Mark Maxwell, Saxophonist

I’m in the studio this week producing a CD for my good friend, Simrit Kaur. She’s a singer, composer and harmonium player here in Nevada City and performs a style of music that is along the lines of Snatum Kaur and Deva Premal, very spiritual, very beautiful and inspirational.

I’ll also be performing sax and flute on this project.  I’ll post some of the music from these sessions soon.  You’ll love it - she sings like an angel.

In the meantime, Simrit’s band - including your’s truly will be performing Saturday evening - Mar. 29 - here in Nevada City.  You can learn more about that event here.

Namaste!

Imagine - It’s 2 A.M., you’re driving through downtown San Francisco on Freeway 80…

…you’ve driven too many miles, drank too much coffee, you need to stop and sleep but you don’t - you end up with this almost mystical feeling about The City you’re passing by, like there is some magic to it, some mystery that is just beyond your seeing, something palpable but inexplicable about the place, a majesty perhaps - San Francisco, the Goddess of Cities, the Beautiful Jewel on the Bay.

Anyway, that’s how I feel, especially at the end of one of those late night LA to SF drives where you feel like you’re tripping because you’re so wired on coffee, Snickers, and XM Beyond Jazz - very surreal!

And that’s the feeling of this week’s song, Freeway 80, kind of a mystical majesty, a sense of transcendent beauty and calm seen from afar.

Somehow I ended up doing three versions of Freeway 80. The first version is the original version, very full and lush with a fairly simple sax line. The second version, Roberta’s favorite, is slower and more sultry with more space in it, very beautiful. Version three, my favorite, is a little more stark and intense, and features some cool echo and delay effects on the sax.

(You’ll hear a slight bit of harmonica in version three; that’s my buddy Paul Michael Meredith.)

Take a little trip on Freeway 80. And enjoy the ride. Buy the song(s) here.

Freeway 80 (Three Versions):

1.

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Have Sax, Will Travel

Indeed, I travel a lot, and always with the sax. I habitually lean a little left because the sax is always on my shoulder.

I’ve been playing the saxophone since 1964, 43 years now! Wow! Somebody give me an honorary doctorate.

I do make house calls. That’s a lot of fun…

This one’s a lot of fun. Initially, it was my attempt to do a song in the Down To The Bone style, groovin’ on a riff in a celebratory style, funk/jazz/soul all wrapped up.  It ended up being kind of a smooth jazz saxophone celebration of life.

I invited my friend, Joe Fajen, to join me on the trombone on this tune. The trombone gives the sound a slightly Jazz Crusaders feel. Tenor and Bone - what a great sound!

Dr. Saxophone At Your Service. Let me know how I can help.

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Are you hip to the EWI (Electronic Wind Instrument)?

I’m just finishing a rather torrid month of simultaneously being on the road and moving, an exhausting combination that I can really recommend for encouraging one to surrender. Subsequently, this week’s song is from the archives.

This is the original version of a song featured on Saxual Healing. On this version, I play the whole first part of the tune on the EWI. For some unrecalled reason, I’ve always thought that this was the inferior of the two versions, but listening to it now, man I think I like it even better than the version on Saxual Healing. What do you think?

As on all the Saxual Healing tunes, I play all the instruments.

Hey, infuse yourself with a Little Bit ‘O Soul Now (EWI Version), this week’s Song-A-Week.

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(For those of you who were paying attention, this song was included in last week’s mailing as a “will probably never see the light of day so I’ll include it here” song. Lo and behold, it was requested that I offer it for sale; thus, it morphed rather conveniently into this week’s song.)

Hey, next week, new music! Some cool stuff, too.

“I started by definitely being a copycat. That’s the way it was. I mean, I wanted to be the white Grover Washington Jr. and I think I became the white Grover Washington Jr.”

You know who said that? You might be surprised. It was Kenny G! Proof positive that Grover Washington Jr. was a smooth jazz saxophone pioneer: The best selling instrumentalist of all time (Kenny G) started off wanting to sound just like him.

I remember seeing Grover and his band at the Embassy Theatre in Fort Wayne, IN back in the late 70’s, me and 2,000 my black brothers and sisters. We were all on our feet the whole time. He grooved so hard, so deep. It was incredible!

There’s an excellent biography of Grover at musicianguide.com. Here’s a couple of interesting excerpts, the first being about his big music business “break”:

His first big musical break came quite by accident. Commercially-minded record producer Creed Taylor had put together a set of pop-funk tunes for alto saxophonist Hank Crawford. On the eve of the recording date, Crawford was arrested “on a two-year-old driving charge,” Washington told Rolling Stone. Taylor then called in the little-known Washington as a last-minute replacement and had him play the alto parts. The album, Inner City Blues, was released in 1971 under Washington’s name. It became a hit–an album, Palmer wrote in the New York Times, “that sold hundreds of thousands of copies and did much to break down barriers between jazz and pop.” As Washington admitted to Wansley, “My big break was blind luck.”

And this about his influence in the pre-smooth jazz music scene:

Washington developed what is called a jazz-pop or jazz-rock fusion musical style. It consists of jazz improvisation over a pop or rock beat. Although he came from a jazz background, influenced by such artists as John Coltrane, Joe Henderson, and Oliver Nelson, Washington’s wife got him interested in pop music. “I encouraged him to listen to more pop,” Christine told Rolling Stone. “His intent was to play jazz, but he started listening to both, and at one point he told me he just wanted to play what he felt, without giving it a label.”

The popularity of Washington’s brand of jazz-pop helped make jazz-pop music a success. Keyboardist Bob James told Wansley, “Grover was one of the main people to make this crossover movement happen. We had people intrigued by jazz, but a lot of it was so complex they didn’t relate to it. Grover maintained a very high level of musicianship and yet his playing was very melodic and direct.”

Smooth jazz poineer, indeed.

Grammy award winner, hit song writer, sax legend Grover Washington Jr. Truly a smooth jazz saxophone pioneer. Check this 1981 video of Grover and his band playing his hit, ‘Mister Magic.’ Enjoy!