Originally published in Jersey Jazz - Reprinted by permission of the New Jersey Jazz Society
Drummer Ulysses Owens, Jr.'s Cellar Music album, A New Beat, featuring his Generation Y of up-and-coming young jazz artists, spent eight weeks at Number 1 on the JazzWeek charts.
That success with emerging artists has prompted some to describe Owens as a modern-day Art Blakey, the legendary drummer who nurtured so many young talents. Owens' response: "Not to diminish my hard work, but I would not have become what I am today if not for those who helped me. I'm just repeating a model."
Growing up in Jacksonville, FL, Owens was supported by a lot of local musicians "who sort of reared me and helped me get to New York." Once he got to New York after being accepted to Juilliard, his two key mentors were the late pianist Mulgrew Miller and multi-reedist Victor Goines. "To be completely honest," Owens said, "I did not even know who Mulgrew was. Of course, he was a great player, but he came over to the drums and took my hand and said, 'You got to play this way.' First of all, nobody had ever given me that much attention. Secondly, he wasn't a drummer. He became my mentor, and, later on, I understood that he had played with Art Blakey and Tony Williams. And, he used to tell me all those stories about Blakey."
His other mentor, Goines, was the first Artistic Director at Juilliard Jazz. "I always say I thought he hated my guts, but, actually, because he was so hard on me, he made me a great musician. So, that I'm being compared to Art Blakey -- I think it's incredible because it's the true tradition of the music. If you want to grow, you've got to be mentored and have an uncanny ability to play." (Owens will be performing with Goines' quartet May 17-19 at New York's Dizzy's Club).
Owens is currently Small Ensemble Director at Juilliard Jazz, and one example of those he has mentored is alto saxophonist Sarah Hanahan, who can be heard on A New Beat and was a Jersey Jazz Rising Star in September/October 2020. "When I first met her," Owens recalled, "she was fresh off the train from Connecticut (She had graduated from the Hartt School of Music Jackie McLean Institute at the University of Hartford and came to New York to get her master's degree in Jazz Studies at Juilliard). I was with the Mingus Band, and I said, 'I'll hire you and put you front and center.' She not only went from playing beautifully; she was a star." With young musicians, he said, "first and foremost, there has to be a talent. And there has to be a teachable spirit. I met Sarah during the Covid year. That was fall of 2020. We started virtually and then Juilliard had us come back in January 2021. I made the students write an essay of, 'What are you against? What bothers you?' Sarah wrote about misogyny, the disrespect she had experienced as a woman in jazz. She was so passionate. That's when I decided to hire her. What was in that anger was a lot of beauty."
In her audition for the Hartt School, Hanahan played "I Hear a Rhapsody", which was recorded by alto saxophonist Jackie McLean on his 1960 Prestige album, Makin' The Changes. She told me that McLean was her biggest influence, and Owens pointed out that, "There's a direct connection between Sarah and Jackie McLean, by design. Jackie McLean created a whole community and fostered the music in the way he embraced it, but to create a pathway. And, Sarah's a part of that crew." McLean, who also had a knack for spotting young talent, appeared on six Art Blakey albums recorded in the 1950s. He passed away in 2006 at the age of 74.
Like the young musicians who played with Blakey, Hanahan has now moved on from Generation Y. "Sarah's actually no longer in the band because I said, 'Go do your own thing. I'm excited to hear her new record coming out from Blue Engine and what she's going to be doing with (drummer) Joe Farnsworth, taking her to the next dimension." Hanahan will preview her new Blue Engine album, Among Giants, on June 6 at Dizzy's Club. Her quartet will include pianist Marc Cary, bassist Nat Reeves, and drummer Jeff 'Tain' Watts. Reeves is another of her mentors. He was a Hartt faculty member, and she told me, "He used to pull me up on stage even when I wasn't ready. I'm so grateful to him for that." Hanahan has appeared recently with Farnsworth's quartet at Greenwich Village's Smalls and Chris' Jazz Cafe in Philadelphia.
Ulysses Owens, Jr.
Owens took a quartet to Tokyo in March with two young musicians who were on A New Beat -- trumpeter Anthony Hervey and pianist Tyler Bullock -- and two new members of Generation Y -- saxophonist Langston Hughes II and bassist Thomas Milovac. In June, Owens is doing a Canadian tour, with trumpeter and A New Beat band member, Benny Benack III, replacing Hervey on trumpet. Hervey and Bullock have been featured as Jersey Jazz Rising Stars (April 2022 and February 2024, respectively). Owens produced Hervey's debut album, Words From My Horn (Outside in Music: 2023), and Hervey's composition, "Better Days", is repeated on A New Beat. Bullock, currently one of Owens' Juilliard students, is also the pianist with the Roy Hargrove Big Band.
Hughes, who Owens said is "burning up the scene," is currently pursuing a master's degree at Juilliard, has also toured with Wynton Marsalis and The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, and has performed with such artists as vocalist Jazzmeia Horn and pianist Orrin Evans. Milovac is described by Owens as "my quiet storm. He lives in Orlando so nobody knows about him. This cat's got some McBride, some Ray Brown, some Scott LaFaro."
Generation Y was started in 2019. "We did one gig at the Jazz Standard and Covid happened." By the time he could get back on the road and build a new band, some of the key members, such as alto saxophonist Alexa Tarantino and pianist Luther Allison, had moved on. A New Beat is a combination of young talents. "I told Corey Weeds (saxophonist and owner of Cellar Music), "We're gonna play everybody on the record." In addition to Hanahan, Hervey, Bullock, and Benack, A New Beat includes performances by Allison, alto saxophonist Erena Terakubo, bassists Philip Norris and Ryoma Takenaga, and vocalist Milton Suggs.
Takenaga, from New Providence, NJ, is studying jazz at New York University and has been featured twice in Jersey Jazz. In May/June 2020, he was profiled in a Rising Stars article about three students who received multiple awards at the Charles Mingus Festival and High School Competition held every February at The New School in New York City. In May 2021, he was part of a feature about the three New Jersey high school students who were accepted into that year's Carnegie Hall NYO Jazz Orchestra.
Owens first encountered Takenaga at an NYU workshop. "He's an incredible musician. I took him to Europe with me. Right after that tour, (trumpeter) Christian Scott picked him up. Now, he's everywhere." Terakubo was the cover story in the October 2023 issue of Jersey Jazz in connection with her appearance at the South Jersey Jazz Society's Jazz@ThePoint Festival in Somers Point. In 2022, she was invited by Music Director John Beasley to perform at International Jazz Day, and on May 14 she will be appearing in San Diego at two concerts called "John Beasley and the Next Generation", curated by alto saxophonist Charles McPherson for the La Jolla Music Society. Her mentor, alto saxophonist Vincent Herring, calls her "the world's best female alto saxophonist." Terakubo met Owens at the Tokyo Jazz Festival. "She was there playing with the great (trumpeter) Teramasu Hino," he recalled. "She kinda stuck in my mind. She's great."
Reviews of A New Beat have been very enthusiastic. Jersey Jazz's Joe Lang wrote that, "The young players flawlessly execute the demanding charts conceived by Owens. The excitement generated by these players illustrates that the future of jazz is in good hands." According to AllAboutJazz's Glenn Astarita, "The band supremely carries the torch of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers manifesto, serving as a dynamic incubator for emerging jazz talent amid hard-swinging choruses and dynamic bop interplay." AllMusic's Matt Collar praised Owens "whose dynamic, intensely swinging style propels the group forward throughout the album," adding that, "players like trumpeter Benny Benack III and saxophonist Sarah Hanahan are on the cusp of great things and just coming into their own as players. Particularly thrilling is their improvisational sparring on (Jackie McLean's) 'Bird Lives'." He also singled out Hervey's "warm-bodied solo" on Roy Hargrove's "Soulful".
Owens acknowledged that, "I do have an ability to spot talent," and his overall goal is that, "If a person goes on the road with me and gets that experience, they could emerge to something greater. That's my hope with Generation Y. For every person you see in the lineup, I've got two or three others waiting to go on the road."
The New Jersey Jazz Society is a non-profit organization of business and professional people, musicians, teachers, students and listeners working together for the purpose of advancing jazz music. Their mission is to promote and preserve America’s original art form – jazz. The Society seeks to ensure continuity of the jazz art form through its commitment to nurture and champion local talent, along with showcasing outstanding national and international artists providing for the younger generation via arts education programs.
