Quincy Jones’ life spanned the gamut of modern American pop music. He absorbed, influenced and recreated this tradition for generations. It’s amazing to look back on the life of the composer, arranger, and producer and hear him talk about his friendships and work with Sidney Poitier, Lena Horne, Ella Fitzgerald, Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson, and Tupac Shakur.
Over the years, The Times spoke with Jones, who died Sunday at age 91, at various points in his career. There he recalled being a black composer in Hollywood in a less enlightened mid-20th century climate. He probably made the biggest pop album of the century with Michael Jackson, and it was his heartbreak about the real-world violence of gangsta rap that affected his family.
Jones’s philosophy about music was cosmopolitan and curious from the beginning. He traveled widely, and as a composer he learned European classical and folk traditions and combined them with innovations in black art forms such as American jazz.
He told The Times in 2001 that traditional music “lifts your spirits.” “You can see that the evolution of music in most countries, like ours, is based on folk music roots. (Béla) Bartók comes from Hungarian folk music. Scandinavian folklore is awesome. I can’t believe how beautiful all the songs Miles (Davis) and Stan Getz played, ‘Dear Old Stockholm’, beautiful folk music. Travel is the best education. You are experiencing the food they want to eat, their language and their music. And that is the soul. That’s real. They will tell us: Don’t go to the souq (market or bazaar)! Don’t go to the Kasbah! That’s exactly where we went. It’s like going into the ‘hood! “I’ll be right there, baby.”
One of his first loves, jazz permeated everything he did in film scores, pop, and education. “(Earl) Basie, Clark Terry, it was an incredible education,” he said. “We talk a lot now. But I would sit, shut my mouth, and listen to them. Been there because the old guys know what they’re talking about. All the young brothers calling Louis Armstrong ‘Tom’ and stuff like that. This is the man who invented our music. He has no samples, no radio stations, nothing to listen to. He’s just inventing it. Art Blakey said to Branford Marsalis, ‘I had to spend a lot of time getting you to do that little flip.’ It’s true. “There’s a lot of blood flowing there.”
He added, “Before I die, I want to be a part of a way for Americans to learn about his music.” “They don’t understand it. We have the greatest mothership on Earth. I need to talk to the administration. We need a Minister of Culture. I don’t want to do that, but I need to. Everyone has one. The culture of this country is the Esperanto of the world. “It’s the first thing schools cut out, but there would have been a better spirit in the country if that had happened.”
Jones gained early recognition as a film composer, composing scores for the Oscar-winning “In the Heat of the Night,” “The Wiz,” “In Cold Blood” and “The Color Purple.” But breaking that foundation was often a lonely endeavor for black artists in mid-20th century Hollywood.
“Sydney Poitier and I were the only ones there,” said Jones, who has appeared in several films starring his close friend Poitier. “He handed me the composer’s baton.”
As recording technology evolved from simply recording live performances to an artistic technique, Jones adapted his methods to fit the new era. But he always tried to emphasize the human qualities of being in a room with a band and reading to each other.
“The nature of music is designed to be interactive. Synthesizers and drum machines? It’s not interactive,” he said in 2001. “When I was recording with (Frank) Sinatra, Sinatra would sit right in the booth and look right at me and look right at the rhythm section and the trumpet section. It was the only way we knew. And I can handle it in a different way. Because I have worked with all generations. Keep moving. Many people did not want change. … Now everything is possible: modular, layered, overdubbed.”
But Jones quickly recognized the potential of new electronic instruments and composed the theme to 1967’s “Ironside” using a then-nascent Moog synthesizer.
“Robert Moog said to me, ‘Quincy, why don’t your brothers use my instruments?’ “I said,” he recalled in 2017. Because we sculpt electronic signals into smooth sine waves or rough sawtooth waves. But the problem is that it doesn’t bend. And if it doesn’t bend, it can’t be funky. And if it can’t get funky, brother, you don’t touch it.’ So he came up with the pitch bender and the portamento, and I did it really quickly.”
In the world of pop music, Jones and Jackson’s work, especially on the era-dominant LP “Thriller,” changed everything. In an emotional reflection after Jackson’s death in 2009, he said: “It was a perfect convergence of forces. “In the music world, something happens every 10 years. There was Sinatra in the 40s, Elvis (Presley) in the 50s, and the Beatles in the 60s. …In the 80s, there was Michael Jackson.”
Jones discussed how he refined the talents that made Jackson such a powerful performer. “We owned the ‘80s and our souls will be linked forever,” he said. “Reminiscent of Fred Astaire, Sammy Davis Jr., and James Brown all at once, he worked for hours perfecting every kick, gesture, and movement exactly as he intended. made to combine. We tried all kinds of tricks I’d learned over the years to help him grow artistically. For example, I dropped the keys by a third to give me more mature range and flexibility in the upper and lower registers, and I tried a few more tricks. The tempo changes. I also tried to lead him into more in-depth songs, some of which were about real relationships…
“At some point during the session, the right speaker caught fire. “How about a sign?” he asked. “It’s no coincidence that almost 30 years later, no matter where you go in the world, you hear ‘Billie Jean’, ‘Beat It’, ‘Wanna Be Starting Something’ and ‘Rock’ like clockwork in every club and karaoke bar. ‘With You’, ‘Thriller’, etc. ”
After Jackson’s ’80s heyday, as hip-hop became the dominant commercial force in pop music, he spoke with sadness and insight about how music designed to reflect real-world pain and neglect could succumb to hip-hop. Jones was the founder and president of Vibe magazine, whose daughter Kidada was engaged to Shakur at the time of his death, and Jones said he would seek peace within black music for “the rest of my life.”
“We need a unity of hip-hop nation,” he said. “I think hip-hop was closer to the pulse of the streets than any other music we’d heard in a long time. Not only music but also sociology continues the tradition of black American music. Even if you read a musicology book, you don’t always get the whole story.”
He added, “If major labels participate in the interests of music that suffers from violence, they are responsible for that.” You’ve got to move on, buddy. What else do you do? Are you going down? If I didn’t think positively, I wouldn’t have taken the time to do this. The community must work together to solve this problem. “We want to help these young people survive and realize their talents and dreams.”
Looking back on his career, Jones was troubled by the idea that his later achievements were due to his stature and connections rather than to his consistently creative musicianship.
“What bothers me is when people, young and old, try to disparage you by saying, ‘Well, Quincy’s biggest advantage is that he has a powerful phone book… and he can call anyone!’ That means doing it. “He said in 2001: “Now that’s the funniest thing. I have spent most of my life perfecting my craft. I wanted to be a great arranger, a great orchestral player, and a great composer. It’s been like that since 13:00. I did my job. And then I was able to apply all the elements. They see you sitting at the console holding your head like this and thinking. People think you don’t know what you’re doing. I have made 40,000 arrangements and 40 films, I have worked with every singer on the planet, black and white, Nana Mouskouri, Charles Aznavour, Stevie (Wonder). It’s really hard work. Like you don’t have to do anything. You have a phone book and can call great people. please! That makes it two inches.”
Jones has never been short of words when it comes to setting the record straight against critics who seek to portray him as a sellout. By staying true to the craft of music in whatever shape or form he can, Jones may not have sold out, but his work has made undeniable records and sold in huge numbers.
“I started out as an arranger. “That’s how I became a producer,” he said in 2001. “This is the path I take as an arranger that opens many doors to understanding. You work with people like Dinah Washington, Billy Eckstine, Tony Bennett, Paul Simon, Sinatra, Aretha (Franklin), Sarah (Vaughan), Ella (Fitzgerald), Carmen McRae and many others. I really learn a lot at that school. That school doesn’t exist anymore so it’s hard to understand what they give you. 700 miles a night for years. I’m traveling on the band’s bus. There are 70 shows in the Carolinas alone. In California, it’s 27 years old. everywhere. This doesn’t make sense. And if I get stuck with a big band in Europe, some idiot will come up to me and tell me they sold out. please. give me a break “Hey mom!”
