Fred Jung: So Ornette was pivotal in your early development?
Barre Phillips: Yes, it wasn’t so much the music, which I loved very much. It wasn’t a big discovery, the music itself. It was what he was talking. It was what he was saying with his words when you would talk with Ornette because I met Ornette in 1958, I mean, personally. It was actually four years later when I re-met him after he had made all those initial records and everything. I met him again and he gave me the message and I was ready for it (laughing).
Fred Jung: What was the message?
Barre Phillips: The message was, well, in detail, as far as antidotes go, Fred, he came and sat in with a band that I was playing with out in California. He had been in New York for about four years at that time. He was out on the West Coast again. I was still on the West Coast and he sat in with us on a friendly basis. We were just playing standards and what was acceptable in the jazz repertoire at the time and he said, «Well, you guys played great. How come you’re playing this school music? Why don’t you play your own music?» And I was ready for the message.
Entrevista a Barre Phillips realizada por Fred Jung en Jazz Weekly. Fotografía tomada por Joan Cortès el 24 de enero de 2010 en Círcol Maldà (Barcelona) el 24 de enero de 2010 en una actuación a dúo con Joe Morris.
Texto: © Fred Jung
Fotografía: © Joan Cortès, 2024
