Patrice Rushen is LA’s jazz connoisseur

(News4usOnline) – The work of Patrice Rushen speaks for itself. She is a woman of many firsts. She is the first woman to serve as musical director for the Grammy Awards. She is the first woman to hold the title as musical director for the NAACP Image Awards. 

The same can be said about her role with the People Choice Awards and how she called the shots as musical director for the Emmy Awards. Her resume is full of firsts and barrier-breaking achievements during her groundbreaking career, including being in charge of music for a late-night television talk show. 

She has three Grammy nominations under her belt. She not only plays the piano, she is revered as a world-class pianist. She has composed music for films such as “Waiting to Exhale” and “Men in Black.” There is a lot that Rushen has done in her illustrious career. 

Despite all of her incredible achievements, Rushen feels she has not made it to the accomplishment mountain top just yet.   

“Well, I don’t think I’ve…I don’t think I’ve gotten to whatever the greatest accomplishment is going to be,” Rushen said. “But the idea is, and I see what I understand what you mean. The idea is, I think that the goal for me was to be a comprehensive musician. That was the goal. I didn’t even know what that exactly would mean or entail.”

While all of these markers serve as important barometers for Rushen’s trajectory as a musical giant, making music is at the core of her success and the key to her longevity, she said during a Zoom interview with Dennis J. Freeman.  

“I don’t think I was worried about fame,” Rushen said. “That seems to be like a something that I have to offer to my students all the time. It’s like, why are you? Why do you want to do that? And I’m not knocking fame, trust me, there’s a lot of perks to being famous.” 

She continued, “I get it right, but I think that that is a result of something right? And I think that the longevity piece for me has been just the desire to and the joy that comes out of being able to make music. I mean, everybody can’t do it.”

Creating music has been a gift that Rushen has been able to share with others for over six decades. That journey began as a child prodigy long before he went out and joined the Locke High School band in South Los Angeles and then transferred to playing at local musical festivals before she landed her first deal with Prestige Records. 

Playing for Locke allowed Rushen and her bandmates to go places and perform at locations such as the Monterey Jazz Festival where she caught the eye and ear of music officials from Prestige Records. Rushen wound up signing a three-album deal with Prestige and cited the move as an important step in her recording career.

“Big time, big time, because, um, up to that point, you know, I was playing locally and doing some things, and that I was seen by them and a few other labels at the Monterey Jazz Festival of 1972,” Rushen said. 

As things would play out, Locke’s band didn’t make the cut to be on the big stage, but Rushen’s combo band did. This opportunity allowed Rushen to be noticed by music executives. 

She was a hit, but the one caveat that stood in her way between moving on to another level musically was self-doubt.  

“It’s an international festival [Monterey Jazz Festival], and you’ve got a lot of record companies and people like that there, and people were very interested, you know, in talking to me and signing me. I didn’t feel like I was ready at all,” she said. 

“And people probably would say, Now, you’re out of your mind. But I was saying no to a lot, because I was like, you know, people who make records, they know what they’re doing. I wasn’t ready,” Rushen added. 

The record company found a way to convince Rushen that she was ready, allowing her to have creative control of her albums, she said. 

“They said, Listen, we get it, and we just want to be part of what doc. We think you’re going to be an important artist at some point, and we wouldn’t want to just document the beginnings. That’s the way they put it. That sounded safe to me,” remarked Rushen. 

Since that decision, the classically-trained pianist has seen her musical career expand by leaps and bounds. Her collaborations with different artists over the years tells you about her musical pedigree. And there’s been many. The list of people that Rushen has worked or performed with is too long to mention. 

However, to name a few of them, the list includes Nancy Wilson, Herbie Hancock, George Benson, Dianne Reeves, Prince, Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, and Sheena Easton. Rushen’s body of work as a performer, songwriter and composer is just as impressive. 

Rushen brings her repertoire of music to the Walt Disney Concert Hall sponsored by LAPhil on May 2 in downtown Los Angeles with a live performance. It’s not a stretch that Rushen will at some point during the concert hit the right button when she plays perhaps her most endearing song, the hit “Forget Me Nots.” 

“Forget Me Nots” is one of the most popular songs to be sampled. The hit tune, which came out originally in 1982 and spent 16 weeks on the Billboard Top 100 chart, has had an amazing shelf life thanks to artists such as Will Smith, George Michael, Randy Crawford, and Lee Ritenour reviving the song. 

When asked if she could pinpoint a reason why “Forget Me Nots” continues to resonate with artists and fans alike, Rushen was somewhat at a loss for words.

“I don’t know, really,” she said. 

She would say that thanks to the song’s incorporation in movies such as “Big” and “Men in Black,” it became a launch pad for “Forget Me Nots” to be accepted by another generation of listeners. 

“There’s a new use in this big movie, right? And then fast forward a few years later, and it’s used as the basis of the song, the theme for ‘Men in Black’ for that whole franchise. So, the lesson for us was the belief in things. Take action on your belief. And you know, years and years later, now it’s, it’s continues to be sampled a lot,” Rushen said.

Feature Image: “Patrice Rushen, Courtesy of the LA Phil”