Saxophonist Kirk Whalum’s ‘Epic Cool’ journey with jazz
How would you define ‘cool’ in this record and in jazz musicians?
I think it’s a paradox, on the one hand, you know that the atmosphere is filled with people who play better than you, that’s the humility part of it. Like you look around on this corner, that corner, you can look in your age group, a third of your age, and they are all killing it. I think the cool part is you being able to relax into it? That’s the thing that the coolest of the cool. Miles Davis just was so relaxed into that thing he was doing.
He had such confidence, it’s like people said it was arrogance, but it wasn’t that. It was just man. I know what I have. I know what I don’t have. I’m not trying to bring that, I’m bringing what I have, this is who I am, and you can do that with confidence, and that’s what cool is.
Is that what people can hear on Epic Cool – your confidence?
I think so, for instance, the title track, I’m playing the big baritone. It’s the first song I’ve recorded on baritone, but I’m so far back on the beat. I’m laid way back, kind of the West Coast part of all of this stuff, Jerry Mulligan, and Miles, too, but like you’re just so far back on the beat, you’re not in a hurry. So that’s I think that’s the manifestation of that.
Why use the word epic, and what emotions do you connect with in that particular record?
The title Epic Cool came from a buddy of mine, who’s also in the same age, middle sixties, who is a sports announcer in San Antonio, Don Harris. I sent a song to him before the record came out, and he said, ‘Man, that’s epic cool’, and that ended up being the name of the song and the name of the record.
In my head, it’s about people our age being faithful to stay in there and being faithful one, and being courageous at the same time to say, “Yes, I’m on the older side of this, but I have something important to say.” There’s a wisdom that comes with all those years and as well. There’s a gravitas, if anything, maybe epic equals gravitas, like there’s something that we have, that the bad, bad, bad young players they don’t have yet. They’ll have it when they’re our age. So I think, for the listeners, too, who like you’re in your sixties or seventies, you’re like, Hey? I want to connect with you. We got some energy to bring to you and connect with your energy like man, we still out here.
What’s your invitation to someone who hasn’t listened to your music?
This is Kirk Whalum, come check me out, as I do my best to get out of the way and present something that you will feel long after I’m gone. I think it’s that I mean, in fact, there’s a song on my new record. The record is called Epic Cool, but there’s a song called Pillow Talk, and, as usual, it’s a double entendre. It’s like the intimacy of that setting, and that song is so powerful. It’s like me playing way down low on the instrument, as opposed to, and it’s just very intimate and very tender.
So that’s the thing I would love to invite people to, is through a song like that, I know there’s so many impressive people who do what I do. There’s Eric Darius, Marcus Anderson, all these young brothers, but what I’m hoping I can do through a song like Pillow Talk is, I just whisper, you’re so close to me and it doesn’t have to be sexual, but that you feel the spirit, you feel something greater, something beautiful.