Front-Row Seat: A Conversation with Jason Miles

By the early 1980s, artists had too much freedom to express themselves through sound. The consequences of avant-garde experimentalism were too esoteric. The fusing of jazz with rock was somehow too mainstream. No, we needed an art form that would still appeal to exactly slightly less than 1% of the market. No more no less. Enter Stanley Crouch. Like a phoenix rising from the flames of a burning artform, the man who himself couldn’t adequately make music embarked upon a quest to rescue the desiccated corpse of Buddy Bolden. But he needed a lieutenant.  Someone who could carry on the war against free expression, armed with Master Crouch’s edicts of proper manners. He found a young protégée in a trumpeter from New Orleans, the man Ken Burns would later credit with inventing jazz: Wynton Marsalis. Together, they could finally target those who dare expand sonically. At last, they could exact their revenge. Decades later, the dust had settled, and an armistice seemingly met. Ornette Coleman was invited to Jazz at Lincoln Center, the House that Wynton Built. The damage to the avant-garde community from the ideological war is well documented. But less discussed is the other battlefront of the neo-traditionalist cabal; the impact on music of more popular sentiments. Jason Miles saw the fight firsthand, and his recently released Grover Washington, Jr. record, Grover Live (Vol. 2) (G-Man, 2024), shows how that music also survived the battles. 

Crouch’s conservative crusade disrupted long standing relationships within music, causing innovators to seek new partnerships. The most obvious case of this could be seen in how, partly fueled by the label’s unjust adoration of Wynton; Miles Davis killed a thirty-year relationship with Columbia Records. Heading to Warner, he wanted a new sound that signaled such a break; one that incorporated contemporary computerized sounds into the sonic terrain of jazz. To reach this goal with the album that ultimately became Tutu (Warner, 1986), the Dark Prince of Jazz reached out to Jason Miles. After all, as the trumpeter would note in his autobiography, Miles was “a synthesizer programming genius.” The keyboardist had also turned Michael Brecker – perhaps the greatest saxophonist of his generation – onto electronic instruments. The point is that while some obsessed over an aesthetic of acoustic instruments, Miles never hesitated to dig into the technology available to him. 

While not as targeted by the arrows of the neotraditionalist quiver, another target was also that of “smooth jazz.” To some extent our understanding of “smoother” music is still shaped by these attacks. If you ask many people their thoughts on such music, the results tend to be less than flattering. To be fair, much of what constitutes smooth jazz is indeed lame. There are too many mediocre musical minds who try to show flash devoid of substance. To a large degree, these people are mostly just buying into the narrative that such music is devoid of substance anyway. But when you look beyond those seeking a quick buck instead of true creative expression, you find that smooth jazz is like any other style. There is a soul at the core of the music that shines through and which, incidentally, ties the music into the essence of jazz music. 

While a few artists regularly show these qualities in their work –  George Benson and Bob James to name two – perhaps the most obvious example is Grover Washington, Jr. The saxophonist’s albums like Mister Magic (Kudu, 1975) and Winelight (Elektra, 1980) are indeed gentler sounding and accessible but without sacrificing an iota of substance. Even the most ardent, yet open minded, critic of smooth jazz could readily recognize the value of such records. But Washington continued to create records for another two decades. Grover Live (Vol. 2) captures a live performance from about a year before the saxophonist’s untimely passing in 1999. What the record reveals to listeners is that even as the commercial space known as smooth jazz increasingly filled with charlatans chasing a quick buck, Washington never sacrificed his artistic vision. His music still held true to itself. It still disproved the misguided aim of the Crouchian crusade.

This conversation with Jason Miles from September 24, 2024 goes into some of these highlights of his career, much of which – and more –  is also covered in his great book, The Extraordinary Journey of Jason Miles – A Musical Biography (Book Writing Cube, 2022). We also discuss how both Grover Live albums came to be and how Washington’s music continues to thrive. 

PostGenre: You moved to Portugal in 2023. There is a long history of American musicians getting more respect in Europe than back home. Do you feel that is still the case today?

Jason Miles: Yes. It’s much more calm here than it was back in New York. People here work to live. They don’t live to work. And that’s a huge difference.

People also generally show more respect for the arts here. People here are much more fashion-conscious as well. Back in the United States, my friend who wrote ‘The Color Purple’ invited us to the last preview of it on Broadway. I was blown away by what people were wearing to a Broadway show. Shorts and sneakers. T-shirts. You’re at fucking Broadway, man. Show a little respect. The people here in Portugal respect the artistic lifestyle. Over here, people seem to greatly appreciate what I do and have done over a fifty-year career. In the United States, people are less supportive. 

That said, you still need to go to the United States if you’re serious about trying to make some money and create something for yourself. If you’re going to make a name for yourself, you gotta go to the places where you can make a name for yourself, and that’s what the US has to offer. However, the work itself seems to be respected more in Europe. How did you first discover my work?

PG: Through your work on Miles Davis’ TuTu. 

JM: Ohh, well there you go. Miles was my hero. It was my dream to work with him. I first saw him perform in 1975 at The Bottom Line in New York. When I saw him, it was clear he was very tired. I looked at my wife and said, “I might as well just give up, man, because there’s no way I’m ever gonna be able to work with Miles.” I didn’t see how it could happen. 

One thing I realized, many years later, was that it wasn’t like Miles went around town searching for musicians. No, it was all about who told Miles about you. Miles always had people in his groups telling him stuff like “Hey, you gotta hear Art Blakey, man. There’s this young guy Wayne Shorter playing with him, and he’s really happening.” I’m incredibly proud that I was put in that circle. Everyone gets their mind blown when they read in my book how it happened. When you read it, you’re sitting there in the session with me, Miles, and Marcus [Miller]. Marcus wrote the forward to my book and talks about how I had a front-row seat to the magic times. I could see what Miles was building, and I did. My entire career, I built off of everything that happened to me. 

PG: How did you start playing synths to begin with? 

JM:  Well, it was very interesting because I grew up in Brooklyn, and we had bands. I was playing accordion when I was seven. Then I moved over to the piano. Later, I heard the organ and switched over to the organ in my rock band. I was fourteen, fifteen, or sixteen when I was playing organ and it was like living a dream. Then I started hearing stuff like [Wendy Carlos’] Switched-On Bach (Columbia Masterworks, 1968) and experimental people like [Karlheinz] Stockhausen, but did not quite get their music. 

But one day, I was walking on campus in Indiana. When I went by the music hall, I heard a sound that I had never heard before. I went inside, and there was a guy on stage with a little thing on a table. Nobody else was there. He was doing a sound check. I walked to the stage and asked him what he was doing. He told me his name was Robert Moog, and he was playing an instrument he had created: the Moog synthesizer. And he showed me how to play it. From then onward, I started hearing the synthesizer more and more in Keith Emmerson, Joe Zawinul, and Herbie [Hancock]. Herbie’s Headhunters (Columbia, 1973) was the one that completely blew my mind. As much as I like Chick Corea and Return to Forever – Light as a Feather (Polydor, 1972) also totally changed my life around – and Weather Report, I knew I needed to experiment with synths when I heard Herbie’s solo on “Chameleon.” 

And from there, my girlfriend at the time and I moved back to New York, and I started from the bottom there. But I was very lucky because I knew my shit. I knew how to talk about the music. In my book, I tell the story of how I met Joe Zawinul for the first time. We ended up becoming friends for thirty years, but I was a young guy when we first met. I went to see him with Weather Report in 1974, during the gas crisis, at this place in New Jersey. Even though the place was in the middle of nowhere, it was packed. But when Weather Report took the stage, the whole place emptied out. The place was a pickup bar. Even though there were so few people there, the music was fantastic. There were only maybe twenty people left in the huge place. 

After the performance, the band’s percussionist came out and asked me if I had anything to smoke. I told him I did and that it was really good stuff too. So, he invited me backstage with my girlfriend. Joe Zawinul was standing there talking to someone but ultimately walked over to me when he found out that I’ve got some good shit to smoke. And we started talking and from there we became friends for thirty years. 

But I wasn’t getting the big jobs with synthesizers until one night I reconnected with Michael Brecker. Michael was saying how badly he wanted to get into synthesizers and he figured I knew what was happening. Michael had just gotten out of rehab. So he wasn’t doing drugs or anything, and he was trying to develop with electronics. And he told all these great producers about me. They knew me, but they weren’t hiring me, but Michael supported me.

PG: You also got Michael into using the Electronic Wind Instrument (EWI).

JM: I was the one that really egged him on to do it. He wanted to get into it but he wasn’t quite focused on it. When he got out of rehab, he couldn’t do the same things that he was doing before in terms of drugs and hanging out. Now Michael could focus on music and his future rather than where he was gonna get the next hit from. We started working with digital instruments together, and he became a very good friend and confidant. And he just exploded as far as ideas go and in terms of developing on the EWI with what he was doing with breath and everything. 

PG: You recently produced Grover Live (Vol. 2), which featured Grover Washington, Jr. on a pretty wide range of saxophones. He certainly looked for more textures to use, but he never experimented with the EWI. Do you have a sense of why that was?

JM: No, no, that that’s not Grover man. 

I met Grover through Marcus Miller. Marcus and I connected in 1985, basically through Michael and Lenny White. Marcus and I worked together for a little over a year after TuTu. Marcus had played on Winelight (Elektra, 1980) and some of the other albums Grover put out on Elektra with Ralph McDonald. Marcus was signed to MCA Publishing, and somebody took his songs to Grover. Grover loved one of those songs, “Summer Nights,” and we started recording it on Strawberry Moon (CBS, 1980) with Grover. 

But everybody saw me working with Marcus. When Marcus and I worked together, nobody understood how we worked or how we were doing what we were doing. I had all these synthesizers, and we were just creating sounds and putting together all this other shit. Grover was impressed with what I was doing with synthesizers and asked for my number. Grover and I ended up staying in touch, and I saw him several times. 

Marcus and I parted company after working together for ten years. We had done so much together but he wanted wanted to play live with a band and I wanted to take everything I had learned over the last seventeen years and produce. We just went in different directions. But I stayed in touch with Grover. I put him on some really good stuff, man. He was greatly appreciative because I got him playing very creatively. But then he died very suddenly. 

After Grover died, I  came up with an idea to do a tribute record to him, which became To Grover with Love (Q Records, 2001). Making that album is a story in how fucking terrible it is that some musicians will try to sabotage you even when it’s not in their own best interest. It was an ugly experience. But I persevered and made an incredibly successful album. Then I made a second one, 2 Grover With Love (Koch, 2008). 

PG: How did you go from those tribute albums to producing now two Grover Live records?

JM: [Grover’s widow] Christine [Washington] called me up. She had found some tapes of Grover’s performances. She was convinced that I knew what to do with them. Christine, [my wife] Kathy [Byalick], and I sat in Grover’s office and listened to several live recordings and narrowed them down to the few that ended up on Grover Live. The first Grover Live came out in 2010. It was a tough job putting it all together and editing it. 

But the record was very successful. People loved hearing Grover again. Then, recently, I was doing a lot of live shows in Japan and South Africa to perform Grover’s music. They’ve been very successful everywhere. People loved the music. But that was partly because I brought it back to the cool shit, not the Columbia smooth jazz stuff. I went back to Winelight and Grover’s CTI records. I would always end the performances with “Mister Magic,” and people would go crazy because it’s such a great song. It’s the kind of song that you remember who you were with, where you were, and what you were smoking the first time you heard it. 

PG: You mentioned Grover’s smoother works. Do you feel his work, in general, has been misjudged to some extent because of bad “smooth jazz” by people who have proclaimed he is their hero? For instance, in the documentary Listening to Kenny G (HBO, 2021), Kenny G goes on and on about how he idolized Grover. Not to bash anybody, but… 

JM: You can bash Kenny. 

PG: He’s hardly the epitome of creativity. For decades, he has gone out there and played the same repetitive, fairly uncreative stuff over and over. He can circular breathe. [sarcastically] Wow. And that’s about it. Do you feel the attention Kenny gives to Grover needlessly extends a bad reputation to Grover in some way?

JM: You know, I know firsthand that Grover showed Kenny all that circular breathing. Kenny came on the tour bus and followed Grover around. But for Kenny, it was more about money than anything else. When it came time for me to put together To Grover with Love, I had assembled a lot of different artists. We had some great horn players – Everette Harp, the Brecker Brothers, and Gerald Albright, to name a few- on it. We all poured our hearts and soul into the record. I had also reached out to Kenny to see if he would want to be a part of it. I figured he would love having a way to honor Grover. But Kenny refused to play on it. I think he thought it was somehow beneath him. I don’t get intimidated by that kind of shit because it is what it is. 

But what really bothers me is the perception he has seemed to have made for himself. When you hear the wannabes, you can tell. And [Kenny] isn’t just not a wannabe. He’s a robot. He’s a wannabe of a wannabe of Grover. You do actually have a generation of cats after Grover where you really feel Grover’s influence. People like Kirk Whalum,  Gerald Albright, and George Howard. These guys were definitely influenced by Grover. And that’s almost the natural progression of things. 

But then there’s the guys that just said, “Well, it’s so easy to play. I don’t have to do that much to learn smooth jazz.” So they don’t put much work in. They just cop shit instead of going and saying, “Well, Grover’s my influence, but I think I’ve grown my own voice.” Honestly, Kenny’s actually a good horn player. He could play if he wanted to. But when you play records like Kenny’s and Clive Davis tells you that he wants more of them and they would sell tens of millions of copies, you make those albums that Clive Davis wants. That’s what happened with Kenny. 

PG: So, you released the first Grover Live album and played his songs live. How did the second Grover Live album come about fourteen years after the first?

JM: When I moved to Portugal, I brought with me about ten terabytes of hard drives full of archival material. Tons of stuff. I’ve finally had a chance to go through and see about getting so much of it out. There is so much really good stuff saved there. I stumbled upon the recordings of Grover Washington’s shows. I had a couple of them. I saw two shows that we kept from all the DATs. One of them came out on the first Live album and the other I hadn’t done anything with yet.

I listened to that unreleased one and felt it was better than the other one. Why the hell didn’t we do this one? So, I got a hold of Christine and the label that put out the first record and told them I had found a new Grover album and to check it out. 

The good thing is that this second record is not the same as the first one. There’s a new drummer, which adds a different flavor. And you do hear the difference between the two albums. There’s a different groove with the band, and it’s a different thing. You can hear the difference between them just from having Richie Morales on drums instead of Stephen Wolf. Both are exceptional drummers, but each brought the band into different places. The great thing is that the band adjusted to what was going on, and you hear it on the second record. Plus, Grover never played the same shit the same way twice anyway. 

PG: Other than who is in the band, what can you share about the performance on the second Live album? The materials do not seem to provide much information about when or where exactly the performance occurred.

JM: That is kind of a mystery in a lot of ways. I just went by what was on the DAT tapes and Christina’s memory. She had a very good memory. But on the DAT tape, it said it was from Albuquerque, New Mexico. When you listen to something very closely for ninety minutes, you try to stay completely focused on it. Especially on the music to make sure there are not any flubs or digital mistakes on the recording. Some of the things said on the recording are not ultra-critical. But at one point, Grover says “Welcome to the Wolf Trap.” I didn’t notice it at first, but that would seem to suggest the performance was at a place called The Wolf Trap, which is in Vienna, Virginia.  The performance would have been in 1998.

PG: A lot happened in the fourteen years since you produced the first one. You moved overseas. There was a pandemic that changed many things. And just the mere passage of time changes an artist’s approach and sensibilities. Do you feel you approached the two Live albums differently in any way?

JM: I think the most important thing you could possibly do in producing archival recordings is just to represent well what’s there and to make sure it’s edited correctly and mastered correctly. Those things allow you to give people the very best sound. And, so, I felt like fourteen years later it was almost like two weeks after the first one. It was only after I listened back to the album that I fully processed how much time had passed between when I worked on the two.

PG: What do you feel is Grover’s legacy, More than twenty-five years after his passing?

JM: When it comes to legacies, it is the same for every artist that is no longer with us; will it be preserved by somebody, or is it just going to be dependent on people discovering the artist and then those that truly care carrying on their legacy? Grover’s legacy will definitely be very strong for his contributions. There is no doubt about his influence on a whole generation of players. He has enough albums out there and history that maybe his legacy will survive.

‘Grover Live (Vol. 2)’ is available now. More information on Jason Miles can be found on his website. His fascinating autobiography, ‘The Extraordinary Journey of Jason Miles – A Musical Biography’ is also available from his website.