Listen to the full conversation on our podcast “Beyond the Fame.”
The Kennedy Center has the perfect way to kick off Black History Month this Friday.
Seven-time Grammy winner Christian McBride presents “The Movement Revisited” to honor Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, Martin Luther King Jr. and Barack Obama.
“This was my first-ever long-form opus,” McBride told WTOP.
And to perform it, McBride’s bringing his big band, singer Alicia Olatuja and the Howard University choir, led by McBride’s collaborator, J.D. Steele.
Tamara Tunie (“Law & Order: SVU”) will read the words of Rosa Parks; Vondie Curtis-Hall (“Chicago Hope”) will read Malcolm X; Dion Graham (“The Wire”) will read Muhammad Ali, and Keith David (“Greenleaf”) will read Dr. King, all backed by the Christian McBride Band.
The program features five movements, starting with a tribute to Parks.
“I did my best to capture what I thought were the personalities, the feels of each icon,” McBride said. “Rosa Parks: quiet, but very powerful. … It starts with Rosa — ladies first.”
The second movement honors Malcolm X, specifically focusing on the last year of his life, McBride said.
“When he broke away from the Nation of Islam [and] made his pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca, he started to see the world from his own lens. He became a man of such wisdom in his last 12 months, so I wanted to capture the sound of someone awakening [with] late-era Coltrane.”
The third movement honors boxing legend Muhammad Ali.
“Loud, brash, funky,” McBride said, describing the Ali section.
The fourth movement honors King.
“The first part is called ‘Soldiers’ — that’s how I think of him, as a freedom soldier, all the marches he led, all the sit-ins,” McBride said. “He encompasses what we all preach but don’t practice,” McBride said.
“Your beliefs are not what make you a good person; it’s your actions,” he added. “I wanted to capture that in the second [part], which is called ‘A View from the Mountaintop.'”
Finally, it wraps with a salute to former President Barack Obama.
“The fifth and final movement is called ‘Apotheosis: Nov. 4, 2008,'” McBride said. “That piece was written just as Obama was taking office. … We all remember how we felt on that night, Nov. 4, 2008, seeing an African-American person become president of the United States, so that piece is dedicated to that night.”
Born in Philadelphia in 1972, McBride grew up listening to all the greats.
“My father was a professional bass player, and so was my great uncle, so it runs in my family, both of them having played a lot of jazz, rhythm and blues, and soul music,” McBride said. “Motown, James Brown, Al Green, Aretha Franklin — that’s my bone marrow.”
At age 9, he learned electric bass, then switched to acoustic bass in middle school.
“My great uncle was so excited that I was playing the upright bass that he gave me a crash course in jazz,” McBride said. “The way he taught me about the music was so wonderful and so entertaining that he singlehandedly sparked my love of jazz.”
He was dubbed a teen prodigy en route to studying at Juilliard.
“I was aware that I was being called a teen prodigy, and it was for the reason that I wanted to make good on all the potential that everyone thought I had,” McBride said. “My goal was to not be the cliche child star that burns out at age 20. I wanted to be around all the best musicians and take my cues from them.”
He surrounded himself with masters such as Ron Carter, Ray Brown, Ray Drummond, Marcus Miller and Buster Williams, while joining Bobby Watson’s group Teen Horizon.
In 1995, he was finally ready to release his own first album, “Gettin’ to It.”
“There was something they called the Young Lions Era,” McBride said. “The Marsalis Brothers had become very hot in the ’80s. … There was a spinoff group, like me, Roy Hargrove, Joshua Redman, James Carter, Stephen Scott, Greg Hutchinson, Mark Whitfield. Major record labels, for about 15 minutes, were interested in signing jazz artists.”
In 1996, he formed the group SuperBass with Ray Brown and John Clayton.
“I got to meet Ray Brown in 1991 and Ray became one of my greatest mentors, like a second father,” McBride said. “So much of what I learned on bass came from him. It was an honor of a lifetime when in Dec. 1992 he called and said, … ‘Why don’t you and John join me in Pittsburgh and we’ll do a three-bass thing?’ … That’s how SuperBass was born.”
He ultimately transitioned into the Christian McBride Band from 2000 to 2008.
“In the late ’90s, there had been a resurgence of classic soul, the neo-soul era, Lauryn Hill, Erykah Badu, D’Angelo, and my homies from Philadelphia, The Roots — Questlove put together a group, The Soul Aquarians,” McBride said. “Also, the jam band movement started to get huge. … I said, ‘Let me put together a band that’s a little of all of that.'”
The band included Terreon Gully (drums), Geoffrey Keezer (keys), Ron Blake (saxophone) and McBride, recording two albums: “Vertical Vision” (2003) and “Live at Tonic” (2006).
“Ron got a job playing with the ‘Saturday Night Live.’ Geoff got married and moved to California. Terreon got married and moved to Atlanta. So real life split the band apart, but we’re all still the best of friends,” McBride said. “One of these days we will play together — what am I talking about?!? We’re playing together Friday night at the Kennedy Center!”
It will be full circle for McBride, who co-produced the 2011 Kennedy Center Honors.
“That was pretty heavy; my first television credit,” McBride said. “That was pretty spectacular being able to do that for Sonny [Rollins] and all of those great legends there.”
Let’s not forget that McBride is a legend himself, having won seven Grammys.
“My first Grammy … I did not know I won,” McBride said. “I get this box in the mail from the Recording Academy, so I just thought it was a Christmas basket, a hoodie, a coffee mug or something. I open it up and it’s a Grammy! I went, ‘What?!?’ I had played on this record by McCoy Tyner. … If your name is on the album cover, then you are eligible for a Grammy!”
He tried the same thing a few years later, but turns out, there are different rules.
“Dee Dee Bridgewater did an album and she said, ‘I’m gonna do the same thing, I’m gonna make sure all of your guys’ names get on the album cover, so in case I win, all of you get Grammys,'” McBride said. “She won the Grammy and we found out the rule only applies to instrumental records, not vocal records. We were like, ‘Man! You guys with all these rules.'”
In 2012, he actually got to go on stage to accept a Grammy for “The Good Feeling.”
“When I finally went to the Grammys and heard my name get called as a winner and had to go up and make a speech, that’s a feeling you’ll never forget,” McBride said. “It’s incredible. That adrenaline goes through you, you tell yourself, ‘OK, be succinct, try not to get up and ramble, there’s a show going on, so get your words together and get on out.'”
And on that note, we’re out.
Listen to the full conversation on our podcast “Beyond the Fame.”
