Jazz Monthly: I know your CD like the back of my hand; talking about “Miles Remembered –The Silent Way Project.” But I have to be totally honest. When I first got it… now here I was a lover of Miles, as were you… I said, “Alright here we go again a little tribute to Miles.” But boy was I ever wrong. I absolutely loved the CD. In fact when I was looking at the inside of it, I’m saying, “Where’s the electric Piano?” That’s the first thing I noticed. But really, Mark, you don’t miss it at all. I think it’s better without the electric piano.
MI: Well, I don’t know “better,” but I do know that we made some very conscious decisions. We didn’t want to copy. We wanted to find the “spirit” of that music. Since the record was made, they released the box set with a lot more of the comments and descriptions on how the original “Silent Way” record and the original “Bitches Brew” were actually made. I always had a sense that Miles was always sort of a “first take” guy. He was never an over rehearsed guy. So one of the things we did on that record was… it was all “live.” The whole record was made “live” at the Baked Potato here in Los Angeles, so it had a very spirited feeling about it. I also loved the sound of two guitars – especially if you pick guitar players who have completely different approaches. It becomes just a wonderful blend of sound.
So in a sense it was taking the concepts of those early records, but doing them differently in… oh… how many years later? (Laughing) Forty years later. I think, overall, I am very, very proud of it. The choices we made were good choices. One of the interesting things is we toured this record for about two, three maybe even four years after its release. Due to scheduling, we couldn’t use the same two guitarists all the time. It actually turned out to be a fantastic experience because every time you would have two different guitar players interacting on this music, a whole new thing would open up. We were doing tours with Nels Cline for instance who is now in Wilco, and that series of tours was another whole take on this type of music – which was equally as rewarding.
Jazz Monthly: It’s worth mentioning again; I mentioned it in the little intro that I did for you. This CD won best Jazz Album of 1999 by the London Times and they don’t like junk you know? (Both laughing)
MI: We were very thrilled about that. I think a lot of that came from performing at Ronnie Scott’s, and it was so enthusiastically received there. English Jazz fans – they really loved this project. Like I say, we were there for along time and I think the Times guys were down there a lot. They really responded to it. So I couldn’t be happier that we had that reaction.
Jazz Monthly: I’m recommending to people if they haven’t gotten that CD to get it! As I said I have had it for many years now “Miles Remembered: The Silent Way Project,” it is worth having and then some. It is just spectacular.
Let’s talk a little bit before we get to “Bittersweet” Mark, about your film composing and scoring. When did that really begin for you?
MI: That happened in 1982. I had recorded some music with a good friend of mine who was a master of Chinese flutes and percussion, and the traditional usage of those. We had come up with this concept of wanting to write some music for his instruments and electronics synthesizers. We wrote a couple of pieces, recorded them and were shopping it around looking for record deals. Unfortunately, we got nowhere with that – but we were sending it around to a lot of people. Eventually, it got into the hands of a film director who said; “This is really, really interesting. I want to know who these guys are.”
That’s basically how I got the introduction into the film business.
It was an opportunity that I grabbed onto and I realized things like this don’t come around very often in life. I applied myself very, very diligently and somehow scored a picture without really having any specific training in scoring pictures. I was helped by a couple of really wonderful music editors and producers. When I came out the other end having scored a major motion picture, I realized that this was a tremendous amount of fun. It was very inspiring and a lot of hard work, but also paid very well. They gave me money for production… so I just kept going. I found an agent and the rest is history.
Jazz Monthly: Was that “Never Cry Wolf” Mark?
MI: Yes. That was “Never Cry Wolf.”
Jazz Monthly:: Absolutely spectacular. Mark when you hit with that you already, you were really on your way because people were saying, “Hey this is a young guy and he’s playing Jazz and he’s playing electronic music.” You were right up there with the best of them at that time.
MI: As a trumpet player?
Jazz Monthly: As a trumpet player and as a film scorer.
MI: Well, I mange to keep the trumpet playing somewhat alive. With “Bittersweet” I’m pushing back out to the market place again. I’ve actually got a new band here in LA. I'm making another real push back into the Jazz world as a player. I’ve been skirting around the edges of it for the past three or four years and I really want to get back into it in a big, big way. So this is the first of the couple of different record projects that will be coming up. On the film business, it continues just to grow and grow. I keep finding exciting films, and really wonderful directors to work with. I can’t complain, things are inspiring and a lot of fun.
Jazz Monthly: Your more then deserve it. One of my favorite scores was the “Black Dahlia.” There’s kind of a funny story here, Mark. I know Brian De Palma directed the “Black Dahlia.” When De Palma and you first met… I'm paraphrasing… he had met you to score the Black Dahlia, and he said to you “Mark, I'm looking for a mournful trumpet score,” and you said something like, “Well I'm your guy; I’m a mournful trumpet player.” Right? (Laughing)
MI: (Laughing) I’d say that’s better then paraphrasing. That sounds almost verbatim.
Jazz Monthly: That was a great line, then of course you scored “Nell”, I guess that was fifteen years ago. Still sounds fresh and alive by anyone’s judgment. And of course one my favorites is “Crash” the movie. It was written and directed by your friend Paul Haggis and it won an Academy Award right?
MI: That’s correct yes.
Jazz Monthly: Now lets talk about your CD “Bittersweet.” They say its kind of Australia meets the USA right? If you could explain that Mark?
MI: Well, I met Kate about four or five years ago. We were involved in some charity concerts actually. I heard about her, but never heard her or didn’t know much about her music. So as you do in some of these concerts, you met some of the people that you will be playing with, and you try and find some common ground to come together and put a good show on for the audience. We discovered that this was a mutual love of ours. The great American songbook for lack of a better word. Cole Porter /Duke Ellington, arguably the greatest American composers were the founders of what I consider to be the backbone of American musical culture. So we are drawn to it, we performed them together and the more we did it we established this dialog that was just so exciting to the two of us. The more we did it, the more we became aware the audience reaction was exceedingly good too! Then we would get some request, “You guy’s have to do “Duke” some more, and we would love to hear this again.” Finally after the last time we did this, we just came off the stage together and said, “Alright, we have to stop talking about this and we are going to do this. We are going to make a record.”
We put together a little group – an independent financial unit. Basically we went and recorded a record on our own. Now placed in various places around the world, it’s being released on “Universal” in Australia. Kate has a huge thriving career there. We are doing it in a various tiered release here in the States and there is just a big electronic web presence for the album itself. It’s very exciting! We captured, I think, exactly what we wanted to… and more! I think even though it’s not recorded in front of an audience, we had a few friends down there and it was just enough. You know, here you are… and do it now… and do it great! (Laughing) There was kind of a vibe that we captured; we really interact on this material. We also are very fortunate to have a truly stellar band. Three of the finest musicians in the jazz world today, and we happened to find a schedule where they were all available, Peter Erskine, Alan Pasqua, and Tom Warrington; doesn’t get much better than this. We couldn’t be more proud and happier with the result of this album, and so far the response has been very, very good.
