Event Preview
Ramsey Lewis and his Trio perform at the 20th annual Jazz Under the Stars concert, an outdoor benefit show supporting scholarships for arts students at Clark Atlanta University
If you’ve never attended, think Chastain Park, but with all seating tableside. Bring along your own food and drinks; alcohol permitted.
7 p.m. May 4. $60. Harkness Hall Quadrangle on the Clark Atlanta University campus, 223 James P. Brawley Drive S.W., Atlanta. 404-880-8136.
When Ramsey Lewis’ father, Ramsey Sr., pulled up stakes and left Augusta for Chicago, he became part of the Great Migration of southern African-Americans seeking better fortunes in the North.
One thing he didn’t leave behind was his love of music, which he and his wife cultivated in their son. So young Lewis went from playing songs in his Chicago church to becoming one of the world’s prominent and prolific jazz pianists. On Saturday, Lewis, now 77, will headline the Jazz Under the Stars outdoor concert at Clark Atlanta University.
Lewis spoke with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution about his legacy, what it’s like to have recorded one of the most popular jazz renditions of all time and about the “jazz police.”
Q: Like so many jazz artists, your musical roots from childhood are in gospel music. How heavily does that style influence you now?
A: Gospel music is embedded in my very being because I began studying piano when I was 4 years old and by the time I was 9 years old, I was playing in our church for the choir. So performing gospel music two or three times a week until I was 15, it remains with you. We have to understand, the music we call jazz is an outgrowth of the African-American experience which goes back to slavery and comes forth. And the bedrock of African-American life at that time was church. … So it's impossible to really study the history of jazz and not end up in the same room as African-American sacred songs.
Q: How extensive was your classical musical training?
A: My first piano teacher was our church organist. But she got to a point when I was 12 years old that she suggested to my parents that I go downtown to the conservatory because she had taught me as much as she could. When I got to the conservatory, I met a teacher named Dorothy Mendelson and that's when it all began. It was through her that I learned more about how to play from within and to listen with my inner ear. And that's when I hooked the two up, both the church experience and playing classical music.
Q: Hubert Laws is another great jazz musician who grew up in both the gospel and classical music traditions. But Laws said that for him, classical was initially a struggle for him to master because it comes from a different impulse, one that wasn’t his part of his tradition growing up.
A: The approach to playing classical music is totally different from playing jazz and you cannot make a career out of both of them at the same time. With classical, there are rules. You can't be too unwieldy because then you get outside of what the composer meant. With jazz, jazz is all about starting with the composer and going as far as you can go. It's all about improvisation. There is not improvisation in classical music. There is only interpretation. So it's impossible to do both.
Q: At a recent concert here at the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra with pianist Marcus Roberts, some people walked out. What’s the key to making the pairing work?
A: When you bring those two musical forms together, each side has to give a little bit. The improviser has to understand the restrictions of the orchestra, because they are not improvising. On the other hand the composer of the work must understand that he or she must leave space throughout the piece where the improviser can fly and be free. It's a difficult marriage but there are those who have been successful at it.
Q: Your 1965 version of “The In Crowd” is one of the most indelible live jazz recordings in the history of the idiom. It’s been used in several movies and is considered the epitome of cool. So many others have recorded it, but your version remains the essential version. Why is that?
A: I have no idea what made that a hit record. If I had an idea, then I would make all my records hits. It was the coming together of the elements. Eldee Young the bassist and (Issaac) "Red" (Holt) the drummer, we were sitting in a coffee shop in Washington, D.C., on Monday or Tuesday and we knew we had to record live at a show that weekend and we were looking for one more song to round out the set. We had some serious jazz songs lined up and we were looking for something a little more lighthearted.
The waitress — I’ll never forget her name: Nettie Gray — she said, “Listen to this,” on the jukebox. It was Dobie Gray’s “The In Crowd.” We went back to the hotel and practiced it. Three days later, we played that night and were about to end the set and Red said, “We got that new song. Don’t you want to play it?” And we started playing the song and Lord have mercy. The Bohemian Gardens, where we were playing, that was a jazz bastion. John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, those are the people that played there. But people got up, started dancing and clapping their hands and we looked at each other like, what’s going on? We all became one: the musicians, the music and the listeners.
Q: You listen to your older cuts like “Wade in the Water,” and there’s a classic profile to the sound. But then some of your newer work has at times sounded like smooth jazz.
A: I'm not looking at new ways to interpret jazz. I can only be me and reflect what I'm feeling. Your experiences influence your music. So as you go through life, if you allow yourself to be in the moment and be aware of where you are, who you are and why you are, then you're going to change a bit. You're not going to stay the same.
Q: Because there are a lot of purists out there who still think there’s only one true way to play jazz.
A: We call them the jazz police. And when we see the jazz police coming, we go the other way.
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