Dale Clevenger

We know what you're thinking: "Wait a minute. Dale Clevenger is the principal horn of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Why in the world are you writing about him in a series about jazz horn players". Well, we were also pretty astonished when we heard what he does on his Tuesday evenings, so we decided to ask him about it:

– How did you stray from classical horn styles into playing jazz?

The straying was over a long period of time. When I was in high school I had a buddy, Andy Hagen, who is now one of the best trumpet players in the country. I used to go over to his house and he would play along with Stan Kenton records. I just pined because I couldn't do that on horn. I didn't try to do it — I felt intimidated because he could do it. In my four years at Carnegie Tech my roommate Calvin Custer played jazz piano and jazz bass, and all the guys I was pals with were capable of playing jazz. I attempted a couple of things, but they would snicker at me and say, "Stick to classic". And I passed up the opportunity again.

I got to New York and started the long road of freelancing, and the very first job I had was the Radio City Music Hall. I saw right away that I needed to be able to swing to have the feeling to play certain rhythms. Jazz, swing, bebop, whatever, written out in the show. Once at a studio session, I was playing with Earl Chapin, a very uptempo thing that started very fast — 1-2-3-4 (sings), and I said, "Earl, I can't play that". He said, "Yeah, you can, come on. Just follow me". It brought home to me the necessity of being able to at least read jazz figures.

But I still didn't learn to improvise. Then about 1975 at the horn workshop in Muncie, Indiana, I heard a lecture by Dave Amram on improvising. He said, "First of all, get it out of your mind that you have to improvise only 32nd notes. You can improvise whole notes. And then half notes. Then quarter notes. Then eighths, then 16ths, and then 32nd notes." I got to thinking about it, and I finally became convinced that yes, at the age of 35 I could start improvising jazz.

Then one day Cy Tauf (of the jazz group Eras) came by, and I said, "Where are you going?" and he said, "I'm going to play some jazz. Come on over". I said, "Ok". And I sat in with them. That was nine years ago. We play everything from Dixieland, blues, swing, bebop, ballads, to 70's and 80's rock. Jazz of all eras. Bobby Lewis and George Beam on trumpet, Cy Tauf on bass trumpet (trombone), plus bass, drums, and piano, and usually a reed — sax or clarinet. They allowed me to come and by osmosis learn the tunes, learn the rhythms, learn the feel, do a lot of imitating, and actually get out there and do it, improvise. And make a lot of mistakes. But after nine years I can hold my own on certain kinds of music which I feel very comfortable with and know very well — the melody, the harmony changes. I can play almost any kind of blues.