Collier keeps musical plates spinning
Prodigy of Quincy Jones brings dazzling instrumental skills and won’t mind if things go a little bit awry
You’d think a one-man band playing a dizzying array of instruments would pray that nothing goes wrong on stage. Not Jacob Collier, the musical wunderkind.
When the 22-year-old north Londoner hits the stage on Wednesday as part of TD International Victoria Jazz Festival, he’ll be playing drums, grand piano, guitar, bass, synthesizer and melodica. Collier will also sing, harmonizing up to 12 voices simultaneously using a one-of-akind device created by Ph.D. student Ben Bloomberg at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Essentially, Collier keeps all these musical plates spinning simultaneously using a looper system that records and repeats sections of sound (drums, bass etc.). The performance is accompanied by a real-time video display.
Not long ago, he played a show (Collier can’t remember the town) at which an audience member let out a loud whoop. This ambient sound was recorded by his percussion loop, which meant the shout was heard every couple of bars, over and over again.
It didn’t faze Collier. In fact, he liked it.
“It was great because I made that into part of the melody,” he said, phoning barefoot from a beach in Los Angeles.
“I think people enjoy seeing this human element of the technology. Often, technology can come across as seeming quite invulnerable.”
Collier’s stage set-up is so complex, it’s rare when something doesn’t go slightly off the rails. He views this as a bonus — something that yanks him out of his “comfort zone” and keeps him on his toes creatively.
He came to international notice on YouTube. In recent years, Collier has posted videos of himself playing a grab-bag of music, such as Burt Bacharach’s Close to You, the Flintstones theme, Georgia on my Mind, Jerusalem and George Gershwin’s Fascinating Rhythm.
His big breakthrough came via a virtuoso version of Stevie Wonder’s 1973 song Don’t You Worry ’Bout a Thing. It begins a cappella, with Collier singing a choir’s worth of harmonies. Then it shifts into percussively dense Latin jazz, with him playing a multitude of instruments with jaw-dropping aplomb.
Don’t You Worry ’Bout a Thing not only racked up two millionplus views, it attracted raves from musicians including Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock, k.d. lang, Pat Metheny and Steve Vai. And that’s not all. “Quincy Jones sent me an email saying: ‘Hey, this is great. I love it. We should talk,’ ” Collier said.
Jones did more than talk. The legendary producer/composer/ musician flew the then 19-year-old Collier to the Montreux Jazz Festival in 2014 so they could meet. The upshot was that Collier was signed to Quincy Jones Productions, joining a roster of gifted young musicians handpicked for mentorship. “He’s an unbelievably special guy,” Collier said.
Last year, Collier released his album In My Room. A mixture of originals and covers, it spans jazz, pop, rock, folk, funk and world music.
In My Room shows the influence of such artists as Stevie Wonder, Take 6 and Sting.
“Stevie was my number one growing up and kind of still is. Everything I love about music I think he represents on some level,” Collier said.
He recorded and produced the album by himself, toiling away in his room in his childhood home in London. This home studio can be seen on the disc’s cover, which shows a spikey-haired Collier surrounded by keyboards, banjo, guitars, a double bass and percussion instruments.
There’s a certain slickness to the music, perhaps a reflection on his heavy reliance on technology. Interestingly, Collier says he’s not particularly enthralled with electronic instruments. For one song on In My Room, titled Hideaway, he uses the sound of “me hitting the floor with my fist” instead of a kick-drum.
Taking the one-man band concept to such a level requires extraordinary dedication. During recording, he would sometimes log 16 or 17 hours a day, stopping only to eat and sleep.
“If I’m in that room and I’m on a roll, I can just go and go and go. It takes for the sun to come up to put me to bed,” Collier said with a laugh.
After the In My Room tour concludes, Collier plans to make a collaborative recording using guest musicians. A follow-up tour will reflect this approach, mixing his one-man-band concept and other players.
Collier said the “wunderkind” tag doesn’t worry him. After all, it’s not a label he came up with.
“In a way, it’s not up to me to think about that too much. My responsibility is more concerned with just to be making things,” he said.
“If I can be happy in my life and keep on making music, I think that’s the best thing that I could be doing.”