The Backstage Edition Of Jazz History

This year's edition of A Jazz Piano Christmas has now been distributed to NPR stations and online at NPR Music.

I've had the great fortune to be involved in A Jazz Piano Christmas since we started doing it live at the Kennedy Center in 2002 — first as a producer, and lately as the host. But the best parts of the gig are the jazz history lessons I listen in on every year as musicians kill time backstage between the two live sets.

Some highlights:

—Numerous stories from Dr. Billy Taylor. Like the time when he was just out of high school, and he left his home in Washington, D.C. for a trip to New York to see Teddy Wilson's big band, and was told to check in with a friend of his dad's. The friend owned a small club in Harlem, and when Taylor arrived, the friend invited him to a jam session. Taylor sat down at the piano, and was doing what he thought was good playing, when he was tapped on the shoulder by an older gentleman. "Excuse me, son," the man said. "Let me show you how's that's done." It was Willie "The Lion" Smith.

Dr. Taylor also said that another pianist about his age sat down and started playing things Dr. Taylor hadn't heard before. Willie Smith said to the pianist, "Monk, I told you to watch that new stuff!!" Dr. Taylor says he and Thelonious Monk started a friendship that day that lasted until Monk's death in 1982.

 

—Trombonist Slide Hampton stopped by A Jazz Piano Christmas in 2005 to sit in with pianist Daniela Schaechter. He told us about his early days in New York City, when he shared a small apartment behind the Apollo Theater with two roommates who, like he, had no money, no gigs and loads of ambition. He said they used to pass idle time playing and practicing and dreaming of making it in jazz. The roommates: Wayne Shorter and Freddie Hubbard.

—This year, Joe Sample told me about the early days of playing electronic instruments in jazz. He had an incident at a famous venue (whose name shall be withheld to protect its stagehands) where a small bolt dislodged in his Fender Rhodes electric piano. The offending part was creating a large, explosion-like sound as it rumbled around inside. Yet he was forbidden by union rules to open the piano up and retrieve the offending bolt. He and the audience had to endure what must have been a horrific sound because there were no accommodations in the union contract for musicians to repair their instruments themselves.

It was also a treat to watch Joe Sample tell Billy Taylor that when he (Sample) left his hometown of Houston at the age of 16 to make it in jazz, he had but his clothes and four albums in his bag — one of which was Dr. Taylor's. That was a real-life reminder of Billy Taylor's influence on pianists who came after him.

—In 2007 pianist Hank Jones told me, in his soto voce speaking style, about the thrill he had sharing the stage with Charlie Parker. The fan in me still marvels at speaking with those who have the experience of actually playing with Parker. I more than marvel — I actually get chills. Seriously.

—In 2008, pianist Arturo O'Farrill told me that his dad, legendary Afro-Cuban composer and arranger Chico O'Farrill, would often set aside nights to just sit and listen to records. All kinds. Any kind. He also had touching stories of traveling to Cuba, and tracing his father's footsteps in Havana. He came across musicians who used to play with the elder O'Farrill who still had pictures of him and Arturo's mother long before Arturo was born.

—The event is called A Jazz Piano Christmas, but we've had other instrumentalists perform. Trumpeter Ray Vega had my attention in 2004 with stories of performing and traveling with Mongo Santamaria. Vega said Santamaria was a stickler for getting the sound and the feeling just right at gigs. The part about getting the feeling right was eye-opening for me. Often, musicians unfamiliar with the Afro-Cuban clave don't deliver it with the proper inflections, and it seems Mongo would offer personal tutorials. Percussionist Pete Escovedo, who played JPXMas with vibraphonist Dave Samuels in 2005, held my attention with stories of playing with Cal Tjader in the early years of Tjader's career.

The history of jazz is told in the green rooms, backstages and kitchens of venues all over the world. I have been fortunate to be able to be a fly on the wall when the stories start flowing at A Jazz Piano Christmas.