Jamie Fox, Comfortable In Both Jazz And Blues Circles

New York guitarist Jamie Fox has performed with artists from organist Jack McDuff to folk singer Joan Baez.

In popular music, he has worked with artists like Blood, Sweat, and Tears to singer-songwriter Jackson Browne.  In television, he has done a lot of work for PBS. “In addition to his own recordings, he is featured on CDs by Ed Reed, Jen Chapin, and Stephan Crump’s Rosetta Trio”

JB:  Growing up in Southern California did you start with rock and pop music, and what inspired you to play jazz guitar?

JF:  I did start with rock and pop music. In retrospect, it was a glorious time for that. I was very excited by The Beatles and other British bands, but at the same time, there was Stax (Otis Redding was about as big for me as The Beatles), Motown, all sorts of great popular music, even some blues (BB King’s “The Thrill Is Gone”) and jazz. 

Music was important in my household. From a young age, I heard lots of jazz, blues, classical, and early rock music courtesy of my parents (the classical part) and an older brother who played saxophone at the time. I heard recordings of John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins, Eddie Harris, Billie Holiday, Chuck Berry, Fats Domino, and many more. I didn’t distinguish much between genres; it was all just cool music to me.

When I was about eleven my mother drove me into Hollywood to take weekly music lessons; I started with piano and electric bass (so I could be in bands with my buddies). The electric bass teacher was a jazz guitarist named Mark Cleary who encouraged me to switch to guitar, which I gladly did. My mother got me a beautiful new red Gibson ES 335 around that time. My teacher recommended records by Django, Charlie Christian, Joe Pass, Johnny Smith, Kenny Burrell, Gabor Szabo and others. I wasn’t really interested in trying to play that music, but I liked it a lot.

I didn’t think about playing jazz until I got to college at the University of California at Santa Barbara; I was inspired by bands like The Grateful Dead and Allman Brothers to get more and more into improvising. In particular, the way the Dead did some free improvising got me interested in free jazz, Ornette Colemen and later John Coltrane, and that led to exploring the wide world of that freer style of playing.

JB:  Did you study guitar at the university level and if so, what did you appreciate most about it? 

JF:  I didn’t study guitar at UCSB because it wasn’t an instrumental major at the time. They did have a jazz big band that I auditioned for. All I had to do was read some chord charts, but I couldn’t. I recognized the names of chords from my time with Mr. Cleary, but I didn’t get in the band. But at the same time, I played constantly with my friends outside of class, forming bands and playing gigs. I was a music major for a few years and did appreciate learning the beginnings of music theory.

JB:  You have performed with Brother Jack McDuff, Ernie Watts, Dr. John, and Gene Harris and all have impacted you I’m sure.  Talk about that.

JF:  By the time I moved to San Francisco in the mid 70’s I was fully engaged in learning to play jazz. I did well enough that a saxophonist friend, Dan Wilensky, recommended that I come down to sit in with Brother Jack McDuff, who needed a guitarist. It went okay and he said, “Alright, we leave next week.” That was my first road gig, and it was not the gentlest of introductions to that life, although McDuff was musically incredible and it was the strongest music I’d played up until then.

The other folks you mentioned were in the context of a jazz festival in Hawaii where I played in the house band with friends I’d made in San Francisco. They were one-off concerts, but a great chance to play with world-class musicians.

JB:  Talk about serving as Joan Baez’s Music Director from 1989-2000 and at the same time playing with Blood, Sweat & Tears. Was David Clayton-Thomas in BS&T at that time?

JF:  The Joan Baez gig came about when a singer I knew in San Francisco told me she was looking for a guitarist. I went down to Joan’s place in Palo Alto and played a bit and she hired me, with the provision that I have an acoustic guitar. I said, “of course I have one,” and went right away to the music store and bought one. Up until then I’d only ever had one electric guitar at a time. I was still mainly interested in playing jazz, mixed with blues and R&B, but it was a great experience. We did two European tours and one in the U.S, all of which last two or three months at a time.

It was a few years later, and after a move to New York, that I played with BS&T, another recommendation from a saxophone playing friend. David Clayton Thomas was still in the band. He was the only original member but we always had a great horn section and it was fun playing that music.

JB:  Talk about your 2007 album When I Get Home.

JF:  I’d been writing tunes since the San Francisco days, and once I was in New York I decided to record an album of my own music. It was fairly ambitious in that I had a lot of ground to cover and did some arranging and overdubbing, as well as having pianist Kenny Werner augment my trio on some of the songs. I’m happy with the way it came out.

JB:  Is I Wish your newest CD?  Tell us about it.

JF:  Yes, I Wish is my most recent recording. In contrast to When I Get Home I thought I’d stick to the trio format, with longtime collaborator Stephan Crump on bass and drummer Dan Reiser. Once again, we did mostly my tunes but included an impromptu take on the standard Beautiful Love. It’s funny, but with all the time I spend working on bebop and Standards, I’ve rarely recorded any. I love a wide range of music, not just jazz, and I always wanted to play everything that I hear that I like, or at least invoke the flavor of it. That’s what I try to do with my own music.

JB:  What do you appreciate most about the Gibson ES-335 guitar you use? 

JF:  The 335 is a great guitar, I like its versatility and feel I can get a good sound for whatever music I’m playing, whether it’s jazz, blues, funk, or whatever. I played it on my first CD, but for the second I used my Gibson CS 336, a very similar style of guitar. I like the smaller body size of the 336. I go back and forth between the two, sometimes going a few years before switching again for no particular reason. I also have a 1959 Gibson ES-175 that I use on some gigs.

JB:  Talk about the jazz scene where you live and how you are able to make a living playing music there.

JF:  Well, I’ve lived in New York City since 1996. I think everyone knows how much music is going on here and and how many great musicians there are. Currently, most of my work is teaching, although I do some playing around town. My most consistent gigging and recording association is with Jen Chapin, a very talented singer and songwriter. It’s not jazz per se, but the music is very sophisticated. I can make a living here because of the teaching, but I get out to play whenever possible. 

Check out Jamie Fox play…

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