Jazz legend on the Grammy beat
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Terri Lyne Carrington is just 11 years old and hanging backstage at a concert hall with her friend 鈥淓lla鈥 鈥 that鈥檚 Ella Fitzgerald to us mere mortals 鈥 and the jazz legend wants to introduce her to jazz virtuoso Oscar Peterson, who had just finished performing.
鈥淓lla Fitzgerald says, 鈥榊ou need to hear her,鈥欌 Carrington, now 55, said. 鈥淪he was just somebody who would encourage me and hang out with me. She was shy, and I was disarming because I was a kid. She took a liking to me.鈥
So Peterson invites the young drummer to perform alongside him before the audience escapes. They jam on stage, impressing the crowd. One attendee 鈥 the then-President of Berklee College of Music 鈥 was so wowed he offered Carrington a scholarship to the exceptional music school.
鈥淚t was really because Oscar let me play but (also) because Ella introduced me to him and told him, basically, he should hear me,鈥 she said.
Literally anointed by jazz legends, Carrington was destined for greatness. Four decades later, she鈥檚 proven she is not only great, but groundbreaking.
She鈥檚 earning the highest honor bestowed on jazz artists, the NEA Jazz Masters Award. The three-time Grammy winner is nominated for best instrumental jazz album 鈥 an award she won in 2014 and is the only woman to do so in the show鈥檚 63-year history. She worked as a musical and cultural consultant on the hit Disney/Pixar animation 鈥淪oul,鈥 making sure it portrayed the jazz world accurately. And she鈥檚 the founder and artistic director of the Berklee Institute of Jazz and Gender Justice and has spent nearly 16 years teaching at the college.
鈥淚 knew she was going to open some doors since she was around 12 years old,鈥 11-time Grammy winner and jazz icon Wayne Shorter said. 鈥淪he鈥檚 one of the finest drummers in the world. She has a lot of finesse. She decorates. And she can also drop some bombs.鈥
Shorter, 87, remembers auditioning 12 drummers for a tour and hearing Carrington play, leaving him in awe.
鈥淲hen Terri played, she mixed things up,鈥 he said. 鈥淪he made the bass and tenor drum sing and the snare drum, not just rattle, she knew how to put pressure, release and have a flowing (set). She knew how to tell a story.鈥
Carrington, who grew up in Medford, Massachusetts, first played saxophone and piano but fell in love with the drums at 7. She came to national prominence decades ago as the drummer in 鈥淭he Arsenio Hall Show鈥 band and earned her first Grammy nomination with her 1989 debut 鈥淩eal Life Story.鈥
Twenty-two years later she scored her second Grammy nomination, and first win, with her fifth album 鈥淭he Mosaic Project.鈥 And she鈥檚 honed her skills on the road, alongside Herbie Hancock, Al Jarreau, John Scofield, Dianne Reeves, Cassandra Wilson and Clark Terry.
At the March 14 Grammys she could continue to make history. 鈥淲aiting Game,鈥 her new album with Social Science explores heavy topics like politics, racism, sexuality and police brutality, is nominated for best jazz instrumental album, the award she previously won.
鈥淭he jazz instrumental category is a really big category. To have risen to the top of that via jazz critics is something that I don鈥檛 take lightly. Especially because I didn鈥檛 assume at all that this one would get that kind of recognition from the critics,鈥 said Carrington, who won DownBeat magazine鈥檚 Critics Poll for top jazz artist, top jazz album and top jazz group 鈥 making the drummer the first female instrumentalist to win in all three categories in the same year in the magazine鈥檚 68-year history.
鈥淭hose critics seem to be older generation, I don鈥檛 want to say, white guys, is what it feels like. For them to embrace this album the way they have really taught me a lot,鈥 she said. 鈥淣ot to judge other people. I just felt like, 鈥楾hey鈥檙e not going to get it.鈥 And they did.鈥
Carrington spent three years creating 鈥淲aiting Game,鈥 which features collaborations with Esperanza Spalding, Rapsody, Malcolm-Jamal Warner, Meshell Ndegeocello and more.
鈥淚 wanted to surround myself with people that were younger than me, that had their pulse on what鈥檚 happening in jazz today,鈥 she said.
But Carrington is still a spring chicken, sort of, in jazz. At 55, she鈥檚 one of the youngest to receive the NEA Jazz Masters Award and one of few female instrumentalists to earn the honor.
鈥淎s much as I feel honored to have received these accolades and awards, the bigger problem is that it hasn鈥檛 happened before. There鈥檚 been women before me that have had lots of amazing work out there, one being Geri Allen,鈥 she said.
鈥淲hen slavery ended men could go on the road and bring their guitar and play in juke joints around the corner and make money. That was respectable, but it wasn鈥檛 for women. Most of the time (women) have to work harder and don鈥檛 have the same access and support. That makes it not fun, so women quit.鈥
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