In Conversation With Peter Erskine

can I be profane please really have a hundred percent all right [Music] the great drummer you might as well stay home and we feel very fortunate uh this year and tonight to have with us one of the best drummers around if not the best Mr Peter Erskine I think the other reason to be honest that I was crying was because that was a moment when I realized I'll never be able to do that this is fascinating because I'm I'm getting excited boy it's good to see you again you too man it's been so long um and welcome to the daddy Club oh yeah thank you man and welcome to the grandfather though that's amazing thank you yeah and how old are your kids now uh our son is 40. Tai Chi is 40 and our daughter Maya is 35. okay and their birthdays are coming up pretty quickly wow and um Maya's son who's our grandson Leon is is just it's going to be uh two years old in a few days amazing I'm hitting the 18 month Mark with my daughter unbelievable that's the best thing in the world it's amazing yeah and I used to be the guy who was like the latest I'll ever be to something is on time that was always my Mantra was like I'm never going to be late and I we scheduled for 10 a.m today I pulled up at 10 or two but now I've become dead it's like she gets that extra two minutes every time when she wants it you know it's interesting how that it's very magnetic like she says something I'm like okay everything else of importance Falls away and laser focus in on her it's amazing um I you're having said that I should just point out that as my clock uh reached at 10 A.M your car pulled up oh wow okay well would that work our meeting was scheduled for nine no just kidding um sitting here and and talking to you and not mentioning where the report is probably like um talking to a great painter and not mentioning maybe their greatest work uh but because I think most people know that about you by now I want to focus in on something really specific that's been on my mind as I listen to all your music the past few days to prepare for this conversation did you arrive at storytelling as not just a drama but as a musician because this prolific side man catalog from such an early age Big Bear and Stan Kenton and these large ensembles plus through weather reports steps ahead like all these things that everyone knows but also this undercurrent of solo albums focused so much around the trio and was so two questions really was the trio format the smaller thing and the more focused and and compact thing a reaction to the larger and louder ensembles you would spend so much time working with early on and how did you get to storytelling as an artist from a side note well uh I'll do my best to answer the storytelling so uh part of the question first um I think that was a direct result of of joseville's advice to me which was uh you know you should always compose when you play and that combined um with uh innumerable conversations uh with my best friend from high school a director named Jack Fletcher he's also a teacher of trauma and um we we would speak often and a lot about intentionality and being specific and this is something that in my work writing music for theater I've just always hear the directors talking to the actors about you know whether they were being specific enough about what was what was their intention doing something and you know theater is is the ultimate form of Storytelling so you know it has been forever so it just all made sense to me uh in terms of of drumming um now this this wasn't any kind of noble Quest um it really is but it usually comes out of a dissatisfaction that we have when we hear ourselves back and just go you know that's tired sounding or that's dumb or uh that feels pushed how much did you record yourself early in your career early in your not that much to my detriment okay um you know when when I would uh have to bear witness to my playing like in a recording studio uh you know it felt like Judgment Day and and was always a bit of a shocking moment because like you know I knew what my use the word intentions again I knew what my intentions were right yeah I was already getting a clear idea of what I wanted to sound like and why was that because I just listened to a lot of music so I was you know I'm just trying to I hear I'm wearing my art Blakey t-shirt yeah I was trying to do what my drumming Heroes did and in the context of these other musical Heroes so and then and then I would shortchange the music you know it just wouldn't come out okay like I wanted it to um and and so I would have to listen along with everybody else you know when the record came out um finally i s uh when I started observing myself on video um like early Kenton well Captain was just once or twice you know like okay we would play uh at a there was a high school somewhere in Pennsylvania and they they had a video no audio visual club or something and they videotaped one of the concerts and that was kind of revolutionary at the time to have that it was pretty Advanced it was a it was a reel-to-reel uh black and white video system that Sony had and my dad had one similar wow um uh and then eventually they they went to the cassette kind of like the betamax thing but in the old days it was just reel-to-real and it was black and white but I was uh I was not pleasantly surprised by observing myself how how choppy I looked from a look perspective yeah and I said well okay that's starting to make a little bit of sense and a few more times over the years uh you know and again to to quote Joe salvanol I've told the story before you know he came up to me one night after a concert and he goes you know man you were playing this beat tonight it didn't feel right and I turn around and look at you didn't look right neither so I you know I said what do you mean he said I got your shoulders all hunched up you know so I went back to the hotel room and sat in front of the mirror on the edge of the bed and uh now all the years I've been playing it was until I was on tour with uh Diana Krall um and yeah this was when I was 50 years old okay and my daughter was going to see an uh Alexander technique specialist and Alexander for those of you who don't know that was the surname of of the guy that developed this awareness of of body posture and how it can either help or hinder the expressive process like that's about sure yeah um he was a uh he was an actor and he was losing his ability to project his voice he would go see one doctor after another and they said there's nothing wrong with your voice and he realized he was blocking his own because of his posture yeah okay I think more or less alignment all these things uh so uh a friend of mine uh first well I remember back in Indiana University um some of the classical students were were into Alexander technique and then an old friend of mine Michelle mccarski of wonderful violinist who uh has recorded two or three albums with Keith Jarrett oh well um she uh had become a practitioner and was just extolling the virtues blah blah so I decided to accompany Maya to her session and I booked a short session for myself and so when it was my turn the Alexander technique practitioner um said well I know nothing about drumming but why don't you show me how you sit and this is I think a go-to for unless you're in a profession or activity where you stand so I sat with my kind of hunched over bad posture yeah and he said all right let's try something so it was sitting up and he gave me the imagery of of my tail like the like like a bird's right tail of feathers sprouting out behind me yeah okay yeah and and straightening up and and the the incredible thing when I so I tried this when I got back on on the road with Diana was that I opened up to the rest of the band okay because I was closing off I you know the the music was taking a direction that I wasn't 100 comfortable with Wow Diana having an impact on your musical choices it was having an impact on your musical choices completely but the the musical slash spiritual right choice is because I was like I don't like this music and therefore I don't like I'm not liking these people because I was kind of like what am I doing here and then this allowed me to receive the beauty of what they were doing wow and and it and that makes you feel better about yourself yeah you know I was like just the simplest change of posture had had not only a physical but a spiritual effect and and of course this helped the music um and and so you know functioning as as a as a teacher at USC I'll be leaving the University at the end of this semester yeah just to have more time at home nice but um you know it involves all these things and and uh my teaching method um going off on a tangent please uh thanks uh has never been you know sticking to the lesson plan you know and the benefit of all your students well ultimately some of them where's this going right kind of thing um but uh it's always really rewarding to get the feedback finally like it's usually about a year or two after they've graduated and also get these amazing letters like wow yeah um so uh in terms of the storytelling um I would credit having been fortunate enough to work in the theater World um that both of my uh children the work in the Arts my son Tai Chi is an editor film and video editor and and Maya is an actress and and writer and director um and my buddy Jack you know so uh you know for all the the high the high talk of art or the or the talk of high art yeah um uh I think you'll agree with me that ultimately all all we really need to do is just play what we want it to sound like right right what do you want it to sound for sure that brings up an interesting thing of I heard Tiger Woods talk about this as he warms up on the golf range and he has a real versus feel when he looking back at his video real versus feel feel yeah okay so he knows what it felt like when he hit the shot we know what it feels like when we play but what was the reality I think we have a distorted perception of what is actually happening in the moment um and and some the best of us can or best people best players or whatever can bring the reel in the field like really in line like he said when he's playing the best what he feels and what he wants like you said about knowing what you want it to sound like and playing the way you want it to sound like those two things kind of align have you ever thought about that well this is fascinating because I'm I'm getting excited um because uh a thing I I work on with my students um when you said feel I because of my bad hearing I thought you might have said fear oh okay um I'm sure that plays A Part somewhere well um you know everyone's always afraid of of someone judging yes you know but you know if if I'm playing and on uh and I'm in a enclosed room and on the other side of the door uh Steve gadd standing there no he's not standing there would that change no the reality is it is what it is and so once you can Embrace that well he might be there he might not if he's there then that means he probably dug it I mean right you know it's always a dragger and you see somebody get up and leave it so I never get nervous if somebody's there you know because I just wow that's nice that they're that they're listening but um it was Bill Evans The Pianist who uh said in he did a series of interviews with his brother okay and uh I think the brother asked about that does he play differently if it's a larger audience versus a smaller one and he said he could be uh in a closet with no one else present and it wouldn't change the relationship he's having with the music at that moment which is kind of a beautiful thing see I I heard you once uh talk about uh Neil Neil pet like and and talking about what he does in a stadium drum solo you know keeping fifty thousand people and you said I wouldn't know how to do that not but I disagree like I think you would do great first of all um but there is a certain element of that about being able to play to the room not change what you are saying emotionally or or or not changing your personality but perhaps playing to the situation a little more that maybe comes with experience just I mean this is the genius okay of um drummers uh like you know Jeff Porcaro Jr Robinson um the list could go on and on you're talking about Studio guys it's a studio drummer recording onto tape before we had the ability to adjust things using a computer how they could compose come up with a part that worked the best for that song and um I mean you know James Gatson how blame I mean you listen to multiple takes at these drummers would do and it's just phenomenal how focused they can stay and build on it now another great drummer um but he straddled an interesting fence was Earl Palmer because Earl was he was a jazz guy and and I I think he he couldn't resist the improvisational urge now when uh when most of us jazzers do Studio stuff um yeah we get in our own way because we can't it's very hard to play the same thing over and over I mean the joke is Shelley Mann to find jazz is you know someone never playing the same thing once yeah but you know it's a blessing and a curse yeah I think um so the the the the the you're like Neil um he he he practiced what he did and there's no there's no judgment on that woman I mean it's just it's it's it's you know the the the the the result is is what counts and um one gratifying thing and and he said that that not only he knows it but his band noticed it was that he was taking more chances after as a result of our working together um and I I never got a chance to hear how that manifested okay you know so you never heard the band Live no okay no right before the lockdown I was uh flying back from Vienna with my wife and we had um uh it was one of those you know you have to buy your own ticket kind of thing so we we found a pretty good business class deal on Air Canada gotcha like going through Toronto I know I know it well okay so uh the uh the flight from Toronto to Los Angeles I noticed Getty Lee and and his wife I assume it's this way um a couple rows back on the other side up in first and I I you know I'm not sure what stopped me because I I could have you know again I just want to express my condolences right um and then I was thinking I would give the flight attendant a note please pass this yeah but um the the five I was feeling like it was he didn't want to be bothered I found out later uh just a couple weeks ago uh don Perry called me and um we realized holy cow Getty was flying to La the next day was a memorial service for Neil and and Dome was was saying he felt really bad because I was supposed to have been invited and I wasn't and if the rush people had known oh man but the whole thing um and I said oh my gosh you know I I was on the flight right that's what he was doing so coming to L.A I I didn't know because I didn't come first with him um and yeah that was a sad thing but I I enjoy the the memories of when Neil came and and our oh uh our follow-up conversations after every session well it's interesting you talk about Jr and Jeff baccaro and those guys being able to make that part create that part and play it over and over again I last three days been listening to you non-stop in a multitude of situations and yeah okay so with Kenny wheeler and Dave Holland probably not the same notes no combination played ever again uh but what about when you get in a session for magnetic for instance like and when you you're that period of the 80s and into the early 90s and sequences and well you know I was trying to craft parts and and whenever and that's what I'm asking because it sounds that way you know that's we've it's doing the best I could I mean and whenever I would um throwing something dumb I remember one time uh Mike vigniri turned to me on a playback and he said it was it was really good up until he just he said why did you do that I was like I don't know why it's so good you know I had so um but I had this beautiful moment and and I didn't understand it until years later but you know I was um I Was A Bachelor I'm living in in New York and I've got this nice nice Co-op apartment and I put on this uh new album I guess at the time it was a Michael McDonald album the one that had a cute forget oh wow okay big big record yeah big record um but the tune that that I kind of zeroed in on was um was was a song called that's why okay and then and it has Jeff playing and I I listened to it again and I listened to it again and I started crying as I was listening to it and you know I like to think that uh the the beauty of the performance uh the the the Perfection that I was hearing so it was kind of like you know for me it was like seeing the pieta or something it was just like you know holy cow but the I think the other reason to be honest that I was crying was because that was a moment when I realized I'll never be able to do that this as close as I like to think I can get to this you know and the drumming was always competitive and you want to you know I kind of want to be the leader of the pack yeah that's in some way sure some angle um and and it was just kind of wonderful moment as painful as it was realizing I'll never be able to do that that's just beat that's beyond the reach wow and and I'm getting close because I'm in this laboratory now and this was right when we were doing those steps ahead albums and when you talk about the pack that's a pretty serious pack at that time as well that's you and Steve Gad and Smith and Jordan all the states yeah a lot of Steve a lot of steams but will and Hiram and all those guys it was that your hang in New York with Will and Hiram and that like 21st Street Band a little bit the 24th 24th Street man sorry were you kind of interchangeable with Steve in some of those situations Dan rolnik was was my Hub right for that um so uh and this is no exaggeration when whenever I played with Will um any number of times he he might he might say um hey can I uh it was just quietly ask if he could redo his part okay and he somehow would remember exactly where I might have done this or that and he made it work wow but it's will Lee we're talking about but yeah Willie and and he'd never say like let me go in here and fix it because you you messed it up he would just do it but I I could hear what he was doing yeah I was like wow amazing um so it was always great to get to play with him um yeah but New York was filled with Incredible musicians yeah of course I just wonder what that everyone kind of had their Hub like you say I yeah yours was Don gronick and what was and I might have sorry my Hub started to shift from you know I went to New York to to to to to start working with steps right which became known as steps ahead did you do wonderlust before you moved to New York yeah okay yeah so uh I did this Mike vinery album Wanderlust which was because Mike's son had heard me play with weather report at the Beacon and he was like Dad you should you should call this guy did brick call you a fool for or something or say you were nuts for leaving weather report did I hear that once did Mike Brecker say you were nuts for leaving weather report to Giant steps ahead is that an urban myth well no it's um so sorry steps uh we were in Japan yeah and I think we were doing a tour uh and Kazumi Watanabe I was flying with us yeah and that's the first time I worked with Mike um I'd worked with Brecker briefly um uh uh Michelle Columbia okay album uh and we did a live showcase at the bottom line um I'm still living in Los Angeles so uh so uh maniri flies me to New York and I'm uh I'm the other drummer Steve Jordan played on some tracks and I played on a couple tracks it was just one night we recorded at um media sound okay um fabled Studio yeah on 57th Street in New York um and Warren Bernhardt was in the band Tony Levin uh Sammy Figueroa was playing percussion uh Mike Brecker and Kazumi and Mike vignary producing um and as a result of that then Michael called me to work on Wanderlust okay and that's when I met Don krolnick and then um and then grollnick brought me to New York to play with his band for a few nights at 7th Avenue South it was his first gig as a band leader I think I bootlegs of that yeah and and he I remember he he had bam books made up and he spent a fortune just having to use a cop and not to mention flying men yeah um and uh and then I think Don sort of vouched for me to uh to play with steps uh because Steve gadd was with his schedule and things was was not keeping up with you know Mike minieri really wanted the band to work more sure and um and the the band had a lot of meetings okay and a lot of a lot of Psycho Drama would always seem to get played out okay meetings um and and uh maniri wanted everyone to commit make more of a commitment and and both Mike Brecker and Don Roenick um were of the Mind how did they put it they said won't be there for any gig you book just don't ask me to commit wow okay because you know that I I want to know that if in Don's case in it I remember he specifically mentioned Linda Ronstadt books me for something I want to be able to do it yeah um uh but it was interesting because um uh for for Mike meniere it was a sexistential question if this band's going to make it we need to commit and he was intrigued by weather report and he saw me a little bit as I was a guy that could share a few Secrets okay you know along the way this is how we did that so and oftentimes I'd say well you know what what the band would do here is yeah yeah sure it's a clunky edit but we'll just over another simple crash and who cares not so um so at any rate we're in Japan and um we had all just committed to doing a tour that that upcoming summer in Europe and then I get a call from weather report the management and they said hey Peter Joe and Wayne have changed their minds they've uh because I committed to the tour because the weather report was not a break going to do anything and then they said they've changed their minds you know they they need to do some touring just purely Financial okay I'm sure artistic as well uh so I said well my goodness I've just committed to doing this other tournament and and they they just said very matter-of-factly well you need to make a decision and that when and the guy was like well now so I said well I'm gonna keep my word with the guys I just gave it to right and he said okay we understand no problem we'll let John Wayne know and so I hang up the phone it was like in the evening however late nine or ten at night it was dark I remember because it was like this time of year February or March and uh I'm a little bit dizzy yeah right uh this is what five years at this point you've been in the band yeah more or less yeah and and I'm feeling immediately like wow this feels nice wow okay I like this I'm like wow so I I feel why I need to go for a walk so uh I I just step outside the room and it's a big hotel and I'm walking towards the uh the elevator area and there's Mike Brecker and I said Mike guess what he goes what I said I just quit weather reports so I can do the the step story this summer and he just looked at me and he said what are you nuts and then he walked away and I was I wasn't expecting everything yeah um wow and and so that was that and that one thing I mean we talk about Don gronick a little one thing I love about looking at the history of your recorded history is these associations you have with you know it's not even a handful it's like a bunch of musicians maybe 15 or 20 musicians but they are long-lasting relationships that have spanned sometimes a dozen sometimes even 20 albums when you look at Abercrombie you look at Pasqua you know your Trio with carp your Trio with Derek you know there's these amazing relationships that have sort of woven through the decades um I want to go back to Mark Johnson I know a lot of people are going to be bass players listen to this podcast and it really sounded like you guys of course it was unique but it sounded like you work something out but you figured some things out together that seemed like a very important relationship of a bass player and a drummer you talk about that is that yeah no you're as accurate or is that that's very accurate okay I mean uncannily accurate um when Mark and I were on tour I mean we we met um at a jam session uh that Ross trout okay together wow and we did a gig I can't remember I don't I don't think I think Lyle was on it maybe Paul McCandless it was C okay you know I I just moved to the city um but it sure was fun and um when Mark and I started playing more and more with John Abercrombie and then we would be doing touring um we uh we talked about what we were doing a lot and we would often be on these concerts bookings that uh or Billings where we were it was a festival where there was another band playing and and so we we would listen to the these other Rhythm sections and then talk about what we liked and what we didn't like so it wasn't just like wow that you know that's not it [Music] um things you could Implement yeah yeah so uh for example um uh I had this Trio with JF Jenny Clark amazing French bassist and Daniel Humera and uh it was pretty free yeah and to me it just it was like um finding a hidden waterfall and their playing was just like water coming down and I I couldn't I couldn't fathom just how how flowing it was wow that that there was never the wrong Jagged it just no matter you know and it could be very rhythmic it could be any number of things but it just flowed so effortlessly um and that's where we began to figure out um how to listen to one another without imitating one another one we played so when Mark would do a thing like um let's say the tempo boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom so I'll tap the time [Music] so he would he would push yeah and what made it work was that I didn't go with him it's easy enough that you just you know you can hear and you can kind of follow each other around but then we found it was more interesting the the elasticity became more apparent by not necessarily following I think you might have just revealed what it is I like so much about it and I've never put two and two together so so [Music] um it was just and and yet you know okay one of my favorite recordings that we did I get goosebumps just thinking about it is uh uh an album we did with Rick margetza hope hope Oh My Song of Hope one of my favorite albums of all time it's amazing yeah oh and Joey calderazzo yeah Steve Cardenas I want to say maybe you are Steve urkiago Steve okay okay so I was playing guitar yeah um yeah yeah so so Mark's playing is so for lack of a better word Noble it's so and so grounded and his sound is so you know he always got such a beautiful voice it was quite Majestic yeah Majestic totally yeah and and then that was the first time I really got to play with the Airtel okay and and it's like I do a thing and ayerto could complete the thought yeah and I'm looking over like holy cow that was my first gig it was with ayato really my first memory of musicianship on that level is is him is that thing you're talking about yeah it's just it will live with me to the end it's unbelievable right it just lifts the room up you're just sort of like wow and then Colorado's doing the burn yeah and the Beautiful Thing About That Tune What I Love About That Tune is you never are consciously aware of when it's come back yeah to the beginning of the form yes so Rick's cycles and forms a sort of open a little bit yeah it's brilliant so great it's brilliant and uh Matt Pearson produced that that was I was um you know the the the the the rest of the album okay but that tune for me is just one of my all-time favorites uh everything about it the sound that James Farber got we did that at power station right um I mean you've just mentioned all the classic elements that go into a jazz album of that era right like the musicians and Farber and Power Station all right interesting uh moment I don't know if it was that album I think it might have been a later album and I was beginning to put my home studio together and I was uh and and at the time I was also working quite a bit in Europe uh I think at this stage of the game I was I was doing a fair amount of work at the uh wdr radio station in Cologne and so I'm checking out the microphones yeah yeah and I'm thinking boy if uh Neumann 47 that would yeah wow that would really you know save my money and yeah and so I said James can I ask you a question he goes sure Pete what what's the one microphone I should get and I'm hoping he will confirm the 47 the 47. he just he goes you want my honest answer your honest opinion I said of course you said you're not gonna like it yeah I said what he said an sm57 I said really what yep yeah I said why he said if if I could only choose one microphone he said I would choose that I can do it it can do everything in anything and and so yeah and did you know according to my friends at Shore that the mic element inside the sm7 is exactly the same as the 57 as a 57 wow just a different different brains around it wow okay yeah that's I mean yeah well you know I'm no expert I mean at any of this stuff but it's it's I know what I like yeah I know what I like yeah and um but since we're talking about microphones um I'm gonna introduce a topic that please maybe you would have gotten around to but um when I was doing the Steely Dan tour alive in America right oh that's the album yeah but um you know we're playing much larger spaces than I was used to and the drummer's first impulse is when it's supposed to be loud you want to fill the space and it's impossible to film that big of a space and I I just know myself well enough that if I push Beyond a certain level I'm just not happy with the way I play okay because I don't have the the depth of Technical Resources to be able to play that loud for that long I think when I was younger yeah I had pretty good chops um so uh you know stealing down I was in pretty good shape for it but I just I knew I knew my limitations anyway my mantra every night before I'd go on stage I'd find a quiet place literally I did this thing and I would I would just say the words the name Jim Keltner over and over to myself that's great let the mic do the work yeah right and I would welcome if someone would correct correct me if I'm wrong here but um you know the the microphone is a bit like a speaker you've got the element that that moves and it can only move so far right so um if you start let's say in the case of a snare drum really hitting it hard then it reaches the point and right then what no more there's a ceiling yeah so then the gain structure has to has to be adjusted man um um and so the for me the biggest drum sound I mean sure I mean you you excite the air in the molecules when you hit at a certain you can get that power but um boy when when the microphone can do the work in terms of recording right I mean something that's always struck me about you is like your first instinct when it comes to an accent isn't to use the hoop yeah like it's like you can you at this angle you can be unbelievably uh I don't know dynamic and musical it doesn't all have to be flat you know and I think one of the worst things that you can do is is to you know use the hoop head combination to overuse it right because it just um stage especially if you're in a live haul it just eats everything up well I was thinking about one gig we did in Italy where I was the only thing that was Amplified and we were in a like a church hall or something remember this one yeah so acoustic piano Pete and me and I was the only thing that I was petrified absolutely most that nervous I've ever been in my life and I'll tell you why because you know how those live rooms get and any Amplified instrument as with a kick drum or anything with a mic on it just fills the space and reverberates and it's really hard to control if you overplay so first of all it's the quietest I've ever played it's probably one of the most satisfying gigs I've ever played because not one time did you look over and go like this and that was what I was like because I knew your range like I've experienced you as a fan uh as me as a band leader as you as a band leader on stage in the studio us both assignment with other people I I'd like to think I know what's going on when I look over at you I know when it's good I know when things are a little bit awkward I know what but I also know how we need to work together to make them better to get them to where we need them to be and that moment of being in that room was like oh this is the test this is it if I pass this test I'm pretty pretty much guaranteed that I can navigate any other situation because it was so delicate now where did that come from when I look at your history it's like really loud Kenton is loud weather report is loud you know you know not in a bad way it's just the nature of 17 people being on stage or Jacko with his stack of amps and and didn't oh sorry go on I just you know solving on one's complaining to Charcoal you know Jocko you're too loud okay the chocolate would point to his acoustic app yeah and he had like two or four of them at this point he goes those apps that are set at the same volume as when I backed up Phyllis Diller at the sunrise there's some musical theater in the round like in the Everglades it's a Sunrise Theater back in 19 whatever he goes I'm not too loud well there you go he was hilarious it definitely seemed like weather report got louder though in the period where you were in the band oh boy well not because of you just yeah but uh Joe um was getting really loud okay his his uh I remember we did a a pair of concerts for a Newport Jazz Festival at Lincoln Center and I he was so loud the first concert and and he agreed to turn down and the second one was much better okay you know um he would yeah he would Joe would usually be the guy that kind of pushed the the the the the level of the stage volume uh which is crazy because I had like way more like Max Roach and Joe Morello in you than I do like you know the Frantic sort of buddy or those those guys so where did that like transition come to like into your Trio for instance like transition isn't the quietest thing you know those couple of early albums and not the most no definitely not like the paladinos and John Taylor stuff or the stuff with pasquar and cop or Derek well I mean the ECM stuff was uh just the result of you know we're all in the same room right uh piano lives wide open um the the bare minimum of Gobo walls so uh and you know music's a lifelong learning process uh I'm gonna jump forward quite a few years from the ECM stuff to uh I was doing a Seth MacFarlane recording or capital and uh Rich Breen was engineering wonderful engineer and we're in the we're all in the same room so the drums are in the room the saxes are here the brass sections there old school string sections and B which was in the joining room that we kept open and uh I follow all the rules of big band drumming and we go in for the first playback and it's horrible oh to my ears and I you know I it's not just the drum mics that are hearing the drumming it's the saxophone mics it's a turmeric so the drum sound gets very wide and washy and diffuse and and you know I had the the light bulb moment this is why Alvin Stoller played the way he played this is why you know Jack Sperling made those choices why Shelley Mann why Earth and you know any number of drummers so um I think the worst thing uh uh especially if you want to play kind of traditional music was the the drum booth you know and and uh drummers who got so used to being in the booth well I could just turn it down or turn it up and and have all sorts of control um which is fine but it's very easy to to overplay all right so taking it even further um we were in like day three or four of the session and Joel McNeely was a producer and an e-ranger great writer uh Joel and I have known each other for years he we went to the same High School in a locking Arts Academy not at the same time uh but Joel uh was very gracious and said you know I'm doing a lot of film work these days and this has not been my area of expertise or whatever so he said do me a favor if anything seems Jive or corny let me know sure so I'm not saying the thing I mean because it's just it's just great um the the drum parts were generated from the I think uh sibelius files so I'm seeing Phil's but I'm not seeing what the brass are doing so the drum parts weren't really crafted the way I want to see them so I was spending a lot of time you know getting out of the where the drums were and and through the forest of mic stands whatever and asking to Trump that soon we have yeah um and uh and so I I decided uh let's change that process the first pass they never keep so I'm just gonna play I'm just gonna play quarter notes on the ride symbol and I had a pencil in my left hand and okay something there yeah I should know so then I knew kind of where the look and as I'm listening back I could make the notations without being kind of called off guard right but it feels good it feels really good all right Chuck Berg offers playing oh yeah and uh uh we do you know three takes whatever get get the perfect date and everyone's like kind of high-fiving and everyone's happy and I look over at Chuck and I go kind of he goes what man I doesn't swing as much as the first time we played it down you know something you're right so I I went to Joel I said Joel could we do this one more time yeah why I said I just think we can get it to swing more sure you know let's ask Seth and Seth's having fun he's like yeah why not the trumpet players were not happy yeah but we do it one more time and we so we get I'm just playing quarter notes we get to the shower course eight measure nothing no comments [Music] so I catch the last eighth note on the end of four bar eight that's it whole shall course one note and it's great so can I be profane please really I have 100 all right so I I wanted to to Seth as we're listening back I said yeah I said you know the reason I wanted to do it I said the drums were too explicit on on the other take I said it's kind of like pornography and without missing a beat he just leans over he goes yeah I know what you mean man a lot of us we like to fill the through the panties first I don't know if we should keep this oh that's so good oh that should be the opening quote of the podcast so that's great that's I'm breaking your confidence but oh good um I mean when we were mixing my album that you played on theater by the Sea first track very very simple brushes and my engine we're mixing it my engineer leans over and he's like um Yannick yeah we are one minute and 53 seconds into the tune and Pete still hasn't played the kick drum what the is going on and he said and it's perfect you know like so I yeah I definitely appreciate that well it's yeah and this is this is not the only way to do it it's just it's one way right and and of course you played on hearts and numbers I mean there's at the other end of the spectrum of like being big and catching everything and yeah that really works and but the I'm glad you mentioned the the snare drum hoop thing because uh it's it drives me nuts and basically it drives me nuts if that's all I hear all night because I'm just deaf at the end of it you know yeah it's it just wipes out the sound of the band and and then what else happens What drummers don't realize is that all the interplay isn't making it out front right because everything is getting buried yeah adjusted for that what was the dynamic like uh it was you and Mark Johnson in in Gary Burton's band right with Matheny yeah yeah what was the dynamic like with that with Pat was loud okay and Mitch Foreman I I believe right yeah because car wasn't that loud but the the his rolling oh I mean you know he we had the sink lever and that was set up and it was a whole big production but it was it I think it was mainly that he had a rolling super loud huh yeah wow it always it was because the way you guys play with Abercrombie and skull and like the bass desires I always knew it was possible to have everyone in the right place yeah I never got that never got too loud right when we did the uh we did the tribute to John Abercrombie um I was astonished by how loud a couple of the drummers and and it just rate you know and I'm like well you know skull's loud skull's not loud right this goes loud because the drummer is flying so darn life yeah you know I mean I've I've played even recently you know a few times with John and it's I mean we did a concert uh by now if there's six year and a half ago or so with Franco ambrosetti Scott Colley was plant-based Yuri Kane was playing piano live it was John sensitive he even has an album called quiet like the guy can play quiet you know and and the way like Adam deached for it I mean yeah boom and he's intense but it's never yeah which is crazy because the situations in which he finds himself could lend themselves so easily to just bashing bashing but it's so intensive I think that's what I like about you Adam Brian blade is another great one cooking at a low volume he's just like the simmer gets so similar that's why Adam's one of my favorite drummers and I I told him so on Facebook and he got bothered by it I think he said come on man don't don't make me live up to that I'm sorry um because he it just has this beautiful all right you guys want the master class yes they do absolutely watch and and I know you've seen this watch the Aretha Franklin Amazing Grace oh yeah look at the body language of the Rhythm Section how relaxed yeah that's amazing right yeah it's just like you know how was talking about scope briefly how was um how was your relationship with Charlie Hayden I know you did that record time on my hands with levano is that right well I yeah I was producing at the uh uh but you know I got to play with Charlie a few times the last time was was I think one of the last times he might have played dark almost put together a thing at um uh vitellos okay and and Charlie showed up and then came up to play and then didn't want to stop wow just it was wonderful that's beautiful yeah he you know Charlie kind of saw Into the Heart of things in a way that most most of us just don't have the ability to he strikes me like he didn't really care what anyone thought you know I mean the way he played it was kind of yeah I I to be honest yeah I kind of I don't even know if that's the term that if he thought of it in those terms right you know oh well I think actually as I said I was like well most great musicians don't care what anyone else thinks I think that's what makes them great musicians but just when I think about the amount of people even ask me or perhaps yourself as a teacher about like how do you break through into that area of Freedom into that flow State into that you know just unbridled progression in your journey I mean you know I learned a great thing from you when we were recording in Italy and and I was you you came with you came out to be very frustrated and you said he didn't you know he didn't ask you to produce this because I was and and I really you know it was a that was like a damn he's right you know right I had to step outside and think on that right because and it's I thought I was starting to like just talk myself out of out of working in town here because uh you know it's funny on one hand people would come up to me you know Gene Cipriano bless his heart um he said Pete he said you know what I love about you I said what he said you don't give a because you know I I would say something and then people will turn around and like mouth like okay then and I would get frustrated like why am I the only guy speaking up about this stuff sure um and then I was doing this one recording and the guy said that's a good book but I went to brush so long to be like really violent really I and I I kind of smiled and I held up the brushes I said I said hey you know what you see is what you get said I I don't do that you know I'm sorry so what restored my faith um in recording was I got flown to Iceland very nice and it was insane I I cut my reunion visit at my old high school Interlochen Arts Academy A Day short catch a flight out of Chicago overnight to Reykjavik I met there almost a five hour drive up to the northern part of excuse me of Iceland um almost a five hour drive to uh this part of Iceland and um the project was was was kind of a to highlight or create a calling card for this uh uh like in Residence studio type of thing whatever you call that um so there's this amazing Hotel they've teamed up with and the studio and they're not adjacent I mean right because I don't think anything's a Json and the keyboard players they were a pair of of uh synth players who worked a lot with Bjork a couple percussionists Matthew Garrison was playing bass because he has a family yeah in Iceland and then this wonderful singer uh who for lack of uh she reminded me more of weighing shorter than just about any music and it's all kind of focus and improvisation she was and the everything was improvised just start playing some you know which which could be a recipe for dumb but um man it's some of the it's just like this was fun it was really really fun and then um just there a day and a half and flew back to here the northern lights made an appearance very nice uh and and then I I came back to town and and and then it was more of you know play this or play that and just becoming less and less a fan of that when if ever have you felt the most pressure to be yourself the most the most pressure to be yourself If Ever I mean is that pressure that's that's always an opportunity I think great that's a that's a relief valve I think to be yourself um you have a very well-known past as a musician and you know not necessarily that oh we need this or we need this aggressive brush thing but the expectation of well we really liked you playing on 8 30 or oh Port of Entry or oh that you know like is there a line that you have to draw at some point and just say well you know what that was 40 years ago and yeah now we're into something else or somebody once uh sent me a track and um I was recording at home and and at a certain point I I just say you know what this this this was not a good idea you don't owe me anything right I'll take care of the engineer you don't get you don't get my tracks right yeah and um that's still I'm still trying to figure out the best way to handle remote recording so um uh it's usually best when the client can come be present because then they can give you an immediate note so you you you craft a whole take and you kind of pour your yourself into it and and uh and you don't like the gift to be disregarded too much right so um uh that that was one of the Covey challenges uh and now post coveted but uh you know I mean the very nature of of recording has changed um we're all kind of making uh making our own our own music or becoming part of some film project but there's not a whole lot of big budget records no forget it I um Steve Smith Bryson information we did a new record a couple of few months ago and just to get the email and say we're going to be six days in the studio was astonishing in 2022 to spend that amount of time making music in one place all together in the same room nice was yeah what part of the country we did it in in New York in New York yeah and garzone came down from Boston and played on a record which is amazing in many areas well I can't wait to hear it man yeah we're playing next week if you're around Catalina's three nights yeah [Music] yeah I know you and Steve go like all the way back to all the way back down Camp 1973 I think when I was on the Kenton band okay he was in high school and then at Berkeley I ran it to him there I saw yeah I I knew a lot of uh am I right in believing that you played an orchestra with Kenny arnoff well it at Indiana University Indiana right yeah but we were both there as students um all these lives Crossing yeah Kenny was the was the uh was the star he was the rock star of the orchestra still with the sun no no not yet um uh he played a little bit of drum set and you know I trustee won't mind my saying I mean he was not regarded much but you know but as a drum set player he he was in some blue no you know records tune cover band and then the Steely Dan covered man it's um or a band that played Steely Dan right and then I remember uh shortly after I'd moved to Los Angeles and that was in weather report um Kenny came out to visit and and we went out to grab some beers I was living in Encino okay and we're we're at a bar and basically what I remembered from the conversation was uh he said yeah I'm in this band and this guy's really busting my balls about the way I play and and you know I don't know if I should stay in it or not and I I can't remember if I gave him advice from where the other I my memory would like to think that hey that sounds good why don't you stick with it you know but anyway that was John Cougar [Laughter] very nice and um but yeah he was uh you know credit uh Kenny that he had the fortitude and and the humility to to uh and it was a you know his situation was not that different from uh Andy newmark's okay when uh when the late Jim Gordon came in to play something and Andy said do you mind if I watch and and Kenny did that do you mind if I watch and learn um but but when we were at school together yeah Kenny was incredible uh timpanist marimba player so we did this one concert now I I returned to Indiana after being on the road with Kenton for three years right so I had left the gig to come back to school everyone else all my classmates so I'm struggling a little bit with with motivation and prayer who am I but I love all that stuff Meanwhile my teacher is very concerned about my touch because I got very heavy-handed okay um uh so he comes up on stage Professor George Gaber and goes up to Kenny the Bravo great job shakes his hand went up to another percussions Bravo which have uh it might have been Rebecca kite then Judy moonert who became a well-known professor in somewhere in Michigan um Bravo great job and so I'm waiting for my bravo I played Temple blocks okay and Gabriel comes up to me in front of all of us he just says I want to see in my office tomorrow morning eight o'clock ouch and just leave so um you know all right so I get up early and drive the campus and knock on this door and they ate and before I think I even had a chance to say what's up he said why were you hitting those things so hard last night wow you know and subsequently at one of our lessons uh whatever we were doing he stopped motioned me to stop and um he pulled out a triangle beater and handed it to me and he pointed to a triangle in the corner of his teaching Studio he said mezzo piano you get one chance and I go I think he just take so far for the cigar he said that was too loud I'll get out and he threw me out wow so what did I practice that's going to make you think a bit right whole notes well on on you know with a stick on the right symbol yeah but how consistently could I play pianissimo uncomfortably and and what were the mechanics involved with that what you know in terms and this is something that I had to work on yeah for a long time because you know that got interrupted by you know you joined Maynard Ferguson's fan yeah kidding um and uh and weather report I mean they they liked that I had the power to play that stuff and that I knew how to swing and that I had the big band sensibility and I think that when I came along um the band had uh because of the percussion I think Jocko was starting to feel a little end in sonically oh I think interesting yeah even between you and Manila or with Alex it was only a quartet when I came so okay so um Manolo left and then Alex split gotcha both of their own accord although I think Manolo may have pushed things to gotten fired from something he was a an emotional yeah band members the impression I got yeah um I mean you know that band was my favorite version of weather report and I I loved I love the band with gravatt yeah with Alphonse mysterious traveler um but heavy weather was was so sparkling yeah um but you know I I think the the the afro-cuban element that they just sort of wanted to pull back from that a little bit gotcha um and so the courts had kind of provided a chance just for them to I you know I'm I'm not my favorite drummer and weather report by any means that's interesting and I've I that's not false modesty I just sure you do the best you can I understand and and I think some of it was actually quite good you know some of the the Jazz stuff um and some of it was me just still struggling to figure out um you talk about telling a story how do you know how do you tell a story that's always going this way right it took a long time for me to realize that you can so it's very interesting stories have chapters absolutely and it's very interesting as a bass player and maybe this is a advice to other bass players out there to play with you as little or as much as I have however you want to look at it for me it's more than I ever thought I would do I've only experienced with you the like the max like full-on full force 1980 Something weather report thing one time which was when we played trains when we were on tour with Chuck Loeb in Tokyo and you were transported to this other place and me and Chuck talked about it we never said anything to you we were like no this is just don't talk about this this just let it happen and you were transported to this whole other place yeah it sounded like Mike Brecker was on stage it just sounded like there was some force in the room which was taking you to this place and up until that point and subsequently I'd experienced a far less uh higher ceiling in terms of the dynamic um with you so that was really interesting to experience all of those things with you and understand I remember that remember this yeah and uh that was fun that was a fun oh man it was such a fun tour and what oh no are you gonna go Wasabi the sushi restaurant excuse me um no the the greatest moment um you know sorry we won't get into the particular space um when when he when he oh yeah popped open his his Chopsticks the the little OB wrapper yeah just went flying right across the sushi Chef's face and and you were seated next I just you were in the agony I was dying because it was him and then me and then Chuck and you I was and the chef was just looking like and he's Japanese so he's very like respectful of and that was a super high-end place as well remember the guy who took us there the coffee mogul it was like in the basement of the Shiseido yeah exactly is it near Yamaha yeah yeah it was amazing food but that was quite a comical thing I want to end on I want to end on one thought let's make it a musical one not a Wasabi one okay um when you would appear on a record and you would only be on one or two tracks and I'm thinking the Mike Brecker record maybe it's don't try this at home and is it talking to myself talking to myself talking to myself okay my memory is still functioning I guess Dawn is producing gronick is producing this right yeah I mean it's a great story Hal that oh it is I didn't even know there was a story behind it but so so go ahead please no no you want to ask all I was asking maybe the story answers that is when you step into a situation like that now me as a younger person hearing that from afar it's about it's a record it's a big thing but you're in this small part of it yet it's still the whole thing still tells the story are you aware of the rest of the cycle okay so um I was doing uh this was my third album called motion poet right which was a fairly ambitious project um we were recording uh we we chose a studio called Master sound Astoria and and we visited the place on an earlier trip to New York and James Farber and and uh and I remember the guy that ran the studio was talking about how many like 150 feet the grounding and I looked at James like pretty great right and he's like yeah sm57 man so um and this studio by the way the the the the recording facility had been built for I think the U.S army it was a production facility and the iso Booth was like like a like a a bunker a bunker I mean it was the quietest I mean so we put Mark in there the I mean the base sound was extraordinary yeah anyway so recording this album and um I wanted from Mike to solo on one tune through a series of you know and gronick is producing my album and he's also producing Mike's album and we've worked simultaneously or in a similar time well Mike's album I think the bulk of it was dumb okay but they wanted you know Dom wanted to record this tune of his so they'd already done the stuff with Jack I think I hadn't heard any of it um uh so Michael needed a studio to record this thing and we worked out a deal because I bought my budget bought block out time gotcha for for like five days nice or whatever that's just how the story yeah that Mike could get the studio and and my drumming and returned if he would over dub the solo the solo so so Mike agreed to the term so the the tune is called hero with a thousand faces um and his his solo was the second take if you want to hear the first take you go to Peter erskine.com um I think for 99 cents you can alternate take nice download it's pretty amazing um so it's you know it's just extraordinary and then okay he did that for me now his band showed up so uh we were going to record that tune and so uh my drum setup and sound we already had to solve the motion poets perfect um Jeff Andrews came in um that's Mike's done yeah yeah it's done I came uh because uh the guitarist on my album where John Abercrombie and then Jeff mironov had done some stuff so Mike showed up and Brecker and uh as I recall one take I love that story and and I mean because you know you know we I think we just ran it down and just did it and we liked it and I mean Don's stuff I I sort of knew what Don liked um although one time when we were recording Don's album uh Hearts yeah I said the will like like I was like I said hi I got an idea for the intro uh that's you know three four like like this is genius and will just looked at me he said that's your idea for every entrance [Laughter] I went yeah you're right okay that's amazing to end the podcast on a worldly story that's beautiful and we started with a willy we did we did we got to give will a call we will sit down hey buddy all right thank you man appreciate your time as always my great pleasure absolutely thank you oh [Music] foreign

Channel: Janek Gwizdala Podcast

Views: 8,497

Keywords: janek gwizdala, janek gwizdala podcast, the practice room, janek, gwizdala, janek bass, janek bass player, bass player, bass podcast, music podcast, peter erskine interview, peter erskine, janek gwizdala peter erskine, peter erskine drums, peter erskine weather report

Id: g3SJL95RB1w

Length: 79min 8sec (4748 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 20 2023