An Exclusive Interview with Jim Horn

How important were King Curtis and Duane Eddy in the formation of your career. Do you consider them mentors?
King Curtis was in New York when I quit high school to go play with Duane. I went to Phoenix and more or less auditioned for him. I played there in the studio--he was finishing a record--and then he asked me to go up to New York to work the Brooklyn Fox at the Alan Freed Easter Week Show. And that's where you do four or five shows a day...everybody would run on and do the one hit they had, or two hits and the next guy would be waiting in the wings to run on...So, I was backstage with Duane and King Curtis was in the house band and I had remembered all the old records he had played on, all The Coasters records, Charlie Brown and Yakety Yak, and I couldn't believe that I was there in the same building with him. Duane had let Al Casey, the bass player, know that he wasn't thrilled with my performance, my sound, or whatever it was, so I went out and bought a saxophone like his first saxophone player, Steve Douglas, he had a King tenor. So, I traded in my Selmer Tenor for a King, got a new mouthpiece, then came back the next day and sat down with King Curtis and learned how to growl and tongue and play differently, because I was going to be a jazz player all through high school. King Curtis helped me, he actually saved my gig, 'cause that next show I went out with Duane and I had a whole different sound, and on Rebel Rouser I got all excited and jumped up and leaped up in the air, and Duane loved that and said "Leave that in".
Leaping onstage with Duane Eddy

So, I had to jump up in the air on Rebel Rouser for the next five years on the big finale at the end of the song. King Curtis was the one guy who really helped me establish a sound. In New York, I was able to find any kind of mouthpiece or reed or saxophone there to fit the occasion, so it paid off to hang out with King--and he was probably one of my biggest mentors, and then Plas Johnson was the other one. He's the one that played on Pink Panther and Peter Gunn. He came from New Orleans through the Fats Domino ranks. He was playing on all the hits in L.A., and King Curtis was playing on all the hits in New York. Those were the two guys I really listened to on pop records. Then there were other jazz players like Stanley Turentine, Charlie Parker and Cannonball Adderly who I had listened to earlier. Those were the players that really set me on my way, and then I became known as a rock and roll saxophone player that can also play jazz.

Do you consider mentors an important part of a developing musician's career?

Yeah, 'cause a young kid playing guitar is going to obviously hear some guitar player who he's going to idolize. You base yourself, and your playing on that...you start from there. It's a good way to start playing as you listen to these guys tapes or records or CDs and you play along with them and you learn some of their licks.

Do you think mentors are as important to a developing musician as to a developing artist?

Yeah, I'm sure a singer would have to sit around and practice as much as a guitar player or a saxophone player would. When I was playing we'd go out to night clubs and that's where we learned. We cut our teeth playing in clubs. So, a singer, I would imagine, would either have to sit around the house and sing or go to a club and sit in with the band and sing and learn songs. That's the only way they're going to tell whether or not they can sing.

How important is it for a developing artist/musician to have formal music performance training?

Well, I had private lessons. My mother was responsible for my first saxophone, and she had me take lessons on piano and trumpet. Whatever I played, she made me take lessons...she was kind of old school...so, I learned to play saxophone by taking lessons. And I think if everybody did they wouldn't develop so many bad habits. I think it's very mandatory that people learn how to read or at least take some sort of instruction so that they won't develop bad habits.

Do you consider it important for an aspiring artist/musician to have an understanding of the music business industry, for example, a knowledge of accounting, royalties, copyrights, unions?

Well,I think you learn that later on. When you first start playing that's the last thing you think about...you just want to take the money and go home. But as you learn later on in the business you get to publishing and writing songs or doing contracts for a band you start realizing you should know a certain amount about it, but if you know too much it would probably take away from your playing or singing skills. It would be nice to know a little bit about it.

The basics?

It can't hurt to know the basics, yeah...

What is the greatest misconception of life in the music industry?

I think a misconception would be people thinking that as soon as they learn how to play this instrument next year they're going to be rich, they're going to be wealthy, they're gonna be a star...but it takes a long time to develop a reputation, your skills as a good musician or singer...so I think that's the misconception, as soon as I learn how to play the saxophone or guitar I'm gonna go out there and just kill everybody, I'm gonna be it..

What's the greatest emotional high that you've attained during your career?

Uh, meeting each one of the Beatles individually. I think anybody would probably say that if they had met them all. What was fun was that I didn't meet them as a group, I met and worked with them individually and that made it more fun.That was the greatest emotional high, I think, walking into the room meeting George Harrison and putting the horns together for the Bangladesh Concert, and then walking in with John Lennon and Harry Nilsson...there's John with his funny little glasses on and all we wanted to do was party and cut records...it was after the Beatles...he was more or less having fun with Harry Nilsson just doing whatever Harry wanted to do. And Ringo...I met him sitting around the pool at Richard Parriage's, very casual. We talked about the songs and he said, "You're the horn player here, you write the parts". They're all funny, they all have a great sense of humor. Paul McCartney, as well, he's a great musician.

(L: sax section with George Harrison,Jeff Lynne and Duane Eddy/ R: with Paul McCartney and Duane Eddy)

Hangin' out with Ringo Starr

When was the first moment that you realized that you had achieved success?

I think when I was out with Duane for about a year and we went to Philadelphia and we bought these brand new clothes like you saw the Beatles wearing later on--no cuffs on your pants, cardigan suits without collars on them with no lapels, and little skinny ties, little one-inch ties. And we bought all this stuff in New York and Philadelphia, and came back home to see my friends graduate. I just strutted in there,with my pointed Italian shoes on polished to the hilt, knowing that I was playing with a rock musician, a popular well-known guitar player, Duane Eddy. I was a Rebel in Duane Eddy & The Rebels.At the party after graduation, in my new suit ,with my saxophone ,sitting in with the band, I knew then "I'm gonna make it. I did promise my folks I'd finish high school, but I didn't get to, 'cause I launched my recording career after that. Playing five years with Duane I met people in the studios. And through Duane I was able to become a studio musician and pursue my career. I made sure I always tried to be the best at what I did.

If you couldn't have been a musician, what profession would you most likely have pursued?

The navy sounded so cool, man, you know I was going to go to Annapolis and go to the music school there and it just sounded like a great way to go and get the service military thing out of the way. The Navy was supposed to be the easiest military, ...just playing my instrument, playing the saxophone for four years. And I thought, "What a way to go", you know? I may have ended up being a teacher after that. I don't know what I would have been. I never even got that far, so it's really hard to say. My father was a bricklayer...I could have been a bricklayer...but that didn't suit me at all.

Do you ever regret it?

No, I don't regret any of this 'cause I never would have met all the people I've met in the industry. It's been great.

At the beginning of your career, when working with famous artists, how did you present yourself? Humble? Confident?

I was fairly quiet. After a point I was more comfortable because I had worked with so many good artists that when I did meet the Beatles individually I just walked in and said "Hey, George, how you doin',man?" I didn't freeze up or go into a cold sweat or start stuttering. I was like one of the guys. It's the kind of attitude you have to have when you're working. After I was in the studio cutting my teeth with Duane in Phoenix, I felt comfortable walking into a studio and sitting in front of a microphone. That can be one of the scariest things...sitting down in front of a microphone and having to play a solo or read some music along with other musicians and do it right all the way through. So, once I got through that, it was easy. The microphone wasn't even there, you just played...This is not pertaining to my past, but when I met Garth Brooks he wanted me to come and play a saxophone solo. That was rare because not too many country artists have saxophone solos and Garth was so big--this was a few years ago--he was so big at the time I thought "Well, this ought to be fun".I went in and recorded the song on the alto and he said,"Do you have something lower"?and I said, "Yeah, I've got a tenor", so I played it on tenor and he loved it. After I put the solo on he said, "Jim, you've gotta teach me that solo".And I said, "You've got to be kidding. Have you got about ten years?" He said, "No, just come out to my house, man. Find a real good horn for me and come out to my house and teach me how to play that solo".I said, "O.K., if you're really serious about it".And in the back of my mind I thought, "Gee, I wish I could just come out and play that solo on stage. It would be more fun for me",which eventually I did at the Hollywood Bowl. Garth flew me out there and I played that solo...it was great, we had a lot of fun with an eighty-piece orchestra. Anyway, I went out to his house. I found him a brand new Yamaha tenor--I got him exactly what I thought would be good for him, I didn't want to get him a student model 'cause he needed all the help he could get. I went out to his house twice and the first time I showed him how to get a sound on the horn, how to read on the horn, and showed him how to finger. I played the solo, I wrote it out, I transcribed the solo so I could sit there and play it for him. I came to the next lesson and he had already learned the solo off of the record. He sat down and he wanted to play along with me in his racket ball court. He's got a huge area on his property where he has racket ball courts, a basketball court, and a big lounge with a pool table. So we'd go into the racketball court,where it had great echo, and play. Both of us played this solo together and I thought, "Wow, this is a trip". I'd never done anything like that with any of the Beatles or anybody else I'd ever worked with. Before Garth and I starting practicing again he said, "You want to shoot a few baskets"? He was just loose...I thought "I like this guy". He didn't make me feel like I was under any pressure. Garth was someone I could have been nervous around and he made me feel comfortable. There I was teaching him how to play saxophone...I could have really have been nervous, but he was the one that was nervous at first, standing there playing like a kid learning his first instrument and it sounded kind of funny. We had to work on it to get the tone right. He went out on the road and played that live. He came running out there with his saxophone and play that solo and the crowd went nuts,they told me.

You worked with him again at his Central Park gig...

Yeah, that was great.He called me a few months before the gig and told me that he didn't want anybody to know that Billy Joel and I were asked to do the show. We were supposed to be the big surprise along with Don McLean who wrote American Pie. I didn't realize how big the thing was going to be. There were between 700,000 and 1.2 million people there. It was just a blanket of faces when I came out on stage. The show opened up with all his songs and it was The Garth Brooks Show which I had never seen. It was incredible. He works very hard. For four days he worked on putting it together and he rehearsed until two in the morning the night before. Then he came back the next day and worked another whole show which was unbelievable. I think Garth is determined to always be the best at what he does. He felt it would be good to have Billy Joel from New York and the saxophone on stage. It was perfect the way he set it all up.To come out on stage with Garth and play with Billy on New York State of Mind was the biggest rush I've ever had. I thought I was going to be nervous, but when I started playing my alto solo it just all fell into place.

( Billy Joel and Jim Horn)

                     It was incredible seeing all those faces in the audience...they went back into the trees and all around until they filled the whole north end of Central Park. Leading up to the concert was a normal rehearsal, but when the show started there was so much energy and such a rush. It was one of the biggest events I think I've ever played, outside of The Concert for Bangladesh with George Harrison. Bangladesh was different, but the feedback I got from the audience and the energy was similar. Garth draws that from them so easily. He'll rock on one song and then he'll stand with his guitar all by himself singing a real pretty song or a sad song. He had some audience members with tears in their eyes, which was moving, and you'd see everybody singing the lyrics along with him. Thanks to Garth, he trusted me and thought I could go out there and do a good job and I really tried hard for him. We're the best of friends. My heart goes out to Garth.I think he's one of the greatest entertainers I've ever worked with.

Is there an artist or musician you haven't worked with yet that you'd like to record with?

I'm writing my smooth jazz record right now and I was thinking that it would be fun to play with another instrumentalist. David Sanborn, he's the one that I haven't played with, that I don't know and I should, but I think he and I could really cut a great record. I could play baritone and tenor and he could play his alto. Someday I may call him and say, "I'd like to do a record with you". But there's probably a whole lot of people that I would like to go into the studio and work with. I'd like to produce Steve Winwood someday. I think it'd be fun just getting him in the studio writing with other writers and doing like I did with Delbert McClinton.

How do you get your gigs? Do you still network through your industry connections?

I've built up a reputation so people know how to get a hold of me. L.A. used to have contractors and they would call and book different people. Here it's different... it's a small town...it's a different situation. Like Tony Brown, a producer, will call his secretary and say, "I need Jim Horn to come in and play a saxophone solo",and then his secretary will call and ask me when I'm available and I'll go in. They'll also call me when they need a horn section.

How important are industry connections and networking for an established artist/musician versus an aspiring artist/musician?

It depends on how they would get their connections and how they would start. Networking is very important. The hardest part right now with musicians--young musicians--is getting a start. I got a start on the road playing live concerts and playing night clubs. Today there are a lot of clubs around and there's a lot of road work for musicians and I think that's where a lot of them are getting started. Especially country bands. You'll find out in Nashville that there are a lot of country and road bands. These guys will come into town and start doing sessions... then you can't get them to go on the road anymore 'cause they've cut their teeth out there. But I think there are a lot of rock bands and pop bands the same way that go out and tour for awhile and they become pretty good at it. Then they come home and they get into the studio scene. Networking does help, and that's where you would have to get started.

Is it necessary to have different performance skills on the road compared to in the studio?

Yes. I think everyone should play live. You should practice. Like this morning, I'm writing right now so I ran through the two new songs I've been writing to make sure the melodies sound right. To me that's practicing. But if I sat down and played scales, I wouldn't have any fun doing that. Now, a young person starting out, they should sit and play scales, whole tones to make sure they get their pitch right. I think everyone should either practice, play some live gigs, or tour. I tour a little bit as well as do studio work and that's helped me a lot 'cause it's two different kinds of playing.

You work both on the road and as a session player. Some musicians choose to do one or the other. Why do you choose to do both?

When you're playing live you really try not to make any mistakes at all. In the studio you try not to as well,but if you do make one you can stop the tape and go back and start over, do another solo, punch in here, punch in there. It kind of spoils you. If you go out on the road it disciplines you again. I think it's good to do both and play clubs as well, because in a night club there are people sitting maybe two feet away and you better play every note right.

How do you practice?

I just get the horn out and play and ad lib a little bit. It's different every time. One time I was playing flute upstairs and Denise, my wife, said, "Oh, that sounds so pretty I wish you'd do that every morning".But I'm not in the mood to get out my flute every morning and play (laughs). I was just in the mood that day, sitting there looking outside at the trees and the birds, so I played a little bit of flute and it was fun. I would put myself somewhere else...I was just sitting there playing with my eyes closed. I've got three saxphones and two flutes sitting there so I just pick up whatever I feel like playing.

You mentioned you play some piano .

Just for arranging.

Should a famous musician, like you, have artist management representation?

Oh, yeah, especially if you have a CD coming out, then they would in return be responsible for booking you on some live gigs, or clubs, or touring.

How about Public Relations?

PR, as well. Yeah, you usually have an agent, a manager, and a publicist. You need all three of them.


Do you think synthesizers and computers will replace live performance?

No,not in the long run. They have up to a certain extent already. I hope they don't let it go too much further. I think they've tried just about everything they could, but now they realize a real saxophone solo can never be replaced. Synthesizers replacing horns sound like kazoos. It just doesn't sound the same. But horn sections will manage to get samples of brass--trumpets and trombones and they get this (makes horn sounds)--and it sounds like a horn section. It passes...it's O.K. There will inevitably be some synthesizer emulation, but there will always be live playing, because a machine can only do what you program it to do. It takes a human performance to add the heart and soul to a recording.

Why are you a musician?

Probably because of my mother... my mother played piano. I was raised in the fifties so she would come home with sheet music. Today we come home with a new CD...we don't come home with music for anybody to sit down and play. I kind of wish that was still around 'cause people don't do it. You can go out and buy sheet music today, but you don't see anybody buying it. So, she would come home with the latest top two or three songs. Back then you'd go in the music store and you'd hear these songs on the radio and you'd say, "I want so-and-so's music for that song" and they'd have it there. You'd buy the sheet music--it was cheaper than buying a record--and you'd sit down at the piano and play the song. Everybody would get around the piano and sing along...I'd sit up on the stool next to her and sing. I started playing piano when I was about six, I think, and I didn't like it, 'cause the songs were terrible... they were real corny, songs they made kids learn back then. Today they have songbooks that are a lot hipper for young kids that are playing piano to start out with and at least they can play a song that they probably heard on the radio or they have on a CD. But they had terrible stuff for us to learn, so I switched to trumpet. Trumpet was so hard. I think I was about eleven years old, ten or eleven. It's hard to sit there and blow through your lips the way you have to blow to get a sound on a brass instrument...a lot of pressure. My music teacher had a big old funny lip, and I didn't want to have a big, old funny lip. So, I quit playing that and started playing saxophone when I was twelve. I always liked music because of my mother, I'm sure. She was always playing around us and we sang. It was fun.The reason I started playing saxophone was because a lot of R & B records always had a saxophone solo. I think that was the one reason I fell in love with that sound...that saxphone player always playing that solo in the middle, and that's what I wanted to do. So, that's one of the reasons I learned saxophone.

Is it helpful to be married to someone who understands the music industry?

Yeah, sometimes it helps when you're making decisions.The hardest part, sometimes, is living with someone in the music business. You have to learn how to get along and not say things that are going to upset them. We've learned how to do that. If I come home and say "I want to do this,what do you think?" she'll say, "Nah, you shouldn't do it" or "Oh, yeah, that sounds great, you ought to do it".I need that some times. Denise is a songwriter and has worked as an artist, so she plays songs for me. If I think it's really great I let her know,and if I think it's okay, I'll tell her it's okay. She appreciates my honesty . There are a lot of people in the music business who are married to people that aren't in the music business and they love it because they have that opposite thing going on and that works, too. If you are going to live with someone in the business it's got to be a fifty-fifty situation.

You have two sons who chose careers outside of the music industry, one as an architect, the other as a graphic artist. Are you glad they pursued jobs outside of the business?

Yes. They enjoy playing, and they're great musicians,but they discovered how difficult it is to make a living playing music.I think James realized,in his mid-20s, that he better do something constructive and make some money, so he became an architect. John is doing well, playing in a reggae band and producing/writing songs in Seattle. He also continues to do graphic art work.

Tell me about your upcoming CD.

It's called The HIT List. It's based on recordings I've played on over the last twenty-seven years. I went in and cut the tracks the way the original tracks were cut and had some of the original artists perform . Leon Russell played piano on Lady Blue and Delta Lady and sings the bridge on Lady Blue. Becka Bramlett sang the part on Delta Lady that her mother sang, and it sounded just like her.Michael McDonald sings the signature line on Ride Like the Wind which he cut for Christopher Cross. David Hungate played bass on two Toto tracks , Africa and Rosanna. On the Steely Dan tracks, I had Thom Flora and Chris Rodriguez do all the male vocals. It sounds like the original. I wanted the choruses and signature lines to come up so people could recognize the song . I'm real proud of it. We put alot of work into it. If I go out and play live I I'll be able to talk about each song before I play it and talk about the experiences I had in the studio as we cut each record. I think it would be fun for the audience.There will probably be a short biography in the CD liner notes, along with some photos, so people will realize who I've recorded with. I'm sure that it will be accepted by the smooth jazz stations because there's are a good combination of rock and jazz instrumentals on it .