Chas Meredith - a pioneer of Irish Jazz

Recently, one of the first Irish musicians to take jazz seriously and treat it with the respect it deserved - the saxophonist, trumpeter and Ellington scholar Chas Meredith, passed away. In the way of these things, his generation is passing from the scene,  but I think it's important for all musicians in any scene, no matter how large or small, to mark these occasions and recognise where we come from, and the people who made it possible for us to do the things that we do.

As someone a couple of generations removed from Chas’ musical circle, at first I wasn’t very aware of him as a player, though I did know, through his close friend John Wadham, of his expertise in all things Ellington, and at first this was my image of him – as a scholarly man with a passion for Duke Ellington. Then I got to know him, again from a distance, through his jazz radio programme on RTE, where I realized he had much broader tastes than only listening to Ellington, and I heard much great and, to me, unfamiliar music on his programme. Chas had a perfect voice for radio - measured, clearly enunciated, and with a neat and often droll turn of phrase which could be wickedly funny.

As anyone who knew him will remember, he did not mince his words if he didn’t like something, and even the great and good of jazz weren’t immune from Chas’ criticism if he felt it was warranted. I particularly remember a programme where a new Dexter Gordon album had come out, and Dexter at the time was the darling of the critics, having made a high profile return from European exile to his American roots. However Chas didn’t care for him, but felt duty bound to play a track from the album. 30 years later I can still remember the introduction delivered in that wonderful voice: ‘So, here is Dexter Gordon, playing with Johnny Griffin – the sleeve notes don’t tell which man solos first, and frankly, I don’t care…….’

I finally got to know him in person, when much to my surprise, he called me to sub in his band – a group that played Ellington small band arrangements, which would not have been my area of expertise. The fact that I played bass guitar rather than the more conventional double bass didn’t phase Chas at all, and showed how he cared more about the music than any perceived orthodoxy of how it should be played. It was a terrific experience for me as a young musician and I learned so much about this music and how it should sound if played well – and since the band was lead by Chas’ he ensured the music WAS played well.

It was also my first experience of the famous Chas count-in, which any musicians who knew him will, I’m sure, be familiar with – ‘Right gentlemen – straight in, and ultimately, straight out again’

It was also my first introduction to his wonderful playing and mastery of two completely unrelated instruments – the saxophone and the trumpet. This is a doubling that is rarely seen, since the physical requirements of it are so different. But Chas surmounted these difficulties with ease, an extraordinary thing for a part-time musician, who had so many other calls on his time, to be able to do. Chas was a natural musical talent, and one can only imagine what could have been if he had devoted himself full time to music.

Here he is on baritone, playing an unusually slow version of 'Sweet Georgia Brown', with some of his colleagues from the same generation, in a recording made in the mid 1990's when Chas was in his late 60s

From getting to know him musically, it became clear to me that when I needed someone to talk to the jazz students at Newpark about Duke Ellington, that he was the man to call, and anyone who was in those classes will remember the erudition, the insights and the sheer entertainment of those talks, and the life and context that Chas brought to them, elevating them far beyond a mere classroom talk, and into the realms of riveting living history.

From then on we became quite close musically, and had many a get-together where music was discussed, and as always I was both entertained and educated by the sheer depth of knowledge he had about jazz and the passion that he brought to every discussion of it. He was also tremendously generous with his time and enthusiasm, and I think generosity and doing what he believed was right were two of the hallmarks of his character. I think the way Chas became involved in helping John Wadham in John’s last years, was a classic example of Chas’ energy, determination and generosity.

One plan I had, which never came to fruition, was for Chas to come to the school and to give a talk to the students about his life and the history of Irish jazz, both of which are inextricably intertwined. So when Chas called me last December and told me he was unwell and the prognosis was not good, I asked him if he would allow me to interview him about his life. To my delight, he agreed and I spent three hours with him, listening to him, and recording him telling me about his life and, since it was so closely wrapped up in that, how jazz developed in Ireland. (The picture at the top of this piece was taken at that meeting)

He had an extraordinary memory - no detail escaped it and I learned so much about the history of the music in this country. I even learned some personal history that I didn’t know about when Chas told me that in the ‘50s, he and my father - another jazz fan, would slip out of their respective offices - Chas from his legal practice, my father from New Ireland Assurance company – and meet at a café called the Wagon Wheel and compare notes and the latest news from the jazz world.

In recent months I stayed in touch with Chas and he very generously gave me much of his musical memorabilia, including much very valuable material that will be important when the full story of Irish jazz and the people who made it comes to be told. He also gave me many scores and arrangements of his, and this year at the school, we will recreate his small Ellington band arrangements using students from the school, and perform them in public – something which I think will be very apposite in remembering this remarkable man, and I’m very glad to have been able to tell Chas about that before he passed, and I know he was very happy with the thought of the music living on through new generations.

And these new generations, and my generation, have so much to be grateful for to Chas, and his colleagues, who blazed a trail for a music that was universally loved but flew very much under the radar in Ireland. If it wasn’t for him and others like him, Irish jazz would be never have developed as it has, and we should all be grateful to these wonderful musical pioneers who gave so selflessly for so many years.

Finally, here is an excerpt from the interview I did with Chas in which he tells the extraordinary story of how Gerry Mulligan came to stay at his house for a whole summer in the early 1970s. All the hallmarks of Chas delivery are here - the sonorous voice, the brilliant use of language and the sense of humor. His joy at the recollection of this amazing event is also clear.

I'll miss him.....

The Wad: Great Drummer - Great Man

Tonight myself, and many of my Irish jazz colleagues, will be celebrating the life and work of the great drummer John Wadham, ('The Wad'), who passed away ten years ago. To any Irish readers of this piece, John will need no introduction or explanation. To others, I can say that John was one of those people who is indispensible to a small scene, bringing a level of expertise and ability that is of an international standard, and that sets the example for all those around them. He was the standard bearer for great swinging drumming in Ireland and was first call for every visiting jazz heavy-hitter who came from abroad, in the same way that European drummers such as Eric Ineke, Alex Riel, and Daniel Humair were (and are), in their respective countries. Like them, John was of an international standard and could sound good with anyone, and make them sound good. The list of people he played with was a measure of his standing both within the Irish jazz community and internationally – Zoot Sims, Maynard Ferguson, Barney Kessel, Art Farmer, Harold Land, Joe Newman etc etc

Apart from being a great drummer, John was also a really nice man – friendly, generous and VERY funny. He had a wicked sense of humour and could be very forthright in his opinions about players he felt were not up to scratch, (about which he was invariably right), and situations that were not ideal for playing. But he had absolutely no malice in him and he never had a hidden agenda, he was a straight talker, but careful not to be rude. However, towards the end of his life when his hearing was going, many very funny situations arose when John would bellow his opinion of some piece of incompetence on the part of a musician, in what he thought was a quiet undertone, but which in reality could be heard a couple of miles away!

John was English, and had that English propensity for making remarks that were measured and matter of fact, but completely cutting. He remarked about an ex-student of his, who had gone on to worldwide fame with a major rock band, that the drummer in question was ‘by far my most famous student, and by far the least talented’.

John was also unflappable – I remember being in his car, driving on the motorway with him, at 70 miles an hour, when another driver did a lunatic overtaking maneuver, and cut right across us. We avoided a collision only by an incredibly adroit and fast reaction from John, (who was a very good driver), and we continued on – I was gasping with fright in the passenger seat, but John’s only reaction was to take the pipe out of his mouth, look at me sideways, and say laconically “I think we’re dealing with a fool here…..’

I first met John when I was brought to a jazz party by my father when I was fourteen, and I remember John being very friendly with me and laughing and joking with me as if we’d known each other for years. Over the years I saw him be like this with so many people – friendly and polite and approachable. And John was one of those people whom, once he knew you were really into the music, would go out of his way to help you discover great music of all kinds.

The first time I was invited to John’s house for one of his legendary ‘listening sessions’, I felt like I’d won the lottery! I stayed there with him till 4am, being played great record after great record, at deafening volume through the huge speakers John had in his living room. John was a record collector and had over a thousand LPs, lots of 78s, and reel to reel tapes and cassettes. In those pre-CD days when so much jazz was out of print, he was an incredible source for the young musician, with an evangelistic streak concerning the music. ‘You don’t know Andrew Hill!? Oh you’ve got to hear this!’ How many times were variations on that statement made to me in John’s house over the years, as he played me literally hundreds of records?

 With Maynard Ferguson

And not only would he play them for you, he would lend them to you to take home! He was extraordinarily generous in that way, and those nights in his lovely house, the coffee served in the china cups, laid out on the tray along with the biscuits, the smell of the pipe tobacco infusing the air, the music blasting out of the speakers, John’s running commentary on what was going on in the recording, these were among the most memorable moments I’ve had in music, and among the most influential, in the way it gave me an education in the jazz tradition and introduced me to so much great music and performers.

But of course the real education for an aspiring jazz bassist was to play with John. This was the Rolls Royce of jazz drumming in Ireland. Swinging, with impeccable time, listening intently to everything, and demonstrating a love and knowledge of the jazz tradition in every beat. I played with him first in 1979, and in retrospect I realize that I was nowhere near good enough to be playing with him, but he was complimentary and generous in his remarks, and when I overheard him tell another musician that ‘the young fellah has great time’, I think it was one of the proudest moments of my life.

A little later I was to join Tommy Halferty’s trio, with John on drums, and this was another hugely important experience for me. Tommy had (and has) a ferocious technique, as did John, and incredibly fast tempos were easy for them. So I was thrown in at the deep end and had to try and keep up with the maelstrom of ideas swirling around from both of them. The music was also very open, and John, though coming from a traditional background, was no conservative, and would try anything, from rock-oriented things to playing completely free. Playing with this band formed a huge part of my apprenticeship and I learned so much from playing with these two great and far more experienced musicians.

 Tommy Halferty Trio - 1980

Here’s an example from the early 80’s, recorded in John’s living room in one of those impromptu recording sessions he like to organize. We play ‘It’s You Or No One’ at a fast tempo and John is just fantastic here. All the trademarks are in evidence, including the mischievous 2-bar disco drum fill he does on the in-head! And his accompaniment of my attempt at a bass solo is a model of how to accompany a bass solo – quiet, but intense and interactive.

This has been transferred from cassette, so the sound is lo-fi, but it’s a great example of John in full flow. I’ve left in the little bit of banter and the trademark laugh at the beginning, as a reminder for those who knew him.

The trio played regularly together for about four years, and apart from that, over the years, I played with John in so many situations and, like all musicians of that calibre, he was always consistent – swinging, professional, creative, supportive and with that amazing time that was so easy for a bassist to play with.

John was a confirmed bachelor, who lived in the lovely house in Dalkey that had been his parents’, and with his trademark moustache, pipe, interest in cricket and trains, he was every inch the Englishman, and he never lost that identity despite living in Ireland since the 1950s. As a result he remained a larger than life character around his neighbourhood, and in the music world, and was widely loved by a huge cross section of people, not only musicians. John liked routine in his life, and it was always endearing how when we would travel abroad, he would always immediately find a shop where he could get the Times and a place for a beer where he could do the crossword. He was one-off – a great jazz drummer and a unique man. In his Will he left his drums and all his music and records to Newpark Music Centre, the school where I and many of my colleagues teach -  a final act of generosity from a man who was generous all his life. Generous with his time, his enthusiasm, and most of all his music. Ten years after his death, (and I’m sure I’m not alone in this), I still miss him

I'll finish by posting an example of his playing with a big band - another thing of which he was a master

'I've Suffered For My Art, Now It's Your Turn!' (Jazz Musicians and Their Audience)

At a time when jazz is perhaps more economically challenged than at any time in the past, it’s not a bad idea for jazz musicians to have a think about their audience, and their relationship with it.

Jazz musicians and the audience - then and now

The presentation of jazz has changed tremendously over the course of its history – in earlier times jazz was seen, by its practitioners as much as by its audience, as another form of entertainment. I’ve just been reading Count Basie’s autobiography, and it’s clear from this that Basie’s initial ambition was to get into ‘show business’, and he began in Vaudeville, backing singers, dancers, comedians etc. Though his career mutated into that of one of the most respected bandleaders in the history of jazz, he never lost his image of himself as being an entertainer as well as a serious musician.

And this is generally true of most musicians of his generation and even later generations.  The beboppers were revolutionary musicians, and denizens of a counter-culture with its own codes and ways of being. They were also aware of themselves as artists, yet even they were very conscious of how they looked on stage – see if you can find any photos of Bird playing in public without a jacket and tie on. Even the iconoclastic Monk, when asked what the band should wear, replied, ‘Sharp as possible!’ And even the taciturn Coltrane, architect of the extended solo and someone with an apparent disregard for the staying power of an average audience, would insist on his band wearing suits whenever they played in a concert hall setting.

So up to the 1960s at least, jazz musicians were very aware of what they saw as their responsibilities to the audience at least in terms of presentation. Then something changed – the idea of musician as artist, and a rebellion against the idea of musician as entertainer, took hold in jazz.  Since the 1970s there have been many variations in how jazz musicians present themselves to their audience, but I think it's fair to say that in general, thoughts about the audience are not on top of most jazz musicians' agenda. Musicians have usually devoted most of their time to honing their craft and developing their art, and have been happy to let the chips fall where they may as far the audience is concerned. There is almost an unspoken belief that it's the audience's job to figure out the music, and the musician doesn't need to take them into account. It's the musician's job to play the music and the audience's job to listen - clearly demarcated roles, with no room for compromise.

The Big Questions

But now, when it's more challenging than ever before to make a living as a jazz musician, perhaps players need to ask themselves about their relationship to their audiences, not just for the sake of economics, but for the sake of their art too. Good questions for a jazz musician to ask themselves could be:

Why do people come out to hear live music?
How does my music feel?
How do my performances look?
Am I aware of a connection to my audience and is it important?

For some jazz musicians, even asking those questions is heresy, and is already moving into the area of showbiz.

But for me, there is no reason why an acknowledgement of the role of the audience, and an understanding of what might affect an audience, (and in what way), is any kind of sell-out, or dumbing down of your artistry. It's simply a recognition that music is played for people and there's a dynamic at play in live performance. An understanding of that dynamic should be important to the musician, since his or her success or failure, (both artistic and commercial), will depend upon a successful negotiation of that dynamic.

To take each one of those questions in turn:

Why do people go to hear live music?

Music used to always have a societal function - it accompanied something. A religious ceremony, a landmark in life (birth, marriage, death), a celebration, a ceremonial occasion. Since the advent of recorded music, this has changed utterly, and now the reasons people attend music performances are as many and varied as the music and the audience itself. On any given night, in any city in the world, you might have people listening to Shostakovitch in a concert hall, jazz in a jazz club, punk rock at a rock venue, and dancing to techno at a dance club. But could there be a common thread linking all of these people at these very varied performances?

Yes there is, and it's this: anybody who goes to a live music performance, wants to feel different when they leave the venue, than when they went in.

They want to feel something, experience something, take part in something or maybe have something done to them. They may want to be made happier, or given food for thought, or, in the case of dancing, have some kind of physical release. This is the reality - people do not go out and pay money in order to feel the same as if they'd stayed at home - they want an experience of some kind, a transformative experience, at least as far as their mood goes.

So the next obvious question for the musician, wondering if we do make people feel different, is  -

How does my music feel? 

As musicians we ask often ask ourselves how our music sounds, but do we pay any attention to how it feels? As a player, a good question to ask yourself is as follows -  imagining yourself as a stranger, coming into a performance of  your music - how do you think that the music you typically play, would feel to you, (the stranger)? Do you think it would make you feel good? I'm not talking about the technical intricacies of the music here, I'm talking about the vibe. What kind of feel and vibe does your music put out, and if you can identify that in your own mind, do you think this vibe is the one you''d like to communicate to others?

Connected to that question is the next one:

How do my performances look?

Now this is a question that is usally very low on the priority list of many jazz musicians. To even consider dressing up for a gig is often considered the worst kind of commercial/sell-out mentality. But the visual aspects of performance are very important to audiences. I'm not necessarily talking about how the band is dressed, (though a certain breed of musicians' proclivity for shuffling onstage looking like they just got out of bed, having slept in their clothes, probably doesn't do much for the audience's anticipation of what's to come), but how everything looks.

This may or may not include how the band is dressed, but will definitely include the band's demeanour on the stage, and how well the audience can see everything that's going on. In recent years, aware of how much music is consumed on Youtube, I started to film a lot of my performances. It's amazing what being at the viewfinder end of a camera does for your awareness of how things look, and one of the worst things to look at visually, is a big stupid music stand directly in front of the player, obscuring everything they're doing! There's nothing duller from an audience's point of view than seeing five people on stage looking down at music stands, or even worse, looking at music stands directly in front of their faces - visually it's the most boring thing possible.

I appreciate that in these days of little rehearsal time and lots of original music, music stands are a necessity, but some thought should be given to minimising the visual distraction of the stands, and keeping them as far from the audience's line of sight of the musicians as possible. Any chance of memorising the music, and getting rid of the stands should be taken, and any band that plays a standards gig, reading from music stands, deserves to be horsewhipped!

Am I aware of a connection to my audience, and is it important?

Is it important for you to connect to your audience, or do you feel that it's their job to connect to you? That's a subtle but important distinction. In the case of the former, there's a paramount desire on the part of the performer to communicate something to the audience, in the latter there's an assumption that the playing of the music will in itself be sufficient to nourish the audience. In the first instance the performer may pay attention to the aforementioned visuals, and make an effort to communicate with the audience verbally as well as musically. In the second instance such things as visuals and non-musical communication are not taken into consideration, or deemed important.

Whichever way you lean in your own dealings with the audience, I do think it's important to at least be aware of the audience, and at least have made a conscious decision as to what your relationship with them is.

It's a show!

My own view is that all performances are a show. No matter what kind of music you play, there's an element of the visual involved, and there are also 'performance' elements involved. No matter how much weight you may place on the music itself, the visual and performance aspects of the event will have an impact on the audience. Jazz musicians often forget that the majority of their audience are not musicians and have little or no knowledge of, or interest in, the technicalities of the music. To the general public, the atmosphere of the event is of tremendous importance, and everything that goes into the creation of an atmosphere should be of interest to the musician. We are dependent on people returning to our performances, so the effectiveness of what we do should concern us.

Miles Davis was famously, (or so it seemed), unconcerned with his audience, but this in itself became a show! Audiences enjoyed, (and expected), the famous Davis taciturn personality - the glowering, the pacing, the turning his back on the audience, became a show in itself. Jarrett's fussiness and demands for silence, irritating and pretentious as it sometimes is, does make for drama - when he walks on the stage there's a sense of something happening that goes through the hall. The Coltrane Quartet's visceral physicality in live performance was a show in itself. None of these performers had a typical showbiz connection to their audience but all of them provided a show nonetheless.

I think what's important, regardless of which approach you take to your audience, is that you should be aware that there, (hopefully!), is an audience there, and in all likelihood they have paid money to see you, and perhaps travelled a distance to do so, and taken time out of their lives to listen to your music. That deserves recognition. Recognition that the audience have a role to play in the performance of live music. Acknowledging the audience, at least in your own mind, can be a valuable tool to you in being able to take a more broad view of the message and impact of your music, and give you a more objective view of what it is you're doing, or trying to do.  I believe that acknowledging the importance of the audience will have a positive impact on your music.

If you think the audience are of no importance, then fair enough - but play at home! 

Wayne's Magical World

I went to see Wayne Shorter’s quartet last night, the now classic band that he’s had for more than 10 years. This is the second time I’ve seen them, and it was equally as good as the first. There’s something magical about this band. They’ve received a lot of praise and recognition over the last several years and they absolutely deserve it – and more. Watching them in action last night, I witnessed something quite unique – there’s nobody really doing what these guys do.

First of all, the music is so abstract, yet they are playing forms and structures. It’s free, yet it’s tied to the jazz conventions of melody and harmonic structure. They have a repertoire, but no set programme – sometimes compositions appear, are touched upon, only to disappear again. At other times a piece is explored for more than twenty minutes. There are solos of a kind, yet they are all collective – for a moment it seems one or the other of the quartet will be soloing, only for one or more of the other members to become involved and take over.

Over the course of the performance the music evolves organically in front of your eyes. I HATE to use this cliché, but in this case it’s absolutely the correct one -  at a concert by the Wayne Shorter Quartet, you are taken on a journey. The performance last night began in what seemed to be unfocussed meandering, with each member fluttering in an out of the music. It was hard to grasp any underlying or unifying structure, and you could be forgiven for believing that the band were unable to find any kind of forward motion, and were just noodling. But slowly, yet inevitably, the music began to become both more cohesive and yet mutate into something else. As a listener you got the sense of some greater structure rising out of the four constituent parts, yet being unable to put your finger on how this was being done.

And this is the magic of this band – the way they can collectively create something singular that is comprised of the four constituent parts. Something that is not pre-conceived, yet can attain the most formal structure, a structure that is created by the free-flowing narrative of the band. It’s an extraordinary balancing act, and one that can only be achieved by a) a band that has been together for this long, b) has such great virtuoso musicians within it, and c) is led by a genius….

And Wayne really is a genius, under even the strictest meaning of that overused word. Apart from the compositions themselves, his ability to guide the band simply by what he plays is extraordinary. His timing is perfect, his entry and exit points are masterful. And the choice of notes…… his ability to play such unexpected notes in relation to the underlying harmony, yet always remain lyrical is unique – nobody else can do this like he can.

And the band are perfect – Danilo Perez almost seems like the MD, free to start something, or suggest something or take the music in any direction he wants. Wayne allows him to do this, yet, by dint of his playing, remains in complete control of the ultimate direction of  the music. Brian Blade is the dramaturge in the band – his use of dynamics thoroughly energises the music, and when he really gets going, it’s one of the greatest sights in contemporary jazz drumming. And John Patitucci is the unsung hero of this band. The way he interweaves his lines with the other guys, while holding the bass function down is masterful. He knows exactly when to go and when to stay. When Blade slips off the metric grid in one of those blazing attacks, Patitucci will fix it in a split second. He is a virtuoso bassist who puts his virtuosity completely at the service of the music

Wayne is 80 this year and still looks and sounds strong, with no seeming diminution of his powers. But all humans are mortal and so if you get a chance to see this group – a group that will definitely be spoken of as one of the great bands of jazz history – you should go, and avail of the opportunity to see something unique and magical. The following video clip gives just a glimpse (but only a glimpse), of what will be in store for you.