15
Nov
2005
There was no logical reason for Bruce Katz to give up the life of a working musician. By the the late 1980s, Katz had toured with the likes of Bo Diddley, Chuck Berry, and soul singer Barrence Whitfield. Equally adept in jazz and blues, and with the piano and the soulful Hammond B3 organ, Katz had built a solid career as a sideman. But he was burned out.
So he went back to school.
And earlier this year, he ended up in prison. (But more on that later.)
"I didn't stop playing," Katz said in a phone interview last week, describing what happened when he returned to college. "I just stopped touring." The school experience was instrumental in turning Katz from in-demand side player to acclaimed composer and leader.
Katz has been back on the road a lot over the past 13 years, but instead of playing only other people's music, he's been performing his own instrumental jazzy blues tunes. He'll be appearing at Blueport Junction in Davenport on Thursday in an event presented by the Mississippi Valley Blues Society. Katz is touring now in support of his fifth solo record, 2004's Deeper Blue, and plans to have a new album out in late 2006. Including his solo work, Katz estimates that he's played on more than 50 records.
His band focuses mostly on instrumental blues - bassist Rod Carey does sing, infrequently - but Katz is quick to stress that the conceptions audiences have of instrumental blues are misguided. "Instrumental blues is a rarity," he concedes, and many people think that they're either unimaginative and rote - the solo-heavy filler that bands play before the singer comes out - or intellectual and inaccessible. "You can and people do dance to our music all the time," he said.
Katz is reticent to say what he does is better than vocal blues, but he acknowledges that instrumental music doesn't have the crutch of vocals. "It's really all about the tunes," he said. "These melodies really have to sing in their own way. The melody has to really resonate. ... We don't even miss the singer." Try humming a few bars along with most of what you hear on the radio - whether pop, rock, or blues - and you'll understand that melody doesn't matter much these days.
After abandoning the life of a working musician on the road in the late '80s, Katz enrolled at the New England Conservatory of Music and earned a master's degree in jazz performance. "I wanted to surround myself with music," he said.
The New England Conservatory brought new perspectives and influences. "I was by far the oldest student in the school," he said. He studied with Geri Allen, Paul Bley, Cecil McBee, and George Russell. He focused on playing, practicing, and writing his own material. But taking that much time away from being a circuit musician means starting anew, and Katz did that, too.
A few months after graduation, in 1992, Katz was playing what he calls "this kind of dumb gig," doing background music for a Best of Boston awards party, "sitting in the corner. ... I feel these laser beams boring into the back of my head." It was the blues guitarist Ronnie Earl, at the event to pick up an award. Katz began touring with Earl that October, at about the time his first solo album (Crescent Crawl) came out.
Katz worked with Earl for five years, finding time for his own band as well as his second solo album, Transformation in 1993. "I was fitting my own gigs in between the cracks," he said. With his third recording, Mississippi Moan from 1997, Katz stopped being a sidekick and became primarily a bandleader.
"In many ways, it's way easier to be somebody's sideman," Katz said. If, for example, he was working with guitarist Duke Robillard (as he did in 2001), and the band is playing to a nearly empty room, "I don't care," Katz said. "It's Duke's gig." Katz wasn't really apathetic; he was simply making a point: Leading his own band, of course, entails a lot more responsibility.
The 53-year-old Katz began his musical training early, playing classical music on piano at age five. By the time he was 10, he was teaching himself the blues where they intersected with jazz, enchanted by Bessie Smith records. He was into blues and rock early, and found bebop in his late teens. By the time he enrolled in the Berklee College of Music in 1974, he was a self-described jazz fanatic.
The addition of the warm, thick Hammond B3 organ sound to his repertoire might seem a natural expansion for a piano player. Not so, Katz said. When he was first saw the Hammond a quarter-century ago, "I didn't even know how to turn it on." He was introduced to the instrument back then as part of the house band at a Boston recording studio, he said, and 25 years later, "I'm still learning."
While the piano is primarily a hand instrument, the Hammond is played as much with the feet. The keys on the organ, he said, have "no touch sensitivity," Katz said, meaning that it doesn't matter how hard or soft you hit them. The volume is controlled by the "expression pedal," and a Hammond player's foot "is always moving on that pedal."
Generally, he said, "a lot of times piano players and organ players don't mix." The instruments, he added, "play very differently."
Making music is important to Katz, but so is spreading it. He teaches at Berklee. His current tour involves many places - such as Davenport and the Pacific Northwest - that he hasn't visited regularly or at all. (Katz has never performed at the Mississippi Valley Blues Festival.) Earlier this year, he ended up in prison (but only for a day) in Mississippi, at the request of a filmmaker acquaintance who teaches creative writing to inmates.
Katz called it "one of the top experiences I can remember." The prison had three bands, he said: rock, gospel, and blues. "Us and the prisoners were all hangin'," the organ-player said. "It was pretty amazing. They really kind of moved us."
Many of the people his band met were serving long sentences for drugs. Some were professional musicians. (Katz talked with the grandson of Junior Kimbrough in prison.) "These guys rehearse every single day," Katz said. "They're working their butts off trying to become better musicians." Someone might have 12 years left on a sentence, Katz said, but music represents something bright in their lives.
Like Katz did many years ago when he returned to college, these are men who have surrounded themselves with music. They're people with good hearts, Katz added, who made mistakes. "The divide between us and them is very slim," he said.
The Bruce Katz Band will perform at 8 p.m. on Thursday, November 17, at Blueport Junction, near the intersection of Intestate 80 and U.S. 61. Cover is $8. For more information, visit (http://www.mvbs.org).
So he went back to school.
And earlier this year, he ended up in prison. (But more on that later.)
"I didn't stop playing," Katz said in a phone interview last week, describing what happened when he returned to college. "I just stopped touring." The school experience was instrumental in turning Katz from in-demand side player to acclaimed composer and leader.
Katz has been back on the road a lot over the past 13 years, but instead of playing only other people's music, he's been performing his own instrumental jazzy blues tunes. He'll be appearing at Blueport Junction in Davenport on Thursday in an event presented by the Mississippi Valley Blues Society. Katz is touring now in support of his fifth solo record, 2004's Deeper Blue, and plans to have a new album out in late 2006. Including his solo work, Katz estimates that he's played on more than 50 records.
His band focuses mostly on instrumental blues - bassist Rod Carey does sing, infrequently - but Katz is quick to stress that the conceptions audiences have of instrumental blues are misguided. "Instrumental blues is a rarity," he concedes, and many people think that they're either unimaginative and rote - the solo-heavy filler that bands play before the singer comes out - or intellectual and inaccessible. "You can and people do dance to our music all the time," he said.
Katz is reticent to say what he does is better than vocal blues, but he acknowledges that instrumental music doesn't have the crutch of vocals. "It's really all about the tunes," he said. "These melodies really have to sing in their own way. The melody has to really resonate. ... We don't even miss the singer." Try humming a few bars along with most of what you hear on the radio - whether pop, rock, or blues - and you'll understand that melody doesn't matter much these days.
After abandoning the life of a working musician on the road in the late '80s, Katz enrolled at the New England Conservatory of Music and earned a master's degree in jazz performance. "I wanted to surround myself with music," he said.
The New England Conservatory brought new perspectives and influences. "I was by far the oldest student in the school," he said. He studied with Geri Allen, Paul Bley, Cecil McBee, and George Russell. He focused on playing, practicing, and writing his own material. But taking that much time away from being a circuit musician means starting anew, and Katz did that, too.
A few months after graduation, in 1992, Katz was playing what he calls "this kind of dumb gig," doing background music for a Best of Boston awards party, "sitting in the corner. ... I feel these laser beams boring into the back of my head." It was the blues guitarist Ronnie Earl, at the event to pick up an award. Katz began touring with Earl that October, at about the time his first solo album (Crescent Crawl) came out.
Katz worked with Earl for five years, finding time for his own band as well as his second solo album, Transformation in 1993. "I was fitting my own gigs in between the cracks," he said. With his third recording, Mississippi Moan from 1997, Katz stopped being a sidekick and became primarily a bandleader.
"In many ways, it's way easier to be somebody's sideman," Katz said. If, for example, he was working with guitarist Duke Robillard (as he did in 2001), and the band is playing to a nearly empty room, "I don't care," Katz said. "It's Duke's gig." Katz wasn't really apathetic; he was simply making a point: Leading his own band, of course, entails a lot more responsibility.
The 53-year-old Katz began his musical training early, playing classical music on piano at age five. By the time he was 10, he was teaching himself the blues where they intersected with jazz, enchanted by Bessie Smith records. He was into blues and rock early, and found bebop in his late teens. By the time he enrolled in the Berklee College of Music in 1974, he was a self-described jazz fanatic.
The addition of the warm, thick Hammond B3 organ sound to his repertoire might seem a natural expansion for a piano player. Not so, Katz said. When he was first saw the Hammond a quarter-century ago, "I didn't even know how to turn it on." He was introduced to the instrument back then as part of the house band at a Boston recording studio, he said, and 25 years later, "I'm still learning."
While the piano is primarily a hand instrument, the Hammond is played as much with the feet. The keys on the organ, he said, have "no touch sensitivity," Katz said, meaning that it doesn't matter how hard or soft you hit them. The volume is controlled by the "expression pedal," and a Hammond player's foot "is always moving on that pedal."
Generally, he said, "a lot of times piano players and organ players don't mix." The instruments, he added, "play very differently."
Making music is important to Katz, but so is spreading it. He teaches at Berklee. His current tour involves many places - such as Davenport and the Pacific Northwest - that he hasn't visited regularly or at all. (Katz has never performed at the Mississippi Valley Blues Festival.) Earlier this year, he ended up in prison (but only for a day) in Mississippi, at the request of a filmmaker acquaintance who teaches creative writing to inmates.
Katz called it "one of the top experiences I can remember." The prison had three bands, he said: rock, gospel, and blues. "Us and the prisoners were all hangin'," the organ-player said. "It was pretty amazing. They really kind of moved us."
Many of the people his band met were serving long sentences for drugs. Some were professional musicians. (Katz talked with the grandson of Junior Kimbrough in prison.) "These guys rehearse every single day," Katz said. "They're working their butts off trying to become better musicians." Someone might have 12 years left on a sentence, Katz said, but music represents something bright in their lives.
Like Katz did many years ago when he returned to college, these are men who have surrounded themselves with music. They're people with good hearts, Katz added, who made mistakes. "The divide between us and them is very slim," he said.
The Bruce Katz Band will perform at 8 p.m. on Thursday, November 17, at Blueport Junction, near the intersection of Intestate 80 and U.S. 61. Cover is $8. For more information, visit (http://www.mvbs.org).
