Scott Henderson Discussion

[hipfreejazz]

Hey Scott,

I attended your 9/3 performance at Alvas. Thanks for continuing to play with such passion. For a 20 year old meth-head, you're kickin' ass. LOL

You stated that solo writing is a long and challenging process. On the final three Tribal Tech albums, you employed improvisation based composition. Have you considered applying this concept with your trio to expedite the writing process? You've been playing with Alan and Travis for nearly a decade. I would think there's sufficient chemistry to explore this approach.

Alan and Travis are both talented but much younger musicians. How do you offer constructive criticism and praise to younger players that you collaborate with? In Tribal Tech, I read that you were brutally honest with each other. With HBC, due to experience and stature of Jeff and Dennis, I assume that there's a level of respect and tactfulness in interacting with each other.

On “Sphinx”, right before your solo, what are you doing to obtain that highly distorted tone (you knelt down and seemed to be manipulating a pedal)?

On “Mysterious Traveller”, during the intro section, how do you achieve that repeated dark sound? Is it a patch in SE-70?

Thanks,

Pete

[Scott Henderson]

I've definitely thought of doing at least a few jams with Alan and Travis on the next album, and then expanding them in post production like we did on the last TT albums. I want to make at least half of the music on the next album looser, so it's more different from night to night on the road.

Good musicians are always open to constructive criticism, no matter the age. It's not really criticism, but suggestions from the writer of the tune. When I'm playing someone else's music, I'll bend over backwards to give them what they want, even if I think my idea is better. There can be some conflict, but I think the writer should have the final say. However, Alan and Travis have come up many of their own ideas for my tunes which I would've never thought of - I want their creativity, and almost never need to tell them what or what not to play.

On Sphinx, I'm dialing up the vibrato speed on my Arion chorus, to simulate what I did on the record.

The sound on Mysterious Traveler is a dark, very weird reverb patch on the SE-70.

[Red Suede]

That's the way the Beatles composed together Scott. You're in good company. The composer always had the final say......

[countandduke]

I LOVE writing music as a collaboration... There's a point at which I stop and tell everyone how much I enjoy writing with others and trying it this way, that way, SOOOOO much fun.

Scott, did you ever "write" with Joe Z.? If so, was he open to suggestions? I can imagine he was more along the lines of, this is how the melody and harmony go, play what you want during a solo...

Thanks brother...
Chris

[Scott Henderson]

Joe told me that almost every Weather Report song took up the whole 15 minutes of tape, and then was edited down from that. That's how it was on the records I did with him, and playing live was no different. I didn't write with him, but he needed someone to edit songs in real time on stage - I gave cues to go to the next section, which would piss Joe off sometimes, but he never stayed mad for long because he didn't really want to play a set of five 20 minute tunes, which is what would've probably happened if someone didn't step in and edit. Joe was a very free musician and hated counting bars, and he wasn't a fan of arrangements - I think for him they were a necessary evil.

I was asked many times for my opinions about the music and how it was arranged to play live. That surprised me, because of Joe's reputation as a tyrant. I didn't feel that way about him at all, I felt like he was a pretty democratic bandleader. "Play my notes exactly as written and then play a solo" - that's Chick Corea, not Joe.

During my last year with Joe, he became less interested in playing songs with harmony, and most of the tunes were based on one chord vamps. At that point, there were no sections to cue, and in my opinion, songs went on for way too long. My hope was that Joe would write more great songs in the Weather Report style, but I guess he'd had enough of that kind of music and went into a World Music direction.