(upbeat music) (upbeat orchestral jazz music) (upbeat orchestral jazz music fades) - We're now joined by Steven Feifke who is a Grammy award winning artist.

Congratulations, sir.

- Thank you very much.

- He's a band leader, composer, arranger, and pianist.

Hey, how you doing?

How cool is that Grammy?

- It's pretty cool.

- (laughs) Break it down exactly.

What did you win for?

- So I won for the Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album for this record right here which is called, "The Generation Gap Jazz Orchestra."

(Steve clapping) And this album right here is all about celebrating and showcasing generational diversity.

And I produced it alongside my collaborator and mentor for this project, Bijon Watson, who's a great lead trumpet player.

And it was just so incredible too, one of the cool things is that I'm actually the youngest-ever band leader to win this award in this category, and to win it for this record right here for a mission like this is very, very special.

- That's awesome, and we're happy for you, proud of you, congratulations.

- Thank you.

- Curious, jazz came into your life, and this is part of our Arts Connection series, you'll see the graphic up.

Jazz came into your life when?

- Yeah, so I started playing the piano when I was four years old.

My mom was my first teacher and I was very shy as a kid.

And so piano and music in general, kind of gave me a bit of a voice that I didn't have otherwise.

And when I was around nine or so, what started to happen is that I became a little bit frustrated by reading music.

And I was a little kid, I was a lot younger.

20/20 hindsight, I wish that I had stuck with classical music, but what happened next kind of became one of the greatest gifts that could have possibly happened for my career which is that when I told my teacher that I was feeling a little bit bored by reading music and kind of feeling like I was unable to really give my own voice to the music, she said, "Well, have you heard of Jazz and improvisation?"

And I said, "No, I haven't."

And she basically walked me through, during my first lesson on that tip with her, she walked me through this incredible, I remember the lesson exactly, she walked me through how to play a waterfall on the piano.

She said, "Okay, play me a waterfall," and like any little kid, I run my finger down the piano.

She's like, "Great, now what happens "when the water hits the ground?"

And I was like, "Can I do it?"

And she's like, "Yeah, do it," and I crash my fingers on the piano, and she's like, "Okay, a little bit softer, "but yeah, that's the right idea."

And so she started walking me through, basically, how to realize what I was seeing and feeling on a deeper level in my head through my music.

And I basically learned about Jazz and about improvisation through composition.

And Jazz is all about making music in the moment.

And so through that, I really felt like I was able to, I didn't have the words for it then, but I really felt like I was able to return to that place that I knew when I was four years old, five years old, again, even though I wasn't conscious of this at that age, I really was able to return to being able to kind of make music that came straight from my heart.

And so as I've gotten older and older, I develop more and more tools and techniques that help me say more.

- Steven, was that in Lexington, Massachusetts?

- Yeah, so I'm from Lexington, Massachusetts originally, and moved to New York in 2009 to go to school.

- Hold on, was that a teacher?

I'm sorry for interrupting.

Was that a teacher who did that for you?

- Yeah, yeah, her name is Susan.

- What was that teacher's name?

I have to do this.

- No, no, no, please.

I say her name.

We keep in touch to this day.

Her name is Susan Capestro, the greatest teacher I ever had.

- Ms. Capestro.

- Yeah.

- She saw something in you.

- She was an incredible teacher.

She really embraced everybody at the level that they were at and just kind of helped them do what they felt that they needed to do.

And I'm forever grateful for the lessons that she taught me, and also for just our friendship and relationship now as adults.

- Yeah, we're big fans of celebrating public school teachers.

Generation Gap Orchestra, your orchestra, talk about it.

- Yeah, Generation Gap Jazz Orchestra, it's an orchestra that was founded by myself and Bijon, and we have about two decades between us.

And so this is where we got the idea for the name, Generation Gap.

It was actually be Bijon's idea to call the album and subsequently the band that.

- Tell everyone who your colleague is.

- Yeah, so Bijon Watson, incredible lead trumpet player who has performed on records that you've probably heard and listened to if you've ever checked out Michael Bublé or Diana Krall or you've seen the movie, "La La Land."

And we met backstage at a concert.

One of my other mentors, John Beasley, invited me to one of his performances.

And I was a lot younger than I am now.

And I met Bijon backstage at that show and we just hit it off.

Bijon is also from Massachusetts, and we started chatting here and there over the phone, and he became a really important figure in my life.

And as our friendship developed, there was one time that he asked me, he was like, "Hey Steven, "can you arrange some big band music for me?

"I need this or that."

And you know, this is a big part of my career as well is that I write music for a lot of artists and for other mediums as well.

And so usually I say, "Yes, of course," but with Bijon, I just said to him, I was like, "Man, why don't we start our own big band?

"I'll write the charts "but let's start our own band."

He was like, "That's a great idea."

And so that's how the band started.

And we're huge into education so Bijon and I first presented this ensemble at the Jazz Educators Network Conference.

And the ensemble itself is comprise comprised of almost five decades of musicians.

And it wasn't an intentional thing that we had got like five generations.

You know, the whole idea here is that everybody who has something to say should be given a platform to say it.

And so Bijon called some of his friends, some of his mentors, some of his students, I called some of my friends, some of my mentors, some of my students, and we basically got together this very diverse-aged ensemble.

And so when we had our release show at Berkeley College of Music, we played at the Berkeley Performance Center in Boston as one of our release shows when the album came out in October, what we did is that I was able to actually bring in some of my students at Berkeley at the time to perform with us.

So like one of the singers, one of the trombonists, one of the saxophonists, one of the guitarists, and this is sort of like the whole message of the ensemble is- - Which is what?

- To do this, celebrating and showcasing generational diversity in music, especially in Jazz.

- And the new CD?

Talk about the new CD.

- Yeah, the new CD is this one right here.

It's called, "Catalyst."

This is my sixth album in two years.

It's my seventh album as a leader.

And this is a big band album and I just love big band music.

And so for me, this is a special album for a number of reasons.

The music on it is very, very personal to me, special to me in many ways, and there's a couple of reasons why it's called, "Catalyst," but I'll give you two of them right now.

Number one, there's an incredible group of musicians on the album.

People who have been playing in my band for over 10 years at this point, in the Steven Feifke Big Band.

And they are incredible musicians, but I just started thinking to myself, "Well, everybody's in the recording studio, "everybody's on stage, "Like what do they need to make the music actually happen?"

'Cause 18 people, it's a lot.

And I started thinking like, "What is the catalyst "for that situation?"

And could I possibly give music that allows everybody to be themself, musically speaking?

And so in that way, this is one of the ideas of, "Catalyst."

And the second, the one that I personally feel is very, very close to my heart is that there's a track on the record called, "Patience's Promise."

And I don't know if you've ever heard the phrase or the age old quote, "Good things come to those who wait."

And I started to notice at a certain point that I was waiting and waiting and waiting for something to happen to me, slash for me, and that I, in the meantime, was developing and having these other ideas for myself about what I actually wanted my future to look like.

And so the track on the record is called, "Patience's Promise," and it is kind of alluding to that quote that good things come to those who wait, but actually, "Patience's Promise," is an abridged title for the song.

The actual full title of the song that I say to myself in my mind is that, "Patience's Promise is a Lie."

And that if we want something in our own lives then all we have to do is go out and make it happen for ourselves.

And so in that way, I see myself as my own catalyst in my own life, and I hope that other people as well can see themselves as their own heroes, and to become their own catalyst to make their own dreams a reality because this right here is a dream come true for me.

- Well said, Steven.

Congratulations and wish you all the best.

- Thank you so much, Steve.

I really appreciate it.

And likewise.

- Yep, you got it.

One of the youngest Grammy award winners ever.

We'll see you next time.

- [Narrator] One-On-One with Steve Adubato has been a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

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