Jimmy Heath: Phone Interview with Ken Dryden, 2011

Here is the second of jazz journalist and radio host Ken Dryden’s conversations with Jimmy Heath (1926-2020). I will be publishing the earlier one soon. This telephone interview took place on September 6, 2011. Throughout, Jimmy focuses on the fact that will be 85 years old the next month, and that his career is going through what he calls a “remix”—that is, a lot of activity and new directions. At the very beginning, after Ken reminds him that they last spoke in 2005—which we will hear soon—they discuss Jimmy’s recent and ongoing projects, concerts, recordings, and compositions.

At 5:15, Heath talks about trombonist and multi-instrumentalist Michael Dease and also mentions saxophonist Sharel Cassity. He goes on to speak about the importance of bringing younger musicians onstage. As he says, “Most of my peers are gone.” Continuing in this vein, at 7:35 they refer to his years mentoring students at Queens College, where he taught from 1986 to 1998. Since then, trumpeter-composer Michael Mossman has directed the jazz program there, and Heath’s protégé Antonio Hart continues to teach saxophone.

At 9:15 Ken talks about hurricanes, and that leads to Heath talking about the “hard knocks” that he experienced. He’s referring to his time in prison during the late 1950s for heroin possession. Heath was very open to discussing this period, and he talked about it in his memoir. But for the purposes of this interview it wasn’t necessary to delve ito it.

At this time Jimmy still performed on occasion with his drummer brother Tootie, as he mentions at 10:10. Bassist Percy had passed away in 2005. Jimmy hoped to reissue an album with all three of them, entitled Marchin’ On. At 12:45, he tells a joke from pianist Cedar Walton. This leads to a discussion of Dizzy Gillespie. At 16:00, Heath mentions his involvement since the beginning with the Monk Institute’s educatiolnal program as well as its jazz competition. He mentions that they’d be moving to U.C.L.A. The program is still based there, but now it’s called the Herbie Hancock Institute. Jimmy was being showered with awards, and it was a busy time for him. He stresses his good luck.

He and his wife Mona would soon have their 52nd wedding anniversary (19:00), or as Jimmy tells it, they would be on “52nd Street.” “We all start on First Street,” he adds. And we’re all in the park—Central Park, that is—starting at 59th. But few make it out of the park—that is, past 110th Street, which is the upper end of Central Park. Ken and Jimmy wonder about Irving Berlin’s age—in fact, he lived to be 101. This leads to a discussion of Eubie Blake’s birth year (20:45). Ken is correct that although Blake famously celebrated his one-hundredth birthday, research after Blake died showed that he lived to be ninety-six. Jimmy Heath talks about being with Eubie on an airplane to Europe around 1973.

Jimmy remembers (23:00) having seen Glenn Miller “live,” and says it made an impression. It would have been nice to hear more about this. Then Ken asks him how he composes music, and he describes writing by hand, then entering the music into Finale software. ENJOY the interview!:

Now that you’ve heard the interview, you’ll find it very interesting to read the resulting article, which of course is not a full transcript. Ken has artfully shaped key parts of their conversation into an essay:

THANK YOU KEN for sharing these fine interviews with us. More to come!

All the best,

Lewis