One could write a book about Charlie Haden’s career, so it is just as well that he has started one himself. In the meantime, we will be able to see a documentary about him screened at ACMI during the Jazz Festival, where he will be an artist in residence as well as playing with Bill Frisell and a version of the Liberation Music Orchestra.
When I connect with Haden by phone he is busy with a Swiss TV crew putting the final touches to the story of his life – and what a life it has been. It traces his career in music from the time he sang on radio with his parents at the age of twenty-two months through to the country album he has recently recorded with his wife Ruth and children: Josh (former member of Spain) and the triplets Rachel, Petra and Tanya. The album was inspired by a family sing-along at Haden’s mother’s 80th birthday in a cabin in the Ozark Mountains.
Apart from the splendid harmonies of the triplets, one of the standout tracks on Rambling Boy is Josh’s ‘Spiritual’ (once covered by Johnny Cash). There are also some great performances from Pat Metheny, Elvis Costello, Rosanne Cash, Bruce Hornsby, Vince Gill, Jerry Douglas, Sam Bush, Ricky Skaggs and more, not to forget son in-law Jack Black. Haden credits his wife Ruth with organizing the whole project and producing and points out that she co-produces everything he does.
“It turned out even better than I thought it was going to turn out,” he admits. “I’m a jazz musician and I haven’t done country music since I was fifteen. I was concerned but the country musicians were all fans of mine and they all did it as a labour of love and it just turned out great.”
You can hear the infant Charlie, dubbed ‘the two year-old Cowboy,’ singing on the Old Haden Family Show, recorded back in 1939. The excerpt appears on Rambling Boy, an absolutely brilliant album released last year and one that still awaits a massive audience. Nominated for a Grammy for the Pat Metheny instrumental ‘Is This America? (Katrina 2005)’ the album certainly shows Haden’s career in a completely different light than one might expect. He had a chance to play to a country music audience with the entire cast of the album at the Grand Old Opry in the new year.
You can also hear Haden sing ‘Oh Shenandoah,’ appropriate because he was born in Shenandoah, Iowa, and sang with his family until he was fifteen and he discovered jazz when he saw Charlie Parker play.
By then he had decided to play bass in his early teens after which he departed for Los Angeles as a nineteen year-old where he met and played with such legends as Art Pepper, Hampton Hawes, and Dexter Gordon. In 1959 he worked with Ornette Coleman and went on to collaborate with the likes of John Coltrane, Archie Shepp, Keith Jarrett and Pat Metheny.
In 1969, Haden joined forces with pianist/composer Carla Bley, founding the Liberation Music Orchestra and since then he has been in constant demand working with a stellar array of musicians, including Hank Jones, Don Cherry, Dewey Redman, Paul Motian, Jack DeJohnette, Michael Brecker, Kenny Barron, and Pat Metheny (with whom Haden shared a 1997 Best Jazz Instrumental Individual/Small Group Grammy Award for their Beyond the Missouri Sky). Haden has also explored his love of world music working with Brazilian guitarist Egberto Gismonti, Argentinean bandoneon master Dino Saluzzi, and Portuguese guitar giant Carlos Paredes and others,
Haden who was invited to establish the jazz studies program at California Institute of the Arts in 1982, says his Artist In Residence means that he will not only be playing some of his Liberation Music Orchestra but will also be playing in trio format and with Quartet West. He will also conduct a masterclass towards the end of the festival. It is a program that will enable jazz fans to see as many facets as possible of Haden’s musical personality.
Melbourne festival-goers will be amongst the first in the world to see the Rambling Boy documentary. “You are going to love it,” he says but adds that he is going to be busy over the next few months finishing the book.
Haden notes that, as we speak, his friend pianist Brad Meldhau is here doing some gigs, including a festival in Adelaide.
“Australia must have a lot of jazz festivals, otherwise it is just one long one. Does it never stop?” says Haden. Certainly, the Melbourne jazz festival has been hugely re-invigorated by new artistic directors and its best line-up ever and it impresses Haden. “It sounds fantastic,” he says.
Charlie Haden's Quartet West with special guest James Muller Trio will appear at The Sydney Opera House on April 30. Tickets are available at the Sydney Opera House website.