David Amram is a shameless self-promoter, and I mean that in the most complimentary way.  It makes perfect sense, doesn’t it?  If you really believe in what you’re promoting, where’s the need for shame?

I met him on a plane to New York a couple of years ago, and he gave me his card.  Just a week later I found his Triple Concerto LP in the dollar bin of a record store, and since then I haven’t been able to escape his name.  The man’s worked with artistic geniuses of all kinds and generations, the never-ending list including Dizzy Gillespie, Jack Kerouac, Willie Nelson, Dustin Hoffman, Odetta, Leonard Bernstein, Charlie Parker, Woodie Guthrie, Charles Mingus, Thelonious Monk, Sonny Rollins, Sir James Gallaway, Pete Seeger, Hunter S. Thompson, Arthur Miller, Johnny Depp, Warren Zevon, and Townes Van Zandt.  And he’ll gladly tell you about his experiences with any of them.  But he doesn’t name-drop for selfish reasons – he talks about his friends with genuine pride and gratitude.

Amram has written over a hundred pieces of chamber music and the scores for the award-winning films Splendor in the Grass and The Manchurian Candidate.  He’s an accomplished pianist, percussionist, and flutist, as well as a pioneer in improvisational French horn playing.  He’s written three books.  And at 79 Amram has as much verve as any musician in his twenties.  He’s constantly traveling, inhaling music and culture of countries all over the world (when I called him to set up the interview he was on his way to Abu Dhabi).  Perhaps the New York Times’ James Oestreich said it best when he wrote in 1993, “Amram was multicultural before multiculturalism existed.”

A renaissance man in every sense of the word, Amram puts every penny and pleasure he earns right back into the music and people who surround him.  He was gracious enough to invite me to his home in Putnam Valley, New York where he sat down with me and talked my ear off.  And the hardest part of the interview process was deciding what to cut.  Here’s the abbreviated version of what he had to say.

Inflatable Ferret: You’ve worked with everyone you can think of, and not just musicians.  You’ve worked with Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonius Monk, Jack Kerouac, you did the soundtrack for The Manchurian Candidate.  How did your background in music start?

David Amram: Well, I grew up on a farm in Feasterville, Pennsylvania.  Growing up on a farm during the Great Depression, everyone’s options were zero.  So, with that good starting place, as they say in New York, (in New York accent) “It can only get worse!”  So, things could only get better, and therefore to have the outrageous dream to someday do something with music was far-fetched.  But since there weren’t many options at all, it wasn’t as far-fetched as any other dream at that time.  And when I was about ten years old, my father said to me, “David, what do you think you want to do when you grow up.”  I said, “I’d like to be a full-time farmer.”  He said it was impossible in today’s economy to be a small family farmer – this is in 1942.  So, he said, “What else would you like to do?”  I said, “Well, I’d like to do something in music.”  He said, “That’s worse!”  So, many years later, just before he passed away in early 1990, he came up and saw me working on my tractor after I’d been able to work in music and bring up my kids to do what I had done.  And I said, “Does this remind you of me?”  He said, “Yep!”  To the extent that I was able to fulfill some of my dreams, I’m really grateful.  But I never even thought when I started I’d be able to do it – it was just something I wanted to do.

My uncle David was a seaman, and he took me to hear the Philadelphia Orchestra when I was a little boy, and he also took me to hear Duke Ellington.  He explained to me that both kinds of music were great and heartfelt, that they both were enduring and came from cultural roots.  He told me all kinds of stuff.  I didn’t know what he was talking about really.  But he put it in my mind and that I should pay attention.  My other uncle, who grew up in Las Vegas, New Mexico (not Nevada) and most of the people around him at the time were Indian.  So, when he would visit the farm he would tell me about how it was growing up with Indian people and that I should pay attention to every living thing and try to understand and respect it.  My other uncle had told me that as well, that when you travel around the world you can learn different languages, different food, different ways of moving, feeling, talking, dancing, being and that each place he went to had something very special, and that even if you couldn’t ever understand or learn all about it, you should pay attention and respect it.  I was really fortunate to have that as part of my background.

So, I moved to Washington D.C. when my dad had to sell the farm in 1942, and we moved from a 160 acre farm to a little 16 foot wide house on Q Street in what they called a “checkerboard neighborhood”, which meant African-American and Caucasian people were living in the same block in a segregated city.  Our nation’s capital was officially segregated in 1942 up until I went to the Army in 1952.  So, even though I hung out, played music, socialized with black people, technically we weren’t even supposed to speak to each other.  It seems almost unbelievable that our nation’s capital could have been that way.  The whole South was that way, and most of the rest of the country was pretty much that way, even though it wasn’t officially the law.  So, when I went to the Army in 1952 and went to Europe – I was lucky instead of going to Korea, I was sent to Europe – I was ready to understand that as an American I came from a country with a lot of different people, but that we all came from that core of the American Indian ethos that there was a core that was here, and the rest of us, however we got here, were still trying to figure out how to get along, how to be together, and how to find our place and search in some way for our heritage.  So, when I was in the Army I learned German, French, Spanish, Italian – not only hung out with people, but also played music and tried to use every single experience as a field trip.  And I still do that in 2009.

Every time I leave here and go anywhere I’m always looking and listening and trying to learn.  And that’s why I’ve been able to do so many different things and not be a dilettante or have a multiple personality disorder.  It’s just, to me everything is important and an adventure.  And almost everything you mentioned – working with Dizzy Gillespie, working with John Frankenheimer, who directed The Manchurian Candidate, working with Elia Kazan when I did the music for Splendor in the Grass, being chosen by Leonard Bernstein as the first composer in residence with the New York Philharmonic, playing with Willie Nelson – all of these things happen by bumping into somebody or doing something and having a good attitude, or being around when someone says, “Hey, would you like to do this?”  And very often, “Come on and do this.  We’re not sure we can pay you, but you might find this interesting.”…”Yeah!!!”  And it was interesting, even if it was with someone who wasn’t famous.  That’s how I started working with Shakespeare in the Park in 1956.  They were looking for someone to write music for Shakespeare production on the Lower East Side, and the woman who was going to do it was a very good improvising pianist, but she couldn’t write anything down.  She said [to me], “I can’t do that.  You’re at Manhattan School of Music.  Why don’t you do it?”  So, I met this guy Joe Papp, and then I began to write a lot of things for the theater.  And six months from now [May of 2010] in Baton Rouge, Louisiana they’re televising, filming, and recording my opera Twelfth Night, which we began to think of writing back in 1958 with no money and no way to get it done.  Joe Papp finally said, “Okay, we’ll do it.”  1968 it finally got done, and now in 2010 it will be on DVD, and someone will look at that and say, “Oh boy, that’s nice.  How did he get to do that?  He must have had his chauffeur-career counselor-lawyer-manager-guru take him right to the top.”  When in reality, it came out of something that I would have started doing 52 years prior to that.

The first jazz poetry readings that were done in New York with Jack Kerouac were the result of a bring-your-own-bottle party in 1956.  He handed me a piece of paper [with poetry] and said, “Hey, play something.”  And I played, we enjoyed it, and we got to hang out and become friends before On the Road was published.

And there are a lot of things that I still do today. My kids – Alana’s 30, Adira’s 28, and Adam’s 25 – they all have their own bands, and I go sit in with their bands sometimes.  I’m going this evening to play at a place a block from where I moved in 1955, with a good friend of mine who’s a wonderful singer, Morley Kamen, who’s terrific.  And people say, “What are you doing this for?”  This is something I enjoy and get a lot out of doing.  And it’s a block from where I started in 1955, and I still get that same feeling.  I don’t think I’m 24 years old anymore – I’m 79, and I’ve got my driver’s license to prove it.  But all the things I do always come from trying to do a good job and trying to do what I’m guided to feel would be interesting, fun, and educational.  And maybe even where I can make a contribution to somebody else.  It’s not a federal offense.  Having too many mirrors in your house is a bad idea, even when you’re young and good-looking.  And it’s amazing when you do things that way how satisfying it is.

I think one of the things that we’re lacking today is the realization that part of our gig as the old speedometer moves along, is what Dizzie Gillespie advised me to do on his 70^th birthday.  He said, “David, I met you in 1951 in Washington D.C. when you were a 20 year old kid in your basement apartment just like a hick!  And now you’ve got gray hair.”  He said, “It’s time to put something back into the pot.”  So, that’s part of what our job is as older people – to put something back in.  It’s the principle of organic farming.  And I don’t think that means just writing out a check, if you’re lucky enough to have anything in your checking account.  That’s good too.  But the best thing of all is to remain in what I call the University of Hang-out-ology – to be with other people and see if maybe you can put something into their life.  It’s not that hard to do.  It’s not about money or power or egomania or getting something.  It’s about giving something, sharing something, and what you get back from that is something that you can’t buy.  It even makes you feel good…And it’s legal! (laughs)  And good for your health.  It beats drugs, dope, drinking too much, or spending money on new age, fake spiritualists who blaspheme religions they don’t know about.

I used to always hang out with older musicians and older people, and some of them just had that niceness, that glow.  I said, “Boy, I’d like to be like those guys some day.”  And I’m still trying to be.  But at least I knew that it was possible.  So, I think that’s one of the things the arts can teach everybody – that it’s good to do better than is expected, to do more than you’re expected to do, not to whine and complain if someone else gets the chance to do something that you were more qualified for.  And with most people who are sitting at home watching network news programs and shaking their fists at the television screen, it doesn’t change world politics.  If you can’t control American policy, you can control your own conduct.

I think we can realize what we can always do something, and working in the arts can teach us that – how to help out the scene, how to cover up someone else’s mistakes so that the whole picture is still strong.

IF: One of the greatest benefits of music I think goes along with what you said about other cultures.  It gives you some insight into other cultures.  Of course, you don’t have to like everything, and there are going to be certain kinds of music you hate, but to be able to appreciate that is really special.

DA: Well, I think some will really touch your heart.  Some music is like a language.  Different kinds of music are like different languages.  There’s some music where you can hear the blues foundation or the rhythmic foundation.  You can hear gypsy influence if you like Brahms, because Brahms was inspired by gypsy music.  Of course, the Hungarian dances had a lot of gypsy influence in them.  Conversely, you could get into gypsy music through [Brahm’s] work because there’s enough of that in his music to tune you into where it came from.  If you like any kind of Russian folk music you can appreciate Tchaikovsky.  Then there are some kinds of music that are so far out in terms of Western music you have to think completely differently, like when you hear music from India.  But then when you understand the structure of the ragas and how they put the rhythm parts together and then go to India and see a concert where people are sitting there listening and knowing what it is, it’s a different feeling.  And it’s not just being spaced out.

And there are worlds and worlds of music out there that are so deep, and they in some way can all touch your heart.  Then there’s other kinds of stuff that you hear sometimes at the supermarket or in an elevator that’s controlled by what I call “the penitentiary of bad taste” That’s the prison we’re all assigned into and told that we belong in to sit there like convicts waiting to get that one stale sandwich slipped through the little compartment.  And that’s supposed to do it for your whole life.  It’s the idea that you are such a sick human this is all you deserve…not that I want to sound judgmental or anything. (laughs)  But that’s what the whole global entertainment industry has done to two or three generations.  It’s extraordinary that anybody’s listening to anything, that anybody’s writing songs and symphonies.  There’s a bigger audience for European and American classical music, for jazz and what they now call world music than there’s ever been before.  And that’s because the central nervous system of human beings doesn’t change.  The desire for nourishment doesn’t change.  And there’s such a collapse of the industrial music industry that produces stuff that’s so repelling, eventually people when they find out there’s something else out there, they don’t buy the other stuff.  And the reason they stopped buying that was because there was something else that was available.  And when they tried to blame that on Napster, they suddenly said, (in mocking voice) “We’re so concerned about the rights of the poor artists getting their royalties.”  Are they kidding?  All you have to do to get any royalties is to be able to afford enough lawyers to get some of what you were cheated out of back – generally speaking.  There were people who were honorable, but they are among the few.  The deal was, everybody ripped off everybody, and down the food chain were the artists who were supposed to get those royalties.

Secondly, and most interesting of all, they found out that the preponderance of stuff that was downloaded were things that you could never buy in a record store.  It wasn’t part of that pay-off system of the record industry.  Nobody bribed or paid off Beethoven or Mozart or Shakespeare or Bach or Dizzie Gillespie or Charlie Parker or a whole army of people who’ve enriched the whole world.  No one paid them off to make it more beautiful, so it’s not necessary to have that as the only operating system.  So, suddenly this thing called the Internet made it possible to get a lot of stuff you couldn’t get before.  For 99% of all the musicians in the world, especially those with some sincere feeling of wanting to create something beautiful and pay their rent, suddenly the door’s wide open.  For those who say, “Oh, it levels out the playing field.  There’s too many people and too much competition” I always say, “there’s never too many sunsets.”  The fact that it’s an open door means for the first time in history almost everyone has a chance to do something and have one person in the world appreciate it.  All you need is one person.

Charles Mingus told me that in 1955 in the tiny Café Bohemia where the owner, if he didn’t like your attitude, he’d beat you up and throw you out.  And Mingus said, “Look man, I don’t care how ratty the joint is.  Every night with me is Carnegie Hall.”  He said, “Just find one person to play for, and play for them.  All you need in your life is one person to play for.”  This was right before I turned 25, and he said, “I know you’re writing symphonies like me that no one even wants to look at and will probably never get played.  But all you need is one person to write it for.”  And I never forgot that.  So, I played at Pete Seeger’s 90^th birthday not too long ago there were 20,000 people, and the next night where I played at the Cornelia Street Café (where I play the first Monday of every month) there were 60 people.

IF: You have all these necklaces.  Do you wear them everywhere you go?

DA: When I met you on the plane I had these on, and since I saw you I’ve been in Iceland and Abu Dhabi.  This one I got when I conducted the Wichita Falls, Texas Symphony.  The concertmaster came up and said, (in Texas twang) “Mr. Amram, we want to give ya our state bluebonnet, and we want you to know you’re the first guest conductor Wichita Falls, Texas Symphony ever had that didn’t act like a Nazi!” (laughs)  I said, “I don’t think I can use that on my brochure, but I certainly appreciate it.”

IF: What are you working on now?

DA: Well, I’m starting a fourth book, since my big speedometer tells me November 17^th, 2010 I’m going to be 80.  It’s going to be called David Amram: The First 80 Years and Larry Kramer is doing a documentary about me of the same name.  And I’m starting a new classical piece – I was going to write a mass with [author] Frank McCourt, but he was so busy that he never could quite get all the material together, so whatever piece I write will be dedicated in his memory.

IF: Obviously you have an appreciation for all kinds of music.  Do you ever listen to any modern music or rap?

DA: Oh, sure.  I did some scat, which is the foundation of rap, but it was a different rhythm.

(starts to freestyle) “Here we are in Putnam Valley and I’m being interviewed by two people who both go to Fordham U/And I hope what I’ve said this afternoon has some kind of value, and I can honestly say that most of it is true/Now when we met on that airplane a long time ago I bet you never thought the afternoon would end up like this/But having you call up on (because I missed you last Sunday because I had to be somewhere else) is an experience I definitely wouldn’t want to miss/Now people who rhyme compulsively like this are usually taken away for being certifiably crazy/And I often do this before I introduce the song I wrote with Jack Kerouac, which we know today as the song from Pull My Daisy/Well since Shakespeare himself, the greatest rapper of all, said that brevity’s the soul of wit/He would’ve freestyled all afternoon, but at the very end he would’ve said, “That’s it!”

That wouldn’t get the Pulitzer Prize for poetry, but that process is something I was familiar with before the word “rap” came.  Rapping is something that’s part of an old cultural experience, and some of the rappers, especially some of the ones who aren’t part of the industrial rappers complex, are phenomenal.  There’s a group called the Flobots.  Some of them were school teachers, one of them played the Denver symphony.  When I was at the Denver Library they wanted me to do some poetry and include rap, so they asked if I could do something with the Flobots.  So, I was freestyling with one of the Flobots, and then I got him to do some scatting, and he said he’d never done it before, but he was terrific.  There I was, a guy older than their grandparents, doing something that started during the era of their grandparents, which they have further refined, and it’s constantly developing.

Max Roach, the great drummer, said that eventually music is going to be added to what kids are doing.  They’re denied instruments in the schools and the education we had, so they have to create their own musical art with no instruments.  And that’s slowly happening.  I go to high schools and colleges, and there’s a phenomenal level of all forms of the performing arts.  There’s a huge number of gifted composers, songwriters, rappers, ballet dancers, actors, rappers, and they’re not going to go away.

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