FAREWELL TO JAZZ LEGEND?
Free concert will pay tribute to Oliver Jones
Oliver Jones sports his trademark sheepish grin. “This is it,” he declares. “Really.” Really? Canada’s premier jazz pianist is referring to his retirement, but we’ve heard that one before. Numerous times. Going back almost 20 years, actually.
I’ve written my share of Jones retirement stories, and I’m not biting this time.
Fact is, his fans and concert promoters just won’t let him leave — and despite his mild protestations, he is pretty much married to his piano.
The Sud-Ouest borough and the Youth in Motion community organization will pay well-deserved tribute to Jones on Saturday, not far from where he grew up in Little Burgundy. There will be a free outdoor concert at the corner of Workman and Dominion Sts. beginning at 2 p.m., featuring a who’s who of the local jazz and blues scenes: Ranee Lee, Skipper Dean, Daniel Clarke Bouchard, Trevor Payne’s Montreal Jubilation Gospel Choir and Moah. Kim Richardson and Charlie Biddle Jr. will host the event.
At 4 p.m., the homage moves inside Dominion St.’s SteCunégonde Social Centre, which will then be renamed the Oliver Jones Centre.
Jones insists he isn’t slated to tickle the ivories on Saturday, but if pressed, he might step up “for just one number,” so as not to spoil the party.
“I’m not happy that I haven’t been playing a lot lately,” he says, holding court with Sud-Ouest borough mayor Benoît Dorais in Jones’s Côte-St-Luc apartment.
Still grinning, Jones is talking golf here, not piano.
A longtime lover of the links, he’s had to put aside his clubs for a spell. His knee isn’t up to it.
Jones had a more dangerous health scare about a month and a half ago. He suffered a minor stroke, which affected his speech — not his hands, as many had feared. “It was scary,” he recalls. “It was after breakfast with my son. I couldn’t manage to finish a sentence. Which has never been a problem, so I knew something was up.”
A series of tests was run, and he was hospitalized for a night. Mercifully, he made a speedy recovery and is now as lucid and chatty as ever. “I’m feeling pretty good now. It’s not my time. I’m only 83, and I plan to make it to 100 like my mother. There’s a lot of longevity in my family. I had a cousin in Barbados who was declared the second-oldest man in the world before he died at 115.
“But now with my retirement, I plan to take it a little easier.” Again with the retirement? “I almost did it in 1999, when
I stopped playing for 4 ½ years and when I became active (in music programs) with four different universities and various churches and councils.
“I was still involved in music, and what was really great was that I was able to give away thousands of dollars (in grants) to other artists. I honestly didn’t miss performing . ... It was only when someone would approach me and ask if I would do one particular concert or festival.”
And so it goes with Jones. He just can’t say no.
The concert that led to more offers was a 2004 Montreal International Jazz Festival gig with his Little Burgundy buddy and mentor Oscar Peterson.
“That was one of my most memorable concerts, and Oscar was very moved. I knew Oscar was very sick at that time, and to be able to share the stage with him was just wonderful.
“But that was foolish on another level, because people started calling the following day to do more. I told them the Oscar show was a one-time event. And so I ended up doing 84 more concerts that year.”
Then Jones declared he was definitely retiring three years ago when he turned 80, following a tribute concert at the Oscar Peterson Concert Hall to mark his 75 years of playing piano. “Did I really say that?” Yes. And that retirement lasted maybe a month. “Those concerts were mostly benefits or events to help young musicians,” he says of the shows that followed.
“But at the beginning of this year, I retired in Barbados. That was supposed to be my last concert. But when I came back to Montreal, I was asked to do a special concert, then one in Ottawa. And there’s one coming up in Mississauga. But that’s it.”
Whatever. One can bet that if both Jones and a piano are in the same room, there will be music.
Unlike many in his métier, Jones is so understated and humble that it is easy to overlook his many accomplishments. He has to be prodded to remember his many feats and honours.
Jones has recorded two dozen albums and has won numerous Juno and Félix awards. He was named an Officer of the Order of Canada and a Chevalier of the Order of Quebec, and received a Governor General’s Performing Arts Award and the Oscar Peterson Award, presented by the Montreal jazz fest for contributions to Canadian jazz.
In 2014, the city of Montreal unveiled a 95-square-metre mural of Jones in Little Burgundy. Another mural in his old ’hood is planned. And in a few weeks, Jones will receive the 2017 Montreal International Black Film Festival Lifetime Achievement Award. The world première of the documentary Oliver Jones: Mind, Hands and Heart, directed by former Canadian track star and TV personality Rosey Ugo Edeh, will be screened at the fest on Sept. 30. The doc focuses on Jones’s visit to Rio de Janeiro and his (alleged) final official Barbados concert last January.
Sud-Ouest mayor Dorais, who has been listening intently to Jones, is struck by the man’s modesty.
“Oliver Jones is a legend, not just in Montreal but around the world,” says Dorais, who is at the helm of the Jones tribute events on Saturday. “Yet, he is so downto-earth. He never forgets where he comes from. He’s so proud of his Little Burgundy background, and he still spends so much time with the youth in the area. We are so thankful for his many contributions to the community in the past and still today. That is why the borough decided it was so necessary to pay him proper tribute.”
Jones is grateful to the community, not just for honouring him but for providing him and so many young musicians with opportunities.
“There weren’t a lot of opportunities for young blacks when I was growing up,” Jones says, “but Little Burgundy was a hotbed for music. So many musicians came out of the area and made their mark around the world.”
He gives special credit to his piano teacher Daisy Peterson Sweeney, the recently deceased sister of Oscar Peterson. She took eight-year-old Oliver under her wing.
Jones hopes Saturday’s concert will give young musicians from the area the determination to succeed. “With the right amount of drive, there is always hope.
“I’m looking forward to this party, which is really a celebration of the music of so many. I might even get dressed up with a lot of lit balls hanging on me,” cracks Jones, in reference to the city’s 375th-anniversary lighting of the Jacques Cartier Bridge.
For the record, the Jones homage is not part of the 375th-anniversary proceedings. And the cost is minimal, with the musicians performing pro bono.
If Jones does play a song at the concert, he will have to play from memory. After one of his retirements, he donated all his arrangements and music books to universities.
“All that’s left is in my head and a few classical music books.”
On that note, Jones heads over to his trusty Yamaha piano and begins playing a classical lullaby from his childhood lessons with Peterson Sweeney. It is mesmerizing. “Wow!” Dorais marvels. Indeed. The soft hands still have it.
We are so thankful for his many contributions to the community in the past and still today.