Peaks and Valleys: A Conversation with Michael Leonhart (Part Two)

For the second part of our conversation with Michael Leonhart on The Normyn Suites (Sunnyside, 2022), we discuss Elvis Costello, the Avant-Garde, scoring Red Dead Redemption II (Rockstar, 2018), and how the beauty of “Catharsis” with Bill Frisell came to life. Check out part one here.

PostGenre: How did Elvis Costello get involved with The Normyn Suites? You worked together on Hey Clockface (Concord, 2020), correct?

Michael Leonhart: Yes, I contributed to his album. I was putting together The Normyn Suites after we worked together on Hey Clockface and thought he would sound great on two of the songs. So, I sent him the songs, asked him if he wanted to work on them, and warned him that they were different from anything else he had done musically. He was just fearless and went for it. 

PG: Is it a different dynamic when Elvis is working on your album compared to when you were on his?

ML: Honestly, not really. Even in his late 60s, Elvis has this teenager vibe in terms of being willing to go out there, be himself, and take risks. He’s not a fan of multiple takes. That’s the case regardless of whether it is his album or someone else’s. Or, at least, that has been my experience. He was very cool to work with both times. 

PG: What was behind the decision to have two versions of “Shut Him Down”, one with Joshua Redman and another with Chris Potter?

ML: Well, it was back in July of 2020 and everyone was making those crazy videos with tiles on the screen. I was wary of doing yet another one. At the same time, I was checking in with the full roster of the orchestra, which is about 75 strong. We only get about 20 people on the stage but have to have several backups available in case someone can’t make it. It was clear we couldn’t put together a full band in any meaningful way. That inability to get together made a lot of us in the band very sad. Even though I was initially reluctant, I knew we had to do a video together. I love these guys and wanted to find a way to play together even if it was only by video. 

When we were trying to finish the video, I had put out feelers to Chris Potter, Joshua Redman, Branford Marsalis, Kamasi Washington, and a few other guys to see if they could add to it as well. Chris sent in the bass clarinet solo that ended up on that version of the song. His solo was great and he videoed himself performing it. It was a shorter section, only 16 or 24 bars. I gave it to Daniel Carlson who was editing the video and thought the shorter solo was the perfect length for the video. While I would have loved a longer solo, it was just going to complicate things in terms of doing it by video and how quickly we would be able to put the whole thing together. So, we put Chris’ brilliant bass clarinet into the video and released it. 

But I still wanted a longer solo. Josh [Redman] sent an audio recording of him – we didn’t get video from him – and it was also great. So, I decided that I would let the video version with Chris’ bass clarinet live on its own and also write a little more for the orchestra and put in a longer solo section for Josh. I sent Josh the longer version and that is what he recorded on. I started toying with the idea of combining both Chris’ and Josh’s solos on the same track but didn’t want to start copying and pasting and have the song just become a collage. So, I decided to issue both versions on the album. I thought of it as an A-Side and a B-Side. The longer version is Josh’s and the shorter one is Chris’ accompanied with a video. And doing it that way ended up being pretty cool because I was able to effectively bookmark The Normyn Suites with the same song. There is a beautiful symmetry in ending and then starting back at the beginning. 

PG: Among the orchestra’s members are artists with impressive avant-garde credentials. Bassoonist Sara Schoenbeck, for instance, has worked with Roscoe Mitchell, Henry Threadgill, and Wadada Leo Smith. You have also worked with Yoko Ono and Nels Cline. There does not seem to be anything overtly “out” about The Normyn Suites. Do you feel that influence is still there?

ML: I see avant-garde ideas and sounds like a color. As with any painting, some colors fit the artwork and others do not but may be perfect for another one. When I was younger, I would try to throw all kinds of different ideas into my music. It wasn’t to prove something, but simply because those were the sounds in my head. But now I’m trying to be a little more minimalist and more focused. 

That’s not to say there aren’t moments on The Normyn Suites that are not influenced by the avant-garde. I feel it is particularly present on “Anger”, for instance. For a while, I thought that maybe the song was too angular and jagged. But the more I reflected on it, the more it seemed perfect for expressing its intended emotion. It truly expresses anger. 

The entirety of The Normyn Suites is very lyrical, so the avant-garde didn’t often creep in. But I’m not afraid to use it when it is right. I love having experience with things like avant-garde music that I can draw upon to add to the music where it seems like it fits best. For instance, there is a track on [Nels Cline’s] Lovers (Blue Note, 2016), called “So Hard it Hurts/Touching.” It is a song written by Annette Peacock and has a marimba and Nel’s brother Alex on chains. It is very abstract. I loved orchestrating it for clarinets and bike chains. I can’t explain why, but it felt the same as writing horns for Steely Dan.

It is all about what feels right in the moment for the narrative you are trying to make. And, in that sense, it is not too different from film. Steven Soderbergh directed both Ocean’s Eleven (2001, Warner Bros.) and Sex, Lies and Videotape (Mirimax, 1989). How does the same person make two films that are so different? It’s because both films focus on storytelling, and some elements fit better with one story than the other. 

PG: Do you feel your experience scoring projects like Red Dead Redemption II (Rockstar, 2018) influenced your composing for The Normyn Suites in terms of providing an overarching narrative on the album?

ML: Absolutely. Scoring is closer to this album than the avant-garde because there is a theme here. When you score, the hardest part is putting yourself second to the story and the director. With the best film scores, the composer is a painter. But he’s painting someone’s house, not the Sistine Chapel. If you think you’re painting a masterpiece on its own, you’re not doing the music the proper service. You have to be ready to put yourself second to what the film needs, to what the house needs, and that may be painting a wall white.

With The Normyn Suites, the story wasn’t about solos and soloists. I needed to walk away and look at what I was trying to express; grieving, love, and loss. In that sense, composing for the album was very similar to scoring. Some moments called for musical restraint. There was one where I wrote a long horn part and it was incredibly cool. I was sad to do so, but I needed to let it go. It ultimately just didn’t fit the narrative. Composing for the album was a matter of putting that narrative first.

Writing for Red Dead Redemption was a trip. I had to put multiple layers together at once. It’s really crazy. Eight to sixteen tracks can be shut off or shut down, depending on which way the character turns. At times it was challenging and frustrating. But if you are patient, there is a lot to be learned from composing for a project like that. 

PG: “Catharsis” is an incredible piece. How did it come together and did you always plan for Bill Frisell to be a part of it?

ML: I’ve known Frisell on and off for several years. I don’t think he and I were in the same room, but we worked together on a Vinicius Cantuaria album [Vinicius (Transparent,2001)] over 20 years ago. When we were recording the album, Frisell left the studio as I was coming in and we struck up a conversation. Bill is just a wonderful human being. We have a friendship; we are not incredibly close but did keep in touch. 

I saw Bill about six months after Lovers came out and he told me he loved the album. I was incredibly flattered. And I ended up asking him if he wanted to be a part of the new album that wound up being The Normyn Suites. I thought he would be perfect for the project. We started working out logistics for recording with him but he usually travels frequently and it was difficult to set up something.  But this was mid-2019 and when COVID hit, suddenly Bill was free and agreed to record for it.

I started working with Bill and had him record his solo from home. He’s very sweet and we took a few days to make sure he got his sound setup right and then recorded. I was a little worried about the possibility that Frisell would play something beautiful but which wouldn’t match what I needed for the album’s narrative. It would have put me in the tough situation of choosing between a beautiful Frisell solo or the narrative. As I was saying a minute ago, the narrative has to control. So, it would have been hard to pass up on whatever beautiful thing he came up with if it didn’t fit the album. But Bill’s performance was ultimately perfect for the track. I felt funny even doubting he’d come through. What he came up with was just so lyrical and vulnerable. Childlike yet sophisticated. 

Another piece that blows me away is “The Dunes of Cahoon Hollow.” I’ve long wanted to use a choir with an orchestra. It’s hard to make that work on stage. I love the sound of a wordless choir, going back to music by Max Roach with Abbey Lincoln or back to Mahalia Jackson. Once the piece started coming together, it greatly moved me. It was a very special track to make. Everything was so cinematic. 

The Michael Leonhart Orchestra’s The Normyn Suites will be available on March 25th on Sunnyside Records. It can be purchased on Bandcamp. Or, if you want to support PostGenre while buying the album, it is available in our Amazon Affiliate Store.

More information about Leonhart can be found on his website.

Photo Credit: Frank Jerke