Patrice Rushen








Ambassador for Artistry in Education, 2008–Present
Trained as a classical pianist, Patrice Rushen gravitated to fusion, jazz, R&B, and pop in the ‘70s and '80s. Her musical life has been diverse as she added roles as a vocalist, jazz pianist, composer, producer, and educator to her classical career. With an honorary doctorate in music from Berklee in 2005, she is a frequent visiting artist and speaker at Berklee. Rushen has four Grammy nominations and has composed scores for movies and television. She holds the distinction of being the first female director of many of the industry's top award shows, including the Grammy Awards, Emmy Awards, the People's Choice Awards, the NAACP Image Awards, and others. Her hit single, “Forget Me Nots,” has been covered and sampled by many other artists.

 Rushen, whose nickname is “Baby Fingers” because of her small hands, was born in 1954 in Los Angeles. After high school in South Los Angeles, she earned a degree in music from the University of Southern California. An acclaimed jazz pianist, she has performed with such artists as Herbie Hancock, the late Prince, Carlos Santana, and Stevie Wonder. She has written many pieces of symphonic music, some commissioned by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.

 Rushen was part of a 2015 Berklee Women’s Empower Symposium at Berklee's campus in Valencia, Spain. She was clear about the value she sees in a Berklee music business education: "You can see what (musicians) are going through. You feel it in terms of watching them practice. You understand what happens when they get in front of the microphone.”

 Rushen continues to advise and mentor music students, both at Berklee and at the University of Southern California, as an artist in residence and curriculum consultant. She also works with various music-in-the-schools programs and music education programs for underprivileged youth in Los Angeles. Throughout her career, Rushen has woven together many roles and strains of music to make a harmonious whole.

https://patricerushen.bandcamp.com/album/forget-me-nots


AUDIO: <iframe style="border: 0; width: 100%; height: 120px;" src="https://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/album=47833051/size=large/bgcol=ffffff/linkcol=0687f5/tracklist=false/artwork=small/transparent=true/" seamless><a href="http://patricerushen.bandcamp.com/album/forget-me-nots">Forget Me Nots by Patrice Rushen</a></iframe> 

No Magic Bullets 

 

After Straight from the Heart, Rushen's contract with Elektra expired and she signed with Clive Davis' Arista Records. "I was on Arista for about three years and in that time, I did one record. In the first year," she recalls. "And then because they didn't hear a hit, I waited for a year and a half or so, for them to come up with this magic bullet. I wasn't used to that. I had had over a decade of being allowed to not only put together the records without much interference, but also it had connected with the audience and with radio, in terms of whatever the perception of my musical persona was, it had worked."

Unlike Elektra, Arista didn't release records until its people -- primarily Davis -- were satisfied with them. "Clive had to have his stamp of approval on each thing before they would do it, and I had to wait my turn. It took almost two years. And by the time they came up with what they thought was this magic bullet, I was like, you know, I don't think I want to do this," she recalls. "I was never going to be what I think he may have had in mind, and I certainly don't think that I would be allowed to continue to grow and experiment in the ways that I had, up to that point, been allowed to do, so I asked to be released. And, you know, ultimately, they did."

Making Music Every Day

 

Rushen hasn't made a studio record since Signature in 1997, but she continues to play, compose, arrange music across a variety of genres and formats. She has realized her lifelong ambition to make music for film and television; she has been the music director for the NAACP Image Awards, the Grammys (three times), and the People's Choice Awards. As long-time chair of the Popular Music program at USC's Thornton School of music, she has taught generations of students about jazz, pop, soul, R&B, and dance music, and she continues to pass her knowledge along.

 "To answer your question, am I still making music, yes. But I think the connotation of your question is are you still making records, recordings, and from that standpoint, it has been a long time since the last CD that I did," she says. "I needed to step away. The record business as I knew it has definitely changed, but it left some negatives on me."

 Her current project, Remind Me: The Classic Elektra Recordings 1979-1984, selects 15 songs, representing all four albums, as well as singles, to introduce her work to a new generation.

AUDIO:  <iframe style="border: 0; width: 350px; height: 470px;" src="https://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/album=3671532586/size=large/bgcol=ffffff/linkcol=0687f5/tracklist=false/transparent=true/" seamless><a href="http://patricerushen.bandcamp.com/album/now">Now by Patrice Rushen</a></iframe> 

 Rushen says that she got a call when Warner Brothers Group announced it was selling some of the Elektra catalogue it had acquired in a series of mergers and acquisitions. "My albums were still selling even though they weren't putting any promotion dollars into it. The use of the material by hip-hop and other artists has ensured that my material remains popular," says Rushen. "I guess somebody had the bright idea to see if we can get this catalog."
"There's a generation of people who are using this music and a generation of people who could be introduced to more of it. It is viable and useful, and it sounds good. It was really well recorded," she adds. "It's difficult to imagine that it would not be relevant and catch on with people." The music will available as a three-album vinyl set, as well as in all digital formats.

 The world has changed in a lot of ways since the late 1970s and early 1980s, but the music's appeal remains constant. "I hope people get the same thing out of it now that they got back then," she says. "People need hope. People need ways in which they can step back sometimes and just allow themselves to remember what it feels like to feel good about something."

Complicated Catchiness


Songs that stand the test of time, says Rushen, have both an immediate appeal and a way of opening up on repeat listens. "For a song to be great, there's got to be some element of a song that resonates with the listener. It can come from a lot of different places. Maybe it's the rhythm or a melody, chord progression. Even the way that the lyric feels in your mouth when you sing it. If a lyric is hard to sing, it's probably not going to be that memorable. There are all these elements that can capture your attention. It can be catchy. That can come from any direction," she says.

"But the other thing is if you keep on listening, you discover something," she adds. "You get deeper inside the story. Or you hear how that bass line works against the kick drum. And these are not things that you consciously say, gee, I'm going to sit here and listen for these things. These are things that just are. But those things are the things that make you keep going back."
Hugely catchy hooks, backed with a craft and skill and complexity that comes from a deep knowledge of music -- sounds like Rushen's songs, back for another turn in the spotlight.

AUDIO:  <iframe style="border: 0; width: 350px; height: 470px;" src="https://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/album=911530986/size=large/bgcol=ffffff/linkcol=0687f5/tracklist=false/transparent=true/" seamless><a href="http://patricerushen.bandcamp.com/album/patrice">Patrice by Patrice Rushen</a></iframe>

Related Articles Around the Web

https://afropunk.com/2019/07/afropunk-interview-patrice-rushen-speaks-her-truth/



Bobby Holland / mptvimages

Music

AFROPUNK INTERVIEW: 

PATRICE RUSHEN SPEAKS HER TRUTH

by Ericka Blount Danois

July 31, 2019

AfroPunk

For people who grew up in the 1980s, Patrice Rushen’s music provided the soundtrack to their basement parties and nightclub forays. Hits like “Forget Me Nots,” “Remind Me,” “Feels So Real,” and “Haven’t You Heard,” ruled the radio and dance floors all over the world. In the ‘90s hip-hop artists sampled and interpolated her hits to make meaningful songs for their generation. Rushen’s hit, “Remind Me” helped launch Mary J. Blige’s career in 1992 when she interpolated it for her song “You Remind Me“ and helped Bed-Stuy’s Junior M.A.F.I.A. get radio play with the Aaliyah featuring “I Need You Tonight.” Rushen’s hit “Forget Me Nots” found a new audience when the sample was used for  Will Smith’s 1997 film-inspired hit “Men in Black.”

 Known in musician circles by her nickname “Baby Fingers,” for her small but dexterous digits, Rushen is a singer,-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist who plays the piano, keyboards, flute, clarinet, and percussion. Classically trained, she has composed for the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.

 Her new compilation album, Remind Me: The Classic Elektra Recordings 1978-1984, was released on Strut this month and features cuts like the 12” versions of “Haven’t You Heard,” “Forget Me Nots,” and “Feels So Real (Won’t Let Go)” and the LP version of “Remind Me,” as well as early classics like “Music of the Earth” and “Let’s Sing a Song of Love.” The compilation album will come in all formats, including a vinyl edition with never-before-seen pictures and an exclusive new interview with Rushen. Years ago Elektra didn’t see any hits on the album “Straight from the Heart.” Rushen had to hire an independent promoter to get the album heard. It would eventually garner a Grammy nomination. Now those hits will reach a whole new audience.

 AFROPUNK talked to Rushen about her new compilation,  the contemporary artists she likes, and her boundless musicianship.


The music that was recorded during that time period when I was with Elektra was probably the most prolific time for me. Radio used to be such a tremendous, powerful tool. It really made a big difference in people finding me. I was recording before that I was doing some jazz records and then working in the studio – during those years I was able to find what would become my sound from the standpoint of kind of borrowing from the tradition, but also utilizing things that were happening in the present and not being afraid of the future. So basically just doing the music that I like to do and having the resources to be able to do it for those years. We had budgets to work with so I could do strings and horns and I could write and we had a lot of things in our favor. They gave me all the colors in the crayon box to play with.

Let’s talk about your jazz beginnings. You got your big break at the Monterey Jazz Festival, tell me about that.

I was part of a high school band and we entered a competition but there was a combo division also, so our band didn’t win, but the combo I entered did win. So the prize was that you appear in the festival. So that appearance with my combo of 1972, brought a lot of attention and garnered the Prestige [Records] contract — three albums for them.

I know you got a lot of flak from straight-ahead jazz musicians about moving into different genres like R&B and disco, talk about that.

It was a little uncomfortable because there was sort of the implication there that there was some kind of ownership on what, as an artist, is possible for you. And that limitation was uncomfortable to feel. Like, wait a minute, just because I do this well doesn’t mean that’s all I can do well. It doesn’t alter my love or dedication nor my commitment to jazz. At first, I felt a little weird about it, but I wasn’t so weirded out that I didn’t continue to move on. I hadn’t done enough recordings and had enough experiences to feel that I had even found my voice even in jazz. So I was kind of hesitant to sign that first contract. I wasn’t looking for a record deal. But I needed money for school. That was one of the things that prompted me to say yes. I didn’t feel ready by any means. I didn’t have the attachment [to jazz] enough to feel like I was betraying anything because I hadn’t been there long enough. It didn’t stop me from pursuing what it was I thought I wanted to do musically and I had seen how others much more established in jazz who were having some of those same criticisms —[musicians like] George Duke, Herbie Hancock, Chick Corea or anybody that was outside of a particular approach to what that music could be. They handled it — they just kept on moving.

I’m impressed by the fact that you’re a multi-instrumentalist, you arrange, produce, you sing, you write music and all of the different ways that you work in music, what led you down that path?

I thought I wanted to be a composer for film and TV [at first]. My fascination with other instruments was like, “How does that work?” So I could understand better how to write for it. I was a music education major and that was a safe bet for my parents to invest in. You come out of that with the qualifications to teach. You might end up teaching high school band— you also need to know how the instruments work. It was ideal for somebody like me that wanted to write to kind of get into all the different orchestral instruments and understand a little bit about each instrument in each family. It wasn’t wasted energy, it was all wonderful, transferable knowledge

You actually did end up writing and composing for TV and film…

I did, yeah. Robert Townsend actually gave me my first opportunity in terms of a feature film, which was “Hollywood Shuffle” and from that, he got five HBO specials [“Robert Townsend and His Partners In Crime”]. He directed all five. That was the start of everything in terms of music direction. Utilizing all of the tools [I had at my disposal] to help his shows. From those, I got the NAACP Image Awards which I did for 13 years straight. From that, I did the Emmys and later the Grammys. That music direction actually began an offshoot of having all these various experiences as a performer as a producer, as a studio player, as an arranger. All of those things came into play with that.

Were you looking towards anyone to model yourself after — like Quincy Jones or Curtis Mayfield who had worked in composing for TV and film?

Quincy Jones for sure. That’s who I saw moving quietly across all of these different areas which were also areas of interest. I thought it can be done. I knew a lot about Quincy because I was a fan of his writing especially. I knew that he had been a trumpet player, I knew that he worked in all of these bands, his love, and study of classical music, all of the things that helped me understand better his depth and fearlessness. He told me there could be an obstacle course in getting to what I wanted, but to not be afraid of variety and diversity and experimentation and just be really good at it. Those words served me very well.

As a woman in the industry, producing, arranging, playing, what kind of challenges were you having?

Fortunately, I think I had come up in a time when a lot of that groundwork as far as women had been laid. I didn’t have to pioneer any of that. I was in high school, the majority of my peers were men, especially as an instrumentalist. My level of seriousness and commitment wasn’t ever a question. They were my best friends, so they were protective of me. I had a very healthy association with being the only woman, but being supported. And I had that same kind of support at home because my parents were like OK, be good at it and be happy and do the work. And that carried over so by the time that I met, at least to my face any hesitation or resistance based upon other people’s bias or issues, the cat was out of the bag. I was gone already and I kept it moving. I had been given permission to be my best self by people who had my back.

I would do the albums and do the records — we had done our homework. We brought it to the label and they sat there and they were like, “Nah, we don’t hear anything on it.” At first, it was like, you’re kidding me, then we saw they were serious about it.  “Haven’t You Heard” and a couple of other records, were poised to be stronger, they became hits at Black radio, for sure. But at the time there was also this push for crossover and you really did need the record company’s help to do that — and they needed to be involved in it and want it for you. And to go after it in a way that would make pop radio respond. And I never had that. When they said that for the “Straight From the Heart” album we just knew that we needed to be proactive and not just need it to be a tax write off for them, but to go after the music. We knew it needed to get in front of the people for them to decide. We figured out what we needed to do just a few weeks of independent promotion. And it turned out to work.

Coming up in the ‘80s with Anita Baker, Michael Jackson, and Prince, and all of these major artists, do you feel like you got your just due as an artist?

It depends on your definition of getting just due. During that time, it could have been that they were just missing it. The result of it was I was allowed to do whatever I wanted to do. So I didn’t have to worry about committees of people deciding what songs were going to go on the record. I didn’t have to worry about people coming by the studio telling me I had to change this or that. We were allowed to organically explore our process to get there. Without interference or involvement. From that standpoint, it was all good. Once the records hit the marketing mechanism at that point we were in place to get the music to the people. If there was a place where I thought I didn’t get my just due it would be there. But that’s not something I was in control over. But the records found their way.

Did you get a chance to explore your classical roots, I know you wrote for the Detroit Symphony Orchestra —were there other areas where you were able to explore that background?

I did one movement of a symphony. I had my cathartic moment and was literally putting it in a box and a friend of mine who happens to be a teacher and composer called me up and said, “What you doing?” I said, boxing up my symphony, no one is ever going to hear it. He said don’t do that, why don’t you enter it into one of these reading contests which I had never heard of before. This group called the American Composers Forum had a contest that my friend was aware of. He said, just enter the first movement and if they pick it, you at least get to hear it. When they heard it, they asked are you going to finish it? And when I finished it, it was read on the Detroit Symphony and they commissioned me afterward to write for them and their youth orchestra. Those kind of sensibilities are part of what had to be applied to writing for film – they are all branches of the same tree. There’s been no wasted time because all of those things have ended up helping the other things.

 Who do you like in terms of female singers nowadays?

 Ledisi and Lalah Hathaway. A generation of people who are old enough to appreciate the tradition and have done some study and some work understand that they are part of an important continuum, but at the same time they are young enough to embrace and understand the new sensibilities of what the music is and what can be brought to it and enhance it. I see them as two people that stand out most immediately when you talk about singers today.

 You’re teaching at USC now as Chair of the Popular Music program, what’s that like?

 [I’m] teaching and lecturing a lot. Traveling [and] still playing with people. I just came back from Europe having played with a jazz bassist Christian McBride. We just got back from Europe. I was part of this experimental band called the Christian McBride Situation. It’s comprised of two turntablists, myself, and saxophonists. Great experimentation with a new pallet of colors. I have this new compilation coming out. I am looking to tour with this record. I had never really done that. I had never performed this music in the context that it was under my own name, not since the ‘80s when it came out. Even then I didn’t do a lot of it because you needed record companies’ support and those things were difficult, especially for me.

 I am the ambassador for artistry in education for Berklee College of Music. I’m at USC as the Chair of the Popular Music program and that involves the development of a curriculum and a methodology to create a working situation so that kids would graduate and be able to go into the workforce. Developing a program like that has been very exciting.

 You’ve been blessed to be able to work in music exclusively for your whole career, talk about that.

 I was either teaching someone, playing, writing, performing with, performing myself, collaborating, it’s always been in and around music. There are so many opportunities that are available because we only see the stuff that’s in front, but there’s a whole bunch of stuff that goes on for the things to be in front.

 What was it like to work with legendary tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson?

 That was my first album [1970’s Prelusion], I had been a Joe Henderson fan for a long time and he happened to be on that label. Just as a rule of thumb they used to pair the new artist with a more established artist that was on that label just to give them a little something. They said here’s a new artist we have on our label, we wanted to ask you if you wanted to record with Joe Henderson. I was like, are you kidding me right now. He appears on that very first album. All my emotions were running through – excited, terrified, he was so gracious. He didn’t talk a lot. Very soft-spoken. I was thrilled because I had been a fan for such a long time and here he is on my very first record. It was unbelievable.

 There are aspects of the music that still resonate and are still vibrant. They are focusing on the vinyl. Its a whole package, like a two-album set. There are pictures I’ve never seen before. The packaging is beautifully done. It feels really good that this music is resurfacing and Strut has put together a beautiful package for it and this time around with it being given this kind of attention.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/17/arts/music/patrice-rushen-jazz.html

Patrice Rushen Found Success in Jazz and Dance Music. She Hasn’t Been Forgotten.

She was already an accomplished jazz bandleader when she began releasing pop albums for Elektra in 1978. A new best-of compilation looks back at her major-label career.


Credit...Andrew Testa for The New York Times


The sounds of the 1970s and ’80s feel newly alive in pop today. Listen to Beyoncé cover Frankie Beverly, or Kendrick Lamar sample the Isley Brothers, or any Teyana Taylor track, and you’re also hearing the music of 30 to 40 years ago.

The same thing is happening in jazz, maybe to a greater extent. Musicians like Robert Glasper and Thundercat are also embracing hallmarks of the era: technological adventurism; smooth-but-deep textures; a desire for the comfort of a solid, encompassing groove.

What all this tells you is that we’re living in Patrice Rushen’s world. We just might not know it yet.
Ms. Rushen was 23 years old in 1978 when she began recording an impressive run of dance-pop albums for Elektra. Already she was the author of three recordings as a jazz bandleader, had played on dozens of other people’s albums as a session musician and was touring around the world. Along the way, she’d earned a music degree from the University of Southern California.

But what was to come was momentous. The five albums she released on Elektra seemed to confirm the notion that jazz musicians could make good dance music, and mean it, and be successful doing it. Somehow, in the dilemma between pop success and jazz legitimacy, Ms. Rushen never had to choose. (You can hear a spark-notes version of that era thanks to “Remind Me: The Classic Elektra Recordings 1978-84,” a thoughtfully assembled greatest-hits collection due Friday on Strut Records.)

Credit: Walt Disney Television, via Getty Images
“When we were coming up, the prize was to be as versatile as you could be — to play with anybody,” she said in a recent phone interview before ducking into a rehearsal for her upcoming European tour. “You wanted to be able to play jazz with the greats, but you also wanted to know the nuances that allowed you to play dance music, and create music that people wanted to move to. The challenge became getting enough vocabulary to have that balance.”

On 1982’s “Forget Me Nots,” her biggest hit (later reconstituted as the “Men in Black” theme song), the point isn’t that anyone takes a blazing solo, or that the harmonies twist and turn surprisingly. It’s Rushen’s comfort with open space, and the rugged simplicity and sharp execution of her band.

It’s little wonder that Ms. Rushen has been name-checked by contemporary crossover stars like Thundercat and Robert Glasper, or that her new collection still feels like a usable how-to guide for musicians trying to convert conservatory chops into songcraft. Listen to “Remind Me: The Classic Elektra Recordings,” then put on Esperanza Spalding’s recent masterstroke, “12 Little Spells” — an album full of funk rhythm, electroacoustic textural play and cerebral-sensual poetry — and it’s hard not to hear history washing up onshore.

In her years with Elektra, Ms. Rushen seemed to be modeling an archetype that never ended up fully taking hold: a musician with an untroubled command of the jazz tradition, and a devotion to sharing that skill set with a popular audience without softening it up. Vested with a major label’s resources and an arms-length relationship to its executives, she made carefully produced, protean pop records that set dance floors aflame. Then she toured the material with a smallish band, relying on the talents of her ace jazz musicians to create something fresh on the road.

In 1982, with “Forget Me Nots” climbing the Billboard charts, Ms. Rushen appeared on the TV show “Soul Train.” After singing her hit to a flock of dancers in the show’s flashy studio, she stood for a short interview with a moonstruck Don Cornelius. He noted that her latest album, “Straight From the Heart,” seemed to come from just as genuine and nuanced a place as her early jazz records. Her eyes brightened at the thought.

“It more or less illustrates the change that I think black music is going through,” she told Mr. Cornelius. “We’re getting back to the groove again, and to the way things really feel — kind of blending the complexities with the simplicity, and putting it together for another thing. It’s very exciting.”
Born in Los Angeles in 1954, Ms. Rushen started playing piano at age 3, and she was giving classical recitals by 6. She attended Locke High School, which had a prestigious music program, where instruction often extended beyond the classroom. Reggie Andrews, a young instructor, invited figures like Herbie Hancock and members of Earth, Wind & Fire to speak at the school, or to rehearse there. He took his students to studios, to watch producers score movies and TV shows. So Ms. Rushen never felt like she had to choose between jazz or pop or writing for film: It could all be part of the same life.






Credit: Andrew Testa for The New York Times


When she was 17, Ms. Rushen and her band won a competition that earned them a spot at the Monterey Jazz Festival, and she found herself swarmed by interested labels. She signed with Prestige, and she released three albums between 1974 and 1976, all while attending U.S.C. From the start, her music was of the fusion zeitgeist: Some of the five original tracks on her 1974 debut, “Prelusion,” were full of wound-up swing and acoustic instrumentation, but on others, Ms. Rushen doubled her Fender Rhodes keyboard with a woozy ARP synthesizer, while the drummer Ndugu Chancler tended to a slinky rock beat below.

By 1976, when she released her third and final Prestige album, “Shout It Out,” she was writing funky jazz-pop — in the mold of the Mizell Brothers or the Stanley Clarke-George Duke Band — and she was singing on top of it, in a wispy, beguiling, ingénue’s voice that betrayed her age in ways that her musicianship never did.

She had also become an in-demand side musician, playing with jazz-fusion titans like Jean-Luc Ponty, Stanley Turrentine and Donald Byrd. By the time she signed to Elektra she had a significant following among jazz audiences, and among black radio stations’ more open-minded listeners.

With Elektra, she found that her mixed identity confused even the executives who’d signed her. “Haven’t You Heard,” a coy disco burner from her 1979 album “Pizzazz,” reached No. 42 on the Billboard Hot 100, but when she delivered the follow-up, the label told her there were no hits on it. The album was “Straight From the Heart,” and its first track was “Forget Me Nots.”

“Sometimes they wouldn’t be ahead of the curve,” Ms. Rushen said. She and her management paid to promote the record themselves, and “Forget Me Nots” became a radio mainstay, hitting No. 23 on the Hot 100.

When things caught on, the benefits didn’t escape her. Learning from jazz history, Ms. Rushen had been diligent about claiming her publishing rights. “That was a very big thing,” she said. “To know that the mechanism was in place, if things caught on, for that catalog to be of value.”

Today, as the chair of U.S.C.’s Popular Music Program, she preaches the importance of developing acumen and awareness, and then forging ahead with whatever it is that feels true. She’s found the message resonates, just as her music lives on in the hundreds of songs that sample her dance beats.
Ms. Rushen enjoys the experience of hearing how her songs have been repurposed, when samples come in for her approval as the copyright holder. “It’s very fulfilling to know that the music has a life of its own, beyond what it was for me,” she said. “That it keeps going.”



A version of this article appears in print on , Section C, Page 5 of the New York edition with the headline: These Days, a Lot Sounds Like She Once Did. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper






Patrice Rushen’s Journey Through Jazz, Pop and Hollywood


Interview, News, Patrice Rushen, Bennie Maupin, Sonny Rollins, Eddie Henderson, Quincy Jones, Benny Golson, Christian McBride, Mike Clark, Wayne Shorter
 
by John Murph     
July 29, 2019
Downbeat  
 
Patrice Rushen’s first appearance on Soul Train was not as a musical guest.

 After Don Cornelius took the show from Chicago to Los Angeles in 1971, Rushen was one of the first high-school dancers recruited by producers. And today, she bursts into laughter recalling the Golden Bird chicken dinner and soda that Soul Train’s producers awarded the dancers for their funky, syncopated and sophisticated street moves.

 “I was even one of the scramble-board contestants,” she said. “Soul Train became so popular because it was an extension of us as young black people being able to see ourselves and represent who and what we really were about.”

 About a decade after those appearances—following the launch of a career as a jazz pianist, composer and accompanist for Sonny Rollins, Jean-Luc Ponty, Eddie Henderson and Benny Maupin—Rushen returned to Soul Train. This time, though, she was on stage leading a tight seven-piece band during a lip-synced performance of “Never Gonna Give You Up,” the infectious, uptempo r&b single from her 1980 LP, Posh.

 That song and several other soul gems are included on Strut Records’ dynamic retrospective Remind Me (The Classic Elektra Recordings, 1978–1984). The compilation documents Rushen’s commercial peak with signature classics like “Forget Me Nots,” “Music Of The Earth” and “Number One,” and exudes an urbane ebullience that maximizes her expansive gifts as a multi-instrumentalist, producer, singer, arranger and songwriter.

 Remind Me also illustrates the importance of dance in Rushen’s work, which she said always has been an essential element, regardless of genre.

 “There is a certain connection between the organized movement of sound and one’s body,” she began, before explaining that as a prodigy in Los Angeles, she participated in a University of Southern California eurythmic class in which teachers observed how gifted children absorbed music and their reactions to it. “In that program, a lot of the activities were about movement to music, because we didn’t have verbal skills yet to really express our thoughts about the lyrical quality of songs or why they liked the melody, harmony or rhythm. But the teachers could hand us a little scarf or something, put the music on, then ask, ‘How does that feel?’ They would find out by just watching our bodies. So, the idea of songs, emotions and colors having some sort of fluidity within them that makes your body move is a big deal to me.”

 Rushen’s deep appreciation for the soul and funk music of her youth, anchored by her understanding of classical and jazz, explains why many of the songs on Remind Me remain in heavy rotation on radio and still draw crowds to 21st-century dance floors.

 “You can feel her spirit inside those records on Elektra,” said DJ Ron Trent, a Chicago deep-house producer. “There are great keyboardists out there, but not many that can take their feelings and translate them into little rocket ships that penetrate everybody’s hearts.”

 For a greater appreciation of Rushen’s musical breadth, exploring her work before and after her seven-year stint at Elektra displays a fascinating trajectory, marked by intriguing twists and turns—and guided by an early aspiration to work in film and TV. Before working with Elektra, Rushen landed a three-record deal with Prestige, following her participation in a band competition at the 1972 Monterey Jazz Festival. Rushen recalls not being overly interested in signing with a label, but took advantage of the opportunity to help pay for college, where she majored in music education and minored in classical piano.

 Drummer and educator Terri Lyne Carrington said Rushen’s ’70s soul-jazz material is so durable because of a well-rounded understanding of music history: “She’s done her homework to understand how black American music progressed from blues and spirituals to its other modern variations. Growing up in the late 1960s or early 1970s, r&b was strong, but jazz was still quite strong. She had enough talent to excel at playing jazz in high school, but she never gave up her love for r&b.”

Prestige released Rushen’s enchanting debut, Prelusion, in 1974. It boasted her extraordinary gifts as an improviser, composer and arranger, as she led an octet that included tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson and drummer Leon “Ndugu” Chancler through a set of originals. Rushen’s impressionistic harmonies and intricate arrangements revealed a maturity well beyond her 20 years, as well as a strong affinity for Herbie Hancock. That album and portions of her 1975 sophomore LP, Before The Dawn, resemble Hancock’s late-Blue Note recordings, Speak Like A Child and The Prisoner, in terms of the dark, evocative horn arrangements. Before The Dawn also documented her exploration of synthesizers and the sly insinuation of r&b, particularly on the vocals-heavy “What’s The Story.” Her third Prestige LP, 1977’s Shout It Out, would pick up on those jazz-funk explorations for the rare-groove classics “Let There Be Funk” and “The Hump.”

 “Herbie Hancock was one of the first people that I just completely identified with,” Rushen said, “because of his technique, tone production, sense of harmony and the collaborative voice that you could always hear in his music. He always left room in his music to be able to respond to whatever unexpected moment would occur.”

 Concurrently, Rushen put in time working on others’ sessions. After she played on Ponty’s 1975 Upon The Wings Of Music, the violinist was so taken by her musical prowess that he wanted her to join his touring band. She didn’t accept on the urging of her parents to finish college.

 “Patrice’s feel, improvisations and handling of chord changes were just right for my music,” Ponty recently recalled. “Also, she was experimenting with all the new keyboards at the time. She demonstrated so much musical intelligence. She was a great sight-reader who could handle complex arrangements with odd time signatures. But her playing wasn’t just intellectual, she was able to go into that next dimension, which is the emotional approach to music.”

 Rushen’s agility with synthesizers and electric piano also helped elevate Eddie Henderson’s 1976 album Heritage to classic status.






  • Keyboardist and composer Patrice Rushen is seeing her catalog reinvigorated with the release of “Remind Me (The Classic Elektra Recordings, 1978-1984).” (Photo: Bobby Holland)
  • Keyboardist and composer Patrice Rushen is seeing her catalog reinvigorated with the release of “Remind Me (The Classic Elektra Recordings, 1978-1984).” (Photo: Bobby Holland
“With her generation of playing, she was ideal for the concepts [on the album],” Henderson said. “[It was] really a game changer for me; before I had focused so much on bebop, then working with Mwandishi with Herbie. People like Patrice ... made me shift gears and change my approach, just like how the younger people informed Miles Davis. She was invaluable.”

 Rushen continued doing session work through the late ’70s and 1980s—during her commercial peak. She even worked with Prince on his 1978 debut, For You. But after 1984, Rushen left Elektra for a short stint at Arista. The move, though, came with less artistic control, and her sole recording for the label, 1987’s Watch Out!, was severely delayed. Nevertheless, the three years between her final Elektra recording and Watch Out! afforded her the opportunity to fulfill her original dream of composing music for film and TV. She scored Robert Townsend’s 1987 satirical comedy feature, Hollywood Shuffle, then handled music on five episodes of his 1990 HBO comedy show, Partners in Crime.

 Just as she helped break gender barriers in jazz through her solo and sideperson work, Rushen was doing the same in the realm of film and TV scoring, especially after she became the first woman to be the musical director for numerous Emmy, Grammy and People’s Choice awards broadcasts, as well as the NAACP Image Award shows throughout the 1990s and into the mid-aughts.

 “In my own music, I was allowed to do my own horn and string arrangements, and I was allowed to produce,” Rushen said. “Many of the [activities] that I was doing behind the scenes for my own projects were building on the skill set that I would need ultimately to score television projects and musically direct events.”

 While her name recognition in the r&b world attracted Townsend, Rushen recalled that she faced race-fueled resistance when it came to scoring other movies, especially those that didn’t involve a black director or protagonist.

 “Many film producers didn’t always have to say it when they were surprised when I walked into the room,” she said. “You could see it on their faces with them thinking, ‘How can a black woman score an adventure film?’ As if I wouldn’t have any idea about what an adventure film would look or sound like. I’d already had long conversations with people like Quincy Jones and Benny Golson, who knew that I would be facing some interesting barriers. They were thoughtful and real about some of things that I would have to consider. But they never said, ‘Don’t do it.’”

 As Rushen persevered in the movie and TV industries, she continued doing remarkable session work with the likes of Carrington, Wayne Shorter, Carlos Santana, Mike Clark and Wallace Roney, among others. This summer, she’s touring with the Christian McBride Situation. And at USC, she’s an artist-in-residence and curriculum consultant; at Berklee College of Music, she’s an ambassador for artistry in education.

 Even though Rushen continues composing everything from contemporary jazz to pop and orchestral works, she isn’t too interested in signing a new record deal or trying to recapture the commercial pinnacle of her Elektra period. Still, she’s delighted that the recordings are being reinvigorated through Remind Me (The Classic Elektra Recordings, 1978–1984).
“Creating music with the jazz and ’70s dance-oriented r&b sensibilities was relatively new when I started recording. But it was very natural for me because it mostly was made by the generation of musicians that I came from,” Rushen said. “But the record companies were still trying to figure out that marketplace; a lot of that music could fit in many places. Back then, the labels put musicians in certain categories and they never wanted us wandering outside that category. Happily, today’s consumer doesn’t listen to music quite in that same way. They hear what they like and they don’t necessarily worry about what category the music fits in.” DB

https://theundefeated.com/features/patrice-rushen-songwriters-hall-of-fame/

Patrice Rushen should be a future Songwriters Hall of Fame inductee


The consummate composer and singer helped define a golden era of smooth R&B





Patrice Rushen In Concert – Detroit, MI
Patrice Rushen Monica Morgan/WireImag

by @ESPNStyleWriter



This week, Berry Gordy, Jay Z, and James “Jimmy Jam” Harris and Terry Lewis will be inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. They will join immortals such as Little Richard, Valerie Simpson and Nickolas Ashford, Dolly Parton, Nile Rodgers, Jerry Garcia, Marvin Gaye, Cyndi Lauper and more. This week The Undefeated celebrates future Songwriters Hall of Famers — the ones who make the whole world sing and bop, and even milly rock.


They remind me / I’m lucky I’m falling / In love with you darling

— Patrice Rushen, from her 1982 hit “Remind Me”

Long before I knew anything about Patrice Rushen being an accomplished multi-instrumentalist, respected songwriter or the current chairwoman of USC’s Popular Music Program at the Thornton School of Music, the pint-sized pianist shepherded me through the summer of 1982. Her superb seventh album, Straight From the Heart, was the background soundtrack playing on Howard University’s FM radio station, WHUR, in my stepfather’s light blue Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme, or during Jack Daniel’s-and-Coke-fueled card games next to the water sprinklers in auntie’s backyard.

 I stared for hours at the Straight From the Heart cover — back before music videos and digital streaming deprived folks of other visual privileges. Miss Patrice in front of the nondescript Olan Mills backdrop was pretty in a completely approachable way, thank God; she was every black girl in seventh grade during that era named Michelle, Sabrina or Crystal. I traced the soft bird feathers in Rushen’s perfect hair and stared longingly at her neat cornrows exploding into a riot of shiny glass beads.
“Forget Me Nots” was the biggest single on Straight From the Heart, the one that earned Rushen a Grammy nomination (she has three) for best female R&B vocal performance and her sole Top 40 pop hit. It’s still a monster jam, with the cleverest one-two finger-pop opening in R&B music history. The killer bass groove and melody has also been sampled to death by the likes of Will Smith, George Michael and MC Solaar, thereby ensuring it has had a long life in mainstream pop culture and serving as a reminder that Rushen should be enshrined in the hall.

 But “Remind Me” (written by Rushen and Karen Evans) was, and still is, my all-time favorite song, a perfect 5-minute, 18-second tonic that has soothed my fears and given me hope for 35 years.

 The warm opening organ arrangement lays down a groove that never lets go as the story of innocent love and appreciation unfolds. I still can’t wait for the “yeah, yeah” chorus — it’s the opioid earworm that has you strung out like an addict.

 The best thing about “Remind Me” is that Rushen isn’t a Hall of Fame singer. She’s not Aretha, Patti LaBelle or Whitney. But who is? Who can actually sing a Chaka Khan song out loud and in front of other people, without hurting your own feelings? Sometimes you just want to luxuriate in your jam and sound just like the artist. Rushen’s normal-girl voice, a smooth soprano, allowed you to feel the song without all the effort.

 Of course, 1982 was a killer year for R&B album releases. Michael Jackson’s Thriller, Prince’s 1999 and Marvin Gaye’s Midnight Love were all released that year, as were Stevie Wonder’s Original Musiquarium, What Time Is It? by The Time, and Gap Band IV. The incredible list goes on and on: Luther Vandross’ Forever, For Always, For Love and Get Loose by Evelyn “Champagne” King and Living My Life by Grace Jones.

 Soul and R&B music was changing in the late ’70s and early ’80s, Rushen explained to Soul Train host Don Cornelius that year. Her approach to music:
“… more or less illustrates the change that black music is going through every so many years. We’re getting back to the groove again, to the way things really, really feel. Kind of blending the complexities with the simplicity, and putting it together for another thing. It’s very, very exciting.”

 Rushen is here for me and my kids. The only other singer/songwriter who even comes close is Michael Jackson, and that’s complicated in a bunch of different ways. That’s also another story. I now play the song at least three times a week, hoping that it’ll be that song for my two boys.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Jill Hudson is the senior style writer for the Undefeated. She is an evolved nerd, a caffeinated shoe fanatic, and a maker of long lists and perfect martinis.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrice_Rushen

Patrice Rushen


From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
PATRICE RUSHEN
 
Patrice Louise Rushen (born September 30, 1954) is an American jazz pianist and R&B singer. She is also a composer, record producer, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and music director. Her 1982 single, "Forget Me Nots", received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance. Rushen had great success on the R&B and dance charts. "Haven't You Heard" went to number 7 on the R&B charts, with "Forget Me Nots" as her only top 40 pop hit in the United States. 

Biography

 

Rushen is the elder of two daughters born to Allen and Ruth Rushen.[1] In her teens, she attended south LA's Locke High School and went on to earn a degree in music from the University of Southern California.[2] Rushen married Marc St. Louis, a concert tour manager and live show production specialist,[3] in 1986.[4] They have one son, Cameron.[4][5] Her nickname is "Babyfingers," a reference to her small hands. In 2005, Rushen received an Honorary Doctorate of Music degree from Berklee College of Music.[6] She has been a member of jazz fusion band CAB.[7]
 
Her song "Hang it Up" was featured on the 2005 video game Fahrenheit.[8]
 

Cultural impact

 

The chorus from "Forget Me Nots" was used as the music for the 1997 song "Men in Black". The song was a number one hit in ten countries, and was the top most played song on American radio. Rushen was credited as writer and composer, along with Will Smith and Terri McFadden.
The same chorus can also be heard in George Michael's song "Fastlove". 


Awards

 

  1. ASCAP Songwriter's Award, 1988
  2. USC Black Student Assembly, Legacy of Excellence Award, 1992
  3. Crystal Award, American Women in Film, 1994
  4. ASCAP Award, Most Performed Song in Motion Pictures for 1997 for "Men in Black," 1998

 

Musical directing

 

  • The 48th Annual Grammy Awards (2006) (TV) (musical director)
  • The 47th Annual Grammy Awards (2005) (TV) (musical director)
  • The 10th Annual Walk of Fame Honoring Smokey Robinson (2004) (TV) (musical director)
  • The 46th Annual Grammy Awards (2004) (TV) (musical director)
  • The 9th Annual Walk of Fame Honoring Aretha Franklin (2003) (TV) (musical director)
  • The 8th Annual Walk of Fame Honoring Stevie Wonder (2002) (TV) (musical director)
  • The Best of Robert Townsend & His Partners in Crime (1991) (TV) (musical director)
  • "No Strings" by "Sheena Easton"- Rushen as record producer. (1993)
  • The Women of Brewster Place (1989) (TV) (special musical consultant)
  • "The Midnight Hour" (1990) TV Series Herself (Musical Director) (unknown episodes, 1990)
  • Robert Townsend's HBO variety show series: "Partners in Crime" (1988) (TV) (musical director)

 

Other sources

 


 

External links

 

 
 
THE MUSIC OF PATRICE RUSHEN: AN EXTENSIVE VIDEO OVERVIEW, A CROSS SECTION OF RECORDINGS, MUSICAL ANALYSIS AND COMMENTARY, PLUS VARIOUS INTERVIEWS WITH  PATRICE RUSHEN:

Patrice Rushen - Forget Me Nots (Official Video)




Patrice Rushen on Musical Lineage | Loop





Patrice Rushen - Straight From The Heart 1982 

 





Patrice Rushen - Watch Out (Digital Video)





Patrice Rushen Remind me

 




Patrice Rushen before the dawn (full album)






Patrice Rushen - Didn't You Know





Patrice Rushen - Never Gonna Give You Up






PATRICE RUSHEN INTERVIEW






Patrice Rushen - Haven't You Heard (12" Version)





Patrice Rushen - Straight From The Heart 1982 (Full Album)




Patrice Rushen piano solo ('88 Montreux Jazz Festival)







(𝐅𝐮𝐥𝐥 𝐀𝐥𝐛𝐮𝐦, 𝟏𝟗𝟖𝟎) 𝐏𝐚𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐞 𝐑𝐮𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐧 - 𝐏𝐨𝐬𝐡 [𝐇𝐐]