Interview with Charles Lloyd

This past Wednesday afternoon, a noted jazz musician named Charles Lloyd came down to KUNM's studios to talk about his music, his life, and jazz in general. What follows is most of that encounter with Dave Norris and asking the questions. Charles Lloyd will be appearing tonight and tomorrow night at a new local club, so ladies and gentlemen, Charles Lloyd. Not that, you know, it has to be some sort of balance like that, but it seemed as though the music should be accessible to all, and I was hoping what I'm getting at is, I'm hoping that it's not going to be like jazz, while I was in the 50s where young white intellectuals could get to the music, and the blacks weren't supporting the music, you know. I mean, other places we play, like we just played a concert over in Phoenix, so about 2000 people would play a concert with Herbie Hancock, of course Herbie was a large draw, but it was a well mixed audience in terms of ethnic thing, but all I'm saying is, aren't there black people in the Albuquerque, all of a sudden?

Maybe they aren't exposed to the music, or maybe the firehouse didn't advertise on the black stations, or whatever those labels are, the boxes. I can do without any of those boxes, but I just thought that was sort of far out. Yeah. It is. And then I got back home and watched the TV, and I saw the basketball team play. Yeah. You guys are quite a number of blacks now, Albuquerque, because I've gone to like James Brown concerts and almost a lot of games around, but the whole audience will be black. I hear you. I don't know if they don't... Let's just say, if they don't hear the advertisements about jazz, it's going on or what? I hear you. There's not that many stations in this town that played jazz, really. You know what I'm saying? I'm not complaining about the people that were there, the lightest that they were there, but I'm just wondering why couldn't everyone get to the music? I mean, I would do the Santa Vue out of the notion that, you know, he's a university and it's open form, and music can be presented, and whoever's big enough to get to it, it's fine. I mean, this is going on over the air, something like that, and people can hear it in

their living rooms. Yeah. Yeah. So. So. What, I've been wondering what directions you think jazz is taking. Do you think it's going in the direction of electric jazz, you know, with rock influences, something like that last George Duke thing we heard, or things Herbie Hancock is doing, do you think it's becoming more electrified and fine? I think that those toys are available now. We have to face that, you know, and the electronics are much more sophisticated, and in terms of using technology, I'm not one to negate it. At the same time, if you ask me where I think music is going, I think that it's really going where it's always going. I mean, music happens from a notion of inspiration, some sort of notion of, I'm talking about creative music happening from one having to make music.

I mean, when I was a little kid, I said, gee, I want to be a musician. All the old dudes would say, gee, June, you know, be a doctor or lawyer, and just laugh to the old dudes, because there was no alternative for me but to make music. So what I'm saying is, I think that the music is going within more and getting to distillation of essence of some sort of pure creativity of, I mean, I think that because these toys are available, we all check them out and play with them, you know, check out all these. There's someone in Boston, some geniuses just made an incredible dynamic microphone, not a pick-ups for saxophone. I didn't like to play those pick-ups because they had such a ceramic kind of quality, you know, not really good quality, but this dynamic microphone was really fine. So I checked it out and I've been playing, I have a good time, but I just played it away. And there's something about acoustic music, which I'll always love, you know, I can't negate that.

At the same time, I have to admit that there's something I like when my pianist Holtap, who's from Cape Town, South Africa, plays the synthesizer, and just really makes some jungle sounds come out of it in the nicest way. So it's sort of a man from two worlds notion, you know, I mean, we always have to be in touch with the source, and at the same time, don't get OD with Con Edison, I really feel it. And if you ask about rock, rock's influence, I mean, I think that there's been more influence from the other side, you know, because I think that not to negate rock, but I think that the creative process that goes into many of the artists, like you've got a side of his only seven more days to McCoy Tynan's birthday, I mean, McCoy Tynan is a major American artist in his time. I mean, he only plays acoustic piano. If he played the electric piano, he probably demolished it because he played his fingers just bash out the keys.

So fiercely. Like he's a tailor to that too. He's also. But what I'm saying, some people that's suitable for, and it's also what the music is expressing. I mean, that thing of expressing wonder and elation and god consciousness or whatever one is, I mean, my pull to the music was always just such a spiritual thing, you know, but in terms of influences, I mean, we live in a world now where transportation, everything is sped up, you know, that whole thing that was understood well in the sixties, you know, but what I'm saying is that there's good music happening all the time. I mean, his Stevie Wonder tell him in how totally outrageous and how fucked up the program is and he had a Jackson 5 coming to duty while I mean, that's kind of far out. But then I also noticed that wouldn't it be out if he had behind him some guys really playing some outrageously creative music too, taking it even further, you know, than just the formula because what we're saying is that improvise music, it gets pretty boring

to be part of a horn section and doing a happy slave act night after night, you know. I think that's why we play this music because it's a way of singing the soul free, you know, it's a way of expressing the expressible and I mean words can go to some places, but like, last thing after we played, there was some feelings in the audience that were totally incredible and it doesn't have to do with geography, I mean, you know, because this is the Albuquerque, I mean, what I'm saying is that there was just, there was such a feeling of communion, you know, and it wasn't localized and so what I'm saying is that the music visits and I think that the notion of freshness of creating something that has a life and has a spontaneity, I'm a firm believer of the notion of that thing of being at the edge and capturing the magic of those moments, I like that, it demolishes time, I know you know.

That's where I think it should be going more to, because we need it, I mean, civilization is getting more spared up and those idiots are getting more crazy with those political programs, you know, and it's not a, gee, I'm listening, I'm listening, I'm listening to those words, those idiots, I mean, I am they and they are me and me, all the life is the one, I mean, I know that, but sometimes I get I rate about how insane it can be sometimes and don't we realize that we all live here in a small place and why don't we tune into the music and that's so much noise. I just thought during cult trains last days or some of the stuff Albert Ailer did or Dolphi and people like that, it was really spiritual music and it seems like a lot of jazz coming out nowadays is, it doesn't seem to be the cutting edge of jazz, it seems like it's, you just hit a party when you say it, it seems like it's a more electric funky, you know what I mean?

Yeah, I know what you're saying, but you just hit on it when you say a lot of jazz that's coming out now, meaning that's being merchandise, right, you understand. And so, right, maybe we don't get the best stuff, maybe the best stuff isn't even recorded, I don't know. No, that's true. And I've always maintained that a record is like a photograph of a friend, you know, it's there and it's nice to have, you know. But for example, let's look at the success that Harvey Hancock's had with those records, you know, okay, so they're funky, you know, and they get out and people can dance and boogie and stuff like that to them, you know. And that's, I certainly wouldn't say that that's an adoration of the Lord, you know, but that's a feeling that this man feels and he wants to express that and that's where he's coming from at that time and it expresses that. But I wouldn't think that you could say that that statement totally holds true of, well, see, what's being put out now, you have to understand the nature of the marketplace, what the marketplace wants to put out has to do with what they think is a successful formula.

And so they say, well, once you come into studio and get some of that out there and then they have these charts and stuff like that and then formats and what people can listen to. And that's why the notion, again, of compartmentalization is not what, so I'm not negating the music being funky. I think that the music should have a totality though of feeling. I think that it should raise you on all kinds of levels. I mean, that George Duke piece you played. I mean, I could sit here and feel all right, you know, but it didn't take me to a place where I like to go, you know. But I made a record, Gita is my last record, which came out on the A&M. And I think that I would deny that, I mean, I think that there's a tone in that record, if you ever heard it. Not too much. Okay. There's a tone in there, which I hope speaks to some of what I'm saying, you know. And so, but again, I think that people should hear the music also live because I think

that oftentimes more can happen there than has been happening on records. Not to negate the artist, but you see, we aren't in total control all the time of the marketplace as we all are aware. So if left totally up to the artist, I mean, I think that you would, you also talk about, you mentioned great artists such as John Coltrane and Eric D'Auffee, and you mentioned during the time that they were making those records, Coltrane was obviously a great master and insight, indisputable. But his records were not really promoted or really gotten out to the masters of people, but the masters heard the music anyway because of the strength of it, the beauty of it was so strong. But they can go and manufacture a record now, you know, and sell as many records as trains, record sold it. Like that forest flower record of mine, you play it. It sold up 100,000 units, which was a lot of units for a so-called jazz record.

But that, I mean, Atlantic discovered that by accident and said, what's going on here? You know what I mean? It just seems that, I hear what you say, I live in that too. We'll get 10 or 20 new jazz albums in, and there'll be maybe two or three that I think are as innovative as exploratory or as spiritual as, say, Coltrane's later years. It's always been that way, though. Yeah. And at the same time, you have to realize that if you talk about the past and what was heard, let's say 10 years ago, 5 or 10 years ago, then it was geared to sell 5,000 records. Now they're not even interested in pressing a record that would sell 5,000 records. You understand? They claim it will be a total loss or something like that, which again is a shame. Is that so? I mean, maintain, though, if the beauty of that music of which you speak were exposed more and played more, the artist is hard with saying much more. I mean, Herbie would certainly love to stretch out and play as made in boards type pieces.

I mean, as he played for years, so you can't negate a man who goes in and hooks up the con in, especially maybe he feels that at the time, you know? Yeah, well, I try to play as much jazz as possible. I appreciate it. I'm not on the case. I'm just trying to look at it. I'm trying to look at it too. Do they consider a record that would say sell only 5,000 copies? Why is it a total loss? Because of record and cost? Yeah, because record and cost and the press and to get it to the marketplace, in present day market and economy, it would not make money. That used to be what was so called a break-even figure, because then they had to computerize whether it would cost to get the musicians into the studio and record. And it just costs a lot more than it used to or what? It costs a lot more than it used to. And still jazz music is made with less costs than what Led Zeppelin or some of those turkeys

would spend to make a record, you know? And what's that guy's name who doesn't even record what's his consequence, you know? But what I'm saying is that the music, he costs more. Recording costs, you know, the whole thing of the resources and vinyl and studio rates have quadrupled, you know, that whole kind of thing. So that kind of ferrets out a lot of great artists. And the same thing goes applies for the club kind of thing that you mentioned earlier. I mean, for example, we come here to play the fire sign at Music Theater. And we have to fly. He and fly equipment, you know, and places to stay, and agents and all that stuff and accounts and salaries and tax programs get taken out so that you won't get busted for B, you know, in the whole computerized notion. And it's not inexpensive to do that. And yet, you know, it's that I have no choice, like I'm a musician by nature, not by profession, you know?

So it's just something that I have to keep working it. I mean, but you mentioned, you should study a little more. I mean, you mentioned you have no sense of chronology, whether the key Jared play with me before you play with Miles after some sense, you know, but the year is exactly. But what's so is that it's interesting how a lot of beautiful artists have been negated. Like Eric Toffy, he had to go to Europe to live over there because he couldn't make a living in America. I mean, he'd make, you know, two, three, three, entire year, and live in a New York jungle, you can't survive with that. Yeah. Even a lot of the swing bands did that right during the 40s with 50s. I mean, like Duke went to Europe a lot. And a lot of the early jazz bands. Yeah. Sure. Some of the kind of thing. I don't know if they were accepted more over there or not. They seem to be close. And the last time, yeah, he's better. Yeah. Because the people were more openly appreciative on a level of here comes a major art form.

But in America, because of the whole intimacy of the racial system, Duke couldn't be appreciated on the level of the depth of his talent. Nevertheless, he not being one to be run over by the Mack Truck always stayed positive and presented his music right up until he, and did you notice that after he cut out within a few months, five more of his cats cut out and went with him. So we don't really know what we're not directing his movie, you know. So the best thing we can do is be as honest and open and try not to harm anyone. I mean, so if you receive 10 records and only two of them are of merit, it's nice that you have enough taste to appreciate what is of merit. And hopefully you'll play some of that too. But for some reason, you seem to have to have some commercial consideration to play. The other records that you play to kind of mix it up to turn those people on to keep, to hold them

or to keep the interest. So it has to do with balance. You see, we're not playing this music in our closet. Yeah. Sir, I don't know. Not everybody out there digs jazz. I mean, we try to play a lot of variety. The music is very beautiful. It's just that the labels get things confused and also what's promoted in the presentation of the music. But stay with your heart. And don't be controlled by our mass media to cause you to forget this music. And next time I see you, you'll have on the whole program of America's mass communications media. Hi, how are you? Do you ever find yourself having to alter your music in order that it will sell? And do you ever have to make concessions, a lot of concessions, like change your music so that it will sell more? That's how I've been fortunate in that,

and that's an out question in that I've been fortunate, that for some reason I've been blessed that I've always had some ability to communicate with an audience. And I've always been performing and playing on lots of live concerts over the years since I formed my group after leaving Cannonball Adderly in about 65. And I've had a group now for about nine years. And I've been fortunate in that I've had very little commercial pressures put on me in that way. When I was at Atlantic Records and where the bulk of my records were made, I felt it was a kind of plantation arrangement that that was working with. And my consciousness wouldn't allow me to continue to work for them. But I noticed that they tried to exert some pressure when they saw it, oh, there's something here. And maybe they were trying to even help. But in some ways, I think that what

has to follow one's own bells if one is that strong into that. So fortunate that I could go out and play, be invited to play concerts and continue to present good music that those pressures haven't had to bother me like that. And just the romantic notion of the music always was so strong that I wasn't trying to figure out how to make a living with it. And then all of a sudden, one day, the living thing was seen on the computer, OK, you have your pilot's license to continue to make creative music, something like that. So that's what I'm saying I feel blessed about. Do you think a lot of jazz artists are forced to make concessions like that? Not just jazz artists, but artists. Yeah. I mean, the artist is always, I mean, for some reason, the statement, I mean, artists, I mean,

if we're talking about true artists, people who are saying something and touching people's hearts and minds and so on, there always is some other force which would like to control that, something like that. So I think that always goes on. It just depends on how much one cares to submit to that. I mean, there are always agents and managers. And oftentimes, they don't really know that much about where you really come from. Who do you think interferes the most? Record companies or producers or what? I mean, saying something like, you can't do this while it won't sell. It's too wild or as expensive as you want to. It's hard to lay that label so much on jazz musicians because check Freddie Hubbard, he's got a new record out. What's it called? It wouldn't be what you would expect. In other words, he probably really wanted to record with his small group. And they were always pressuring him over at CTI to make those slick music commercial kind of slick hip jazz records.

And Freddie went with Columbia. And evidently, he must have not let them exert that much pressure because he played some straight ahead kind of B-bop, which he's really good at and really incredibly equipped. And it's also selling lots of records. And so high-energy. So what I'm saying is that, and Miles has always had his little funny part, what I'm saying is that I think that the jazz artists are too much of individualist to be controlled like that because if they could be controlled like that, they'd probably be playing in horn sections back in a B-b-king of Bobby Blan, which I had to experience when I was a kid. But the interesting thing is that on the other hand, someone like George Duke may decide that he wants to get his capital gains program in order soon and not have to be dealing with social security. Because all kinds of things dance through all of our hearts. And no one has a cornerstone on greed or lust

or any of those things. So one has to continually ask oneself, what are the values that one is living by? Now, that gets on down into what it really is about. What are we here for? And what is life and what is it about? And for me, it's always been school. So when you ask me these general questions about what so about the artists in the marketplace, I can't totally answer in general. But I can relate to, I know that from my space, it feels better to not have to stay at some of the fucky type hotels I used to have to stay at years ago or not have to deal with things in some kind of inhumane kind of ways. And I noticed that it seems to take crown or a dollar or a goal or whatever to get the airplane up in the air to get that whole thing. But at the same time, there is some notion of respect for that which is of which we all are. There's a totality of empathy with business that,

which says to me, OK, activity goes on, but amidst the activity, don't identify. I don't be so wigged out by that. So some Mr. Businessman comes up and slaps me on the bank. So real good, Charlie. We want you over here. And we want you to sell a million units next week. And we're going to really get you out there to the people. I see yes, that's very good, very beautiful. And we've got some very beautiful music for you. And so in other words, you, one has to know what ones values are. And so now if you want to, then it doesn't go into talking about home training or civilizations or society or how men got totally insane in the first place. Or why don't we stop him so many parking lots and have more redwood for us or something like that? And why doesn't this country have a John Coltrane universal apathy or rename the, I don't know, one of those parks or something like that.

So there's not that care. But what the artist has to do is realize that, yes, life is eternal. And the belief is that this is life is school. And we get out less than straight this time in dance on out with the port report card cooled out. Oh, we just keep laying, laying with the wheel and keep dealing with it and like that. So it has to do with balance. That's basically where it's coming from. And I certainly wouldn't want to make a record. All just laying down some tap dance in music. I mean, I would like for one's heart and mind to be able to dance with the music. And I hope that the music dances on some shores, which also touch some universal truth within the listener also. And I like to touch people with that, with the value of that the music comes through me. I don't take authorship. And they that I really hope you come here on music while we do it.

And I know you probably be able to do it. But something really nice is going down. I mean, here for individuals playing music on a level where universality comes out a lot in the music. And so those questions all go away. And one size and says, yes, it is still happening. That's good. I'm glad you think that. Yeah, I believe. I like to think that. But it just seems that it's going along very seldomly that still assure me that jazz is still. That's because record comes. It's still the cutting edge of the music in general. Records come along from not the artist control. You see all the time. And you see, and we're in a different time now where the artist more than ever, I made records. So they just don't even release. You know what I mean? So it's still releasing culture and stuff. It's they release strange stuff because they know that there's automatic, large sale out there for it.

But they don't really put the heartfelt interest into it. It's just something in the catalog at ABC. I've talked to Alice Coltrane about it. And she said that in terms of her family estate, she's done much better from the publishing than ever from the sales of those records. I mean, it's negligible in terms of lifestyle. And that's sad for the widow of a beautiful artist, such as him and she being a beautiful artist. And it makes some of us kind of reclusive, you know, to not to make the music in seasons and to keep some of what is, I don't mean keep. One doesn't keep anything, but you share in different ways. For example, I became a teacher of transcendental meditation because that was something that has helped my life so much, like it cultured my nervous system a lot and dissolved,

so much stress. It made it much easier for me to catch planes. I didn't need crutches, such as drugs or to be high or to. I mean, a lot of things which would keep me going before. And I just noticed that it got more simplistic and my energy level got so much higher that I wanted to share that with my friends. And a lot of them couldn't get to the traditional student-in-attach international meditation society or meetings on your campus because a lot of my friends are located in other places other than the campuses. So that's been a joy to share that with people. I got turned on to what's so about food. You know, I mean, someone can come up to me and ask me, what are my politics? And I might turn and ask them, what do you eat? You know, because if you're walking around out there eating little herm in the chicken and all this to pig and stuff like that, I mean, fear and aggression, witnessed nations throwing rocks at each other for thousands of years that's been going on. So it's just civilization hasn't really gone too far. I mean, it's sort of in terms of physical science, Einstein and Newton and those dudes did a lot of cooking,

you know, Nicholas Tesla, somebody. But in terms of social science, I mean, man's still in the cave, man, age. I mean, Turkey talking on the TV about nuclear missile dis and missile land. And we made an agreement and said, but who are you really, sir? I mean, what is it really? And they don't know, you know? And that's important, I mean, the basics. So you just, it keeps coming back to me. The answer to that is there's a lack of foundation, you see. And the values are all misinterpreted. And I bet you, out of most of all the records that are released, there's so many throwaways, so much garbage, so much misused products. They come in the garbage all the day. Right, right. And you throw that stuff in the file basket too, I bet. So what I'm saying is if we had a foundation in our lives, something that would predictably give us a sense of inner being and awareness and living that and radiating that, then the stress in our society would dissolve a lot.

And I think a world peace would become a reality. We wouldn't have to have some Turkey on the tube talking about heat and negotiate at this. And this guy's gonna fly over there tomorrow to have a Chinese chicken dinner, you know? Because what's so is that it's much better to eat an avocado than a chicken and a much better protein and plus chicken. He's a little scavenger out there in the yard. I mean, eating all kinds of little dirt and stuff like that. And then this guy sells them down there in a big box in barrel. And then you eat that stuff and you are what you eat and you manifest that type of consciousness. Now, that's outrageous to lay on the audience because I bet that most people steal dealing with that. But in college, man, I wanted to go to college and learn all this and know about music. And they just shine me on the 300 years of European classical tradition, which is very beautiful. But I kept saying, what about Charlie Parker and Billy Holiday and Lester Young and Tray and then they say, oh, well, we don't know anything about that. Just, you know? I went to that same thing here. Okay, but check this out. In medical school, these job doctors who were giving all these people our operations. Did you see how sick that poor man was

when they wheeled him back into the limo to send him back to San Clemente? I mean, they shoot him up with so much stuff. I said, oh, well, that's coagulating with that. I mean, there's so much, so little understanding of nutrition, you know? And it's just really amazing. And I think that folk really ought to get down to understanding about natural foods and not polluting the planet so much and just some beautiful, speaking of that, I heard a beautiful poet last week, Gary Snyder. Are you hip to him? No. Oh, he's so incredible. And he was talking about these very, very same things. And just with such an eloquence and such a beauty, like I'm a musician and I say it best through the music. I mean, my music deals with what it really deals with. What I'm trying to be about is that, like we live in this society now and what it's saying is that I'm trying to make a better world. I mean, the notion of a place where there is not so much insanity chaos, disease, blah, blah, and where it all gets transformed into something blissful and where it gets close

to some sort of harmonic union where there's a universality rather than I'm not negating individuality or anything, but it's just that we've just gotten so far from basic values, you know, be kind to others. Do not do on others what you not have them to do on to you. And JC and all those dudes have been through here and have laid those things down, through the Krishna, all the heavyweight dudes like that. And to live that kind of notion. And then that's, again, I still come back to that. That's the inspiration of the music from when I came into it and I'm still naive enough to still be interested in doing that. So when you ask me about, what's going on? I don't think it's being naive. I was going to ask you about that. What you thought of music as a consciousness raising thing. I mean, how do you think music is? I witnessed it so much.

I mean, like I witnessed it last night. It made this conversation like a pimple in contrast. I mean, when you hear, like, last night when I got up on the stage, the stage was weird, you know what I mean? Here are these beautiful guys, Rob, Shoemaker, and Al Grimm. And these guys, they put together this Firehouse Music theater here in Albuquerque. They pick us up at the airport, you know, they get all the stuff. And they really care. And you can see they love the music. They're just really so excited they could do this. I get there in the stages too high for the audience. You know, there's weird. And so I wanted to say that here we are, and we want to share our love and our music. And the stage is too funny and in a weird position. But, you know, the music will flow. And it was just some way of saying hello to the audience. But it was just sort of awkward just getting started, you know. And I don't know, there was some women's liver out there. I mean, I used some word, you know, and she took all the virus. What about, you know, that's fine, that's polarity you want to deal with, you know, fine. But, you know, I was just trying to set a tone to get the music

say hello to you, Miss. I wasn't trying to bother your program, anything like that. But so everybody, you know, it's fashionable, you know, have flags or whatever. What I'm saying is that the music started. And then all of a sudden there was a feeling in the room which transcended all of that, you know. So, obviously that's exactly what the music is about. I mean, raising consciousness, inspiring beauty, inspiring life, man. And the music cleanses us every time we play it. I'm glad to hear that, especially on the first night. Oh, yeah, it was, I suppose there's a few people who saw you at the last gig here at the U of A. But still, that's good for you. Yeah, well, yeah, first nights can be weird, but there was a communion spirit there last night. I hope it grows and I hope more people can get to the music. And I asked a question about the black audience, only out of having been living in a manipulative culture. And I just wondered, you know, other brothers and sisters being manipulated and not being able to get to the music.

Or is that their consciousness or whatever, what is the game or is it economics? Because, you know, it seems reasonable that you can come there for two or three dollars and hear the music, you know. I was going to ask you if you thought music was as valid as a consciousness raising medium as, say, any certain religion. Yeah, music is my religion. You know, like I said, yeah, I meditate, like transcendental meditation. Okay, Mari, she came through here. Okay, who's 15? They got a 15-year-old dude. And who's next? It's not on that level. What I'm getting at is Mari's just brought a beautiful technique, which has been around for centuries. It just gets lost every now and then, Buddha and Christian and even JC taught meditation, you know. So that's always been happening. And, but, when I first started playing music, it was like a meditation, a mantra, where you're getting me dissolve in that stress and getting me to that beautiful zone where, and that kind of music we were talking about, I'm not talking about music, rock and roll music,

just to jump up and down to, and when Mick Jagger prancels around, puts a silk skirt on Chuck Berry or the Beach Boys, put a surfboard on it, what I like about the Beach Boys is they make beautiful harmonies and their masses in the studio. That's what I'm touched by. I mean, it's Chuck Berry's form, so there's no negating that. Of course, Brian Wilson is taking a further that and written some beautiful songs also. But music is definitely a religion, and I noticed that I feel really blessed in this incarnation to be able to be a musician, because what's so about being a musician is that, I was trying to explain this to a friend last night, who was telling me about how good some muscle shows, horns were doing, who were touring with Alton John, and I was saying, well, okay fine, but, creativity, if you gotta sit behind Alton John every night and play, do do do do do do do do, I mean, you're gonna be in a straight jack about the end of the tour, you may have your 10,000 or whatever the tokens are, but I sure much rather have my sanity or insanity

or whatever polarity or whichever microscope you want to look at it from, and play a music which comes through me and uses my nervous system to communicate something bigger than my small individuality. And I noticed when we began to perform, something begins to happen where the music transports us. And I used to think in the 50s and 60s that like I started as a kid at 10 years old in the 50s playing music. But it was always wanting to say something from my heart wanting to understand what truth was, what God is, what light is, what wonder is about. And trying to articulate those things in the music, and I'm still trying to do that. And what happens is that it's not like craft gets more refined. I believe in basics and when developing one's craft, it's a beautiful thing about jazz artists. And like the classical conservatory, I went to,

they didn't understand that we had perfected the craft. I knew much more harmony in theory than they knew at USC when I got there. But freshmen, harmony and all that stuff. But anyway, so it's just, you know, not communication. But what I'm getting at is that the music comes through, it's on such a high level of creativity, and the pure and the more one is interested in purging oneself and living values which have to do with fundamentals. The more essence one is allowed to have, I mean, it's in proportion to what one gives and what one seeks just as, you know, the plants you, you, I mean, the seeds you sow, you know, what you will reap. So, I mean, the basic universe is always told of those major truths. Yeah. Can I ask you a question? I get excited about that because that you touch on something really, really beautiful. I mean, it's music religion. Oh, I'm saying very creative music is. Yes, music that touches on spheres more than just heat music.

You know, just body music and jumping them down. Because if one is always locked in the room with jumping them down or eating barbecue sandwiches or eating or making greed machines, I mean, there's got to, again, a thing of balance and being the middle way of balance again, you know, and then what balance teaches you more and more is that, I'm not negating abundance either. I mean, we live in the society, you know, and this is a material world, but what is needed is more infusion of the absolute into the relative, more infusion of this beautiful music into our environment. It makes something really incredible. And I don't even take authorship for the music. I mean, I just, I'm blessed that I can be there and it comes through. And I don't want my limited nervous system to even get in the way of it, my personal hang-ups or preferences. And at its finest, I'm not doing anything, but I do maintain that craft is important, as well as inspiration and talent, you know, good health.

Do you find it takes a long time to reach a certain mental state, a certain... It takes work, yes. I mean, do you, do you have to play for a long time before you reach that state, or can you meditate your way up to that state and start playing? No, no, no, no. Short cuts to it. When I was a kid, the, the old dude, he used to say, Junior, it takes 20 years to master your instrument. And I never quite knew with that minute. I'm going to get it together real quick. Yeah. But it takes a real long time to master it. And that's why it's best to discourage youngsters going into art. Because one doesn't go into art. One does it by nature. I mean, it's something that comes through one. And naturally, you have to work and work your ass off for many years. And it continues to go on, you know what I mean, in terms of development. Now, I mean, say in a, in a, in the studio, if you want to be a certain place, mentally and spiritually, does it take...

Do you, do you have to play a long time before you, I mean, do you have to warm up for a long time, do you have to jam for a long time, or does it... Actually, in the studio, or the conception of the pieces... Or can you just start in and... As a composer, some pieces come through real quick, you know, and some pieces develop and take a long, long periods of time for them to have their life and to come on. And in terms of the studio, it depends. There's not always just a formula. I mean, you don't go in sometimes and jam for a few hours and it's happening. Sometimes you go in and you realize that it's not happening tonight, folks. Right. Like, very much the... Did you just quit then, or did you... Yeah, I've done that. Yeah. Doesn't matter if I... Recently, I went into the studio a few months ago, and there was just such incredible magic one night that wasn't expecting it. And we worked, oh, about, oh, 14, 16 hours nonstop. I mean, there's no time for breaks. I mean, we weren't even in worldly time anymore. You know, it just becomes something else. And so, I have so wrapped up, we went into the next night, where we're going to stay at this, and it just was not happening. Right.

But that's why I meant to craft is good, because you can turn out a professional quality something, but I'm not interested in professional quality something. I'm interested in that something where it's blessed, and where something special comes through. So, that extra something. I'm interested also now in studio techniques. That's a nice thing also. When the Beach Boys came around and told me they were big fans of my music, I wanted to know where they really fans, you know, because I knew Brian had that computerized studio in the basement. And they said, yes, and I said, I'm trying to put my music together, and they said, fine, come over and use Brian's studio. What I'm getting at is that... And I used to record it in Atlantic, and there would be this giant of engineers drinking chocolate milk, and want to get home to their old ladies, and not be listening to what was going on in the studio. And missing lots of important things. What I'm getting at is that I want to be able to get the music onto the vinyl that is being made. I know that's a difficult notion, you know, because music, you know, the vibration rate and the planet and all that, but to capture that. So, it's good to work with sympathetic people

and to home grow your own totality. Do you have a lot of problems in the studio, with just working with people, or engineers and stuff, usually pretty cooperative? Yeah, I'm pretty fortunate in that I'm... I don't know what the word is, but I'm obsessed enough when I'm in there that everyone else knows it, and so it just... Everyone gets involved and caught up, and everybody's doing their work, you know, because there's no time to be sitting around there stroking, because I'm not in the chocolate milk, you know. I had my mango early in the day before I came there. I keep speaking of things like avocados and mangoes. I know that's a weird notion being out here in New Mexico, but fruit burns cleaner, you see, and it keeps the machine running real fine. And I've been checking that out more and more. I had some real good apple juice out here,

organic health food store around here, somewhere where somebody brought me some apple juice, which I've got here. Are we ODNs something? Because every now and then somebody comes and peeps through them, and looks in at us. They probably wonder what's going on. No, there's an on the air light over the door there. They probably wonder why it's been on so long. Oh, I dig it. No, that's all right. Am I ODN? No, no, that's cool. I appreciate your sensitivity. Let me just say that this is KUNM and Albuquerque. You have to give an ID. Oh, do that. Yeah, okay, well, I just did it. Tell them about the Firehouse Music Theatre too, and we'll be there through Saturday. Right. Two performances an evening. You started eight, usually? Uh, yes. It's like that. Yes. And we started about eight, and you'll be able to get home and get your weedies or whatever it is. But to share the music is, that's a mission that I seem to feel strongly that it's a blessing to have it and it's a joy to share it. You know, that's where that's coming from.

But don't lose faith in terms of getting so much weird vinyl in here because... Oh, I don't. Yeah. I keep looking for the good stuff. Yeah, because the good stuff is always around. Sometimes it just has to surface in another way. Right. Like that. Because they keep changing the... We're not businessmen or marketing research analysts. I mean, you know. And all that thing works on the Peter's principle anyway. So what we have to do is just do the music and the marketing people try to figure out what's so what are the trends or what's going to make our hit. Yeah. And then they have lots of lunch and business meetings and they go to Puerto Rico for a CBS convention and they go to Beverly Hills and then they go to Switzerland. And it's just silly. Yeah. But on the biggest scale of things, it's like a foundation in our societies. And the reason the music had been understood better in Europe in the last, in the 60s, which I experienced,

was that there was more of a cultural understanding. However, in the 60s and now coming into the 70s in this country, there seems to be more of a mass awakening of people. I hope so. Yeah. I hope so too. And I questioned it last night when I wondered were we going to be back in the 50s, you know, with you young white intellectuals coming to hear the music and so brothers would not get to hear it again. But what's so is that the whole notion of lack of foundation, lack of roots, but there's an interesting thing about the universe. It has its balance and nature is so incredibly wondrous in its work. Something is out of whack. It will be balanced, you see. And so you are the manifestation of why your father couldn't get to it or something like that. Or maybe you will work to hear something just as it's ongoing. So what I'm saying is that I have great hope and faith and the possibility of people awakening more.

It'll always be on the level, though, unfortunately, until someone who has such a grace can come and just bliss, you know, just bliss us all out, you know, if that. But again, in the meantime, we have to do it for ourselves, you see. And you get guidance along the ways. And everything is available to you when you're ready for it. But it'll always be a ratio of ten to two. You'll get ten records and two of them will be good. So there'll be a little pockets here and there where it's happening, like the firehouse, music, the uninviting us here. That's a little pocket where they're trying to do something. You hear play in the music, but you have to judiciously play a little funky, funny cut, you know, in the end. Lay something else in on them, you know. But at the same time, you touch hearts and you open people up a lot to the beauty of the music. Could I just keep seeing Renzo walking around out there. I wonder could he come in? I would like to know what was his reaction or his understanding of what went down last night just briefly,

because I've given my... Could you come in a minute? I felt went down from my side. And I thought that it was very beautifully. I mean, like words happen, but in terms of the expression or the experience, I mean, they seem to have been, by the end of the performance, a special feeling, a quality of feeling in there to me last night. Now, am I just being crazy or what's so about that? No. It was just real needed. It was maybe the first jazz that's been in town since... since maybe the last time you were here, probably. That's sad, man. This should be... We just don't get that many jazz artists here. That's why the people are just so receptive to it, because it's so good to hear. It's not some lorant rock and roll band playing that's something, you know, it's quality music. It's really nice. Well, then, I just wondered, you know, what was that? Because I felt really, really good about it. And I mean, it was such a nice feeling. And I appreciate, you know, we don't know what's going down now in terms of what we share, but I'm sure

that someone out there gets touched by something or some people can't use it or tunes off or whatever. But I know when I was a little kid, I used to turn on a radio and I had to try to find jazz and it would be coming from some weird place and it would never come on to laugh the midnight and mom's wanting me a sleep at 10 o'clock, you know. And that's so outrageous, you know. I'm sure most of the people who went to the gig were probably jazz freaks. I mean, it's not your average teen kids' kid that goes to the rock concert, you know. I would like to know what he... Did you probably heard of you because you were here before or maybe they'd dug in one time? Okay, but what about your average? What about your average? What about the average teenage... I'm not trying to bust him, but I would like for a couple of them to come in here too. Yeah, so would I. Yeah, because that's... They see the poster Charles Lloyd, they know who Charles Lloyd is. That could be a traveling salesman. It could be anybody, you know. It could be Dolfie or anybody. They wouldn't know who it was. A lot of them. But then, why is it that I keep going to all these towns and I keep hearing people saying,

oh man, I sure wish I could have gotten here Dolfie when he was alive. He was really great. Boy, gee, wasn't he? That's something like that, you know, or a cold train or something like that. What I'm saying is that it's always been around, you know. Yeah. It's just amazing how... It's just that the way that the media is and the way that you pick up on music is that you may not start to pick up on jazz till maybe 16 or 17, and that's just... If then, and then that's just the beginning, and then by the time you're 20, you're really starting to hear all, you know, like train and such like that, and it's really nice. So is that what's going to be so then? I mean, the media will always... Yeah, right, that's why we... There just isn't that much jazz that's played in this town. Not just this town, anytime. On the radio. Hey, I'm just playing jazz. You hear no jazz on AM radio. Most FM doesn't have very much jazz. There's a couple stations in this town that played jazz. But I looked at the mountains that they surround in this town, and there was a spiritual feeling. Yeah, in this country.

And the skies around here. I mean, you mean to tell me that the people here don't witness these incredible sunsets and the majestic nature of this country, and the quietness of it just drive in a way sometimes. Sure, they witness it. But this is where the music that expresses that. Well, this is what that is. I mean, why? I know, but they don't know that. They never hear a radio. They never hear a radio. Why don't someone... Okay, well, how do we... How do we get the communications? Well, I try to play as much jazz as possible. Yeah. We have two jazz shows on this station. I play as much as I can in the afternoon, so that... I mean, a lot of people think jazz is too wild and freaky. They just can't get it into it on a daily level. Well, this is reciprocal. The more energy you put into listening to it, the more you get out of it. That's how I've discovered it in the beginning. I only got turned on to jazz from Bitches Brew. Yeah, but there's anything good. I mean, don't you have to put something into it. Sure. You know, just go and take it.

Like rock, it seems to me rock comes at you. Yeah, it comes at you. It makes you want to move your body. You can pet your foot and you can do the body day. Whereas jazz, like, say on this afternoon show, a lot of people are, say, between classes or on a lunch break or something, and their heads just starting in the place where they can sit down and listen to a long cut, you know, like that. But they can sit down and put the work into listening to get out of it. If they sat down and listen to that long cut that you just spoke of, that forest flower thing for 17 minutes, they would be recharged much more than what they put into it. And as a consequence, we'll be able to go out and do all those other little mundane gigs as well as important gigs that they have to do. Look, you may think you don't like jazz. Well, sit down and listen to it. You know, you have to work a little. Listen to what's going on. Listen to the bass player, the drummers, see what the musicians are doing among themselves, how they're communicating, how the sax answers, the drums and how the piano, you know, quotes, cult trainer, whatever's going on, you have to sit down and listen to this. You know, it doesn't just come at you like rock does a lot of times.

You have to sit down and put work into it to listen to it. And it just seems to me that people skipping around from work to classes that are washing dishes or whatever they're doing, their heads just starting in the place to sit down and do that. Maybe late in the evening they can do that on an all night show or something. That's what I spoke of earlier though, it's important to be centered all the time. In other words, don't be out to lunch all the time and get it together at night when you lay the body down. I mean, obviously the body needs some rest, you know. But there is something called inner inner being or awareness which also there isn't an in live and quality within us all which can always be awake. And once that's awakened, the sleep state, as we used to know it, doesn't occur. And this music is one of the avenues for being touched with this. And it should be quiet as it's kept. It should be allowed to be known by people.

I mean, here we are at a university where I bet you that most of the busy work goes on of the professor feeding out some information and you give it back to him on a piece of paper and working through all of that. Unless one is getting some spiritual food, it's going to be pretty much of a mechanical existence and not much is going to be gotten out of anything. So if you're postponing all this for when you're out of school to get it together, that ain't gonna work either. So again, the notion of dealing with it all just as it's going down and opening up to that beauty within and realizing that the music inspires life. I mean, it's just, I just don't understand why things got so out of hand. So you have to understand from my point of view that as a little kid, four years old, I knew that this was what I was going to do. So that's all I know about it. So if I seem naive about what's going on,

it's, I asked myself last night, I got home after the beauty of the performance in the evening. I said now that room couldn't hold more than a few hundred people. And although it may have been maximized, if it were at the arena where you present your local, who are those bands around here that they present? Who are the big boys? Well, we have a lot of big-name groups that come through. Who are they? Van Morrison, Little Feet. I like Van Morrison. I like him. Okay, all I'm getting at is that, well, he's been inspired by this music. I mean, you're having a way to try to find out what's going on. I like Van Morrison because he's trying to find out, have you got that record of Van Morrison Astro Weeks or something where Richard Davis is playing that most incredible bass stuff back there? Who, which is really simplistic for Richard Davis, but it sure puts a thump on Van Morrison's little song.

You know, it gets it on in there. And so that's, that's a weird commentary. And here's Richard Davis, who's an incredibly beautiful bassist, who played on my first album on Columbia called Discovery some 10 years ago. But who gives that music so much life? If Richard Davis were to come to town, I bet he would be not understood either, you know, whereas as you'd say to the people when you tell them to listen to the music, check the bass flat. I bet they got Astro Weeks at home. Check that bass play out on them. He's playing some totally outrageous stuff, you know? Yeah, people get turned on to it indirectly, I guess. You know, they'll be... I've been thinking that the follow-up rock is getting better. But then I noticed that it's still getting, it's still slick and manipulated productions, you know? I don't find it to be honest, really good music going down. Like a rock album will come out, and you know, it'll be a group that say most kids dig

and say there'll be a jazz musician on it, you know? And I'll try to hit them to the fact, you know, listen to this guy he's doing such and such, he played with so-and-so, or like this last concert that Santana did here. It was very jazzy. Things like that could turn people on to jazz. So in other words, it always can happen. But again, it happens for another reason, right? It seems to me. Justice Herbie has a hard record of turning all those people on. It happens for another reason, because they can get off to it, and they never knew that he was making beautiful music with Miles several years ago. Yeah, sure. And it seems that way to me, because I've had friends over to the house, you know, and I'll try to turn them on to some jazz. And they'll sit there and listen to it for a while, and then halfway through the song, they'll get up and light a cigarette or pop a beer, or go do something else. You know, wait, wait, wait, wait. Why is it this part? You know, wait, come back. You're not listening to it. Do you know why that is?

No. Really? I know, man. I know exactly why that is. Because- I don't know if the musician gets too far out for that. No, no. What it is, I don't know. Exactly the reason it is, man, is because the lack of fundamentals that we spoke of earlier, they are not in tune with themselves and can't sit down and be comfortable with themselves. Because they're so busy always on the wheel and running in there. Some people just can't sit and listen to it for years. But those very people may really need to check that gig out of sitting down and- I know, I tell people that. You have to- And once they do it, they say, damn. If you ever check this out, you haven't talked to people who say- Oh, I'm too busy right now. I'm just so busy. Yeah. Why they're so busy running in circles? Because, you know, the principle of the universe is do less and accomplish more. But you do less from being centered. You know, you know, you know, you know, say, oh, I've got to do this later. No, oftentimes people who are so busy, man, are so busy shuffling papers. Did you ever read that homegrown comic books? The one who are a crumb with-

with Mr. Whiteman goes out and- Oh, wait a minute. Yeah, wait a minute. Yeah, wait a minute. And the guy shuffles, shuffles, shuffles, shuffles. He said, no, but she's mine. Don't you understand? Because I didn't understand. You know, he's so busy shuffling papers that- Yeah. And the winner begone said, gee, that guy's got a nice ride. I know that could be a winner begone flat shot here, because I ride around. And, you know, people kind of into the campers and stuff like that, you know. But the inner quietness can take you on such a camper ride that you wouldn't even believe it. You talk my fuel prices. I mean, you can forget it. It's free. Yeah. It's really free, man. That's- So when I got in your car today and you made some little apologetic statement, I just was laughing. I mean, that was stupid. You- I mean, that was offensive to me that you would do that, because I was not- I was not locked into that. I mean, I've been in palaces and I've been in chicken shacks, and I know that it's the same stuff. Really? Just dookie. You know? And you just- Yes, I mean, it's not on that level. But so the super one of Bego and the sky is within you. I mean, that's all I'm saying.

And those people who are running around tell you they don't have time to listen to it. They are better get in touch with themselves. Yeah, right. So you should send him a telegram this evening.