Down Beat
When bassist and bandleader Ron Carter left the Blue Note stage on a recent night in lower Manhattan, a group of fans trailed behind him as he headed to the upstairs dressing rooms.
A line of autograph seekers with albums, books, programs and other memorabilia already had formed outside the door. Two or three were called in at time to bask in Carter’s presence, and he seemed to enjoy the adulation. Several of his admirers had copies of The Brown Beatnik Tomes (Live At BRIC House), the bassist’s recently released concert album recorded in 2015 with poet Danny Simmons. The disc’s title invokes the Beat Generation, and though Carter, 82, lived during that dynamic period of nonconformists, he said he didn’t participate, referring to it as mainly a movement of white guys.
The album, though, isn’t his first collaboration with someone from outside the jazz world. Carter scored and performed on the soundtrack to O Povo Organizado (The People Organized), a 1976 documentary by Robert Van Lierop about the successful revolutionary struggle in Mozambique.
The bassist added: “In the past, I had worked with poets, as well as folk singers, such as Leon Bibb. That was also at a time when LeRoi Jones was a popular poet and working with musicians. Danny Simmons came to me and asked if I would commit to [the project]. I didn’t know him, but I knew his brother [Def Jam founder Russell Simmons], and so it was on. I think, overall, we accomplished what we set out to do, and I hope it was a mutually rewarding experience.”