Good evening, everyone. Hi. My name is Larry
Gallagher, and on behalf of MIT Video Productions and
MIT Music and Theater Arts, I'd like to welcome you to
this very special program. I'd particularly like to welcome
MIT's President and First Lady, Rafael and Chris Reif. And of course our very
special guest, Jacob Collier. [APPLAUSE] Jacob's residency
last fall at MIT is the subject of
the documentary that we're about to screen. Following the
screening, Fred Harris, the Director of MIT's
wind and jazz ensemble will moderate a
brief Q&A session that is going to
include key contributors to the film and the concert. The evening's
program will conclude with a special
performance by Jacob. And so Jean Dunoyer,
the film's director, will introduce the
film in just a moment. But first, I'm very pleased
to introduce MIT's President, Rafael Reif. Well good evening, everyone. There was no way I was
going to miss this evening. No way. Three reasons. One is, never in
my life I've been invited to a movie premiere. This is my shot and I was
not going to miss that. That's number one. Number two, I really wanted
to meet Jacob Collier. Very much wanted to meet him. I've heard so much
about him, and I wanted to hear about
himself, and about his music, and about what he did at MIT. And I also heard
that he has claimed that MIT is his second home,
so I will come here to say, welcome back home, Jacob. [APPLAUSE] And there was a third reason. There is one other reason
why I wanted to be here, and that is to recognize one of
our most special talent at MIT. This is a fellow who is
known in some circles as the Ken Burns of MIT. Do you know who
I'm referring to? I'm talking about
Mr. Larry Gallagher. I think all of you know,
all of you, I'm sure, know, that Larry
and his MVP team, they got an Emmy
award over the summer for his documentary,
A Bold Move, that describes the move of MIT
from Back Bay to Cambridge. And that was not it. That was his second Emmy award,
because the same team got an Emmy award a couple of years
ago, both of them very richly deserved. So I want to take this
opportunity, Larry, to say to you, thank you for
telling the MIT story with so much care, love, and elegance. And to your team, the MVP
team, for all the terrific work they do for MIT. Thank you so very much,
and congratulations. [APPLAUSE] Well, can you hear me? It's a thrill to be here. It's a thrill to be sharing
this film with you tonight. And thank you very much, Rafael,
for those very kind words. This is really a
passion project, so it was extraordinary
to spend all this time with so many people,
many of which are in this room tonight, who
have so much energy to create. And I think that that energy,
for creation and doing it in a collaborative way,
is kind of a way for us to enjoy our lives
to the fullest. And so I think this project
was definitely that for me, and I hope for all the
others who are here tonight in the audience. And also, to make
documentary films, the hardest part
is funding them. And so I wanted to give my
gratitude to Neil and Jane Pappalardo who have given MIT
Video Productions the space to create, to tell the
incredible stories that are going on every day at MIT. So we get a chance to
pick those stories, and tonight you get
to see one of them. So I hope you like it. And I'll be here afterwards
if you have any questions or you want to hear me
talk about the film. I could go on forever. All right? Enjoy the show. And it's about to start. [APPLAUSE] [VIDEO PLAYBACK] [MUSIC PLAYING] We are making music with one
of the most talented people I've ever met named
Jacob Collier. So you go, (SINGING) you
don't wanna be my savior. And you don't want to--
especially with the-- you don't wanna be my savior. In the music world,
Jacob's huge, you know? And so in some
ways, for him to get to work with all these
musicians, it's the best thing. We were able to get
him to come to MIT and kind of do a
week long residency. MIT's visiting artist
program is trying to bring great artists
in substantive contact with our students. It's all about music
education experiences. I wanted them to feel the
sparks of Jacob's creativity firsthand, and I wanted
them to go beyond that, to get inside his music and to
be able to make it their own. For this kind of thing, it's--
all you really need is-- is like a-- you
know what I mean? More than like-- you know,
you could even find like a-- I mean, like do your
own thing, but you could find a riffy thing
that's just kind of like-- you know what I mean? And just like-- because
I guess the guitar is like basically a
drummer here as opposed to being a harmony instrument. He creates a really
great atmosphere for working with people and
bringing the best out of them. That sounds amazing. It's a creative environment,
and that really feeds me. Their minds are obviously
so sharp, you know? And it's not even
necessarily musically sharp in the foreground, but these
guys think about stuff. There's this gig on Saturday
that if don't have tickets to, I believe there's a waiting
list, but you should come. It's going to be so crazy-- 200 musicians on the stage. I'm performing with Jacob
Collier, which is amazing. When I listen to his music,
it like sends chills up my spine, especially "Hideaway." Like, that's my favorite song. A sense of peace
a sense of calm, and something making sense. When I started
listening to the music, I realized this was a
lot more complicated than most arranging projects. As a music nerd, it's a
beautiful looking score to me because there's all
these things that didn't appear like they should
be there from the beginning and they start to show up. His music is in many ways
like classical music, which is that so much of
it is specified. Take me anywhere you want to go. You know that my love is strong. It's pretty moving for some--
well, "Hideaway" especially. There are certain
points in the music where it's pretty overwhelming. [MUSIC - JACOB COLLIER,
"HIDEAWAY"] (SINGING) Softly, like the
calm that follows storms So he states the melody. He sings the melody. It's all very tonal and
pretty like a pop song. And then we get to the
bridge and suddenly he throws us for a loop. (SINGING) In my hideaway. Even when I close
my eyes, darling I will always stay wide
awake in my hideaway. Touch me like I've never
loved before in the place the I adore in my hideaway. The drummer has one of
the hardest things of all. He's got to play the
fives on the symbol but still maintain the
slow four with his foot. (SINIGING) I know whichever
way the wind may blow, there will be a place for
me to go in my hideaway. Whether you be lost
or found, darling, I will always stay wide awake
in my hideaway, my hideaway. Down, falling down. Down, falling down. Down, falling down. Down, falling down. In the second verse, he
adds this layer of fives. So, 3, 4, 5. [TICKING] And it's made more
complex by the fact that the fives are grouped in
fours and threes and sixes. Falling down, falling down,
falling down to the ground It's-- you know, you don't
hear the math of it when you're listening to the song. You just suddenly
become unmoored in this kind of dreamlike state. And yet you still
hear the slow pulse from the original
part of the song. He's kind of playing with this
notion of you, the listener, thinking you know where you are. And he'll throw something
at you that unmoors it but without completely
divorcing you from the structure that you knew before. [OOING] It's just-- it's a revelation. It's amazing. And all of this is happening
in what at the beginning seemed to be a simple
four chord pop song. [SCATTING] This is kind of
what our lives are like is that we try to
reduce them so that we can get through the day. But there's stuff going on that
if we just pay attention to it is beautiful,
inspiring, frightening. And he's kind of encapsulating
all of this in a five or six minute song that appears to be
a pop ballad at the beginning. [SCATTING] Let me feel the sky
and feel the moon. Let me sing and always
tune to my hideaway. It was just like
everything I had ever wanted to hear in music because
it's so intricate in detail, but it's purposeful, and like,
he has a purpose for everything he does, every note he hits,
every weird beat that he plays. Find a home in everything
in my hideaway. Maybe you can come to stay. And I will meet you here
someday far away in my hideaway. What my mom did is
recognize that I had some kind of weird brain
that was very thirsty and very inventive and quite
emotionally mature and presented lots of
different things to me. Like, this is Bach. This is Stravinsky. This is Bartok. This is Britain.
This is Earth, Wind, and Fire. This is Bobby McFerrin. This is Sting. Those are like a lot of
my heroes growing up. And I wasn't told to
do anything with them. I was just told to enjoy them. She used to do things like
turn on the vacuum cleaner or, as we say in the UK,
the Hoover and plug it in and it would go [VACUUM SOUND]
and she would say, Jacob, what note
does that feel like? This is when I'm
two, two years old. I was like, G? yeah, that's a G.
Really, the biggest gift I was given as a child was
a space and the affirmation to create in it. And I was never, ever
taught to practice ever. I was never taught to practice. And people don't believe that. No, no way. Where's the discipline? Sort of thing, and it's
funny because it's true, but people have an
idea of how to learn and how to teach that I think
is horrifically out of date. Do my dreaming and my scheming. Lie awake and pray. Do my crying and my sighing. Laugh at yesterday. Now it's dark and I'm alone. But I won't be afraid in my
room, in my room, in my room, in my room. I like the idea of at the
beginning of "Hajanga," the first thing you hear
is the strings come in. It's like the announcing
of a new song. Yeah. So I quite like the change
of texture for that. That's cool. Do you want to do those edits? You can plug in the
speakers and do those edits. I'd love that, yeah. Can we plug in a microphone? Yeah. Ah, sweet. [SINGING] I saw one of his
videos on YouTube and I thought, oh my
gosh, this guy's amazing. He's got this great sense of
aesthetics and editing skills and mixing and all these things. And I like to build
music tech stuff. And so I sent him a
Facebook message saying-- I'm at MIT and I make stuff. Have you any ideas of
stuff you'd like to make? And I said, oh, yes I have. I've always dreamed of
singing harmony on the spot, be able to essentially
improvise a choir. Singing in the life time. Take these broken wings
and learn to fly, oh, oh. A harmonizer takes
whatever you're singing. And there's a keyboard and
you can play different notes. And the notes that you
play are transformed so that what you sing is spread
across lots and lots of notes-- basically multiplies
his voice up in stacks. Take these broken
wings and learn to fly. Oh, all your life
you were only-- you were only waiting for this
moment to-- moment to be free. Blackbird, fly. Blackbird, fly. Because this is like
woodwind and then sax. Those sounds go
together, don't they? Yeah. I'm going to be creating this
kind of improvised harmonic, more spontaneous technological
musical compound piece where I can send the
musicians information during the performance via
maybe iPad screens or something like this where I say,
you play these notes now. And they play it. It swells up and swells down. And then I can fill in the gaps. And it's like a
big conversation. And this is one of the
main pieces of work that will be done
between now and December. I think on stage,
you'll need one laptop. That will be the MIDI input. OK. And that will have a keyboard. We each open up a web page on
our phone, and there's a staff. So he's picking all these
different notes, chords, rhythms, everything for
every different instrument. And we're playing them as
they come up on our screen. It's allowing Jacob to literally
play the band in real time. I'm a scientist. I'm an engineer too,
so I like to tinker. I like to explore things. And one of my best
laboratories is with music. So I think if anything
Jacob, has made us into bolder, more risk
taking experimentalists. I learned perhaps more
about how it's best not to learn and not to
teach than how to learn and how to teach. Don't give people all
the answers to things. If you give people
all the answers, then they are the
subject to your criteria. But if you give them all
the questions and the clues, then they find
their own answers. And actually, the process of
finding an answer is almost all of learning. So I think teachers
have a responsibility to trust their students
to find not only answers, but their own answers that might
be different from the teacher's answers, especially when
it comes to something like jazz which is so vague
and so expressive and personal. (SINGING) If I let
your mind create me, the work will never end. I don't wanna be a preacher. I just wanna be a man. I won't let you exaltate me. Just to keep me as I am. I don't wanna be a--- We have to take
the cue from him. I had an idea for like-- for the section that
it goes [VOCALIZING].. I could be there like
with the [INAUDIBLE] I'm getting stuff. [VOCALIZING] Just to give them
the rhythm there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. [INAUDIBLE] OK. At what stage in
the process do you write the lyrics to the song? It depends. Sometimes they're the
first thing that I write. I write a lot. I write-- I have a
thought book that's filled with words,
really dense imagery, like really interesting,
dense imagery. And when I come to write lyrics. I try and write as
little of it as I can because the music
is already complex and I need to allow
people to find their meanings in the words. Like the song "Hajanga"
it's just a number of seven syllable lines. Everybody near and far,
come together as you are. And to the ocean, to the sky,
sing that cosmic lullaby. That could mean lots
of different things. That could mean life and death. It could mean a simple
song that your mother sings to you before you go to sleep. It could mean the
actually universe-- like, lots of different things. I'd rather write words
that invite people to understand them rather
than project my understanding onto other people. Everybody near and far
come together as you are. And to the ocean, to the sky,
sing that cosmic lullaby. Sing that lullaby. Sing the hajanga. Sing your pleasure,
sing your pain like I'll never sing again. Let it echo loud
and clear across the ancient stratosphere. And when the good
days pass you by, there's a spark of
joy that can be found. And when those dark clouds bring
you down lift your hands up from the sky singing [SCATTING] As the words go round and
round and round and round, let the tears roll
down and down. [SCATTING] Sing the way you
wish to be across the ancient stratosphere. Even when those dark
clouds bring you down, there's a spark of
joy that can be found. Oh, even when things
break and fall apart. Lift your voices from
your heart singing-- [SCATTING] So every morning
and every night, from that darkness to the light,
like a beacon shining bright, sing the hajanga. You'll be all right. From the winter
comes the spring. It don't matter
what life may bring. Said you can do most anything. So give your hajanga
a song to sing. So tell your mama
and tell your pa. Sing it near and sing it far. Be exactly the way you are. See the hajanga. It's your guiding star. So every woman, every man, in
every nation, in every land, I said please you've
got to understand. Now sing the hajanga
and take my hand. Then one day, your
life is through. Nothing more that you can do. So give away the things
you know, things you know. And tell your friends
you love them so. Tell them hajanga. Probably busy this whole
week, but if you ever find like an hour and you want
to go grab a pint anywhere-- yeah, yeah, fantastic. Are you're going-- you
coming on Saturday? I am. Just find me after the--
find me after the show. I'll be hanging out. Cool, all right. Fantastic. All right. So-- Yeah, yeah, so nice
to meet you too. Yeah, see you soon. Thank you. Cheers, see you later. I really feel like MIT is a sort
of second home in some ways. I've always felt
some kind of kinship with this kind of idea of
celebrating the introvert. At MIT, it's a sort of sublime
understanding of the people who think inwards first. And I would count myself in
amongst that group of people. So I'd like to celebrate that
idea, I think, and being at MIT consistently reminds
me how wonderful it is when people
think beyond this level and up and down into the
other realms of things. So I'd like to just sort of say
thank you to MIT as a concept. [INAUDIBLE] If the groove's
going [BEAT BOXING],, and the bass is going
[BEAT BOXING WITH BASS NOTES],, that's cool, right? It's like, it's more cool
than [BASIC BASS LINE].. Yeah, [COMPLEX BEAT BOXING],,
because they have a gravity that goes
towards the same place, but they don't
have a unison line. Let's try a different groove. This is a groove
that's hard to nail, but it's the groove
on the record. And it's like a lilt groove. So it's less of a shuffle. And it's like halfway between
a shuffle and a normal groove. So this is straight, and
then this is triplet. It's like halfway
between like this. It's less about putting
the high hat later. It's more about bringing
the snare earlier. So it's like-- [BEAT BOXING] Actually, if I play and
then you guys can join in, maybe that's a good
way to get the feel. So it's like-- I dig it. Can I have a go at the drum kit? [INAUDIBLE] [PLAYING DRUMS] He very carefully and
deliberately swings it in certain ways and
modulates the time and pulls and
pushes in a way that just gets this like
really visceral groove where you just like
get into it so much. [SINGING] That little bit of extra
effort to, you know, change it makes such a difference. And that's such a Jacob
kind of construct. It's like that extra
bit of intention that just-- you know, even
just a tiny little breath or a tiny little extra note or
something that doesn't quite, you know, fit in what the rules
say they're supposed to do. So at the end, were you guys-- had you guys split
into two sections, or were you singing
different things? Some of them saying, I don't
want to be [INAUDIBLE].. And the other one was going-- You don't want to be-- Yeah. Yeah, yeah. We could do girls versus boys. It could be so like,
I don't want to be, and then, you don't want to
be my-- you know what I mean? Put your hand in
the air if you'd be willing to sing along
in this next song with me. And by that, I mean
everybody raise your hand. This is a song called "Savior." It's the last tune of the night. Thank you so, so
much for coming. This must be what
Quincy Jones felt when he first encountered Stevie
Wonder or Michael Jackson-- that here's someone
who has really, really deep musical resources. He's marshalling
this at a young age, and he has phenomenal
performance skills, arranging skills,
composition skills. It's just incredible that all
this exists in a single person. Don't wanna be a-- [SCATTING] I don't
need you saving me. I don't need a savior. [SCATTING] She wants to touch me deep
down below and up above me. And I know that she's
never going to love me. I, I, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I know she's always
gonna try to please me. But she can never find
the strength to leave me. You'll never be
the one to free me. Ah, ah, oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll be on and I'll
be done watching life go round and round. I'm not the person you've
been searching for. So go and knock on
someone else's door. Because I don't want
to listen anymore. Oh yeah. You say that I'm
lost and you can help me find that I don't
want to be a savior no more. I wish you could tell me
something to change my mind. But you don't want
to be my savior. [SCATTING] The way he performs
is enthralling. I can't even begin to
imagine his potential. I mean, he's only, what, 22? I just think all of us
are so incredibly lucky. I'm gonna start with
this side of the room. Are you guys ready? Just a second. Say you don't want
to be my savior. You don't want to
close that door. I don't want to give a reason. Would you tell me what
we're searching for? Sing it. You don't want to be my savior. You don't want to
close that door. I don't want to hear a reason. Would you tell me what
we're searching for? Everybody You don't
want to be my savior. Come on! Say you don't wanna
close that door. I don't want to hear a reason. Would you tell me what
we're searching for? All right. Say you don't want
to be my savior. You don't want to
close that door. I don't wanna hear a--- I don't wanna be a preacher,
I just wanna be a man, I won't let you exaltate me. Just to keep me as I am. I don't want to be a preacher. I don't want to. [MUSIC PLAYING] He's one of those once in
a lifetime kind of people that changes the way
you look at things. [MUSIC PLAYING] It's really inspiring. It makes me think that there's
real divinity in the world. [CROWD SINGING] Black bird singing
in the dead of night. Take these broken
wings and learn to fly. Oh, no, in all your
life, oh, no, oh, you were only waiting
for this moment to arrive, for
this moment to a-- birds singing in the
dead of night, oh. Ba ba ba ba ba ba. Take these sunken eyes and
learn to see, learn to see, learn to see. All your life, oh, oh, you were
only waiting for this moment to be free, moment to be free. [END PLAYBACK] [APPLAUSE] I'm so happy. And this is what
Jacob's spirit does. I mean, it's just, he makes
you happy in so many deep ways. Can I just got a quick show
of hands of how many people were involved in
that whole residency? Whether you're a musician, or
you were behind the scenes, raise your hand. If you were involved in some
way or another, raise it high. [APPLAUSE] Thank you so much. Because this really
started as a dream that grew, and grew, and grew. And it was fabulous. We're going to give
the audience a chance to ask questions of all
these amazing people. But I want to say one thing. I've always been in awe of
the ephemeral nature of music, of live performance. Because once you
do it, it's done. You can never recapture it
quite the same way again. And this always
makes me exhilarated. But it always makes me
sad, so that what I find is that, after
really good concerts, I'm rather depressed for a
while, usually an hour or two. After this concert,
weeks I was depressed. So I thank you all for that
great feeling of depression. We're going to do this Q&A.
And I think you know everybody. But I just want to introduce. First and foremost, here is
Jamshied Sharifi, class of '83. [APPLAUSE] We might get some
questions about this. But Jamshied is a fantastic
composer, and arranger, and producer. He was the Director of the
MIT Festival Jazz Ensemble for seven years, took it
on after he graduated. And he had the incredible-- I still don't know
how he did it-- task of not only
transcribing Jacob's music, but arranging it for
very large forces. So Jamshied Sharifi, yes. [APPLAUSE] Of course, you've
already met Jean Dunoyer, our wonderful film
director and editor. [APPLAUSE] And of course, the brilliant
and ever innovative media mastermind of MIT and
well beyond, Ben Bloomberg. [APPLAUSE] And of course, the
magical Jacob Collier, whose capacity for creativity
with heart knows no limits, Jacob. [APPLAUSE] So here's your chance. Anybody has a question,
we just ask you come down. There's a mic on either side. Any question of any of these
folks would be great to have. Hi, I have a really
exciting editing question, if there's such a thing, for
Jacob and for the filmmaker. How do you take
something like all that happened to be
concise as a filmmaker and not make it a Peter Jackson
Lord of the Rings movie with 19 endings? And is there a part
of it like letting go? And also, I guess with
arranging your music with all these
people, and it could be like a 10 hour long
concert, so how much of it is letting go of
attachments and stuff like that to make the
whole thing better? All right, yeah, I can
handle that question. So really, what
it is is you spend a lot of time looking
at your footage. And you're looking
for the peaks, for the real moments
when everything's coalescing perfectly. And when you're
making film, there's always some things that
just fall off the edge, that just don't work at all. Or that great shot you
wanted just didn't happen. And so you really
look at your footage to concentrate the energy
on the bits that really fly. So in the case of the
rehearsal for example, I ended up boiling it down to
about 20 minutes of rehearsal. And I loved all of it. But once I get to
that point, then I've decided I like those 20 minutes. And then, I just
choose the bits that illustrate what might have
happened before and after, in terms of the song
that you're hearing before or after in performance. So those are some of
the thought processes that I go through with editing. It's really about
finding the nectar, squeezing it to the maximum. I don't know if Jacob
wants to add something. Yeah, I can relate
to that, for sure. I think for me, when it
comes to making music, there's always the sorrow of
letting go of a good idea, right? It's just very sad. However, I've always had
this idea, a slight mechanism for dealing with
this kind of thing, where I often record
ideas on voice memos. So it's like [BEAT BOXING] And I whisper to myself
about how to create, how to manifest it from that
point and all sorts of things. I then take that idea and
put it in a timeline view. I then cut it up
and color code it in gold, silver,
and bronze ideas. And bronze ideas are filler. And in my case, those are
sometimes quite extreme already. Silver ideas are the
moments that make you go, whoa, that's crazy. And gold moments are
like mic drop moments. And my challenge is always
to have the patience and trust the listener to leave
the gold ideas to the end. Because I want to
do them all at once. And I've always had a love. And my intuition has always
found that doing everything at once is really fun. And the older I get-- now, I'm all grown up. Yeah, and I think I'm
learning that it's that tricky thing of, the
more you know how to do, the more courage it takes
not to do it all at once. But the more you have that said
courage, the greater the depth of the end result of something. So I think it's a process of
understanding your own process. For me, it's about letting
everything come out. Everything has to come out, all
the ideas, all of the visions, all of the various
things that one juggles in the creative process. I think that, if you
don't let that come out, then there's something
that is never going to be done as a result.
And so everything comes out. And then, one needs the
courage to deal with each thing as it is, and then to place it
where it needs to be placed, if that makes any sense. Jacob, given
whatever preconceived notions you had about MIT-- and we all had them before
we came and discovered what MIT is all about-- given those
preconceived notions, what surprised you
most about interacting with these wonderful students? Yeah, fantastic question. So I mean, I feel like I had
scratched the surface of what MIT was all about. Because I've been hanging
with Ben for a while, I guess a year,
if that's a while. Two years. Two years. And I think I was
expecting some fun. And I was expecting
some innovation. But the quality of the
brilliance of the minds just blew me away. The moment I came
in in September, and dipped my toe in,
I think that's where we got some of the
rehearsal footage was from that initial
rehearsal time. And it's like, these
guys are just alive. And when you look someone in the
eye and their eyes are going-- it's just that I connect
with that so much. And it's wonderful. And often with collaborations,
and especially with teaching, you come to these
institutions to teach, whatever that happens
to mean, and there are these students with no eyes
looking at you in the audience. But here, it's like
everyone is just ready. They're just thirsty and ready. And they're like sponges. So you say an idea once and
it sticks with everybody. And that's so rare. I can't tell you
how rare that is. And then, obviously, when
you rehearse, it's exciting. And when you arrange and
discuss, it's exciting. But when everyone
gets on that stage, no one really knows
what's going to happen. Me and Fred had discussed at
length, the different sections, and the order of the
songs, and things. But things change so fast. And then, you're
taken by surprise. And I think, for a collective
group of people who are perhaps used to organizing
things, and frameworks and understanding that things
happen in a certain order, and these are the
greatest science and math brains of our generation. But then, you could drop a
bomb and people all respond. And I think that was something
I wasn't expecting at all, but something I
was elated to find. Thank you. You're welcome. This is for Jacob. So you've obviously used
extensive music technology and you're here because you're
pushing the limits of it. What kind of music technology
do you have musical visions for in the distant
future, for the tech that's like not even close? And also second question, do you
want to grab a pint after this? On me. [APPLAUSE] Thank you very much. Yeah, to the latter is a yes. All right, see you there. To the former, I guess Ben
and I can answer this question together. Yeah, so when Ben sent
me this Facebook message, it was very thrilling for me. And actually, it
was serendipitous that I even saw it. Because I tend to stay
clear of Facebook messages. Because it's a minefield. You never know what weird
stuff you're going to find. And it just so
happened that, one day out of three or four weeks,
I decided to check them out. And on the top of the
pile was Ben Bloomberg. And so I clicked on his name. And then, there was
this-- it wasn't long-- it was a short paragraph. It basically just said-- I mean, you can say
it better than I can. But it basically just said,
I've just seen a video of yours. And I think it's exciting. And I just create things. I love to create things. And to me, that was like,
well, that's me as well. I love to create things. But Ben likes to create digital,
performance-flavored things. And yeah, I guess as you saw in
the documentary, it was like, do you want to make anything? And the answer to that
was an absolute yes. And we jumped on Skype
and spoke for three hours. And it was just like-- I'd been waiting-- how old
was I at the time, 19 or 20? I'd been waiting 20 years
for that conversation. So it was like-- And Ben was just it
was just astounding. Because it would be
very easy just to say, well, that's a lot of stuff,
and that was fun, goodbye, that sort of thing. But I think, partly
because a lot of the stuff just wasn't really
possible, and some of it still is not
possible, and some of has been made possible by
Ben, which is just astounding. And I guess the first thing, I
wanted to tour my room, right? I wanted to tour my
room, which is not a conventional way of touring. Because normally, one
would tour with a band. But I want to be able
to tour with the room. And I wanted to get to sing
in harmony on the spot. Do you want to explain a
bit about the harmonizer, and how we did it, and how it
works, and that whole shebang? Yeah, I mean, so it's all of
our favorite sounds in one box. And there are a lot of other
approaches to similar things, like phase vocodors and all
kinds of things out there. But first thing Jacob said
is, well, all the ones I could find only
have four notes. And I want to play way more
than four notes at a time. And so the first
thing we did is we started to try to
figure out how to make one that could play a
gazillion notes simultaneously. And it was like, well,
what if I play a chord, and then I want to
keep that one going, and then play something
else on top of it? And so we came up with
this thing, actually. It's right there, which
is a bunch of electronics, and software, and some
off-the-shelf stuff, and some custom stuff. And yeah, I guess that was the
first thing we sat together. We did in about a weekend. Jacob came to Boston to visit. And we put it all together. And then, we started
thinking about other stuff. Yeah, I mean, it's
an ongoing challenge. It's like, as a human
being, how can I make my creative process
bigger without detracting from my humanity? That's the thing, isn't it? Because technology just
steals humanity sometimes, stows it away in some
invisible, dangerous place. And I think for me,
it's that thing of, if I had 11 arms or 12
arms, I would try and play all the instruments at one. But I don't. So the only way to do it is to
try and use our imaginations about how to achieve that. But the goal is like more human,
rather than remove from human. And I think that's an aesthetic
that we said and share. Moving forward,
there's so much to do in the world of technology. But it has to feel like you
can touch it, you can feel it. And the moment you touch,
it gets you out of yourself. Because for me, those are
the best creative processes. It doesn't matter whether
it's the piano, or a bass, or a computer, or something. It's like, if you
touch it and it goes-- then, you want to
create into it. And so yeah, I mean, we've got
a bunch of strange projects that are flying around,
like this is the harmonizer. And there's now soon
to come to vocalizer, which is a dangerous
sample library made of voices that does-- and various other things. And then, we're
trying to figure out a way to essentially
teach a computer how to navigate harmony, and
then present to humans the user interface
with which they can interact using their own
emotional criteria to navigate. So they don't have to be
musicians to know that, if you add a [PLAYS CHORD] To that chord, it
warms your heart up. But if I can just put
that in someone's hand, but they don't have to say,
OK, it's an A minor chord and I'm adding a D, they can
just say, I want to just go-- and then, they can
make it happen. So it's a bit of
a romantic idea. But we're working towards
it piece by piece, where we are going to tackle that. I think is a challenge,
especially with the technology stuff, figuring out actually
what the tech is good for and what Jacob is
good for basically. And so a lot of people
build systems, especially for live performance. And you're trying to
lean on the computer to do something that
just a human is always going to do better. And maybe 10 years, 20
years down the road, we'll have something
that does it. But when you look
at it right now and you're thinking about
an experience for people in an audience, computers
do certain things really, really well. But we do certain things
really, really well. And so finding the
optimal synergy there is what we're
excited about working on. A computer is ever going
to follow a score as well as a human can, at least in
the next two and a half years, let's say. So maybe we'll wait
two and a half years. But those are a lot of the kinds
of decisions and philosophies that we think about. Where can we apply the
technology in a way where it's actually doing
something that helps, that makes that
performance more musical? So your anecdote with the vacuum
cleaner reminded me of this. So in pieces like "In the Bleak
Midwinter" and "Fascinating Rhythm," you display this
microtonally perfect sense of perfect pitch. How much of that was just
something you've always had? And how much of
that was developed? Interesting question. So perfect pitch is just
a kind of memory, really. It's being able
to recall a sound. And I suppose the more I've
recorded things over the years, the more I've realize
that this is not in tune. It's not in tune at all. To very quick demonstrate,
if you take a major triad-- I mean, you guys know this. Because this is like Pythagoras
figured this stuff out, right? But on the piano, this
is a G major chord. And the major third is
actually 14 cents too high, which means 1,400ths
of a semitone. So the correct one is like-- [SINGS NOTE] It's like that, out of tune. But I realized this. I mean, it's like, how does
no one know this stuff, man? It's crazy. It's like a hoax. And so I just strive
to sing more in tune. And I had to disregard computers
knowing better than I did. Because I had to learn about
how to tune chords by ear. And then suddenly,
it's like, well, my perfect pitch declines
that B. Because it's not A440. And then suddenly,
you learn that there's no reason why 12 keys are. They're just this limit. There are more. And then yeah, so for example,
"In the Bleak Midwinter," where go to G half-sharp
in the fourth verse, it's just a voyage
into a key that is slightly fresher
to everybody's ears, definitely mine. Because I got bored
of the normal ones. So I thought it would be
fun to try things out. But you know what? I think anybody
with a skill set-- I'm sure you guys
can relate to this. But you have your skills that
you use on a regular basis. And then, once those
get tired, it's to do with knowing how to
gather in a way that's not going to disrupt what you
already have but is going to push you and stretch
your imagination and your creative strengths. And I just think, for me, that
the microtonal thing was a bit of a game that, for a while-- I'm still into it. But there was a while
where I was really into it, and voices going [SINGING NOTES] Sort of-- [SINGING NOTES] It was just interesting for me. Because voices need to move. That's it. That's the gesture,
movement and arrival. And if you arrive in
a satisfying place, it doesn't matter
how you get there. So microtones or no microtones,
it still does the job. So it's just a nice
thing to think about. It's another example
of just thinking in between the gaps of details
and finding that there's magic in the things that
aren't quantized, by which I mean everything's the same. Like, if I play a groove
into Logic that's like this. And then, I quantize
it and it goes-- it's fine, and it's
accurate, and techno guys are going to dance well to that. But it goes back
to your question. It's lost some of its humanity. Because the computer squeezed
the humanity out of that. So Samba, for example-- [BEAT BOXING] The groove there-- [BEAT BOXING] It's not straight. It rolls like an egg. And once you get to learn
that, it's like, oh, so that's not accurate then. This is just one
potential thing. All the semitones don't
have to be the same size. You can go in between. And you can stretch
things around. Yeah, I mean, I could talk
for a long time about this. But the basic premise is that
things that are perfect just generally are neither
perfect nor moving. And so it's just nice to
push, as much as you can, the things that we believe
to be straight and correct into places that have
a bit more potential for unfamiliar,
emotional language, if that makes any sense. One question for
Jamshied, if I might. I think that you might be the
only person, other than Jacob, with Hajanga, who has arranged
Jacob's own music for forces beyond just Jacob alone. I don't know if that's
true, but anyway. It might be close to being true. I think it's close
to being true. So how was that process? You actually know. I do. But they don't. When I started on the business
of arranging Jacob's music, within about an hour, I
realized that I was not going to be able to
really understand what was going on inside of it. So I called up you guys and
asked for the multitracks, in other words for the
versions of the songs in which every element was isolated,
so that I could hear them in isolation and try to
figure out what was going on. And even with that,
I mean, Ben sent me sessions that were
about 60 tracks wide. But a single track would have-- I mean, it would be
labeled "Guitar." And it would have
12 guitars in it. So it was an incredible
density in all of this. And I mean typically,
I'll spend two or three days on a good
sized arrangement, on an arrangement for orchestra. And all of these for Jacob where
at least eight or nine days. Because there was so much
decoding, and understanding, and really re-orienting
myself to what I thought I knew about music. Because you were doing-- I mean, you're saying this. But I'm verifying
you're doing stuff that I've never seen before,
that I've never seen people consider, in terms of the way
harmonies are put together, in terms of the
way the time was. Because it definitely
wasn't quantized. And yet, it grooved its ass off. And I was trying to figure
out how is this all working. So yeah, there were
days of what I'll just call decoding and
analysis, of trying to understand where
it was coming from, and then taking that and putting
it on paper, so that us mortals could read it. It was revelatory. It was really enjoyable
and eye opening. But yeah, it was a revelation. I still feel that and feel
it more hearing pieces again. There's so much in
what you're doing that it's at a level
I've never seen before. So I don't know if that
answers your question. [APPLAUSE] Thank you so much. We'll have one more
question, I think. Hi, OK, so I was going to
preface this by asking you if you have any problems. But the real question
that I was going to ask is what obstacles
have you faced? Because I know I personally
suffer, in my artistry, from a lot of anxiety and a
lot of perfectionism paralysis things. It's just the philosophy
of, well, I mean, if you're not going
to do it right, then you shouldn't do it at all. Are there any major things
that you either are currently working through or you
have overcame to become such an expressive musician? That's a really wonderful
question, thank you, and a huge question as well. That's why I said, do you have
any problems would be the best. Do I have any problems? Yeah, so when I go to
restaurants and look at the menu, I cannot make a
decision about what to order. That's it. So I think, OK, to break this
down into short sections, one is to do with the
way that you learn and the reason
that you learn it. And for me, as basically
a self-taught musician, I didn't look to other
people for the answers. And so I think was brought up
to very much trust my intuition to lead me in the
right direction. And I think I enjoyed the
process of arriving at a place more than I did the place. Because when you get to a
place, it's like, oh, OK, done. And for me, that's like
what Fred was saying. It's like you do all
this glorious work to get to a place. And then, you do the show. And it's gone. And it's a little bit sad. So for me, in terms of learning
things, it's always just been about, instead of
isolating a destination, and then going there
and achieving it, and the achieving of it
being what keeps me alive, it's like the varying
forms of nourishment that I'm subject to during
the process of gathering a particular area within
a framework of something, that process is
something I really enjoy. But I never really
minded what other people thought of what I was doing. And I still don't
really mind, actually. And so the fact that
now I'm making music and people are listening
to it, and coming to my shows, and things,
it's absolutely wonderful. But it does truly feel
like a bonus to a process that I so thoroughly
enjoy that there'd be nothing that would
stop me doing it, if nobody was listening at all. So I think, to that end,
people say all sorts of things about people. And so you can be
bruised by something that somebody says
about you or to you, but only really if
you take their opinion as a method through which
you can validate yourself. And for me, I've always been of
the belief that I trust myself. I love my imagination so much. I just completely and
utterly believe in it. And it's not that I
always get it right. It's just that being in
there feels really good. And as a child, I just used to
sit in a room, just in heaven, with nothing else
other than just-- because my mind was just
making all this stuff happen. I'm sure many of you
guys can relate to this. But one particular challenge is
that an overactive imagination in education is a
difficult thing to handle and a difficult thing to be
understood by those around you. And so for me, it was always,
Jacob, can you just do a bit less, just play simple. You've got lots of
good ideas, Jacob. Just one is enough. So I played a drum kit in
the concert band at school. And on the part it's like [BEAT BOXING] And it's like, OK, well [BEAT BOXING] And all these musicians
are just trying to play along with their part. And it's like,
everybody, stop, stop. OK, Jacob, less is
more, less is more. And it's that interesting
thing of less is more. Because less is only more
when you know what more is. And then, you can make
a conscious decision to step back from that. And for me, I think it's like
what I was saying earlier. It's about you have to
let yourself come out to be able to see yourself as
raw elements, raw materials. And then, you can make
some creative decisions about what to do. But if you're constantly
pushed back into the shell, not in terms of a very negative
way, like you're bad or wrong, but more just like there's too
much that we can't deal with right now, so just wait 'til-- just right now, you just
got to play that groove. [BEAT BOXING] So I think for
me, as a teenager, I just had trouble relating
to the people around me that were telling me that things
were correct and incorrect. And I think I've learned since
that music, thank goodness, is not biology, for example. It's not a matter
of life and death. It's really just lovely. And the point of
music is to explore what it means to be expressive. And so there is not really
such a thing as this is correct and this is incorrect. And I've never paid
too much attention to this is the right
note to put in the chord and this is the wrong note. But I think, as I said, I've
trusted my intuitions enough to gather a sense of why
I feel this is strong and this is weak,
in terms of emotion. I'd maybe say that this voicing [PLAYS CHORD] Is not as strong as [PLAYS CHORD] This voicing. Because I don't necessarily
want to double the third, as Bach would say. And I later learned
that Bach said don't double the
third in principle. But I think it's-- going back to the
original point, it's like, why do you do music? Why do you do anything? And for me, the
reason I do music is because I want to
chase those goosebump moments, the moments that just
make me go like, oh man, what does is that? What is that sound? And how do I understand it? How can I achieve that myself? And I looked around me as
a teenager and nobody else was thinking in those terms. So I just took upon myself
all the responsibilities of the band members and
gradually gathered things. But one problem I've had is
that my technique, my hands have never ever been
able to catch up with my head to the
point where, when I went to just college
as an 18-year-old for a couple of years, I
was the kid in the class with no chops but the ears. So I could hear everything
that was going on. I knew the notes,
and the chords, and why emotionally this
one note was just so tender, and stuff like that. But I couldn't just play
over Don Elliott 300 BPM. I couldn't do that. So it was hard to explain
why some things have value. It's hard to explain why
certain things are valuable, some underneath details. And I'm sure you guys,
and Jamshied, I'm sure, and absolutely Jean
can relate to this. Because it's to do with,
when you create something, it's tuning into all the
different levels of gestures, right? It's the general
gestures of it's this, and this is the beginning,
and this is the end. Or it's loud, and it's quiet. Or it's bright,
and then it's dark. But there are many
gestures in between that are to do with
it's bright, and it's heading towards brightness,
but I'm not going to make it bright until later. And suddenly, it's added
a dimension of intention that I just really
enjoyed as a teenager. So having the patience
to invest in those parts of your imagination
is a challenge. Because it's fairly, generally
misunderstood and/or dismissed. So I think there are always
times in a person's life where you have to think, well,
why am I doing this again? Why do I love this? And why is it important to me? And if, for example, my
left brain takes over, which it often does, I'm
sure some of you guys can relate to this thinking,
about thinking, about thinking, about thinking conundrum, right? And that's a problem. Because it's what you
described as paralysis from analysis type situations,
where you're just tied up. And you can't even see the
wood for the trees anymore. Because you've lost perspective. And all of us, as creative
people, can, I'm sure, relate to that thing
when you tune so deeply into a part of a process that
there's just no seeing it for what it is anymore. And that takes the courage
to step away, or get somebody else's opinion,
and not be defensive, and all sorts of things. But I think it's
coming back to a place that belongs to you, a place in
your mind that belongs to you, and where your values are
safe from others' judgment. And yeah, I could speak
for a long time about this. One other thing I
might quickly mention is that just touring was
exhausting at first for me. Because I'm certainly
an introvert. So concentrating on all
those little details, they kept me alive. And touring funnily enough, no
one really minds if its like-- or-- it just doesn't make
much of a difference. Because everyone
just wants to go-- So at first, it was like,
do you guys even care? And then, it's like, oh, now
I understand that actually, with communication, the
gestures have grown. The importance of putting the
foreground in the foreground has grown. And for me, when
I create things-- I'm sure you guys would
relate a little bit to this as well-- it's
like this background is in the foreground. The underneaths are
in the foreground. Because they're
under the microscope. But when you perform,
that is the foreground. You are the foreground. And I had to realize that
it's the same energy that goes inwards that goes
outwards when one performs. But you just need to polarize
the direction of that energy. And then, you're fine. And I didn't need to build a
sort of Jacob the Champion who does touring and
excites people thing. It was just like I just
needed to be myself, but in a different direction. And so it's just like
falling off a log. You just think, well,
I'm going to be me today. And I don't really mind, even
if you like it very much. But it's just nice to see you,
sort of attitude to touring. I hope that helps a little bit. Yeah, is there-- OK. [APPLAUSE] I was going to say, is there
a place where-- because I know you're a very busy person. But if you could share a little
bit more of your insights with me, when you find the time. We could figure out. Yeah, I'd very much enjoy that. OK, great. It's a date. Just give me something. Perfect, cool. So we are certainly so
grateful to have Jacob as a part of our community. We hope he continues to
be part of our community. And he's a world citizen
these days, along with Ben. And we thought it'd
be great to end with Jacob performing for us. Jacob Collier. [APPLAUSE] I just need to apply
some tape to my face, with the help of Mr. Bloomberg. [APPLAUSE] So meet the harmonizer. He's a lovely beastie. [MUSIC - Jacob Callier,
"Oh Danny Boy"] Oh Danny Boy The pipes, the pipes are calling From glen to glen And down the mountain side The summer's gone And all the roses falling It's you, it's you
must go and I must bide But come ye back When summer's in the meadow When the trees are
[? touched ?] with snow For I'll be there in
sunshine or in shadows Oh Danny Boy, Danny
Boy, I love you so Oh, Danny Boy, I love you so Take me anywhere you want to go You know my love is strong And my heart [? Softly, ?] [? softly, ?]
[INAUDIBLE],, follow the storm I've been searching all along For my heart, where it is Here it comes Darling we don't always far away Oh no Where are we going, near or far Come together as you are To the ocean, to the sky Sing that old, sweet lullaby Sing with me, child Sing your pleasure,
sing your pain Like you'll never sing again Let it echo loud and clear Across the ages Even when the sun
refuses to shine There's a spark of
joy that can be found Oh, even when things
break and fall apart Lift your hands up
for the world, singing Come ye back when
summer's in the meadow Danny Boy, Danny Boy I
love you, love you so Danny, Danny, I love you so When summer's in the meadow Oh, Danny Boy, I love you so Danny Boy, oh, I
love you so, you so Oh, Danny Boy, I love you so Oh, Danny Boy, I love you so Oh, Danny Boy, I love you so I love, I love, I love you so Danny Boy, oh, I love you so [APPLAUSE] Thank you so, so
much, thank you. Thank you so, so much to Fred. Thank you to Ben. Thank you to Jamshied. Thank you to Jean. And thank you guys for
coming along and being a part of this very,
very special evening. I will not forget it in a jiffy. I'll be thinking about
this for a while. It's been very, very special. Thank you so much for coming. And see you very soon. Thanks. [APPLAUSE]
