Ahmad Jamal: In his Own Sense of Time and Place

This interview first appeared in the Santa Barbara News-Press on October 2005. The introduction has been updated.

For the late, great and uniquely poetic pianist Ahmad Jamal, who passed on at age 92 on April 16, 2023, easy descriptors never sufficed in capturing his particular magic. He was a classicist, a modernist, a minimalist and a seeker on his own terms. "Poinciana," circa his classic 1957 live recording from the "hit" album Live at the Pershing: But Not for Me, may have been a defining milestone, a new model of jazz grace and space. But a rich musical life lay before him for the next 60-plus years, particularly in the trio mode he mastered, regardless of waxing and waning jazz world attentions.

Despite the fact that Jamal subsequently slipped through the cracks of recognition due him—though embraced in Europe and beyond American borders—Jamal's musical sensibility and influence was deeply ingrained in what jazz became after his arrival from his hometown of Pittsburgh. Miles Davis was a celebrated admirer, whose voice was colored by Jamal's sense of time, harmony, adventure and musical alchemy, as was Keith Jarrett and John Coltrane. These and other acolytes implicitly spread the Jamal gospel, through their own personal stylistic modes and missions.

We can listen back and feel the timelessness of what Jamal was after, thanks to his vast discography, some archival material of which has thankfully been unearthed in recent years. His song and touch—not to mention his strong will to resist complacency—remain relevant.

The following interview with Jamal dates back to October 25, 2005, shortly after he had released an especially strong album, After Fajr, on the Dreyfuss label—its title song, sung by vocalist Donna McElroy, based on an Islamic prayer. (He was born Frederick Russell Jones, but converted from his Baptist beginnings to the Nation of Islam, prompting his name change).

This interview, with Jamal in an open and reflective frame of mind, also came just before returning to play in the jazz-friendly ambience of the historic Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara, California. As our conversation revealed, Jamal was an artist highly attentive to the room, and the inventive moment.

You're returning to play at the Lobero Theatre (in Santa Barbara), where you played two years ago. That seems like a good environment for you to play in.

Yeah, I like the backstage. It's very quaint and very interesting. They have a very unique setup there. It's one of the older theaters. It was very pleasant working there.

I heard you at the San Sebastian Festival a few years ago, in a theater with interesting, modern architecture. I've also seen you at the Vienne Festival.

Vienne is a very special festival.

Obviously, you're well-loved in Europe, and always have been, right?

Yeah, we are champions over there, thanks to a friend of mine who talked me into going back after staying away from twenty years. That was (producer) Jean-François Deibert—who we just lost. He had a second liver transplant, but he didn't survive it. He talked me into coming back to Europe after an absence of some twenty years.

Earlier, I went over there and shared a date, sharing a bill with Hampton Hawes. A lot of people have forgotten about Hampton Hawes. He was a tremendous player. After going to ORTF (French Radio, where he recorded in 1971, released in 2022 as the Lost ORTF Recordings), I didn't go back for twenty years. Not only did I go back under Jean-Francois' promotions and bookings, I started recording for his record company, so my record company is French now. I record for Birdology, distributed by Dreyfuss. He used to be distributed by Verve, but he left there and went with Dreyfuss.

Dreyfuss is a good company. He reminds me of Leonard Chess. He's a real dyed-in-the-wool record man, very authentic record man, like Nesuhi Ertegun, Ralph Kaffel, and Leonard Chess. They don't make those kind anymore.

Is it a happy home at the label?

Yeah, it's a family affair so far. I have left JFD productions, because things have changed since Jean-Francois died. The charisma he had is hard to duplicate, so I have a new representation in Europe. I'm with WLA Associates, Jody Wenig and Paul LaMonica. They're successors of the old Joe Glaser ABC agency, who I was with when I first started. So it's interesting—a little déjà vu.

Do you do a lot of playing in the States these days?

It's a mixed bag. There are certain venues I like in the States. I enjoy working Yoshi's. We just started doing the Blue Note after ten or fifteen years. We were doing the Iridium exclusively and then I stopped doing that. I started working at Lincoln Center or Carnegie Hall, if George calls me. I worked Lincoln Center with Shirley (Horn) earlier last year. I did two nights at the Blue Note. We're going back for a week in March.

I'm working specific venues, like the Regatta Bar in Cambridge, which I opened more or less. I enjoy the first-class hotel there, the Charles. I do Yoshi's. I did Jazz Alley in Seattle, after fifteen or twenty years of not doing it. But mostly, I tend to only want to do concerts, and not too many nightclubs. We do a lot of stuff in Europe. But I'm not working back-to-back. I pick and choose, by the grace of God. We work at most six months out of the year. But I've always done that.

I'm never been a touring guy, as such. I had my restaurant built in Chicago, designed to stay home. I'm a home person. That's how I came up with that record at the Pershing. I was the artist-in-residence there. That's what developed. The rest is history. I stayed in there for months on end, with Vernell Fournier and Israel Crosby, some of the most profound musical thinkers I've ever worked with in my life. They were great thinkers, musically.

That trio was one of jazz' greatest groups, in my humble opinion.

I have Kenny Washington the jazz maniac, who we missed sorely, has been trying to get all that stuff released on Mosaic but I haven't given him the word yet—all that stuff we did on Chess. He's just crazy about that stuff.

I always get the sense that your antennae is up on many levels—not only onstage, but also in the room. Is that fair to say?

The room is the dictator. You have to recognize the quality of the room as well as the audience. Certain things go well in certain rooms, and some things go bad. You learn how to program. After so many years in the business, you learn how to read an audience as well as a room. You have to have all the components and the coordinates together, or else it's not going to work.

You have to be very careful about where you work and what the conditions are, because the presentation is part of the importance of the delivery. I try to read a room. In fact, I don't try—I automatically read a venue, as soon as I hit it. I look at the characteristics of a place, plus an audience gives you a lot of feedback.

Maybe I can make the analogy of wanting to play a decent piano to play and having a decent room. Is there a point of comparison there?

Fortunately, I went with Steinway many years ago. With John Hammond on my right and Fritz Steinway on my left, I went over to 57th Street and endorsed the piano in 1960. In the "American classical" field, they only had Hazel Scott and John Lewis. That's all. I was the third entry from that group. They had a lot of the European classical players, but not many people who represented the American classical music.

Since that time, a lot of people have joined the ranks of Steinway. I guess, because of my endorsement, that opened the door for a lot of people who were playing terrible instruments. As a result, I put a lot of the Steinways in venues. I've been with Steinways for a number of years. I have to have a good instrument. That's the main thing. I don't leave home without out. It has to be in the contract. Otherwise, I don't work. I've had that for years. It's essential for all musicians to do that. Otherwise, they'll present you with a piano and say `what's wrong with it? We just painted it white' (laughs).

That's an interesting point you bring up: so you've influenced jazz piano on that basic, equipmental level?

Yeah, a lot of venues' doors were opened for the emergence of the Steinway piano, in venues that had junk before. The guys started following my lead, and now, a lot of people are with Steinway. Not to go on an ego trip, but I was a catalyst for a lot of venues buying Steinways. Rather than bringing an instrument in, they say it was cheaper to buy one.

Of course, your stamp is all over jazz. Do you hear your own influence and voice in a lot of pianists?

Well, I hear a lot of people still trying to capture the moment we got at Pershing. I feel people trying to capture the moment when we recorded "Poinciana." So much plagiarism has taken place. It's amazing how many people have tried to emulate what Vernell and myself and Israel were doing in those days. But it's also heartwarming to hear that. Emulation is certainly a sign that are listening, at least, if not admiring.

Even with "Poinciana," to bring up your greatest hit, you were obviously onto something new there. You had a real sense of space. Was there a point in your musical development where you realized you were going left when all around you were going right?

Well, I attribute that to my hometown of Pittsburgh. It's a remarkable place. So many of us come form Pittsburgh, and all of us are distinctly different, from Billy Strayhorn to George Benson. August Wilson is distinctly different. He was one of the most talented playwrights in the world. Then we had Billy Eckstine, Art Blakey, Ray Brown, Tom and Stanley Turrentine, Kenny Clarke—the expatriate—Earl Wild, the exponent of Liszt, and so many others from Pittsburgh. Everyone is distinctly different. That's what happens there. Dodo Marmarosa, Erroll Garner. One of my favorites if not one of my biggest influences was Erroll.

Who's writing "Lush Life" now? Nobody. That's Billy Strayhorn from Pittsburgh. I used to sell papers to his family when I was a kid.

Pittsburgh is a place that you should be happy to have grown up in, as a musician as well as in other areas of endeavor. So I attribute that distinct approach, if I have that, to my hometown. It's unique. It's just a phenomenon.

A lot of great drummers come from New Orleans, and a lot of great trumpet players. That's another phenomenon. Must have been something in the water, because it happens in New Orleans. Then you have cities like Memphis, which produced people like Phineas Newborn, Jr., whose expertise and approach to piano is certainly neglected. You have Phineas Newborn, George Coleman, Jamil Sulieman Nasser, Frank Strozier, the late James Williams, Harold Mabern. They all come from Memphis. It goes on.

The names are hard to exhaust, just like with Pittsburgh. You start naming Pittsburghers and you just have to stop. There are many who stayed there, unheard, as have left. I think of Phyllis Hyman, Maxine Sullivan, and all those great talents from the city.

Is there something about a sense of individualism in that city, maybe partly because of its detachment from the central hub of New York City, or even Philadelphia?

Well, Philly also has that tendency of great players coming from there. Jimmy Smith was from Norristown, PA. The great professor Art Davis is from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. A lot of people overlook Art because he's been in education for many years in California. But he's one of the greatest bassists of all time. He's from Pennsylvania. So Pennsylvania—Philadelphia, Pittsburgh—that happens there. All those great things happen there, as far as individualistic stylings and writing go.

Who's writing "Take the A Train?" I must say, not to take anything away from Duke Ellington, because I love Duke, but some of his biggest hits were written by Billy Strayhorn. "Take the A Train," "Satin Doll," "Lush Life," all that stuff is Billy's. He did a lot of that stuff in his teenaged years. So Pittsburgh is pretty unique, and I think that's where I draw my inspiration from.

So it was a lucky thing for you to have started your earthly career there?

I believe so, and then to go to Chicago and become the artist-in-residence at the Pershing, that was a blessing as well. There, we did the monumental work at the Pershing that still goes on and on and on.

It's fascinating to watch you work with a trio—underlining the word with. You really generate a collective energy in the group. Does that concept go back to your famous early trio?

Well, I conduct everything, whether it's one piece, two pieces, three pieces, or seven pieces. In Paris, I did have seven pieces. People don't know that I have worked with every configuration known and unknown to man. When I was a kid, I worked with saxophone and piano, that was all. In Chicago, I was Israel Crosby's pianist. He had saxophone, piano and bass. So I've worked in a lot of configurations. In Paris, I had seven pieces, with George Coleman, the late, great master Joe Kennedy, Manolo Badrena, Calvin Keys, Yoron Israel on drums.

So sometimes, I expand. But my favorite vehicle—and also the most practical one, payroll-wise—is my small ensemble (laughs). I find great pleasure in structuring my arrangements for the trio. What happens is that they can be adapted for any size orchestra. Gil Evans arranged "New Rumba" for Miles Davis (in 1957). All of my arrangements are like that. They can be adapted for large groups.

I've been writing since I was ten years old. I haven't done any movie stuff or any great orchestral writing, but my small ensemble is my orchestra. So I conduct them, and maybe that's what you're referring to. There's a certain wonderful relationship between my players and myself. It's like magic.

It is. There is so much interplay in your group. Other piano trios, however modern they may be with their musical language, tend to be stuck in the conventional approach of the piano up front with the other musicians acting as support system. The pianist is the hero, and his musicians lurk in the background.

Well, I don't want anyone to bill me as the Ahmad Jamal Trio. I just want to be billed as Ahmad Jamal, and that's it. The word "trio" is very limiting. It's a small ensemble. In most cases, I bring the small ensemble. Sometimes, I'll bring a large ensemble. But I don't allow them to bill me, contractually, as a trio. That word is very limiting. It's been overused and overdone—trio this, trio that. It's sickening that groups are still being billed that way.

All you're talking about is numbers. You're not talking about music, because you can make a small ensemble sound like a large ensemble, or the opposite, depending on what your approach is. I'm either working with a small ensemble or a large ensemble. Most of the time I bring the small ensemble.

I've been listening to After Fajr, a wonderful album. I'd say that is a good reflection of the small ensemble format.

Well, we keep doing things. Hopefully, I'll have time to get back to that discipline I had when I was a child, without all the distractions that come with growing up. I'm trying to get in the mode of realizing my full potential, if not some of it. I still have a lot to say, musically. I try to keep writing new things and keep doing new things. Hopefully, I'm beginning to practice again, like I did when I was a child. I'd like to keep my fans, from 1 to 92, hopefully.

Speaking of writing, the title song is beautiful. It's based on an Islamic prayer, is that right?

Well, it's about what happens at dawn. "Fajr" means "dawn." We have a prayer at Fajr and it is based on that prayer of dawn. I wrote that after I completed my Fajr prayer. It's very significant, because that's a very important time of day. I wrote that after I completed my Fajr prayer. It's very significant. A lot of things happen at dawn, if you're alert and up, and not "hazy or lazy," as my lyrics go.

I wrote it as an instrumental first, and then I wrote the lyrics on the plane one day. That's what happened. I got some of the great singers out of Berklee in Boston to join me in putting the piece together. Donna McElroy, the lead singer, did a sensational job. She's a sensational singer.

I'm guessing that you don't sing that one live in your shows.

No, I'm not like the late, great Shirley Horn or the late, great Nat Cole, both of whom started singing by accident, really. I've always wanted to sing. I used to try to sing when Joe had the four swings. Ray Crawford, my former guitarist, did the singing. He wasn't as inhibited like I was. All musicians can sing. George Benson just went ahead and did it. He can sing and play. All of us can sing and play. I don't know any musician who can't sing, but some of us don't do it. We'd rather not do that, and have some reservations about singing.

But I admire the singers, because they're working with the oldest instrument in the world. It's very important to recognize that: it's the oldest instrument in the world, and the most important one, as far as I'm concerned. Without the human voice, we wouldn't be talking now. There are a lot of voices out there that are pretty inhuman (laughs). There are a lot of people out there saying inhuman things these days.

The human voice is certainly the oldest instrument in the world.

Does this experience with "After Fajr" whet your appetite to write more songs with lyrics?

Oh yeah. I've written some songs for the human voice. Natalie Cole recorded "Ahmad's Blues," and Marlena Shaw did the first version. The lyrics were written by the late Bob Williams. I'm always writing songs that are adapted for lyrics. I love it.

In fact, my great friend was O.C. Smith, although I didn't know him very long. But it was a friendship of quality. He was a great singer. A lot of people remember him from "Little Green Apples," his big ten million-seller, but he was the singer with Count Basie, following Joe Williams. What attracted me to O.C. was the great record he did with Horace Silver, Soul Mates.

We were working on a next project. We were talking about a project dedicated to George Washington Carver, who his father knew quite well. I had started writing some things for that project, but O.C. died. One of his last records was with me, Picture Perfect (2001). That's an album you don't see too often. I think it's overlooked. He's on two tracks on that—"Whispering" and "Picture Perfect." He did two of my lyrical things. Aziza Miller did my lyrics. She used to conduct for Natalie Cole—a very talented musician.

I like that you open your new album with "I'm Old-Fashioned," which is a bit ironic, in that I never think of you as being old-fashioned.

Spike Lee's father, Bill Lee, introduced me to that. He wrote arrangements for me in Chicago years ago when we were both in Chicago together. So "I'm Old-Fashioned" is a revival of that period.

Stylistically, you're modern, sort of mainstream, but not really. Where do you see yourself fitting into the musical spectrum of jazz pianists? Or do you concern yourself with such matter?

I'm a Pittsburgh (laughs). You can't typecast us. We're different. All of us are different, believe me, from Dodo Marmarosa. He's a forgotten figure who was one of the greatest players of all time. He did some things with Charlie Parker and was on some of Artie Shaw's big hits. Unfortunately, he had some problems and went back home and died there.

There was also Johnny Costa, who played piano on "Mr. Rogers" for years. People used to watch "Mr. Rogers" just to hear Johnny Costa play that piano.

I'm one of those guys.

So Pittsburghers are Pittsburghers. We're tough to duplicate. You can join us, but you can't fight us. You can fight the "Lush Lifers" and the George Bensons. Who played bass like Ray Brown? Nobody. Who played drums like Art Blakey? Nobody. Who played drums like Kenny Clarke? Nobody. That's where it is.

And who plays piano like you?

(laughs). Who plays piano like Erroll Garner? Nobody. Erroll was unique unto himself, like nothing else. Tremendous player. Then we have all sorts of singers who came out of Pittsburgh—Billy Eckstine. Maxine Sullivan, Dakota Staton is another one. Phyllis Hyman must have come from Pittsburgh. There's some debate about that. I think Oscar Levant is from there, too. When you get into writers, August Wilson stands out above most of them.

So we're very fortunate to have a town that could be so productive of good things, as well as some of the things that weren't so good.

Does it feel that things are moving along in a nice groove for you in recent years? It appears that way, from outside appearances?

Things are very pleasant for me. I really enjoy each day, each meal and each conversation. The most productive period of my life is right now. But you know, life is a fleeting thing. You don't say `I've got it made,' because the minute you say that, you don't have it made. But right now, I enjoy a certain degree of peace, and I hope it continues.

To me, life begins every day, and I mean that from the bottom of my heart. It doesn't begin at 50 or 60 or 20 or 10. It begins every day.

I try to tell myself that, but I frequently forget it.

If you lose that enthusiasm, then you don't feel like getting up. You must have the enthusiasm required in this life of ours. If you don't have that, then you've got problems.

Well, and you've had this creative fire within, for most of your life, haven't you?

Well, yeah, but you have to light it. You have to keep it lit. Fire itself—that means you have something. But you know there's a song, "Light My Fire." Fire is latent in the flint, too. You have to strike it.

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