1. George Duke describes the time he tried to change the notes. “Sister Serene” from I Love The Blues She Heard My Cry, MPS (1977)
2. George Duke on playing with Frank Zappa. “Sister Serene” from I Love The Blues, She Heard My Cry, MPS (1977)
3. George Duke on being himself. “We Give Our Love” from Don’t Let Go, CBS (1978)

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Don’t Stop is also the third Osborne album to be produced by multi-instrumentalist George Duke, a man with high praise for the singer. “Jeff isn’t one of these fly-by-night artists, and that’s what I liked about him,” says Duke, “besides the fact that he’s an incredible talent, a good writer, and a pleasure to work with. There’s really no pressure. When we work together for these three months each year, it’s a party, and I think it shows in the music. He also has a commitment to growth. I don’t think any of these records sound the same.”

Osborne spent the better part of ten years with LTD, as drummer and vocalist. If you listen to LTD closely you can’t miss his distinctive voice. His passionate rendering of LTD’s “Love Ballad” in 1976 features that same velvety growl that he uses here on the ballad “Let Me Know.” Osborne’s reputation in the business has been that of a balladeer, and his firstever hit with Duke, “On The Wings Of Love” in 1978, did nothing to change that. “When we did the first album he said, ‘You know, I’m really known as a balladeer, and that’s where I’m most comfortable. You’re going to have to help me on the uptempo stuff’ And from there, we had to fight to keep a ballad on this record! There was so much up-tempo stuff that we all liked on this one that it was real difficult. As a matter of fact, we were more worried about the ballads on this record than any of the other two records we’d done.

“He sort of thinks like a drummer, and that’s why he’s rhythmically so good. He likes that real rhythmic kind of stuff,“ Duke continues. “When he first brought in some of the songs for this record, I was kind of surprised that it was so different from what you would think of a Jeffrey Osborne thing.” “You Can’t Be Serious,” “Hot Coals,” and “The Power” are testimony to the harder edge on Don ’t Stop. “He wanted to do that kind of thing,” Duke says, “so I said, ‘Let’s go.’ “Live F or Today,” “Borderlines,” and “Don’t Stop“ also give him a chance to show off his vocal versatility, a low range and growl that is pretty much unequaled in pop, a feisty squeal that doesn’t waver, and a full and warm midrange. “It’s one of those real natural God—given talents like Stevie Wonder. They just open their mouths and music comes out,” the producer says.

Osborne molds expressive phrases out of a single word, like “more” or “no.” And according to Duke, who recorded most of the album at his house/studio Le Gonks West, it doesn’t take the singer long to put his tracks down “Nine times out of ten you’re going to get it on the first or second take,” he says. “Generally I tape a second take just in case something happens to the first one. For no particular reason other than just to say I’d like to hear it again. He comes in prepared, and knows just what to do. I worked him a little harder on this record. I actually did say, ‘Why don’t you do this again?‘ And he’d look at me and start laughing and say, ‘Wait till you do your record. I’m going to come in here and…’”

Osborne co-wrote all but two tunes on Don ’t Stop, four of them With keyboardist Don Freeman. One of the Osborne-Freeman tunes, “You Can’t Be Serious,” is about an experience With flying saucers. Lyrically, Don’t Stop is the most strong and varied Osborne LP yet. ‘I think it was right after the Stay With Me Tonight record, and I talked to Jeff indirectly about lyrics—it didn’t have anything to do with this record,” Duke says, “But I said it should be possible to make a hit record out of something other than, ‘I love you baby, let’s go away in the sea, you and me.’ It seems like artists are all writing about the same subject. I just threw it out that we should do something a little different, cause I was trying to do something different at that time on my own solo records, which didn’t work out so well. But I still felt it was possible. And maybe he thought about that a little, and that’s how we got kind of weird with some of this.”

“Hot Coals,” “Serious,” and ‘Borderlines” are among the more visual tunes, and are enhanced by Fairlight synthesizer effects. “I have a Synclavier now,” Duke says, “but at that time I didn’t have anything and I wanted some different kind of sounds, and somebody who knew the instrument (John Barnes, Gary Chang, and Derek Nakamoto programmed Fairlight on the LP). He would try different things and I’d try to give him an idea of what we were looking for. On the spaceship song we needed some outer space kind of effects, and on “The Power” we wanted synthesizer bass and something that was strong.”

While they were tracking the effervescent cut “Live For Today,” Osborne told Duke that he would like to hear a choir singing behind him. They assembled “The Choir of Life—” Pat Benatar, Lynn Davis, Tramaine Hawkins, Howard Hewett, James Ingram, Joyce Kennedy, Debra Laws and Kenny Loggins, and they power it out, adding a distinctly gospel flavor. “It was a great feeling,” says the producer. “There’s some magic that happens when you get all that talent in one room, especially when there are no problems with ‘I’m a star.’ Man, it’s amazing. They just did it for Jeff for the love of it, cause there wasn’t any big money thing. That’s all it was—it was a love thing.”

Duke says that Osborne is one of those rare artists who knows what he wants his album to sound like long before he enters the studio. That makes the producer’s job a lot easier. “My basic gig is to keep everything cool so he can create and make the best possible product. Make his dream come true.”

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Herb Cohen MGT.

740 Nonh La Brea Ave 6 O r g e

Hollywood , Ca. 90038-
Ph # 1-213-935-4444
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Keyboard Chameleon George Duke Has Had a Strange Journey from Zappa to Outer Space

Duke began studying piano in Marin City, California at the age of seven. Some of his earliest musical education came in church. Duke says of the influence of gospel music, “When I first went to church l was scared to death. I didn’t know what was going on because there was so much emotion. You could feel it. l’d watch how the organist would sort of feed the preacher, like he’s backing up a soloist, and watch him work the audience.”

Encouraged to take up an “orchestral instrument” in the Tamalpais High School Band, he chose trombone. He did his undergraduate work at San Francisco Conservatory of Music with trombone as his principal instrument (because of scholarship money available for trombonists, he laughs). He loved the classical music, but found it limiting.

“I couldn’t change the notes,” says Duke in mock frustration. “I never will forget going to see my teacher one day thinking I had done something real slick. l’d learned how to read this piece and play it right, but I had this other idea. I thought it would be better if it had this other note in it. So I played it for my teacher like that. He said, ’What? You can’t do that.’ He took this little baton he had and rapped it across my knuckles.”

Duke’s love of classical music wasn’t completely crushed by the experience. While getting his master’s degree in composition from San Francisco State he composed an opera titled Tziim, portions of which he has performed on albums over the years (and can be heard on his recently released The 1976 Solo Keyboard Allumr). But his love for improvising music was much stronger.

During high school Duke had dabbled in rock bands, latin bands, and had begun leading his own jazz trio that performed in clubs he was too young to be in. When the manager of one such club found out his age he was quickly fired. “I had it tough for a while because I had this baby face, and I eventually grew this goatee which I’ve had forever,” he says, still not looking his 37 years.

In the late ’60s Duke’s trio backed up artists such as Al Jarreau at San Francisco’s Half Note Club. He began a musical association with jazz violinist Jean-Luc Ponty there too. “Jean—Luc was an incredible violinist,” says Duke. “There was nobody doing that kind of thing at the time. He was the closest thing musically to playing like Miles Davis. And this was like a different kind of instrument.

“Dick Bock, Jean-Luc’s producer, had an idea. He said, ’You guys play real high-powered jazz. Suppose you play that same thing and every now and then change the beat to a rock beat? Play rock beats and improvise like you do playing jazz. I’ll put you in a rock club.”’

Duke is amused as he tells of their first gig at The Experience, a psychedelic rock club in Los Angeles. Bock promised him there would be an acoustic piano there, but the keyboardist arrived to find only an electric. He had never played an electric piano. Quincy Jones was in the crowd, as was Cannonball Adderly, Frank Zappa, “and all the freaks,” he laughs. “I said, ’Man, this is out.. But we’ve got to play. That’s all there is to it.’

“I never will forget Jean-Luc’s face when I saw this chick get up off the floor with no bra. You have to re member we’re talking about 1969. Without a bra, and these things were juggling around back and forth. Jean-Luc started playing, and all of a sudden I’d never heard him play like that before. I said, “Yeah, this is it.’ So that was the beginning of fusion for me and him too.”

Duke was approached by Frank Zappa, who asked him to join his band, a unit that included Flo & Eddie, Aynsley Dunbar, Ruth and Ian Underwood, Tom Fowler and countless others. There’ve been a lot of wild Zappa bands and this one ranks among the best. “I didn’t even know what I was doing in that band,” Duke says. “Frank likes things that are real diverse. l guess he thought this would look real strange, ’so let’s do it.’

“He put me, like a jazz impresario, in the middle of all this stuff ’cause I played the kind of solos he liked. I used to be crazy. I’d play anything. I’m much more conservative playing now, much more purposeful. Then, I would throw the kitchen sink in the middle of a song to make it happen. Elbows, knees, and he used to love it.

“lt was a learning experience for me because all of a sudden here I was with a big rock and roll band. He was still sort of an underground figure but he could work anywhere in the country and thousands of people would show up to see him. And he’d be doing this crazy music. Here we were riding around in limousines and private planes — hippies! I lived in San Francisco, too, but the audience l’d played for was totally different than Frank’s audience. It was a real shock for me. Nobody wearing bras It was another trip.”

After a year with Zappa, Duke left to join Cannonball Adderly’s group. The keyboardist feels that’s where he did his growing up as a musician. “Cannonball was like a walking historian,” he says. “He’d talk to me about music, but it was interesting the way he used to do it. He wouldn’t come out and say, ’Don’t play that,’ or ’That’s wrong.’ He’d say, ’What if?’ or ’What do you think about this?’ Or he would just throw an idea at me and see if I could work it out.

“I always considered myself a pretty good accompanist. I could play behind anybody. But Cannonball was the hardest soloist I think I ever played for. One day I just gave up. I went backstage somewhere we had played and told him, ’Man, I can’t play behind you. I don’t know what to play. I can’t figure out the way you think and the way your ideas come together.’ He’d look at me and laugh. He’d tell me little things—— ’Well, listen to this. Sometimes I take the notes and do this.’ But he wouldn’t tell me what to play. He just gave me an idea of what he was thinking about. Frank’s different. I talked to him one day and he said, ’Look, I look at soloing like this.’ He took a chalkboard and drew this line and this figure. He says, ’That’s the way I think of music — shapes.’ 1 said, ’Shapes, ok.’ I looked at it and began to see what he was talking about. There were angular lines that went all kinds of ways. Some would stop for a minute and then there’d be a big dash up.”

The keyboardist went back with Zappa for another two-year stint. He credits Zappa with introducing him to synthesizers, and with starting him seriously thinking about singing. “He’d say, ‘Aw, come on, sing a little bit.’ He opened me up to a lot of things. I wouldn’t even play triplets. I said, ‘No, no, you’ll never get me to play that. I’m a musician, I don’t play those

sort of things.’ He’d look at me and say. Something wrong with your hands?’ Eventually I gave in, and that’s when I had a great time with that band.

“There’s an element that he always wanted in his band which he never had until he started getting people like me, Chester Thompson, Napolean Murphy Brock and certain black artists in the band. He wanted the blues in there, that R&B element. That’s what made his music so crazy. In the middle of all this weird stuff you’ve got the blues.

“The main thing I took from that band is, ’Hey, let’s have a good time. Don’t take yourself so seriously.’ I could really look at myself and say I’m not the god of piano playing here. I should lighten up a little bit.”

That sense of humor is certainly evident on Duke’s solo records. His earliest albums, Inner Suurce and Save The Country were jazz efforts. With his 1974 MPS/BASF release Feel, Duke began branching out to include bits of latin music, some jazz, a little blues, a vocal tune or two, some strange synthesizer music and the bizarre and outrageous humor. “It left people wondering, ’Who is this guy?’ But it was me,” he grins.

Some people remember George Duke for the Dukey Stick, for the pulsating glowing wand he uses onstage, or for the sexploitation punk funk raps on Reach For It with orgasmic effects that would make Donna Summer blush. Some people might remember him for Amanda B. Reckondwith from the spoof, “Rokkinrowl.” Some might remember him for the simple beauty of a love ballad like “Someday.”

Unlike many “jazz” artists who try their luck in the pop marketplace, George Duke has done pretty well. His first hit single was “Reach For It” in 1978, and the LPs Don’t Let Go, Follow The Rainbow, Brazilian Lave Affair, and Dream On were also successful. How has Duke made the transition so well?

“Some people do find it difficult,” he says. “I think producing a lot of artists helped me a lot, because I can see the other side of the fence. Some jazz artists have never found the essence of what makes that particular kind of music work.”

Larkin Arnold, then with Capitol Records, gave Duke his first shot at producing in 1977 with an album by trombonist Raul DeSouza. Don Mizell arranged for him to produce violinist Michael White and vocalist Dee Dee Bridgewater. “I wanted to get to singers,” Duke says, “because I figured they had a shot at Selling more records and would enlarge the base.”

He followed that with Flora Purim’s Carry On album for Warner Brothers and a record by Seawind. But he began to learn what pressure was all about when given. the reigns of a Taste Of Honey projbct. “They had been platinum. I started saying, ‘Ohhooo, this is the big time.’ They’d had a record right after their big record which didn’t do so well, so they were looking at me to bring these girls back.” Duke pauses “We got lucky.” The third single off the album was a million- selling remake of “Sukiyaki.”

“I try to produce the artist based on the artist‘s strengths and needs, as opposed to putting my sound on the artist and having them do my music. I like to use more of the artist’s ideas. That’s because of the way I was brought up musically. People didn’t always tell me what to play. They guided the ship.”

While working with these vocalists, Duke has learned some lessons and applied them to his own singing. “Most musicians, when they sing, are thinking of the notes and about pitch. They think if they sing a note out of tune that wrecks the whole song. Singers don’t think about that. They think about what they’re saying and the best way to get the expression of those words out.”

Duke began thinking differently about his own vocal approach right around the time of the Clarke/Duke Project, his successful album with virtuoso bassist Stanley Clarke. He remembers the beginnings of that record: “I said to Stanley, ’We can’t do the kind of record that everybody thinks we’re going to do. Everybody knows we‘re going to do one of these high-powered fusion records. We’ll sell a certain amount of records, but let’s see if we can enlarge that audience.’ So we did ‘Sweet Baby.”’ That record is quite possibly the biggest hit either of them has had to date.

To his record cumpany’s chagrin, after his Dream On album Duke wanted to do something different. His new creation, the album Guardian of the Light, is the elaborate mythical tale of Sorel’s attempts to guard the “Life Crystals,” and. win the love of Ti. “I wanted the story to be timeless — any time, another planet, yesteryear, in the future, but have the songs be now,” he says. “It’s looking at the whole psychology behind war and fighting, in funk songs. Most concept things like that are done with rock groups, generally. It doesn’t happen too much in R&B except for maybe George Clinton.

“The record company hated it,” Duke shrugs, while breaking into a somewhat innocent grin. “They said, “What are you doing with a story?’ I’m always doing something a little weird.

“You can enjoy the music without the story, but somebody’s going to read that story and connect it with the music and they’ll see what I was trying to do. When Sorel lost the crystals he thought it was over. But the power of his own mind was much stronger than he ever thought. That’s the simple thing I was trying to say in that whole scenario. Try to depend more on yourself.”

Guardian of the Light will probably be a respectable seller, not a smash. Duke understands, but goes on undaunted believing in his ability to make “real, bonafide, serious, big records.”

“My tastes are so vast that maybe it’s impossible for a large number of people to be totally into me and everything I do. Realizing that, I think everybody’s entitled to’ like whatever part of me musically it is that they want to like. I think that’s fine.

“Actually. I’d like to be like Stevie Wonder or Frank or Michael Jackson. Those musicians have reached a point where they can do almost anything they want to do. It goes beyond exactly what they’re doing or the style of music they’re performing People love them for who they are any as long as it’s good they know they’re going to get off. And if it’s something they don’t understand they’ll probably call it ‘genius.'”

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Herb Cohen MGT.
740 North La Brea Ave.
Hollywood, CA 90038
Ph# 1-213-935-4444
Fax# 1-213-936-635

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Duke is now called frequently by Anita Baker for arranging ideas. natalie Cole called him for assistance on a Billie Holiday song. Sadao Watanabe and Hiroshima had him produce recent releases. He introduced Philip Bailey of Earth, Wind & Fire to the world as a solo artist, and he’s worked on several Deniece Williams projects. He did Smokey Robinson’s album and a track for Miles Davis this year, before taking his old friend Jarreau into the Top Five in the jazz and R&B charts with Heart’s Horizon.

This well-rounded musical knowledge results from training–some on-the-job–in a variety of styles. He graduated from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, studying classical piano and trombone, but grew bored with it when instructors chastised him for wanting to change notes in classics that he learned. He received his master’s in music composition from San Francisco State University and taught classes in contemporary improvisation and jazz in American culture. He led the house band at S.F.’s Half Note Club from 1965 to 1970, frequently backing a yet-unsigned Jarreau.

After moving to Los Angeles, Duke got his first taste of playing electric piano with Jean-Luc Ponty, and was soon asked to join Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention, where his trombone skills were put to use as was his growing keyboard prowess. Zappa forced him to use a synthesizer for the first time, for which Duke is probably quite grateful. Between separate two-year sstings with Zappa, Duke played with Cannonball Adderley’s band from ’72 to ’73. Duke began recording as a solo artist in 1974, with time along the way in the Cobham-Duke band and Clarke-Duke project. On many recording sessions, his name as a sideman has been Dawalli Gonga. Almost overshadowed by producing credits, his solo career is again on the move with the playful and far-reaching Night After Night.

His producing career started in 1977 with trombonist Raul de Souza’s Sweet Lucy and Flora Purim’s Carry On. His first big hits were with Taste of Honey (“Sukiyaki”) and jeffrey Osborne (“On the Wings of Love”), and he’s hoping for some of that same crossover magic with Jarreau’s new one. Jarreau seems quite pleased to be collaborating with Duke again. “George helped me get a breadth of material like I’ve never had,” the singer says. “He’s played this wide variety of music as an accompanist, and then accompanying himself as a soloist. There aren’t any iner, you know.”

I spoke recently to Duke about his work as a producer.

Mix: Do you think the groundwork was being laid for your producing career with your early solo records, the spectrum of music and the craziness like the “Dukey Stick” that you got into?

Duke: Without a doubt. Even my undergraduate years in school–all that theory, composition and ear training. All that stuff has really helped me be more flexible in what I’m doing now. I know a lot of guys don’t read music, but reading has meant a lot to me in terms of my pocketbook. As a producer I don’t have to go out and hire other people to write stuff out. Sometimes I don’t have time and I’ll get somebody to do it, but ina pinch I can sit down and write a lead sheet out, as opposed to trying to explain to someone at a session that I want this and I want that without knowing quite how to say it. I saw, “Listen, this needs to be in A, this should be a B-flat.” You can actually talk music language with people that understand. And all the technical stuff really makes a difference. I learned a lot of that from watching Frank Zappa, who seemed to know so much about what was going on in the studio. The first time I worked with him I said, “Man, I want to be able to do that.” He could look at the engineer and say, “This needs less 2K.”

Mix: Were there other producers who influenced you?

Duke: I never really got into producers until later, because I always considered myself an artist. I started getting into production as a means of making an alternate buck during the disco era, when it looked like the music I was playing was going to be blown away. Other thank Frank, I would assume that Quincy Jones was an influence in the late ’70s, but I basically just drew from whatever I heard on the radio, from whatever I liked and all the experiences I had in the past from the artist standpoint. I never really had a producer. I was always in there kicking around on my own. So when I started producing other artists, I wasn’t coming in like, “Okay, now sing this note here, this is a song we’re going to do.” It was more like, “Okay, what do you want to do with this record? Where do you want to go?” And of course each artist has a different need, so it was all kind of pliable and adjustable.

Mix: If somebody asked you today, could you pick up a Narada Michael Walden- or Keith Olsen-produced song?

Duke: Most producers have a pretty identifiable sound. The main difference between me and most of the on temporary producers is that I do so many different types of music that it would be a little more difficult to tell my productions from one another. Going from Miles Davis to Smokey Robinson, for example. If you heard the song I did for Miles and the one I did for Smokey you’d swear they’re produced by different people. That’s diversity. That’s what I’ve always tried to do in my playing and my music, and I’ve tried to adapt that to production as well.

Mix: How do you explain being a great player and being able to cross over to successful producing? Not everyone can do that.

Duke: A lot of it has to do with just being able to get along with people and being able to listen and perceive what’s going on in somebody’s head. Sometimes you get singers in and they’ve got a thousand things going through their mind, and they’re not putting out their best. You’ve got to find some way to get a spark out of them and get them into the song so they’re making the decisions. Even though you may be making suggestions and guiding the ship along in a certain way, you have to convince them that they have made the right decision. And once they make a decision, it’s like something clicks on in their head, something changes. As soon as that confidence comes back, it’s like another singer stepped into the room. And it’s the same way with horn players.

Mix: You and Jeffrey Osborne seem to work well together.

Duke: He was very involved with what was going on in the studio. I learned as much from him as he learned from me. When you’re dealing with a singer like that, there’s almost nothing to say. He goes in and sings, and two takes later you’ve got it. He had a lot of confidence and a very innate sense about which way to go with his own career. At that time he was very unique, and I was glad to have that opportunity to work with him. I have to admit that the third record I did with him, Don’t Stop, suffered from not having as much involvement from Jeffrey as Stay With Me Tonight did. I have to accept blame for that, even though it was a successful record. He had gotten so hot and was flying up to perform at Vegas and Tahoe and wasn’t around for enough of the record.

Mix: What do you spend the most time on in the studio?

Duke: I’ll spend a lot of time on a vocal. I’ll spend a lot of time on a mix, too, but in the final analysis I’d probably spend more time on a vocal. Because if the vocalist is the lead and we don’t sell it with the vocal, we ain’t got a shot whether the mix is right or not. A mix can be bad and the vocal can be happening and you’ve still got a record. So the basic pocket of the record has to be there, which generally doesn’t take that much time for me. And as long as I can get the artist in that work mode, and really believing that we’re going for something special, then we’re generally okay.

Mix: How much of a good sound in the studio is equipment, and how much of it is the ears in the booth?

Duke: Whether you’re talking about samples or live musicians, you got to start with something that’s good. If you’ve got a great sample then you don’t need to use as much EQ or anything else. So if you start off with a good source, it’s automatically going to sound better. Plus I have a great engineer, Erik Zobler.

Mix: If you had to choose, would you prefer good equipment and a bad engineer or bad equipment and a good engineer?

Duke: I’d rather have bad equipment and a good engineer, because you can’t replace somebody that’s got an ear. In my studio I’ve got what I call a “Poor Man’s Massenburg” setup. I have a Series 3B console, which is an old Soundcraft, before they changed over to the SSL people. The Series 3B we use for playback almost exclusively. There may be an occasion where we record through the board, but very seldom. Normally we go through George Massenburg preamps, or another kind–one that was actually built by my engineer–depending on what we’re recording and what we’re looking for out of the preamp; something very transparent, not quite as sophisticated or as wide, or whatever. We go through various limiters or other praphernalia, depending on what we need for the sound we’re dealing with, and go right into the Mitsubishi. I have a 32-track digital tape machine. And on occasion I’ll just record right out of the Synclavier into the Mitsubishi.

Mix: What first piece of equipment would you buy if you were starting up a studio?

Duke: A Synclavier, because that’s a studio all in one. The Korg M1 is great, too. But when I recorded Jeffrey Osborne’s first record, all those great songs except for a couple were done in my office, where I had my secretary working, my coffee machine and my refrigerator. I had switches put on so I could turn the regrigerator and clocks off. I used to put foam in the windows. I’d move my secretary’s desk, and we would put Jeffrey over there and put a mic up in front of him and let him sing. Close the door. And I had to make sure my kids didn’t walk on the floor up above. There was no Synclavier at the time. In terms of recording, you don’t always need something real elaborate to make something happen. But to bring it back to the Synclavier at the time. In terms of recording, you don’t always need something real elaborate to make something happen. But to bring it back to the Synclavier, you’ve got a very strong medium for recording, a strong workstation for doing everything you need. Even without Direct-to-Disk, you can definitely do a complete track on the Synclavier. That’s what I’ve been doing for years.

Mix: I can understand a producer having a core of musicians and wanting to use them on a lot of different records. Do you feel any obligation to use new guys, keep bringing in fresh players?

Duke: No, I don’t feel an obligation to do that. In terms of my work, my responsibility is to the record company and to the artist. And that’s pretty much where the buck stops. I have to give the artist, in the most efficient way possible, the product they’re looking for, and that may mean using the guys that I use all the time. I admit I’m reluctant to use musicians I don’t know, because I can call such and such and they’ll come over here and be in and out in ten minutes. I could call somebody else who doesn’t read as well or I don’t know, and then I just wouldn’t know. I will experiment more on my own records, because it’s my budget and that’s different. But when I’m dealing as a producer with other people’s records, I’ve got their money in my pocket and I don’t want to experiment with it.

Mix: Has MIDI changed things at your studio?

Duke: Oh, tremendously. Without MIDI we’d be in the Dark Ages. I remember going onstage and playing without MIDI, and I don’t know how I ever did it. If we’d had MIDI when I was with Frank Zappa, can you imagine what could have happened in that band? I wonder sometimes. But in the room here it’s made it much faster to do anything I want to do. I think it’s just the greatest innovation of this century. [Laughs] I really think it’s absolutely essential. I’ve got everything going through a big Cooper MIDI switcher, and everything is hooked up to the Synclavier through that, so I can switch it around any way I want to. I’ve got my Minimoog and all my stuff MIDIed up to this unit, and I can pretty much choose what I want to do and run it down any track that I decide to use on the Synclavier. I love the idea of rack-mounting everything and having it come through one or two keyboards.

Mix: In what ways does your own music benefit by you being a producer?

Duke: I did a couple of songs for Barry Manilow. A lot of people would say, “Wow, that’s weird.” But I tell you, from working with Barry you learn something. From working with Frank I learned something. From working with Miles. Whoever. From working with Smokey Robinson recently, I can see how he looks at his own music and what he’s looking for. And I’ll take a little piece of that and put it in my music. Other than that, it’s hard for me to produce myself. I’m really an artist at that point. I don’t get on myself as hard as I probably should, except about my vocals. My voice in general has gotten a lot better because of that, but in terms of overall concept of albums that’s kind of tough, because I’m really an artist first and the producer takes a back seat. I tell him to sit down, because this is my record, and my time to get crazy and do what I want to do.

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