Ron Carter

Ron Carter
a.k.a. Ronald Levin Carter, Ronald Levin Carter, Ronald Levin Carter

BASSES LOADED
Ron Carter Goes for the Deep End on Stardust
If there's a name synonymous with the upright jazz bass, it's Ron Carter. From his classic work in the 1960s with, among many others, Miles Davis, Eric Dolphy, and Wes Montgomery, through his subsequent recordings with hundreds of artists ranging from Roberta Flack to Bill Frisell, Carter has been the first-call man on his instrument for four decades and counting. Carter keeps his eye firmly on the future, but he also has a healthy reverence for the past, and Stardust is his homage to a past bass master, Oscar Pettiford. Interspersing four of Pettiford's most memorable compositions with his own originals and some choice standards, Carter and his handpicked quintet, featuring the jazz legends tenor saxophonist Benny Golson and pianist Sir Roland Hanna, turn in a classic mainstream session of their own. Ted Panken spoke about base matters with the instrumental giant himself.

BN.com: Stardust is an homage to Oscar Pettiford. When did he start to enter your world? When did you begin to listen to and immerse yourself in his music?

RC: He made a record with Bud Powell and Kenny Clarke in Europe, with Coleman Hawkins, that has some trio tracks. And I heard him again playing with Monk and Art Blakey on a Riverside recording that has "Tea for Two" [The Unique Thelonious Monk]. Those were my first listenings to him. Then I became aware of his compositions. Cannonball Adderley played "Bohemia After Dark" and Bud Powell did "Blues in the Closet." I started becoming familiar with his compositions at the same time.

BN.com: You moved to New York in 1959, so you never actually met Oscar Pettiford.

RC: No. He moved to Sweden in '57 or '58. And when I got to Europe in '61 or so, he had just passed away. So I never even saw him play live.

BN.com: So what were the qualities about his playing that struck you? Was he someone whose lines you were trying to emulate at a certain point?

RC: No. He just had a great sound on the instrument. His tone quality was perfect, and the notes he chose as a soloist were for me just unheard of, that combination at that time. He would play "Body and Soul" or "Stardust" by himself. At the time, I didn't know of anyone who was doing that, just playing solo bass on a gig. I've heard of him being in Paris and playing a whole set by himself in small coffeehouses. Those kinds of things really interested me, that a guy would feel so comfortable with his ability to be able to do that.

BN.com: So how did the idea for this album gestate? Is it something you'd been wanting to do for a long time?

RC: Actually, I'd kind of run out of things to do. I've made enough records, and the executive producer for the Something Else label, which is part of Toshiba-EMI, suggested that I do maybe an Oscar Pettiford project. And not having done that kind of project, certainly, I said, "Let me give it some thought and look around for some material, if I can find songs that I think really are related to Oscar Pettiford." So I came up with six or seven songs that I thought would be nice for a tribute to him, and I submitted these songs to the label. They said, "Okay, put together a personnel." I hadn't played with a vibes player on one of my records. I worked with Joe Locke at a concert in Boston two years before and liked what he played. Benny Golson has always been one of my favorite people as well as tenor players, so it seemed like a good idea to do the three or four tunes I finally decided would fit this kind of personnel. I worked with Roland Hanna over the summer on a Terumasa Hino project. And people don't know Lenny White is a great jazz drummer. So I thought this kind of personnel would be a nice change of pace personally for me, and with this great Oscar Pettiford library, it would be a cinch to make it work.

BN.com: Well, which bass players would you cite as players who informed your notion of how the bass should be played?

RC: There were none who did that. I would say that Cecil Payne influenced me by the way he was able to be an independent-sounding baritone saxophone player at the time of four or five other great baritone saxophonists. Leo Parker, Serge Chaloff, Harry Carney, Pepper Adams, Gerry Mulligan, they were all major saxophone players at that time, and Cecil was able to use the same instrument and get his own kind of sound out of it. If you are into baritone saxophone players, when you hear those five, it's easy to pick out Cecil Payne from all of them. And J. J. Johnson, who developed the skill of playing so many notes within the small range of the trombone. Those things caught my attention, not necessarily bass players in and of themselves.

BN.com: How did your notion of playing the bass develop, then, particularly within a jazz situation?

RC: Well, I studied the instrument. I have taken lessons for a very long time, so I learned the instrument. My skill level is pretty high. And having studied harmony and composition and arranging, I have a good sense of song form and the rules of the game that you want to break, and by being curious and finding out that this rule works here and, if not, why doesn't it work. When I came to New York, there were plenty of clubs to work where you'd do three sets a night during the week and four on Friday and Saturday, so there was ample space and ample gigs to fool around and try something that works and have a chance to come back to the next night to develop it.

BN.com: So the New York club scene in 1959, and the early 1960s, and then the Miles Davis band was your laboratory for working out all the different complexities that comprise the Ron Carter sound.

RC: More or less, yes. But you know, I still work on that stuff. I didn't stop in '68 because I thought I could do everything I could do. I mean, there's still things I'm looking at doing, finding the best set of notes and the best sound, and playing in tune... There are things that the bass demands of you every time you pick it up and take it out of the case. I'm still aware of those things, and I work on them constantly.

Bn.com: How do you feel you're doing with that?

RC: Well, I'm still looking for the best notes I can find every night. And as players change, and as compositions change, and as the days change, and as the music's demands change, I'm kept on my toes every night.