MICHAEL MAYO BONES “One of my priorities with this album was to make something that resonated with me. Because, for a really long time, I was only focused on what would resonate with other people. But I found that I don’t want people to resonate with things that don’t feel truthful to me. I want the people that gravitate to my music to do so because it comes from a place of honesty.” –– Michael Mayo On Bones, his new album release on Artistry Music/Mack Avenue Music Group, virtuosic vocalist/composer and international performer Michael Mayo establishes his place as one of the most acclaimed and versatile voices in music today. But from the time he was small, there was no doubt that Michael would take a musical path through life. The gifted child of two “first-call” L.A. session musicians, he was literally born into the business and spent his childhood listening to and learning, up close, from some of the greatest musical artists of the 20th century, all of them friends of the family. “My mom is a singer, my dad is a saxophonist/multi-instrumentalist. I grew up in the studio watching them do their thing,” he remembers. “They would go on tour, sing with people like Whitney Houston, Luther Vandross, Earth Wind & Fire, Stevie Wonder, Diana Ross, Michael Jackson…all the greats.” Young Michael was also soaking up plenty of recorded music at home. Early on, he says, it was soul and R&B singers like Aretha Franklin, Donny Hathaway and Brandy who captivated him and would inform his musical growth. Other artists who resonated with him were D’Angelo, Jill Scott and the unparalleled Bobby McFerrin, whose genre-defying, multi-part a cappella compositions would be a discernable influence on his work. As he grew older, Michael continued absorbing and being inspired by an ever-expanding range of musical genres –– from jazz to neo-soul to electronica. Already displaying talent as a gifted singer, himself, he began exploring the classic jazz vocalists. “I listened to a lot of Ella Fitzgerald –– she was the first jazz singer I ever listened to, and she was the one that really made me fall in love with the music,” he says. “Sarah Vaughan, Mel Tormé, Nat King Cole.” “You know,” he continues, “I talk about all the singers I listened to back then, but instrumentalists had a really powerful influence on me, as well. People like Louis Armstrong, Freddie Hubbard, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderly, Charlie Parker.” These and other jazz greats taught Michael the power of improvisation, helping build the connection between “my ear and my instrument,” as he says. Throughout his life, that goal of creating a seamless connection between what he heard and what he could sing would be a constant force, propelling his drive toward musical growth. He laughs when he says he would often envy instrumentalists, especially horn players. “For me, as a singer, one of the things that is the most obvious but also weirdly elusive is that we don’t have buttons like instrumentalists do. If an instrumentalist wants to play the note ‘C’ on their instrument, that note is going to come out, regardless of whether they hear the note in their head ahead of time or not. But for me, as a singer, if I don’t know what the note sounds like before I sing it, then it’s not going to sound right.” Michael says he has worked hard to “develop a sixth sense for what something is going to feel like, and what it’s going to sound like before you sing it. It makes up for the fact that we don’t have those ‘buttons.’ It’s all about remembering the sensation of a sound.” By high school, Michael was already a prodigious vocalist. When it came time for college, a friend told him he should consider applying to the famed New England Conservatory of Music (NEC). “I had never even heard of it,” he recalls. “But when I went there and saw the place and learned about its deep musical legacy, I had this certainty that this was where I needed to be.” Upon graduating from NEC, Michael went on to become only the third vocalist accepted into the prestigious Thelonious Monk Institute in its 20 year history. It was there that he began what would become a long relationship with Herbie Hancock, leading to the legendary pianist/composer inviting Michael to tour South America with him in 2018. “There are so many words I could use to describe Herbie and the impact he’s had –– and continues to have –– on my life,” says Michael. “Even if I hadn’t gone to the Institute, or never gone on tour with him, just the music he’s made over the years has been such a big influence on me. And the tour was such a dream,” Michael jokes, “I sometimes question if it really even happened.” The appreciation for technology that Michael first developed in college, when he got his first looper pedal, was enhanced by time spent with Hancock, and it continues to play a big role in his musical expression. He moves with ease between interpreting classics with a small group or big band, to creating experimental and improvisational solo compositions that can have as many as 250 looped and layered vocal lead and choral harmony parts, such as on “Stolen Moments,” from the new album. Michael is similarly skilled at merging aspects of different musical genres, or ignoring them when he chooses. “I used to be pretty rigid when it came to genres. I was, like, ‘Jazz and R&B are mutually exclusive, and you must approach them like two entirely different things.’ But I learned that things that seem like they are entirely unrelated usually do have a common thread. Today, whether I’m singing my own music or other people’s, I know that the only real common thread I care about is truth and authenticity.” Bones, Michael’s new album, follows through on that mindset, with its multi-textured and clear-eyed exploration of themes surrounding the emotion of love. It was produced by Eli Wolf and features Andrew Freedman on keyboards, Nick Campbell on bass and Robin Baytas on drums ––three players Michael has known and collaborated with since high school and college. “I first met Eli when he came to a gig I was doing in New York City and, right off the bat, I liked his vibe and thought ‘This is a cool dude,’” Michael laughs. “Then, when I looked him up, I saw what incredible projects he had done. He was with Blue Note for a long time; he made a record with Al Green for them that was really amazing, and he produced Norah Jones and Robert Glasper. We got together for coffee and everything gelled right away, and when we ended up working together, he had such a great, positive vibe and such amazing musicality. It really was a joy to work on this album with him, and I feel like it’s the best thing I’ve done, so far.” ••• Michael explains key tracks from Bones: The Way: “It’s basically a song about someone who is expressing that they are attracted to someone, and is expressing it to that person in a way that is clear but also respectful. I had just spent my first summer in New York and I started dating someone. There were things I wanted to say to them and I realized that I couldn’t really figure out how to verbalize them, and this song came out of that. It can be really scary and difficult to express to someone what you are feeling for them, and this song is just an expression of that.” About Your Love: “It’s a song about an attraction that you thought was mutual, but you came to know after some time that it was never mutual and was unrequited from the start. It’s about the games people can play with each other’s hearts, sometimes intentionally but often not. The song ends with this kind of childish ‘nah- nah, nyah-nah’ taunting-type refrain, because even though that’s not what people mean, it often feels that way.” Stolen Moments: “I recorded this whole song in my room at home. It’s something like 250 vocal tracks. It’s basically a musical elaboration on not having the time you need with the person you want to be with, and it’s very much a mutual feeling. It’s what you both want, but all you can find are these little pockets of time. The only words in the song are ‘I don’t want to go, it’s only stolen moments, only stolen moments,” and that only happens twice in the song. The rest is wordless. We don’t feel our feelings in words. It’s only when we put words to our feelings that we realize what they are. When you’re in the midst of feeling it, it’s usually just some sort of sensation.” You and You: “On its surface, the song basically asks the question ‘How can you be with someone when you are not even feeling okay with yourself?’ But it’s also kind of a letter from my ideal self to my current self about not putting your goals for growth and development on such a high pedestal that they seem out of reach. Each section of the song brings out a different part of that idea.