Marvin: What’s with you? You haven’t written a newsletter since November of last year. What’s your problem?

Marvin: It’s not that I’ve been too busy, although I have been busy enough. I mean, between performing out on the road, continually networking to keep performance and tours happening, and typical involvement with the family, I am kept quite busy. But that’s not it really.

Marvin: Well, what is it?

Marvin: Frankly, it’s everything that’s going on in the world. As you know, I am a pretty optimistic person, always thinking toward the future. I’m just naturally that way. But this past eight or nine months has been a real “downer” for me, and I don’t really want to write about the world-at-large.

Marvin: What do you mean by that world-at-large stuff?

Marvin: Let me see if I can clarify what I mean for you. I mostly write about the many artistic activities in which I am involved and the people and subjects connected to them--the music and musicians, teachers and education, the arts, and all that affects them and are in turn affected by them. I also write a great deal about societal issues and how I believe they affect us. Some of which I write is controversial, but generally I write about things that I find fulfilling and uplifting.

Marvin: So? What’s your problem?

Marvin: My problem is seeing a world that is so opposite to the world in which I grew up.  Or maybe it is my perception that the world was so different when I was growing up.

I remember a world in which people were civil to one another, a world in which people actually cared for one another. I can’t feel that in our society today or in the world as a whole. I don’t want to dwell at length on this perception, but it represents “truth” to me. Look at the fanatical divisiveness in our country, the lack of respect we show one another, the distrust we have in anything that seems to regulate our lives, as if our human nature will take care of those things. It seems more like our “inhuman nature” these days. Anger is rampant, and respect no longer finds a place in our society. Corporations have led us into a dark place where money is valued above human life--Massey Mining, BP, all the large financial institutions like Goldman Sachs, Citicorp, AIG, and others. And the rest of the world is just as bad or worse--the Congo, Darfur, Russia, Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. We are inundated by all these matters, and I feel deeply affected on a personal level. Who wants to read about this crap from yet another source like this newsletter? No! I want to write about the people, who they are, what they do, and all the other things that are fulfilling and of interest both to me and to my readers. How much more negative stuff does any of us want to confront?

Marvin: So what ARE you going to write about?

Marvin: Well, smart-ass, why don’t YOU suggest something that you would like me to write about? As a matter of fact, I am going to ask all of you who read Cadenzas to suggest subjects or ask questions that relate to me, my experiences and/or fields of endeavor in which you are interested. This idea might lead to some very interesting articles regarding subjects any one of you is curious about that are within the realm of my experiences and musical life. At the same time, it might also broaden the scope of Cadenzas. I can’t promise to follow up on all your suggestions, but this approach should be a fun way to include items of interest that we all might enjoy.

Thoughts, anyone?

---

Cadence Magazine - Interview, Part 1

The following interview was done in mid-2008 with Ludwig van Trikt for Cadence Magazine and was published in the October-December 2009 issue. I want to thank Robert D. Rusch for giving me permission to reprint this interview. Because the interview was done two years ago, I have updated any information that is out of date. This changes none of the facts, only the issue of time-frame, and, in some cases, change of circumstance. My reasons for reprinting the interview are 1.) Few of my readers subscribe to Cadence; 2.) Mr. van Trikt asked some rather blunt questions that I have rarely encountered in interviews previously. I thought you all might enjoy reading them. Because of its length, I am posting this interview over two editions of Cadenzas.

© Cadence Magazine 2010.  Published by CADNOR Ltd. All rights reserved. Reproduction or use of contents prohibited without written permission from the publisher. credit Cadence: www.cadencebuilding.com    info@cadencebuilding.com    ph: 315-287-2852).

Cadence: During the past few years a number of senior Jazz artist have had second careers in so far as being in the media spotlight again (the late Andrew Hill, Hank Jones, Little Jimmy Scott -for example). Do you feel that your artistry is now going through another level of creativity which coincides with some recent major Jazz media coverage?

MS: A senior Jazz artist? I have never thought about things in this light, so let me take a minute to do so.

Okay--but before answering your question, let me clarify that I am not experiencing a second career, OR a resurgence of my first career. My career, to my good fortune, has never stopped moving forward, nor has there been any time since I left the University of North Texas in 1961 that my career has taken a hiatus. Today I tour with my groups or those of others six to seven months a year, which is, to me, the optimum amount of time to spend “on the road.” Most of that time, about ninety percent, is spent performing; the remaining ten percent is spent working in Jazz education.

Interestingly, if one is not constantly in the media spotlight, then some people think he or she has become inactive or even passé. There are many very fine musicians (actually most musicians) who get very little media coverage; yet they are experiencing very busy careers, touring many months of the year, and constantly striving to “stretch the envelope,” that is, to keep their creativity and their music growing and moving forward.

The answer to your question about whether I feel that my artistry is now going through another level of creativity which coincides with some recent major Jazz media coverage is multi-faceted. First, I feel that since leaving the “studio” world in 1990--yes, I have been away from being a studio musician for twenty years!--my creativity and learning curve have grown immensely. Someone said to me during those studio years, “Marvin, you are a good Jazz player, but unless you get out of this business of running from session to session, thinking as much about the business as the music, you’ll never attain the level of creative artistry you seek.” At the time, being so entrenched as a studio player, I didn’t want to recognize or admit that this might be true. But when I made the decision in 1987 to begin backing away from the studio scene and involving myself more fully as a Jazz musician, I realized the obvious truth in that statement. The difference between the two areas is that one demands you divide your time and efforts between the music and the business, the other that you must concentrate all your attention on the music and your creativity. When one concentrates all his efforts on the latter, his creative playing and ability to learn and grow should move upward exponentially. I certainly feel this is true in my case.

I am also very fortunate in that I am now able to choose with whom I want to play and be just as discerning in the work I perform. So, I have chosen musicians with whom I can relate musically and who challenge me, but from whom I can also learn.

I mainly perform with my quartet (Bill Mays, piano; Rufus Reid, bass; Ed Soph, drums); in duo concerts with Mays; and with The Inventions Trio, our new group with Bill on piano and Alisa Horn, cellist. I never lose the excitement of performing in any of these three formats. The music is so free, so pure, and the focus of these groups is always on the music. Other things that make the music so exciting, so workable, are the camaraderie we feel toward one another and the musical sensitivity that is so apparent among all of us.

In addition to my own groups, I still tour and perform with my dear friend, Swiss composer George Gruntz and his Concert Jazz Band, a group comprised of all-star American and European musicians. I am also a member of the Westchester Jazz Orchestra (WJO), a big band of prominent New York musicians living in Westchester County, New York; this big band is led by pianist/composer Mike Holober. The freedom to pick and choose with whom I play and the work I wish to perform contributes greatly to my musical growth.

As to recent major media attention coinciding with my recent musical activities, I think it more likely that this is due to the visibility I have had on a number of recent Jazz recordings and the reviews these recordings have garnered. My own projects and the relevant reviews over the last six or seven years--my new quartet recording, Alone Together, and the quartet projects with drummer Ed Soph, The Stamm/Soph Project Live at Birdland and The Stamm/Soph Project, plus the duo CD with Bill Mays, By Ourselves--have made people much more aware of my work than in preceding years. Along with these ventures, the new Inventions Trio recordings, Fantasy and The DelawareRiver Suite, has been reviewed in most of the Jazz journals and Internet blogs with raves for the whole group. And the recordings on which I am a prominently featured soloist, composer/arranger Jack Cortner’s Fast Track and Sound Check and the WJO’s All In, have also contributed to my notice.

So, the answer to your question (do I feel that my artistry is now going through another level of creativity which coincides with some recent major Jazz media coverage) is “no.” I feel my level of creativity has been rising steadily throughout the twenty years since leaving the studios. But it is only just recently that my work has been recognized a bit more by the media.

Cadence: When I first approached you about the interview there were at least two articles/reviews in the major Jazz press. Yet you expressed some doubt about the media’s genuine interest in your career over the years. Please explain?

MS: I’m not sure exactly what you mean by “major press,” but let me be clear about some things before I give you a few of my thoughts on this subject. I recognize how fortunate I am to have a career of such longevity and creativity and of being involved with so many great Jazz artists over all these years, many of them having been my heroes as I grew up in this music. I have no real gripes, only a great deal of appreciation for what has come my way through several factors--my own talent and hard work AND immense help from those many musicians of whom I just spoke, plus the plain, unadulterated luck to be in the right place at the right time.

And there is also no doubt that I have been the subject of more reviews these last two years or so because of the number of projects upon which I have been featured and the amount of touring I do. As to major articles, other than maybe the “Players” profile in a recent issue of DownBeat Magazine, I’m not sure to what articles you might be referring, but nevertheless, like all of my colleagues, I appreciate whatever press I might receive. Visibility helps give us the opportunity to play.

So in regard to the “Jazz media,” no, I don’t believe that they have particularly ignored me. That would be a ridiculous assumption on my part. Rather, in my opinion, and leaving myself aside, I feel that the “business of music” has dramatically changed these past 25 or 30 years; I also believe the Jazz media, like the rest of the U.S. press, television, most radio, and other outlets of information, have narrowly focused upon the popular trend of any given moment. Then too, the cultural scene in America has changed radically over the years under heavily conservative forces, especially during the Gingrich years under the Republican “Contract with America.” Jazz, like much of the world of music and the Arts, has been negatively affected by these movements.

But, again referring to the press and the music business, many of the traditions and many of the musical values of many of the excellent players of my period and earlier have been less recognized and less appreciated by these entities over the past three decades. Someone once said to me that after the generation of players that included Freddy Hubbard, Woody Shaw, and that group, several generations of Jazz musicians that followed, players who were extremely active and visible at that time, “fell into the cracks.” There seems to be a lot of truth in this statement.

I also believe the record industry’s discovery of “marketing,” especially as it pertains to what “the business” might consider is a player’s marketability, is another factor affecting what we do. Many times this strategy has little to do with the depth of the players’ music, but rather their salability to the public because of other elements, mainly whatever image or images a PR department can create for them. When this becomes a major factor, the music and the music business become institutionalized, and the music assumes a lesser place than these other things. Imagine Dizzy or Clark Terry, Bird, Benny Carter, or John Coltrane being subjected to this kind of stuff in order to become the artists they are and were.

Certainly one thing that has had an effect on my career is, paradoxically, my years as a busy studio musician. Though I spent much of that time playing and recording with many of the major Jazz artists--Thad Jones/Mel Lewis, Duke Pearson, Oliver Nelson, John Lewis and the American Jazz Orchestra--and being in the orchestra for a number of major and historic projects, some musicians and segments of the press and the business have categorized me as a “session player,” a number of them refusing to take me seriously as a creative Jazz artist. However, there were, and still are, other critics who don’t let this attitude influence them, but rather look to what they hear from the player’s music as their guide. This open-mindedness has certainly worked in my favor and, along with my own perseverance as well as learning how to network and get out on my own to make things happen, I continually have a busy touring schedule, performing as a prolific soloist with my own groups and those of others.

So in answer to your statement that I “expressed some doubt about the media’s genuine interest in my career over the years,” I think it is more an expression of how the Jazz world has changed so much over the years due to what the press, the business, and the marketing entities have deemed relevant and pertinent to our music, none of which I feel has anything at all to do with the music itself. My concern, my only concern, is the effect this attitude has had on the music AND the musicians.

Cadence: How do you explain your ability to maintain your technical prowess after all these years?

MS: As a young musician, I was taught that practicing was the key to eventually attaining mastery of my instrument and to developing my musical skills. I have always practiced in the classical manner, that is, to continually work on the fundamentals of trumpet playing. Throughout my earlier development, I not only practiced the fundamentals, but also many etudes and a great variety of solo literature as well. I started very early on learning to improvise by playing along with my brother Gordon’s record collection. And during my high school years, in my trumpet lessons with my teacher Perry Wilson, we included learning and playing “standard” tunes and Jazz originals by the masters; but otherwise I did not practice Jazz.

I still practice a great deal, maybe one-and-a-half to two hours a day when not touring, concentrating mainly on fundamentals of the trumpet. When I have the time, I also practice etudes and solo literature. I undertake this regimen to maintain my embouchure and to continue to develop and further refine my technical and musical skills. For me, this routine is essential so I can feel as comfortable as possible in any playing situation. I learned long ago that it’s no fun getting on stage feeling insecure or uncomfortable with my instrument. Practicing helps me avoid this feeling and allows me to maintain my technical skills.

Cadence: Your career came of age while there were several iconic figures around on the Jazz scene. What musicians in particular influenced you in your own writing and playing?

MS: Let’s first get the subject of my being a writer out of the way. I have never really felt myself to be a writer, even though I have composed maybe ten or twelve tunes. But a composer? No. Any influence would probably come from my being steeped in music from the “Great American Songbook” and classic Jazz repertoire.

As for far as my playing is concerned, the influences are many, the first and maybe one of the most important being my older brother Gordon and his Jazz record collection, which he so generously shared with me. Almost from the beginning of my playing at age twelve, I was listening to these records and, being caught up with the music, I tried to copy and play what I was hearing. Gordon had a variety of records, such as Basie and Kenton, a lot of albums like the great Jazz at the Philharmonic sides, and those of both East and West Coast artists. I became taken by all of them and kept discovering different ones, always trying to copy the players on those recordings. I didn’t think about what I was doing. I was just having fun. I would do my regular “classical” practice and afterwards play along with the Jazz stuff as a reward, the “icing on the cake” so to speak. My influences at this point were many--Charlie Shavers, Ben Webster, Howard McGhee, Illinois Jacquet, Flip Phillips, Lester Young, Harry “Sweets” Edison, Charlie Parker, Clifford Brown, Zoot Sims, Clark Terry, to name a few. These were among the many musicians represented in my brother’s record collection.

When I arrived at North Texas, I met many other players from all across the country. I got turned on to what they were listening to, so my playing and my musical tastes expanded even more. I was hearing Miles Davis for the first time and also much more of Dizzy, along with Freddy Hubbard, Donald Byrd, John Coltrane, Lee Morgan, Hank Mobley, Stan Getz, Cannonball and Nat Adderley, J. J. Johnson, Kai Winding, Carl Fontana, and on and on. There were so many, and they all had so much to say. And every one of them was influencing me.

Along with hearing new recordings, I was playing with a lot of excellent players at the school and also with the local players in the Dallas and Ft. Worth areas, many of whom were great Jazz musicians. A few of them were saxophonists James Clay, John Hardee, Peyton Park, Claude Johnson, Birdie Carter, and Leroy Cooper; trumpeters John Anderson and Willie T. Albert; guitarists Jack Petersen and Donnie Gilliland and drummer Paul Guererro, just to name a few. I was a sponge soaking up all of it. And this process has continued all the years since, right up to this time. There have been and continues to be many people who influence me, the most important today being pianist Bill Mays with whom, happily, I play the great majority of time.

Cadence: You have an active involvement with Jazz education throughout the United States and abroad. In what ways has Jazz education changed since your own days at North Texas State University, both in terms of trumpet technique and the general teaching of the art?

MS: That is a bit difficult to answer because changes vary from teacher to teacher and student to student. In many ways, the teaching of trumpet technique has not changed, but students seem to be taking it to new levels. The players who develop to this degree many times play higher and sometimes faster than those of my period. But if you go back to the 1930s and listen to Jimmy Lunceford’s recordings, you hear Snooky Young and Al Killian playing just as high as the players of today, but with better sounds and better accuracy. If you listen to the recordings of Dizzy, Clifford Brown, and Freddie Hubbard, you’ll hear playing that is as fast as any player today. But in the long run, what is technique without musicality? Musicality is something that seems to be missing in many of the players today. I believe too many are caught up in the technique while lacking any realization of either sound or musicality. And this is coming from one who is known to have a pretty well-developed technique.

As for the general teaching of the Art, there have been many promising developments and probably just as many that have not been so beneficial to the music. The many self-help teaching aids, books to help players learn to improvise, books that help clarify the theory behind improvisation, and the many transcriptions and play-along aids, can all be helpful ONCE the player has learned the vocabulary and has, to a certain extent, developed the ear and learned the process toward becoming an improviser. In talking with many of my colleagues today, I find that a number of them feel very strongly that many young players use these devices as crutches, trying to find an easier means to their ends. They rely on “book learning” as the foundation of their playing rather than “learning by doing.” These students expect the books to provide shortcuts to learning and also to remove the risk from the process. Some of today’s teachers believe this is “institutionalizing” the process of learning of the music.

When I was learning to play trumpet, I listened to the records of many artists and, finding many whose playing I wanted to imitate, I copied their solos from the record to my ear (not to paper) by playing the passages along with the recording over and over until I knew them. I did this for numerous recordings. Once I had learned the solo, if I did so correctly, I had absorbed the player’s sound into my ear, at the same time learning his articulation, style, and his approach to the solo. You do not learn this from a book; you learn by doing, and doing so by using your ear. In this way, repeating the process endlessly with recordings of the many players I admired, I developed my own ability to create and improvise, and eventually developed my own voice in the music.

Cadence: You obviously have not lost your affection for the American Popular song; but what are your feelings on any recent material? Lately, we have seen various Jazz artists tackle the band Radiohead & the artist Bjork for example?

MS: Andy Bush, a very good friend of mine from England, did the trumpet work on Radiohead’s first album or two, and one of my daughters is a Radiohead fan. I don’t know anything about Bjork. And, frankly, I don’t keep up with the newer “pop” groups, even ones such as Radiohead whose music contains material of a more musical nature. I just don’t find much in the way of melodic or harmonic substance that interests me. Yet there is still so much material to be rediscovered in the “Great American Songbook.” Pianist Bill Mays keeps coming up with great suggestions for tunes that we should explore together, tunes that to me have those melodic and harmonic qualities that are pleasing to the ear. Along with that, we continue to write original pieces and look into the compositions of others whose music we might want to adapt to what we do.

Cadence: In 2000, what led to your starting a self produced record label?

MS: Simply put, I started my own label because no company was interested in me or any of my recording projects. This roadblock was and remains to be true for many fine artists. As clearly demonstrated by all the kids who were making their own records by the year 2000, the production of one’s own projects had obviously become more affordable. Many mature artists who had a fan base wanting to hear their music became educated to this idea and decided to do the same. It opened up a whole new world to many of us.

Having just finished our duo recording, By Ourselves, Bill Mays and I wanted to release it to the public and also sell it on the Internet and at our performances. This CD has since gone into a third pressing. Around the same time, Ed Soph and I decided to produce the first of our Stamm/Soph Project CDs using the same process. It has gone through a second pressing.

Things haven’t changed much since 2000 except for the fact that I have recently been working with Jazzed Media to distribute my CD and DVD recordings on their label. I produce the recordings at my expense, and this company handles them through their marketing system. Though the recordings come out on the Jazzed Media label and are distributed and sold through their sources, I still own all the rights and continue also to sell them at my performances and on my Web site - http://marvinstamm.com. My current projects on the Jazzed Media label are a second Stamm/Soph Project, Live at Birdland, and my most recent quartet recording, Alone Together, a two-disc DVD/CD set of a concert performed live in Los Angeles at Rising Jazz Stars in November of 2006.

The Inventions Trio recording, Fantasy, with Bill Mays and cellist Alisa Horn, was released on the Palmetto label in 2007, an obvious choice at the time because Bill was a Palmetto artist. We are pleased, of course, that the CD earned great reviews and excellent airplay. The trio had hoped to continue a recording relationship with Palmetto, but turmoil in the industry has changed our direction. Recording companies face tremendous changes in business practices due to the Internet and the downloading of sound files. For this reason, Palmetto decided not to go forward with the trio’s new materials. Not to worry. We released The Delaware River Suite, our second trio CD, ourselves in 2008 on Bill’s No Blooze Music label. The group and what we do is too good not to be exposed to the public eye and ear. Pardon my immodesty, but that is the truth of it.

So, in summary, the music business is in a state of flux these days. According to all reports, this industry faces an unknown future; the business outlook certainly lacks reassurance. We can expect massive readjustment, not necessarily all of it bad. While this upheaval might portend some negative elements based on past experience, it will also provide exciting opportunities based on new technologies. Individuals are now more easily able to explore recording techniques and outlets reserved in the past for large companies. We must recognize both the positive and negative elements and isolate those of greatest benefit. The key is finding how to make the positives work for YOU.

Cadence: Without getting you in trouble with the IRS what kind of profit if any do you make in having your own label?

MS: Really, none whatsoever. As we pay off the expenses for the production costs of these CDs, it is usually time to order another pressing. And then our hope is to be able to sell all of this second or third pressing. Actually, we always consider ourselves lucky just to break even.

But I, along with Bill Mays and Ed Soph, my partners on the projects you asked about, didn’t produce this music expecting to make a profit. What we wanted was to document our music at those various periods in our musical lives. That is, was, and should be, in my opinion, the reason for recording one’s music. In many (though not all) cases, focusing on money rather than creativity changes the character of the music to some degree.  When financial consideration with a profit motive becomes the primary purpose for producing a musical project, the music takes on a shortsighted and subservient attitude. Bill, Ed, and I knew we would probably take some kind of a loss (which we did), but we got a lot of attention from the Jazz critics who reviewed our CDs and thought very highly of them all. Most important, what we got was documentation of our music and personal fulfillment from our efforts.

(To Be Continued in Cadenzas - Edition XXXII)