One of Smooth Jazz’s founding fathers, Alex Bugnon has created one of the most recognized styles in today's contemporary jazz piano.  It is a sultry mixture of contemporary jazz, funk, and R&B with hints of gospel.  Growing up in Montreux, Switzerland — the home of the Montreux Jazz Festival — Bugnon started playing classical piano at age six. Guided by his father, a jazz guitarist and classical opera singer, Bugnon acquired a love for a wide range of music from Scott Joplin, Thelonious Monk, and Bill Evans to Herbie Hancock, McCoy Tyner, and Joe Sample. Once a year for an entire month, Montreux becomes the crossroads of the musical world, and Bugnon went to his first concert at age seven to see none other than Aretha Franklin! He studied at the Paris Conservatory and the famous Mozart Academy in Salzburg, Austria. At age nineteen, he moved to the U.S. and attended the Berklee School of Music. While a student at Berklee, he performed with local bands at clubs in and around the Boston area. During that period, he also performed in church with many gospel groups. In 1985 he moved to New York where he spent four years working as a session musician and touring with urban and jazz luminaries such as Patti Austin, Freddie Jackson, James Ingram, Earth Wind and Fire, and Keith Sweat. Bugnon began his recording career in 1989 with his debut album, LOVE SEASON which reached the pop charts and the Top 40 of the R&B charts as did his 1990 recording, HEAD OVER HEELS. SmoothViews meets up with him today, just as he’s finishing his 10th solo recording, Going Home.

SmoothViews (SV):  Alex, we want to warmly welcome you to SmoothViews.com.  Many of us are Alex Bugnon fans from way back, from your first album Love Season, and 107 Degrees in the Shade,This Time Around to four best-selling CDs on Narada.  Although SmoothViews has been online for five years, this is our first opportunity to sit down and chat with you in depth! Thank you for bringing us many years of fantastic contemporary jazz and countless, invigorating, live performances.  We are honored to be speaking with you now, especially on the eve of your new CD release Going Home, which will come out around the end of November.  Congratulations!
Alex Bugnon (AB):  Thank you very much. It’s my pleasure to be here.

SV:  We are closing in on your street date. What stage are you in right now?
AB:  Mastering is finished today.  It’s being mastered by Steve Vavagiakis for Bang Zoom Productions.  He started on Tuesday, worked on it yesterday and is finishing up now. All the packaging is ready and we’ll begin manufacturing next week.

SV: You have a really good group of artists working with you on this record.  I love the acoustic trio setting with some additional instrumentation, especially the horns and guitar. Who did all your horn charts?
AB:  I wrote the melodic arrangements and basic chords, but Vincent Henry, Greg Boyer, and Barry Danielian added their talent for orchestration.

SV:  WOW! That’s impressive!  I had no idea that you had that expertise.  I like the way you work the horns in to most of the tracks.
AB:  Thank you!

SV:  I saw you perform this past May on a Saturday in a quartet setting and enjoyed it very much. So did the audience.  It worked really well live. Would you tell us more about your inspiration for the acoustic quartet setting on this album? 
AB:  First of all, it was an idea that Vincent Henry, my co-producer and horn player (sax, flute), had for awhile.  He thought I should do a ‘60s inspired record, with a Les McCann/Eddie Harris vibe.  I really liked that idea, but I wanted to include a little more jazz than that, more towards a Herbie Hancock/Blue Note era kind of vibe.  You know, Herbie in a Blue Note quintet with two horns or a sextet with three horns, Wayne Shorter, Dexter Gordon, and Freddie Hubbard. That’s what I was going for.  At first, I really wasn't sure what to write or how to write for this kind of sound. For the first 3 months of 2009, I was home every day.  The beginning of the year was just so horrendous for gigging. So, I was practicing every day, anywhere from 4 to 6 hours a day, which is something that I haven’t done since I was at Berklee. For three months I did that.  The rest of the time I was listening to Ahmad Jamal, especially the album The Awakening; that’s one of his best known records, one of my favorites. I was listening to the whole Blue Note catalog of Herbie Hancock (chuckles), and to Les McCann, Miles Davis’ favorite accompanist Wynton Kelly, and Miles Davis himself – I realized that in the sixties, this music was the popular, commercial music of the time.  Back then, this sound was really hip and underground…and well, commercial, especially the music of Miles and certain tunes of Herbie. I said, “Oh WOW!  You can be viable playing that sound, that instrumentation, a trio or quartet with 3 horns.  You don’t have to make an R&B song with synthesizers and drum machine.” You don’t need all that to be marketable.  History shows that when Herbie did “Watermelon Man” and “Cantaloupe Island,” those were huge hits.  And they were deep into playing on those records.  They didn’t hold back for any radio play.  So, you can see the concept for Going Home came from a lot of listening and practicing.  At a certain time in April, I started to come up with new material.  You saw it yourself when we played in Wisconsin.  Something unlocked in me, because of all that listening and practicing that I did, the intelligent practicing; the writing for the new record came from that.  It was totally natural.  I didn’t have to sit down and scratch my head for hours.  The tunes just came in minutes. That’s how this record came about.

SV:  Come to think of it, your earlier recordings had that heavy R&B electronic funk sound, accented with Fender Rhodes.  But I can see a natural evolution in your work, especially around the time of your albums Southern Living and Free, where you began simplifying, trimming out the extraneous instrumentation, back to the core…which is your magnificent playing.  It is so amazing to hear you on the Steinway grand.  Don’t get me wrong, I love you on a Fender Rhodes and all your electric keyboards, but to hear the way you make that Steinway sing…Oh! Baby! Baby! The energetic runs and intricate fingering are phenomenal!
AB: That was hard to play! (laughs) It’s an unforgiving instrument. I’m glad to have a church across the street from my home that has a Steinway. I went to practice on it everyday. (laughs)

SV:  You used to have a grand piano in your home. No more?
AB:  I did; it was a Yamaha.  Most of my Narada records were done on that Yamaha piano. I don’t have it anymore.  A couple years ago, I was not actually enjoying playing it anymore. On the road, I was lucky enough to have Steinways about half the time and, at home, to have one right across the street at this beautiful, old church, an 18th century church. The eight foot Steinway in that church sounds great!  I would come home from touring, look at the Yamaha, and say, “I don’t think so…” (laughs)  I knew I could do something else with that money, so I sold it. Hopefully, I’ll have enough money one day to buy a Steinway B.

SV:  You could become a Steinway artist.
AB:  I almost became one in 1994 when I did the record for RCA.  The rep for Steinway was all set to go; we turn around and she was no longer with the company.  We didn’t know anyone else there at the time.

SV:  If you keep playing like this, you may just find a new connection yet!  I want to ask how you made your song selection for the new album. There’s such variety, from Herbie Hancock’s “Oliloqui Valley,” to the French Swiss folk song by…
AB: Father Joseph Bovet.

SV:  Please tell us more about that song.
AB: Absolutely!  I would love to talk about it.

SV:  Is that a song from your childhood?
AB:  No, that’s a chorale, four-voice chorale, that the priest Father Joseph Bovet, is one of the most prolific church and popular music composers of Switzerland.  Most of the best known folk music has been written by him - folk songs, popular songs, the August first songs, a national day, where songs are sung to honor that day.  They are beautiful songs.  He was a priest, but he was also a master organ player and choral conductor at the big cathedral in Fribourg, Switzerland; he was a classically trained musician.  This chorale, I didn’t know until my father’s funeral in 1998.  My father was a great singer, mostly of opera.  So are all my father’s cousins.  None are professional except a cousin of my generation.  My father’s cousins are butcher, teacher, and so on, but they all sing opera like nobodies’ business - Just for the love of it.  At my father’s funeral, of course, everybody was there. His whole group of cousins, about 10 or 12 of them, got together before the service with my cousin Yves, the professional singer and conductor. They put together three songs.  One of them was Father Bovet’s “Nouthra Dona di Maortsè.”  They were singing right behind me, and when I heard this song, which was so beautiful, I turned around to experience it better.  It was so moving…I’ll never forget that. About a year later, I asked my cousin, Yves, “What was that song, that you sang at the funeral, the last one of the service?”  He faxed me the lead sheet music and I’ve always kept it at home.  Suddenly last year, I came up with this arrangement.  It’s a real chorale arrangement with no beat [Alex plays the chord progression.] It’s actually classical. [Alex sings the melody.] It’s a chorale that I made it into the song on the album.  It’s a beautiful melody.  This arrangement lends itself to Father Bovet’s song very nicely.

SV:  In the fourth track on your new CD, “Nouthra Dona di Maortsè,” you take the lovely melody and improvise around it and add the great horn section.  The percussion and drumming are really exceptional.  It really is beautiful!
AB:  I love it!  I really love it!

SV:  If it’s a chorale, there must be some lyrics to it. What do they mean?
AB:  Yes, there are lyrics, but I don’t know them!  They are in Patois Gruyérien , an original dialect of Switzerland.  I don’t understand it!  (laughs)  But the title is “Our Lady of the Steps” that’s nothing more that a little church in mountains.  It’s a beautiful chapel in the mountains of Switzerland that some people go to, on a pilgrimage, to do charity work.  There you go!

SV: If I could go back to the Herbie track for a minute.  You open the album with it.  This song has been recorded by a lot of different artists.  When I heard your version, I said, “WOW!” It’s full, lush, and highly improvisational.  You do not mimic Herbie, but you definitely capture the spirit.
AB:  Thank you.  That piano pattern that Herbie plays on the top, is the part of the song that, to me, is so cool.  That’s what always attracted me.

SV:  Since you listened to most of his early Blue Note works, you’d readily pick out those striking melodies.  They stay with you, don’t they?  When you were recording this track, were you thinking about Herbie?  Were you and your fellow musicians focused on creating a “Herbie vibe” when you were playing together?  Or was it “in the moment?”
AB:  Totally in the moment. As you might have seen on the credits, we recorded the whole album in two days, May 5th and 6th, with Nicola Stemmer at Nine Lives Studio in Jersey City.  We didn’t have time to think and maybe that was good, (laughs) because every time I had too much time to think, I usually messed up.

SV:  Did you record the horns live?
AB:  It’s funny you should ask. At the time, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do.  We went in the studio and recorded all the music as a quartet.  I left with the music as is, for over a month.  I wasn’t sure if it needed anything else; I wanted to fix some things and Victor also had some bass things to fix.  But, at that point, Victor went on the road.  He got injured in an airport in Moscow and sprained his finger. He couldn’t play bass for a month! For Victor, that was really bad.  But, as far as I’m concerned, it was actually a blessing in disguise.  I was able to sit down with the music and explore what I was going to do with it.  I wasn’t sure if I was going to keep just the trio.  Then one day I woke up and told Vincent that I was coming down to DC to record.  I also called Greg Boyer, the trombone player.  Vincent and Greg did a session together, playing over the quartet music.  I said, “Hmmm, now that we’ve gone this far, why don’t I add a little trumpet in there.”  So I went back to New York and recorded Barry Danielian, one of New York’s top trumpet chairs.  He does all the biggest gigs, Barbra Streisand, Michael Feinstein, Carole King the biggest Broadway shows like Bye, Bye, Birdie. He’s like The Guy, the “go to” trumpet player, top session guy in New York.  And I went to Berklee with him!  We played together at Berklee with Branford Marsalis, Smitty Smith, and Jeff Watts.  We’ve known each other for a long time. In fact, Barry mixed the record at Urban Sufi Studios in Jersey City.

SV:  I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Barry, a real stand-up guy.  I saw him play at the Berks Jazz Festival in the Jason Miles’ tribute to Miles Davis, “Miles to Miles.”  Barry was outstanding.  On your new CD, did I read that Barry also plays flugelhorn?
AB:  Yes!  On the title track “Going Home.”

SV:  For that track, Barry’s playing is so subtle and slightly melancholy. It is really emotive.  We’ll talk more about that track in a little while. Your second track is called “Silverfinger,” which is such a great title for your performance on this song!  Your fingers are all over the keyboard! (laughs) Is that how you came up with the title?
AB: (laughs) Actually not.  I was, of course, thinking of “Goldfinger” and also Horace Silver! (laughs)
It’s just a play on words.  The first line on the piano is a take on “Señor Blues,” which is a song by Horace Silver.  It reminds you of that song a little bit. Horace Silver, now there’s another piano player I totally admire.

SV:  Horace Silver is amazingly prolific and a true pioneer, especially in the 1950’s music scene.  He didn’t get all the attention that others did, but he is still one of the jazz stalwarts and a role model for those who came after him. There’s a huge band sound in the way you produced that track, lots of horns, which I love. 
AB: It’s saxophone and trombone, sometimes two tracks of trombone where he doubles his part to create another voice in the mix.  I don’t remember all the different combinations for the various tunes because we created it “in the moment.” (laughs)

SV:  Tell us about the trombone player, Greg Boyer.  Click for pronunciation
AB:  Greg Boyer is in his mid 50s, a tall, very handsome man.  His wife and he look like People magazine’s most beautiful people in the world. (laughs) The kind of people you hate! (laughs) He is originally from Baltimore.  He has his own acoustic quartet, The Greg Boyer Peloton, that is straight ahead and funk.  In the ‘70s and ‘80s, he was a member of Parliament/Funkadelic. In the ‘90s, he was with Maceo Parker doing all the arrangements and playing.  For the last few years, he’s been with Prince.  Greg is just amazing.  That last solo on “Going Home” is just remarkable to me.  Greg drives a Harley.  He puts his trombone on his back and goes to the gig. (laughs)

SV:  That’s a great image! (laughs)  The third track on your new record is “The World is a Ghetto,” familiar to smooth jazz audiences from George Benson’s In Flight album.  You really make this song your own. The horns add to this arrangement, carrying the melody, with piano improvising around it.  I am curious, was there a particular attachment you have to this song?
AB:  Actually, I heard a version of this song by Phil Davis [on his Philosophy album] that had those very different chords; that progression of chords is totally different. I was, “WOOO, I like that! I’ve got to play those chords!”  That’s where some of the arrangement came from, Phil Davis.  Also, the horns take the melody because I wanted the piano to stay free to play around the melody, as opposed to playing the melody itself. On a song like that, if the piano plays the melody, to me, it’ll sound like musak.  A song like that played by the piano, I would have thought I was in Macy’s or some place like that. I’d rather have the melody played by the horns, which gives a classy, old fashioned vibe that sticks to the original War melody.  I don’t want to write any little embellishments.  The melody has to stay right there.  I’ll do the rest on piano; I’ll play around, go crazy around it with piano, playing freely around the melody and the taking my solo.  Also I didn’t want to make it longer than three minutes. I didn’t want to make it such a big deal.  I thought three minutes was enough for such a famous song.  I just wanted to give a touch of it and then move on.

SV:  The number five track is very hip, called “Jersey Jump.”  Your producer and horn player Vincent Henry is also the composer.  Here’s an interesting, strident melody that repeats prominently.  Did Vincent write this on the fly? Or is this something you two came up with together?
AB:  He already had this song for awhile, but it was arranged very differently. It was more like an African jazz vibe, like Fela-Kuti-meets-Quincy-Jones. He had a big horn section on trombone, trumpet, with piccolo on top; and it was a different rhythm.  I just kept the melody.  That’s it.  Then I made it into that gospel thing.  We came in the studio with just the melody.  Victor Bailey [electric and acoustic bass], Poogie Bell [drums, percussion,] and I just went into the studio and worked it out. We rehearsed the song three or four times and we hit a vibe. Then we recorded it, just like that, one take. Straight from the top to the bottom. Boom.

SV:  Tell us about your relationship with Vincent.  Is he a long time buddy from Berklee?
AB:  We met at the same time I met Poogie, in 1986, when we were chosen to become Freddie Jackson’s first band, right after Freddie’s first album, Rock Me Tonight, you know, “Rock Me Tonight (For Old Times Sake,)”  “You Are My Lady.”  We went into a major, two year, arena tour and stadium tours during the summers. Vincent was the guitar player and saxophone; Poogie was the drummer; and I was the main keyboard player.

SV:  Touring like that for such a long time, you’d really get to know each other.
AB:  Oh yeah! And I’ve known Victor Bailey since 1979!

SV:  Oh my gosh!  That’s right when you moved to the US.  
AB:  That’s right. I was at the Berklee cafeteria having breakfast with somebody I had just met.  A young Victor Bailey came in and he was mad as hell!  Turns out he was too young to get the gig with Grover Washington, Jr. (laughs) and Victor didn’t like that!  He said, “They won’t take me because I’m under age!”  That’s how I met Victor.  I’ll never forget that.  He went on to play with Weather Report.

SV:  I really enjoy this next song, “Another Love Season.”  There is such a strong, hip, bass line and the melody is so gorgeous. It reminds me of the title track of your very first album Love Season.   On this new track, I was hearing a lot of acoustic guitar.
AB:  That’s Keith Robinson!  I had to put my buddy on the record. 

SV:  He used to play with Earth, Wind & Fire, right?
AB:  Oh yeah!  He’s “Mr. Freelance.”  His main gig is with Vanessa Williams, has been for years.  She keeps the same band.  He was the house band at the President Obama ceremony outside the capitol.  He was playing behind Stevie Wonder and all these big time players.

SV:  He must be well connected!
AB:  Absolutely!  Also, on “Another Love Season,”this is Victor Bailey’s debut on the acoustic bass.  He hasn’t played acoustic bass on a recording yet.  That’s his debut right there!  He has studied for about two or three years now…with Ron Carter.

SV:  OH WOW!!! He couldn’t have a better teacher!!!
AB:  No, you couldn’t find a better teacher if you are going to study bass. (laughs)   He goes up to Ron’s house once a week or so.

SV:  He’s got to play more acoustic bass.  It’s stand out playing. I was very attracted to that bass line.
AB:  I wanted to put a little South African vibe on it, but we invariably went to church with it. (laughs)  South African church! (laughs)

SV:  Does “Love Season” hold a special place in your heart, your first album, first popular hit?
AB:  Oh yeah!  I hear from people all the time, showing me pictures of their kids, telling me, “We made this kid while we were listening to your song!” (laughs)  You know, it’s a really good feeling.

SV:  I want to talk to you about the seventh track, “Ahmad’s Apple.”  Oh man! It’s such a great song!  You and the band are really cookin’. Again, some really stand out bass work. It’s just so lyrical, between the drums and the bass, and your Steinway piano, it conjures all-time great piano players like Ahmad Jamal.
AB:  The freedom of this song is exactly what Ahmad has been about all these years.  He never worried about what he was supposed to do in a certain genre.  He never worried about straying away from what a jazz musician is supposed to do versus not supposed to do. He always, always did what he felt. That’s all he wanted to do.  Sometimes his music turns out a certain way and I wonder, “How did he think of that?  It’s crazy!”  In a really humble manner, in my song, we try to emulate how Ahmad Jamal thinks, plays, and writes.

SV:  I really like the title too.  It conjures a New York City jazz club. The Big Apple.  Ahmad’s Apple.  His contribution is so vast.  He could play very simply.  From listening to so much of his music, did it inspire you to take some liberties too?
AB:  Absolutely!

SV:  The closing track is my very favorite, and it’s the title track, “Going Home.”  This track is somewhat symbolic for you.  In your musical journey, your performance on this album brings you “home.”  You are at home in your playing style.  The music itself “brings it home” – it is highly improvisational, with a full bodied melody, and a great bridge.  The composition is almost like a journey.  You move through the piece, changing the textures throughout, a surprise at many of the turns.  I kept thinking “Oh, now where are we going?!”  Your fingering is so nimble.
AB:  It came out so beautifully.  It blossomed like a flower in the middle of the song.  It’s really, really nice.

SV:  And I like the ending so much, with its fun flourish, then horn interplay, and keeps going with 3 endings to it. (laughs) Very cool.
AB:  (laughs) We just couldn’t stop.  One more chord.

SV:  Is this song your statement piece on the new CD?
AB:  Yes, I would say so.  It’s got everything I ever wanted to hear on either my record or somebody’s record.  It has every influence that I had in my life.  The bridge has my trademark R&B influence. The rest of the song has all the jazz influences that I like. The melancholy of the song, the romanticism of the song, it’s got everything that’s a part of me.  I’m really, really happy about that.

SV:  It is truly extraordinary.
AB:  The track was recorded on the first take. That was it. No overdubs. The only song that I had to overdub a little bit of piano was “The World Is A Ghetto” and the end of “Ahmad’s Apple” because…I was goofing around. (laughs)  I redid the end.  Other than that, the whole record is first takes.

SV: Having seen you live in May and hearing this record, playing the album live will make for a incredible experience. Audiences are going to love it.  Will you debut this album in a live performance soon?
AB:  Yes!  As a matter of fact, I’m breaking Dizzy Gillespie’s record - I’m appearing at Blues Alley for the 13th year in a row, at the end of November.  I’ll be playing much of the new record there.  It’ll be like my CD Release parties.

SV:  So, the record will be available at the end of November, beginning at Blues Alley.  After that, fans will be able to find it on Amazon, iTunes, and CDBaby.
AB: That’s right.  And at my shows.  You know, my one regret about this album is that it is not coming out on Narada.

SV:  I love you for saying that! 
AB:  That’s my only regret.

SV:  One last question…Has your uncle Dr. Donald Byrd heard this record yet?
AB:  No, but Dr. Byrd was a big motivator for me to do the record the way I did.  I saw him in April, two or three weeks before we went to the studio.  I was telling him what songs I wanted to do, including one of his songs, “Cristo Redentor.”  He said, “Man, what are you going to do all this stuff for?  This old stuff.  Just write what you feel and go in the studio.  End of story.  Don’t worry about anything that you think you have to do for show business, for radio.  Just go out, do what you feel. And that’s it.”  He said that’s all he’s ever done. So I said, “OK!” That was a big boost. Three weeks later, we went in.  He hasn’t heard it yet, because he doesn’t believe in turning his cell phone on.  It’s probably under the bed someplace. (laughs)

SV:  You’ll have to drive a CD over to his house and play it for him.  He is going to be so proud of you.  You did exactly what he said to do.
AB:  I can’t wait for him to hear it.

SV:  Since I saw your quartet play live in May at “Jazz On The Vine” festival in Wisconsin, have you been playing most of your sets as a quartet?  How do the smooth jazz crowds respond to your approach?
AB:  In our jazz festival shows this spring and summer, I’ve been playing in the quartet setting with Victor, Vincent, and Poogie.  We play my old stuff in a medley and the audiences just love it. They forgot they knew the songs.  “I love that. I used to listen to that.”  On top of that, audiences really enjoy it when somebody is really, really playing their hearts out on stage, especially when there is true interaction between musicians.  When they see a bass player like Victor come in and play a really nice bass solo, or they see Poogie playing a really musical drum solo that’s not loud, people really enjoy that.  We’ve been getting lots of standing ovations.

SV:  Well, I hope you get to play this album live a whole lot more. It’s so refreshing and contemporary with a broad appeal.  You must be very, very proud.
AB:  Oh yes, I am. In addition to many US dates, I know this music will carry me to Europe and rest of the world. My booking agent is on a mission.

SV:  Good luck with that.  We are so honored to speak with you today.  All the best to you!
AB:  Thank you!  Take care!