Rufus Reid

957: Rufus Reid on his life in jazz

It was such a pleasure to sit down with Rufus Reid and catch up on his recent activities! Rufus was in San Francisco doing a residency at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and we got a chance to carve out some time to talk shop.

We dig into the origins of his revolutionary book The Evolving Bassist, his time at Northwestern, lessons learned on the gig, and much more. Enjoy, and check out Rufus’ recent CD Celebration to hear some super-cool writing for jazz trio and string quartet!

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Carnegie Mellon University Double Bass Studio – CMU is dedicated to helping each student achieve their goals as a musician. Every week each student receives private lessons and participates in a solo class with Micah Howard. Peter Guild, another member of the PSO, teaches Orchestral Literature and Repertoire weekly. They encourage students to reach out to the great bassists in their area for lessons and direction. Many of the bassists from all of the city’s ensembles are more than willing to lend a hand. Every year members of the Symphony, the Opera and the Ballet give classes and offer our students individual attention. Click here to visit Micah’s website and to sign up for a free online trial lesson.

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680: Working as a Jazz Bassist

Today’s episode features the following past podcast guests on the topic of what it’s like working these days as a jazz bassist:

Ben Allison – NYC
Dan Chmielinski – NYC
Herbert Smith – Brazil
John Goldsby – Germany
Katie Thiroux – Los Angeles
Kenneth Knudson – Denmark
Larry Gray – Chicago
Rufus Reid – NYC
Sean Conly – NYC

Listen to more “best of” episodes at contrabassconversations.com/highlights.

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Kolstein Music

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Contrabass Conversations production team:

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Michael Cooper and Steve Hinchey, audio editing
Mitch Moehring, audio engineer
Trevor Jones, publication and promotion
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CBC 87: Rufus Reid interview

We’re featuring an interview with jazz bassist Rufus Reid on this week’s episode of Contrabass Conversations. This interview was conducted by guest host Win Hinkle, a former member of the Florida Symphony Orchestra (this orchestra dissolved in 1993) who also worked in Florida as a trombonist, electric bassist, and double bassist, including a lot of time at Walt Disney World.

Rufus Reid is, without a doubt, one of the most influential bassists working in jazz today, and he has had a significant impact on double bass performance and pedagogy throughout his career. His book The Evolving Bassist was one of the earliest of the contemporary generation of double bass method books, and it continues to be a foundational text for double bass students. I recommend it to all of my students who are interested in jazz, and I use many of his exercises for arco study and sight reading practice even with students who only study classical music.

We’re also featuring Rufus Reid and bassist Michael Moore performing All Blues from their album Double Bass Delights, as well as some listener feedback, bass news, a link of the week, and much more. Check out more recordings of Rufus in various settings on his website’s recordings page. Enjoy!