Guitarist and composer Scott Sawyer has worked for over 30 years with artists like Nnenna Freelon, Charlie Byrd, Jack Wilkens, David Murray and Jon Lucian, to name a few. On Go There he is ably joined by an all-star cast. Included in the group are organist and flute player Kofi Burbridge (late of the Derek Trucks Band), drummer Kenny Soule (who has worked with the band Nantucket), electric bassist Oteil Burbridge (Allman Brothers Band and the Aquarium Rescue Unit), acoustic bassist Ron Brendle (Mose Allison and Frank Kimbrough) and free-lance recording artist and percussionist Chris Garges (who has worked with the country band The Moody Brothers).

A better moniker for this excellent recording would be “The Scott Sawyer Blues Band,” for it is the spirit of the blues that influences and percolates throughout. Some of the tunes are overtly blues derived. “Slow Dance,” for example, is intentionally in the slow-blues-drag style. With a stripped down unit of just guitar, bass and drums, with flute only appearing during the solo section, everyone leaves their six-shooters at home and plays in support of a truly poignant feeling. Kofi, who demonstrates a real feel for nuance and shades of color when on organ, proves to be a great flutist during his solo and trading licks sections. He’s so soulful he could make a specter cry.

The up-tempo “AR” rocks on. With a groove that is locked in the pocket, Sawyer turns in his most inspired solo of the recording. It’s not just the fact he has technique to burn, it’s how he uses that technique in tandem with Burbridge to get to the song’s heart in as direct a manner as possible. Kofi’s great organ solo, he lays down some lines that can only be described as righteous, follows the two string players' work, before Sawyer re-enters to drive the piece home.

The ensemble’s take on George Harrison’s “Taxman” demonstrates just how much more music there is still to be mined from The Beatles catalog and “Slow Down, Freight Train” picks right up where “Slow Dance” left off, but this time it’s Sawyer who gets down and dirty. Playing flatted thirds and sevenths may be the vehicle, but it’s in the delivery where artists are defined. Holding back behind the beat just enough to capture the right emotion, Sawyer demonstrates a real feel for statement and anti-statement. This disc is highly recommended for all blues aficionados.

Tracks: Taxman, 5-Spot, Royal & Canal, Slow Dance, AR, Slow Down, Freight Train, In The Stream, Dark Lady, Going...Going...Gone, I Wish You Would

Record Label Website: http://www.scottsawyer.net/doll/catalogue.html
Artist's Website: http://www.scottsawyer.net/
Reviewed by: Thomas R. Erdmann

If you know Raleigh guitarist Scott Sawyer from only his jazz gigs and tours with jazz singer Nnenna Freelon, "Go There" (Doll) opens a different door. Welcome to Scott Sawyer, the funk, rock, blues -- and jazz -- player. A comparison might be made to guitarists John Scofield and Bill Frisell, who also cast a wide net.

With a preponderance of Sawyer tunes, the album is all groove underneath. Drummer Kenny Soule locks in with the Burbridge brothers -- electric bassist Oteil from the Allman Brothers band and organist and flutist Kofi from the Derek Trucks band -- to produce the hippest of backbeats and syncopation. Acoustic bassist Ron Brendle spells Oteil on the slow, bluesy "Slow Down, Freight Train," and there's a hint of mystery in Sawyer's chords and amplifier effects -- but the groove remains righteous.

As enticing as the beat is, there is also a fine sense of proportion in the ensemble dynamics (check the powerful buildup of the 10-minute "I Wish You Would") and solo pacing. On the bona fide slow blues "Go Home," Sawyer takes the less-is-more solo approach, but even on more open-ended tunes, he remains focused and to the point.

The tone of the group is always just right. Soule's drum sound exudes funk. Oteil's bass, ranging from slinky ostinato figures to bubbling Jaco Pastorius-like solo runs, matches Kofi's organ colors and strategically placed entrances and hits. Kofi's flute is also used to good effect on "I Wish You Would" and the "Caravan"-like "Dark Lady."

If you're looking for a pure, hard-line jazz album, this is not it. But if you think it represents a compromise, think again. It's its own species.

"Go There" is available at www.abstractlogix.com.

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Hittin' The Note -- Issue 52

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This story originally appeared in Metro Magazine (March 2007, www.metronc.com) AND online here: www.metronc.com/article/?id=1292
All rights reserved. This copyrighted material may not be published, broadcast or redistributed in any manner.

Guitar Man Scott Sawyer
by Philip van Vleck

Scott Sawyer is one of North Carolina’s guitar masters. Jazz-wise enough to back Durham-based vocalist Nneena Freelon on several national and international tours, yet nasty enough to handle the lead guitar chores for Mel Melton & The Wicked Mojos. And, of course, between 1999 and 2004 Sawyer teamed with Kenny Soule and Bobby Patterson — late of Dag — to form Go There, a trio with a finely honed jazz fusion thing.

Sawyer is set to release a new album this month — Go There — and the feel of the tunes, while referencing both blues and jazz, is neither. The album is, indeed, a revisiting of Sawyer and Soule’s Go There band project, inspired, according to Sawyer, by Soule. In describing his new disc, Sawyer noted first that it’s an instrumental outing: “To me it’s not a jazz record, but some people might consider it a jazz record because it has a lot of improvisation,” Sawyer allowed. “It doesn’t swing in the traditional sense, however; it’s more groove oriented. As you know, I have a blues background, and you’ll definitely hear that on the album. I really don’t know what to call it. It’s somewhere in between jam band, jazz, funk, rock and blues. I’ll leave it up to the listener to decide.”

To this listener, Go There sounds like a righteous amalgam of jazz, funk, rock and blues performed by a crew of very solid players. For immediate inspiration, check the brilliant, funkified arrangement of George Harrison’s “Tax Man.” Also note the 12-minute tour-de-force “I Wish You Would” and the blues “Slow Down, Freight Train.”

The crucial thing with Go There is the musicianship. Everyone is simply outstanding. In addition to Soule’s pivotal contribution on drums and ideas, Sawyer noted that: “I had two bass players: Ron Brendle played acoustic bass on three songs and Oteil Burbridge played electric bass on the rest of the tunes. Kofi Burbridge, Oteil’s brother, played Hammond B-3 on 10 of the 11 tunes, and he also played some flute.”

Many rock fans will recognize Kofi for his role with the Derek Trucks Band. His brother, Oteil, is well known to fans of The Allman Brothers Band, as well as those who follow his band Oteil & The Peacemakers. Oteil is something of a bass-playing icon. Sawyer scored a major coup in snagging him for Go There.

“The first time I met Oteil in person was when Go There opened for him at the Lincoln Theatre in August of 2004,” Sawyer recalled. “I think he may have been aware of me before then through Kofi. I’d been communicating with Kofi via e-mail over a period of a year-and-a-half, and I’d spoken with him briefly over the phone when he was in town playing with Derek Trucks. We’d never played together, Kofi and I, but we had friends — musicians — who we’d worked with and we wanted to get something together. Also, my younger brother, John, had been passing these guys CDs of recordings I’d played on — handing them off mainly to Kofi for a couple of years. John was kind of instrumental in making this project happen. Even though I’d met Kofi over 20 years ago, when I was in Greensboro, John re-introduced us.”

Sawyer went on to explain that Kofi informed him, via e-mail, as they were discussing the Go There project, that Oteil was interested in working with them. Sawyer was taken aback by this offer, but only for a moment. He was quick to invite Oteil to the recording session. Asked how long it took to record Go There, Sawyer smiled and replied: “It depends on what you mean. I guess it goes back to the first time I ever did a project like this, which was the original Go There trio — Bobby Patterson, Kenny Soule and me — back in 1999. In terms of actually making this record, it took three days in the studio, start to finish, with no rehearsal ahead of time. It was pretty intense.”

The record was tracked at Old House Studio in South Carolina with engineer Chris Garges. “Chris is actually a very good drummer,” Sawyer noted. “I’d played some gigs with him and Ron Brendle and John Alexander — jazz gigs. Chris works with Don Dixon sometimes. Aside from being a very fine drummer, he’s an excellent recording engineer. He actually helped me produce the album.” Sawyer allowed that recording an album in three days was a bit stressful, but he firmly believes that, “it was a cool way to make a record. The stressful part came with some of the production issues, some of which were his responsibility.

“That was kind of splitting my brain a little bit,” he laughed. “Business and music don’t necessarily mix that well. Overall, however, I’m very happy with the end result,” adding, “I didn’t have the luxury of going in, recording, taking it home, listening to it, and then booking another date two or four months out, and then ultimately trying to make a coherent record out of the dates,” he explained. “That’s not necessarily a good thing anyway. I had to go in knowing there was x amount of time to make this record, and at the end of that time everyone is going to get in their cars or hop on a plane and go their separate ways. If I don’t have something I can make into a record, then I’ve just wasted some time and some money. I think I’ll enjoy this method even more the next time I do a record,” he added, “because now I know it can be done.”

Sawyer and friends recorded Go There in the days immediately following Thanksgiving 2006. It was a fairly hectic period in terms of recording dates.

“About a week-and-a-half before that I played on a record that Lois Deloatch is recording,” Sawyer said. “A week after that I did a session with a pianist-organist named Gary Brunotte who’s also cutting an album. It was three weeks of lots of recording.

“There were really great drummers on all three projects,” he continued. “The drummer on Lois’ record was Ed Thigpen, who was Oscar Peterson’s drummer. That was just a pleasure. The drummer on Gary’s record was Bill Berg — he was the drummer with the LA group Flim & the BB’s. He’s a wonderful player, too. So I got to go from Ed Thigpen to Bill Berg to Kenny Soule — I felt like a real musician, man.”

In addition to his life as band leader and in-demand sideman, Sawyer also does some guitar teaching. “I work with a handful of guitar students usually,” he said. “Occasionally I do a master class workshop at universities in the area. I’d like to do more than that. I enjoy teaching. I don’t want to be teaching too many hours a week because I don’t want to spend too much time on the analytical side of music. I always have a few students, however, all of whom have a lot of potential.”

Asked if his students mainly come his way due to an interest in jazz, Sawyer replied that: “There was a time when the majority of my students might have been leaning toward jazz, but that’s not the case anymore. As I’ve gotten out and made an effort to get back to my rock and blues roots, I’ve expanded my own horizons again, so I’ve even worked with singer-songwriters who want to learn a little bit more about music so they can do more with their songs.”

In discussing expanded horizons, Sawyer recalled his gigs with Mel Melton with particular relish. “When I did a bunch of dates over the course of a year or so with Mel Melton, beginning back in 2001, that was really cool,” he said. “It reminded me how much fun it is to play music for people who are there for the music. They’re dancing, having a few beers, enjoying the music. I’d rather do that than be stuck in a corner of a fancy restaurant where nobody really cares that much about the music, or where very few people care.

“That feeling that I got playing with Mel is one of the reasons I did this new album,” he explained. “I think it can do well and we can take this out on the road as much as we want to and play music venues, rather than restaurants that have music.” Sawyer added that his remarks were not meant to belittle restaurant-type gigs.

“If you see me playing in a place — a restaurant — and then you see me there again, you can be sure that I’m enjoying myself,” he said. “Once I’m there, it doesn’t matter if it’s the Monterey Jazz Festival or a steakhouse or some little club that seats 20 people. As long as there are a few people listening, that’s all I need to make that connection.”

Sawyer plans to release Go There this month. Check out myspace.com/scottsawyermusic for a taste of the new tunes, and www.scottsawyer.net for news and to purchase Go There.

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