Emmet Cohen Builds Community Wherever He Goes

 

This interview originally aired on The Afternoon Cruise on 06/17/25

READ THE COMPLETE TRANSCRIPT BELOW:

 

Sean McPherson (Jazz88)
It’s The afternoon cruise, and we are chatting with pianist and composer Emmet Cohen. Cohen will be back in the Twin Cities to play at the Twin Cities Jazz Festival. He’s playing this Friday night at 830 on the Jazz 88 main stage. Emmet, I got to see your performance and do a quick interview with you in 2022 when you were at the Twin Cities Jazz Fest with your trio and Bruce Harris, thank you so much for coming back to the Twin Cities.

 

EMMET COHEN  00:22

Oh, it’s my pleasure. It’s one of the places I feel most at home, and I’ll never forget the places that embraced me when we were first getting started, and we had some really fine folks from the from the Jazz Festival that gave us a shot and just gave us opportunities to come year after year and bring Bruce Harris, Patrick Bartley, Houston person. I had so many great experiences in MSP, Minneapolis, St Paul, and I can’t wait to come back and rock it with the four freshmen.

 

Sean McPherson (Jazz88)  00:50

Yeah, well, I’m excited to find out about that collaboration with the four freshmen. We’ve already started playing one of the tunes from that forthcoming volume, two of your collaborations, but I want to look back to your 2024 release that we really loved here at jazz88 Vibe Provider. And in fact, the title track is the one we played the most. And I know that the project in general and that tune in particular were inspired by your friend Michael Funmi Ononaiye. And first off, as human to human, I’m sorry for your loss for you and for your community. And I sort of wanted to ask about that process of first year internal grief, but then how you’re able to channel that energy onto the page and ultimately into the studio as well?

 

EMMET COHEN  01:29

Wow. Well, Funmi was a was a wonderful character. He’s been kind of like a lifeblood of New York City jazz and other creative musics, Black musics from from the from the 1990s and so he spent a lot of time uplifting people and teaching people that that they can walk into a room and make it and make a difference in people’s lives just with a smile, just a laugh. And it’s just really just a pleasure and an honor to to be able to pay tribute in the best way we know how, which is through music. And he was present for all of our live streams. Was at 100 episodes, starting from from the very first one, when we did it in the house. And he just wanted to be around great music. And he loved all the styles of jazz. So the piece we wrote for him by provider it, it it really incorporates a lot of different styles and tempos and feels, and we try to make it all inclusive and encompassing of His Spirit and of our spirits and how we felt.

 

Sean McPherson (Jazz88)  02:32

Well, you know, you get my vote. Mission accomplished. Emmett Cohen, because it’s a beautiful tune, and it’s a beautiful tribute to your friend. Now you got started and developed a name at a relatively young age, and it actually feels like one of the last things people often learn is the importance of the vibe, the importance of bringing good energy, as opposed to just being wildly proficient or even virtuosic. But how do you actually keep people in good spirits? And one of the things I love about even seeing you live on a little Facebook screen that’s, you know, three inches by three inches is how clearly you enthusiastically cheer on the people you’re collaborating with, and send that good energy in all directions. And it seems like something you got pretty young in life, and I was curious how you got that sort of, that spirit of collaborative energy and of connecting with people early on, when I’ve seen I’ve seen it elude a lot of people with great talent. They just don’t know how to make the vibe and the feel good around them.

 

EMMET COHEN  03:29

I think it all starts with community. And I’ve been really lucky to have such great musicians and great spirits in my life. You know, we mentioned Funmi, you know, people that I grew up with as well in New York City, people in the John Batiste fan like Joe Saylor on drums and Brian Carter, who’s now big in the Broadway world, and, of course, Kyle poole, who’s just plays with so much joy. Russell Hall, who’s a barrack on bass, is a very strong personality. Vocalist, Veronica Swift, who we came up with, just loved the music, full of joy. Benny Bennack, the third trumpet player, Louis Tavon pennicott, Bruce Harris, of course, who’s there? She’s spending a lot of time with these, with these people in my generation, who all really just love playing music together. Patrick Bartley is another one that comes to mind. And you know, we just really had a fun time playing together. And I always just try to keep that with me when, you know, when I’m playing, when I hit the bandstand, when we’re traveling. You know, life is so short, like we should really just have a good fun time while we’re playing. It’s serious music and and life is serious. And there’s a lot of things that we that we do take very earnestly, but at the end of the day, you know, when you when you listen to Louis Armstrong play, or you listen to John Coltrane play, and they go off for that high note at the end of the tune, or Erroll Garner, you know, rocking out at the end of the end of the song. You know, you hear the hope in that. And that’s what, what struck me most about jazz when I was learning it, and when I still listen to it, is that. Hope. And, you know, I tried to, I try to get to that. And another component is playing with all the jazz masters, and being with on stage with people like George Coleman, or to the heath or or Ron Carter, Buster Williams, and, you know, spending time around Barry Harris. You know, there’s so much joy. There’s so much love, and what they did and it’s infectious, and it’s and it’s, it’s in every every note I play, I try to fill with love.

 

Sean McPherson (Jazz88)  05:26

It’s the afternoon cruise. I’m chatting with Emmet Cohen. He’s playing this Friday on the Jazz 88 main stage at the Twin Cities Jazz Festival with his trio and the four freshmen. Emmet. Last time we chat, I asked you about playing with Bruce Harris and how that impacts the trio setting. Now you’re navigating your trio plus four singers. And when we spoke, you talked about how Oscar Peterson was comfortable in so many different settings, and a lot of the great players really were able to find their way around with vocalists, with extra instrumentalists, with orchestras. Why not? How do you approach collaborating with the Four Freshmen, where you have the four voices and making sure there’s room for everybody in the mix?

 

EMMET COHEN  06:00

Well, they have their thing, you know, they they do what they do, and they’ve been doing it for for many, many decades, in different configurations. And I think that’s the first thing to respect where somebody is in their in in their collaboration. And so what we try to do is we try to add to that. We try to support it. We try to push them a little bit. We try to pull a little bit, push a little bit, and really just just become part of what it is, and what the spiritual nature of what the of the music. And so they have a lot of arrangements. We’re going to make a great show together. We did a recording with them a few, a few years back. We’re going to play some music from the recording and maybe have some spaces to stretch out festival style. But, you know, we’re just gonna, we’re gonna meet them where they are. We’re gonna have a good time. And, yeah, it’s a really, it’s a really cool thing to play with a vocal group so esteemed as they are.

 

EMMET COHEN  06:56

I’ve been chatting with Emmet Cohen. I got one more question for this gentleman before we let him get back to his very busy day and get ready for a show on Friday at the Twin Cities Jazz Festival. Emmet I happened upon a really cool part of a live stream where you and a couple of your band members were talking about how to get gigs when you’re you know a virtual unknown. And you talked about this burning desire you had as a young person to play with Christian McBride, and the way you prepared for the moment it might happen, listening to his records, transcribing his records, getting aware of who he had played with, and when the call came, you were able to step up and deliver the goods. And I remember the sort of hunger when you’re trying to get started and get things going, and that burning desire, which is changes as you develop and as you mature, and but it just had me thinking, what’s, what’s burning and Emmet now, like, what is? What are you looking to do that same intensity that you want to play with? Christian McBride, many, many years ago. What now gives you that same urge as you continue on in your career?

 

EMMET COHEN  07:52

Wow, what? What brings me that pleasure is to put together really cool evenings, weekends, events. I’m artistic director of the jazz cruise now, and so I get a big chance to put together a lot of different kind of musicians that are all on the boat. And, you know, pick the configurations of how they’re going to play together and what it looks like for a festival. So bigger things like that, where maybe there’s 2000 people on board, and, you know, just to make sure everyone has a good time, it gives me a great, great deal of pleasure to to help younger musicians. I played with a wonderful invited a wonderful pianist this week to our live stream. He’s 18 years old. His name is Brandon Goldberg, and he’s one of the next, the next guys, for sure, you know, to come out and do it. And so we played a little forehand piano together. And you know, that’s really what it’s about. It’s about giving back. It’s about making sure people are united and making sure people have a great just understanding of how powerful it is when we all come together. And this is the this is a hard time in the world for a lot of places and a lot of people. And, you know, I think that music can be very, very healing. And that’s that’s my job as a musician. That’s my job as a band leader and as a teacher to keep inspiring good and positive vibrations that go towards peace in the world.

 

Sean McPherson (Jazz88)  09:18

The vibrations are certainly reaching the Twin Cities we know. They’re actually reaching worldwide. Emmet Cohen, you’re doing beautiful work, and you are always pointing the camera towards other people when you’re talking about the importance of your journey and the importance of this music in general. So thank you for being a vibe provider, a connector and also a world class piano player and composer. We’re looking forward to catching you on Friday night over on the Jazz 88 main stage for the Twin Cities Jazz Festival. Until then, good luck to you, and we’ll catch you on Friday, my friend.

 

EMMET COHEN  09:43

Thank you Sean, love you, man, take care. Love all you guys and see you soon.

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