Bruce Hornsby talks Christian McBride, Tupac and the TD James Moody Jazz Festival

by | Oct 26, 2015 | Coming Up, Culture, Events, Music

Over the past three decades, Bruce Hornsby has done a lot of amazing things with a lot of amazing artists. With The Range, he had a Grammy-winning, multi-platinum album called The Way It Is. As a keyboardist, he’s done multiple tours with The Grateful Dead. As a songwriter, he’s written for Huey Lewis & The News and had songs sampled by hip-hop artists like Tupac Shakur, Snoop Dogg, E-40 and Mase. 2011 saw the release of a musical that Bruce co-wrote with Chip deMatteo and Clay McLeod Chapman called SCKBSTD. Beyond all of that, he’s toured and recorded for on-going collaborations with bluegrass icon Ricky Skaggs, Dead bassist Phil Lesh, guitarist Pat Metheny and double bass virtuoso Christian McBride. And interestingly, Bruce’s most recent high-profile project was scoring Spike Lee’s portion of the hit video game NBA 2K16.

Bruce’s next concert in the area will be on November 12th at New Jersey Performing Arts Center. Appearing as part of the TD James Moody Jazz Festival alongside the aforementioned Christian McBride, this is billed as a “one on one” performance. Other performers in the renowned series at NJPAC include Wynton Marsalis, Tony Bennett and Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings. More information on the festival as a whole can be found at http://www.njpac.org/moodyjazz.

In support of the festival, I had the opportunity to conduct some Q&A with Bruce. Although Bruce is a 13-time Grammy nominee, his answers implied there to be no intention of slowing down anytime soon. I did not have the opportunity to ask Bruce about his interests outside of performing – which including endowment of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program at the University of Miami’s Frost School of Music, having an ownership interest in the radio station WTYD in Virginia, and having his own signature series of pianos through Steinway & Sons – so hopefully another interview opportunity presents itself in the future.

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Is it true that you and Christian McBride met through baseball legend Tony La Russa?

Bruce Hornsby: No, I introduced Christian to Tony, about nine or ten years ago. Tony and I have been friends since 1998, when he asked me to play a benefit for him. And he’s still asking!!

For someone who hasn’t seen you and Christian live together, what should they expect? 

B: I don’t know what to expect, so I can’t enlighten anyone. I’ll bring some music to play, and Christian, having perfect pitch, will be able to play all of it.

What do you remember from the first concert you ever played in New York City?

B: I played The Bottom Line in the late summer of 1986 with my group The Range. Shawn Colvin opened for me; she told me this a few years later when we met.

You’ve collaborated with tons of top players over the years. Is there someone you haven’t yet collaborated with eventually would like to? 

B: My phone literally has not stopped ringing for thirty years, mostly with calls from musicians wanting to collaborate on something — writing, playing on a record, touring together, guesting on some special concert, etc. So I’m not really out there looking for more at this point.

Unlike a lot of your peers, you have never done a duets album. Is that something you’d ever consider doing?

B: No.

Do you have a new album in the works? 

B: We’re just about finished with our new Noisemakers band record, an album of songs written and played on the Appalachian dulcimer. And I’m not kidding!

As strange as it is to say, a lot of people initially learned about you from the Tupac sample, which was around a decade and a half after “The Way It Is” was first a hit. Did that usage lead to new fans coming to your shows? 

B: No, it almost surely did not. I love what he did with it, and I love the checks!

Tupac wasn’t the only high-profile sample of your career. Did you ever figure out the source of your sampling? Like, was there a particular producer who turned other artists onto you. I ask because Billy Squier is one of the most sampled artists, yet his music often has little to do with what it was sampled for.

B: I just figure the artist likes the song, or a section of a song, and decides to use it in their composition. Simple as that for me.

Have you ever encountered the actor/writer David Hornsby, best known for playing Cricket on It’s Always Sunny On Philadelphia?

B: I’ve known David since he was a little kid, because his dad C.W. Hornsby is my first cousin. So David is also my cousin. Whenever I would play Houston, where they lived, the family would come to the shows and the young boys would get a good dose of the traveling circus that is rock band touring. He’s having a great career in Los Angeles, as is his older brother Charlie.

In general, there something that you wish more people knew about you? 

B: If people only know my first two or three records, they really know very little about what I do. But that’s fine; if they come to see me, they will find out.

Do you have a professional accomplishment that you’re most proud of? 

B: The never-ending and ever-expanding number of collaborations with great musicians and songwriters is an area of my career that I think may be special.

When you’re not busy with your career, how do you like to spend your free time?

B: I’m a family guy, so I love spending time with my wife Kathy and our two sons Russell and Keith, students at the University of Oregon and Louisiana State University, respectively.

Do you have a favorite album of 2015 that you can recommend to our readers?

B: I love Olivia Chaney’s album on Nonesuch.

-by Darren Paltrowitz

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