IMN - International Music Network

Thursday March 10, 2011

From Jazz Inside

Jazz Inside:Kurt Elling

March 10, 2011

Jazz Inside: Can we start by talking about your latest recording, The Gate? What does this recording mean for you? What was the process like for you, and what elements of this recording are you most proud of?

Kurt Elling: I’m proud of it in its totality. I’m proud of the interaction between the cats that we have – this particular assembly of musicians loaning their talents, their skills, and their virtuosity to something that I wanted to pull together. I really had to sing up to their abilities on this record in a way that has exceeded all other times that I’ve had to sing up. It was a big challenge when we were in the studio together. I basically had to comment to myself at least, and just say, “Man, you better start singing some shit!” (Laughs) Because they just really brought it. I’ll also say that the secondary and no less important defining characteristic of this experience was having Don Was at the studio with us and having him back up all the stuff that I wanted to try and give all of us who were in the studio so much love and so much support of the things that we wanted to try out and experiment with and play. That just made all the difference cause it gave us so much more freedom and so much more confidence in what we wanted to do. He was right there as the ultimate big brother in the best possible way.

JI: I think it is so important in jazz, being it is so interactive, to have great chemistry on a personal level with your band mates, and I see the difference between long term band mates to short term similar to relationship between young lovers and a married couple. I think it’s beautiful that you have such a long history playing with Laurence Hobgood. Can you talk about what it is that sustains your relationship and what the partnership has been like for you and how it has evolved?

KE: Sure. First of all, we admire one another’s work and we have a very deep regard for the gifts that one another brings to the table and I think those gifts are very complimentary. I can not orchestrate the way that Laurence can and Laurence can not write a lyric or put a show together, so to speak, like I can. My own compositional sense tends to be much more straight forward and simple. Laurence tends to have a much more complex and labyrinthine take on what is possible in the music so we balance one another out in that way and in many ways. I’ve taken care of the business end and the bandleader end and he very, very, very ably takes care of the rehearsal end by and large, and keeps the charts together and really as far as I’m concerned deserves credit for a lot of the quality control when we do a project together and certainly deserves a much broader audience for his own solo and trio work that he’s recorded for Naim and as a great performer in his own right. Perhaps that’s a story for another article.

JI: As a jazz singer, you can’t hide behind tricks and routine or the consistent tone of your instrument if you are uninspired. After seeing many of your live performances, I feel like you always bring your a-game and are at your best. How do you manage to stay inspired day after day?

KE: I definitely have challenges on occasion and I’ll tell you I give whatever audience I’m in front of the best possible music that I can on that day and on that occasion and at times I’ve had to just dig into my bag of – I’m a professional and though I’m not emotionally in a mood to do this right now, I’m a professional and I have a professional task to deliver and that’s just human nature, but you’re right, it is very raw and very vulnerable. Singers are more vulnerable than any instrumentalist. There is no piece of metal to hide behind, literally. You can’t duck behind the piano. Whether that means that the overall premise that singers just don’t have the possibility of playing by rote, I’m not sure that that’s true although I can’t think of an occasion in the jazz world that I’ve heard that. I’ve certainly seen it in other genres.

Download a pdf of the interview here

Read the full article here