There You Are: Brian Auger on his 60 Years in Music
There You Are: Brian Auger on his 60 Years in Music
“All I ever wanted to do was play some good music,” - Brian Auger
By Pat King
You get a sense when speaking to the innovative and monumentally influential jazz-fusion pianist Brian Auger that he approaches every moment like it is an opportunity to will something creative into the world. Reading some of the names the man has been affiliated with over the years is intimidating, to say the least. Auger’s hammond organ has accompanied some of the most recognizable voices in pop, rock, R&B, and jazz. But with his bands The Brian Auger Trinity and the Brian Auger Oblivion Express, where his name was listed prominently on the marquee, he truly carved out his own world and laid the groundwork for musicians looking to fuse the worlds of jazz, rock, and funk.
Before I had the opportunity to speak with Auger over the phone about his long and storied career, I had spent the past month or so listening to his fantastic new three-disc box set “INTROSPECTION” which pulls selections from across his 60-year career in music. The tracks flow together in a non-linear way bouncing around from era to era, proving that if there ever was a set destination to the end of his musical journey, Auger has been having a hell of a time creating the lines on map to get there.
Tell me about the creation of this new box set, “INTROSPECTION”. How did the whole thing come about?
When I first met with the label about it, I said I’m not interested in making a “Best Of”. I have some of those and was basically not interested in doing that again. They said, “You pick the material, whatever you want.” I told them there’s a lot of B-sides, if you want to call them that, that I thought were better musically than the work I had done that was commercial so I suggested doing something with the work that hadn’t been exposed.
A lot of times, interviewers start out by asking the question ‘When was the first time you were aware of music’. But as such an accomplished and adventurous musician, do you remember when music first ignited your curiosity?
I was probably about three-years old. My father had a player-piano and a cupboard full of piano rolls. We had all of the operas, in piano form (laughs). We had different kind of concertos or things like “Moonlight Sonata” by Beethoven. “Madame Butterfly”. “Ragtime”. All sorts of stuff like that. I was mesmerized by this great big machine that was driven by a couple of pedals. I learned to look up at the piano roll and stand on the pedals and hang out underneath the keyboard and pedal around like some kind of demented cyclist. I loved the music! It was just all of this different stuff, it was amazing watching the notes play. At a certain point, [I thought] ‘I love this, I could do this all day!’
One of my favorite pieces of music was “The William Tell Overture” by [Gioachino] Rossini. Which probably everybody knows [mimics the music]. I already noticed that the piano, the keys when I looked at the keyboard, I realized that the keys repeated... The pattern in the keys repeated right away up the keyboard. So, I looked to see what notes played when the beginning of the piece was starting off. I realized that the next octave up, I didn’t know what an octave was or anything, but if I played that same hook just up here to see what happens … I started to play the same thing [mimics the music]. Eureka!
So, I tried to emulate some of the things that we had. The melodies of the operas were amazing. They just occur over and over again. It’s been light years [but I think to myself] “Oh, we had a roll of that!” It sounded a lot like that. My oldest brother, who is about 14 years older than me, I come from a big family of six. The first three; my big brother James and my two sisters Eileen and Daphne. James had a collection of American Jazz. This was where I said, “I love this”. Especially the swing era and some of the people like Louis Armstrong, Fats Waller, and Big Bill Broonzy. That groove stuff… Duke Ellington … Count Bassie’s Orchestra. I used to hear these when he was playing that and I used to listen to that and thought it was amazing. There was that going on and my sisters loved Nat King Cole, Bing Crosby, Sinatra, and all sorts of other people. My mother and father loved the music from the shows. Oklahoma and all of those kinds of shows that were going on at the time. Although, none of us were born into a family that could afford to send me to piano lessons I had my own education going on. From this cupboard full of rolls and then my brothers and sisters… It kind of went on from there.
When I got interested in jazz later on, when I was messing about on the piano and I found a few different chords, and felt, “Wow”. Then I started to listen to the American Jazz players. I loved a lot of piano players, I loved the Jazz Messengers and all of the people that came out of that. Oscar Peterson… I know I’m missing all sorts of people. But later on when I heard Miles [Davis], anyone who played with Miles was cool with me. Herbie Hancock, Wynton Kelly, and Bill Evans. Then anybody who played with Coltrane was also somebody that I loved. McCoy Tyner. Mainly McCoy. The other band that I thought was stupendous was Cannonball Adderley and his quintet. A British guy used to play with him called Victor Feldman. He made a very strong influence on me at one point. I changed all of my left hand chords so that I could play like Victor. The list just goes on and on, but that was basically just the grounding that I had.
It’s interesting to see that your formative experiences with Jazz and Opera are less academic than they traditionally are for most people. Many musicians spend a lot of time refining ‘the form’. It shows how deep of a love for the music was and still is.
I think the great thing was, I played the things that I liked. People will sit in one particular pigeonhole. I played out a lot playing jazz and I loved [going out] and playing all of these evergreens which you were supposed to know all of the changes. That was very grounding from the start. I played a gig in this club when I was about 18 and the club was in the West End of London and the club was called The Cottage Club. I think someone must have bribed the local counsel for an alcohol license because this was the only place that I knew of where you could get a drink until about two o’clock in the morning. What used to happen was, I booked a gig playing piano, it was piano and drums because they couldn’t afford a bass player [laughs]. I had a day job in one of the oldest print firms that existed in London and I had to go to work with a three-piece suit and short hair. I just got out of grammar school at the time and somebody had to pay the rent. I had a younger brother and a younger sister at home and my dad was sick. This was great, man. This club really taught me all sorts of things because everybody who was anybody on the British scene, at the time, used to come by and get a drink until two o’clock in the morning.
A well-known trombone player came in one night and said, “Can I sit in with you guys?” I thought “This is amazing, I can play anything in the key of C or G”. So this guy goes, “Can you play Perdido?” I said, “Yeah! What key? C or G?” and he looks at me and goes, “What do you mean C or G? Perdido is in B flat!” I had to shamefully say, “Well, I’m really sorry but I can’t play in B flat”. Then he turns to the manager of the club and says, “Hey, Al! What kind of piano player is this? He can’t even play Perdido in B flat!”
I was totally taken aback by all of this and I felt terrible. I ran to the all-night train after we finished at about 2 o’clock in the morning and had to walk home across London [laughs]. So, I went home and I didn’t sleep for a couple of nights and I learned Perdido in B flat, somehow. I waited for this guy to come in and after about three weeks he came back in. I said, “Hi! Do you want to sit in? Do you want to play ‘Perdido’?” He said, “Well, you can’t play it in the right key!” I said, “I can now”. He looked at me and said, “Are you kidding?” I said, “No! I went home and I learned it.”
So we played Perdito and he was knocked out and so was I. Then he said, “How can you play all of these tunes? They’re not in the right key! People can’t sit in with you if you can’t play them in the right key.” We were at Charing Cross Road where all of the music publishers had their stores. So he said, “You should go along there and pick up all of these books,” they had all of these books of different things that would tell you what key it’s and it’s some music to it. He said, “You should get that and find out what the keys are to all of those things you are playing and learn the right key!” It was a tremendous education for me. Because I did that and then anybody who came in I could sit in with after that [laughs].
Another thing, he came in one night and said “You were playing the wrong chord in the middle eight of that tune.” I said, “Really?” He said, “Yeah! It’s an A flat minor seven.” I said, “I don’t know what that is. What is that?” He said, “You’re kidding me, right?” I said, “No, I’m not unfortunately. What does it mean?” He said, “Go to the library and get this book and it will tell you how chords are made up and what they’re called.” Bingo. When I got that book I listened to Charlie Parker and thought, “Oh my god. I know what this guy is doing now!” It changed my whole repertoire around, in about three weeks. He came in again and said, “Oh my god, what has happened to you?” And I said, “I took your advice!” I played in that club for about 18 months and that was a tremendous jazz education to me. It really started me off in London.
Could you paint a picture of what it was like starting out early on in the London music scene in the 1960s? Did it seem like a wide open field or was there a sense of competition between musicians to get gigs?
There were a lot of places to play, particularly over the weekend. There were a lot of pubs. Mainly, the halls were in pubs and there were some clubs. But there weren’t that many. I’d get called to play in a restaurant in Berkeley Square and so I would play all night and just play evergreens. That was the whole thing. There was a place in Knightsbridge, somehow or another, there was a casino upstairs. The Casino was like the law in England. I was like, “What is this place? It’s ridiculous!” And, It was ridiculous because I could play for five hours a night. Fifty minutes on, 10 minutes off without repeating anything. Judy Garland’s daughter Liza Minelli used to come in, I think she must have been in her late teens at the time, and she would play “stump the piano player”. She would ask me for all of these out of the way tunes, which I knew [laughs]. After about three or four, she wandered away after that. That was a great gig as well. I had a lot of fun with those things.
And then, I was walking past my record store in Shepherd’s Bush Market. I lived in Shepherd's Bush, at the time. I heard this sound, this was about 1964 so I must have been coming up to my 25 birthday, or something. I couldn’t figure out what it was. It was incredibly exciting, it was amazing. It was Jazz! So I rushed into the store and said, “What is this that you’re playing?” They showed me the jacket to Back of the Chicken Shack by Jimmy Smith. The great Jimmy Smith who every modern organ player really owes a great debt to because he figured out a way to make the sound really hip. It knocked me out and eventually led to me buying a Hammond which I was playing in clubs. Mainly with some kind of jazz stuff, but also guys who played R&B and stuff like that. I made friends with these people and they would hire me to play on their records. I had the idea of starting a band because those clubs would call me directly and say, “Could you play with a trio on Saturday night?” and I would say, “Yeah”, and I would call whoever I wanted to play with. I became a bandleader without knowing it.
Your early band Steampacket, with Long John Baldry, Rod Stewart and Julie Driscoll all sharing vocal duties, is probably one of the biggest “What if” bands in music history. What was the dynamic like in that project and was there a sense that it was too good to be true while you were playing in it?
Not really. I’d already bought the hammond and I had a trio. I was working in Manchester in a club called the Twisted Wheel and this guy who was about 6’5” came in and it turned out to be a guy called Long John Baldry. Long John was probably the best blues singer that we produced. He had a big following and was basically a house-hold name. The Beatles were breaking out large and they had a one-hour show on television at Christmas time and the first two that they did, Baldry was on both of them because they were big fans of his. Along with a lot of people you know like the Stones and Elton John and people like that were in the audience. He asked me to come up and talk to his agent and his manager the following Monday, it was a Saturday night. I said, “Well, okay fine”. He told me he very much liked the band. He was into blues, jazz, anything that was really good in the way of gospel and god knows what. Straight Chicago blues. So anyway, I went up and talked to his manager and his agent. He already had a band called The Hoochie Coochie Men who were a band of complete and absolute maniacs [laughs]. There are very funny stories of stuff that went on, but we won’t deal with that! But they said they wanted someone who could put together a band for John and can make him turn up to rehearsals and learn new material and be on time. They said, “Would you be interested in doing something like that?” and I said, “Well, yeah”.
They said, “Well there’s one thing,” John said, “do you know Rod Stewart?” I said, “Yep”. Because being in a little trio, I sang some things, but a lot of people would want to sit in with me and one of them was Rod. Rod came by and sat in a couple of times. John said, “I’d like to have him in the band”. I thought, what kind of band is this? What is this a kind of Sam and Dave review? We looked at one another and he said, “I don’t think so, I really don’t know. I never thought about it.” It was really kind of strange to have two guys … are you going to divide the vocals? Nobody knew. I said, “Look, I did a couple of sessions with this young lady called Julie Driscoll. She’s got a hell of a voice and loves Nina Simone, all the Motown people, Gospel … She’s right in the right place. Why don’t we add her?” Roddy said, “No, we can’t have women in the band. We won’t be able to swear!” I ignored him because I thought that was absurd. They asked, “How would that work?” I said, “Well, I should go on and play a couple of Jimmy Smith-type raving tunes to get everyone dancing. Then Julie could come on and she would be able to sing some Marvin Gaye stuff or whatever she wanted to sing. Then I would be able to sing backups for Julie. Then Rod could come on and we could both sing backups for Rod. So we’re all on the stage. Then, finally, Baldry would make an appearance and he sings straight Chicago blues. He does a great job on that. Also, Gospel and we all sing backups for him on the gospel stuff. They thought that was a great idea. I said, “Well, there’s nothing out there like that. I don’t know whether people would like that, but there’s certainly nothing like that out there.”
Then, it came around to the name of the band. If you were talking with other musicians … and if anybody played with great gusto and really were very fluent we used to call them a “steamer”. “Ah, he steams along, man. He’s a steamer!” I said, “What about the steamboats that used to go up and down the Mississippi?” In the blues years they used to be called a “Steampacket”. I said, “What about Steampacket, then?” That was it. They all agreed that we would be Steampacket. Steampacket lasted almost two years and was very successful.
I had gotten to the point then where I had gone through all of this material and I thought what I would like to have is a quartet with a great guitar player. Somebody like Wes Motgomery. A great drummer like Bernard Purdy, if I could find one. The guy who used to play bass on all of the Motown records, James Jamerson. If I hired a rhythm section like that and a guitar player and me. Maybe we could ask Julie if she wanted to come in. That was called the Brian Auger Trinity with Julie Dricoll! We were the first band of that kind that actually headlined at the European jazz festivals... This was the start of that whole thing. I wanted to try and develop this idea of having a jazzy approach to everything but with funk overtones. That was it. We had some hit records. We had a #1 in England with a Bob Dylan tune [“This Wheel’s on Fire”, released in 1968]. After a while, Julie, her manager drove us all crazy. He booked us and more or less killed us. There were just too many gigs. We weren’t getting paid properly. It was all sort of a scam, to me, and I wanted to step out at a certain point.
I started the Trinity in 1966 and it lasted until the early 1970s. By that time, I had worked out that there was a disharmony in the band. The management was terrible and it really ruined the band. All I ever wanted to do was play some good music. I thought, “Does it have to be this difficult?” I wanted to push on with developing the idea of a rock-jazz or whatever they called it at the time. They called it jazz-fusion, rock-jazz, jazz-rock. I just called it music! I like a lot of different things from a lot of different places so I put them all together. Whatever that is, it’s something I like so I hope everyone else likes it or otherwise... The record company wanted us to continue, obviously, if you have a hit they want you to replicate that and keep doing it. I decided I was going to push on with trying to make this kind of music and seeing where it led to. Now that I was obviously going to be wadign against the commercial tide, so to speak, I thought well maybe I’m heading towards the quickest way to oblivion here. So, maybe I’ll call it “The Oblivion Express”. So, from 1970, the Oblivion Express took the road and the rest is history!
In your mind, do you have key musical differences that you see between the Brian Auger Trinity and The Oblivion Express?
I think the Oblivion Express was actually harmonically more advanced and gave me free reign to play over sequences that I may not have entertained in the Trinity, really. That’s all. It was a learning experience in the Trinity, for me. All of these things. Because stepping out of the jazz world and getting mixed up with rock and roll and R&B all of those things, it was like, in a way, I had to be careful with my technique. [Try] not to blind people with science. I felt like I was going backwards for a while, but then it meshed. I really enjoyed all of the stuff we made with The Oblivion Express. It pushed forward. Then all of the sudden people like Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea were doing the same things! When I went to the States, they were my idols and, suddenly, I was doing gigs with them. I was actually on different programs with them. I toured with Herbie Hancock’s Headhunters. I did some things with Return To Forever. Also, one of the greatest things that I remember is Maurice White from Earth, Wind & Fire called the agency and said, “We would like Brian and the Express to open for us in the Midwest.” We did about seven or eight concerts with them and they were phenomenal. That was the most amazing music show that I had ever seen, ever. Beautiful tunes, fantastic players. The vocals onstage and the harmonies, it was like, “wow”. I thought it was a great honor.
The first soundcheck, we were soundchecking and Maurice White came down and introduced himself and said, “Thanks for coming out with us.” I said to him, “I can’t believe this. It’s a great honor. We’ve got all of your records and we know your tunes, but I don’t understand. I’m coming from a lot of American artists. That’s what I’ve been listening to since I was tiny. I don’t understand what this movement is called ‘The British Invasion.’” He said, “I don’t know what’s going on over there. But when the music goes out to England, in particular, it seems to go through some kind of filter and you’re bringing the best of it back and it’s so fresh.”
I really like how this box set is structured. The track listings on each CD don’t necessarily adhere to a certain time period of your musical journey. It kind of relates to how you have consistently broken down barriers musically throughout your career and that each phase of time period could easily flow into the next. What was the reasoning for not separating these selections by time period?
I always look at each album as a page in a diary as we were moving forward. Some things that I was trying out really came off great, and others didn’t. Most of it was available. I thought some of the tracks didn’t get an airing, even when we were doing well. They stuck to the same couple of things on each album. I wanted to dig in and say, “Well, what about this?”
I made an album called Planet Earth Calling. Probably, one of the best hammond solos is on that. “Planet Earth Calling”, “Red Alert”, and also “Sea of Tranquility”. A lot of my tracks were too long for radio airplay. I thought I don’t want to edit them down and take the guts out of them. It wouldn’t make any sense. For me, I tried to pick those out and give them an airing because I think they’re very valid. Also, when I finished I thought this is much more a “Brian Auger album” than a lot of the ones because some of them were influenced by other people. I tried to cherry pick what I thought were some of the best tunes and best performances that I’ve made. Whether I hopped around or not, I wasn’t aware of that. But you’re right. I think it gave us a much better picture of my music, in fact.
In recent years, you have played with many of your family members including your daughters Ali and Savannah as well as your son Karma on drums. What has it been like making your band a family affair?
Well, Savannah is no longer in the band. She has a family now. I’ve had a guy named Alex Ligertwood who stepped into the band after Savannah. Earlier than Savannah was Ali, my daughter who was a great Sarah Vaughn fan and who could sing unbelievably. We actually recorded her. But unfortunately, she had come down with horrible migraines and it got to the point where it wasn’t possible to book with [her] and have her with the band as well. We were discussing putting together a list, with Karma, a list of people that we might call to come and sing with us. Karma said, “Why don’t you get Savannah then?” I said, “What do you mean? Savannah doesn’t sing!” He said, “Oh, yes she does! Have you ever heard her? Let’s just have a rehearsal and you can have a listen.” I was just astounded. She came into the band for quite a long time and Karma has always been in the band to and keeps getting better and better. He’s great. He also has his own studio now and has produced a lot of my stuff and some other people’s stuff at the moment. He’s a great engineer as well. We found a singer here, after Alex Ligertwood stepped out. Her name is Lilliana De Los Reyes. Her dad [Walfredo Reyes Jr.] is currently playing drums with Chicago. He’s a fantastic Latin player, as well. Lilliana has a phenomenal voice, man. When I heard it I was like, “Oh my god! Who is that?” She came out on tour over to the East Coast at the beginning of the year and also came out to Europe and stunned everybody. I’m waiting to get some time to collect some songs and write some stuff together. Because I’d like to record with Lilliana. She’s also singing in the chorus with George Benson. But, what a solo voice! So there you go. It just moves along!
You also frequently gig with Italian musician Zucchero. Could you tell me about that relationship?
He’s an incredible writer of music because, again, he writes right across the spectrum.He has some Italian songs that are really beautiful. The tunes are beautiful and also the lyrics are beautiful. I’m very fortunate to speak Italian fluently and we get on like a house on fire. He, at one point, was a great friend with Pavarotti. Pavarotti said to him, “You rock and roll guys, you don’t step out of that very often. What about doing something really serious?” So we wrote this thing called “Miserere” on which Pavarotti is singing. Not only does he have it on record, but actually a film of that, to. Suddenly, I’m sitting there playing this tune to a huge audience who are singing along with this tune. It was straight kind of classical stuff. What a surprise, right? Then he writes stuff, a couple of things that were raging. He says to me at soundcheck, “Brian, I want you to play this stuff. It’s right up your street” [laughs]. It’s great fun. The band is fantastic! It’s an eleven-piece band with two drummers. It’s kind of a rock orchestra that can play anything, and does. He gets on every night and sings for two-hours. This guy is a music lover. He’s certainly got my vote.
After 60 years in the business, you are still gigging and recording. You have said in the past that your favorite era of your career is “Now”. Do you feel like it is important to maintain a sense of curiosity and a willingness to innovate as your career goes on? With such a forward thinking mindset when it comes to your career? How do you view the word “legacy”?
I don’t think like that, man. As I said, all I really wanted to do was play some really good music. That’s great satisfaction for me. Obviously, it’s not that simple [laughs] to me now. But, I am still trying to put one foot in front of the other and get better. You know, learn more as I go along. Particularly, if I go out with somebody like Zucchero, I’m learning how music functions to that many people. Not only that, he writes across a spectrum that is fairly breathtaking. It goes to a place like Tunisia, and his face is all over the Roman Amphitheatre. People show up and they’re singing his tunes. I must admit that I’m really impressed. This guy is very down-to-Earth. He says to me, “Brian, I never visioned any of this happening. I’m a farm boy! I came from a farm!” Boy, he’s written some amazing stuff. It’s incredible. I really enjoy being with him because it’s always a laugh and a joke. There’s no ego involved in it. It’s just, make the music as best as you possibly can.
Do you think that same sense of curiosity to always keep learning is still driving you forward today?
Yes! You know, I must admit, man, it certainly has stretched me intellectually. I just love music, if it’s good. This will explain it. I saw Duke Ellington being interviewed on BBC 2 many years ago. He’s one of my absolute icons. The woman who was interviewing him said, “So Mr. Duke, what sorts of music do you like?” And he said, “Well, there’s only really two kinds of music: good and bad.” I went, “Oh, thank you!” He hit the nail on the head for me. That was when I suddenly realized what I was doing and why. Basically, that’s what I’ve been doing all of this time. Having a ball when I can, playing the best music that I can, and also trying to take a step forward in understanding how to present that to people. [And] still loving all sorts of stuff across the spectrum.
NOTE: Brian’s answers have been edited and shortened for clarity.