There are lot out there that aren’t well done.

B.K: You’ve always had musician features and products that complement in Canadian Musician.

J.N: For companies which go across the country – tour and show their products you are talking tens of thousands of dollars whereas for a couple grand we can do a webinar for them and attract probably more people than their tour and they can participate from anywhere in the world. A company like Sennheiser for instance can have their marketing guy in the states and a product development guy in Germany and get on with Andrew our editor who does the interviews. You can show anything on there – video, audio, text files, pdfs, or whatever it is. It’s a pretty cool medium. Technically you got to make sure you are on a platform that works. Some of them don’t and I’ve been on enough of those.

B.K: All of this started with Canadian Musician.

J.N: That’s right – 1979. Still doing very well. We have a good online presence. We have all of our magazines there and we do an electronic newsletter every month. We still have good advertisers, in fact the issue we just closed was really good. A lot of last minute stuff, but that’s OK.

Music Never Says Goodbye!

“O, Death, O, Death
Won't you spare me over til another year
Well what is this that I can't see
With ice cold hands takin' hold of me
Well I am death, none can excel

I'll open the door to heaven or hell
Whoa, death someone would pray
Could you wait to call me another day”

Those haunting words sung by Ralph Stanley seem to capture the temperature of January 2016.

January has truly been a month of music nobility loss yet only a rare few disappear indefinitely.

Son Jesse and I were having this conversation Monday morning on a short drive back from Mississauga.  Facebook never allows anyone have a long sleep these days.

The moment David Bowie ceased, millions shared every connective memory of Bowie and patched him into their lives – the same for Glenn Frey. Music was recycled; jumped from one track to another like one master DJ was spinning discs.

Looking back, you begin to wonder if artists like Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong were more than iconic musicians but also modern day visionaries. Nearly every contemporary artist has reels of truly awful footage playing on YouTube – try finding that of Ellington or Armstrong.

Seriously, these men were dressed to the nines and always at the top of their game – smiling and foot tapping from one number to another. Both had the advantage of playing potted plants in several elegant movie scenes, but damn, those scenes were beautifully filmed and remain solid and register dignified with the passing of time.

Every month or so the dancing Nicholas Brothers return to “prime time” Facebook friends commenting and marvelling at every toe tapping, banister sliding, double splits move. These guys never died or ran short of breath and are very much alive and with us. Most recently, pianist Hazel Scott, with all her Nubian beauty and monster piano skills makes a return engagement and everyone asks for a background check – who the hell is this person and where did she come from?

There are DJs and collectors around the planet whose sole purpose is unearthing and excavating the past. I applaud them. We tend to forget that what’s being played on radio or fed to the public is short on nutrition and a very small per cent of the exceptionally filmed and recorded music.

That’s why in many cases a collector will pay thousands of dollars for a pristine copy of an LP or 45’ and claim bragging rights.

I was looking for background on James Fountain, a singer from Atlanta who in 1976 had a minor hit with a track CeeLo Green could have scribbled, “Seven Day Lover,” and found nothing but empty space across the Internet other than William Bell produced for his small independent label, Cream. Frustrated, I dug deeper until I discover Fountain made an impact in Northern England when Northern Soul was rocking nightclubs during the late sixties to mid 70s’- like Blackpool Mecca, Golden Torch, Catacombs, Wigan Casino – up in the English Midlands, Scotland and Wales. Fountain didn’t have a clue this was happening for him. The real buzz for me is how a region locked in on a specific sound and built a fashion industry and happening music scene around obscure artists such as Fountain.

Motown played a small part setting things in action but it was all about one-shot artists and that one-time sound. Most artists had name changes to suit the label masters and most came from small regional operations such as Ric-Tic and Golden World out of Detroit, Mirwood in Los Angeles, Shout and Okeh in New York and Chicago. The beauty in this – you can still find the person in the music as if they have never exited the planet.

During our road conversation I’d point to a house, an expensive sports car, a building with the owner’s name scribbled, a sign advertising the best burrito and said to Jesse, “Once these folks pass on their memory with reside within the families they are most connected. Music is a whole different game. Since most is free today and tracks are passed around like rare trading cards - the names on those tracks and voices in those grooves will continue to speak to us at the age that aspiring singer was the day they looked into a microphone and bared their souls. Someone somewhere will be listening and sharing until the day earth collides with the inevitable.

That’s music to my ears!

The Pointer Sisters – The Lost Japan Tapes and the Power Trio

Recently, I decided to rifle through the darkest, dankest room back of the basement. The cave was once a wine cellar – cold with stone trimmed walls. Some ten years back it became a storage area when we moved in. I rarely throw much out especially those boxes of cassette tapes from my early days (1985) at Q-107 when Gary Slaight and Bob Mackowycz put me on the air Sunday mornings at 9 A.M. doing Q - Jazz – my invitation to an off and on side career in radio. I saved every show from the year and half run. Then on to CIUT 89.5 for another year and half – eventually the Jazz Report Radio Network - another year and half run – then Jazz.FM for nearly five years – and now year six with Ted Woloshyn at Newstalk 1010 and a return engagement two years back at CIUT. There was also a nineteen year run publishing the Jazz Report Magazine and all of those interviews with the greats. That was what I went digging after.

There was lung killing mold – cardboard boxes soaked from years of fermentation – old clothes belonging to us when we were starting a family. The stuff had to go!

Yes, the treasure chest was there – those hundreds and hundreds of radio shows, many preserved on cassettes - others CDs. Those hundreds and hundreds of interviews with jazz greats – many long gone: Artie Shaw, Dave Brubeck, Max Roach, Marian McPartland, Betty Carter, Steve Allen, Shirley Horn, Gene Lees, Moe Koffman, Doug Riley, Jeff Healey, Rob McConnell, … on and on.

As I’m digging I come across a couple cassettes recorded in Japan I made with my newly purchased Nakamichi 550. Now, if you have never heard of this beauty – then let’s step back in time.

During the audio craze of the mid- seventies the Nakamichi name was the gold standard. The 550 Dual Tracer sold in Toronto for a mere $1,200 – that was like lusting after a Leica camera – way out of reach for many of us. It was in Japan 1976 when I could actually afford to possess this masterpiece of Japanese technology while touring with America’s high stepping, big energy sister act – The Pointer Sisters.

Deep down I came across a few recordings I made in Japan with the Pointer Sisters and our power – piano jazz trio that suck the bag. The balance is terrible - more hiss than bliss. Yet, what is on those tapes reminded me what a wicked trio we had cobbled together with bassist Jeff Breeh and drummer Chester Thompson who came to us from Weather Report and eventually cut a righteous life-time gig with Genesis then Phil Collins.

Chester and I keep in contact. Jeff? We hadn’t spoken in nearly forty years. So, I do this YouTube search – dear God in music heaven – I thank you and your disciples for giving us unlimited access to profound music history. I found a clip of Jeff from seven years back and a connection to a band. I contacted that person and she sent me Jeff’s current email. Jeff in turn said few words but replied with an attachment - a twelve minute mp3 of a gig we did in Tokyo with big band. Holy bat shit – there it is! Jeff recorded the whole evening taking a direct feed from board and placing a Shure microphone in front of the “sisters.” Then Jeff tells me he has everything including rehearsals – soon to arrive in mail. I sent to Chester who was taken aback with the energy and tightness and interplay and suggests we record again. This was how we played it – with reckless abandon and the “sisters,” just let us fly. Here’s a bit of back story.

My last working months with Martha Reeves were exhausting and revealing, borderline insane. In between gigs I hook up with former Miss Indiana, singer Kellee Patterson, for a few dates around Hollywood. Great players. Nice woman. Then word gets around the Pointer Sisters are looking for a pianist. A fellow music director gives me a call and says he’s recommending me to the group’s new music director, Sandy Shire, and we should hook up. Not long after, Sandy calls and I drop by his Hollywood digs.

Sandy was hyper-crazy fun and brother of Hollywood film composer David Shire.

Sandy pulls out the band’s charts and hands the piano parts over to me. First up? “Salt Peanuts.” I had a look at the sketchy lead sheet of mostly chord changes and a few rhythmic shots, play and then on to an Ellington Medley arranged by Peter Matz. I play through and find nothing too difficult, then on to “Save the Bones for Henry Jones” – my kind of funky shuffle groove. Just as we were moving on to the next read, Sandy interrupts and says – “I want you alongside me.” Damn…

Sandy then gives me the lowdown on the audition to take place at Village Recorders with producer David Rubinson, at the time a rising record mogul.

The day of, I was all nerves. I knew the Pointers were a hot item around Los Angeles and gaining traction across America after having a hit country record, “Fairytales.” I also knew they had high jazz/rhythm & blues IQs and a long time departing music director/pianist, Tom Salisbury who could play his ass off.

I met Sandy in the studio lobby and waited as a couple pianists and drummers took turns and get the ceremonial toss. I could hear Rubinson yelling. Shire told me to keep cool and all would go well.

In I walk and meet a bearded Rubinson who acknowledges and thanks Shire, then points me to the grand piano. I shake hands with the group’s bassist Jeff Breeh and then Rubinson calls the next drummer in who happens to be in Warren Zevon’s band. First up, “Salt Peanuts” – you have to be kidding? Rubinson sets the tempo at a blistering pace and counts in. Thankfully, a few days of practice in between gave me an edge. As soon as the trio starts playing, Rubinson signals stop and goes ballistic on the drummer. “You call yourself a jazz drummer – you can’t hold a tempo. Don’t you know better than to come to an audition and not be prepared? This is jazz man, jazz.  Pack up and get out of here.” Holy shit! He then walks over to me and says – “Fucking amazing. You read that shit – nailed it. Stick around.”

I do just that! No more piano players, just drummers getting terrorized by Rubinson. Then Chester Thompson walks in – that would be cocky Chester Thompson. Chester had already done solid time with Frank Zappa and Weather Report. Sight reading for him after memorizing reams of music with incredibly demanding band leaders was a breeze. Chester sits down and plays everything perfectly, in fact he starts correcting charts – and yes, the tempo held steady. The three of us look at each other and smile. Not long after Rubinson says – “You got the gig. I’ve never seen anyone read such complicated music as quick as you guys.” Yes!

 Chester didn’t commit. In fact, it was negotiation time. Chester had plenty irons in the fire and it was a matter of who did the highest bidding. The “sisters” won out.

Three weeks in Japan.

The moment the plane landed, after what seemed three months in the air we were taken to a television station and the “sisters” were told they were doing back-up singing for a famed Japanese singer. Oh man, this did not go well. Let’s move on – get to the Nakamichis.

After a nights rest the boys go hunting. Jeff, Chester and I hit the electronics district of Tokyo which just happened to be all of Tokyo. We knew one word – Nakamichi. We searched, we searched – we priced – we priced. Jeff and I found what we thought was the deal of any century - $350 apiece – Chester held out. If I remember – a salesman made a special trip to the Prince Hotel and sold one to Chester for around $330. Jeff and I not only bought recorders, we bought gifts for our women – spending a good $1,000 each in a shopping spree; then hop a cab.

Back at hotel I get a call from Jeff – “Have you seen my suitcase with Nakamichi and clothes?” Nope.. “Shit, I must have left on the street corner where the cab picked us up,” says Jeff. An hour passes.” Fuck me, it was still there, Bill – no one touched a thing – these people are the most honest on the planet and so polite. Let’s have a Nakamchi party in Chester’s room.” That we did – manuals and all.

Jeff and I dragged the cassette recorder to a few gigs. I paid little attention to his set-up and even less to mine. I was overwhelmed with just being in Japan. I spent more time on streets than with my prized recorder and placed aside.

The gigs were amazing by any standard. Concerts began at 6PM and over by 7. I played on some of the finest pianos in the world. Most concert halls I had a choice between Yamahas and Steinway concert grands - one even autographed by Arthur Rubenstein and Van Cliburn, two to history’s eminent classical concert pianists - one known for his delicate readings of the Chopin, the other, the bravo of Tchaikovsky.

Chester, Jeff and I got on like brothers. We pushed the sisters to the limit. Chester kept upping the tempo on Dizzy Gillespie’s “Salt Peanuts” to where the girls sounded like they were speed rapping.
Hearing this preserved short forty years on has brought the three of us back in touch once again. So many events have filled the years in between. Hearing the trio at a time when we were in our late twenties and now pushing seventy, puts a big grin in this willing heart! Enjoy..

A Conversation With the Tonight Show's Steve Allen

It was sometime during 1993 and I had just hung up after a riveting conversation with the extraordinary Tony Bennett and I thought to myself, ‘why not go after another long time hero – comic, Steve Allen.’ People do talk – especially entertainers. I wouldn’t try this today with so many handlers advising sub-stars stay mute unless it’s a promo junket, but then it was still the tail end of the golden years – a good many of the pioneers were still in play.

I hook up with Allen through his record label – Concord/A&M. I truly didn’t expect much of an effort on his part – Christ sakes, he created late night television and married dream girl Audrey Meadows – sister of Honeymooners’ Audrey Meadows. 

After contacting his agent I get a message from Allen – “Bill, I’m mailing you several binders which will help you prep for the interview.” A week passes and seven organized and detailed binders arrive all carefully packaged. Wow! I still don’t know anyone this meticulous about documenting their career other than jazz icon Billy Taylor.

I read through the hundreds of pages and then it dawned on me – I’d been life-surfing – this guy was driving full speed through heavy traffic – pedal to the metal!

As a musician, Allen had one Grammy under his belt - co-composer of the jazz standard “Gravy Waltz” with bassist Ray Brown. He’d written 14,000 songs of which I recall The Tonight Show  theme – “This Could Be the Start of Something Big.”

I also religiously watched The Tonight Show when it went network in 1954 – it was designated family viewing. The show roared for nearly four years until a dispiriting Jack Parr arrives. Parr was much more political and an avowed enemy of the coming counter-culture.

Johnny Carson arrived in 1962 and departed in 1992. The show thrived, making Carson the all time king of late night television. Jay Leno, Conan O’Brien and Jimmy Fallon followed.

The landscape today is much more fractured. Colbert, Fallon, Kimmel, goodbye to Jon Stewart – hello… Trevor Noah, John Oliver, Samantha Bee, Bill Maher – a barely visible Seth Meyers. There are some great laughs there, brilliant writers and plenty skits that flat-line.

I came across our conversation a few days ago and here’s an excerpt from the hour long chat:

Bill King: What was it that made The Tonight Show unique and what was your call on storylines and guests?

Steve Allen: One of the great things when I was hosting The Tonight Show was the ability to have a kind of power to think of somebody whose work I’d admired and turn to someone in my office and say, “Get me Lester Young.” That’s like a fantasy.

During the four years I did the show, that’s how it worked. At the time, I never thought of it as unusual, but fully appreciated it because I idolized all those great players. The ability to tell someone on my staff to see if Roy Eldridge was in town and have him show up was sheer beauty to me.

We used to do more than book the great jazz players on the show. We used to honor them. I used to intro them. I didn’t need a cue card or a teleprompter to talk about these men because I had worshipped them since I was 16 years old.

Lester, since I mentioned his name, knocked me out. I remember the first time I met him. I’d seen him playing, but had never met him before. This particular night on The Tonight Show  he came through the back, they call it a scene-dock door. It’s an enormous door they have in theatres where you can move in an elephant or big scenery. He just walked in off 45th Street and suddenly appeared. I looked up and saw this guy with a pork pie hat and tenor case standing there with no one speaking to him, so I hurried right over. I said, “Lester,” and he said, “Yes.” He seemed to have a couple drinks and was a little sideways. I said, “I’m Steve Allen.” Until that moment he wasn’t sure who he was talking to. He got me in focus, leaned close and said, “many eyes.’ It was typically him and really knocked me out. We got along great.

When we would book the giants, they wouldn’t just do one tune the way they do today. We’d let them do two, three or four tunes sometimes. When it was somebody like an Erroll Garner or Art Tatum, they could stay on theoretically as long as they wanted. It was usually for at least three or four numbers.

Sometimes I would take the occasion to do a little ad lib editorializing both about them and about jazz. The most noteworthy example of that came the night Monk was on. It was kind of an odd booking because he’s better understood today. At the time, when he showed up, other players would say, “Don’t quote me man, but I don’t understand what he’s doing.” It was a little strange harmonically.

The night he appeared on The Tonight Show, I was right out of my mind with nothing prepared. I did a five-minute introduction sitting at the piano and sort of took the audience through a brief history of jazz piano. I’d mention the names, do a little Fats Waller lick, Count Basie lick, a little Earl Hines, some boogie-woogie. It was all very quick sketchy strokes. Then I said, ‘Now, we jump into the future. This man is waiting for the rest of us to catch up to him and here is, Thelonious Monk. After my five-minute introduction, he played a two-minute number, got up and walked off.

B.K: On The Tonight Show you presented animated shorts which pertained to musicians in both classical and jazz music. That was hilarious. Where did the shorts originate?

S.A: We didn’t create those; somebody just brought them to us. Why do I think of Lenny Bruce?

B.K: It might have been the Shelly Pederson monologue which was animated from Bruce’s interview album.

S.A: That’s it, and somebody drew. I’m trying to think of the artist that may have done it. It might have been Ernie Pintoff. The original audio track was so hip and the artwork fit perfectly.

B.K: You’ve always had a tremendous sense of comedy. On The Tonight Show you did things like roll out a bathtub and take an oatmeal bath live on-stage and introduce items like attachable chest-hair for men. Do you think a lot of what you originated is still alive on late night TV?

S.A: We did that to a considerable extent on the original show and then did it even more on the second talk show which ran from 1962-1964 in syndication. That was the one David Letterman reportedly used to watch every night.

B.K: His show is similar in many ways.

S.A: His personal style and mine are different, but the gimmicks on the show, as he has said many times, are borrowed from our experiences.

B.K: You recommended either Jack Parr or Ernie Kovacs as your replacement. How do you think Ernie Kovacs would have fared as host?

S.A: Actually, NBC probably made the right decision between those two because I think Ernie would have felt constrained by a talk show. What he really wanted to do is what he eventually did: camera tricks, unusual uses of cameras and visual gimmicks.

B.K: He was certainly innovative.

S.A: That he was. He did not do wit, which Jack Parr did. The few times I met him, he rarely said funny things. But that isn’t rare even among professional comedians, and that is not a put-down of him, he had his own scene going and in that regard he was very original.


B.K: This Could be The Start of Something Big?

S.A: The classic example is the tune was dreamed. Since we don’t deserve either the blame or praise for what we dream, the question is whether I deserve all that money.

One morning I woke up, I dreamed the first several lines of the melody with lyric. As I awaken I reached over and scribbled a few lines of the lyric. I couldn’t write it out because I can’t read music. It’s a weird part of my brain. Maybe the same sort of mystery as idiot savants.

B.K: You starred in The Benny Goodman Story. Any thoughts on that experience?

S.A: The real kick, and like the point I made about the original Tonight Show, was hanging around with Gene Krupa. Teddy Wilson, Lionel Hampton, Stan Getz, and Harry James. Those guys, except for Stan who was in my age bracket, were my idols since I was a kid. It was nice acting with Donna Reed and being a movie star, but I regret to report my relations with Benny left something to be desired.

B.K: How did he react to all of this?

S.A: It was kind of a disappointment. A little bit like finding out there’s no Santa Claus. I still think he was a great clarinet player. Maybe everybody else’s best record is as good as his best, but he did like 800 and they did 20. On that basis, you’d have to give him the crown, I guess. As everybody who worked for him reported, he was not in the running for Mr. Nice Guy.

His real problem was he was in a fog and didn’t seem to get other people in focus. This has led to a lot of funny stories from guys who have worked in his band.

The classic, I guess you’ve probably heard, is when he stopped by a New York club and saw Frank Capp and Mel Powell. He said to them, “hey, if you guys have nothing to do over the weekend, you want to come up to my house in the country and relax and play a little.” Of course, being invited by the “King of Swing” was something. So they said yes. After they finished their gig, they took this long drive out to Goodman’s house. It was in the middle of winter and as cold as could be. He met them there and took them up the driveway. But they never got in his house. Instead, he took them around the back by the pool to this little house that you’d use to change into your swim trunks. He had a studio set up there. There was a piano and I think maybe a drum set. He welcomed them and was making small talk while they’re blowing on their hands, shivering and shuddering from the terrible cold. There was no heat on. As guest, they didn’t want to complain, but finally they couldn’t take it anymore. One of them said, “Benny, we don’t like to complain, but don’t you think its awful cold in here?” He disappeared and came back in about five minutes with a big thick wool sweater on and says, “OK, let’s go.” He related to himself and forgot about others. That’s how he was.