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Geoff 1:01

Yeah, that piano's a little noisier next door, isn't it? But I think it'll I think it'll be fine. Nick, how are you today? You you well?

Nick 1:07

Yes, very good. Thanks so much for doing this. It's wonderful.

Geoff 1:10

No, no, no, thank you for inviting me. It's so great to be back at the Royal Academy.

Nick 1:13

Yeah. Yeah, I've been here for years.

Geoff 1:16

How long have you been the boss here?

Nick 1:18

Well, it was uh the Gerard Presencer was was running it before me, and I was working alongside Gerard, and I think by early 2010 I I was just covering for him as sort of acting head, and then officially from that summer 2010. So yeah, it'll be 16 years this summer, which is shocking. It doesn't feel like that.

Geoff 1:40

That's incredible.

Nick 1:41

It's incredible, yeah.

Geoff 1:42

I mean you've seen some amazing people come through here, the the standard that

Nick 1:45

yeah, they've been consistently uh amazing and inspiring and great people and great musicians. So yeah, it's one without doubt one of the highlights that you constantly in inspired and sort of feel connected to that kind of energy, you know.

Geoff 2:01

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I taught here in the nineties and um I remember assessing a year here that had Tom Cawley, Gareth Lockrane, Orlando le Fleming, and I was assessing. You know, we're talking about '95 or something like that.

Nick 2:13

Right. No, there's been some amazing years. I've I mean they're all without you can't single any out, but I remember that off the top of my head, the the year where it was like Jacob Collier, Rob Lough, James Copus, so endorsing, you know, like just incredible people, all still out there. But they've all been like that. I don't like to single any out because they've they've all been fantastic.

Geoff 2:33

The selection process must be really strict here, right? Because you don't how many people do you take per year?

Nick 2:39

Well, we basically try and kind of structure it round, loosely round an ensemble. It's not kind of iron fenced if we if we wanted, like we have in the first year got two pianists, you know, if you wanted to double up anything, you we have the the you know the freedom to do that. But it we feel like because most of the learning is done in a kind of practical environment that it needs to be operable as a as a band, just so it's fair on the the players that you you know you haven't got kind of three drummers queuing up to play and that kind of thing. So, yeah, roughly speaking, it's a a sort of large small group, as it were, you know, eight, nine, ten eight at the most per per year.

Geoff 3:22

That's still tiny, though, isn't it? That's not many people.

Nick 3:25

But overall, you know, six years, four bachelors, two masters, you end up with a department of like 50 to 60 people. So it's a good number of of you know musicians that get to collaborate with each other. So I think sometimes people think because the Academy is the smallest of the London jazz courses at least. I think sometimes people think it is there's kind of 12 of us or something like that, but it's still quite large, you know, it's not like the accordion department, which is like four people or something, you know. So there's plenty of variety and interaction amongst them all, you know.

Finding Jazz Through Local Gigs

Geoff 4:01

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So can you tell us about how you got started, what got you into jazz in the first place, and what brought you to what is one of the best jazz teaching jobs in the country, I would say.

Nick 4:11

Well, I mean, I think the first thing to say, and especially in relation to the job I do now, is that uh none of this sort of Royal Academy-ness, conservatoireness was anywhere in my background at all. I just grew up in just outside Luton in Bedfordshire, and uh came up through the free kind of county music lessons that we all had then, you know. And and Bedfordshire was amazing. There were kind of big bands and wind bands. And n I kind of came up in brass bands, so but not in a sort of virtuosic Yorkshire sense where they really were kind of master players. I was like banging out Indiana Jones medleys and things like that, you know. All of which to say I never really did the orchestral thing, so I was corn et and then went on to trumpet as I got into jazz, you know. I never did orchestral playing, which I regret to a point, but it is what it is. And um music was super well supported in that area, but the most amazing thing was uh pub in Toddington, this the village, that a retired professional trumpet player took over The Angel pub, and they put jazz on, check this out, eight times a week. It's like as much as a club. It was every night, and Jimmy Skidmore did Sunday lunch times, and they had like a Monday night big band, Tuesday mainstream night. A couple of them were sort of funk nights, but basically, I'd be down there all the time and got lessons from Keith Baldwin, his name was. And so, yeah, it sort of went from there. But basically, most of the teachers around there had mostly perhaps been like in the military bands or things like that, and so their perspective on life, and I say this with no judgment at all, and and frankly, I wasn't like particularly good, I was very normal. Their perspective was look, you could it's going to be very hard to make a living as a musician. Why don't you join a military band? Then it's you it's brilliant, you get a salary for blah blah blah, you know. Yeah, and so I kind of went along with that, and I I ended up joining the Marines as a bandsman straight from school because I thought that's what you do. I didn't have anything else in my life particularly illustrating any other pathway, and certainly not being a professional jazz musician, you know. Keith had been a like a session player, I suppose, but from felt like a different era, you know. But I didn't really like it that much, it wasn't for me, I think. Deep down I knew that. So I left, services no longer required, and uh went to Salford, what was Salford Polytechnic. You know, I was with Georgina Bromelo and Suzanne Higgins, Elliot Henshaw, Craig Wilde. We were all at Salford together. And then the first time I ever set foot in a conservatoire was I applied for the Guildhall postgrad, which was at the time, this is like late 90s, that was the route, wasn't it, into London. It was like a great swarm of people from Leeds College and Salford, and like that was the way into London. So that that was what I did.

Geoff 7:32

Was it was the Academy running a course in that?

Nick 7:35

Well, yeah, Graham Collier would have been leading the he set it up here, and so but they what they didn't have was postgrads. So I think the the first sort of jazz courses were undergraduate ones. Uh and I was obviously coming for a uh that one-year postgrad. It wasn't even a master's then, it was post-grad diploma, you know. But yeah, from there, you know, I've obviously met people who were teaching in that place. I I did used to do the Glamorgan Summer School, and then little bits of teaching cover came up and bits at Middlesex when it was up at Trent Park, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But the Academy specifically, I owe all of that to Gerard, you know, Gerard Presencer. Right. He had taught me a little bit and we became friends. He set up the junior jazz course here, which he gave to me to run in 2003, and then I'd got more involved in the senior course and and then took over from him when he moved on. And so, yeah, I I owe Gerard a lot in that regard.

Geoff 8:43

I can't imagine what it's like to even run a part-time course, but to run a full-time course like this, it's so much organisation involved in it, right?

Nick 8:52

Yeah, there's a lot of admin, and I I think if I have any sort of a skill, which is not one I even knew I had, but I guess it's a pretty good compartmentalization, you know, you kind of manage your time well and what needs doing now and what you can put off, and I'm a fairly meticulous list keeper because otherwise I'll forget things, you know. But it is very complex. But then great swathes of it are repetitive from year to year. They all need handling with care, but the roughly speaking, the yearly cycle is is similar from year to year, you know.

Geoff 9:30

Do you do you do much teaching here?

Nick 9:32

Yeah, I d I do a bit. I I still and I still love that. I teach a decent amount, not all, but a good amount of the trumpet lessons. But they also have, you know, might love it, Tom Walsh, Laura Jurd, Byron Wallen has done little bits and bobs and what have you. So there's there's other people coming in, but I sometimes take ensembles. I do a fair bit of the big band, like directing the jazz orchestra and teaching repertoire and improvisation, bits, bits like that. But there wouldn't, it would be tough, I think, for me to teach a like a regular weekly module kind of thing.

Why Standards are Non-Negotiable

Geoff 10:08

Yeah, yeah. So, this podcast was all about jazz standards. I started making these apps simply because

Nick 10:18

they're brilliant, your apps. I do know that.

Geoff 10:20

Thank you very much. I I know when I started, I was obsessive about the Jamey Aebersolds and the play-alongs and things. Um, as maybe you were too.

Nick 10:27

Yeah, absolutely, yeah. I still use them actually.

Geoff 10:29

You do?

Nick 10:30

Yeah.

Geoff 10:30

Not anymore, you don't.

Nick 10:32

No, not now I have a better option, yeah.

Geoff 10:34

So, how important would you say standards are in the development of a jazz musician?

Building a Shared Repertoire List

Nick 10:40

Yeah, I think non-negotiably important, you know, they are our shared repertoire, and if you go anywhere as I often do within the context of like jazz education meetings or conferences, that kind of thing. But but when they're involving players and they're good ones, you all have a jam or play together, and so wherever you are in the world and wherever you're from, it varies and it you know, it nuances from culture to culture. But standards are standards, they they absolutely define, I think, what we do, the skills that are required to play this music, yeah. And also they're um flexible in terms of your approach, you know. You can play standards and still be interested in a in a very broad spectrum of approaches, and and you can still do that on standards. So no, I I for me they're very, very uh important.

Geoff 11:38

And do you have a do you have a repertoire list that you move from year to year?

Starter Tunes and What to Avoid

Nick 11:41

Yeah, we do in in uh first and second year, and the postgrads do it too. There's a like a course called repertoire and improvisation, and the first term is repertoire, and then the second term is looking at kind of practice techniques on that shared repertoire. Right. And in the first year it's all kind of standards, and in the second year, more like jazz composer tunes, you know, Wayne Shorter tunes, Herbie Hancock tunes, Monk, Kenny Wheeler, Bill Evans, yeah, that kind of thing, you know.

Geoff 12:11

Right. What would be the first few that you would say to a musician to learn when they're first starting out then?

Nick 12:16

Well, I mean I suppose that by the time they get to us, they're a good long way along that that path. I'm still a fan of Autumn Leaves. I think it's such a solid base and it just covers kind of DNA of of the harmonic language that's going to serve you so well. It's more a question of what you'd avoid, really, trying, you know, for anything that's flying by too fast or very chromatic and gnarly, like make sure that there's some open space where, especially for younger musicians, where just a kind of diatonic ear approach could also get you through it, you know. Because when I did used to teach at a younger age, you could so easily hit the buffers where you're trying to do this tune with them, and then suddenly you find yourself two minutes later explaining the chord tones and target notes, and and you just think, no, this is too much theory and too much explanation too early in the process. You know,

Kenny Wheeler and His Sound

Geoff 13:24

Right, right, right. Um let's talk about Kenny Wheeler, shall we? He is revered, isn't he, as a composer, um, especially in this establishment. Tell us your experience of Kenny Wheeler.

Nick 13:35

Yeah, well, we're super proud for our connection here and that we have the archive of his music here. But I mean, when we were coming up, he was very involved at the he wasn't very involved, but Scott Stroman was a massive uh, you know, supporter and fan of his, and the Guildhal l used to do things with him and recording. So I definitely hope and feel that he he belongs to to absolutely everyone.

Geoff 13:58

So you have all his music in?

Nick 14:01

I mean, I first met him when I was at Salford, I had lessons with Richard Isles, and it and it was Richard that got me into Kenny. And I just for me it it was something I I kind of fell in love with. I was never and still am not a kind of master of real pure bebop playing. I I love it and I aspire to it, but for whatever reason it it I don't think it was a lack of hard work, but it didn't come kind of flying out of me. And there's something about the that melodicism and a slight vulnerability and a you know a kind of a different approach that's still in the tradition that that lit a bit of a fire, you know. Right. But I I think often with Kenny people talk about the fact that there's kind of risk in that too for younger players that if you fall in love with someone who's too far outside the core musical skills, you could avoid getting them together because you know it's like if you're just massively into Cecil Taylor or something and don't address Bud Powell or you know, that that you need to be balanced in your approach.

Geoff 15:14

In some ways, I I I think of Kenny Wheeler as kind of almost the opposite of playing standards in some ways. Right. Would you say would you say that was true?

Nick 15:22

Well, I no in a way I think I wouldn't because his harmony is so born of that that language, and it but it's just somehow described. So it it feels like the next step or not not that it's better, but it's like a later step or a s or a a new dressing on on standards. You know, he'll use if are we allowed to be harmonically geeky?

Geoff 15:50

Yes, more than the more than

Nick 15:52

like you look at the first couple of chords on everybody's song but my own or something, instead of where where's it going to C minor instead of D half diminished G7, it's B flat B flat sus. Oh yeah, okay. B diminished. So it's it's got all this shared sound world with the conventional chords, but somehow different. And and Kenny, what people forget, because he's so associated with like ECM and contemporary, well, I know it's 50 years ago, but contemporary European jazz, he was older than Clifford Brown, you know, January 1930. His musical background is massively in the tradition, and and it was what he he loved, you know. But yeah, he was an amazing person. And I I when I moved down to London got to meet him and know him, and and slowly uh that became a friendship, and then I got him involved in the junior academy program on Saturdays, and he'd come in and talk to the kids and always play standards with them, and you know, uh he was amazing. And then, yeah, towards the end of his life, we we sort of agreed that his archive of original scores should come here. So me and a couple of students went round in a transit van and empties his uh his attic into the van, you know. Wow. Was uh quite a quite a thing.

Geoff 17:17

I mean, I I presume handwritten scores, right?

Nick 17:19

Yeah, of course, yeah.

Geoff 17:20

Did he do his own copying, would he?

Nick 17:21

Earlier in the in uh like the 70s when he was doing all those BBC broadcasts, a massive amount of them were his own copying, yeah.

Geoff 17:30

Wow.

Nick 17:30

Later, maybe he'd have people like Brian Vaughan and you know that were sort of famous in that world.

Geoff 17:36

The kids today know don't realise what what is actually involved in that

Nick 17:40

absolutely.

Geoff 17:41

I mean, I remember doing big band sitting there and writing B flat and E flat parts out.

Nick 17:46

Yeah, I mean that's I know. Well, we actually here we make the first years do everything by hand.

Geoff 17:53

Really?

Nick 17:54

So because the thing with Sibelius or Muse Score or Dorico, any of those, you've got to know what it is you're recreating. It won't do the work at the highest level for you, you know, any more than uh Microsoft Word will do your homework. I mean AI is slightly uh challenging that. But you know what I mean. It you've got to know what good layout is supposed to look like in order for the software to recreate it. So, yeah, that's our attempt to keep something of the craft alive, you know.

Geoff 18:26

Wow, so they're not allowed to use Sibelius at all?

Nick 18:28

Not in the first year.

Geoff 18:30

Wow, that's fantastic.

Nick 18:31

Yeah. They don't think so. No, no, I they I think they're sort of it uh into the fact that they you know how to do that, you know.

The Biography and Lost Scores Hunt

Geoff 18:39

That's so great, yeah. You want to talk about the latest project, the the Kenny project? Yeah, well, and what happened to you and where and where you went to celebrate it.

Nick 18:55

Yeah, well, it was an amazing uh thing in 2014 when Kenny was still alive, because I'd been kind of talking about him and playing his music around different colleges and things, uh, the conversation would inevitably come up of well, why don't you write his biography? And I was always like, No, I that needs to be done by a proper writer, you know. I can't but slowly but surely it was kind of weighing on my mind, and my friend Brian Shaw, who I'd met through Kenny, Brian also said, Yeah, well, I've sort of been thinking about that that it should be done, and it should be done by people who know him. And in the end, Brian wrote to me in 2014 and said, Look, I've got a sabbatical coming up, I'm gonna do it, and I can't do it without you. Are you in or not? And at that point, I just thought, yeah, okay, it needs. I I'd seen so many academic theses appearing that just they were accurate in terms of what they were describing, but they didn't capture what he was about because he was such a fundamentally kind of human human being with all those frailties and insecurities.

Geoff 20:06

Quite shy man, as well I think

Nick 20:07

incredibly shy and genuinely self-deprecating. It wasn't the kind of fake humble thing, and uh and all of that belongs in his story. So I I think it needed to be done by people who were close to him. So, yeah, we took on writing the book, and and in the process of all that research, because we had his archive here, I was seeing that there were all these names of pieces he'd played in the BBC broadcast, and he he had always said that the BBC broadcasts were very important to him, but I never really understood why until I went to that place in Reading, Caversham, you know, the BBC Written Archive Centre, and you can pull up all these old micro- fiches of they're called PASBs, it's program as broadcast, and it's a documentation of everything that's ever been broadcast on the BBC. They're not audio, they're micro-fiches, so it just contains the metadata effectively of what was on, who played it, who wrote the tune. And so we pulled these kind of extensive searches and I mean a massive amount of of research, and uh only our sort of naivety fuelled us through it. I think it I I I never say never, but I will say never. I wouldn't do another one because now I know just how much is involved and it's too intimidating. But at the time it was fascinating, you know. So I was realizing hang on, we've got some of these, if not all of these, pieces in the archive, you know. So we we basically set about making a project called The Lost Scores, for want of a better name. And we were going to do it in partnership with Miami University Frost School of Music, who we've got a great link with, and it was all set for June. 2020. And then

Geoff 22:02

we know what happened then.

Nick 22:03

We know what happened then. So it was devastating because we'd done all the like the whole online audition thing. It was all booked and paid for, you know, down to the flights and accommodation, and it obviously all got shelved. But we just about mustered the kind of energy and the will to resurrect it. And bless them, Abbey Road honoured the deposit. Well, it wasn't deposit, it was the full fee that we'd paid. And so we did it in I must have been June 2024 with the students we had then. And it was, yeah, this album that was released on Dave Douglas's Green leaf label called we called it Kenny Wheeler Legacy - The Lost Scores, and it ended up then getting a Grammy nomination in Best Large Jazz Ensemble. So a real kind of fairy tale ending, you know. Incredible.

Geoff 22:52

Did you go did you go out for the

Nick 22:54

Helen and I went to um go out there and with John Deversa, who was the head of jazz at at Miami. And it was, yeah, incredible. Well, it was, I mean, I I often telling people about it now. It's sort of a better story now that it's over. Yeah. But at the time it's uh if you imagine the kind of you know, one of the jazz awards, but also running alongside the Brits, the focus, the folk awards, the you know, the classic FM awards. It's so massive that it's a bit overwhelming, but but it was an amazing people.

Geoff 23:28

But you sat in the room and and listened to the ceremony and

Nick 23:31

Yeah, the the afternoon is when they do all the like the jazz, the classical, the folk, and and the evening actually is more like a pop concert. They they hand out just nine awards in three hours. But it was, you know, Sabrina Carpenter and Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars, all the sort of contemporary stars, you know. I saw Joni Mitchell walk past us and Carol King presented awards. You definitely get a feeling that you're amongst something very special, you know.

Geoff 23:59

So when you get a Grammy nomination, do you get anything to commemorate it?

Nick 24:03

Yeah, there was you on the Saturday night before the ceremony on the Sunday, there's a nominee's reception and and we got a we didn't win the Grammy by the way. Christian McBride, Big Band, won that category and deservedly so. But we get like a nominee's medal, and I think there's some certificates and things on the way for the members of the band who are it's like a performer certif nominee certificate, something like that.

Geoff 24:29

So you said that maybe we could listen to a track from that album.

Track Intro 'Who’s Standing In My Corner'

Nick 24:33

Yeah, well, one of the small group tracks, which is I mean, another example of of kind of Kenny in the in the tradition, because it this to me sounds almost like a Horace Silver tune or something like a hard bop tune, and it's uh and it was from his very first uh very first BBC broadcast, which I have to send a big thank you to Simon Spillett. He he gave me a a recording of Kenny's first broadcast in in uh 1969, and he had this tune on it called Who's Standing in My Corner? And that was about this uh, you know, because as you say, he was so shy. When he used to go to the old Ronnie Scott's, he'd kind of hide, you know, in the corner somewhere, and then one day he walked into the club, and to his dismay, somebody was stood in his little secret hiding place, you know. So this tune is uh Who's Standing in In My Corner? With it's me on Flugel, Donovan Haffner on Alto, and Nicholas Lucassen, great drummer from Miami, uh Jacob Smith, and uh and Scotty Thompson on piano.

Geoff 30:44

So the album is a mixture of small and larger ensembles, right?

Nick 30:47

Yeah, that's the only quintet uh on on there. There was one that's like a nine-piece, but mostly it's it's Kenny's Big Band from that period, which was very kind of unusual, unique lineup because he was coming out of Dankworth's band, and a lot of the charts had been written for that. So the lineup has no conventional saxophone section. It's like a they used to call it the band within a band, but it it's basically a little mixed group of instruments. In Kenny's case, Norma Winston, like voice, flugal, alto, tenor, trombone, for instance, and then on behind them a regular trombone section with tuba plus trumpets. Uh so yeah, it's very kind of unique uh ensemble from that period.

Geoff 31:35

I I spoke to Norma actually, she was a guest with me last year, and she was talking about being part of an ensemble and thinking of herself as a horn, you know.

Nick 31:43

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, she she was a guest on this, and it was amazing to have her and Evan Parker as the sort of living links to the original broadcast. But I think Norma's influence and importance should never be um underestimated, you know. She's such a gigantic figure to vocalists and and musicians in of of all kinds over across the world. When when doing this project going around the world talking about Kenny, you realised there's a few other people who are generally viewed on that kind of a level of of just their importance is way, way beyond this island, you know, and Norma is massively up there as one of those.

Geoff 32:29

On my podcast, I've had a few of the members of the original large and small ensembles recording date. So I spoke to Stan, I spoke to Henry, Henry Lowther, and they've all told us about you know making that seminal album. Yeah, you got any memories of hearing that album and

Nick 32:44

Well it was one of the big ones for me. The the I think the cassette that Richard Isles gave me had the record, the quintet record with Stan on called Flutter by Butterfly, which is still an absolute favourite. Yeah, I mean, and then music for large and small ensembles, yeah. And hearing, of course, Dave Holland and uh you know truly and the the thing about that is it's one of the few times where Kenny really had a working band. So the the rhythm section plus himself was like this an actual gigging unit kind of thing. So the chemistry on it is is just off the charts.

Quick Questions Nerves and Privilege

Geoff 33:20

I know, I agree. I remember that was a massive influence on me, too. So uh to finish off, I've got uh some questions that I ask everyone. Yeah, some musical, some not so musical.

Nick 33:31

Brilliant.

Geoff 33:32

Okay, so question number one, you may have already answered this, but uh, what is a favourite album?

Nick 33:37

Well, I'm gonna go uh back to my youth and uh when I was growing up in Toddington Service Station on the M1.

Geoff 33:45

You grew up in Toddington Service Station?

Nick 33:46

Yeah, nearby. And they sold cassettes. You could go in there and buy jazz cassettes in the shop in Toddington Service Station, and I got Louis Armstrong 'Satch Plays Fats'. Do you know that record? He's just playing Fats Waller tunes, and it's just incredible. I still love that. He's playing the tunes Trummy Young's playing, yeah. That and I think that essential kind of swing thing is so uh relevant still today. You can put kind of modern harmony or whatever, yeah, but the spirit, the rhythmic kind of essence of that, I I still completely love.

Geoff 34:28

Yeah, yeah. Alright, so second question is there a musician alive or dead that you would have liked to play with or would like to play with?

Nick 34:35

I, Herbie, wouldn't that be something?

Geoff 34:38

That name comes up a lot, yeah.

Nick 34:40

Wouldn't that be be really uh something, you know? I'd have to go over that. And I suppose past but related would have been Wayne Shorter, you know, just to feel what that massive amount of empathy and interplay uh would have would have felt like, you know.

Geoff 34:56

Do you have a you have a lot of visiting musicians here in the Academy?

Nick 34:59

Yeah.

Geoff 35:00

What sort of people have you had, memorable people in in the last few years?

Nick 35:04

Well, we're so lucky to have an ongoing relationship with Dave Holland and who's become a very good friend and colleague, and he's still just amazing, you know, whenever he plays, talks about music, such a deep thinking person and full of integrity with what he does. So Dave's an absolute hero. Ingrid Jensen as a you know massively strong female musician who's just totally inspiring to us all. So yeah, Ingrid, Chris Potter was in recently and recorded a solo saxophone album in front of us all, which was just remarkable. So yeah, we feel very uh very, very lucky really with the the quality and the range of guests, you know.

Geoff 35:48

Right, question three. What would you say has been the highlight of your career?

Nick 35:53

I think having that relationship with Kenny Wheeler has been a defining thing for me. It's m brought me closer to people I would have never have come across if it wasn't for that. So, yeah, I still feel like somehow he's kind of watching over me in some ways, you know.

Geoff 36:12

Okay, question four. What would you say was your musical weakness?

Nick 36:16

That I only pause because there's so many that I'm filtering through, not because I'm struggling to think of one. And also I'm thinking of which ones would I am I willing to reveal on not that most of them aren't blindingly obvious to even a casual listener. Yeah. One of the things for me is I don't do enough gigs playing tunes and things like that, so just more knowledge of that kind of standard repertoire would be a thing. I always feel like I wish I'd been in a choir or something that just meant my ears were sharper. They're not awful, but I compared to here, I do a lot with Tom Cawley and and Gareth Lockrane, and they've just got ears like a CSI forensic scientist, you know. And compared to that, I feel like I'm just hearing kind of general colours, you know.

Geoff 37:08

And you were here when Jacob Collier was here as a student, right?

Nick 37:11

Yes, yeah, yeah.

Geoff 37:12

And what was that experience like?

Nick 37:13

Well, Jacob was incredible, and uh we knew him since he did junior academy before that on Saturday, as a yeah, lovely young person and clearly an astonishing talent. And he wasn't kind of all up in your face about that. I think he did what he did because he loved it and it excited him. I don't think there was a conscious kind of strategy, it was an exploration of what he loved, you know. He's quite a genuine person in that the way he talks about music. It is what happened, you know.

Geoff 37:47

Because Tom Cawley was teaching him for a yeah, wasn't he?

Nick 37:50

Oh, yeah, yeah. So we were all still here. I mean, in at least within our time frames, it doesn't feel that long ago at all, you know.

Geoff 37:58

Um do you ever get nervous on stage?

Nick 38:01

Massively, yes. Uh still struggle with with that, and uh it's got easier, I think, with age, because I just you I think you just get tired of it. You get a bit bored of feeling that way and never feeling like you got the most out of a gig. And I think I've with age you've come to recognise it's actually in some ways quite a selfish emotion because it's only about you. I think it was Dave Holland who said that to me once that described it in that those terms.

Geoff 38:38

And I've never thought of it like that.

Nick 38:40

Yeah, it's a good kind of point, isn't it? You know, I've done things with him, I'm very lucky to have done so in the context of teaching things. And and I was nervous before one, and he he said that, not in a way of kind of admonishing me or anything, but just actually it is about you and the audience, they're not listening to you, they're listening to the whole thing, you know. So I've kind of found I could put my attention somewhere else other than my own head, you know. But yeah, yeah, but I've always struggled with that and expectations, and sometimes you know how it was when you're younger, you you could see just one person walks in the room and and they particularly it makes you freak out. That may have been a weakness of the past, at least that I wish I'd just been a little less scared of all of that.

Geoff 39:25

But I mean, leading a jazz course that that takes a lot of confidence. I mean, I call myself a confident person, but I'm I'm not sure I could run a jazz course. That takes an awful lot of confidence, doesn't it?

Nick 39:35

Yeah, it does. For me, they're they're sort of different because I'm I'm perfectly comfortable with what I can and can't do. So I don't feel like being the head of a jazz course means you're the best at every element that's being discussed and taught on a jazz course. Of course you're not. So that's fine. What I try and do is just make an environment where it's all about the young, you know, musicians and and making sure they have everything that enables them to do what they want to do. You mustn't make a course in your image that will be very sort of narrow and and uh could risk getting kind of ego-y on on your terms, you know. So yeah, you're right though, they they are different types of confidence, and I guess I'm lucky I'm I'm okay with that side of it. But it does, in all honesty, running a course, it does give you a slightly fractured relationship with your own playing, or at least it can risk that because you don't get a lot of time. You're always talking about the music rather than doing the music. And it and so you can get in your own head a bit. I manage it okay, but it's a it's a thing for sure.

Geoff 40:54

Or with an instrument like trumpet as well, it's yeah, that's a brutal yeah, it needs to be played, isn't it? Have you ever been starstruck?

Nick 41:02

Well, I mean, definitely, definitely. But I mean I've always been fairly okay with with the fact that they people are gonna be nice and want to meet you and want to talk. But yeah, I mean certainly in the music, but I mean doing things with Dave Holland, he couldn't be nicer and more supportive and and just brilliant kind of open musician. But yeah, you can't help but look look to your side and go, you know. It's just mostly because it's an honour and a privilege, you know, rather than in intimidating or starstruck. But yeah, for sure, that that kind of reverence when you meet those people is really something, isn't it?

Geoff 41:47

When Joni Mitchell walks past you at the Grammys, for example.

Nick 41:50

Exactly that, yeah. Yeah.

Geoff 41:52

Incredible. What's your favourite sandwich?

Nick 41:57

I think I'm gonna say humble cheese and pickle.

Geoff 42:00

Great answer. Any particular kind of cheese?

Nick 42:02

I'd go mature cheddar.

Geoff 42:04

Yeah, yeah. Okay. Have you got a favourite movie? You weren't expecting these questions, are you?

Nick 42:10

Yeah, no, no, I like it. Uh I mean Shawshank Redemption is pretty amazing. I saw that again not so long ago. It is a classic, yeah.

Geoff 42:19

Do you watch a lot of movies?

Nick 42:20

I've a fair few, yeah. One of my uh guilty secrets, I do tend to do um a fair bit of just trumpet maintenance in front of the telly or something like that, you know. If you're just playing kind of long notes or basically when you're tired at the end of a day and it's just put it on your face for an hour. So yeah, I sometimes uh kill two birds with uh one song.

Geoff 42:45

Um what about favourite venue?

Nick 42:47

I do I do love Ronnie's. That feels like a a great privilege to to be there and to play there. I think that should never be taken for granted of just what a historical venue on the world stage that that that is, yeah.

Geoff 43:04

Yeah, my my son Lewis actually, who's he's

Nick 43:08

he made his uh debut, didn't he?

Geoff 43:09

He did, did he?

Nick 43:10

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's amazing.

Geoff 43:12

Yeah, so last weekend he played at Ronnie's for the first time. Incredible. Me and Trudy stayed up till three in the morning to watch. Yeah, which killed us, you know.

Nick 43:20

Oh I bet, but did he appreciate the uh the gravitas of being on that stage?

Geoff 43:26

He did, he did, yeah. And it's yeah, it's it's always special, isn't it?

Nick 43:29

Yeah, well I think it's important to remember that because you're that's in a way, it's not to massively uh go, you know, change the subject, but the the question of what is a your privilege and being like somewhere like this at the Academy where you're around people like Dave Holland or Chris Potter or Ingrid or anyone like that is you mustn't ever take that for granted just because for you it becomes something that that is part of your life, it doesn't change the fact that it's enormous, and the same's true of. Of a venue like Ronnie's just because we're lucky that it's in our orbit, but it doesn't change the fact that it's incredibly significant.

Geoff 44:08

Yeah, absolutely is. And we and we obviously we remember the days of Ronnie actually doing the announcements and that stuff, you know. Okay, so do you get to travel a lot with your with your job?

Nick 44:17

Yes, a fair bit, you know, quite a few teaching residences at at certain other colleges and things like that, and also um occasionally the odd gig that's nothing to do with teaching uh at all.

Geoff 44:32

So, would you have a favourite city that you like to go to in the world?

Nick 44:36

Well, I love Lisbon. I I have good friends in Portugal and I've I've played there a few times, and I do love going to Portugal, but recently I did kind of two, three weeks in Australia, and it was I'm kind of a crazy bird watcher guy, like that's a secret second life, you know, photographing and what have you. And Australia was sort of mind-blowing, and Sydney for just completely like different sounds and colours.

Geoff 45:06

Did you go into the outback or anywhere else?

Nick 45:08

Yeah, yeah. I did a whole trip up into the top pointy corner up in Queensland and up into the tropical rainforests, and yeah, it was a a very memorable thing. But Sydney I I loved as well. It was very it felt kind of at home there, you know.

Geoff 45:24

Window or aisle?

Nick 45:25

Isle.

Geoff 45:26

Every time?

Nick 45:27

Yeah, a bit more space, you know, and being tall, you know, I'm six foot four. I I can't I need something, some concession.

Geoff 45:36

Cats or dogs?

Nick 45:37

Cats.

Geoff 45:38

You have cats?

Nick 45:39

Yeah, we have two cats, yeah.

Geoff 45:41

Less maintenance, I guess.

Nick 45:42

Yes, and easier to go away from, you know, that's the thing. Dogs are amazing that you can take them with you, but they're not easy to leave, you know. Yep.

Geoff 45:51

Most used app on your phone?

Nick 45:53

Probably London North West uh rail rail, yeah. But the um yeah, there's a few bird-related ones as well that do like rare sightings and things like that. But yeah, honestly, maybe the metronome that gets a pretty good uh a pretty good workout. Yeah.

Geoff 46:12

You live out of town then?

Nick 46:13

Yeah, up in Leighton Buzzard in where a lot of jazz musicians up there.

Geoff 46:18

Yeah, okay. And finally, a favourite chord?

Nick 46:21

I've I do love an altered dominant, I have to say, yeah. Okay. It just feels like this perfect uh combination of sort of function and exoticism.

Geoff 46:31

Yes, absolutely, yeah. Well, I think that's the end of the questions, and that could be the end of our little little meeting. Uh, thanks so much for for having me here.

Nick 46:40

Well, thank you for coming.

Geoff 46:41

And playing that beautiful music. And I hope to see you very soon.

Nick 46:44

Yeah, I hope so, and thanks so much, and keep this up. This uh wonderful.

Geoff 46:48

Thank you.

Announcement 46:50

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