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TTP # 21 Avery Sharpe- Master Bass player and Longtime Vegan Athlete Shares About His Incredible Life in Jazz and How He Maintains His Health on the Road
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Avery Sharpe has had an amazing career performing with many of the greats in the history of jazz and most notably was a key member of McCoy Tyners band for over 20 years. McCoy was a member of the John Coltrane’s legendary and seminal quartet that is one of the most important musical groups of the 20th century and Avery is a direct part of that lineage. He tells his story how he klinked up with McCoy and his early days of playing in the bands of both Archie Sheep and Art Blakey, playing with a very young Wynton Marsalis and shares some incredible stories about how that all that fell into place. Health and diet have been a central focus for Avery going completely plant based in 1977. He was blazing the trail and a pioneer showing that musicians can tour the world while being healthy through diet and exercise.
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Transcript
Introduction to Avery Sharp's Musical Journey
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome well to the tordanic you know we're all just energy and that's really all music is it's just energy that is what you're trying to project you know you especially it improvised music you're trying to touch somebody you know you're trying to i expend that energy It's an honor to welcome bass player extraordinaire Avery Sharp to the podcast. Avery's had an amazing career performed with many of the greats in the history of jazz and most notably was a key member of McCoy Tyner's band for over 20 years. McCoy was a member of John Coltrane's legendary and seminal quartet that it's one of the most important musical groups of the 20th century and Avery's a direct part of that lineage.
00:00:40
Speaker
He tells his story of the early days of playing in the bands of both Archie Shepp and Art Blakey, playing with Wynton Marsalis at age 18, and shares some incredible stories about how that all fell into place.
Avery's Commitment to a Vegan Lifestyle
00:00:52
Speaker
Health and diet have been a central focus for Avery throughout his life, and he's an OG vegan, going completely plant-based way back in 1977. He was blazing the trail for all of us, showing that musicians can tour the world while being healthy through diet and exercise.
00:01:10
Speaker
He shares the view with me on how athleticism and music connect in many ways. Avery is a total inspiration and I truly hope you dig this episode. I sure did.
00:01:21
Speaker
Avery Sharp, thank you so much for joining the Torganic podcast today. It's truly a honor and a pleasure to have you here. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it.
Memorable Performances with McCoy Tyner
00:01:31
Speaker
Yeah, man. For a little background, I grew up in Boston. I remember pretty sure seeing you with McCoy at the Morgana Bar. I'm sure. We were there at least once every eight months or so. We were always there with the trio, with Michael Brecker, with Bobby Hutchison, Aladdin, and All-Stars. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, we played there a lot.
00:01:52
Speaker
Yeah, I remember seeing you there many times and obviously never disappointed. You guys are so incredible. How did it you link up
From Georgia to Massachusetts: Avery's Educational Path
00:02:01
Speaker
with McCoy? How did that start? Well, that's kind of a long story. I kind of always tell people I came out of the woods because I never lived in New York. I've never lived in New York. i I'm still up in the hills in Massachusetts. I was born in Georgia and spent you know I was born in Georgia in the 1950s when it was legally seg segregated, not like it, you know. So we I lived in the black section of of Savannah as a kid because my father was in his service and he retired in Massachusetts because he didn't want to go back to Georgia. So that's how I wound up in in Massachusetts. And then I went to the University of Massachusetts
00:02:44
Speaker
And when I went there, Max Roach was there, Archie Shep, Reggie Workman, who played with John Coltrane, who was my first bass teacher. He was coming up from Brooklyn, I think he was living at the time, a couple days a week. But Max was living here. Archie was living here. As a matter of fact, I just saw Archie last night. He still lives in the area, even though he primarily resides in Paris now. But these were my professors. So I mean, it's hard to get those cats together in New York. And here I had them on campus.
00:03:12
Speaker
And then it was Fred Tillis who started the jazz program at UMass and Horace Boyer who was a gospel singer and a gospel historian. These cats were my, you know, my biggest influences. And Archie was the first cat to take me to Europe.
Balancing Music and a Day Job
00:03:31
Speaker
At the end of 1979 he revisited his 1972-1973 atica blue's record that he wrote for the prison uprising in Attica, New York, where they killed a bunch of fall prisoners and guards and blamed it on the prisoners. But we found out it was the guards that between Nixon and Rockefeller, they um they shot it out with the, yeah well, they didn't shoot out. It was really a massacre, but that's a whole other story. Anyway, he revisited that that album in 1979.
00:04:05
Speaker
And he took me to Europe, who was with a big band. And we were supposed to record three nights in Paris at this, I think it was Poly De Glass, I think that's the name of the theater. And they got what they needed the first two nights. And then the third night, we were playing a Calypso that was written by Clyde Criner, a friend of mine, a piano player who no longer is with us. Actually, Clyde's on my first record. Clyde started playing the Calypso, and Clifford Jarvis was the drummer.
00:04:35
Speaker
And I had my head turned, I was playing both electric and upright. And all of a sudden I hear a different groove. And I was like, wow, Cliff is playing something pretty hip tonight. And I turned to look at the drummer and it's Art Blakey. Art Blakey on drums. And so after that was the first time I met James Williams, a piano player that was playing with Art. James said, yeah, man, Art wants to meet you, blah, blah, blah. And so I meet Art and Art goes, when I get ready to change my bass players, I want you to be my bass player.
Intense Lifestyle: Juggling Multiple Roles
00:05:05
Speaker
and I didn't think too much about it. He's not going to call me and Charles Greenlee, great trombone player was on the tour. And of course, new art. He said if he said he's going to call, he's going to call you. At the time, I was still doing my day gig. People don't realize my undergraduate degree is actually in economics. And I'm minored. I minored in music. And then went back to University of Massachusetts in Amherst and went back while I was doing I was doing a day gig, I was an insurance claims adjuster.
00:05:33
Speaker
Yeah, for three and a half, almost four years. So I finished a year of graduate school during that time. I had my first and second child at the end of that, 79. And so I was working full time, playing in about four or five bands. It was crazy. I was averaging about three, four hours sleep a night.
00:05:55
Speaker
um Yeah, you're working all day doing the gigs at night. The great thing about the gig I had was if it took you 80 hours a week to do it, that was your business. You could do it in 20 hours. So I would do what they call a technical person. People say, I heard you sold insurance. No, I was a technical employee. I did work miscompensation. I was a walking, talking paycheck. You got hurt. I gave you your benefits. You got an arm cut off or whatever.
00:06:24
Speaker
You know, you know, so I had expense account. It was cool. So I would do I hung with the older cats when I first got there to see how they did it because some cats would would not be in the office all the time because I'm supposed to be so out seeing clients anyway. Like if you got hurt on the job, I'm supposed to you know meet you either at your house if you got hurt or go to the to the ah factory and whatever. So got it. I hung with the older cats and figured out how to make how to do the job in less time. So cats thought I was crazy because I would you know you be driving to Boston doing dictation on my files. And then on the brakes, cats would do whatever they're going to do. In my car, finishing my dictation, working on my files.
00:07:11
Speaker
And I also figured out during that time in a corporate situation in an eight hour day, people really only get maybe four hours of actual work done at that much because you know, their coffee break and you're talking it to, you know, the water cooler and they take a long time for lunch. So I asked them to give me a key. The office really opened at eight. I would get there at six.
00:07:35
Speaker
do all my paperwork. So by the time 9 o'clock, 9.30 happened, I was out the door seeing clients, you know. And then I would do, you know, big band or orchestra, you know, during the day, the afternoons, and then gig that night. And then I was still raising, I had my first child at the time, so it was it was pretty crazy.
00:07:54
Speaker
ah But anyway, you know, giving back to, you know, Archie, I did regional gigs with Archie when I was in school, when I was undergraduate. and yeah And I didn't work with him for about two years. And then Charles Greenlee, the same cat who told me that Art Blakey would give me a call, he was working in Springfield, Massachusetts for the Mayors of Cultural Affairs. And he would put on concerts for Jazz Cats. And he said, Archie, you haven't heard Avery in a while, you got to hear him. So he put together a concert where I was in the band with Archie.
00:08:23
Speaker
And Archie was like, wow, you know, quite an improvement. So um that's when Archie took me to to Europe. And like I said, you know, Art Blick, he sat in with the band. So when I changed my bass players, I want you to be in the band. i I didn't think too much of it because I went back to work. I still i was still doing my day gig. That was my first tour. And then Archie said, well, I got another tour, but it's a smaller group. We went back. I was with Clifford Jarvis and Siegfried Kessler um on piano.
00:08:50
Speaker
I think Roy Burroughs was on trumpet and Terry Janora was vocal. So I took all my vacation up front from my day gig. They thought I did music as a hobby. They didn't realize all the stuff I was doing because I don't know like people in my business. and like you know I'm a company man. I'm gonna check get my you know ah mba
Career Crossroads: Art Blakey's Call
00:09:08
Speaker
you know business i'm going to Yeah, it kept those two worlds separate. Yeah, exactly. So they, you know, I never showed up at any of the parties because I was always working or playing. They didn't really know what I was. They thought I was strange. So anyway, I'm back in Europe with our with ah Archie Shupp.
00:09:25
Speaker
I call home and my wife goes, Art Blakey calls, he wants you to be in his band. I was like, what? She goes, yeah, he wants you to be in his band. And i you also got a call from your, from, you know, my day gig. I can say that the company was at my life in casualty. And there was a supervisor who was not in my line of ah promotion and stuff like that. But did he didn't like me. So he went through all my files while I was away because I was away for four weeks. Actually, I was away for five weeks. And you know, you're away for that long, you're going to get behind on your on your files. So he went through my files. And so when I called home, she said, Art Blakey wants you to be in your band. Also, your manager, John, I can't think of John's last name. He was like, it was only like it this was like in the
00:10:11
Speaker
late 70s, early 80s. So it was like for what they call technical employees who were black, everybody else was white. So my my my main manager was was black. He was probably like the only black claims manager in in the country at the time. So he calls me.
00:10:27
Speaker
While I'm in, I was in Italy and at the time the Italian phones were just, telephone system was just horrible. So you had to go to the post office. And even so, even when you went to the post office, the lines just sucked. So I'm on the phone. I called John. John. Yeah, Avery.
00:10:49
Speaker
um Yeah. Are you in Europe? Bad line, John. I have to get to you later. I gotta to go. but but got back. um And of course, I was in trouble. Like I said, my my files were behind. And so now I'm you know equivocating about thats at the time, you know, whether or not I'm going to go play full time with Art Blakey or, you know, my daygate. And the first time I played with Art,
00:11:21
Speaker
I said, well, all right, I can do the gig, but I need at least a month to get my act together you know because I got to clean up my files and blah, blah, blah. He said, no, no problem. So in the interim, I did my first gig with him at McKell's in New York. And the first night I played with him, an 18-year-old Wynton Marsalis sits in with a band the same night I'm sitting in. So but i became you know we became friends. and And then the following week or two,
00:11:51
Speaker
We went up to Boston. And at the time, Wynton's brother, Brantford, was still in at Berkeley. Kevin Eubanks was at Berkeley. Donald Harrison was at Berkeley. Who else? ah Jeff Watts, Smitty Smith, all these cats were in school together. And Art wanted to put together a big band that he had seen me you know play with with Archie. That's why he wanted me.
00:12:15
Speaker
so that's you know Eubanks sat in, ah Donald Harrison, all these cats sat in. They were still in school. Branford was there, but Branford didn't sit in. And Wynton came up again. He came up to Boston because Branford told him, he said, man, you need to come up and you know play with art again. And a 14-year-old, Terry Lynn Carrington, ah were in the dressing room. And it's just her and I. And um I knew her father. And she goes, I wonder if art's going to let me sit in? And I'm thinking,
00:12:46
Speaker
This girl must be, something must be wrong with her. you know She thinks Art Blakey's gonna let her sit in. i First of all, I didn't even know she played drums. I'm thinking something's wrong. where I said, well, let me get out of here. Was her dad a musician as well as that? But he was you know more just a weekend warrior, as as we say. And you know he knew all the cats. And we we all knew him. And so when I was like, what's wrong with little girls? It's a little off. And at the end of the night,
First Rehearsal with McCoy Tyner
00:13:13
Speaker
Art calls her up. She sits in.
00:13:16
Speaker
Wails away and I'm like, but okay, this is this is cool. wow um So in the interim, I had called, I had heard that McCoy Tyner's bass player, Charles Frambro had left his group. McCoy and Art had the same management, Jack Whittemore. And I think Jack used to maybe manage Miles and some other cats. So, okay.
00:13:45
Speaker
I called Jack Whittemore because I always wanted to play with McCoy. I said, I heard McCoy's bass player left. ah Can you ask McCoy to give me a call? He goes, you're playing with art. I said, I know, but just ask McCoy to give me a call. just Just ask him to give me a call. And he did it. He'd been trying to reach me at my day gig to know, couldn't couldn't reach me.
00:14:09
Speaker
We kept missing each other. This was before cell phones, you know, and really, yeah well, answer machines were kind of coming along. But but wasn't that, you know, okay, so he was calling me at my day gig. So the last night at Lulu whites, I'm in Boston with Art Blakey. And we're in the dressing room and articles. All right, we're getting ready to go to Cleveland on Tuesday.
00:14:32
Speaker
I said, Art, man, I told you, i I can only do weekends. I need a month to get my my app together here at my day gig. And Art goes off. yeah He goes, Bobby Watson was you know in the band. He goes, Bobby, I don't know what's wrong with these bass players. He's just going off. And while he's going off, bartender comes in and says, Avery, there's a phone call for you at the at the bar. I go to the bar, pick up the phone. Yes. Hey, Avery, been trying to reach you. This is McCoy Tyner.
00:15:00
Speaker
Okay. um Can you make a rehearsal tomorrow? I got a gig this weekend. I said, I guess so, because art is going off. me I guess I can make the gig. So I go down. um Actually, he flew me down from Hartford ah to New York and I took a taxi into ah New York, my base. Wow. And the first tune, I destroyed it. I couldn't play it.
00:15:28
Speaker
It's Festival in Bahia. It's got these bass lines. So I'm looking i'm looking at it. I'm like, damn, did he give me the lead sheet? It's like, what's with all these jumps and skips? And so I couldn't play it. I jacked it up. i was in a I remember being in a three-piece suit, thinking, in my brain, I'm thinking, um I got to apologize to, that's what I said, Mr. Tyner,
00:15:59
Speaker
I'm afraid I can't play your music. I just destroyed it." And then he called another tune. And of course I aced that and then we were cool. What was that one? I don't remember. I just remember the one I messed up. but I remember the other one. I just remember the one I jacked up. I think he did that on purpose just to see where I was at. Yeah, yeah just to take your ass a little bit.
00:16:19
Speaker
But I don't. It's funny you asked. I don't remember what that and the second tune was. I don't feel in shock. So I was just I just played whatever I could play whatever the notes were. I was like, OK, let me just make this because I was like, oh, I'm cool with this. But I'm still thinking. I blew it. I blew it. But it was cool. We did it before he called me. He wasn't totally convinced. He had heard a lot about me. But then after he heard me, goes like, you got a good feel. And then I did a week did ah a You did two nights I think in Ann Arbor at the University of Michigan or something. And the second night he comes, you know, it takes care of business, we get paid. And it's just him and I. And he goes, I've been telling my wife about you. He said, I got a good feeling about you. I think we've been put together for a reason.
00:17:11
Speaker
And I kind of blew my mind. oh i'm Like, this is like one of my heroes is telling me this, I'm just blowing my mind. So I said, well, McCoy, you know, I need a month to get my act together. You know, same thing I told, you know, art, he says, no problem. We're just working on weekends and then we got a tour for ah for Europe. And so I called art.
00:17:33
Speaker
Art was pissed because he, you know, he automatically knew that I was going to play with McCoy because they got the same management. And he wouldn't take my calls. He was, that I heard that he was pissed because he thought that I would leave my day gig for McCoy, but wouldn't leave my day gig for him. So he just, just canceled, wouldn't, wouldn't talk to me. So while, actually, while I was on that tour with McCoy, I wrote Art a letter, explained the whole thing.
00:18:02
Speaker
And then I saw him like a month or two, but maybe two months later. It must have been during the summer. It was like June or something like that. And he just acted like everything was cool. Didn't bring it up. Oh, nice.
00:18:17
Speaker
greeted me, hugged me, and we and we were cool. Beyond just that first tune, what was it like playing McCoy for the first time? did like Quite honestly, there was room for improvement for me. I think he could hear that, but I think he took a chance because I felt that I had a ah good feel you know in terms of...
00:18:36
Speaker
yeah You know, as as I tell my my students, you know, we're all just energy. And that's really all music is. It's just energy. That is what you're trying to project. You know, he especially in improvised music, you're trying to touch somebody. You know, you're trying to expend that energy. It's it's funny, you know, Stanley Turrentine, we did a, he was a special guest with us at Blue Note. And you know, Stanley had seen me play a number of times. And you know, Stanley Turrentine's Mr. Soul, you know.
00:19:05
Speaker
So after the you know after the ah the couple sets we did, he goes, Avery, I've heard you, but standing next to you, I heard you. In other words, you could feel that that energy. And I said, wow, that means a lot coming from you because you put the essence in soul. you know So I think McCoy felt that I had that that energy. He could feel that energy. I think my technical prowess were okay, but I think just being harsh on myself because as musicians, that's where our own worst critics, you know? It's like, sure you know, we do a recording like, oh man, I could have played that better or I could have played something different or whatever.
00:19:48
Speaker
definitely I think he he felt that there was definitely something there. And I think from playing with him, the first couple of months, I'd say the first three or four months, I was tired.
00:20:00
Speaker
because it was so much energy and so much so powerful. And plus I was tired from from the day gig I did and three bands I was in and doing master, you know, working on my master's and raising a family was just, you know, it was just I was
Balancing Family and Music Career
00:20:15
Speaker
tired. So the first time I just did yeah just only music. And then I'm playing with a cat.
00:20:22
Speaker
that just expends so much energy, i was I was exhausted the first three or four months. And then yeah it's like an athlete. ah you know People wonder why I've been a ah ah health enthusiast, really. I was just thinking i about that today. I was talking to somebody today, since really since I was 16. And I said, if you see me play, I wouldn't be able to play the way I play. if I wasn't an athlete, you know, because I played very, it's very physical. Real quick, because I want to get to the health stuff, because that's, you know, definitely at the heart of what this is about, the podcast. You were talking about with your day gig, about how you looked at how the older, the older cats were doing it and how they kind of streamlined and and you took what you could from them. I mean, I kind of see a parallel there with music. Without a doubt, without a doubt.
00:21:10
Speaker
Yeah, it's very the same same concept. Yeah. i just you know I looked at older musicians. you know like For instance, when my when my when my wife got pregnant with our first child, we were in college. And I remember thinking for about, she actually told me when I was at a gig, ah doing a gig at a college. As a matter of fact, I was at a Hampshire College in um and Amherst. I was doing a gig and she told me. she Back then, you know they didn't have the whole pregnancy test. You could go to the drugstore. You had to go to the doctors.
00:21:38
Speaker
you know, and then they tested it. in And then she comes in the while I'm playing, she comes in and goes like this. So I'm thinking, we're cool. I'm playing, you know, everything. We're cool. I get off, she goes, No, that was that is positive. And so for about 20 minutes, I was like really drugged, because I thought that I wasn't going to be a musician. And then I was like, right? There's people who have families and are musicians.
00:22:07
Speaker
Yeah, I guess these cats have kids. Well, I mean, and who take care of their kids too. you know Let me talk to the people who are successful at this and you know who still love their wives and don't have you know five families worldwide. Let me talk to those cats. let me you know And the cats who really ah influenced me that was McCoy at the time. He was had been married 20-something years to his wife. And you know I think they were high school sweethearts just like I was with my wife.
00:22:37
Speaker
And so you know I actually did talk to him a lot about that. And um and then there was Milt Hinton, the great Milt Hinton. He was a big influence on because he'd been with his wife forever. I mean, she would she went on the road with him when he was with Cab Calloway. And she she even learned ah Mona even learned how to copy music so they could make extra money. she was She was cool. And I think she was doing copying for people on Broadway and stuff you know for for musical.
00:23:05
Speaker
Yeah, copy it. And so those were the people that I look to, you know, it's like if and and I've always been if a human being is doing it, this is not to belittle what they're doing. But that means that it can be done.
00:23:20
Speaker
You know what I'm saying? Like when somebody breaks, you know, banister broke the four-minute mile, then everyone's like, oh, it can be done. So if if there's people who are successful at raising kids and being an a musician, those are the people that I need to model myself after. Not the cats who are doing whatever they're doing, we won't say. That's where the cats, you know? And and that's not to but make a judgment on people because, i you know, my best friend was on crack.
00:23:51
Speaker
Amy's been sober for 30 years, but he said, man, you never judge me. I said, well, yeah, because you don't know how life is going to be. yeah you could and I don't know if you played king of the mountain when you were a kid. You know, you'd be on a hill and cats would drag you down and you'd fight back. So you're king attack on a mountain, but you might be in the gutter the next day. You just just don't know what life is going to throw at you. So it's not even ah a judgment thing. you know And and being being a musician, especially in the small circle, it's an international circle, but it's really a small circle. And it's like a family. You know, some cats need
00:24:27
Speaker
extra help or need to go that direction. Some cats, you know, are going to go another direction. I mean, basically, and I might get in trouble for this, musicians are nerds. Really, they don't, you know, we spend a lot of time with an inanimate object by ourselves. That's not normal. That's something, you know, if a kid wants to stay in his his room all day and just do his computer or or play video games, you say, hey, Junior, or something.
00:24:56
Speaker
But now right yes, it we, you know, it's like when the pandemic happened, you know, my friends, of course it was a drug that we couldn't ah perform live, but we're like, okay, we'll just look um call practice. falcon eight Let us know what it's over. know Everybody else is going to start. or even that We're like, you know, some stuff I've been wanting to work on. Okay. I'm ready to play with pe yeah i have a more time of practice yeah i ready to drive people. but This is what we do.
00:25:26
Speaker
you know yeah I always try to model myself after people, or I tried to model myself after people, and I always want to be a good example. And my parents always taught me, like I said, this might be a little rough to say, but my father said, you know, you got people who are assets and liabilities, people who are liabilities, you let them go because they're just going to bring you where you know where where they are. you want to You want to add to people's lives. You want to be an asset. So I'm not one to preach. I'm just one to to live my life a certain way, to which is what I did. So if somebody will say, well, let me take a page from his, what he's doing. He seems to be successful at it. And you know so that's kind of just the way that i you know that i approach you know that I approach things. And I've always approached my life.
00:26:22
Speaker
And what what do you see as sort of the North Star of the thing the way that you try to conduct yourself or you know goals and stuff like that in terms of being an asset for other people? you know i I gather like being you know a solid father and family man, or or what are some other things that you think make you an asset? Well, I think being a health enthusiast.
00:26:46
Speaker
I mean, definitely my generation was a little different. I mean, cats did, you know, there was cocaine and crack and other stuff. um You know, and it did seem like cats were moving more into health.
00:27:02
Speaker
um I think to a certain degree that that has happened. But you know, you've got your, you know, human beings are human beings, they're going to do it, you know, They may need to go through that. My best friend, he needed to go through that. yeah It hurts to watch a person go through that. But you know at the same time, he learned some lessons that I don't know from you know from going to from going through that. So I would say probably probably being a health enthusiast and not, you know i'm I'm a vegan, but I'm not pointing at folks because you know people say, oh, I feel funny eating meat. I'm like, man, you can eat a whole cow if you want. that It's your body.
00:27:40
Speaker
You know, and to me that the most American thing there is, is to have self autonomy over your body. Because for 250 years, people who look like me did not have their autonomy over their body. So I'm very, but you know, really sensitive about that. and Whatever you want to put in your body, that's your business. Now, if you ask me what I think about it, that's a difference. I'm not, you I'll leave you alone. But if you say, what do you think? Now you've opened the door. I will tell you what I think you might not like. You might not want to hear it.
00:28:10
Speaker
But the sciences you know that says that if you eat a lot of meat, you're going to have a lot of problems. In the sciences, if you eat more plant-based, people don't like to say the word vegan because then that becomes a stigma and also becomes a movement kind of thing.
00:28:32
Speaker
Right. But you know then there are some people who say, well, you should eat fish and blah, blah, blah. I just tell people to do the best you can. I'll say, well, my grandmother lived to be 96, and she drank a fifth of scotch every day. And I'm like, yeah, that she got you know she got lucky in her genes. You may not have the genes. You got other genes from you know your other side, you your have mother and your father. You may be the cat like Nat Cole. He died, what, 43 from lung cancer?
00:29:00
Speaker
like right So his body was like, we can't deal with it, man. We're out. you know So yeah I just tell people to to do the best that you can. There's there's no judgment. you know um
00:29:13
Speaker
yeah I'm very focused. That's why I'm a good musician. And so and I always used to get into arguments with some of my contemporaries. of Like when we play some of the most cerebral spiritual music on the planet,
00:29:29
Speaker
there's a part of our brain that's more highly developed than the average person. But everybody has that. You know, whether a cat's a carpenter, him being able to see how to do stuff and work stuff, that's part of his brain that's highly developed. So I'm like, if I can figure out what Oscar Pettiford's plan, I can pretty much figure out anything in life. So I just have to move those neurons over to how to raise a family, how to be, you know, a good father, how to lay tile or how to build something. Doesn't doesn't always yeah succeed, but at least I try. So it gives me a certain amount of confidence. If I can do this kind of music, I can pretty much do anything in life. Yes, just transfer those skills. And because read there's a, I mean, because if I'm improvising, I'm just problem solving.
00:30:18
Speaker
How do I get from this just G minor 7 to this C7 flat 9 or whatever? How do I how do i negotiate that? navigate yeah And as as human beings, that's all we're doing. Every time we wake up, we're problem solving. Because you don't know how the day is going to go. yeah Or whether or not you're going to be finishing that day. You don't you don't know what's going to happen.
00:30:38
Speaker
So, you know, you wake up, you have a plan or not. Yeah, exactly. You know, you may get up and you spill oatmeal on the the shirt that your favorite shirt that you want to wear. as well Okay, now what do I do? but I have no more clean clothes. Everything's in the laundry. you know you So, you know, that to me, that yeah that that's what that's what life is. that we're just We're problem solving.
00:31:01
Speaker
And tell me about your journey with veganism
The Vegan Journey Begins
00:31:05
Speaker
or plant-based. How long have you been eating like that? And what started you? Well, because I was an athlete at 16, I wanted to be a good athlete. I played football. My first organized sport, I think I was 9 or 10. We moved from San Vanna, Georgia. My father got stationed in Plathford, New York. I think I played football for two years. And then I started, I got into baseball. And then when i we came to Springfield, Mass, I got into soccer. And the wrestling coach at Springfield College was the soccer coach for the kids, his son. You know, they lived, you know, in the neighborhood. And I got it really into soccer. And then I started getting into wrestling because my soccer coach was the wrestling coach at Springfield College.
00:31:52
Speaker
And so I wanted to be a ah better athlete, and I started reading more about diet. And because I lived in the black community, yeah the black Muslims, Elijah Muhammad, had written a book, a thing called How to Eat to Live, and every other word was don't eat pork. So I'm 16 years old and reading this, and then there was a ah lot of stigma about eating pork in the black community, even though a great deal of pork was consumed by many black folks in the community. And then you know salt and that kind of stuff. So I stopped eating pork and tried to have really more of a bland diet at that time.
00:32:33
Speaker
I wasn't aware that you could eat good food, spicy food, other than salt and pepper. So, I stopped eating pork at 16 with an athlete. Actually, i was I went to school, I was a physical education major my first two months. well did I realized that for some roman reason for six months I thought I was going to be a gym teacher.
00:32:53
Speaker
and then I started, you know, my friends, you know, started getting into what we call vegetarianism, which was kind of more vegan than the, it's kind of morphed. And then I read a book by, when I got into college by ah Dick Gregory, or no, really after college, I think it came out in 76, about the year I was getting out of college, called Mother Nature, How to Eat to Live, or cooking with Mother Nature, how to eat to live is, uh, Muhammad, well, Elijah Muhammad.
00:33:25
Speaker
Cooking with Mother Nature, okay. So I read Dick, I thought I was a serious Dick Gregory fan from his activism. He came to UMass and plus he lived in Salem, Massachusetts. He had like 12 or 13 kids or something. He had a house in Salem, Mass. So I was just a big fan. And every time he would come to University of Massachusetts in Emerson to speak, I would go see him speak. And so I was a serious fan. So I read his book, which was about I'm not hip to Dick Gregory. What's his background? Dick Gregory was a civil rights activist. He was actually a comedian. And he weighed about 300 pounds, drank scotch all night. Then he got into ah John Coltrane when he changed from drugs and started getting his diet together. There was a woman named um Dr. Fulton, a black woman, who was in Chicago.
00:34:21
Speaker
And in the 60s, Coltrane would hook up with her and she would cook you know vegetarian meals and stuff like that. And Dick Gregory, who's from Chicago, also was influenced by this woman and changed his diet. Like I said, he was 300 pounds or something like that. If you see early pictures of him, you know, he's smoking, drinking, and um became more of a health enthusiast and also became more of an activist.
00:34:49
Speaker
and the you know in the black movement with Martin Luther King and other other folks. he ah just look Yeah, look him up. He just died a few years ago. um wow But anyway, he was a big big influence on me in terms of terms of diet.
00:35:06
Speaker
So it start like I said, it started out as me being an athlete and wanting to just improve what it is that that I do.
00:35:17
Speaker
Funny story, my ah you know there's eight kids. My father and mother had eight kids. And we all look like my father. okay But my oldest sister, who passed actually during COVID, and myself, looked the most like my father. So my daughter was a year old. ah She was born in 76, so in 77 the next year. you know I've been thinking about becoming, you know well, i said like I said, we called it vegetarian, but vegetarian back then meant vegan.
00:35:44
Speaker
my daughter's first birthday, you know, we had all these balloons and stuff. And my father wasn't, he always looked like he was six months pregnant. So he's laying on the floor, we're at my parents' house, he's laying on the floor, he falls asleep. And so my daughter and I are popping balloons with needles at the end of the party. And I say, well, we're out of balloons. And she looks at my father's stomach and goes, ah, balloon, stabs.
00:36:16
Speaker
you know He wakes up, oh everybody's kind of laughing at it except for me. It's like one of those aha moments I'm looking at my father and I'm like, you're looking at the future. He will just like this cat. You know keep eating the way you're eating. yeah And right after that, that's when I decided to become a vegetarian vegan. And wow people thought I had lost my mind. I was like, and this was, you know like I said, this is 77, 78. It was hard to be.
00:36:45
Speaker
yeah you know No meat, no cheese, no eggs, that was that was difficult. so Yeah, you were blazing the trail. Yeah, so when I started going on the road at the end of 79, 1980, I bought hot plate and pots and cooked my own food while I was on the road.
00:37:04
Speaker
yeah code of like versus italy or grant I'd run to the test before they close because you know a lot of times they close down a couple hours during the day back then you know during that time and it wouldn't open up until the restaurants would opened up to seven or eight o'clock and then you're on doing a soundcheck and playing so if they don't have food for you you know you're just out of luck. In 1981 you know I'm on the road for like you know almost two years and then I'm like it's just very difficult.
00:37:31
Speaker
to be a vegan, it's just it's just kicking my behind. So I'm like, yeah you know, you get to Germany, I'm like, well i vegetarian, yeah, we got venus nitzel. So I was like, okay, y'all, I give. I started eating fish, I added fish back in, and I added eggs and cheese. So from like 81 to like 92, 93,
00:37:58
Speaker
93. So about 12 years I ate, I added fish. And then you know how you know how when you're young, well, when I first became a vegetarian, I was 23. And people were saying that yeah once you stop eating cheese, everything will clear up. I didn't feel no difference at all. well You can eat rocks when you're 23 and dead. Bounce back. But at 39, when I stopped eating cheese,
00:38:26
Speaker
I felt a big change. And then you know with the advent of you know whole foods, that kind of stuff, um yeah those kind of things, people were starting to get a little bit more health conscious. That helped out a lot. Then I went back to just being a vegan. Wow. So since 92? 93. Yeah, 93. 93. So I started in 77.
00:38:52
Speaker
for about four years and then 12 years, yeah added fish, eggs and cheese, and then um back to pure vegan in 93.
Maintaining a Vegan Diet on Tour
00:39:01
Speaker
It's easier for you, right, to travel now with vegans become so much more, I don't want to say normalized, but just it's much more everywhere in the culture.
00:39:09
Speaker
it's It's still difficult because you don't being on the road, you just don't eat the way that you you know you cook at home. You put the spices that you want in. you know you yeah you know Of course, you know even in a restaurant or even a quote unquote vegan restaurant, you're putting salt in it for everybody. you know you You're seasoning. Yeah, totally. Oil, salt. yeah But it's it's definitely much better with without a doubt. I mean, um it's harder. And and now, you know I just put that in my contract. It's got to be of a vegan meal. I myifford i was in in Vietnam with Chico Freeman in April. And we were in one spot, even though we did two concerts, it was a jazz festival. And Chico knew that I and the drummer that he used, which is also my drummer, Euron Israel, is also a vegan. Oh, Euron Israel is a vegan too? Yeah, so they hooked it up. I was i was shocked.
00:40:02
Speaker
I mean, they they all kind of vegetables and it was different every time they had tofu. it It was just the food is just incredible. Actually, it's one of the better because we were there for a week and they they met the challenge me because number one is Vietnamese food is going to be a lot of vegetables anyway and tofu. But they do they use a lot of pork. So I was like, as long as you're sure. But ah no, things things are definitely much easier now.
00:40:30
Speaker
um than it used to be. I love your story about the hot plate. People ask me, you know, for years touring, like, how do you do it? How do you eat vegan? How do you eat so healthy on the road? It's impossible. We stop at the gas station. You know, you know, we eat all done. And I think and even if you're not on tour, what I love about that hot plate story is just preparation. Well, see, that's that's what people don't realize. It's like, who is it? Arthur Ash, the great African-American tennis player said yeah the The key to success is confidence, and the key to confidence is preparation. So yeah you know but that's what I mean by musicians and nerds. We are. I mean, like I said, to focus in on one thing inanimate object for that long is not quite normal. But it also helps us ah focus in on what it is that we need you know what it is that we need to do. Exactly.
00:41:30
Speaker
It's like my wife, my wife is just so spoiled, I'm just gonna say it. Been together 53 years, been married 48 years. But when I cook, I'm the one that does the cooking. So it's like another thing, if you want somebody to have a certain diet, you can't say, would you go in there and cook a vegan diet? No, get your behind in there, get some cookbooks. Like my brother, my youngest brother, I'm like,
00:41:58
Speaker
He goes, well, you know you always were the smallest boy. I said, I stopped eating like y'all at 16. We're all the same height. How come it is I look more like dad? I said, this is what dad would look like if he had been a vegan. He looks more like you because now you're getting closer to dad's age when he when he passed. I said, so yeah, this is the way dad would look if he hadn't, you know, he would have died at 63. Well, he probably would have died at 63 because of the whole social and racial thing that was happening.
00:42:28
Speaker
for for black men during that time, like i can I can understand that. But no, you you you have to you have to prepare. So I'm always, you know, whenever I do the cooking, so I cook enough for like, you know, four to eight meals, put them in bags, date them, date what it is, put it in the freezer. So all she has to do pull out stuff and get a salad, whatever it is. Well, she doesn't even do that, but that's a whole other story. but she stu But she does eat fish and and eggs. She doesn't eat fish and eggs. But preparation. i mean you If you cook, you know that it's not the cooking, it's the prep that takes all the freaking time. no And that's what people don't like to do. They think that
00:43:13
Speaker
Even if you go to a restaurant, you call it in. It takes time. You got to wait for them to put it together. You could have done home you could' have gone home and done 30 minutes and put together a meal. you know just But I you know have prep. you know i have I might freeze some garlic. on I might freeze some cilantro, whatever it is. you know Or I might cut up the vegetables the day before, and then, boom, I hit it. So prep.
00:43:41
Speaker
ye Preparation is one of the one of the keys to being successful, period, but if but to being successful or vegan or to have a um you know a successful workout routine or anything. You you got to prepare.
00:44:01
Speaker
you know It's like, okay, I'm going to run or walk three days a week and in between um I'll do strength training or whatever it is. You got to put you got to prepare. you got and You got to prepare your mind for it. you know the so ah The only bad thing is for folks like maybe us is that we kind of obsess about it. So we're thinking about our workout.
00:44:22
Speaker
the day before, you know, getting anxious like, oh man. And that's when you, I also have to be careful because that's when you have injuries because you are too anxious to get into the gym or whatever it is and work out. Yeah, you know, preferably going back to preparation is a very important key. And you're a runner, right? These days? Well, these days I'm not running as much because I have some occupational problems from 50 years of bopping my head.
00:44:48
Speaker
If you've ever seen me play, even up even upright, yeah, occipital muscles here in the neck, back and my back from, you know, from years of just working out. I'm yeah more down to walking, you know, i like last week I just by just ah did three miles but and I walked two and a half and I i ran a half mile.
00:45:11
Speaker
Yeah so I'm doing more stretching which is what I should have been doing anyway for a person who works out a lot. yeah i don't um I just don't have the patience to stretch just let's work out you know like I said let's get to the workout I'll stretch a little bit I might stretch a little bit after but my main thing is is getting to the workout but now i'm I'm starting to do more stretching because of these occipital muscles and my back muscles.
00:45:35
Speaker
from, like I said, for years of bobbing my head and from years of just working out, yeah probably not stretching as as as much as I do. So, you know, I'll be, I hit the big 7-0 next week. Wow. Congrats. Thank you. So, he it you know, just trying to modify things a little bit, you know, not trying to lift the gym yeah oh like I did when I was younger.
00:45:59
Speaker
But but you know as I tell my my sons, I said the whole, or my kids in general, the whole goal should be disease of life, disease and injury free as much as you can. yeah Because if you go into the gym, you get hurt, now you go you can't. You got to wait till it it heals when you should have just not put on an extra plate, you know which you knew you were kind of overdoing it or you were in a rush to do it and now you're injured. so And then sometimes, you you know, you gotta be able to distinguish between what's soreness and what's an injury, which is sometimes difficult, especially if you like to work out, you're like, ah, it's a little sore. No, it's an injury. You have to really check your body out. Yeah. And as athletes, we, you know, certainly I am a you know avid marathoner, runner.
00:46:50
Speaker
triathlete, you know, we want to keep pushing it, right? We want to keep pushing our boundaries, see how far we can go and keep improving. But then we're riding that line of over-training, over-exertion, not enough recovery. You know, it's it's a fine line that as ah can be a difficult one. Yeah, because I haven't done like a half marathon or a small Ironman in several years. Yeah. You used to, though.
00:47:16
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, cool. Yes. And that was in my 50s going into my 60s. I was doing that. Yeah. out there in Western Mass. Yeah, and in Connecticut, and in Connecticut, and there was a small Ironman thing, it was real small. You actually could do it in three with three people. I was actually supposed to do it, my sons, we never got around to it. Oh, like a relay type thing? No, it was biking 26 miles, then you get yeah off the bike and you could ah kayak for five miles or something like that.
00:47:49
Speaker
ah ky then Okay, cool. Six mile run or something at the end. Yeah, like a 10K run. Yeah. So, i you know I was never trying to... I'm a bass player. I'm not a musician. that that's That's what I loved i i love. you know I'm an athlete. I love it, but that's not my main gig, so I'm not going to get hurt.
00:48:09
Speaker
you know that's People say, well, are you trying to improve your time? on it No, I'm just trying to get through the race. That's my goal, to get to the race. yeah I don't care about the finish part of time. i'm not you know I'm not that obsessed with it because my main gig is is this. I think that even though I'm having problems with my occipital muscles, I think I still have a lot of muscle mass. I still look good.
00:48:35
Speaker
not just for 70, period. I look good. Are you seeing anyone about your neck and your back? Oh yeah, neurologists. I've been seeing a neurologist. Actually, both my neurologists have retired and I've got to get a new one. I mean, I have certain things that I that i do. i'm I'm receiving physical therapy now. Does it hurt to play? Does it affect you when you're playing in general or only when you're like running or doing other stuff? All the above.
00:48:58
Speaker
But I, you know, because when I'm playing, I'm able to focus, you know, when you're playing, you're focused so you don't think about it until after. yeah right right And if I'm doing a concert, you know, like I was doing a, um we have a McCoy Tyner's Legends Band that we toured Europe ah back in July. And, you know, or if I'm doing a concert, you know, I did a concert with an orchestra of of my music and back in June for Juneteenth. I mean, if I have a concert, umm I'm going to stand up and I'm just going to do my stuff. I can't, you know, I cannot do me. It's just like, wait, whoa, it's getting a little old here. What's wrong with him? But if if I'm doing a gig where it doesn't require me, I'm not the front
00:49:45
Speaker
the front man, you know, it's not my band that even then I'll still I still got to put in a you know, 110%. Definitely. It's difficult. So sometimes I'm a little bit more aware, I sit down when I can and try not to move as much as I do. But it's hard because that's the energy um but i'm that that I'm giving out. So it, it does hurt me, you know, I put ice, ah I ice it sometimes after and that that helps.
00:50:15
Speaker
Now if I exercise, I can't do a lot that day. In other words, I have to kind of just do some writing or you know not moving around. if lot Not like it was when I you know was younger, i I could work out and then do as much. And I was on tour with with McCoy Tyner and Michael Brecker was a special guest with us. And Michael goes, if we're in Europe, he goes, you know where all the gyms are in Europe. I was like, yeah, you know, I work out. He was one of the few cats that would work out with me on the road. Him, we were not. Bobby heor he was older, Bobby would come and work out with me. Chico Freeman, he'd work out with me sometimes.
00:50:57
Speaker
yeah Most cats on the road, they're tired, they're not trying. I'll tell you a funny story. I'm going to get in trouble for this. When we were on tour with George Benson back in, I think, in 89, 90. Wow. We got to, I don't know where we were, Germany or somewhere, and it was a health club. and They were like, oh man, it's a health club here. and I'm like, finally, somebody's going to hit the gym. We're going to hit some iron, you know we're going to be cool. I come down, these cats are in like bathrobes, insipid mid-jewels at the health club.
00:51:27
Speaker
And they're like, yeah, man, it's good to be at the health club. And I'm like, okay, the gym's over here. The mint juleps are over here where you are. I'm going to the gym. hour because I was just so disappointed. I was like, when you say health club, I'm thinking you're going to run or hit some iron or something. You cats are sitting there in a bathrobe sipping mint juleps. For them it was the spa.
00:51:53
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. But yes that's what they should have said. Spa, I suppose, a health club. I'm thinking, yeah, it was a nice jump, too, by the way. but What brought
The Love for Bass: Avery's Motivation
00:52:01
Speaker
you to the bass? Because bass is a pretty specific thing. There's so many manifestations of bass players in this world. of I feel like it's one of the most unique instruments, like you can really bring a very unique thing to bass. Not like you can on any other instrument, but there's something that ah bass players are just a unique breed into themselves and they're supportive cast. They're not out there being the star, they're really like a supporter of the whole thing. you know And I'm i'm curious, ah what brought you to the bass? Well, I've been doing music since I was eight, because my mother was a piano player in in the church. um But I started bass at 16.
00:52:37
Speaker
I wish I could give you some real esoteric reason why but um like any adolescent boy I was trying to get girls. yeah Girls was like bass players at the time. So um I started playing bass and then once I got into it I said well forget about girls for a minute it anyway, and my parents thought I had lost my mind because my mother understood because you know she was a musician, but i all I did was sports and come home and just practice. you know I just fell in love with the bass. I always tell my students and everybody, all music starts from the bottom. all music stars from the bottom If I have a chord, it doesn't matter what's on top. The bass note tells you what the chord is.
00:53:20
Speaker
So, and I just always, you know, loved the sound. And then when I heard ah the upright bass, I just lost my mind. you know, Ron Carter on the CTI recordings back in the late 60s, early 70s, the music that came out. But my I guess the cast I really listened to, like you said, Oscar Pettiford, of course, Charles Mingus and me with Richard Davis. And then I lost my mind when I heard Coltrane with Jimmy Garrison. Those kind of cats where were
00:53:53
Speaker
where they they laid down such a strong foundation. Those were the kind of cats that I wanted to be at at first. And then when Stanley Clark came along and blew everybody's mind and jockeled and you're like, oh, okay. Mingus was the first like bass player, band leader. And then then you had Jocko and Stanley come, I was like, oh, snap. Yeah.
00:54:17
Speaker
you know basis to lead now. so But still, yeah then everybody kind of jumped on that bandwagon, and which is great, which I did as well. But I also had a foundation. I mean, my cats were, like I said, Jimmy Garrison, Mingus, cats who were laying it down, Ron Carter. So I had the best of both of those worlds, which kind of yeah you know led me into sort of a little different style. you know So when people hear me, I'm like, oh, you sound different. I'm like, well, yeah, like I listened to everybody. you know
00:54:48
Speaker
you know and I'm not trying to imitate bass players, I'm trying to imitate horn players and piano players. Those are the kind of lines that I'm playing, I'm thinking like that as well. I'm a bass player. When I'm a bass player, you have to lay it down so everybody feels...
00:55:07
Speaker
Your first job is that until but just tell him a drummer this the other day a young cat i said first job of bass player and drummer is to make the band feel comfortable. That's our number one job. Whether or not you can solo or not, that's cool. But if you can't make the band feel comfortable, then you just suck.
00:55:26
Speaker
Because people, when they hear the band, they don't know. They don't think the trumpet player is not good or the piano player, they just say the band sucks. Yeah, the pocket, the swing. Yeah, whatever it is. youve got to you got to make it You got to make it work. You got to make the band feel like, oh, yeah, you got to bring the band up. you know where said Energy.
00:55:46
Speaker
Well, Avery, man, thank you so much for joining. This has been so cool to get to speak with you. For listeners of the podcast, they can find you at avarisharp.com, right? Yes, that's with a E, S-H-A-R-P-E. Beautiful, Avery. Thank you so much, man. All right, stay well. Thank you so much to Avery Sharp for joining the Torganic podcast, and thanks to you for listening. Dig into the many recordings that Avery is on with McCoy Tyner and so many other greats.
00:56:13
Speaker
As always, you can find me on Instagram at Torganic and please check my music on all streaming services under my name, David Bayless. Peace.