Chris Botti
BOTTI BLOWS HIS OWN HORN
The Smooth-Jazzer Finds Fame Blowing Ballads
Following in the footsteps of such hit-makers as Chuck Mangione and Herb Alpert, trumpeter Chris Botti has become America’s favorite brass man. But as his breakthrough album, the romantic, acoustic-based When I Fall In Love proves, Botti is a genuinely gifted jazz balladeer with deep roots in the lyrical styles of such trumpet stylists as Miles Davis and Chet Baker. Ted Panken spoke with Botti, a featured sideman with Paul Simon, Sting, and Bob Dylan, about his love of classic jazz and his gratifying response to a dream project made real.
Barnes & Noble.com: You've commented that people are surprised at how you play on When I Fall In Love Why?.
Chris Botti: Look, I've made records in the past that have electronic underpinnings -- Night Sessions and A Thousand Kisses Deep. In some mainstream press, and especially among trumpet players and so on, it's easy to take potshots at that stuff. That's fair enough. I won't begrudge anyone their opinion. But when the record company comes to me and asks me to do a record like this, a classic record all in the moment, in front of an orchestra, that's the kind of thing a jazz musician dreams about. The record cost about three times more than any other record I've made. The fact that the stars lined up and I was able to do this kind of record was so fortunate for me -- and in some ways out of my control. It just kind of landed in my lap, and I was, like, You're kidding me; you want me to make a record like this, and I don't need to worry about making groove-based music or anything like that? It was amazing. People who only hear my records were surprised that I can play jazz at all, like on this record, or have the chops.
B&N.com: You mentioned that a Miles Davis recording of “My Funny Valentine,” a song you perform on this record, is the one single epiphany that made you want to be a jazz musician.
CB: Yes. I got lucky. Someone gave me a copy of Miles's version from the My Funny Valentine live album, the show he did with {saxophonist} George Coleman. The intro with Herbie [Hancock], and the way Miles plays just got me... I knew then that I wanted to be a musician and play jazz and go for it. It wasn't a question of whether I was going to be successful or not, because that didn't really work into my equation. I just knew I was going to be a trumpet player for the rest of my life, or at least die trying.
B&N.com: As a kid, were you seriously into studying the jazz lexicon, the trumpet lexicon?
CB: Oh, yeah. That's all I did. All the Lee Morgan and Clifford Brown and Chet Baker and Woody Shaw, who I actually ended up studying with. I also studied with George Coleman. I did all of that stuff since I was 16, playing in the jazz clubs, learning all the Art Blakey songs. I actually got to play with Blakey once. It wasn't until college that anything remotely revolving around popular music got to me. Then I moved to New York and became aware of the fact that I liked music that was more slow moving. I never want to pass myself off as being something that I'm not. I have a real strong idea of the kinds of records I like to make, and the kind of phrasing I like to do on the trumpet, and the kind of tone that I like to achieve on the trumpet. But I'm certainly not the kind of guy that's going to walk into any situation and just cut "Cherokee" like Wynton Marsalis. That isn't going to happen. It's not my vibe. I started realizing early on what would be my vibe and what wouldn't be my vibe, and just kind of went after it. I think that a lot of young trumpet players are constantly chasing the ghost of Wynton, trying to achieve that thing, and they just aren't successful at it. I tried to go on this path of being myself.
B&N.com: The Brecker Brothers band with [trumpeter] Randy and [saxophonist] Michael were big influences on you, weren’t they?
CB: I got kind of enamored with the way jazz meets rock ‘n’ roll in their music, and I set out to kind of mold myself after that kind of vibe. I have so much respect and admiration for those guys to be jazz musicians and to do what they did, to cut their own path across their type of music. But I started wanting to do more popular kind of music based on that. Plus, I love Mark Isham. At the time, 1984-85, I thought Mark Isham was doing this really interesting sort of jazz-rock experimental stuff, and that was interesting to me as well. I would always keep my love of bebop and the jazz guys at the time, like always following Wynton and Terence [Blanchard] and all that, and as I got older, I started borrowing from each camp, to get my own sound out there. But ultimately, I think the thing that's most recognizable for me is the actual tone of my trumpet. The way that I phrase and play, the actual sound of my trumpet is very recognizable.
B&N.com: What have you been listening to lately?
CB: Oh, man. I go through different periods of Miles. Lately I've been listening to Filles de Kilimanjaro and Nefertiti a ton! And Seven Steps to Heaven and Someday My Prince Will Come. But only because I've already overdosed on all the Live at the Plugged Nickel and 'Four' and More and stuff.
B&N.com: What else is on your I-Pod?
CB: I have a lot of stuff. I have a ton of Sinatra. I've been really loving this completely mellow Keith Jarrett record called The Melody at Night, with You. This guy is the world's greatest piano player. I mean, him and Herbie Hancock. I just sit there and marvel at the simplicity. It's like listening to Chopin, the way he plays those inner melodies and the touch and the sophistication and the beauty. It absolutely destroys me when I hear him play. He's something else.
April, 2005
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