Gregory Porter Storytellerthe by Allen Morrison / Photography by Jimmy & Dena Katz

Gregory Porter StorytellerThe By Allen Morrison / Photography by Jimmy & Dena Katz

ONLY A FEW MINUTES INTO Gregory Porter’s homecoming gig The at Subculture—a brick-lined singer-songwriter basement performance space overcame many obstacles on Bleecker Street in New York’s East Village—the on the road audience begins cheering. to fame Porter, natty in a beige sport coat, black vest, bow tie and pocket hankie, topped o by his ever-present head stocking and black hat, is belting out the €nal chorus of his song “Painted On Canvas” backed by his rhythm section and, on this Monday evening, three horn players. photo caption PHOTO CREDIT PHOTO GREGORY PORTER

He has started the song, which prietor of a local coee shop. As we he describes as an impassioned plea walk to the café that a"ernoon, near- for mutual respect, in a re!ective ly every person we pass says hello to mood, but now, a"er two increas- Porter; he’s like the mayor. When ingly urgent horn solos by his side- not performing all over the world, men, he wails the line, “Can I use Porter lives there with his wife of a the colors I choose?,” stretching the year-and-a-half, Victoria, whom he last syllable of the word colors over met while touring Russia, and their several bars with a soulful !ourish. 9-month-old son, Demyan. A fan shouts out, “Yes!” as a wave What follows are excerpts from of applause sweeps over the crowd. the interview, including comments Porter has been singing for a grand on his album Liquid Spirit , to be total of three minutes. released by Blue Note on Sept. 17. $e show has a heartfelt, celebra- tory vibe. $is is the €rst time Porter, DownBeat: A lot of folks at last night’s gig seemed to know you and 41, has given a headlining perfor- your material. mance in the city in months, and it sold out quickly. Only a couple of Gregory Porter: It’s interest- years ago—before the critical acclaim ing. I haven’t performed in New and the world tours—Porter played York in months. And sometimes a regular $ursday gig at Smoke, an that energy can build up. But I’m Upper West Side supper club where he always surprised by [the sell-outs]. packed them in for three sets a night I’m like, “Where do these people with no cover charge. Some of the fans come from?” But there are some from Smoke (as well as older fans from friends from Smoke, and some fans his house gig at the late St. Nick’s Pub who’ve been with me since St. Nick’s in Harlem) have now crowded into Pub. A lady I didn’t know told me this showcase at Subculture. I had to do “Painted On Canvas.” “Can I get an amen?” Porter I enjoy that song; it’s like a palate says, grinning. cleanser for me. Porter’s updating of a classic soul-jazz sound has attracted a That song has a melody that sticks to host of famous admirers, includ- your ribs. ing Dianne Reeves and Wynton Yeah. And however cryptic the Marsalis. Audiences instinctively respond to the some 20 years ago, Kenyatta recalls, “He was a meaning of the lyric, I’m essentially just talking pure charisma of this imposing, former San Diego young person with an old soul.” In 1998, when about mutual respect. $at’s something that I State linebacker who is not afraid to show his sen- Porter was gigging occasionally and working as a think comes across in a lot of my lyrics. People sitive side. A natural showman, he projects big chef, Kenyatta introduced him to his friend, !ut- respond when I say, “Can I choose the colors emotions fearlessly, singing with the fervor of a ist Hubert Laws; at the time Kenyatta was arrang- I use?” and “Do I have some say what you use?” storefront preacher. He comes by it honestly; both ing and producing a Laws tribute album to Cole. Allow me to de€ne who I am. Don’t look at me and his parents were ministers. When Laws heard him sing, he decided to put say, “$is is what you are.” I am more than people Although Porter has great technical strengths him on “Smile,” the album’s only vocal track. Laws say that I am. as a singer—a round, sonorous baritone, eortless says, “Gregory not only had a wonderful voice but intonation and clear elocution—his appeal is not a certain charisma, a glow that gave that track What was it like for you growing up in Bakersfield? purely musical. It’s more about €lling an ancient something special. I’m very happy I got him on Bakers€eld is its own thing. It’s de€nitely not human need for a storyteller. Porter is a natural that record before he became so expensive!” the Bay Area or L.A. I think about some of the sto- one, and something even rarer in jazz: a genuine $at recording led to Porter being cast in the ries of my childhood, and it doesn’t seem quite singer-songwriter. Tony-nominated Broadway musical It Ain’t right that it was California. His r&b- and gospel-tinged music and o"en Nothing But the Blues in 1999 and more theater impressionistic lyrics pour forth out of his life work, including the Cole show. His singing career Was it very segregated? experience as an athlete, chef, singer, actor and really took o a"er Motéma Records President Yes. When we moved there, it was to an all- playwright. Before his recording career took Jana Herzen saw him and his band at St. Nick’s white neighborhood. And most of my experi- o, Porter spent 10 years in musical theater. He Pub in 2009. Porter’s €rst Motéma album, Water , ences were beautiful—good friends, eating balo- wrote and starred in a well-received play titled earned him a Best Jazz Vocal Grammy nomina- ney sandwiches, swimming in the pool. But when Nat “King” Cole and Me , which told the true story tion and impressive reviews and sales. His sopho- you’re the €rst black friend of a white kid, you of Porter’s early life. As a boy, he was soothed by more release, Be Good , was another solid hit with get this stu … it’s not racism but curiosity. You Cole’s voice, especially the song “Nature Boy,” both critics and the public, gaining hundreds of know, feeling your hair, and “Does this wash o?” with which he identi€ed. Cole’s tender baritone thousands of YouTube views for several songs My mother knew we would have to be like little became a substitute for the voice of his absent including “Real Good Man;” that song secured ambassadors, so she would say, “Let ’em touch … father, who had divorced his mother before he was him a second Grammy nomination, this time for and then say, ‘It’s cool, isn’t it?’ But don’t let them born. $e play, which had a successful two-month best Traditional R&B Performance. $e success of put you down about anything.” run in Denver, included his uncanny evocation of the €rst two albums and his growing reputation But that can happen as well. No matter what Cole on stage singing his hits; it also contained six as a powerhouse live performer were key factors you did, if you won in sports, if you hit a home run, original Porter compositions. in his wins in the 2013 DownBeat Critics Poll: He there was one way the kids could get you. It was, His €rst big break came in his mid-twenties was named Rising Star—Jazz Artist and Rising “Well at least I’m not black.” And it would hurt you when Kamau Kenyatta, the San Diego saxophon- Star—Male Vocalist. every time. ist, educator and arranger, became his musi- Porter re!ected on his career during an inter- I know it sounds like something out of the cal mentor and, in some ways, a surrogate father. view at the three-story brownstone in Brooklyn’s 1960s South, but they burned a cross in our front Kenyatta has gone on to produce or co-produce Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood that he yard when I was 8 or 10. $is may sound strange, all of Porter’s albums. When he €rst met Porter co-owns with his brother—an actor and the pro- but I was fascinated by the construction of the

28 DOWNBEAT OCTOBER 2013

GREGORY PORTER

cross—it was so well done. And they wrapped kerosene-soaked, ripped-up jeans around it; and wire wrapped around that. And the wood—it The Value of Loyalty was jointed so well. It took time. $at’s what got to me as a kid—it wasn’t sloppily done. on Was, the veteran producer and help from trumpeter Curtis Taylor—has been now president of Blue Note Records, together since they met at jam sessions at Har- How did your mother handle it? Dremembered the first time he heard lem’s storied St. Nick’s Pub five years ago. His [sighs ] She grew up in Texas and Louisiana, Gregory Porter. allegiance to them has yielded audible bene- so she could deal with it … but she knew it was “I was driving in Los Angeles, listening fits, providing him with a distinctive and flex- Bakers€eld—this interesting little transplan- to the local jazz station,” he recalled. “And I ible soul-gospel-jazz sound that works equally tation of the South. … But when I say “they” heard that song ‘Illusion’ from his first album well in the studio and on world stages. burned a cross—it was a [certain] group of peo- [Water (Motéma)]. It was actually the lyric that The North Carolina-bred Crawford is Por- ple. And again, the majority, the seasoning of my grabbed me first: ‘I’ve been trying to find my ter’s secret weapon. “He’s a unique player, life was pretty pleasant. It was throwing oranges footing / On the slopes of the illusion / That I and he knows a lot of songs,” Porter said. “He’s in the alley, because there were so many of them lost it when you left me.’ It took me a second played in the black gospel church, played with falling from the trees. to unravel the line. I thought, ‘Jesus, that’s The Four Tops. When I want to go to a place, Yes, I have been called “nigger” so many times brilliant writing.’ I loved the fact that he was there’s no conversation—he just knows how to that the word was defused; it didn’t mean any- telling the story so conversationally. And then, do it. He knows how to go to that Church of thing to me. And in high school, I couldn’t take of course, he has incredible technique, yet he God in Christ sound, he knows how to go to a the girl I wanted to go with to the prom. She was never uses it for the sake of demonstrating Motown sound.” white. Her family, just as straight-faced as could technique—it’s all done in the name of story- be, said to my face, “Cameron is special, and she Gregory Porter (left) and telling. He writes these incredible songs, then pianist Chip Crawford at cannot go to the prom with a black person.” Freihofer’s Saratoga delivers them with relaxed, unaffected direct- Jazz Festival on June 29 But my mother was just so strong. She was ness. There aren’t many folks who do that.” on it. Five boys and three girls. Any time some- Not long after that, Was slipped into the body got in our face, she was in our face push- New York venue Smoke, sat down alone at a ing in the other direction. “Your skin is beauti- table and watched Porter captivate the crowd ful. You are just as good—not better—but just as through three sets. “It was maybe the best good as anybody.” show I’d seen in 20 years,” he said. Signing Porter was one of the first decisions he made Your mother has a presence in quite a few of your songs. Tell me about that. upon becoming president of Blue Note. Porter’s sound brings to mind jazz and She was a spiritual force, so much so that she soul artists like Joe Williams, Donny Hathaway could be hard to understand. I have a song on and Bill Withers, but also a wide range of Af- the new album, “When Love Was King”; she’s in rican-American singers including Les McCann, that. It’s Demyan’s bedtime story. “I remember Lou Rawls, Leon Thomas, and Eddie Jefferson when love was king … of hungry children, €rst (“Moody’s Mood for Love,” for which Jefferson ADAMMCCULLOUGH he’d think / To pull their lives from the brink.” wrote the indelible lyrics, was an early inspi- Co-producer Kenyatta said, “Greg and I once watched my mother pick up a homeless ration, he has said). His occasional forays into Chip have a very intimate musical relationship, man who had urinated on himself, and then put politics are reminiscent of songs by Curtis May- and a lot comes from what happens between him in the front seat of our new Cadillac. For her field and Abbey Lincoln. But perhaps his most those two musicians.” Kenyatta helps arrange it was just matter-of-fact. She cleaned him up; he important influence is that of his early idol, Nat horns and rhythm parts, “but Greg is very in- stayed with us for two weeks. “King” Cole, whose warmth, melodic gifts and volved in the arrangements,” he said. “He’s I remember it so well. I used to have these excellent diction he echoes. like a pitcher shaking off signs from the catch- mirrored sunglasses. When we got that car, I Liquid Spirit , Porter’s first album for Blue er—I’ll make suggestions, but he knows exactly used to sit in the passenger seat and act like my Note, is, like his previous two albums, mostly what he wants.” mother was the chaueur. I think I was 7. And composed of strong original writing, including Crawford agreed. “I might flesh out a she stops the car and tells me to get in the back- the joyous gospel of the title cut, the neo-Phil- chord here or there,” he said, “but it’s not like seat. And she puts this urine-soaked man in the adelphia soul of “Hey Laura” and several dra- I totally arrange anything for Greg—he’s got it front seat and proceeds to drive to our house. matic ballads, including the standout “Water pretty much in his noggin.” And I’m like, “Really?” We don’t do that now. Under Bridges.” There are three covers—Lin- At this stage of his career, Porter can work But she did. Up till the day she died. [On her coln’s swinging “Lonesome Lover,” an oddly with more celebrated sidemen if he choos- deathbed] she said, “Hand me my purse.” She refreshing revival of Ramsey Lewis’ 1965 clas- es. “Look,” he said about the jazz greats, “I’m was trying to get $600 to some family who need- sic “The In Crowd” and a stark, emotional ren- going to play with them, I do play with them, ed it to pay their rent. Now I understand. … She dition of Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne’s “I Fall and I hope to record 100 albums, much of that knows she’s dying. And the very last thing she In Love Too Easily.” with different and unusual musicians.” But, cit- wants to do, is to give. I think about … how dan- Album producer Brian Bacchus, who also ing their unique sound and comfort level with gerously close we came to stopping her from giv- produced the Grammy-nominated Be Good each other, he remains loyal to his band. ing being the last thing she did. But we let her do (Motéma), likened Porter to artists from a previ- “I keep running across masters who say, it. $at was her essence. She was powerful. ous generation of soul songwriters. “To just call ‘Stick with this group.’ Harold Mabern told Greg a jazz singer would be too limiting,” he me, ‘Stick with Chip.’ We opened for Herbie Onstage last night, you said that you have your father’s voice, and maybe a small bit of whatever said. “It doesn’t speak to him as an artist. Greg Hancock, and he was like, ‘Y’all got a vibe—just else he had. What did you mean? is writing stuff that’s very much ‘now,’ but it keep going.’ Sanctioned by Herbie and Harold really is tied to a golden age of songwriting.” Mabern—that’s pretty cool. And [my band- [laughs ] I didn’t want to say I’m just such a Porter’s band—pianist Chip Crawford, mates] know me. When we play ‘Mother’s charismatic person, but he was a charismatic drummer Emanuel Harrold, bassist Aaron Song,’ there’s a sensitivity. They know about dude. I learned a lot about him at his funeral. My James, alto saxophonist Yosuke Sato and tenor my mother, my voice and my story.” mother and he had three children together, but saxophonist Tivon Pennicott, with occasional —Allen Morrison they divorced when she was pregnant with me, so I never knew him.

30 DOWNBEAT OCTOBER 2013 you know when he says that, he’s gonna talk for ensemble class. … Kamau pulled me to the side another half hour [ laughs ]. A lot of times I’ll say a"er class and said, “Man, you got something—I that when it’s time for the encore, and the black want to help you and work with you.” At our €rst audience all understand that. meeting, he made six or seven charts of music in my key; songs that he thought would be good for Did you ever get a chance to spend time with him? me to learn. You hang around that communi- No, not much. … When he was in the hospi- ty and see where you €t in. I knew I had a unique tal, I gave my father an opportunity to say some- voice in terms of my style, my tone, my upbring- thing to me that would send me on my way in life ing. At some point I felt the comfort to bring my and make me feel good about him. And he just gospel understanding into jazz. … $en I found totally failed the test. I told him, “I really enjoy songs that were right in my wheelhouse. singing. I want to be a singer.” And he said, “Aaah, there’s a lotta good singers out there.” I just threw Like what? him this so"ball, and he totally missed it. I sang a Like, “$e Work Song.” “Moanin’.” $at hard- song for him there in his hospital room. All he had bop stu that was taken directly from the church. to do was just say, “Yep!” But, who knows what $at helped me realize that one of the pillars of kind of suering he was under at that time. $at [jazz] was where I was coming from as well. Yes, moment I had with my father is represented in the there’s European tradition; there’s blues tradition; play [ Nat “King” Cole and Me ]. At 30 years old, I there’s gospel tradition. I found my place in it. needed an apology from my father. He was dead, so I couldn’t get one. So I created one. And he That strong Southern soul and gospel element in Did your father sing? your work sounds so new, for some reason, in 2013, apologized to me onstage. I know it sounds crazy. but it’s really not. He did. He was that style of preacher that sang his message. It doesn’t sound crazy; it sounds like theater. $is is what [the song] “Liquid Spirit” is about. Yeah. And it felt real. I forgave my father during “Un-reroute the river / Let the dammed water be / So you come by the “preaching” part of your show the run of that [play]. And I was able to move on. $ere’s some people down the way that’s thirsty / honestly. (Porter describes his early musical explorations Let the liquid spirit free.” $ere’s a spirit, an ener- It’s just a little playful thing I do, but in a way under the tutelage of U.C. San Diego professors gy and a soulful expression that people want, and it’s like going home. Black audiences get it imme- George Lewis, the trombonist and composer, and once they hear it, they’re like … “Aaah!” I’ve heard diately. $ere’s a thing that happens at the end of a Kamau Kenyatta, both of whom saw the young people say—and I’m not saying they’re talking service when you’ve been in church for three hours Porter’s musical potential, and gigging around about me—“Where can I €nd more of this, more and everybody’s ready to go home. $e preacher town with Kenyatta and San Diego jazz legends of your kind of music, this sound?” Something has leans on the pulpit and says, “I’m not gonna hold Daniel Jackson and Gilbert Castellanos.) been missing in their ear. If I supply a little of it, you long … but I got one more thing to say.” And Kamau was substituting for George in a jazz they say, “I want some more of that.” DB