Clapton changed life of blues rocker
Guitar guru Philip Sayce releasing live album next month, playing Peterborough in November
Philip Sayce remembers the night his life changed.
It was back in the late 1980s, and the pre-teen was to attend his first concert.
Performing that night was Eric Clapton, whose music Sayce’s parents would often play and that of other blues and roots musicians. Before that night, Sayce remembers finding concert tickets in the family’s Toronto home to see the fabled guitarist at Canada’s Wonderland, only to have his parents break the news that no, he’s not going this time and his babysitter would arrive soon.
So when he finally was allowed to see the blues-rock guitarist perform, at storied Maple Leaf Gardens no less, Sayce was beyond excited.
When Clapton stepped onstage by himself and started to wail on his guitar, well, that was it for Sayce.
“His playing was just … oh, my gosh, I’ll never forget it,” he reminisced over the phone from California earlier this year. “It took over my whole body. I was a little kid and it just freaked me out.”
Not only that, but accompanying Clapton on that “Crossroads” tour was Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits fame, another of Sayce’s heroes.
“It was like Mario Lemieux and Wayne Gretzky playing on a line together,” offered Sayce, who will release a live album entitled Scorched Earth Volume 1, on Sept. 30 before playing Market Hall later this year.
He also counted guitarists Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck and Stevie Ray Vaughan — whose death hit him “hard,” he said — among his other heroes.
From then on, all Sayce would do was “eat, sleep and play guitar.”
When he was just 16, he remembers going to a pub for an open guitar jam session, and, afterward, he was asked if he’d like to join a band.
“They embraced me and gave me a chance and we’d go play clubs a few nights a week,” said Sayce, who played at Albert’s Hall, Grossman’s and the Horsehoe, among others.
Sayce would be asked by the late great guitarist Jeff Healey to join his band in 1997, and toured around the world for the next few years.
Playing with Healey was “like being invited to the prom,” Sayce joked.
He would then move to Los Angeles and was asked by Melissa Etheridge to join her band, which he did for several years.
He released his first bluesrock solo album, Peace Machine, in 2009, followed by two others, Ruby Electric and Steamroller. Fittingly, 25 years after first seeing Clapton in Toronto, Sayce played at his hero’s Crossroads Festival at another Garden, Madison Square, and was named one of its top performers.
In 2015, he was signed by major label Warner Music Canada after an executive discovered him on the online streaming service Spotify.
While many deride the Internet for its effect on the music industry, it has its benefits, too. For example, if you want to hear a Ry Cooder track, it’s right there at your fingertips.
“There’s more opportunity to reach more people than there ever has been,” suggested Sayce, who added that music is often played in the background now.
“You can’t bring the rules that worked for the last 50 years into this day and age. The world has changed. It’s not Spotify, it’s not YouTube. Movies are still doing OK. The music industry got greedy. It’s a tricky thing. All I can do is make the best music that I can make and just remain grateful for the opportunity to make music in my lifetime.”
Moving from a large venue to a smaller one doesn’t affect the way he plays.
“The intention of what I’m doing,” he assured, “I really want to reach people through the music and try, through my own experience on the journey of life, to put something positive in the world and maybe reach somebody with that.”
NOTES: Sayce plays Market Hall Performing Arts Centre at 8 p.m. on Nov. 17. Advance tickets are on sale at https://tickets.markethall.org ... General admission tickets are $25, plus fees ... Call the Market Hall box office at 705-7491146, visit it at 140 Charlotte St. noon to 5 p.m. Monday to Friday, or visit www.markethall.org for more information.