#stacy dillard

[rjeldridge]

Stacy Dillard, at Smalls (2025)

[mostlymonk]

Epistrophy

Ed Cherry Quartet

Stacy Dillard – tenor Ed Cherry – guitar Jared Gold – organ Sanah Kadoura – drums

[smoovtunes]

Soo boo boo!  Sooooo boo boo.... Soo...Boo... boo boo boo .... boo boo boo... soo loo boo boo.... soo... booo ... boooooo boo boooooo! Wowwwww. Stacy Dillard, a killin' and charismatic NY based tenor and soprano saxophonist, can be caught late Saturday with Brooklyn Circle at Smalls NYC.  Here's "Untouchable" from Stacy's album One, which showcases both his tenor and soprano skills.  Look out soon for live footage of his goosebump-inducing solos during a recent performance with guitarist Michael-Louis Smith at DROM, June 4th.

[smallslive]

Stacy Dillard

Stacy Dillard has made a name for himself as one of the premier saxophonists of his generation, working alongside leaders like Roy Hargrove, Mulgrew Miller, John Hicks, Lenny White, Stefon Harris, Clark Terry, and Steve Wilson, among many others. He can be heard on the new Dezron Douglas Quintet record, recorded live at Smalls, and will appear this Tuesday night as part of the Smalls Round Midnight series, in a sextet co-led by pianist, Theo Hill and trumpeter, Josh Evans.

You grew up in Michigan, correct?

I am from Muskegon Heights, Michigan,but my family comes by way of Indianola, Mississippi. Northwestern Mississippi, kind of.

…And was soprano saxophone your first instrument?

Saxophone was my first instrument; alto. I was 15, going on 16. It was probably about a month before my birthday; I was watching TV, and I saw a horn player, some drums, the upright bass, and piano – to this day, I couldn’t tell you who it was. They were playing straight up jazz, and at the time I had no clue what that was, but I was so drawn to it, I was like “I want a saxophone!” My parents gave me the whole bit, “We’re not buying you a saxophone, that’s ridiculous. It costs too much money!” I’m the youngest of five – three of my older siblings had picked up instruments and not stuck with them very long at all. Two years, max. But I found out you could rent saxophones at this place, the Christian Music Center. I rode my bike over there one day: “90 days, 90 dollars.” I had a little job at the time; I told my parents the deal, and they got me an alto. A friend of mine from around the corner, Omar Fox, he plays. His father plays too — William. He played the same model of soprano that I play now, and he would let me borrow it sometimes. That’s when the love hit! When I graduated high school, my parents bought me a soprano. That was it! 

What were you listening to that influenced you early on? 

When I was in Ohio, I was in the introduction stage of playing straight ahead. Right before that, I was just playing anything I heard. I knew I wanted to play the saxophone, but I didn’t necessarily put a genre to what I wanted to do. I just wanted to be able to play what I liked. Through the scene, being in Ohio, going to school there, that’s what led me to the straight ahead scene — listening to people like J.D. Allen, like Anthony Wonsey on that album with Nick (Payton), “Nick at Night.” Early on, they both showed me so many things, at different ends of the spectrum. Also, Eddie Bayard, tenor player from Harrisburg, PA. Mike Wade, trumpet player from D.C., residing in Cincinnati right now. Drummer Melvin Broach. All the Cincinnati ,Indianola and Dayton, Ohio cats. Lincoln Berry, Hank Marr, two organists. They all showed me different things, and pretty much led me to one place, which is a realization about this music, and the freedoms of it, and how it represents nature, and life, more so than most other forms of music I’ve dealt with.

Because, when you play a pop gig — and nothing against it, because I love it all — depending on your instrument, your emotional input is capped somewhere. But in jazz, you can have ten different bands playing the same song, and they’ll all be different; because, while the composition will be captured, the individual essence still will be felt. At a pop gig, the drummer’s got a job. The bass player’s got a job. The general listening public won’t be able to say, “Oh, that’s ‘so-and-so’ on drums!” But with jazz, it matters. Like with life, everybody matters, unless you believe a slave society is correct. But jazz doesn’t promote that.

In any other style of music, take the singer. That’s usually the person with the freedom, with the ability and the clearance to express all this emotion and put all this emotion out. With jazz, everybody gets to be the singer, while playing their role.

What made you decide to come to New York to pursue a career here?

As much as I don’t put myself above — and definitely not below — anybody else, I’m competitive. New York is the place where the baddest motherfuckers are. I wanted to be in a place where they were, that was the main thing. You can feel the intensity, the difference, the urgency. That vibe is pushing you in every way. I wanted to deal with that. I wanted to go somewhere that, when I got there, I would be at the bottom. I would start at the bottom and learn, even if it meant failing after a long time of doing it. I wanted to be open to the “everything,” if that makes sense.

Who were some of your teachers when you first got to town?

I say this a lot — my teachers are always people that have no clue that they’re my teachers, because as far as they’re concerned, we’re just peers. They’re not in a “teaching position,” I’m not in a “student position.” We’re just hanging. We might be having a beer or catching a train together, and I’ll ask a question, and it’s up to me to listen to their response. Most of music is psychological, anyway. Practicing your horn is something you do to get your mind and your instrument together, just like your mind and your hands, or your feet are together. But a big part of playing with people is psychological. An open mind helps a lot in music. An open mind helps a whole lot — the more open…the more open! You can practice scales alone all day, and marry yourself to a specific conceptual mindset, but if you allow another person to teach you even a little bit, that can open your mind way up.

Who have been the cats surrounding you that have helped you develop your musical concept the most since you’ve been in New York?

Jeremy “Bean” Clemons. Over the past 8 1/2 of these ten years that I’ve been here, he’s taught me so much. Damn! It’s ridiculous. Musically, he’s a genius. I know this more than most people would. I still have mini-disc recordings from when we did these gigs at Cafe Creole on MacDougal Street. We used to be down there on Sundays. Ameen Saleem was on bass, Ryan Weaver on piano, who I wish was still here in New York. J.D. came in and sat in one time, and I said “Can you do this every week?” and he said, “Actually, yeah!” and he did. I had a batch of tunes I’d been working on — week after week we would incorporate more music from the members of the band. I had a separate band at the time as well, me and Bean, Ryan Berg, and Craig Magnano. We all lived together on 129th and Lenox. We even recorded a couple of our CDs there in the apartment [laughs]. So Bean was definitely one of those teachers who didn’t know he was my teacher. J.D. was another one. He taught me more about the horn and the importance of sound. Bean taught me orchestral sense. He taught me how to turn whatever’s on the bandstand into an orchestra.

Tell me about the group you’ve been performing with at Smalls, lately, Brooklyn Circle.

This is a totally different band than the other ones I’ve told you about: Diallo House, bassist, and Ismail Lawal, drummer. Also we’ve got Michael-Louis Smith, guitar, Knox Chandler, guitar, Andy Carballeira B3 organ, and Brian Jackson, piano. That’s Brian Jackson, famous for all those collaborations with Gil-Scott Heron. The gig at Smalls is just me, Ismail, and Diallo, music that all three of us wrote. Same concept as the other bands — built on the same foundation, to vibrate a certain way, make you feel a certain way. This don’t happen all the time, but this is the shit right here — when someone says, “I had a shitty day, but I came here and listened to this music, and I feel alright now!” When I hear something like that, that’s what makes me want to practice. That’s what makes me want to dig deeper. You get that kind of response here. I hold friendship high on the list of qualities that really make a band. Everybody’s got to get along with everybody on the bandstand if we’re going to call it a band. You’ve got to be open. That has a way of operating through the music. If you check out the history of all the great jazz bands, if you check out some of the more personal information, all the members of the band used to hang out. They fought, made up, hugged, cried — all that. That’s why that music feels brand new now and  it’s always going to feel brand new.

And finally, why do you do this? Why do you play music? What is the purpose?

I think the purpose is to really to just energize people to keep going. To shed light in dark places, figuratively speaking [laughs]. Seriously though, that’s the purpose. Our purpose is to inform you that there’s the possibility that your mind could be closing! Music will show you, clearly, an open mind. If you accept that, it’ll show you that, it will give you that, it will open you up more. It’s up to you to acknowledge the difference. I’m not saying music is the only way to salvation; it’s just one of the many highways that gets you where you need to go. But it’s definitely a way. I think it’s our purpose to continue to acknowledge the link between life in general, and music, and how they just breed each other. Especially us that understand that. Do it! You can make people feel a certain way at will! Use it. That’s who we are. We might not lead the way, but we’ll definitely make the way visible.

[balbert3]

A concert I recorded last year of The Brandee Younger Quartet. They're performing two Alice Coltrane songs mixed into one, "Journey in Satchidananda" and "Blue Nile".

Brandee Younger - harp

Stacy Dillard - Sax

Corcoran Holt - Bass

Curtis Torian - Drums