Mike Stern Interview: Jaco, Miles and More

By: Ben Tyree

Mike Stern and his Yamaha Pacifica

For three decades, guitarist Mike Stern has astonished jazz audiences the world over with his quest to push the envelope of what is possible on his instrument, the electric guitar. Now, more than ever, Stern is busy working on a variety of projects that further fuel his insatiable and often child-like curiosity and creativity.

In addition to working with a wide array of cutting-edge jazz musicians within the context of his own Mike Stern Group, he has found time to record with the Jaco Pastorius Big Band and the talented Four Generations of Miles. Stern is also in the process of producing a live DVD and continues to teach clinics and workshops worldwide.

Mike Stern’s playing is often glibly categorized as fusion despite the fact that his palate is much wider, encompassing the beauty and lyricism of traditional jazz, blues, rock, funk, world and folk music. While his music is often labeled fusion by default, the fluidity and intensity of Stern’s playing continue to impress listeners from both sides of the, “Is fusion real jazz?” debate.

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Jazz in Europe vs. America

Ben Tyree: You’ve been on the road in Europe a lot lately. How do jazz audiences in over there compare to those in the United States?

Mike Stern: I’d say that audiences are great in both places. It seems that people are just more for the arts in general in Europe than here. The arts are more stressed, in general. Not just jazz, all music, painting and writing. Culturally, it’s just more stressed in its importance in the schools, and there’s more of a budget for festivals and for supporting the arts in general.

It’s not only taught more but it’s also prioritized more and the budget is there because, basically, they don’t have the kind of military that the United States has. It’s a little simplistic to say that but, basically, all our bread goes to the military. Whatever we have left over we’re paying for infrastructure and, hopefully, social security and Medicare. It’s all going to the military so it puts a serious damper on whatever else you wanna spend money on. So, there are just more opportunities in terms of festivals and stuff like that over there.

But the audience is definitely there, in the States, without a doubt. There are people that are totally into the music so that’s really not a question. But I think there would be even more of an audience if there were more possibilities for education in music.

Ben: Maybe jazz isn’t marketed in the States the way it should be.

Mike: It’s marketed, but it’s a little bit of the “grass is always greener” sort of thing. Sometimes what seems like a European phenomenon may actually be appreciated more in the United States. Say you’re living in New York City. How many times do you want to go to the Empire State Building? But a lot of tourists will go because it’s there. Sometimes people take jazz for granted because it’s a U.S. thing. But actually, I don’t even think that’s true. I think, basically, it’s what I said before. I think, more than anything, it’s just there’s more opportunity in Europe because there’s more priority for the arts in general. It’s too bad.

Who Let the Cats Out?

Click to Download Who Let the Cats Out From Amazon

Ben: What can listeners expect from Who Let The Cats Out?, any new directions?

Mike: It’s different from the last two records. The last two records that I did featured a lot of vocals, especially Voices. That was the first time that I ever had vocals on a record of mine. Richard Bona, a great bass player singer encouraged me to do that. He said that some of the tunes that I write are very, um, kind of lyrical, and would be great with voices.

I heard him sing when I met him 12 or 13 years ago at a festival overseas. I had heard about him so we played a bunch. I grabbed him and we played in my hotel room and he said that he knew some of my music.

He had heard Upside Downsideand he started singing one of my tunes from that and I thought that one of these days I’m going to work up the nerve to do something with voices and, hopefully, I can get this guy to sing on one of my records.

A bunch of years passed and he was in New York so I kind of figured it was time to ask him about it, “Do you think this will work for a record with voices?” I asked him about some new tunes and he said, “Definitely! I’ll sing the shit out of ‘em!” And he was right! He sang some of the tracks on Voices and that was a different thing for me.

Then the next record, These Times, was more of a return to instrumental stuff but it still has kind of a world music flavor. The Voices record also kind of had a world music vibe, you know, just because I’m inspired by a lot of Richard Bona’s stuff.

This new record still has some of that, you know, a couple of tunes with voices, because I didn’t want to give that up completely. So Voices and These Times have more by way of voice than Who Let the Cats Out? but this one is more of what I do, which is play.

The idea on this record was to feature other players that I haven’t played with that I really dig. So, I wrote around them after I found out whether they could do the gig or not. I had some tunes I chose for each player.

I thought, “Well, Meshell Ndegeocello is going to sound great on this tune and then that tune.” And I tried to mix and match. There are two drummers on the record, Dave Weckl and Kim Thompson and I wanted Meshell, for instance, to play with both of them. Then Richard did some voice stuff with Kim in both cases. The idea was to get a whole bunch of great players like Roy Hargrove, Anthony Jackson and Victor Wooten and just go for it.

I wanted to see if I could make that work but it was kind of a shot in the dark in a way because I wasn’t sure if I was going to get too much variety to use on the same record. But it seems like it really worked well. There’s a lot of variety, a lot of different colors, a couple of things with voices but there’s a lot of straight-ahead blowing too. I’m really happy with the way it came out.

Live in Paris DVD

Ben: You also have a new DVD, Mike Stern Band: New Morning – The Paris Concert, out of a gig you played in Paris a couple of years ago with Richard Bona, Bob Fraceschini, and Dennis Chambers. What’s it like playing with those guys?

Mike: I love playing with them. They’re like cats I’ve been playing with a lot. This is kind of different from the record because there are some people I’ve never played any gigs with like Meshell Ndegeocello. Richard I’ve been playing with a lot. I’ve been gigging with him and, as I said, he’s on the last two of my CDs before this one, and so we’ve been doing some gigs. And there’s Dennis.

I can’t get those guys all the time. Dennis I’ve been playing with for 15 years, maybe more, but he’s been playing with Santana and all that stuff. So, it’s hard to get him sometimes. Then Bob Fraceschini who’s been, I’m grateful to say, my saxophone player for the past six years now.

First of all, let me just say that, obviously, I’m really fortunate to play with all these people that I’m talking about because they’re all great players. They all kick my ass on a regular basis even if we’re playing some of the same tunes. They interject new stuff every night.

There are so many great ideas and so much creativity with those kinds of players. I try to grab what I can from all of them. With that DVD, that was kind of a really cool thing just to have Richard and Dennis play together. We’ve done some gigs off and on for a couple of years and then we had this tour in Europe.

They just filmed that one performance for a cable show in Paris. Then it came out so good that they wanted to make a DVD out of it. They sent it to me and I sent it to Dennis, Richard and Bob because I can’t tell. If I’m on it, if I have to listen to myself, I don’t have a good sense of whether or not it’s happening.

I sent it to them and they said, “Man, that shit sounds great. It’s a good DVD, so you should use it.” So we used it and I’m getting a lot of good feedback from people. I know those guys played their asses off and now I like the way I played on it too.

People are telling me they really like where we stretch the tunes. Sometimes you can’t put a twenty minute tune on a CD. I mean, it’s more difficult than on a live DVD where that’s kind of what you expect. You play fewer tunes and there’s more time to play them and stretch out. That’s what’s happening on the DVD.

Jaco Pastorius Big Band

Ben: You recently played on the Jaco Pastorius Big Band record The Word Is Out. What’s the vibe like in a situation where musicians come together to pay tribute to a common influence or former creative partner who has passed away?

Mike: I think it’s cool. Jaco and I were really good friends. So, whenever I get a chance to do anything that features him or his music I’ll go for it. It was a big band chart for this tune, “Sirabhorn”, which is a Pat Metheny tune. I used to hear Pat and Jaco when they were first getting together in Boston. Pat knew him from Miami and he brought him up to Boston when Pat was teaching at Berklee and he began to do gigs with Jaco for his first record.

They were doing gigs with Pat, Bob Moses, the drummer, and Jaco – just a trio – and they used to play that tune all the time so that’s why it was included on the tribute record. Jaco played on that cut on Pat’s first record. They did it, of course, as a trio and this was a big band version of it that I got a chance to play on. The tune is beautiful – it’s challenging and it’s got a lot of harmony in it.

It’s always a good feeling to play the music or to remember the history through the music that Jaco either played or that he wrote, music from somebody that you love and that was Jaco for me. I knew him as a friend; very much as a friend. We were really tight and we used to play together all the time. So, I always jump at the chance if anybody wants to do anything honoring his music and his musical contributions. It was really fun.

Four Generations of Miles

Mike Stern and His Pacifica

Ben: The other tribute project you’ve been doing for a couple of years is the Four Generations of Miles thing. Do you feel that the musicians working in this project work well together despite the generation differences?

Mike: Definitely. Maybe it works even better because it’s really fresh. I mean, basically, I’m the more modern sound in a way because, first of all, it’s electric guitar and, second, it’s my sound with that kind of stereo thing, a little bit of chorus, and a little bit of delay. I use that no matter what. I use it in a straight-ahead context and I use it if I’m rockin’ more.

We have a ball doing that. I think it sounded good on the record. It’s a live record and it keeps it sounding kind of fresh because you’d normally expect a piano to play in that context, or maybe a guitar but more straight with one amplifier, a fat jazz guitar. I love all that stuff too, of course. I’m way into it no matter what.

If it feels right and if it hits my heart, I dig it. I don’t care if it’s more straight-ahead jazz. Whether it’s more of a straight-ahead approach or if it’s rockin’ like crazy, if it hits my heart, I dig it. I don’t care about labels. I really don’t.

But those guys all play their asses off, like Ron Carter and, more recently, Buster Williams. He’s just kind of more available, but we don’t do it that often. We’ve been doing it maybe once or twice a year, kind of a week here and a week there. But the CD was done just right away.

No rehearsal – well, a twenty-minute rehearsal and then we just played standards that we all knew that Miles had played. We could almost pick any standard because he played all of them, [Laughs], and there are some that are very much him on that CD.

But that’s the way they record. They place the microphone in a good place and make it kind of move around so you’re all around the microphone and they go for it. So, that’s what happened. No mix, no nothing and it kind of came out cool. It’s very live sounding.

Working With Miles Davis

Ben: What’s the most important lesson that you learned from working with Miles Davis?

Mike: I’d say it’s the same lesson I learned from Mike Brecker, from Jaco Pastorius, from all those great players – Joe Henderson, Bob Berg, all those players with Steps Ahead, all the players I’ve been fortunate enough to play with: play from the heart. Miles used to do that like crazy and so have all the players that I’ve been really lucky to play with including all the different people in my bands. They all play from the heart.

When I hire musicians, I look for that first: every time they sit down do they go for it, and do they try to learn the music and get inside the song whatever the tune is. That’s one thing. The second thing is that Miles had a really open mind to music. He didn’t care about labels. He didn’t care about if it was straight-ahead jazz or it was Jimi Hendrix.

I used to hear him talk about playing with Charlie Parker and three hours after that he’d be talking about the first time he heard Jimi Hendrix and he was equally excited by both things. He was just following his heart. It wasn’t like, “Oh, one has more chords in it so it’s better music.” It was just like [imitates Miles