November 23, 2025
Mick Rossi has had a burgeoning career spanning decades, genres and artists. We attempt in an hour to cover some decent ground on that amazing career, including Mick’s work with Philip Glass, The Philip Glass Ensemble, Paul Simon, Carly Simon and Hall & Oates to name just a few.
To listen / watch:
- Audio-only: click on the play button in the audio player above, or:
- Video: watch the embedded video below or check it and previous episodes out on our YouTube Channel
Discussion topics covered during the show (links will open in new tab):
Mick’s recent and (8th or 9th) tour with Paul Simon
Mick in action in 2025 with Paul Simon – The Sacred Harp
Mick in action with Paul Simon – Wristband
Recent work with the Philip Glass and the Philip Glass Ensemble – Floe (Glassworks)
Mick with the Philip Glass Ensemble in 2024 – The Grid
The late and great Dennis Sandole
Touring with Angela Bofill
Being approached to play with Philip Glass
Philip Glass – La Belle et la Bête
Mick’s keyboard rig with The Philip Glass Ensemble
Philip Glass – Orion
Philip Glass & Leonard Cohen – Book of Longing
On playing Philip Glass’ Music in 12 Parts
On conducting a Philip Glass Ensemble show with a couple of hours notice
On recording with, and joining, Paul Simon’s band
Mick in action with Paul Simon on Cool, Cool River
Mick’s keyboard rig with Paul Simon
New York’s The Knitting Factory
Mick’s prolific solo output including 160 (and why it should have been titled something different)
Mick Rossi’s Anti-Matter Live at Barbes
Mick with Caleb Wheeler Curtis – Runt
Desert Island Discs: Facing You – Keith Jarrett, Symphonies Nos 1-15 – Shostakovich, Self-Titled – Led Zeppelin, Music for Strings, Percussion & Celesta, Five Pieces for Orchestra – Webern
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
And I never thought about money and I still don't.
I never even thought about it once.
I swear.
I never thought about it.
I never thought about having to make a living.
I just like, this is what I do and this is I'm doing.
(00:20):
Hello and welcome to the Keyboard Chronicles podcast.
For keyboard players, I'm your host, David Holloway, and I'm thrilled as always to be herewith you.
I'm super privileged and honored to introduce Mr.
Mick Rossi as the guest this episode.
We had the pleasure of spending an hour with Mick.
We did need to let him go after an hour, so we always say we barely scratched the surfaceand it's definitely the case with this one.
(00:45):
Amongst many dozens of key collaborations, continues to spend many years with the PhilipGlass Ensemble, working with both Philip Glass himself and the ensemble more widely.
And since 2010, Mick has also been the percussionist and keyboard player with Paul Simon.
So those two artists alone, but as you'll hear, there is so much more to it than that,including Mick's own prodigious solo output.
(01:12):
so many artists just, yeah, it's hard to fathom.
So I'll let you jump in and listen and I'll talk to you at the end of the show.
(01:33):
Mick, I can't thank you enough for coming on the show and particularly giving up avaluable Friday night.
How are you doing?
Great, thank you.
It's so kind of you to invite me to do this.
It's funny, I was just watching an episode of Jimmy Kimmel where he was talking toSpringsteen in Brooklyn, like he spent a week in Brooklyn.
there you go.
Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
(01:53):
So now, Mick, I thought we'd kick off just talking about your last year or two.
I mean, you've been an incredibly busy musician always, but just what have you been up toover the last year or two?
Let's see, you know, a lot of this stuff goes by and then I'm on to the next thing.
So try to, I'll try to recall, but most recently, of course, I was on a really good PaulSimon tour with whom I've been working for years and years.
(02:20):
I think I've done the last eight or nine tours with him, but this was related to a newpiece that he, he wrote called Seven Songs.
It's like a chamber thing.
You know about it.
It's very, very cool.
And
That was like really long to like five months almost straight, which is I haven't beendoing that straight these days.
(02:41):
And the coolest part about it is because, you know, I get to play so many instruments.
get to play all of these crazy percussion, like Harry Partch, microtonal instruments,mallets, piano, of course, and Rhodes, all that stuff.
So it was really a really a fun time and as always a great, incredible.
And, know, as well as a bunch of Philip stuff, Philip Glass stuff.
(03:02):
In fact, I've got a tour coming up next week in Europe with the ensemble and, um, andgoing back.
So there's two new recordings I have that have not been released officially.
So that's that I did last year.
And let's see, was I in Venice last year?
No, that was still, I was on, um, no, I was in Venice for a residency and I.
(03:26):
I'd have to look at my schedule, I just can't remember.
This week I'm having trouble, you know, remembering last week.
Yeah.
Look, I mean, that gives an amazing idea.
And we're obviously going to come back to both those artists and also your own solo work.
have that on the agenda.
we'll definitely do that.
We'll now cast back a year or 10 to your childhood and musical upbringing.
(03:47):
So what got Mick Rossi into music in the first place and you know, those formative years.
dad, an accordionist growing up in Trenton, New Jersey, state of Bruce Springsteen,actually.
Jersey, right?
And yeah, he was a great accordion player and I had two brothers who were kind of musical.
(04:12):
He started everyone off on piano and I started playing when I was four and then I began
studying with him and I was an improviser from the beginning and he forced me to read,which is really what I'm grateful for.
But I was glad that he didn't shut down my ear, my whole training in that regard.
(04:35):
And then I started playing drums at about the age of seven and then I started studyingdrums.
Then, you know, it happened in like grammar school, grade school, where the orchestraconductor needed
instruments so he would just point to me and go, play that.
I'd be like, okay.
So I go, I started to play timpani.
(04:56):
I became, you know, I was a percussionist there.
I started, he goes, I need an oboe.
I'm like, I don't even know what that is.
And then I started playing oboe, which is insane, which nobody ever does willingly.
Beautiful instrument, but yeah.
So that was this.
was playing those three instruments and playing with a symphony and then playing drums inlike a uh queen zeppelin band, you know.
(05:19):
I was playing drums at my father's club day band.
We have these great musicians, great tenor player.
And I was still studying Chopin and Bach.
then eventually, I don't know what I did.
I just, never thought about it.
went to college and then I started studying privately with Dennis Sandoli.
I don't know if you're familiar with Sandoli in Philadelphia.
(05:40):
Teacher of many people, including Coltrane, Pat Martino, Brecker, all those guys.
So I don't know, what does that mean?
That means that I had a very diverse, happy childhood in that way.
was lucky that I could do that.
Eventually my dad and I would butt heads and I eventually went to other teachers.
(06:04):
No, that's amazing.
I mean, no, that's great.
I'm fascinated, Mick, by you made a point there about, you know, you didn't have your earbased musicianship sort of not beaten out of you, but you know what I mean?
As far as you didn't lose that as well as being able to read, which is an incredibleprivilege, as you know.
So I assume that still to this day, you use a mix of those approaches with your playing.
(06:27):
Absolutely, yeah.
I'm really an improviser.
The music I write, I try to make sound like it's improvised, and the music that Iimprovise, I want to make it almost sound as if it's written.
You know, it's a weird hybrid of all that.
But yeah, I teach at the New School here in New York.
I would never shut down anyone for having poor reading skills as long as their ears wereworking, you know.
(06:54):
And, you know, it all depends on if you want to end up at the New York for a harmonic,then you got to, you know, you can't be an improviser.
I don't know.
For me, I was lucky I had both sides of that because I was somehow, you know, my DNAgranted me some, some ears and my dad had enough diligence to like keep me on the line
(07:17):
about being practical too, which we would fight about a lot.
including in the music that I would write myself.
he wanted me to, you know, make money.
And I never thought about money and I still don't.
I never even thought about it once.
I swear.
I never thought about it.
I never thought about having to make a living.
I just like, this is what I do and this is what I'm doing.
(07:38):
I say no to a lot of things and I'm not on social media.
I don't know.
That's the long answer.
Sorry, you didn't even ask.
I love it.
No, that's brilliant.
so, Mick, mean, obviously with that incredibly diverse training and moving into earlyadulthood, what was some of the more, so I'm thinking about here a bridge between that and
playing with the Philip Glass Ensemble.
(07:59):
So what was some of those earlier gigs and bands that led to you believing, well, I amactually making a living out of this.
Well, I still, I actually never even thought that even when it was happening, that I wasmaking a living at it.
I don't know why I was lucky.
I was call it like denial and complete delusional like aspiration, but I was just, I justdid it, you know, it was weird.
(08:21):
And, but one of the early, early things, of course, Sandoli had a big effect on me becauseI was probably 20 when I started doing that.
And I still was for four years, maybe I was 19 and his approach was
Absolutely abstract, like completely impractical music.
(08:43):
If you have your own voice, you can really gain a lot of insight into the composition.
there was nothing you could say, this is compositional, you just had these devices, butotherwise, so he was a big influence.
But some of early things, like I was in, I was in Angie Bofield's band.
you know who Angela Bofield was?
New York.
(09:03):
I had to name Riggs a bell.
Oh, yep.
Yeah
she was great.
She passed away a few years ago, but that was, I was in my early twenties.
That would have been the first time I really did any real touring, you know.
So was very lucky to run into that.
was a great band.
was you know, Phyllis Hyman, Nona Hendrix, all those guys, the Barkay's, all those reallygreat bands from the seventies.
(09:30):
So yeah, that was probably the first thing where I started.
Actually, I was like, wow.
You know, cause I lived close to New York, Trenton, I don't know if you know it, but it'salmost halfway between Philly and New York.
So I could study in Philly, study in Trenton, studied in New York, played all thoseplaces.
oh But that was really what maybe got me to New York.
(09:51):
Not that I cared about going to New York.
I was just like, I'm just going to write music, you know?
that maybe Angie was probably the first thing.
Yeah.
And those early touring experiences, I mean, in spite of your training and doing moreregular gigging, I'm not sure whether you're touring around the country at that stage, but
(10:12):
what was that learning curve for you like as far as the business rather than themusicianship of it?
I learned there's a certain amount of court politics in all of this, right?
So I remember being asked if I wanted to do the record, the new record.
You know, we worked touring around the country as well.
In fact, I was a kid, I was playing at like the garden and uh like the Superdome and allthis crazy craziness, you know?
(10:38):
It's not something I even care about doing.
And not only that, these artists, including, I'll just like go off on a tangent for asecond.
I Philip, even I worked with Carly Simon, I worked with Sting, I worked with Hall & Oates.
These are guys that I would never even, I never thought about.
In fact, to this day, I still don't know the words you can call me out.
(11:02):
I don't even know what he's saying, you know?
I'm just like, you know, I'm just doing it.
there.
not listening.
I don't listen to words.
I'm kind of an idiot that way, but, um, so they were people that I had no interest in.
And, and when it-
popped up, I had friends talk me into it.
I remember when Philip called and I called my friend out in LA, my friend John Valentino,his great guitarist.
(11:27):
And I'm like, I don't want to this music.
What am going to do with this?
He goes, are you insane?
So he talked me into that.
I'm so glad because Philip is an unbelievable special human being.
And it turns out all of them, Paul, I never owned a Paul record, you know, because of mysilly esoteric
(11:47):
Physic minded stupidity.
I would think I got no interest in that in a way.
You know, it wasn't that I was in curious, but so after working with them all, I see howbrilliant they are, you know, and it taught me a lot to just, you know, just shut up and
be grateful, which I am, but don't be so judgmental right at the top.
(12:09):
Well, it wasn't that I just didn't, I didn't care.
I'm in some weird universe, you know, and it served me well because I don't
I had some strange family situation.
My brother committed suicide and all this kind of, everybody's got their story.
So music was like, just went there and I never got in trouble.
(12:31):
uh
I don't think you're unusual, particularly in regards to lyrics.
think half the keyboard player community don't, I know I don't, although bizarrely enough,one of about five songs I do know the lyrics to are is you can call me out or finally
enough, but I don't think that's unusual.
And I think it's because we're so focused on the music.
(12:53):
do have to ask now, Mick, you just mentioned Philip Glass called you now for someone, eventhough you may have been unaware of it to some extent at the time.
For someone to call you of that notoriety, what did they see in you to call you?
I know that's a hard question when you're the person they're calling, but why, why had youcome to his attention that he felt you'd be a valuable part of the ensemble?
(13:16):
Well, it's kind of a simple reason, two reasons.
One is that I play both drums, percussion, and keyboards.
And a tour came up where they needed both for the tour.
So one was Cranascazzi, which was keyboards, and one was Polacazzi, which was percussion.
And another, I forgot, it was another program.
So that was the practical aspect of it.
(13:37):
Turns out that I have friends in the ensemble too, back in the day.
So.
word of mouth, you know, that kind of thing.
Somebody recommended me because they knew I played boats.
And that was pretty much it.
I started that and I've been doing it ever since.
Absolutely.
mean, was there a, was there a formal audition process required there or did you just slotin me?
(13:59):
Never.
I went to Singapore.
I had a sound check.
That was pretty much it.
know we didn't know.
I'll tell you one thing, Philip, there's no rehearsal ever.
Almost never.
Unless it's a brand new thing like the Leonard Cohen thing or something.
So yeah.
no, you walk out, know, sound check hour and half later, you've, you know, did it.
(14:23):
What have I done?
Am I fired?
You know, so that's pretty much it.
No, no audition.
No.
And so what was the, for that first gig then, Mick, what was the prep that you needed todo for that?
mean, people obviously are aware of Phillip's work and it's incredibly diverse.
yeah, was like, what sort of preparation were you able to do to pull that off?
(14:43):
Yeah, oh yeah, I forgot, sorry.
The third piece was La Bella La Bette, the Cocteau film that we played.
It was really a handful.
mean, it's hard, hard, hard, too manual, you know.
Anyway, that was it.
So the only reason I thought I was, because the prep was, of course I got all the music, Ihad recordings, you know, just like anything.
(15:04):
you know, at I have the score, look it over, trying to figure out how I can play like thatfor so long without stopping and.
Boy, that many notes, but I've always had pretty good hands, you know, so, but that wasit.
I went into the famous Looking Glass Studios, which was Philip's old space on BeakerStreet and asked if I could just have like an hour or two on that whole rig, you know,
(15:29):
because I just wanted to see, cause there's patches, you you got, you know what it's like,right?
so I did do that, but it was interesting.
I was in the live room practicing this music though.
It was a bit that I needed to practice.
And there was an interview going on in the control room and I saw like a video camera anda guy and a mic and this beautiful woman.
(15:54):
And I'm trying to, I'm like practicing, I'm like, what the hell?
You know, I'm looking, turns out it was David Bowie.
It Bowie, it's like, that's the most beautiful man I've ever seen, I think, in my life.
Stupid.
So that was my preparation.
(16:15):
I forgot I did go in there that one day on my own.
This was weeks before, maybe a week or two before the tour.
oh
And so I do have to ask, even though we're not a technology based podcast, we're about theplaying, but Mick, when you mentioned about playing the full rig, as much as you can
recall, as you know, Keyboard's changes on, what roughly was the full rig at that stage?
(16:36):
In those days, like it's all gotten so streamlined as you might imagine now, but they wereold Peavey's.
Oh, wow.
And I can't remember the model, but the big heavy weighted, 88 key weighted ones.
Yeah, so that's what we used for a long time.
They went away, they died.
(16:59):
eventually Michael Reisman Phillips,
really brilliant music director and he's the guy that dug all the samples and stuff.
We streamlined everything down to the point where we now travel with like three or fourMac minis and backline weighted keyboards.
So they could be anything from like a Kurzweil to a Roland to yeah, but all have to belike a good instrument.
(17:24):
So that's where we're at now.
At one point we're using those Yonahut P155s.
We actually brought those out, but then
It's gotten even more streamlined now.
It's almost all backline.
So, just while we're on that side of things, as you mentioned, you're about to go out ontour again with Phil.
So you said four or five Mac mini, so you're running what, main stage gig before?
(17:46):
What are you running on that?
You know what he's running?
It's Bidual.
Do you know this app?
Yeah.
it's not, it's not like any of that.
It's just, I don't know what the front end is.
It might be that.
And it used to be like sample cell was Pro Tools for a long time.
We had the huge refrigerators and then those went away.
(18:07):
So I'm pretty sure that's what it is.
Although I, I stay away from it as much as possible.
Not that I can't do it, but I I don't even know about it because every, every sound checkof course.
and I'll play something and it'll be like, where is it?
it's like five octaves up here.
It's got to be move, move, you know, something.
So I let Michael do that though.
When the other town guys.
Yeah, no, makes sense.
(18:28):
so over the years of the ensemble, it's a significant number of years now.
Obviously the music has continued to evolve.
I know you've been involved on more than nine of the recordings.
How is that from your viewpoint as a musician?
What is your view over the years of how it's it's matured and what you've continued tolearn or enjoy as a player within the ensemble?
(18:53):
I mean, the music has matured or I've matured as well.
Well, both I would say.
yeah, I will tell you this that in whatever year it is now five, 26 years, I'm stilltrying to figure out how to play this music.
It is really a beast, you know, and especially the really hardcore early minimalist stuffthat music at 12 parts and in fact, I just pulled this out just so I could, you want to
(19:22):
see what we can play.
This is, this is like my life for a lot of, a lot of the time.
Wow.
This goes on for pages and pages and pages.
So this happens to be Crayona Scotty, like a middle of Crayona Scotty.
I just broke out in a cold sweat, looking at that.
Yeah, but I've been playing it for one year, you know, over 20, 25 years probably.
(19:43):
But the one thing I learned the most is, well, it's a couple of things.
I will say first off, it's amazing to be playing with people that are still living andmaking new things like a guy like Phil, you know, and Paul too, but Philip, you know, we
did a lot of new projects together, Orion and Book of Longing and a lot of stuff.
(20:07):
But having said that,
Having recorded music at 12 parts for the first time I ever played it in Italy, I don'tknow if you know that piece, it's about four and a half hours long, and it's just
unquietable, pretty much.
There will be, as you talk about Turing, somebody will melt down eventually somewhere inthat thing.
But I learned, I've learned how to play his music because you're a keyboardist, right?
(20:33):
You're a pianist.
If you don't relax, you can't waste any energy whatsoever.
And you're in up for pieces like that.
It's almost like trying to run a marathon in a way.
just have to like pace yourself up to the point and you have to relax.
So the most that I think I probably matured is learning how to relax.
(20:56):
You can't force anything.
can't get keyboard hard, you know, most of the time, because a lot of it is just for FISA.
samples.
So it's on or off.
There's not even any velocity to those.
if you're, if you're starting, you know, trying to play with any kind of like feeling, andI don't mean feeling, like velocity sensitive, like emotion, you're going to, you're not
(21:21):
going to make it to the end.
You're just going to burn out, you know, you're just going to get tight.
Your hands are going to hurt, you know, so I never have any issues.
So, but I have learned that.
And what was the other question?
it?
It was just really, yeah.
No, think you've, I think you've covered that nicely and you've also raised a parallelpoint, which I assume your training as a drummer and percussionist, that stamina issue is
(21:43):
obviously a big issue in that, that area as well.
So, I mean, how are the hands holding up?
mean, that's, it's a big physical output across the show.
Yeah, yeah, no, I'm good.
I swear.
I never felt better.
My chops have never felt better, you know.
It's a lot of years of playing that music and figuring out how to do it.
And it's really kept, even when I'm not touring with him, I will practice some of thatmusic just to keep it in my hands.
(22:08):
And it's actually good for me, you know, for anyone, I think.
So, the drum thing, yeah, the percussion thing, the time thing is really important as itis with anyone.
But yeah.
I don't know.
couldn't do without one or the other.
would miss it.
You know, if I didn't get that.
Yeah, it's definitely a symbiotic relationship.
(22:32):
could spend four hours just talking about your time as part of the Philip Glass Ensemble,obviously, aside from your percussion and keyboard work, I know you've done a bit of
conducting in that as well.
I'm going to call it locally.
know you conducted as part of the ensemble at the Sydney Opera House.
Just tell us a little bit about your recollections of that.
Oh man, I really loved that show.
(22:57):
It was called Book of Longing.
Do you know this piece at all?
It was a different thing.
wasn't quite the normal ensemble.
was like a little chamber band, right?
And with four singers and Philip was on the stage and half the time he fell asleep.
You know, he didn't have much to play.
And yeah, it was very cool.
(23:18):
In that show.
In fact, we learned it all together.
I played percussion and keyboards, moving back and forth between marimba and you know,that was my part.
And the reason I came to conduct it, although I have conducted other ones where it wasn'tsuch a howling uh initiation.
Beastman was riding his bike and he got doored in Milan, I think it was.
(23:45):
And when I tell you, you know, was lucky because I knew the piece.
so well, but this is four o'clock and I'm tuning drums and just getting ready forsoundcheck and the stage manager and the tour manager comes up and goes, Reese is in the
hospital.
What are we going to do?
I'm like, fuck, what?
(24:06):
So I combined my percussion and piano book with his book.
He mostly didn't have a lot to play because he was conducting.
So I had all the heavy lifting anyway, but I had to leave.
book out and I had to combine his book and my book.
So there was no percussion that night.
(24:27):
And, um, and I had to conduct it on the spot pretty much.
It was pretty much what happened on that one.
And then I eventually ended up doing a bunch of them, Sydney and a bunch of other cities,cause he was still laid up and he wasn't able to make any of it.
But the others though that I have done, I did Dracula a bunch of times, um, you know,
(24:49):
I was hired, I wasn't like, it wasn't an emergency, both with the ensemble and withKronos, with Philip and Kronos Quartet.
So yeah, but the Cindy thing, man, that was, that was a blast.
Cause I'd been there before and I just remember my dressing room was so great because Ihad a big Steinway D and it was, it had to be about 30 feet long, the room, all windows
(25:14):
overlooking the bridge and you know, just, you know, that's the way it's.
I don't know.
It's kind of epic.
was, it was, it was a thrill, you know?
No, absolutely.
I have to, I say that emergency night at the opera house, you were still playing keyboardsas well as the conducting.
Yes, that was not at the Opera House though.
That was in Milan.
(25:35):
The Emergency Night.
Yeah.
Sydney thing came later on in that tour.
There were a bunch of other...
Yeah, yes, I was because I had to play all my parts plus his parts.
And I had to kind of combine them and figure out which ones were necessary for the piece.
And some marimba stuff I had to play because it wasn't, there was no marimba, so I had totransfer it in...
(25:56):
Yeah, it's basically, there was a bit of improvising going on in that, which is cool.
And I have done a lot of improvising with Philip.
There was a trio that I was in for a long time with Wendy Sutter, the great cellist.
I played all that stuff.
I played percussion and mallets and piano and improvised and improvised pretty much theentire thing actually.
So, which was really fun.
(26:18):
And I know we've only got so much time, but I was really interested in that area in thePhilip Glass ensemble as far as the role of improvisation versus the charts, because yeah,
I mean, is it possible to encapsulate the approach?
Obviously, I assume it varies by the piece and Philip's approach to the performance and.
There's very, very, very little improvisation, almost none.
(26:41):
um That just happened to be a different, they called it the Phil Gweiss Chamber.
It was just a trio.
And I improvised because there was no drum parts written, no percussion parts.
You know, it Choleste, a little Choleste part was written, you know, that kind of thing.
But yeah, so in general, there's almost none.
(27:02):
In Einstein on the Beach, there is one piece called Building where there's a
big tenor solo that plays over this ostinato thing we do, it was craziness, you know.
That's improvised, but rarely does this ever come up.
So in fact, Philip on that tour, was the first time Philip ever played a note that wasn'twritten.
(27:23):
Wendy and I got him to, and he was like, I'm so sorry, Nadia, know, Boulanger.
was like, I apologize to Nadia Boulanger.
was like, Phil, just wait, hit the inside, know, just.
Fuck the string or something, you know, it's like trying to get him to do something crazy,know, a seamless game, you know.
Great.
And so one last Philip Glass question.
(27:45):
Obviously he's an iconic artist.
And so what is the collaborative approach, if there is any collaborative approach as faras preparing for performances and depending on the piece, the band as a unit, how does
that work as far as, know, Philip is very much a band leader and this is the way it goes,which is not uncommon, or there is a little bit more to and fro with it.
(28:08):
What I'll say is that Philip is mostly hands off.
That's Michael Reisman, or whoever conducting at the time.
He's the one running the whole thing, really.
So, you know, like I said, on tour, we just have a soundcheck and we've been playing allthis music for a lot of years.
you know, it's a lot of quirky things because that music is loud a lot of the time andit's hard to hear and the parts...
(28:36):
are intricate and you could get thrown so easily.
So you got to know what you want to listen for.
And there was a time when we all went to all in ears, which I don't like.
So I went back to a monitor, but everybody has their own little thing.
You know, I had a little mixer for a while and then.
So, yeah.
So Phil, although he's not, he's not touring with us now.
He's 88.
He's stopped for past couple of years.
(29:00):
Phil would just be, you know, a couple of notes, you know, play like the low note, youknow, he, didn't have a lot.
to do because he was just getting old and his hands were getting a little arthritic, youknow.
So he was basically hands off, you know, he's cool.
Riesman's very smart.
We all get along great.
I remember one time we sounded so bad and we come off the stage and Phil was like, hey,that was great, guys.
(29:29):
You know, he's like so positive.
He never like yelled at ever at anyone.
I've never heard him like say anything like that.
But yeah, we can be, it can be loose even within the structure, you know, the structuredplane.
So.
No, great perspective.
Thank you.
And I can't think of a more polar opposite artist, but we'll move on to this before we goon to a lot of other things.
(29:51):
Paul Simon.
mean, so it doesn't get much more different than that.
So tell us about how that relationship came about, how you, joined Paul in 2010.
That is just so wacky.
In fact, I love that about it, that they are so diametrically opposed in a way.
I got a message from Paul, phone, voicemail, and it was so ridiculous.
(30:15):
He goes, uh, Mick, uh, uh, you know, I don't know if you know him, he's very, he's kind ofshy, you he's quiet.
Uh, this is Paul Simon.
Uh, I'm a friend of Philip Glass.
And I was wondering if you want to join the band.
I call him back and I'm like,
I know who you are, are you crazy?
I was, he was so, but it wasn't like fake.
(30:37):
was like really, you know, he's, he's.
So yeah, so I had a couple of friends in that band also over the years, Andy Snitzer, MarkStewart, Jamie Haddad, you know, there's a lot of great people in that.
But Philip recommended me for recording actually.
Sorry, that was not to join the band.
That was, that was to actually do a recording with him.
And then after I did a recording, he did call and ask if I wanted to join the band.
(30:59):
So that's how that came.
about and I'm so grateful.
ah
And because it's so different, Mick, what was your approach?
mean, obviously you're an incredibly experienced musician by this stage, but were thereany learning curves there as far as just getting your head around the material?
as you know, Paul Simon's own stuff goes from folk through to electronic and in between.
(31:23):
Yeah.
What was the approach there?
You know, I just have to say it was, his music is very complex and it's kind of a simpleway.
And it's such a respite for me to do Paul because it's requires almost no, it's almost alljust the instinct is.
And I love that about it and he's cool.
And I got a lot of room and, but you know, I've been, I know about all that stuff playing,you know, any, any of these styles I can do.
(31:52):
never even, I didn't study them, but it's just an.
That music is naturally just sort of, it kind of plays itself as the only thing I couldsay about it, you know?
And so we, with him, he's the opposite of Phil.
All he does want to do is rehearse.
It's like days and days and days, which I find kind of cool because I never do that.
(32:17):
And it's like in a band and you're like going over the same, you know, eight bars forlike, you know, half hour.
It's more for him, you know?
But he's very meticulous and although he's loosened up lately, but he knows what hedoesn't want.
I will say that.
And he's kind of a savant orchestrator.
Like he's just, we'll be like, leave that out.
You know, can you, how about, can you do something like this?
(32:40):
And we'll just go, I'll go, no, not that too many notes.
know, usually it's the case.
then, but we have a, we have a funny relationship, Paul and I, in that because he'sfriends with Philip, I showed him a photo of a
dressing room sign from Dallas or something of the Philip Jones ensemble.
(33:02):
Spilled it wrong, it got his last name wrong.
This is the opera house, I think, in Dallas.
So over the years now, he'd always want me to do something because I do a lot of preparedpiano stuff.
He always wanted me to do something crazy, which I love.
I'm like, yeah, who does this in a pop concert?
I have this crazy avant-garde.
(33:23):
Insane soul at the end of cool, river.
But I always go, hey man, Phil Jones, do some Phil Jones.
And he'd like, okay, so I'll do something like Philip, you know, Philip Mike, you know.
No, that's amazing.
again, just briefly, mean, I know you still correct me if I'm wrong, but with Paul Simon,the really extensive touring is essentially done, but there are sort of one-off shows here
(33:45):
and there.
I mean, Paul's struggles with his hearing and that have been well documented.
don't need to go into that, but what essentially is your keyboard rig now when you do playa show?
It's so amazing.
I have Steinway B, which I go to Steinway and pick out and they're kind enough to...
I have the old Fender Rhodes that Richard T.
(34:05):
played for all those years, which is Paul's, but I always call it T's Rhodes, really.
I have a uh Harmonium.
I have Choleste.
I have a Vibraphone.
I have a Glockenspiel.
I have these cloud chamber bowls.
I've got chimes, know, orchestra bells, tubular bells.
(34:26):
And over the years, a lot of hand drums, snare drum.
In this case, I think that's all I had on the last thing was just usually B3, but there'sno B3 on this one.
In fact, I had a C3 out for one time.
And yeah, usually, but those were the more up like pop hit stuff in the arena thing.
(34:47):
So we didn't even need organ on this thing.
Like I said, it was so quiet.
There were no many monitors.
Like I could hear the other side of the stage, you know, without it.
Cello, flute, viola.
It's great.
So yeah, so that, that's it.
Never, almost never.
I did have one like keyboard that I would play a couple samples and in which case, Ibought one of Harry Parch's harmonolodion, you know, this big keyboard that's like 30
(35:14):
notes per octave or something.
So.
We set sample some of that and there was one or two pieces where I used the bass pedalsfrom the organ triggered those.
And another thing where I was playing like a doombeck, but I had to have a low, you know,a bowl, not tablet, but you know, like a new pot.
(35:36):
That sounds like, so it's like a don't, you know, so it would be like this, be like, good.
Good dad hit a keyboard, don't you know, and hit one note on the keyboard.
Anyways, usually there's no electronic keyboard over by me.
Rhodes is the most electronic thing there is.
that's, yeah.
So, which I love because he loves using the real stuff.
(35:58):
And I'm lucky to get to do that.
get to, I get to play all those things and there's no, no cheating, you know, no, no, nocheaping out on it.
eh
And over that time, particularly probably those early years, 2010 through to say 2018,what are some highlights for you as far as when you did perform and tour?
(36:18):
there some key gigs that you particularly enjoyed?
Some highlights?
Yeah, a lot of them, will say I pushed.
It was, was bittersweet because on the night of our 2016 election, I was in London playingat Royal Albert Hall, which I love, I love that.
(36:41):
I love that place because the people are close, you know, and so anyway, so that, thatsticks out in my mind because I just love playing there.
But then I woke up to what I.
was suspecting anyway, alas, and you're lucky you're as far away as possible.
So we won't get into that, but, uh, yes.
And that was a lot of places like, you know, I would bowl effective.
(37:03):
Oh, the bowl Ellie for demonic was the first concert I played with Philip where I met mygirlfriend came to here.
I'm like, dude, crazy.
Look at this first gig that she saw me do with Phil.
So, so I liked the bow.
Red rocks and, and I liked this.
concert hall in Hamburg, it's a small hall.
I'm trying to think, you know, they're all, after a while you just get run together, allthe arenas, can't find my way around.
(37:32):
So many great times, you know.
I can't complain about any of it.
Really, the travel is all very civilized.
It is, yeah.
And you've, I think you've already alluded to this Mick, but I mean, within the Paul Simonexperience, as far as performing, you have a little bit more freedom.
So there is a little bit of more improvisation that goes on.
(37:53):
A lot of room.
Yeah.
I, I, there are certain parts here and there, of course it depends on the tune, but ingeneral, I'm not playing the same thing every night, you know?
There's a lot of, I got a lot of space.
It's fun.
You know, I don't mind playing the same thing here and there, but I'm not really builtthat way.
(38:14):
Can't play the same thing once, right?
That old joke.
I love it.
Now for the sake of our listeners and viewers around the world, Mick has collaborated withliterally dozens and dozens of artists.
So I already warned Mick on this.
was going to ask you Mick to call out some other collaborators.
mean, just for the sake of our listeners, everyone from Marho Visionary Project, CarlySimon, Johnny Valentini you mentioned, Wynton Marsalis, Neville.
(38:39):
Are there some highlights just from probably a musicianship viewpoint that youparticularly enjoyed or it might've been the actual.
Performance itself.
Yeah, well some that you would call out
The big time thing is a different level of show business, you know, which I appreciate.
But I probably have the most fun with projects of my own and my brothers here in New Yorkand in Brooklyn and the old downtown thing with, you know, the old knitting factory stuff
(39:09):
and all that.
And people like Andy Laster and Kermit Triscoll and Dave Douglas and
So many great, great people.
Mark Dresser I've had chance to work with a lot over the years.
Michael Serene, who I just had uh dinner with yesterday.
(39:30):
I don't know if you know him.
He's a great, great, drummer.
um Yeah.
Too many is a name.
can't even.
So many, so many good collaborations.
Yeah.
I mean, even in my early days, was composer in residence in a few dance companies.
I wrote a lot of modern dance music and those were really rewarding.
(39:53):
I get to write whatever I want and basically that's it.
If I can do whatever I want, I'm happy.
If people are on me about, know, don't do that, don't do this.
just like, I don't need this, you know, I got to get out.
Yeah, no, love it.
And I know, I mean, this is probably a good point to talk about your solo work.
mean, you've released an amazing number of both solo albums or key collaborations withpeople.
(40:18):
mean, I know I've listened to Cut the Red Wire Love, Bangkok Cowboys, oh Stray from lastyear.
Just talk a little bit.
I mean, obviously this is a key part of your artistic psyche.
I mean, as you mentioned, going back to your childhood, this, you love doing your ownthing.
weren't necessarily worried about it being
commercially successful, but I mean, there's some amazing music in there.
(40:39):
Just tell us about broadly how you've managed to continue that solo output amongsteverything else you've been doing.
Yeah.
I, it's necessary for my brain to keep doing that in my soul, you know, but some of theseare projects that like, for instance, um, I don't know if you got to hear 160, which I can
(41:01):
explain a quick thing about the title later, but that was a, began as a small shortdocumentary film.
And I expanded the whole thing into a recording, um, by, uh do you know the artist JimDine?
He's an American artist.
No, don't.
Like a modernist, yeah.
Anyway, his son is a great, speaking of the oboe, he's a great oboist.
(41:23):
He made these oboe films.
So I did some scores for him.
But that record, you know, a lot of times I like doing all this stuff myself.
I played everything on that, overdubbed everything, but it's all real.
You know, it's not, there's no sequencing and no...
So I love doing that.
love, like, as you probably do, you know, sit here.
You know, hit some stuff, record, overdub this, you know, change stuff around.
(41:49):
anyway, that, cause I have dyslexia, that record is really meant to be called 106 becausethe entire record was in the metronome marking of 106, not 160.
And I never even noticed it.
It went to the graphics people, the guy sent it to me, proofread it.
Yeah, it's great.
It's great.
160.
(42:09):
It's not 160, it's 106.
So, but.
I'm particularly proud of that record because I just, I love how insane it is and it'sjust not for everybody.
It's really dense and you probably need a drink after it because it's a lot, you know, butI just love being on to the next thing that's different.
(42:29):
I just don't want to do the same thing.
And I had this couple of quintet records that I love doing, the Live at the Indie Factorywith Russ Johnson and Kermit and that one was
I think, um, I liked doing those.
And then I have this, um, I don't know if you got a chance to hear, uh, live at Barbaz.
(42:52):
I just checked it out.
It's cute.
Like that.
It's almost, it's like a surf, like funk, terrible marching band thing.
It's just awful, but I love, I like that.
In fact, I'm getting ready to do a second record with them, but that was a live one.
Yeah.
So there's that.
That's very different.
And then I have the live one from MoMA from a solo piano record.
(43:16):
And then there was a studio solo record.
just, each one, just try to do a different thing almost every time.
That's all I can say is this one I make it different, you know.
And the diversity is incredible across your catalog to date.
And I think you mentioned at the start of show, you've got another two sort of coming up.
this, uh, the saxophone slash trumpet player named Caleb Wheeler, Wheeler Curtis.
(43:40):
You know, this guy is a kid.
I don't think he's 40, you know, he's amazing.
In fact, I just saw him yesterday too.
So that's coming out.
It's called Runt.
Um, it's mostly a duo, improvised duo record actually with him.
So yeah.
And I'm, like I said, I'm on to pre-production for.
(44:03):
The new, that's called Antimatter, my band called Antimatter.
The one that live one from Barbez.
So I have a new, I have all the music written.
It's been sitting there for 10 years, probably longer now.
So I never get to the other stuff.
And this time I said, you know, I'm going to go record this music that's sitting here.
Cause I never, moved on to the next thing so fast.
I leave all that behind, you know?
(44:24):
So, but I'm not sentimental about it.
No, I think you raise a great point there about not being sentimental.
think that shines through with what we've chatted on.
A common question we ask our guests is the whole imposter syndrome thing.
And this may not be an issue.
isn't for a lot of artists, but have there been times through your career you haveactually doubted yourself or you're more of a, I'm not sentimental.
(44:45):
I go with the flow.
If it works, it works.
If it doesn't, it doesn't.
Yeah, I will say I'm not affected by that.
I could probably apply more scrutiny to my own, whatever I end up working on.
But I will tell you this today, I really, I don't judge my music because everything elseis, I'm so judgmental about it.
I, I, if I write something and in a couple of measures, I'll know whether I'm going toscrap it or not.
(45:11):
But if I go further, I just get to the end and that's it.
I rarely edit or.
or go back and fix.
And if it's bad, I accept that and I'm okay.
And I don't care actually, it's cause what I did, it's what I did, you know?
So it's a little bit existential I guess, but.
I don't know.
(45:33):
Yeah.
Yeah, I don't even know what that imposter syndrome is.
mean, it's people who...
I mean, of course I've been on things where I'm like, I'm wrong for this, you know, I'mgonna crash and burn, you know, which, of course, every now and then you get fired for
something, but...
So, know, I never thought that.
I just knew I was wrong.
I didn't feel like an imposter though.
Yeah, no, absolutely great perspective.
(45:55):
And we do need to ask Mick about an onstage trainwreck.
Is there one that you can look back upon and laugh and go, wow, that did not go well?
Yeah, I was thinking about that.
It doesn't happen often though, you know, I have to say that I had to reach back to tryand think about it, but every year I end up doing this benefit for Philip called the Tibet
(46:17):
House here in New York.
Tibet House benefit and brings together all these really interesting groups and bands andartists and everybody plays like 15 or 20 minutes, know, maybe there's 10 or 12 people.
Laurie Anderson, you know, done it with her, done with Philip a million times.
two years ago, the ensemble did it and we come out and you play like 15 minutes and thepiece that evening was going to be a version, short version of something from Music in 12
(46:47):
Parts, which I said was like four and a half hours, but this was only going to be 20minutes, part eight, which is really brutal.
But to play for 15 minutes, I went, this is like going to bed and waking up in the Bahamasor something.
So easy.
So what happened is we're onto like the first eight, 12 measures of this thing.
That's just, you know, blistering fast.
(47:10):
And the keyboards are like at least two or three cents away from you.
Like not even microtonal, it's like a whole step high.
One of them is Michael's.
So it turns out because these are all backline rentals, somehow MIDI information was beingsent to pitch.
And it was changing pitch and it kept moving and getting higher and higher and higher.
(47:32):
So I was like, okay, let it just keep going.
In fact, I was kind of digging it.
I was like, this is so fucked up.
I love this.
But Reisman, this is Carnegie Hall.
Carnegie Hall.
Reisman stops, stops everything, stops the band.
And we're like, he gets up, walks across stage, takes about five minutes to fix it.
(47:54):
He figured it out that it was like, he goes in and he just fixes it, turns off the.
the pitch information.
And we started and we go, it wasn't, people were laughing and clapping, but it did kind ofkill the buzz though.
Cause usually we go out there and we just blow it out, know, but this one was like, ah,it's one I could think of actually.
(48:15):
No, that's amazing.
Love it.
That's a classic.
And then we do have the dreaded Desert Island Discs question mix.
So five albums, if you have to pick them, what would they be?
I almost think of it more as what might've been influential to me than if it's something Ican't live without or something, In a way, but a few things come to mind.
(48:36):
is Keith Jarrett's solo record called Facing You.
know this record?
Unbelievable.
Any Shostakovich symphony, particularly though the 15th, I love the best is last one.
Bernard Hytink's oh reading.
I think it was Concertgebouw.
m
Or it might've been London Phil.
(48:56):
I forgot.
oh Yeah.
Led Zeppelin I just, I love that record so much.
just, I think it's just, I don't think anyone's come even close and none of it, none ofthis stuff.
Um, cause they were really playing those guys.
It wasn't slick at all, you know, they got a little slicker later, but it was still neverslick slick.
(49:20):
Another one would be, um, Bartok's.
Music for strings, percussion, cellist.
Do you know this?
No, but I'll find it for sure.
Yeah.
If you ever have seen the Kubrick movie The Shining based on the Stephen King book, thatscore is in there he's using that all over that.
And then maybe the last thing, it's hard to, I mean, any Bach, like the Bach well-temperedclavier by any one almost, or Gould, or even Heath did some nice ones.
(49:50):
But I will mention one other one, which is probably six, and it's the Webern music, FivePieces for Orchestra, I think it's called.
very last question is sort of a very brief 10 part and we call it a quick fire 10.
So, and I think some of these questions would be particularly amusing given the areayou've worked in.
(50:11):
due to some serious crime, you're sentenced to six months in a tribute band.
What tribute band are you choosing?
That's a valid question.
That's a valid answer.
Maybe the Mavishnu band because that was like, we were really playing that music, but Ican't stand mimicking anything, I'm sorry.
no, valid.
Before a gig, so it doesn't matter which artist or your own work, but what is an importantpre-gig ritual for you to feel settled before you start a show?
(50:38):
Yep.
Great.
Pretty much it.
I mean, it needs sleep, obviously, when you're on the road over in Europe or something,but...
Yeah, very good.
If you hadn't been a musician, what do you think your career choice would have been?
Well, I wanted to be a veterinarian.
Yep.
When I was a kid, I love animals so much that I couldn't bear to see me sticking knives inthem and needles and, know, so maybe that, yeah.
(51:03):
Yeah, no, no, very good.
Nearly impossible given the diversity of your career, Mick, but a favourite tour you'veever done.
You know, I would have to say this last thing I did with Paul, this five-month,seven-songs thing is one of my favorites, because, yeah.
No?
Good pick.
And this is even harder, a favourite gig you've ever done.
(51:24):
I think that the solo piano concert that I did at Momo was one of my favorite things ever.
A lot of it had to do with the instrument was so brilliant that again, it's kind of playsitself that one.
That's very dense too.
you want to listen to it, might, your head might explode, but it's a great instrument onthat.
So that one, yes.
(51:44):
No, I'll check that out.
And I've had the privilege to go in a moment.
It's such an amazing space as well.
yeah.
A favourite city you've played and it might be New York, but you know, what's a favouritecity for you?
like having to do with the music at all or just?
just to probably get from your career, just something that stood out you.
love this city.
Yeah, it's hard to go fast.
(52:06):
Yeah.
again, again, probably an amusing question given your career, but name a song that youused to love, but you've now played it to death and would happily never play it again.
Yeah, you know, can't, I can't, I'm sure there are...
a lot of people don't have one.
Yeah.
A lot of professionals don't tend to have that.
They tend to go, it's the song I play it and I do the job and I get out of there.
(52:29):
So that's a valid response.
Well, there is a, there's one piece by Philip that I really just do not like at all.
It's called Dance Nine in the Upper Room.
We don't play it that often, but when we do it, I do want to like kill myself because Ihate it.
That one I do hate.
I'm sorry, Phil.
Do you have a favourite music documentary or movie that stood out to you over the years?
(52:51):
No, you know why?
Because I don't watch them.
Probably a lot of musicians don't, but I can't take the...
Well, the documentaries are okay.
The dramatization, know, the fiction ones that are the biopics, I can't do.
No, not so much.
No, not so much.
That's great.
Name one thing you'd like to see invented that would make your life as a keyboard playerand percussionist, if you like, easier.
(53:17):
Is there something you go, gee, this would make my life easier?
No, I got it all pre-dialed in, doing these kind of tours, the equipment shows up andit's, you know, I don't,
And I never thought about money and I still don't.
I never even thought about it once.
I swear.
I never thought about it.
I never thought about having to make a living.
I just like, this is what I do and this is I'm doing.
(00:20):
Hello and welcome to the Keyboard Chronicles podcast.
For keyboard players, I'm your host, David Holloway, and I'm thrilled as always to be herewith you.
I'm super privileged and honored to introduce Mr.
Mick Rossi as the guest this episode.
We had the pleasure of spending an hour with Mick.
We did need to let him go after an hour, so we always say we barely scratched the surfaceand it's definitely the case with this one.
(00:45):
Amongst many dozens of key collaborations, continues to spend many years with the PhilipGlass Ensemble, working with both Philip Glass himself and the ensemble more widely.
And since 2010, Mick has also been the percussionist and keyboard player with Paul Simon.
So those two artists alone, but as you'll hear, there is so much more to it than that,including Mick's own prodigious solo output.
(01:12):
so many artists just, yeah, it's hard to fathom.
So I'll let you jump in and listen and I'll talk to you at the end of the show.
(01:33):
Mick, I can't thank you enough for coming on the show and particularly giving up avaluable Friday night.
How are you doing?
Great, thank you.
It's so kind of you to invite me to do this.
It's funny, I was just watching an episode of Jimmy Kimmel where he was talking toSpringsteen in Brooklyn, like he spent a week in Brooklyn.
there you go.
Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
(01:53):
So now, Mick, I thought we'd kick off just talking about your last year or two.
I mean, you've been an incredibly busy musician always, but just what have you been up toover the last year or two?
Let's see, you know, a lot of this stuff goes by and then I'm on to the next thing.
So try to, I'll try to recall, but most recently, of course, I was on a really good PaulSimon tour with whom I've been working for years and years.
(02:20):
I think I've done the last eight or nine tours with him, but this was related to a newpiece that he, he wrote called Seven Songs.
It's like a chamber thing.
You know about it.
It's very, very cool.
And
That was like really long to like five months almost straight, which is I haven't beendoing that straight these days.
(02:41):
And the coolest part about it is because, you know, I get to play so many instruments.
get to play all of these crazy percussion, like Harry Partch, microtonal instruments,mallets, piano, of course, and Rhodes, all that stuff.
So it was really a really a fun time and as always a great, incredible.
And, know, as well as a bunch of Philip stuff, Philip Glass stuff.
(03:02):
In fact, I've got a tour coming up next week in Europe with the ensemble and, um, andgoing back.
So there's two new recordings I have that have not been released officially.
So that's that I did last year.
And let's see, was I in Venice last year?
No, that was still, I was on, um, no, I was in Venice for a residency and I.
(03:26):
I'd have to look at my schedule, I just can't remember.
This week I'm having trouble, you know, remembering last week.
Yeah.
Look, I mean, that gives an amazing idea.
And we're obviously going to come back to both those artists and also your own solo work.
have that on the agenda.
we'll definitely do that.
We'll now cast back a year or 10 to your childhood and musical upbringing.
(03:47):
So what got Mick Rossi into music in the first place and you know, those formative years.
dad, an accordionist growing up in Trenton, New Jersey, state of Bruce Springsteen,actually.
Jersey, right?
And yeah, he was a great accordion player and I had two brothers who were kind of musical.
(04:12):
He started everyone off on piano and I started playing when I was four and then I began
studying with him and I was an improviser from the beginning and he forced me to read,which is really what I'm grateful for.
But I was glad that he didn't shut down my ear, my whole training in that regard.
(04:35):
And then I started playing drums at about the age of seven and then I started studyingdrums.
Then, you know, it happened in like grammar school, grade school, where the orchestraconductor needed
instruments so he would just point to me and go, play that.
I'd be like, okay.
So I go, I started to play timpani.
(04:56):
I became, you know, I was a percussionist there.
I started, he goes, I need an oboe.
I'm like, I don't even know what that is.
And then I started playing oboe, which is insane, which nobody ever does willingly.
Beautiful instrument, but yeah.
So that was this.
was playing those three instruments and playing with a symphony and then playing drums inlike a uh queen zeppelin band, you know.
(05:19):
I was playing drums at my father's club day band.
We have these great musicians, great tenor player.
And I was still studying Chopin and Bach.
then eventually, I don't know what I did.
I just, never thought about it.
went to college and then I started studying privately with Dennis Sandoli.
I don't know if you're familiar with Sandoli in Philadelphia.
(05:40):
Teacher of many people, including Coltrane, Pat Martino, Brecker, all those guys.
So I don't know, what does that mean?
That means that I had a very diverse, happy childhood in that way.
was lucky that I could do that.
Eventually my dad and I would butt heads and I eventually went to other teachers.
(06:04):
No, that's amazing.
I mean, no, that's great.
I'm fascinated, Mick, by you made a point there about, you know, you didn't have your earbased musicianship sort of not beaten out of you, but you know what I mean?
As far as you didn't lose that as well as being able to read, which is an incredibleprivilege, as you know.
So I assume that still to this day, you use a mix of those approaches with your playing.
(06:27):
Absolutely, yeah.
I'm really an improviser.
The music I write, I try to make sound like it's improvised, and the music that Iimprovise, I want to make it almost sound as if it's written.
You know, it's a weird hybrid of all that.
But yeah, I teach at the New School here in New York.
I would never shut down anyone for having poor reading skills as long as their ears wereworking, you know.
(06:54):
And, you know, it all depends on if you want to end up at the New York for a harmonic,then you got to, you know, you can't be an improviser.
I don't know.
For me, I was lucky I had both sides of that because I was somehow, you know, my DNAgranted me some, some ears and my dad had enough diligence to like keep me on the line
(07:17):
about being practical too, which we would fight about a lot.
including in the music that I would write myself.
he wanted me to, you know, make money.
And I never thought about money and I still don't.
I never even thought about it once.
I swear.
I never thought about it.
I never thought about having to make a living.
I just like, this is what I do and this is what I'm doing.
(07:38):
I say no to a lot of things and I'm not on social media.
I don't know.
That's the long answer.
Sorry, you didn't even ask.
I love it.
No, that's brilliant.
so, Mick, mean, obviously with that incredibly diverse training and moving into earlyadulthood, what was some of the more, so I'm thinking about here a bridge between that and
playing with the Philip Glass Ensemble.
(07:59):
So what was some of those earlier gigs and bands that led to you believing, well, I amactually making a living out of this.
Well, I still, I actually never even thought that even when it was happening, that I wasmaking a living at it.
I don't know why I was lucky.
I was call it like denial and complete delusional like aspiration, but I was just, I justdid it, you know, it was weird.
(08:21):
And, but one of the early, early things, of course, Sandoli had a big effect on me becauseI was probably 20 when I started doing that.
And I still was for four years, maybe I was 19 and his approach was
Absolutely abstract, like completely impractical music.
(08:43):
If you have your own voice, you can really gain a lot of insight into the composition.
there was nothing you could say, this is compositional, you just had these devices, butotherwise, so he was a big influence.
But some of early things, like I was in, I was in Angie Bofield's band.
you know who Angela Bofield was?
New York.
(09:03):
I had to name Riggs a bell.
Oh, yep.
Yeah
she was great.
She passed away a few years ago, but that was, I was in my early twenties.
That would have been the first time I really did any real touring, you know.
So was very lucky to run into that.
was a great band.
was you know, Phyllis Hyman, Nona Hendrix, all those guys, the Barkay's, all those reallygreat bands from the seventies.
(09:30):
So yeah, that was probably the first thing where I started.
Actually, I was like, wow.
You know, cause I lived close to New York, Trenton, I don't know if you know it, but it'salmost halfway between Philly and New York.
So I could study in Philly, study in Trenton, studied in New York, played all thoseplaces.
oh But that was really what maybe got me to New York.
(09:51):
Not that I cared about going to New York.
I was just like, I'm just going to write music, you know?
that maybe Angie was probably the first thing.
Yeah.
And those early touring experiences, I mean, in spite of your training and doing moreregular gigging, I'm not sure whether you're touring around the country at that stage, but
(10:12):
what was that learning curve for you like as far as the business rather than themusicianship of it?
I learned there's a certain amount of court politics in all of this, right?
So I remember being asked if I wanted to do the record, the new record.
You know, we worked touring around the country as well.
In fact, I was a kid, I was playing at like the garden and uh like the Superdome and allthis crazy craziness, you know?
(10:38):
It's not something I even care about doing.
And not only that, these artists, including, I'll just like go off on a tangent for asecond.
I Philip, even I worked with Carly Simon, I worked with Sting, I worked with Hall & Oates.
These are guys that I would never even, I never thought about.
In fact, to this day, I still don't know the words you can call me out.
(11:02):
I don't even know what he's saying, you know?
I'm just like, you know, I'm just doing it.
there.
not listening.
I don't listen to words.
I'm kind of an idiot that way, but, um, so they were people that I had no interest in.
And, and when it-
popped up, I had friends talk me into it.
I remember when Philip called and I called my friend out in LA, my friend John Valentino,his great guitarist.
(11:27):
And I'm like, I don't want to this music.
What am going to do with this?
He goes, are you insane?
So he talked me into that.
I'm so glad because Philip is an unbelievable special human being.
And it turns out all of them, Paul, I never owned a Paul record, you know, because of mysilly esoteric
(11:47):
Physic minded stupidity.
I would think I got no interest in that in a way.
You know, it wasn't that I was in curious, but so after working with them all, I see howbrilliant they are, you know, and it taught me a lot to just, you know, just shut up and
be grateful, which I am, but don't be so judgmental right at the top.
(12:09):
Well, it wasn't that I just didn't, I didn't care.
I'm in some weird universe, you know, and it served me well because I don't
I had some strange family situation.
My brother committed suicide and all this kind of, everybody's got their story.
So music was like, just went there and I never got in trouble.
(12:31):
uh
I don't think you're unusual, particularly in regards to lyrics.
think half the keyboard player community don't, I know I don't, although bizarrely enough,one of about five songs I do know the lyrics to are is you can call me out or finally
enough, but I don't think that's unusual.
And I think it's because we're so focused on the music.
(12:53):
do have to ask now, Mick, you just mentioned Philip Glass called you now for someone, eventhough you may have been unaware of it to some extent at the time.
For someone to call you of that notoriety, what did they see in you to call you?
I know that's a hard question when you're the person they're calling, but why, why had youcome to his attention that he felt you'd be a valuable part of the ensemble?
(13:16):
Well, it's kind of a simple reason, two reasons.
One is that I play both drums, percussion, and keyboards.
And a tour came up where they needed both for the tour.
So one was Cranascazzi, which was keyboards, and one was Polacazzi, which was percussion.
And another, I forgot, it was another program.
So that was the practical aspect of it.
(13:37):
Turns out that I have friends in the ensemble too, back in the day.
So.
word of mouth, you know, that kind of thing.
Somebody recommended me because they knew I played boats.
And that was pretty much it.
I started that and I've been doing it ever since.
Absolutely.
mean, was there a, was there a formal audition process required there or did you just slotin me?
(13:59):
Never.
I went to Singapore.
I had a sound check.
That was pretty much it.
know we didn't know.
I'll tell you one thing, Philip, there's no rehearsal ever.
Almost never.
Unless it's a brand new thing like the Leonard Cohen thing or something.
So yeah.
no, you walk out, know, sound check hour and half later, you've, you know, did it.
(14:23):
What have I done?
Am I fired?
You know, so that's pretty much it.
No, no audition.
No.
And so what was the, for that first gig then, Mick, what was the prep that you needed todo for that?
mean, people obviously are aware of Phillip's work and it's incredibly diverse.
yeah, was like, what sort of preparation were you able to do to pull that off?
(14:43):
Yeah, oh yeah, I forgot, sorry.
The third piece was La Bella La Bette, the Cocteau film that we played.
It was really a handful.
mean, it's hard, hard, hard, too manual, you know.
Anyway, that was it.
So the only reason I thought I was, because the prep was, of course I got all the music, Ihad recordings, you know, just like anything.
(15:04):
you know, at I have the score, look it over, trying to figure out how I can play like thatfor so long without stopping and.
Boy, that many notes, but I've always had pretty good hands, you know, so, but that wasit.
I went into the famous Looking Glass Studios, which was Philip's old space on BeakerStreet and asked if I could just have like an hour or two on that whole rig, you know,
(15:29):
because I just wanted to see, cause there's patches, you you got, you know what it's like,right?
so I did do that, but it was interesting.
I was in the live room practicing this music though.
It was a bit that I needed to practice.
And there was an interview going on in the control room and I saw like a video camera anda guy and a mic and this beautiful woman.
(15:54):
And I'm trying to, I'm like practicing, I'm like, what the hell?
You know, I'm looking, turns out it was David Bowie.
It Bowie, it's like, that's the most beautiful man I've ever seen, I think, in my life.
Stupid.
So that was my preparation.
(16:15):
I forgot I did go in there that one day on my own.
This was weeks before, maybe a week or two before the tour.
oh
And so I do have to ask, even though we're not a technology based podcast, we're about theplaying, but Mick, when you mentioned about playing the full rig, as much as you can
recall, as you know, Keyboard's changes on, what roughly was the full rig at that stage?
(16:36):
In those days, like it's all gotten so streamlined as you might imagine now, but they wereold Peavey's.
Oh, wow.
And I can't remember the model, but the big heavy weighted, 88 key weighted ones.
Yeah, so that's what we used for a long time.
They went away, they died.
(16:59):
eventually Michael Reisman Phillips,
really brilliant music director and he's the guy that dug all the samples and stuff.
We streamlined everything down to the point where we now travel with like three or fourMac minis and backline weighted keyboards.
So they could be anything from like a Kurzweil to a Roland to yeah, but all have to belike a good instrument.
(17:24):
So that's where we're at now.
At one point we're using those Yonahut P155s.
We actually brought those out, but then
It's gotten even more streamlined now.
It's almost all backline.
So, just while we're on that side of things, as you mentioned, you're about to go out ontour again with Phil.
So you said four or five Mac mini, so you're running what, main stage gig before?
(17:46):
What are you running on that?
You know what he's running?
It's Bidual.
Do you know this app?
Yeah.
it's not, it's not like any of that.
It's just, I don't know what the front end is.
It might be that.
And it used to be like sample cell was Pro Tools for a long time.
We had the huge refrigerators and then those went away.
(18:07):
So I'm pretty sure that's what it is.
Although I, I stay away from it as much as possible.
Not that I can't do it, but I I don't even know about it because every, every sound checkof course.
and I'll play something and it'll be like, where is it?
it's like five octaves up here.
It's got to be move, move, you know, something.
So I let Michael do that though.
When the other town guys.
Yeah, no, makes sense.
(18:28):
so over the years of the ensemble, it's a significant number of years now.
Obviously the music has continued to evolve.
I know you've been involved on more than nine of the recordings.
How is that from your viewpoint as a musician?
What is your view over the years of how it's it's matured and what you've continued tolearn or enjoy as a player within the ensemble?
(18:53):
I mean, the music has matured or I've matured as well.
Well, both I would say.
yeah, I will tell you this that in whatever year it is now five, 26 years, I'm stilltrying to figure out how to play this music.
It is really a beast, you know, and especially the really hardcore early minimalist stuffthat music at 12 parts and in fact, I just pulled this out just so I could, you want to
(19:22):
see what we can play.
This is, this is like my life for a lot of, a lot of the time.
Wow.
This goes on for pages and pages and pages.
So this happens to be Crayona Scotty, like a middle of Crayona Scotty.
I just broke out in a cold sweat, looking at that.
Yeah, but I've been playing it for one year, you know, over 20, 25 years probably.
(19:43):
But the one thing I learned the most is, well, it's a couple of things.
I will say first off, it's amazing to be playing with people that are still living andmaking new things like a guy like Phil, you know, and Paul too, but Philip, you know, we
did a lot of new projects together, Orion and Book of Longing and a lot of stuff.
(20:07):
But having said that,
Having recorded music at 12 parts for the first time I ever played it in Italy, I don'tknow if you know that piece, it's about four and a half hours long, and it's just
unquietable, pretty much.
There will be, as you talk about Turing, somebody will melt down eventually somewhere inthat thing.
But I learned, I've learned how to play his music because you're a keyboardist, right?
(20:33):
You're a pianist.
If you don't relax, you can't waste any energy whatsoever.
And you're in up for pieces like that.
It's almost like trying to run a marathon in a way.
just have to like pace yourself up to the point and you have to relax.
So the most that I think I probably matured is learning how to relax.
(20:56):
You can't force anything.
can't get keyboard hard, you know, most of the time, because a lot of it is just for FISA.
samples.
So it's on or off.
There's not even any velocity to those.
if you're, if you're starting, you know, trying to play with any kind of like feeling, andI don't mean feeling, like velocity sensitive, like emotion, you're going to, you're not
(21:21):
going to make it to the end.
You're just going to burn out, you know, you're just going to get tight.
Your hands are going to hurt, you know, so I never have any issues.
So, but I have learned that.
And what was the other question?
it?
It was just really, yeah.
No, think you've, I think you've covered that nicely and you've also raised a parallelpoint, which I assume your training as a drummer and percussionist, that stamina issue is
(21:43):
obviously a big issue in that, that area as well.
So, I mean, how are the hands holding up?
mean, that's, it's a big physical output across the show.
Yeah, yeah, no, I'm good.
I swear.
I never felt better.
My chops have never felt better, you know.
It's a lot of years of playing that music and figuring out how to do it.
And it's really kept, even when I'm not touring with him, I will practice some of thatmusic just to keep it in my hands.
(22:08):
And it's actually good for me, you know, for anyone, I think.
So, the drum thing, yeah, the percussion thing, the time thing is really important as itis with anyone.
But yeah.
I don't know.
couldn't do without one or the other.
would miss it.
You know, if I didn't get that.
Yeah, it's definitely a symbiotic relationship.
(22:32):
could spend four hours just talking about your time as part of the Philip Glass Ensemble,obviously, aside from your percussion and keyboard work, I know you've done a bit of
conducting in that as well.
I'm going to call it locally.
know you conducted as part of the ensemble at the Sydney Opera House.
Just tell us a little bit about your recollections of that.
Oh man, I really loved that show.
(22:57):
It was called Book of Longing.
Do you know this piece at all?
It was a different thing.
wasn't quite the normal ensemble.
was like a little chamber band, right?
And with four singers and Philip was on the stage and half the time he fell asleep.
You know, he didn't have much to play.
And yeah, it was very cool.
(23:18):
In that show.
In fact, we learned it all together.
I played percussion and keyboards, moving back and forth between marimba and you know,that was my part.
And the reason I came to conduct it, although I have conducted other ones where it wasn'tsuch a howling uh initiation.
Beastman was riding his bike and he got doored in Milan, I think it was.
(23:45):
And when I tell you, you know, was lucky because I knew the piece.
so well, but this is four o'clock and I'm tuning drums and just getting ready forsoundcheck and the stage manager and the tour manager comes up and goes, Reese is in the
hospital.
What are we going to do?
I'm like, fuck, what?
(24:06):
So I combined my percussion and piano book with his book.
He mostly didn't have a lot to play because he was conducting.
So I had all the heavy lifting anyway, but I had to leave.
book out and I had to combine his book and my book.
So there was no percussion that night.
(24:27):
And, um, and I had to conduct it on the spot pretty much.
It was pretty much what happened on that one.
And then I eventually ended up doing a bunch of them, Sydney and a bunch of other cities,cause he was still laid up and he wasn't able to make any of it.
But the others though that I have done, I did Dracula a bunch of times, um, you know,
(24:49):
I was hired, I wasn't like, it wasn't an emergency, both with the ensemble and withKronos, with Philip and Kronos Quartet.
So yeah, but the Cindy thing, man, that was, that was a blast.
Cause I'd been there before and I just remember my dressing room was so great because Ihad a big Steinway D and it was, it had to be about 30 feet long, the room, all windows
(25:14):
overlooking the bridge and you know, just, you know, that's the way it's.
I don't know.
It's kind of epic.
was, it was, it was a thrill, you know?
No, absolutely.
I have to, I say that emergency night at the opera house, you were still playing keyboardsas well as the conducting.
Yes, that was not at the Opera House though.
That was in Milan.
(25:35):
The Emergency Night.
Yeah.
Sydney thing came later on in that tour.
There were a bunch of other...
Yeah, yes, I was because I had to play all my parts plus his parts.
And I had to kind of combine them and figure out which ones were necessary for the piece.
And some marimba stuff I had to play because it wasn't, there was no marimba, so I had totransfer it in...
(25:56):
Yeah, it's basically, there was a bit of improvising going on in that, which is cool.
And I have done a lot of improvising with Philip.
There was a trio that I was in for a long time with Wendy Sutter, the great cellist.
I played all that stuff.
I played percussion and mallets and piano and improvised and improvised pretty much theentire thing actually.
So, which was really fun.
(26:18):
And I know we've only got so much time, but I was really interested in that area in thePhilip Glass ensemble as far as the role of improvisation versus the charts, because yeah,
I mean, is it possible to encapsulate the approach?
Obviously, I assume it varies by the piece and Philip's approach to the performance and.
There's very, very, very little improvisation, almost none.
(26:41):
um That just happened to be a different, they called it the Phil Gweiss Chamber.
It was just a trio.
And I improvised because there was no drum parts written, no percussion parts.
You know, it Choleste, a little Choleste part was written, you know, that kind of thing.
But yeah, so in general, there's almost none.
(27:02):
In Einstein on the Beach, there is one piece called Building where there's a
big tenor solo that plays over this ostinato thing we do, it was craziness, you know.
That's improvised, but rarely does this ever come up.
So in fact, Philip on that tour, was the first time Philip ever played a note that wasn'twritten.
(27:23):
Wendy and I got him to, and he was like, I'm so sorry, Nadia, know, Boulanger.
was like, I apologize to Nadia Boulanger.
was like, Phil, just wait, hit the inside, know, just.
Fuck the string or something, you know, it's like trying to get him to do something crazy,know, a seamless game, you know.
Great.
And so one last Philip Glass question.
(27:45):
Obviously he's an iconic artist.
And so what is the collaborative approach, if there is any collaborative approach as faras preparing for performances and depending on the piece, the band as a unit, how does
that work as far as, know, Philip is very much a band leader and this is the way it goes,which is not uncommon, or there is a little bit more to and fro with it.
(28:08):
What I'll say is that Philip is mostly hands off.
That's Michael Reisman, or whoever conducting at the time.
He's the one running the whole thing, really.
So, you know, like I said, on tour, we just have a soundcheck and we've been playing allthis music for a lot of years.
you know, it's a lot of quirky things because that music is loud a lot of the time andit's hard to hear and the parts...
(28:36):
are intricate and you could get thrown so easily.
So you got to know what you want to listen for.
And there was a time when we all went to all in ears, which I don't like.
So I went back to a monitor, but everybody has their own little thing.
You know, I had a little mixer for a while and then.
So, yeah.
So Phil, although he's not, he's not touring with us now.
He's 88.
He's stopped for past couple of years.
(29:00):
Phil would just be, you know, a couple of notes, you know, play like the low note, youknow, he, didn't have a lot.
to do because he was just getting old and his hands were getting a little arthritic, youknow.
So he was basically hands off, you know, he's cool.
Riesman's very smart.
We all get along great.
I remember one time we sounded so bad and we come off the stage and Phil was like, hey,that was great, guys.
(29:29):
You know, he's like so positive.
He never like yelled at ever at anyone.
I've never heard him like say anything like that.
But yeah, we can be, it can be loose even within the structure, you know, the structuredplane.
So.
No, great perspective.
Thank you.
And I can't think of a more polar opposite artist, but we'll move on to this before we goon to a lot of other things.
(29:51):
Paul Simon.
mean, so it doesn't get much more different than that.
So tell us about how that relationship came about, how you, joined Paul in 2010.
That is just so wacky.
In fact, I love that about it, that they are so diametrically opposed in a way.
I got a message from Paul, phone, voicemail, and it was so ridiculous.
(30:15):
He goes, uh, Mick, uh, uh, you know, I don't know if you know him, he's very, he's kind ofshy, you he's quiet.
Uh, this is Paul Simon.
Uh, I'm a friend of Philip Glass.
And I was wondering if you want to join the band.
I call him back and I'm like,
I know who you are, are you crazy?
I was, he was so, but it wasn't like fake.
(30:37):
was like really, you know, he's, he's.
So yeah, so I had a couple of friends in that band also over the years, Andy Snitzer, MarkStewart, Jamie Haddad, you know, there's a lot of great people in that.
But Philip recommended me for recording actually.
Sorry, that was not to join the band.
That was, that was to actually do a recording with him.
And then after I did a recording, he did call and ask if I wanted to join the band.
(30:59):
So that's how that came.
about and I'm so grateful.
ah
And because it's so different, Mick, what was your approach?
mean, obviously you're an incredibly experienced musician by this stage, but were thereany learning curves there as far as just getting your head around the material?
as you know, Paul Simon's own stuff goes from folk through to electronic and in between.
(31:23):
Yeah.
What was the approach there?
You know, I just have to say it was, his music is very complex and it's kind of a simpleway.
And it's such a respite for me to do Paul because it's requires almost no, it's almost alljust the instinct is.
And I love that about it and he's cool.
And I got a lot of room and, but you know, I've been, I know about all that stuff playing,you know, any, any of these styles I can do.
(31:52):
never even, I didn't study them, but it's just an.
That music is naturally just sort of, it kind of plays itself as the only thing I couldsay about it, you know?
And so we, with him, he's the opposite of Phil.
All he does want to do is rehearse.
It's like days and days and days, which I find kind of cool because I never do that.
(32:17):
And it's like in a band and you're like going over the same, you know, eight bars forlike, you know, half hour.
It's more for him, you know?
But he's very meticulous and although he's loosened up lately, but he knows what hedoesn't want.
I will say that.
And he's kind of a savant orchestrator.
Like he's just, we'll be like, leave that out.
You know, can you, how about, can you do something like this?
(32:40):
And we'll just go, I'll go, no, not that too many notes.
know, usually it's the case.
then, but we have a, we have a funny relationship, Paul and I, in that because he'sfriends with Philip, I showed him a photo of a
dressing room sign from Dallas or something of the Philip Jones ensemble.
(33:02):
Spilled it wrong, it got his last name wrong.
This is the opera house, I think, in Dallas.
So over the years now, he'd always want me to do something because I do a lot of preparedpiano stuff.
He always wanted me to do something crazy, which I love.
I'm like, yeah, who does this in a pop concert?
I have this crazy avant-garde.
(33:23):
Insane soul at the end of cool, river.
But I always go, hey man, Phil Jones, do some Phil Jones.
And he'd like, okay, so I'll do something like Philip, you know, Philip Mike, you know.
No, that's amazing.
again, just briefly, mean, I know you still correct me if I'm wrong, but with Paul Simon,the really extensive touring is essentially done, but there are sort of one-off shows here
(33:45):
and there.
I mean, Paul's struggles with his hearing and that have been well documented.
don't need to go into that, but what essentially is your keyboard rig now when you do playa show?
It's so amazing.
I have Steinway B, which I go to Steinway and pick out and they're kind enough to...
I have the old Fender Rhodes that Richard T.
(34:05):
played for all those years, which is Paul's, but I always call it T's Rhodes, really.
I have a uh Harmonium.
I have Choleste.
I have a Vibraphone.
I have a Glockenspiel.
I have these cloud chamber bowls.
I've got chimes, know, orchestra bells, tubular bells.
(34:26):
And over the years, a lot of hand drums, snare drum.
In this case, I think that's all I had on the last thing was just usually B3, but there'sno B3 on this one.
In fact, I had a C3 out for one time.
And yeah, usually, but those were the more up like pop hit stuff in the arena thing.
(34:47):
So we didn't even need organ on this thing.
Like I said, it was so quiet.
There were no many monitors.
Like I could hear the other side of the stage, you know, without it.
Cello, flute, viola.
It's great.
So yeah, so that, that's it.
Never, almost never.
I did have one like keyboard that I would play a couple samples and in which case, Ibought one of Harry Parch's harmonolodion, you know, this big keyboard that's like 30
(35:14):
notes per octave or something.
So.
We set sample some of that and there was one or two pieces where I used the bass pedalsfrom the organ triggered those.
And another thing where I was playing like a doombeck, but I had to have a low, you know,a bowl, not tablet, but you know, like a new pot.
(35:36):
That sounds like, so it's like a don't, you know, so it would be like this, be like, good.
Good dad hit a keyboard, don't you know, and hit one note on the keyboard.
Anyways, usually there's no electronic keyboard over by me.
Rhodes is the most electronic thing there is.
that's, yeah.
So, which I love because he loves using the real stuff.
(35:58):
And I'm lucky to get to do that.
get to, I get to play all those things and there's no, no cheating, you know, no, no, nocheaping out on it.
eh
And over that time, particularly probably those early years, 2010 through to say 2018,what are some highlights for you as far as when you did perform and tour?
(36:18):
there some key gigs that you particularly enjoyed?
Some highlights?
Yeah, a lot of them, will say I pushed.
It was, was bittersweet because on the night of our 2016 election, I was in London playingat Royal Albert Hall, which I love, I love that.
(36:41):
I love that place because the people are close, you know, and so anyway, so that, thatsticks out in my mind because I just love playing there.
But then I woke up to what I.
was suspecting anyway, alas, and you're lucky you're as far away as possible.
So we won't get into that, but, uh, yes.
And that was a lot of places like, you know, I would bowl effective.
(37:03):
Oh, the bowl Ellie for demonic was the first concert I played with Philip where I met mygirlfriend came to here.
I'm like, dude, crazy.
Look at this first gig that she saw me do with Phil.
So, so I liked the bow.
Red rocks and, and I liked this.
concert hall in Hamburg, it's a small hall.
I'm trying to think, you know, they're all, after a while you just get run together, allthe arenas, can't find my way around.
(37:32):
So many great times, you know.
I can't complain about any of it.
Really, the travel is all very civilized.
It is, yeah.
And you've, I think you've already alluded to this Mick, but I mean, within the Paul Simonexperience, as far as performing, you have a little bit more freedom.
So there is a little bit of more improvisation that goes on.
(37:53):
A lot of room.
Yeah.
I, I, there are certain parts here and there, of course it depends on the tune, but ingeneral, I'm not playing the same thing every night, you know?
There's a lot of, I got a lot of space.
It's fun.
You know, I don't mind playing the same thing here and there, but I'm not really builtthat way.
(38:14):
Can't play the same thing once, right?
That old joke.
I love it.
Now for the sake of our listeners and viewers around the world, Mick has collaborated withliterally dozens and dozens of artists.
So I already warned Mick on this.
was going to ask you Mick to call out some other collaborators.
mean, just for the sake of our listeners, everyone from Marho Visionary Project, CarlySimon, Johnny Valentini you mentioned, Wynton Marsalis, Neville.
(38:39):
Are there some highlights just from probably a musicianship viewpoint that youparticularly enjoyed or it might've been the actual.
Performance itself.
Yeah, well some that you would call out
The big time thing is a different level of show business, you know, which I appreciate.
But I probably have the most fun with projects of my own and my brothers here in New Yorkand in Brooklyn and the old downtown thing with, you know, the old knitting factory stuff
(39:09):
and all that.
And people like Andy Laster and Kermit Triscoll and Dave Douglas and
So many great, great people.
Mark Dresser I've had chance to work with a lot over the years.
Michael Serene, who I just had uh dinner with yesterday.
(39:30):
I don't know if you know him.
He's a great, great, drummer.
um Yeah.
Too many is a name.
can't even.
So many, so many good collaborations.
Yeah.
I mean, even in my early days, was composer in residence in a few dance companies.
I wrote a lot of modern dance music and those were really rewarding.
(39:53):
I get to write whatever I want and basically that's it.
If I can do whatever I want, I'm happy.
If people are on me about, know, don't do that, don't do this.
just like, I don't need this, you know, I got to get out.
Yeah, no, love it.
And I know, I mean, this is probably a good point to talk about your solo work.
mean, you've released an amazing number of both solo albums or key collaborations withpeople.
(40:18):
mean, I know I've listened to Cut the Red Wire Love, Bangkok Cowboys, oh Stray from lastyear.
Just talk a little bit.
I mean, obviously this is a key part of your artistic psyche.
I mean, as you mentioned, going back to your childhood, this, you love doing your ownthing.
weren't necessarily worried about it being
commercially successful, but I mean, there's some amazing music in there.
(40:39):
Just tell us about broadly how you've managed to continue that solo output amongsteverything else you've been doing.
Yeah.
I, it's necessary for my brain to keep doing that in my soul, you know, but some of theseare projects that like, for instance, um, I don't know if you got to hear 160, which I can
(41:01):
explain a quick thing about the title later, but that was a, began as a small shortdocumentary film.
And I expanded the whole thing into a recording, um, by, uh do you know the artist JimDine?
He's an American artist.
No, don't.
Like a modernist, yeah.
Anyway, his son is a great, speaking of the oboe, he's a great oboist.
(41:23):
He made these oboe films.
So I did some scores for him.
But that record, you know, a lot of times I like doing all this stuff myself.
I played everything on that, overdubbed everything, but it's all real.
You know, it's not, there's no sequencing and no...
So I love doing that.
love, like, as you probably do, you know, sit here.
You know, hit some stuff, record, overdub this, you know, change stuff around.
(41:49):
anyway, that, cause I have dyslexia, that record is really meant to be called 106 becausethe entire record was in the metronome marking of 106, not 160.
And I never even noticed it.
It went to the graphics people, the guy sent it to me, proofread it.
Yeah, it's great.
It's great.
160.
(42:09):
It's not 160, it's 106.
So, but.
I'm particularly proud of that record because I just, I love how insane it is and it'sjust not for everybody.
It's really dense and you probably need a drink after it because it's a lot, you know, butI just love being on to the next thing that's different.
(42:29):
I just don't want to do the same thing.
And I had this couple of quintet records that I love doing, the Live at the Indie Factorywith Russ Johnson and Kermit and that one was
I think, um, I liked doing those.
And then I have this, um, I don't know if you got a chance to hear, uh, live at Barbaz.
(42:52):
I just checked it out.
It's cute.
Like that.
It's almost, it's like a surf, like funk, terrible marching band thing.
It's just awful, but I love, I like that.
In fact, I'm getting ready to do a second record with them, but that was a live one.
Yeah.
So there's that.
That's very different.
And then I have the live one from MoMA from a solo piano record.
(43:16):
And then there was a studio solo record.
just, each one, just try to do a different thing almost every time.
That's all I can say is this one I make it different, you know.
And the diversity is incredible across your catalog to date.
And I think you mentioned at the start of show, you've got another two sort of coming up.
this, uh, the saxophone slash trumpet player named Caleb Wheeler, Wheeler Curtis.
(43:40):
You know, this guy is a kid.
I don't think he's 40, you know, he's amazing.
In fact, I just saw him yesterday too.
So that's coming out.
It's called Runt.
Um, it's mostly a duo, improvised duo record actually with him.
So yeah.
And I'm, like I said, I'm on to pre-production for.
(44:03):
The new, that's called Antimatter, my band called Antimatter.
The one that live one from Barbez.
So I have a new, I have all the music written.
It's been sitting there for 10 years, probably longer now.
So I never get to the other stuff.
And this time I said, you know, I'm going to go record this music that's sitting here.
Cause I never, moved on to the next thing so fast.
I leave all that behind, you know?
(44:24):
So, but I'm not sentimental about it.
No, I think you raise a great point there about not being sentimental.
think that shines through with what we've chatted on.
A common question we ask our guests is the whole imposter syndrome thing.
And this may not be an issue.
isn't for a lot of artists, but have there been times through your career you haveactually doubted yourself or you're more of a, I'm not sentimental.
(44:45):
I go with the flow.
If it works, it works.
If it doesn't, it doesn't.
Yeah, I will say I'm not affected by that.
I could probably apply more scrutiny to my own, whatever I end up working on.
But I will tell you this today, I really, I don't judge my music because everything elseis, I'm so judgmental about it.
I, I, if I write something and in a couple of measures, I'll know whether I'm going toscrap it or not.
(45:11):
But if I go further, I just get to the end and that's it.
I rarely edit or.
or go back and fix.
And if it's bad, I accept that and I'm okay.
And I don't care actually, it's cause what I did, it's what I did, you know?
So it's a little bit existential I guess, but.
I don't know.
(45:33):
Yeah.
Yeah, I don't even know what that imposter syndrome is.
mean, it's people who...
I mean, of course I've been on things where I'm like, I'm wrong for this, you know, I'mgonna crash and burn, you know, which, of course, every now and then you get fired for
something, but...
So, know, I never thought that.
I just knew I was wrong.
I didn't feel like an imposter though.
Yeah, no, absolutely great perspective.
(45:55):
And we do need to ask Mick about an onstage trainwreck.
Is there one that you can look back upon and laugh and go, wow, that did not go well?
Yeah, I was thinking about that.
It doesn't happen often though, you know, I have to say that I had to reach back to tryand think about it, but every year I end up doing this benefit for Philip called the Tibet
(46:17):
House here in New York.
Tibet House benefit and brings together all these really interesting groups and bands andartists and everybody plays like 15 or 20 minutes, know, maybe there's 10 or 12 people.
Laurie Anderson, you know, done it with her, done with Philip a million times.
two years ago, the ensemble did it and we come out and you play like 15 minutes and thepiece that evening was going to be a version, short version of something from Music in 12
(46:47):
Parts, which I said was like four and a half hours, but this was only going to be 20minutes, part eight, which is really brutal.
But to play for 15 minutes, I went, this is like going to bed and waking up in the Bahamasor something.
So easy.
So what happened is we're onto like the first eight, 12 measures of this thing.
That's just, you know, blistering fast.
(47:10):
And the keyboards are like at least two or three cents away from you.
Like not even microtonal, it's like a whole step high.
One of them is Michael's.
So it turns out because these are all backline rentals, somehow MIDI information was beingsent to pitch.
And it was changing pitch and it kept moving and getting higher and higher and higher.
(47:32):
So I was like, okay, let it just keep going.
In fact, I was kind of digging it.
I was like, this is so fucked up.
I love this.
But Reisman, this is Carnegie Hall.
Carnegie Hall.
Reisman stops, stops everything, stops the band.
And we're like, he gets up, walks across stage, takes about five minutes to fix it.
(47:54):
He figured it out that it was like, he goes in and he just fixes it, turns off the.
the pitch information.
And we started and we go, it wasn't, people were laughing and clapping, but it did kind ofkill the buzz though.
Cause usually we go out there and we just blow it out, know, but this one was like, ah,it's one I could think of actually.
(48:15):
No, that's amazing.
Love it.
That's a classic.
And then we do have the dreaded Desert Island Discs question mix.
So five albums, if you have to pick them, what would they be?
I almost think of it more as what might've been influential to me than if it's something Ican't live without or something, In a way, but a few things come to mind.
(48:36):
is Keith Jarrett's solo record called Facing You.
know this record?
Unbelievable.
Any Shostakovich symphony, particularly though the 15th, I love the best is last one.
Bernard Hytink's oh reading.
I think it was Concertgebouw.
m
Or it might've been London Phil.
(48:56):
I forgot.
oh Yeah.
Led Zeppelin I just, I love that record so much.
just, I think it's just, I don't think anyone's come even close and none of it, none ofthis stuff.
Um, cause they were really playing those guys.
It wasn't slick at all, you know, they got a little slicker later, but it was still neverslick slick.
(49:20):
Another one would be, um, Bartok's.
Music for strings, percussion, cellist.
Do you know this?
No, but I'll find it for sure.
Yeah.
If you ever have seen the Kubrick movie The Shining based on the Stephen King book, thatscore is in there he's using that all over that.
And then maybe the last thing, it's hard to, I mean, any Bach, like the Bach well-temperedclavier by any one almost, or Gould, or even Heath did some nice ones.
(49:50):
But I will mention one other one, which is probably six, and it's the Webern music, FivePieces for Orchestra, I think it's called.
very last question is sort of a very brief 10 part and we call it a quick fire 10.
So, and I think some of these questions would be particularly amusing given the areayou've worked in.
(50:11):
due to some serious crime, you're sentenced to six months in a tribute band.
What tribute band are you choosing?
That's a valid question.
That's a valid answer.
Maybe the Mavishnu band because that was like, we were really playing that music, but Ican't stand mimicking anything, I'm sorry.
no, valid.
Before a gig, so it doesn't matter which artist or your own work, but what is an importantpre-gig ritual for you to feel settled before you start a show?
(50:38):
Yep.
Great.
Pretty much it.
I mean, it needs sleep, obviously, when you're on the road over in Europe or something,but...
Yeah, very good.
If you hadn't been a musician, what do you think your career choice would have been?
Well, I wanted to be a veterinarian.
Yep.
When I was a kid, I love animals so much that I couldn't bear to see me sticking knives inthem and needles and, know, so maybe that, yeah.
(51:03):
Yeah, no, no, very good.
Nearly impossible given the diversity of your career, Mick, but a favourite tour you'veever done.
You know, I would have to say this last thing I did with Paul, this five-month,seven-songs thing is one of my favorites, because, yeah.
No?
Good pick.
And this is even harder, a favourite gig you've ever done.
(51:24):
I think that the solo piano concert that I did at Momo was one of my favorite things ever.
A lot of it had to do with the instrument was so brilliant that again, it's kind of playsitself that one.
That's very dense too.
you want to listen to it, might, your head might explode, but it's a great instrument onthat.
So that one, yes.
(51:44):
No, I'll check that out.
And I've had the privilege to go in a moment.
It's such an amazing space as well.
yeah.
A favourite city you've played and it might be New York, but you know, what's a favouritecity for you?
like having to do with the music at all or just?
just to probably get from your career, just something that stood out you.
love this city.
Yeah, it's hard to go fast.
(52:06):
Yeah.
again, again, probably an amusing question given your career, but name a song that youused to love, but you've now played it to death and would happily never play it again.
Yeah, you know, can't, I can't, I'm sure there are...
a lot of people don't have one.
Yeah.
A lot of professionals don't tend to have that.
They tend to go, it's the song I play it and I do the job and I get out of there.
(52:29):
So that's a valid response.
Well, there is a, there's one piece by Philip that I really just do not like at all.
It's called Dance Nine in the Upper Room.
We don't play it that often, but when we do it, I do want to like kill myself because Ihate it.
That one I do hate.
I'm sorry, Phil.
Do you have a favourite music documentary or movie that stood out to you over the years?
(52:51):
No, you know why?
Because I don't watch them.
Probably a lot of musicians don't, but I can't take the...
Well, the documentaries are okay.
The dramatization, know, the fiction ones that are the biopics, I can't do.
No, not so much.
No, not so much.
That's great.
Name one thing you'd like to see invented that would make your life as a keyboard playerand percussionist, if you like, easier.
(53:17):
Is there something you go, gee, this would make my life easier?
No, I got it all pre-dialed in, doing these kind of tours, the equipment shows up andit's, you know, I don't,
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