The Evolution of a Jazz Musician

Edwin A. Daugherty is a Chicago-based saxophone player whose impressive tenure as a musician spans 40 years. Daugherty got his start studying under the legendary Walter H. Dyett, former musical director at Jean Baptiste Point DuSable High School in Chicago. After graduating from high school, Daugherty went on to gain notoriety among fellow musicians and performers and played for such well-known artists as James Brown, the Jackson 5, Nancy Wilson, B.B. King and Koko Taylor, to name a few.

Daugherty, whose passion for his craft has led him to choose art over commercialism during his career as a musician, loves playing music so much that he has done so without pursuit of fame or fortune. And although he is credited with such appearances as the one on Muhal Richard Abrams' album entitled "Things To Come From Those Now Gone," which was originally released in 1972, Daugherty is now turning over a new leaf as he branches out and begins to make a name for himself as a solo artist in the city of Chicago.

Following the performance of the Edwin Daugherty Quartet at the 2007 Chicago Jazz Festival, I had an opportunity to interview Edwin Daugherty and learn more about his history as a musician and his vision for the future.

Dr. Marable: When did you first develop a love for playing the saxophone?

Daugherty: My father decided I needed something to keep me occupied. So he rented this saxophone for me. I was in the sixth or seventh grade. I did not love it. I pretty much hated it actually. It took a year or two before I got to the point where I started really enjoying it.

Dr. Marable: So when did you enter the scene as a full-fledged musician?

Daugherty: After I graduated from high school. We were very well prepared in high school. We had a good band director and when we got out of high school, we actually played in a summer band which was a professional band. Our band director put us in the Union.

Dr. Marable: The Musicians' Union?

Daugherty: Yes.

Dr. Marable: Tell me more about that.

Daugherty: Well, there was a black union and a white union. There was a black union because the white musicians wouldn't let blacks get in the union. So we started our own. And probably five or six years after I had joined, they wanted to merge. This was during the Civil Rights Era, and I guess they were a little embarrassed about the fact that we had two musician's unions in Chicago and they were very anxious to have us merge. Eventually we did merge and that's why the Chicago Musicians' Union is 10-208; 208 being the black union and 10 being the white union.

Dr. Marable: So what's been one of your memorable experiences as a musician? I'm sure you have many.

Daugherty: Well, it wasn't a big performance or anything but we had been working on learning to improvise - play jazz and such. We used to live in a coach house - me and a musician friend of mine - and we had some guys over playing a session. And for a moment there it all came together for me. I got to take the solo and it just came together. And that probably was one of my most memorable experiences.

Dr. Marable: So what style of music do you enjoy the most?

Daugherty: I've always liked jazz because the most interesting things were going on for jazz musicians. R&B and the Motown sound came to the forefront when I was young. For the general public, that was their interest, but for musicians, the greatest creativity was always within jazz. And my parents listened to jazz, so I listened to jazz. That was where the fun was.

Dr. Marable: You work with musicians both young and old. Have you observed any major generational differences between the younger musicians who are out now and some of the more seasoned musicians out there?

Daugherty: I think that it's easier for young musicians now to get the theory, the pedagogy of jazz, than it was when we were coming up. We had to get it from other people - from older guys who were not that willing to give it up. But now jazz is recognized in America as an art form and they teach it in college. And high schools have jazz bands and you can major in jazz and there are people who have standardized the theory. There are books about it and recordings of rhythm sections you can play along with. It's just easier to gain the basic knowledge. When I came up it wasn't that easy. So in a way you can say that jazz musicians are able to develop faster.

Dr. Marable: What about the role of technology? Do you think that has made it easier as well for musicians?

Daugherty: Absolutely. Like I said, you can buy CDs with all the standard tunes on them with just the rhythm section or one instrument missing and you can play along with them and develop whatever you're working on. So that's a big change. When I was young we had to try to find somebody to sit there and play [laughs] four hundred choruses of "I've Got Rhythm" so you could work out whatever music you were working on.

Dr. Marable: So at this stage in your career, what vision do you have for yourself as a musician?

Daugherty: Well, my career has been varied. I've done a lot of playing with R&B artists and jazz artists and...I want to synthesize all of that into a style and just do that. I don't know if it's going to be successful or not...I'd just like to put it all together.

Dr. Marable: You write your own music. How long have you been doing that?

Daugherty: Forever. I was writing my own music in the 70's.

Dr. Marable: How has your writing evolved from that period of time?

Daugherty: I think it still expresses whatever I'm thinking at the time, so in that sense it hasn't changed. I'm thinking now though of incorporating the technology you just mentioned into it more, because in a lot of cases I'm using technology to write things and get different sounds. You have a wider palette of musicians now and a wider palette of sounds, because electronically it's almost unlimited.

Dr. Marable: Has that been difficult? With all of the new technology - trying to merge that into what you've been doing all along?

Daugherty: It has. It's challenging because people are not receptive, particularly if you're a jazz musician. There's some pretty narrow-minded thinking about exactly what a jazz musician is and isn't. And when you start to incorporate that technology, in a lot of people's minds, you are no longer a "jazz musician." But on the other hand, the word "jazz" is used to identify all kinds of things. You've got jazz festivals where there are hardly any jazz musicians - not real ones. They may have the latest hip hop or R&B group and they're calling it a jazz festival. So the terminology is beginning to slide a little bit.

Dr. Marable: Who are some of the jazz greats that you admire?

Daugherty: John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Sonny Rollins. I could probably come up with an endless list of people. Coleman Hawkins...Lester Young. It covers the gamut.

Dr. Marable: Who have been some of the more interesting people to actually play with?

Daugherty: I've probably enjoyed to some degree everybody that I've played with. The R&B artists and the jazz artists. The Chicago's AACM, which is the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, has always been kind of a cutting edge organization in terms of avant-garde or free jazz or whatever's going on, so that's been fun. I used to play the shows where you'd have James Brown performing. All of it has been fun.

Dr. Marable: How have you gotten most of those types of gigs?

Daugherty: It's word of mouth as a musician. As an artist - any kind of artist - it's word of mouth. There's no formal structure for pushing people along so to speak. If you're a good musician you get recommended to other musicians and you start to develop a name and people know who you are and they hire you.

Dr. Marable: How does performing as a solo artist compare to performing as a group for you?

Daugherty: At this point in my life, I probably enjoy doing my own thing more. And I'm going more and more in that direction.

Dr. Marable: What are all the different instruments that you play?

Daugherty: I can play most wind instruments. However, right now I'm playing mainly the alto saxophone and an electronic wind instrument - the Yamaha WX series of electronic instruments. But I can play and have played just about everything.

Dr. Marable: Some people make reference to you as a local musician. How would you describe yourself as a musician?

Daugherty: I would say that I'm a local musician. I've been a working musician most of my adult life, and that means playing all kinds of jobs - whatever was available. That could mean anything from jazz jobs to playing a bar mitzvah or dinner dance or whatever - blues bars. And that's what I've done. And in addition to that I've had an opportunity to get out and travel around, but not under my own name. So yes, I am a local musician in the sense of identifying me.

Dr. Marable: You have several followers. What are some of the things that people who keep up with your music often say to you when they come to your performances?

Daugherty: Well they're glad to hear me and [to learn] that I'm out performing under my own name, which I have not been doing a lot of over the past years. There was a long time there when I was doing a lot of jobs with other people, working as a teacher, band director and working with other people's bands. So they're glad to see me back playing under my own name.

Dr. Marable: So can the public expect a CD or anything if they want to hear your music?

Daugherty: I'm working on it!

Dr. Marable: Where have you been performing at lately?

Daugherty: Well as you know, I just did the Chicago Jazz Festival. The previous weekend, I played in the Jazz in the Alley Festival, which took place in Dunbar Park in Chicago. It's a neighborhood festival. I've been doing a few jobs around town with a few other different artists, notably Kahil El'Zabar. We've been performing with the AACM Great Black Music Ensemble on the first and second Sundays of the month at the Velvet Lounge in Chicago. And I'm also still doing jobbing dates while I'm working on my own thing.

Dr. Marable: Do you have any words of wisdom for those up-and-coming young artists out there who are trying to get a music career going?

Daugherty: I'd say pay attention to the business as well as the music. The music business is 50% music and 50% business. So pay attention to the business.

Dr. Marable: Well thank you Edwin Daugherty. It was wonderful talking to you!

Daugherty: The pleasure was all mine.