“Jazz Monthly Feature Interview” Gail Jhonson
Smitty: Ladies and gentlemen, I am so excited to welcome my next guest to JazzMonthly.com. She is an incredible musician, she has a wonderful new record out, and let me tell you, she pulled all the funk out of the trunk for this great new project. It is called Pearls. She is also music director for Norman Brown, one of my best friends in the business and I’m telling you, you’ve got to hear this new record because it is unbelievably fantastic. Please welcome Nu Groove recording artist, the incredible and amazing, my girl, Ms. Gail Jhonson. Gail, how you doin’?
Gail Jhonson (GJ): Doing great. Thank you. That was a wonderful introduction.
Smitty: Hey, you’re welcome. Hey, it is so fantastic to see you out there doing your thing, and what a great follow-up to Let the Music Play.
GJ: Yeah, I’m telling you, it’s been two years. I’ve been really working this record and trying to get it done, and just with a little bit of patience and a whole lot of time, and it’s here.
Smitty: Yes indeed, and you’ve got some “Lights Out” players on here. My boy Nelson Braxton and Marion Meadows.
GJ: Mm-hmm.
Smitty: And my boy Norman Brown. I mean, this record is bumpin’ hard! I love all the tracks on here and you really showcased your talent on this great record.
GJ: Wow, that’s good coming from you, Smitty. I know you listen to a lot of music and interview a lot of people, and so that’s wonderful. Thank you. I’m glad you’re enjoying it.
Smitty: Yes indeed, you’re welcome and thank you. You come from a wonderful music part of the world, Philadelphia, and you got started at a very early age. What, were you around ten years old when you started playing?
GJ: Yeah. Yeah, my girlfriend, she was late coming home from school one day and I was sitting out waiting on the steps wondering where in the world she was, and finally she came home and I went running down the street to go meet her and I was like “Where were you?” She was “Oh, taking piano lessons.” I’m like “Piano lessons?” And she was like “Yeah.” And I said “Damn, I wanna take piano lessons” and I ran all the way back home and out of breath, telling my mom, “Look, I gotta have some piano lessons.” I don’t know why I was so adamant about it, but (both laugh) I was just so intrigued. I always have been. My mom bought me a little piano when I was about two or three years old, but anytime there was a keyboard around, I’d tinker with it.
Smitty: Yeah, well, we’re glad you were excited about it back then.
GJ: Yeah.
Smitty: But was it hard to stay with the piano lessons or were you just excited about it? Was it something you looked forward to?
GJ: No, it wasn’t hard. It was a little bit of a hardship on my family. My mom, she scraped to keep the piano lessons going because I was going through the books so fast, every time she turned around she had to buy another book.
Smitty: (Laughs.) It’s kinda like the kids going through the computer games today, huh?
GJ: Yeah. So eventually we couldn’t keep up the rental payments on that and so then I just practiced at school, and then I got discouraged because the teachers, they didn’t want me to play anything other than the classical lessons that they gave and I would hear stuff on the radio and I would come back to the piano and then pick out the melodies and try to figure out what they were doing, and she would go “No, no, no, no, no, no,” so that kind of got discouraging and I quit piano lessons for a whole year and I was just—I felt so sad and so lost.
But then I went to the Uptown Theatre in North Philadelphia and saw Stevie Wonder playing a Farfisa keyboard and I said “Oh, it’s on. I gotta have one.” Yeah, that’s one of the organs that you hear a lot on like Sly & the Family Stone records. That was a real popular sound, kind of a rock organ sound and Stevie Wonder was playing that keyboard and I said “Oh yeah, I gotta have one,” so he sparked my love back up and got me going again, had to get the keyboard. I didn’t get the Farfisa, but my family, we scraped up something. We got a Yamaha.
Smitty: Yeah, well, Stevie Wonder has sparked a lot of people to start playing or to keep playing. (Laughs.) You went on to Berklee, right?
GJ: Yeah, I was working with local bands in Philly and I finally went on, after graduating from high school, went straight on to Berklee and I just fell in love with it. It was a really fantastic experience. Of course, we were all broke, but we didn’t care. We were just playing morning, noon and night, and trying to learn as much as we could and, of course, trying to pay to stay in there, so it’s quite expensive to go to school there and now I just don’t know how the kids are gonna make it, but somehow they do. Yeah, definitely on to Berklee and I learned about all the hip jazz guys, you know? Teddy Wilson and John Coltrane, and I knew about Mongo Santamaria and Ramsey Lewis a little bit, but I didn’t know about all the jazz greats until I got to school.
Smitty: Yeah, and then you landed a huge gig with Morris Day. Wow!
GJ: Yes, yes, that was really something. I had to work and do some smalltime tours, East Coast things, with a lady named Brandi Wells—she is a vocalist out of Philadelphia—and a fellow named Eugene Wilde. He did “Gotta Get You Home With Me Tonight.”
Smitty: Yeah.
GJ: So those were really nice East Coast tours that kinda really broke me in for getting on the professional side, but once I landed that gig with Morris, then I came to L.A. It was really dynamic then.
Smitty: Yeah, I can imagine. Talk about the Philadelphia scene when you were coming up as far as music. What was it like?
GJ: Oh, everybody played. Everybody played music. You couldn’t walk down a block anywhere without a band somewhere practicing in the basement. See, back in Philly we have basements and you can just set up all of your gear and you get plugged up and practice. There were lots of bands and we all had buses, we all would customize our buses, and we would take old school buses and convert them into music caravans, you know? (Laughs.)
Smitty: Yeah.
GJ: Yeah, with our colors and put our name on the side of the bus, and we would do gigs off and on, sometimes every weekend instead of all the band members having to drive. Well, we couldn’t drive because I was 14 when I was gigging, so my uncle Bill Reeves, he was our escort, and we were all under age, so we couldn’t drive so we’d all pile into the bus and he would drive us to the gig and we would unload our gear and set up and start playing and sit in the corner somewhere. (Both laugh.)
Smitty: But that was a beautiful time, though. I’ve heard so much about the Philadelphia scene and how beautiful it was back then.
GJ: Yeah, on the weekends, the guys that played percussion—of course, I played percussion too. I would go out with them sometimes and I played my flute, because I played flute for six years, and the guys, well, they would play the kunga drums in Fairmont Park. We’d go out there and they would be drinking wine and stuff. I wouldn’t do that, but… (Both laugh.)
Smitty: Yeah. Because that was a cool time.
GJ: Yeah.
Smitty: So how different was it for you growing up in Philly and then moving to Los Angeles? What kind of transition was that for you?
GJ: Oh, well, the first thing I found out about was pedicures. (Both laugh.) I had no idea somebody else would do your toenails. (Both laugh.) So I’m telling you, that was the first thing I learned, but the other thing was going into studios where you had to pay to go into a place and set up your gear and rehearse and then tear it down and take it back with you, so different cultural things, and then the whole thing about people didn’t want to rehearse. You just had to be good enough that you could just come in and rehearse a little bit and okay, let’s go do the gig. So it was kinda different for me.
Smitty: I often wonder sometimes what it’s like when you go from one culture to another and what it takes to adjust to that and then keep doing your thing at the same time, you know?
GJ: Yeah, it was hard being away from my family, but I was so driven and so determined, and I’ve always been driven. I’ve always had a job. I always did something. I was working since I was 11, so I was selling Avon or doing something, but I always played my keyboards and I always gigged somewhere on the weekend and all that kind of thing. So, yeah, it was hard for that and then, of course, things were much more expensive, but then I was making so much more money and it just seemed like it would just last forever. I was like okay, I’m gonna go with one thing now. Okay, well, if this doesn’t continue, I’m sure I’ll be with Prince or somebody and, of course, it turned out somewhat like that (both laugh), but I did a whole lot of auditions. I counted ‘em up. I’m sure I did at least a hundred auditions for everybody from Sheila E to Jeffrey Osborne to Teena Marie, and that was a fun time too, just to have open auditions where people could come and try out and network with other people and be all dressed up, and that was fun and that kinda doesn’t happen anymore. Cats just get called. “Okay, yeah, he’ll be good for a gig. Call him,” you know?
Smitty: (Laughs.) Yeah, it takes away that fun edge of it.
GJ: It really does, yeah.
Smitty: Yeah, absolutely. So tell me, what was it like when you finished your first project?
GJ: When I finished my first project, it was a little bit out of frustration. I had been doing several projects. I had completed several CDs we call them now, but back then we were doing cassettes, and I did them on all different kind of groups: singing groups, rappers and my own group, duos and quartets, and all kind of stuff, so I have a little collection of several CDs—several collections of music that I’ve made, but once I got into the Smooth Jazz thing, I did a record called It’s About Time because it came from a compilation of songs I had written for other people and they turned them down. Nobody would use anything I was writing, and so I said “Well, shoot, I’ve got 16, 17 of these songs. I can put ‘em together and just make my own CD.” So, of course, I was my own engineer and my own art designer and all that stuff, so I did my best with it, but the songs were nice. Some of the songs were really good. I had some guest artists even back then. Andre Delano played sax for me and Cliff Brown played guitar. He’s a fantastic guitarist. He’s still in the L.A. area. And a young lady, Della Miles, a vocalist, and she sang so, I mean, some of the songs were really, really good, but they just didn’t have the arrangement and the mixing and the sound quality. You need to go in the studios and, I don’t know, five, six, seven, twenty thousand dollars to really make the record sound good.
Smitty: Yeah, absolutely.
GJ: Yes, so that’s how the first record got started, just by a bunch of rejects and I put ‘em all together and I said “Well, I’m gonna invite somebody over and let’s see what they can do with this one.” So my family was “Well, it’s about time you do something just by yourself.”
Smitty: How cool. You spent some time in Australia too, didn’t you?
GJ: Yeah, I did. I love theater and I love comedy, and I had the opportunity to work with Rain Pryor, Richard Pryor’s daughter.
Smitty: Oh yeah.
GJ: We traveled all over the States and we had actually a three-month run at the Canon Theatre in Beverly Hills.
Smitty: Wow.
GJ: So that was my first theater experience, but working with her was really, really nice, and so I got to travel with her to Australia and I brought my daughter with me and we had a really fantastic time. We stayed there about a month and, of course, I got to sight see everything there was and got to go to all the jazz clubs. In fact, we sat in, because Rain sings as well, and we sat in at a really famous club in Australia and I can’t think of the name of it, and everybody from Miles Davis to Ella [Fitzgerald] to everyone has played that club. Even my piano teacher from Berklee had his picture on the wall because they have all these pictures on the wall, and I’m sorry, I can’t think of the name of it, but it’s the only one true historic jazz spot and we went and sat in and she sang “God Bless the Child” and I played the piano and we got a really hearty applause and it was great.
Smitty: Wow. So what was it like when you performed with Bobby Womack?
GJ: Oh my gosh, what a classic hero of mine. He was so much fun. He would call me Fish. We’re both Pisces, you know. (Both laugh.) First time I came to his rehearsal, somebody needed him to move his little Mercedes, a little gold Mercedes, and he was busy working and I said “I’ll move that for you.” (Both laugh.) And I looked at him and I was like “Whoo, he’s really giving me the keys.” My long hair blowing in the wind and I was like “Oh, I can work this.” Bobby took me all around the world. In fact, I got so excited about being overseas, I went to a little Belgium café and had me a Belgian waffle and went to a little place and had me some cappuccino or something I’d never tasted before. I mean, we only had Sanka when I was growing up. (Both laugh.) I went shopping and I came back to the hotel and everybody was gone, so I had to fly back by myself. I actually took a couple trains, a couple buses, and learned a couple of languages real quick to get off at the stops I needed to.
Smitty: Wow.
GJ: See, well, they all went on to Paris. That was the next gig. So I made it on to Paris and made it on to the gig, so thank God for American Express.
Smitty: Yeah, wow. Well, you had some incredible influences.
GJ: I’ve had some…really great teacher about entertaining and about form and, I mean, my first gig was learning a 19-song medley and it was like oh my goodness. But, see, I could write music down, so I was standing over the music director’s shoulder and I just was jotting down, dit-dit-dit-dit-dit-dit-dit-dit, and by the time he was like “You got it? You got it?” I was like “Yeah.” He got up. Shoot, baby girl’s on it. But I was able to at least follow along and then get it together as rehearsals went on.
Smitty: Yeah, how cool. Well, you’ve had some incredible influences in your life, notably Duke Ellington, Herbie Hancock, Stevie Wonder. Talk about how they influenced you. We hear people say that all the time. “Well, some of my greatest influences are this person or that person.” But talk about how they influenced you.
GJ: Well, I think with Herbie I just liked that a lot of his songs are very simple. He’d start from the bottom and he just keeps building and keeps building and keeps building. And I think he has a very strong composition background and, in fact, that’s what I studied at Berklee. I didn’t know about Herbie’s background so much, but I just loved to write, and so that’s what I like about Herbie and I try to incorporate it in my style. Just start real simple and then just start layering and layering because that’s how I hear. I hear horizontally across. I hear all the instruments at once and then I move into the next section. I won’t hear the next section yet until I kinda get the first one down. You understand what I’m saying?
Smitty: Oh yes.
GJ: So that’s what I like about Herbie and his music, and I think that’s how he has influenced me to continue in that vein to just start simple and then really improvise, totally somewhere else if you want to, you know? So open that you can do it, leave it to your interpretation. Whatever you’re exposed to, whatever level you’re at, you can play any Herbie Hancock song, and the more experience you get, the more advanced it can become, so that’s what’s nice.
Smitty: And I love that about him too. He has an incredible way of leaving the door open for improvisation, which I think is beautiful.
GJ: Yes. Yeah, exactly.
Smitty: Let’s talk about this record because I’ve heard you play live many times and we all know, and for those that do not know, you have been Norman Brown’s music director for many years, but Norman, I love you like a brother, but move out of the way because Gail’s coming up front to do her thing because this record is such a fabulous compilation of great songs and you’ve got terrific players, and what I really love about this is we get to hear you do some incredible solos to really showcase your talent as a keyboard player and I think that’s just wonderful.
GJ: Yep, I was trying not to get too “solo-y” but also I think I really just want to play, and if it’s really about jazz, you really just want to express yourself, you want to express your heart, you express what you’re feeling, so that’s definitely what I intended to do and I’m glad it’s coming across like that. And Norman Brown, he said he’s happy for me and so we’ll see if maybe I can come on one of these Summer Storms and be one of the opening acts for him.
Smitty: There you go! I like that.
GJ: Mm-hmm.
Smitty: Well, let’s call him out on that, all right?
GJ: Personally I had a lot of fun working on this record. Actually, I’d written about 25 songs. I really couldn’t decide. I was trying to paint a picture, I was trying to tell a story, and it just kept pouring, so with me when I write, it just kinda comes all out at once and then there’s a lull, but I don’t worry because I know I can go back and work those songs and see how they develop and then until another inspirational burst comes along, so that was what was going on until I finally made the whole compilation and I said “Okay, these are my pearls, these are my favorite ones.” And like I said, I got some help from some fantastic people like James Lloyd. I called him up and I was like “Can you write something for me?” (Both laugh.) And he did. He was so gracious and just sent this stuff over. He said “Gail, check this out. See if you dig it,” you know? That’s his language.
Smitty: Yeah.
GJ: I said “I dig it” and so we reworked it back and forth. You know, today we’ve got the Internet now. We can just fly files across the country in the matter of an hour, you know?
Smitty: Yeah, true.
GJ: So I was able to work his songs to the way they would really come to a compromise between the two of us. I mean, he didn’t fight me on anything, but he said “Yeah, I like that. Maybe you can work on this or maybe you can do that better.” So he was really, really gracious and so was Nelson Braxton. He flew down and we had lunch and we sat in the studio all day and I played all the songs that I wrote and he liked that one, “Pacific Breeze.” I think that was called “Song No. 52” or something like that because I didn’t have titles for them yet. “Pacific Breeze” was because he’s up north in San Francisco and I’m down here in Los Angeles and I said “Okay, the breeze is flowing from south to north and north to south,” and it turned out to be a really, really nice song.
Smitty: Well, I’ve already told you this. You know that’s my favorite track on this record.
GJ: We wanted that to be the single too.
Smitty: Yeah, I was looking for that one to be the first single to radio, but since I’m not calling the shots (laughs), we’ll go with that.
GJ: It’ll be the second single for radio, that’s for sure.
Smitty: Yeah, but it’s a beautiful song and I love the mixing and mastering, the work that Paul Brown did too with the songs.
GJ: Yeah, Paul Brown lives five minutes from my house. I had no idea this Grammy award winning, I mean, superstar hit maker, mixer guy is two minutes from my house, and he was so cool. He’s got a real cool studio, but he was really nice. He just said “Okay, Gail, come on over. I’ve got some down time. Let’s see what you got.” And in fact, he took one of the tracks, “Silky Slide,” and he played his guitar on top of that. He said “I like that song.”
Smitty: (Laughs.) Yeah, you have a way with the Brown cats.
GJ: (Laughs.) In fact, I had a gang of initials “NB” all over the place. Actually, it was really when I first got started with the Keep the Music Playing CD. I had nothing but Johnson people helping me. First Kevin Johnson, my guy that was helping me with my graphic and Internet stuff was Michael Johnson, my keyboard player in Philly was Mark Johnson…it was just all these Johnsons all over the place. And then with this record, all the Browns came along.
Smitty: Well, I guess next time it’ll be either the Smiths or the Joneses. (Both laugh.)
GJ: Yup, yup, yup, perhaps so. When my first husband—well, my only husband—his name was Jones, so I used to be a Jones.
Smitty: How ‘bout that, huh? Well, you know what? Gail, when you first told me you were working on this project, I remember back when you were telling me about it and I knew it was going to be fantastic but I had no idea it was going to be this good. I mean, it is just amazingly good, I mean, crazy good.
GJ: Yeah, I’m really, really happy with it. I’m just so excited, I really am. There’s one other cut on there, “Miles Away,” that I worked with Travis Miller from New York.
Smitty: Yeah.
GJ: Oh yeah, he worked with—in fact, he just came back from the funeral with Sean LeVert, so he works with those guys. You know, LeVert, he played with them for years. Gerald Alston and Will Downing. So he brought a different flavor with “Miles Away” and I was really excited about that one too.
Smitty: Yeah.
GJ: All of them, excited about all of them. I’m telling you, I can just go on and on.
Smitty: I know.
GJ: The track that I dedicated to the soldiers, I think it’s Track No. 2, “My Soldier.”
Smitty: Yeah.
GJ: It had a haunting feeling and had a lonely feeling to it, and I wanted to dedicate something to those guys that are over there in 129-degree weather every day. You know, I feel their pain sometimes and I think that song expresses that.
Smitty: Yes, it does.
GJ: Mm-hmm.
Smitty: Great track. You need to get that track to them.
GJ: Uh-huh, yeah. Yep, that would be nice for them to hear. Well, actually, Oprah got my CD. I gave it to her as a gift, so I hope she’s enjoying it as well.
Smitty: Oh, well, Oprah, sound off if you hear this, girl!
GJ: Yeah, we put it in a little gift bag for her. She always does so much for everybody else, you know?
Smitty: Yeah.
GJ: “So how about you getting a gift sometimes?”
Smitty: Absolutely.
GJ: The gift of music.
Smitty: Well, speaking of gifts, how is it going with going out and touring and giving your audience a gift of this great music?
GJ: Well, we’ve got a couple of gigs coming up. Actually, April 29th I’m gonna play live here at the Aqualounge in Beverly Hills and we’re gonna play some of the songs from the CD and just kinda celebrate the release of it, and so I’m looking forward to that. I have a couple of local gigs, but this Summer Storm thing seems to be taking off. I don’t know when I’m gonna find time to squeeze mine in until the fall. Well, no, I take that back. April 27th I’ll be in Detroit at Club Yesterday’s. I’m gonna open for Pamela Williams.
Smitty: Oh yeah!
GJ: Yeah, yeah, so Dee Brown, Gail Jhonson and Pamela Williams will be on that date, and then I probably won’t have another show again until September. There’s a Black Network Association September 20th. So I’m really looking at the fall, October-November, down in there, once the record catches on with radio, and just see who starts biting.
Smitty: Yeah, well, it should be a fun summer and a fun rest of the year, actually, with this great record.
GJ: Yeah, I sure hope so, Smitty. I am, mm! I’m so excited it ain’t funny. (Both laugh.)
Smitty: Well, you should be and you know you’re my girl, so you know I gotta comment on this photo you have underneath the CD. Were you hiding? (Both laugh.)
GJ: Oh yeah, you have to really wanna listen. You take that CD out and then you get another gem, see?
Smitty: I know. I said “Oh, Gail’s got her little sexy on here.” (Laughs.) But it’s a great project and I love the art design. I don’t know who did this, but I love the art design.
GJ: Yeah, I’m with NuGroove Records so it was the art director there and myself and my fantastic photographer Nick Spanos. He is absolutely fantastic. So I was able to, once I got all those fabulous pictures, put everything together and that’s what we got.
Smitty: Yeah, and speaking of that, by the way, congratulations on your new record deal with NuGroove.
GJ: Yeah, yeah, huh? How ‘bout that? When I told everybody about NuGroove, they were like “What? You got a deal? Nobody’s doing that anymore.” (Both laugh.) So I said “Oh yeah, they do.”
Smitty: So you’re over there with the “Chack Daddy” [David Chackler]! He’s one of the coolest out there.
GJ: With the Chack Daddy. He is so fantastic. He is just really so cool. He was so welcoming and he said “Come on, let’s do this. Let’s see what we can do,” you know? He really liked the music, he likes my style, and why not, you know?
Smitty: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, tell him “Welcome to the group.” (Laughs.) There’s a lot of us that really love your style. Well, I want to say congratulations because I really think that you’ve really scored huge with this project and I just love everything about it, and I really think that the listening audience is going to just totally embrace this record because, man, it is fantastic.
GJ: Well, thank you. Thank you so much, Smitty. Thank you.
Smitty: And I can’t wait to see you. I wanna hear you play some of these live. I got to hear you recently on the All Star Smooth Music Cruise. We had a good time on the cruise and that was cool.
GJ: Smitty, that was a lotta fun. Well, the 2009 Cruise is coming up so hopefully I’ll be performing—I know I’ll be performing with Norman Brown, but I’d sure like to do some things from my record, so we’ll see how it goes.
Smitty: Oh yeah, you’ve got to do some things with this. Because, man, this music is too good to hold back, it really is, yeah.
GJ: Good, good, yup.
Smitty: Well, listen, once again, congratulations on this great record and your tour dates and, of course, all those will be on your Web site.
GJ: Right, www.gailjhonson.com.
Smitty: Cool! Yeah, and I can’t wait to see you out on the road. I know I’ll see you real soon in Las Vegas, so I look forward to that. We’ll get to do a little hang.
GJ: That’s wonderful. I look forward to it.
Smitty: All right, we’ve been talking with the incredible and fantastic Ms. Gail Jhonson. Her latest project is called Pearls and trust me, it is a beautiful, funky strand of music. It is available in stores everywhere and online April 29th. Gail, thanks again for spending some time to talk about this great record and you know I love you, girl, and love what you do and for that I just put you in My Five. (Both laugh.)
GJ: Wonderful, wonderful. You have a very great weekend. I will talk with you soon.
Baldwin “Smitty” Smith
For More Information Visit www.gailjhonson.com and www.thenugroove.com
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