# John Scofield: Showing off is not his thing: Video, Photo

- Link: https://jazzblues.eu/2022/02/03/john-scofield-showing-off-is-not-his-thing-video-photo/
- Published: 2022-02-03T13:56:48+01:00
- Author: https://JazzBlues.EU

**Easy-going master: Boxing Day John Scofield is as original and versatile as he
is.**

Even jazz musicians don’t do everything right. Except for John Scofield. It may 
be due to a guitarist trait that cool jazz guru Miles Davis was quick to spot. When
the two crossed paths in the early 1980s, Miles brought the young man from Dayton,
Ohio into his open pool of musicians. Reason: Now he finally has someone who can
teach his guitarist Mike Stern a little understatement. Whether the taming of the
wild Mike Stern by the reserved John Scofield worked may be unclear; their interaction
at Miles was short-lived anyway. What remains to be noted, however, is that John
Scofield’s never boasting guitar playing, far removed from any star posturing, has
secured him the sympathy of the guild and opened many doors in jazz and other musical
genres.

Anyone who asks a jazz guitarist about his role models or rockers who they value
as jazz musicians can bet that the name Scofield will come up. Of course, this is
primarily related to his musical competence, and in turn to an almost encyclopedic
variety of styles, which he masters without posing as a musical polymath. The best
example of how John Scofield doses his skill and discreetly hints at his knowledge
is the track “She Was Young” from his recent recording “Swallow Tales” from last
year with bassist Steve Swallow and drummer Bill Stewart. Towards the end of the
improvisations – cleverly prepared on his Ibanez AS-200 from 1986 – sharp distorted
tones emerge as if blown over from another sound world. And shortly thereafter follows
a rock ‘n’ roll lick, as one remembers from the legendary Chuck Berry, before he
began one of his curious duckwalks across the stage. It doesn’t need more to indicate
that nothing musical is alien to him.

After training at the Berklee School of Music in Boston, John Scofield had a spectacular
start on the professional music scene in 1974 with the reunion of Gerry Mulligan
with Chet Baker in New York’s Carnegie Hall, before joining Billy Cobham’s power
band. Musical highlights followed, performances with Charles Mingus and Gary Burton,
with Lee Konitz, Ron Carter, McCoy Tyner, Joe Lovano and finally enrollment at Miles
Davis’ private jazz university. He probably also learned from Miles to give young
musicians a chance and at the same time to give himself musical rejuvenation. It
was fascinating how his style changed and yet always remained the same, always with
this clear, sometimes also edgy, melodically comprehensible, blues-oriented playing
without virtuoso frills.

This becomes noticeable in the chamber music compressions with Marc Johnson’s “Bass
Desires”, the duo album with Pat Metheny “I Can See Your House from Here” and the
exotic trips to India on “Überjam”, then in his soul jazz adaptations with “Up All
Night” or the folk outings with Larry Goldings on “Country for Old Men”. When the
British composer Mark-Anthony Turnage was looking for some jazz soloists for his
orchestral work “Blood on the Floor” with the Ensemble Modern, the choice fell naturally
on John Scofield. And in this dark-melancholic avant-garde composition, too, John
Scofield has designed his part “Elegy for Andy”, which is completely fixed in notes,
with his characteristically striking jazz articulation, without actually playing
jazz. Among contemporary jazz guitarists, he is one of the most productive, versatile,
original, open and certainly one who has remained young at heart. On Boxing Day 
he will be seventy.

![John Scofield 2009 in Montreux](https://i0.wp.com/media1.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/
feuilleton/2648850870/1.7699879/format_top1_breit/john-scofield-2009-in-montreux.
jpg?w=640&ssl=1)

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