Jim Cullum has no intention of retiring. The trumpeter, cornet player and leader of the Jim Cullum Jazz Band has been playing his brand of classic, pre-World War II jazz professionally since the 1960s. His accomplishments include world tours, a syndicated radio broadcast from his home in San Antonio and a meeting with Louis Armstrong as a young player. Cullum and his band will appear in Aurora this week as part of the annual Summit Jazz Festival, and we caught up with the jazz veteran to talk about the genre, the fans and the future of the music.
Aurora Sentinel: What will the band lineup look like at this year’s Summit Festival?
Jim Cullum: For years and years it was always a seven-piece band. That’s what we feature; that’s what will be there. That’s four rhythm players and three horns. A lot of the personnel has been the same for a long time.
(They) are getting to be old stalwarts in the business. They’re known to a lot of jazz fans. Allan Vache is on clarinet; Mike Pittsley is on trombone. John Sheridan is on piano, Hal Smith is on drums and there’s a couple of new guys. Phil Flanigan on bass is a very much heralded player. He’s considered one of the greatest bass players around. Bob Leary will be on guitar and he’s coming from Florida to do the Summit with us.
You’ve been playing this gig for decades. What’s kept the Summit festival going for so long?
Part of it is (organizer) Juanita Frederickson does it well. Another part of it is that it’s all in one room. Some of these festivals have multiple stages. Sometimes it will be around town and it gets to be stressful and you end up working to get to the right stage. It’s just not as comfortable. We’ve been the constant.
You play such a wide range of material. How do you approach covering some of this iconic music, jazz standards by the likes of Louis Armstrong, Fats Waller and Duke Ellington?
We’ve always taken a large swath of material from whatever what might appeal and play it in the band’s natural style. We don’t try to imitate or copy the material.
We follow the harmonics pretty faithfully to the way the composer wrote it, but we play the music in the band’s natural style. We try to swing everything.
How do you approach putting together a setlist?
As far as a setlist, I try to make it make a little bit of sense one piece to the next. I try to vary the tempos, I try to change the key so you don’t run through several tunes in the same key.
You’re dealing with a crowd of diehard fans. Do you ever play an obscure track that nobody knows?
We’ll play a song that I think is pretty obscure. I’ll say, ‘Does anyone know the name of that song?’ Only a few times have I been able to plank them out. I’d say 95 percent have some knowledge of the music.
Can you talk about meeting Louis Armstrong?
The first time I met Louis, I was about 14 or 15 years old and my older sister, she had graduated from college with a journalism degree. She went to work for a local newspaper, and the music critic that normally would have been sent to review Louis’ concert was ill; they asked her to go. I went with her and I sat in a folding chair outside the dressing room. She said, ‘My brother is out here and wants to meet you.’
Then, within about a year or so, I went to hear him in San Antonio and Dallas and Houston … I went into the dressing room; that’s when I got to know him the best. I have pictures of the two of us. He invited me to play gold plated trumpets. He was very, very nice to me, very generous and very nice.
The Summit attracts a lot of older fans, but there are young players who appear in some of the bands during the festival as well. What’s the advantage of this kind of setting for an aspiring musician?
Playing in clubs, that’s where jazz really developed in the first place. It’s that atmosphere. That looseness. There’s a certain kind of risk taking in jazz performance that you don’t get on recordings. It’s risk taking, and certain classical settings stifle risk-taking.
Developing as a jazz player requires some risk taking and doing it a lot. Making mistakes and learning from them. Some of the things that are at the heart and soul, at the core of the music, are hard to transfer in the classroom. It’s a great place to actually develop as an improviser and player.
You’ve been at this for many, many years. Ever think of retiring?
I’m still able to do it. I like to do it. There’s no reason not to. I’m healthy. I don’t want to not do it. Unless I was to become ill, I will continue to do this as long as I can.
Reach reporter Adam Goldstein at 720-449-9707 or agoldstein@aurorasentinel.com
The Summit Jazz Festival
Will run from Sept. 27 to 29 at the Red Lion Southeast, 3191 South Vaughn St. in Aurora.
Information: summitjazz.org