Geoff: 0:01

Hello again, podcats Geoff Gascoyne here, hope you're w ell Today I'm talking to an old friend of mine, Martin Hathaway. Amazing musician, a great teacher, a great clarinet player, alto sax player, a lovely bloke. He's coming around to my house gonna make him some lunch and then we're gonna have a little chat and a little play.

Geoff: 0:21

So here we go

Announcement: 0:39

The Quartet jazz standards podcast is brought to you by the Quartet app for iOS. Jazz standards podcast is brought to you by the Quartet app for iOS.

Announcement: 0:48

Taking your jazz play along to another level.

Geoff: 0:50

Martin, how are you? I'm well, I'm well. Are you well? I'm well. Thanks for coming over.

Martin: 0:53

It's fantastic to be here. Great to see you.

Geoff: 0:55

Can we start by talking about your background a bit and how you got into jazz?

Martin: 1:00

I think I was identified as a young boy. I had musical talent of some description. I mean, like a lot of kids at that time, I played the recorder at school. I can remember sort of being able to pick out tunes quite easily. So I just used to, you know, go home and muck about with the recorder and find some tunes that I liked to play, and that continued with the support of my mum. I started to have some clarinet lessons.

Geoff: 1:30

I went to the local music centre in Chelmsford where I was born and where I grew up, and as far as the jazz was concerned, I think that seemed to be able to play things by ear quite well, naturally, just sort of find notes. And when I got the clarinet, in fact, I can remember learning how to play or trying to work out how to play Moon River, without actually knowing how to play the clarinet properly. So I sort of had all these strange fingerings in order to make the right notes. Um, that was before I had a clarinet lesson. I just wanted to play. I did that by hook or by crook,

Geoff: 2:03

What age would that be?

Martin: 2:04

Age would that be?, I think I was about eight or nine. A few years later my granddad bought me a quite a cheap saxophone. So so I had a saxophone and also my granddad also bought me a piano as well, because I wasn't very good at music theory when I was young and one of the music teachers said you should learn how to play the piano because that will help you with your theory. So I had all these instruments to experiment around with, and then with the jazz specifically, my uncle used to bring along uh records when they used to come and visit sort of every month or so from east london loads of vinyl for me to listen to, and I was allowed to borrow it and record it onto cassette tape as you used to do in those days.

Martin: 2:44

So you know, uh, so there's loads of Art Pepper and he was particularly interested in west coast jazz. So he had all these records of Stan Getz, Gerry Mulligan, um, Chet Baker Quartet, Lee Konitz. So I just used to listen to these things and try and work out how some of the tunes went um. And I can remember working out how to play Walking Shoes by Gerry Mulligan right, which was one of my favorite tracks, and so I played that in the in school in a school assembly, on my own with no accompaniment, and I stood up and played the melody and I and my solo was kind of a combination of the Gerry Mulligan and Chet Baker solos kind of squashed together.

Geoff: 3:27

I had absolutely no idea what I was doing. That was a big thing, wasn't it, the school assembly doing?

Martin: 3:33

yeah, I remember doing that as well, and I thought it sort of sounded okay. And I can remember and this is not a joke actually I finished playing and then there was silence and then I sat down and then one of the teachers said thank you very much, Martin. Stunned silence. Anyway, that was one of my first experiences of playing what I would probably describe as real jazz, you know thanks to my uncle, and then also becoming a member of the Essex Youth Jazz Orchestra, which, when I was about 14. And that's how I met Scott Stroman um, he was running the band so that obviously then sort of took my jazz thing on to the next level playing in a big band and also being with Scott and various people that came to tutor and and reading music as well yeah, I mean when I first started I I wasn't so good on the reading because I think I used to rely on my ears so much because that was my strong suit.

Martin: 4:27

But obviously, being in the bands and stuff and playing in ensembles, my reading started to get better. You know, I started to play more jazz, started to get to know the music of jazz more, and then also going on the Guildhall Summer School and other educational opportunities that Scott's friends were doing. So I can remember doing a workshop somewhere near Cambridge. That was the first time that I met Dave Green and Trevor Tompkins and we played So What? by Miles Davis which I'd never heard of before. And so I can remember doing that workshop and thinking, wow this is great. And then going to the record shop and going to the library as well. I used to go to the Chelmsford Library and just find records and record them onto cassette.

Geoff: 5:16

Absolutely, me too yeah.

Martin: 5:19

And anything I mean. That was how I discovered Charlie Parker and John Coltrane. I didn't know at that time who any of these people were, other than the fact that they played the saxophone.

Geoff: 5:29

So what did you do with those recordings? Did you transcribe things and play along to them? How did you use those recordings?

Martin: 5:35

I mean, I certainly played along to them and I certainly, as we were talking about the Gerry Mulligan thing earlier on. I guess that was trans, I didn't.

Martin: 5:49

I didn't write anything down at that stage, I was just sort of I just listened to the, the records, a lot and then just yeah and played along to the, to the tapes. Getting ready to go to music college was when I started to write down things or work things out more manuscript paper but I think before that I just used to play by ear. I guess you know my theory in my notational skills weren't brilliant when I first started off. Did you take lessons from anybody? I went to the local music center on a Saturday morning in Chelmsford where I was doing the, the classical clarinet grades and then saxophone. I had some really inspirational music teachers at the music center and at school Jean Crook, who is still alive, she's in her 90s, brilliant teacher, really inspirational. She could have been and would have been a very good jazz musician. She could play really well by ear. She could transpose anything into any key at sight. So she had all the skills.

Martin: 6:47

But she was very supportive, even though she didn't know specifically about jazz.

Geoff: 6:49

Do you think that had a bearing on where you sort of led on to? Because I know you've done a lot of teaching, you still do a lot of teaching, and you were head of the Guildhall course, weren't you? That's right. So how did that lead up to you becoming the head of the Guildhall?

Martin: 7:04

I can remember, in fact, being at school when the careers officer used to ask you what are you going to do when you've left school? I only had two choices that I put down. One was musician and the other one was teacher, because I've always enjoyed trying to help people. I seem to have got a bit of a talent for music and I enjoy helping other people. You know share the magic of music. If there's anything that I can do to try and help, when I was a student at the Guildhall I got a Saturday morning teaching job at my old music centre and I had a few other private students. And then in my last term as a student at the Guildhall, an opportunity arose where Lionel Grigson, who was one of the teachers at Guildhall, couldn't take a class and some of the students had suggested that I replace him just for that term, and so it was agreed. So I tutored this group and it must've gone quite well, because then they asked me to continue and I've been there ever since.

Geoff: 8:01

Yeah, yeah, that was 1991.

Martin: 8:03

How many years were you the head of the and I was head of the course for. Well, I actually had two periods of of leadership, because what what happened at the Guildhall was that they they started the undergraduate jazz programme there formally in 1994. Now I'd been, so I'd been a student there at the end of the 80s and there had already been a number of undergraduate students who were kind of like jazz specialists I suppose. So it was me, I was there, Tim Garland was there at the same time, Jason Rebello, we were all on the classical course, but we all had our jazz specialisms. And then it was decided that there were so many musicians like this coming through that they should actually have an undergraduate jazz stream. Right, that was 1994. And they asked me, as someone who'd been at the school for quite a while already, to actually lead that programme. So my official title there was coordinator of undergraduate jazz.

Geoff: 9:09

So I did that. Had you done any of that kind of leadership stuff before I'd

Martin: 9:13

led some quite a lot of workshops, one-off workshops, working for Essex Music Service I mean it's very different and also and also the Essex Youth Jazz Orchestra. That was the other thing that I'd actually been leading, that after Scott had retired. So I did have some experience in leading quite a lot of workshops. But in terms of doing something at a major conservatoire was a different thing. But that role was a coordinating role, so it was an artistic role but also, you know, trying to sort of put together a course that we thought would be, you know, beneficial to the students, you know, giving them skills to be professional musicians.

Geoff: 10:02

So you were deciding what the classes were.

Martin: 10:04

Yeah, I mean, a lot of it was kind of, in a way, jazz equivalents of what was the existing structure on the undergraduate programme. So, for example, you know they'd had there was a small classes which were known as musicianship. So obviously we had a jazz version of that. So we just had the jazz specialists in that group and that class was essentially an improvisation workshop, yeah, but then we also had some combos.

Geoff: 10:35

My experience in jazz education is it's such a personal thing and trying to make an academic subject out of jazz it's not like classical music, is it? You can't look at the dots and play it a certain way. You know there's so much more interpretation in it. So how do you make a formal thing out of jazz? That's the question.

Martin: 10:57

I mean obviously it can be done.

Martin: 10:58

I mean obviously there's loads of models for that.

Martin: 11:02

I remember talking to Dave Liebman, the sax player, who famously played with Miles Davis, and he used to describe Gil Evans' apartment in the late 1940s in New York as a jazz academy, because there was Gil Evans' flat, you know, and Charlie Parker was there every day and Miles Davis was there every day and all of the, the young musicians who were interested in talking about the music, playing, practicing, and he said, you know, that was a jazz academy, right, and you know, in a way, that's what we had at the Guildhall was when I certainly when I was a student, you had all of these amazing people there and we were, all you know, talking about playing, doing a lot of playing, obviously, yeah, trying to put it all together.

Martin: 11:48

And and then, obviously, you know, there's famous Berkeley College, you know, in the States, you know it's one of the first places, I think, to sort of devise a, a course for teaching jazz. I mean, people often ask me can, can jazz be taught? And I think the answer is yes, anything can be taught if you have a system, and there are obviously rudiments and lots of nuts and bolts.

Geoff: 12:12

But quite a lot of it is subjective though, isn't it? I mean, I know, for example, you are a big fan of early jazz. Yeah Right, but you might get kids into Michael Brecker. Is there a certain sort of nuts and bolts thing that you feel?

Martin: 12:30

that they all have to have ? I think there is and um, and I actually, if I think, if I look at my own, my playing and my teaching, I think it's it's actually broadened now. It's hopefully I'm a much better teacher now and, uh, you know, you can teach people how to improvise. Obviously, style and different periods of the music come into it, but there are some general principles that you can apply to any style. For example, you know, taking a melody and just experimenting around with it is, of course, how people started improvisation, and Louis Armstrong certainly played like that. That was how he improvised. So if you can, if you can identify systems and ways that people do it, that's what. That's the information that you can then impart to your students and you can actually do that.

Martin: 13:14

That particular example is something you could do with with any style.

Geoff: 13:17

What I found by interviewing all these different people is how diverse everyone's take on this is. You know, I spoke to Alan Barnes and he said exactly what you said.

Geoff: 13:28

Paraphrasing is rephrasing a melody, you know yeah spoke to Dave O'Higgins and he said licks, licks, licks, you know, and completely different approach, you know yeah and it's fascinating that isn't it,

Martin: 13:41

it is, it is, and I've I've certainly done all those you know I've taught, I've, I've practiced all of those things is, it is and I've I've certainly done all those you know I've taught, I've I've practiced all of those things you just mentioned and I've certainly taught those things and they're all. I think they're all useful. You know, having licks is is useful. Some people will probably. I know some jazz teachers. I've met people in my journey you know who who don't like that particular method of learning, but I do think it has its uses, you know, because it gives you its vocabulary and it tells you everything about the music, about how it works.

Geoff: 14:17

I remember when we first taught alongside each other, we used to go to France, didn't we, and teach on the Clive Fenner summer schools. Yeah, I would always bring detailed charts and get everyone to reading and you'd be not using any music and just doing stuff by ear and I just learned such a lot from listening to that, you know, and how you did it, and how much more of an oral thing it is compared to my sort of slightly more academic kind of written, slightly neoclassical, approachical.

Martin: 14:43

Well, they've all got their places, Geoff, I mean they do your stuff is fantastic as well, but um yeah, it's just.

Martin: 14:49

It's just trying to have a mixture, isn't it? And one of the things like, again, that people learn things in different ways. I mean, I do try and do a lot of things by ear still, but I can remember teaching on one course where we had some feedback at the end and there was a couple of students who said they really enjoyed it but they would have liked a little bit of music to sort of help them along the way, and that's something that you, you know. Again, you, you learn as a teacher. You know it's always good to evaluate what you're doing and to get some feedback and to make adjustments and and I can see where those people were coming from just a little bit of notation probably would have helped in that situation. So it's a mixture, isn't it? Mix and match.

Martin: 15:33

When I was a student at Guildhall, one very important teacher for me was Lionel Grigson, who was also very much of that mind.

Martin: 15:43

You know he said all the answers are on the records and you know, I mean he was also a great academic and he would write things down or things would be transcribed, but he was very much about, you know, listening to the recordings and trying to learn tunes by ear.

Martin: 16:02

He was kind of very anti-Real Book, got very annoyed if he saw people bringing Real books into his class because he'd try and do a lot of things by ear and I think that's because I was. That's the way that I'd learned. That's how we kind of we had a very sort of close musical relationship as a result of that, um, and then, obviously, when I, when I first started teaching, I think you, a lot of what I was doing was modeled on the people that, yeah, who were important to you, like Lionel. So we did, we did do a lot of ear playing and Lionel was also quite keen on people learning licks and, as we know, there's a there is a great value in that, but there is a danger, obviously, that if you go too far down that route then you can just end up playing the licks sounding like a machine playing the musical typewriter, exactly, not really sort of improvising with the vocabulary you've learnt, and that can be a that can be a danger.

Martin: 17:04

A healthy balance of all the things we've been talking about I think is probably the way forward.

Geoff: 17:15

So I've made some apps. They contain 500 standards across four volumes and I've asked you to pick a standard for us today, and we're going to talk about it and play it. Sure, which standard have you chosen? I have chosen How Deep Is The Ocean? How lovely, and why have you chosen that one?

Martin: 17:34

I've chosen that tune because it is, funnily enough, been a tune that's just been in my head a lot in the last couple of weeks. The thing that really triggered it off was I was watching on YouTube a couple of interviews or mini documentaries actually, of Lee Konitz, and he's somebody that I've always really loved his playing. Again, I, you know I used to listen to a lot of records that my uncle had of his and that was a tune How Deep Is The Ocean that Lee Konitz and his mate Warne Marsh, who's another one of my heroes, they used to play a lot, cause it's a, it's a beautiful melody, it's a, it's a beautiful melody, it's a, it's a lovely harmonic sequence. That it's one of those sequences that I, I don't it never, it never tires. You know, it's always a joy to play on that tune and that's certainly the. The sort of the Konitz Marsh approach was that they they mind a relatively small repertory of standards, but that was one of the tunes that they really enjoyed, right so we're going to play two choruses.

Geoff: 18:41

We're not going to play the tune. First chorus will be a two feel from the bass. Second chorus is four feel from the bass and then we're going to end on e flat chord. Okay, four bars, four bars introduction. Okay, okay, you ready, yeah. Okay, here it comes. Yeah me um, thank you yeah, thanks very much, yeah, yeah. So what kind of things were going through your mind when you were improvising during that?

Martin: 20:56

Because we've just been talking about Lee Konitz. I suppose I had a little bit of Konitz in mind trying to find a melody. I mean, one of the great things I think about Lee Konitz was that he, you know his approach was was not sort of lick based at all really. I mean, obviously, you know, you obviously knew he was somebody that always tried to construct a great melody, note for note. So you know, whatever note you happen to be on in a certain place within the chord sequence, you, you know, you're trying to find maybe the nearest note in the next chord or to try and play in what you might describe as quite a sort of a linear, a way, a sort of horizontal way of improvising rather than necessarily sort of going up and down the notes of the chords.

Martin: 21:39

You know that sort of tradition of sometimes in jazz education we refer to, you know, learning how to play tunes like this. You would play the chord tones, the arpeggio notes, to the chords, and I mean obviously Konitz could do that, but he tended, I think he tended to play more, you know, finding a line. You know that moved by step, like what Lester Young used to do in fact before before him. So I was trying to find a strong sense of melody, if I possibly could, in those. I think you achieved that.

Martin: 22:10

Thank you very much, and I think there was a yeah, there was a couple of times where I would couple of gray areas that I sort of need to sort of just revise or practice a little bit. I think to why I like that, that chord sequence. There's some challenging moves in that tune. It's a. It's a really beautiful sequence and that's why I said earlier on, like it doesn't, it doesn't tire for me. You know, in, in from a harmonic and melodic point of view, because there's so many little nooks and crannies in that tune, because there are a lot of chords in that piece, it's very easy to end up just focusing perhaps on harmonic things without necessarily thinking about all the other stuff, about interest in rhythm, interest in texture and dynamics and the other materials of music. You know that aren't necessarily all. You know, jazz improvisation isn't all about melody and harmony. I mean, those are obviously incredibly important components, but there are the other components as well. I'm trying to have a nice combination of all those materials when I'm playing.

Geoff: 23:16

Do you ever start a solo with a specific lick in mind or a specific phrase in mind? Uh?

Martin: 23:22

No, I just sort of um, I just sort of start out for the best.

Martin: 23:28

Sometimes I mean yeah, with a, with a blank mind, which is easy to do, because I because I say to my students it's easy for me to do that because my mind is always blank, um, but I, but I actually do try and do that. I mean, if you know, I might be following somebody else on a gig in terms of blowing, so I might take inspiration from the person who's just played, you know, take the musical baton from them, and that might be a starting point yeah for my solo, depending on what on how they've just played, where they where they were at when they left off their solo.

Martin: 24:04

Other than that, I think, yeah, sometimes I just sort of wait, just sort of, and then as soon as I start playing, then I've started and then I will try and do something with whatever it is that I've served up at the beginning, try and start from from from nothing so it starts off in C minor, this tune right and does a 2-5 in C, C minor.

Geoff: 24:25

Yeah, so when you, when you go across that 2-5 bar, are you thinking of the 2 and the 5 or you are you just thinking of pure melody? How is that working? It's very good questions.

Martin: 24:38

Geoff, I think a combination of all those things. There's some, there's some different approaches to that. You know, in terms of.

Geoff: 24:43

Could you play me a couple of approaches you?

Martin: 24:45

know I did play it as a kind of a, as a concert, sort of c minor six type sounding yeah. Yeah.

Geoff: 25:00

And then approaching the two five, the minor two five. Yeah, Just imagine that you're playing one, two five.

Martin: 25:15

Yeah, so there I played, yeah, I played one and then a 2-5. And there's a few different ways of doing that, yeah, I mean yeah, so on the half diminished chord, there I was playing, you know, natural nine, and then you obviously could then make the G7 sound altered. So there's and I mean those are all theoretical things which you know create different ways of creating different kinds of melody. You know different kinds of harmony, different ways of creating different kinds of melody. You know different kinds of harmony.

Martin: 25:57

And, and obviously the last two things were spelling out different chords there, different ways of spelling chords, whereas the first thing we played, which was just that a minor sixth, pentatonic, is something that kind of fits, it's a sound world, that kind of fits over the top, yeah, which you know, I mean that particular sound is a sound that you know McCoy Tyner and John Coltrane used to play quite a lot, that kind of minor sixth. Yeah, it's kind of like a modal jazz technique or sound. So all these things they give you different approaches to how you're going to construct your melodic and harmonic approach. Fabulous.

Geoff: 26:38

I've got a few quickfire questions for you. Sure, some of them will be easier to answer than others, some of them will not. Okay, starting off with what's your favourite album.

Martin: 26:49

That is such a difficult question to answer. Obviously, as you know, students ask me that question quite a lot. Yeah, I would say that my favourite album is a record called Tales of the Algonquin, which is by John Surman and John Warren, and I'll tell you why that's the case. It's because, well, there's lots of reasons, but it has many of my favourite jazz musicians on it, British jazz musicians on it, British jazz musicians and musicians from that period who were active in Britain in the late 60s, early 70s.

Martin: 27:21

The improvising on that record is amazing from all the players. John Surman is a is a is a featured performer on that record, but all the music is written by his friend, John Warren, who's a Canadian composer who is still around, who lives in York and he's now in his 80s. He was very active on there in the London jazz scene, contemporary jazz scene in in the 60s, John Warren, and so all the music is by him. So it's got this amazing combination of fantastic open improvising, different approaches to improvising, all these different personalities of the musicians who play on that record, plus these amazing compositions. So I'm also a massive fan of composed music, jazz music and big band writing, and John Warren is one of my heroes as a writer, so it's got all of his amazing music on this record. I don't think I know John Warren is one of my heroes as a writer, so it's got all of his amazing music on this record. I don't think I know John Warren. Well, you better check him out.

Geoff: 28:20

I know Dave Warren.

Martin: 28:23

Yeah, I know Dave. Warren too.

Martin: 28:24

Yeah, there's a few great Warrens. We played a lot of John Warren's music when I was a student at the Guildhall in the big band with Scott. I can remember the first pieces of his that we played and I remember going up to Scott after the first rehearsal saying this is amazing, this music, who's written this? I'd never heard anything quite like it was this. It was very orchestral in its approach and it was very through composed, you know. So all these different sections of the music and different sections for people to improvise on, they, people weren't necessarily improvising on the same chords and so on and so on. So it was away from the sort of the tradition. It was more in the Ellington or Gil Evans kind of mould of jazz composition, I suppose, as opposed to the Basie stream.

Martin: 29:10

I love Count Basie as well, but it was certainly some writing that I'd never really sort of come across at that point in my life, and so I became a bit obsessed with John Warren's music and, um, Stan Sulzmann, who I was studying with at the time, we used to play in John Warren's band. So I mentioned this to Stan, you know, and Stan said oh, you know, I'll tell John that we've got this young person who's really interesting. So I then got this phone call from John Warren and he sent me loads of his recordings. That's how I started getting interested in his music, and this particular record is quite a well-known one in British jazz circles the Tales of the Algonquin. So it's all John Warren's music. It's a great record. I'll check that one out, there we go.

Martin: 29:56

That's a very long answer to your first question.

Geoff: 29:58

That was, but it's a very thorough answer. Is there a favourite musician, alive or dead, that you would like to have played with?

Martin: 30:05

That's another great question.

Martin: 30:08

Ah, so many. I mean, I've been very lucky to have played with some amazing musicians, and again, some people that I, you know. When I was listening to all those records from the library, you know, I heard all of these amazing musicians and I've been very lucky in my life that I actually got to play with and to know some of these people. Bix Beiderb ecke He'd definitely be one from the early jazz period. Bix is one of my heroes as a performer and as an improviser. I think he was an incredibly skilled improviser and ahead of his time in lots of ways as an artist. As an improviser, I would love to play with him. That's pre-Louis Armstrong. Same time, same time, sort of same period, but yeah, Armstrong would be another. And Charlie Parker.

Martin: 31:04

Yeah, he's probably high on everyone's list, and John Coltrane would be another, and there were so many others Lee Konitz, who we were just talking about, Warne Marsh there's some other musicians who are heroes of mine, so the list is endless.

Geoff: 31:20

What would you say was the highlight of your career or a best gig moment?

Martin: 31:23

so far? That is also a very difficult question to answer. There's been so many highlights. Playing with your big band, at the Pizza Express, and that's not just because you happen to be sitting opposite me, but but playing with you, yeah, it's definitely. That's too kind but, surely not true?

Martin: 31:42

it is true, it is true, um, and I mean that most sincerely. Um, yeah, I was lucky to lead my own group. I had, um, I had a quartet um in the early 90s with Phil Robson on guitar, who I was at Guildhall with, and we had a gig at Ronnie's with that group, playing opposite the late Bob Berg. That was an interesting experience, but that was the first time that I'd led my own group at Ronnie's and so that was obviously a particularly important moment, I think, in my career to sort of stand on that stage and actually get introduced. This was when Ronnie was still alive, so I actually got introduced by Ronnie and he was very nice to me and everyone else. That was a particularly important moment, I would say. I don't know, there's so many others. I mean it's just great being asked to play actually, you know, and to play actually you know, and to play with.

Martin: 32:38

I've been very lucky to, as I was saying earlier on, to have played with a lot of my musical heroes from the British jazz scene, hearing the records when I was sort of younger and just loving the music, and then when you actually get to meet them. I was lucky to get to meet some of these people. I played with Michael Garrick for many years and he was someone that I really loved listening to his music when I was younger. Harry Beckett, the trumpet player, was somebody else who he's on that record that we were talking about Tales of the Algonquin and various other things, so he had this very particular and special way of playing, great sound and feel.

Martin: 33:15

And I can remember doing a gig with Lionel as a student and Lionel said, oh, the person on the front line with you is going to be Harry Beckett. I remember getting incredibly excited and then we did this gig and there I was. I can remember just the magic of standing next to him and hearing that sound. The sound that I heard on records was there, it was. It was right next to me and I was playing with this guy, you know, and it was just amazing magic. Yeah, and I've had. So I've been lucky that I've had a lot of those similar experiences of various other gigs over the years.

Geoff: 33:46

So great. What was the last concert you attended?

Martin: 33:51

I might have to think about that one. I don't know. I might have to think about that one. I don't know any gigs you've been to in the last year, or something most of the time it's ones that I've actually been playing on, which sounds quite bad, but I think, partly because I've been so busy with things that I I'm not sort of getting out that often to actually see other people play, which is something that I should try and do more often.

Geoff: 34:28

Have there been some moments in your life, some gigs that you've seen that have been influential on you?

Martin: 34:33

Yeah, I mean I can absolutely. Again, many. We were talking about John Warren. I remember going to see John Surman had this particular project of his called The Brass Project, of which John Warren wrote all the music, and they had a residency at Ronnie's years ago and so I went. I think I went three times in the week to see that. That was pretty amazing actually. I mean that's just one example that springs to mind. Seeing Ornette Coleman at the Barbican some years back and being really amazed at the fact that he could still do it even though he was getting on.

Martin: 35:14

It took a little bit of time for them to warm up. I was there and I was thinking, oh, you know, there he was and it was just amazing to see him live. And then he really started playing and I mean that was amazing seeing him still being able to just really make it up as he went along. I I'm also seeing Keith Jarrett a couple of times, who's another hero of mine and a similar thing just sort of seeing him in action and also seeing what we all go through, which is kind of the ups and downs of being in the spotlight on the stage. Like we were just talking about. Ornette took a little bit of time to warm up. A couple of times I've seen Keith Jarrett where I got a little feeling of that.

Martin: 36:06

There was one gig at the Festival Hall where it was the trio, the standards trio and I don't think they were very happy with the sound in the first set. They were kind of feeling their way a little bit and you could kind of sense that maybe it all wasn't quite well. And then the set sort of finished a little bit early and then there was a very long interval where I suspect they were probably doing another sound check or just sorting some things out. And then the second set was completely different. They really went for it and it was amazing

Geoff: 36:36

What is your musical weakness?

Martin: 36:41

Well, it's a. It's a thing I was saying um earlier on. I when, when I first started off, my reading was very poor and I think that has something to do with the fact that I used my strong suit was always sort of playing things by ear and having a good musical memory. I think At home I did a lot of playing, which I would probably describe as practicing, although I sometimes didn't practice the things that some of my music teachers were telling me that I should be, but I certainly did a lot of playing. But yeah, I found it a little bit tricky to start with to understand music theory, and that coincided with reading. So I found reading sort of challenging. It's something that I've improved on dramatically because obviously you have to and I started playing in more and more ensembles and the more situations where I had to read, obviously it gets better. But that's something that I still sometimes find quite challenging, especially if I haven't done many reading gigs.

Geoff: 37:39

Do you ever get nervous on stage?

Martin: 37:41

Yes, yeah, all the time. I mean I think I've had different periods of nervousness, if that's the right way of describing it. When I was younger I used to get very nervous, particularly in things like exams, not so much on sort of concerts, but I think when the pressure was really on, if I was having to sort of you know really sort of produce something that was you know sort of challenging in an exam situation, I used to get pretty stressed out. The more on top of the music that I was playing, in terms of you know how well I'd prepared, the less nervous I was Then.

Martin: 38:17

I've gone through various periods where I've always felt pretty, pretty comfortable on stage and then I've had a few sort of ups and downs as far as that's concerned and sort of some other factors in my life I think have affected my confidence, you know, not just as a person, but that that also sort of manifested itself sometimes to being on stage where I've I've I've been able to play, but it's been I would describe it as interference, you know, not being able to completely be focused on what, what it is I'm trying to do. But that has got better. So I'm, you know, I'm currently in a pretty good place as far as that is concerned, and a lot of it, I think, for me is personally down to, you know, my preparation for, for playing and even though we're talking here mostly about, you know, improvisation. My sort of key to a lot of my teaching is is is talking about preparation for improvising. You know, we don't quite know what we're going to play when we play, when we're playing jazz, but there's lots of different ways that one could play and a lot of those things can and should be explored and practised different techniques.

Martin: 39:30

Going back to the teaching thing that we were talking about earlier, I think that you know I'm at my best when I when I'm, you know, my technique is at its best playing wise and also in terms of the mechanics of the music. But if I'm on top of that, then I sort of I can really enjoy myself and feel comfortable about what I'm doing yeah,

Geoff: 39:49

Okay, a couple more slightly off topic questions for you.

Geoff: 39:53

What's your favorite sandwich?

Martin: 39:55

Every day is different, fishy sandwiches are always good. I like fish, tuna or something tuna sandwich or some description.

Geoff: 40:09

What about a favourite movie?

Martin: 40:10

Where do I start with that?

Martin: 40:12

Goodbye. Mr Chips has always been a favourite of mine. You like the oldies? Yeah, I do like that film. I just think Robert Donat, who plays the role of the teacher in that film and who ages you know brilliantly as the story goes on, I think that's an amazing performance. I really enjoyed that film. I also like lots of films with with Michael Caine in Educating Rita, that's a good film.

Geoff: 40:37

Oh, yeah, yeah uh, is there a favorite venue that you like to play in?

Martin: 40:42

From a jazz point of view. Yeah, I mean, there's always. For me there's always something special about playing at Ronnie's, I would say, just because it's that you know it's hallowed turf and I suppose you know as a as a British jazz musician, that is the place where you one always sort of wants to be yeah at, so I always get a particularly sort of special buzz about playing there.

Geoff: 41:07

What about a favorite country or a city?

Martin: 41:10

I've always really liked being in France, just because of the vibe. You know, whenever I've been lucky enough to play in Europe I've played in Europe quite a lot you seem to be treated with a lot of respect as a musician when you're in Europe. Well, you know this, don't you? You know it's seen as something special If you're a musician. People want to know you and they're really interested. They are, oh, really, you're a musician? Wow, that's amazing. Yeah, and sometimes here we don't quite get that. Yeah, is that really your job? And what do you do during the day?

Geoff: 41:42

What's your real job?

Martin: 41:43

Exactly, all that sort of thing.

Geoff: 41:45

One last question what's your favorite chord?

Martin: 41:48

What a question that is.

Martin: 41:51

I don't know whichever one I'm on at the time.

Geoff: 41:59

Thanks for the great playing and the years of inspiration as a teacher and for looking after my Lewis as well at school. Thank you very much, Martin. It's lovely to see you. Nice to see you too, and we'll play together in December when we have some more Big Band. We sure will, if not before. Absolutely All right see you soon.

Geoff: 42:12

Cheers, bye, bye.

Announcement: 42:16

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