Lou Donaldson: Immersed in the Blues

When it comes to a soulful jazz groove, it just doesn’t get much groovier than Lou Donaldson, whose blues-drenched alto saxophone has been a distinctive voice in jazz for more than six decades. Charlie Parker was a major influence on Donaldson’s sound, as he, in turn, was on generations of saxophonists who followed him. Donaldson’s early recordings with organist Jimmy Smith in the late 1950s led to the widespread popularity of groove-filled jazz in the ’60s and ’70s.An important moment in Donaldson’s long career was when Alfred Lion, co-founder of Blue Note Records, heard him at Minton’s Playhouse in New York and invited him to record for the label. Donaldson played a key role in getting many musicians their debut sessions with Blue Note, including Grant Green, Blue Mitchell, Ray Barretto, Curtis Fuller, Donald Byrd and Horace Silver. A Night At Birdland, which Donaldson recorded with Art Blakey, is considered one of the first in the hard-bop genre.

During the ’50s, Donaldson spent much of his time as a bandleader touring with a group that featured organist John Patton. He began using the organ-saxophone format exclusively and has gone on to employ a variety of organists over the decades, including Dr. Lonnie Smith (on Donaldson’s acclaimed 1967 album Alligator Boogaloo), Jack McDuff, Charles Earland, Leon Spencer, Pat Bianchi and Akiko Tsuruga.

Donaldson was inducted into the International Jazz Hall of Fame in 1996 and was named a 2013 NEA Jazz Master. Today, at age 87, he entertains audiences around the world with concerts that are soulful, thoroughly swinging and steeped in the blues.

His performances on Sept. 22 at the 2013 Monterey Jazz Festival were preceded by a spirited onstage interview hosted by jazz journalist and producer Willard Jenkins. What follows are edited excerpts from the interview, presented as part of the NEA Jazz Masters Live program, which supports educational and outreach activities.

Willard Jenkins: Lou, tell us how it is that blues and soul are always at the core of your playing. How, exactly, did you become so thoroughly immersed in the blues?
Lou Donaldson: My father was an AME Zion minister, and he listened to church music, spiritual music, for many, many years. And that’s related to the blues. After I started playing, I heard nothing but blues in the South. That’s all we heard down there. When I was in the U.S. Navy, I heard Charlie Parker, and he was one of the greatest blues players of all time. I tried to develop my style like he did, and that’s where it came from.

Jenkins: As is the case with many reed players, you actually started out on the clarinet at the tender age of 9. How did you eventually choose to play the alto saxophone?
Donaldson: Well, it’s a long story [audience laughs].

Jenkins: We’ve got time — let’s hear it!
Donaldson: In 1945, I was attending A&T College in Greensboro, North Carolina. And I got drafted into the Navy. You know, I didn’t volunteer; They drafted me. [laughs] When I got into the Navy, I was an excellent clarinet player. I was the number-one clarinet player at the college — playing marches and classical music and stuff like that.

There were a lot of musicians in the Navy — at least 200 musicians. And a lot of them had come from New York, Chicago and California — from big cities, and they brought their instruments. Now, I’m from North Carolina, and I see all these guys and they walk with a hump in their back. [audience laughs] All of them had this hair, they put lye in there. And they straightened it. They just looked like musicians. [laughs].So when they said, “Yeah, I was with Duke for a year,” and “I worked for Count Basie,” I believed everything they told me. [audience laughs] So when the guy asked, “Who wants to join the band,” I didn’t even put my hand up because I knew I couldn’t compete with these guys, you know, because I’m from the country.

They put me into the radar pool because I’d been to college. When I took the intelligence test, I knew all the mathematics and all that stuff. I must have scored pretty good. And I was going to be one of the first black radar men in history. Because up until then, a black man couldn’t be anything in the Navy but a cook or a steward’s mate.

I was walking by the band room one day, and I hear this squeaking and squeaking and squeaking. I’m like, “What’s all that?” I stuck my head in the door, “Who the fuck is that making all that noise?” And [the band director] said, “Whatchu talkin’ ’bout?” And I said, “Man, that’s the worst clarinet I ever heard.” [laughter] I said, “Give me that thing.” He said OK. So he put some music up — you know, a Barnum & Bailey march or something. I knew everything because I played this in college.

So I played. He said, “What’s your name? You’re the best clarinet player I’ve heard. You play saxophone, too?” I said, “Yeah.” I lied. [laughter] I had never touched a saxophone. But he didn’t know. He gave me a saxophone and a clarinet and said, “Take this back to the barracks and just start practicing. I’ll call you when I can get you in the band.” He called me about two weeks later, and by that time, I had the saxophone under my belt. And that’s how I got in the band. [applause]

Jenkins: Tell us about your experience at North Carolina A&T.
Donaldson: They had a wonderful band, and the instructor was one of the greatest black violinists in history. He’d been at Oberlin Conservatory, and he was a great teacher.

I got in that band, and one thing I want to emphasize right now: You couldn’t play jazz. If they caught you playing jazz, they [kicked] you out of the band. Well, one time they caught me practicing in the band room. The music instructor and the dean heard me, and the dean knew music. He knew I was playing something by Benny Goodman; that wasn’t no march. [laughter]

They wanted to know why. I was good at clarinet, so they didn’t want to get rid of me. But they said, “You can’t practice anymore in the band room.” So I’d go in back of the dormitory in summertime and practice out in a field.

In the wintertime, I’d go in the shower room because nobody’s taking showers in the winter. One day I was in there and somebody wanted to take a shower. His name was Arthur Merriweather. He was a tuba player in the band, too. And he said, “What are you doing in here, man? Get out of here.” And I said, “I’m practicing.” And he went back and told all the guys in the band. He said, “You got a new name for Louis.” They called me the “shit house” clarinet .[laughter] I got mad. I told all of them, “One day, all of you guys will have to pay to see me play!” [applause]

Jenkins: Describe what your first encounter with Charlie Parker was like.
Donaldson: My first encounter with Bird was unbelievable. I went to a place [in Chicago] where Gene Ammons played. Ammons had a great band, of course, everyone in there was using vitamins [laughter] … Vitamin X.

They had a great band: Ike Day, Jodie Christian on piano, Shep Shepherd on bass. And this guy was laying over in the corner, sleeping. He looked like a bum. Finally somebody came in there and said, “Can you get him to play one?” I’m lookin’ around. I didn’t know who they’re talkin’ about. So finally I went over there and woke him up. Somebody gave him a saxophone. And man, let me tell you. …

Jenkins: He didn’t have one?
Donaldson: Gave him a saxophone. He didn’t have a saxophone. His saxophone was in the pawn shop. And, man, you talk about playing a horn. I had never heard anything like that in my life.

Jenkins: So when you heard that, I guess it was like an epiphany. What did that make you do, when you heard that kind of majesty on the alto saxophone?
Donaldson: That made me almost go crazy, because the tone seems like it would cut right through your chest. Right here, that sharp tone. This cat was playin’ some stuff! And I had never heard nothing like that before. I said, “Who the hell is that?” Guy says, “That’s Charlie Parker.” I said, “Charlie Parker? Who does he work for?”

He didn’t work for nobody. He’s a junkie, you know, picks up the beat and he can play it, but he ain’t got a job with nobody. Eventually, he got to go with the Billy Eckstine band. But it was amazing. … When I first heard Charlie Parker, I knew that was something nobody else could do, and I was going to be one of the first ones to get on board with it.

Jenkins: Talk about how you got started recording for Blue Note Records.
Donaldson: I was working at Minton’s. Alfred Lion bought the business and brought Ike Quebec back with him. Now, Ike was a great saxophone player. And Ike knew music, and he was savin’ Alfred Lion from makin’ mistakes. He really couldn’t play music. Alfred didn’t know anything about music, ultimately.

Anyway, he said, “We want to record you, see. Can you play like Charlie Parker?” That was a stupid question. So I said, “Yeah! I play like Charlie Parker!” [laughter] Because I wanted a record date. That’s how I got on Blue Note.

Jenkins: Tell us about your first recording session.
Donaldson: The first date I made was with the Milt Jackson Quartet. And that group wasn’t the Modern Jazz Quartet. It was Jimmy Clark, Milt Jackson, John Lewis and Percy Heath. I made the original record “Bag’s Groove.” Some people don’t know it, but I know it.

Jenkins: “Bag’s Groove,” major blues. A significant part of your career, and your playing, has been about the blues.
Donaldson: Right. Blues.

Jenkins: For you, is blues the true essence of jazz?
Donaldson: Blues is jazz. If it wasn’t blues, it sounds like other music. A note is a note, but when you play the note with a blues feeling, it sounds different than other notes.

I’ve heard a million guitar players play the shit out of the guitar. But none of them sound like B.B. King. You know why? Because of the way he bends his notes on the guitar.

Jenkins: When you hear young people who are trying to play jazz, but they don’t have that same kind of blues perspective, what would you say to them?
Donaldson: Well, I’d say go somewhere and find a day job. [laughter] You’re not gonna play no jazz. You’re not gonna play. You can’t play it.

The blues. If you never had ’em, you can’t play ’em. You can’t play blues when you’re at home and Mama and Papa are payin’ the rent. You can’t play the blues.

When you get married and you have two or three kids and the first of the month is coming up, you start feelin’ ’em! You watch musicians, you listen to ’em when they’re in their 20s or 30s, and listen to ’em when they get to be 50 and 60. There’s a different sound in that music.

Jenkins: Your sentiment is that a youngster probably hasn’t lived enough life to really feel the blues?
Donaldson: That’s right. Sufferin’ music. We call blues “sufferin’ music.” If you never suffered, you can’t play the blues.

Jenkins: But there are different ways to play the blues: happy, sad, funky.
Donaldson: It’s the same feeling in there. You listen to Charlie Parker. He plays Kansas City blues, and then he plays “Cherokee,” and you hear the blues in that. It’s just the way he phrases it, the way he plays it.

Jenkins: So, blues is actually …
Donaldson: It comes from here [points to his heart], not here [points to his head]. DB