The perpetual crossroads we face in life- the random forks in the road begin in our adolescence aren’t always recognized as such until the narrative of one’s “story” is elucidated with the passage of time and people and then you realize that your life has been defined and formed by a series of choices made at various crossroads.

I am a musician and one of the benefits in choosing such a vocation is that there is a clear beginning to the narrative (nobody was born with a clarinet in their mouth!). So how did this all start? How did I, a kid from Coos Bay OR, become a professional woodwind player in New York City against seemingly impossible odds? It really started in earnest with one very special man who took an interest in me as a fledgling, clarinet obsessed 11 year old and taught me from the ground up.

July 13th would have been his 100th birthday and for his centennial, I would like to remember the person who started me on the musician’s path and who has helped me, in his passing, learn to be a better human being from the lived example of kindness and humility that he set.

Matt Utal was a legendary Hollywood studio musician whose career began shortly after the war- notably as the Lead Alto Saxophonist with Les Brown’s “Band of Renown” for 33 years as well as his work as a woodwind doubler for tv shows as a member of the NBC staff orchestra. In 1987, Matt and his wife Lee retired to Bandon, Oregon, thirty miles south of my hometown of Coos Bay, Oregon.

By the late 90’s, the Utals moved up the coast to Coos Bay as the majority of musical and artistic activities on the southern Oregon coast were based “in town”. The home they moved to on Oakway drive sat exactly equidistant between my childhood home and my grandparents’ house.

After an aborted early attempt at the flute, I happened to view a rerun of “Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood” on PBS featuring the wonderful clarinet virtuoso Richard Stoltzman. Hearing Dick Stoltzman casually rattle off the opening strains of the third movement of Mozart’s clarinet concerto in Fred Roger’s’ tv living room was enough to convince me to ask my folks for a clarinet. My grandparents, being children of the swing era, promptly introduced me to the music of Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw. My life changed in an instant and I knew, as soon as I heard the clarion call of Benny Goodman’s mellifluous tone, I was going to be a clarinetist. Little did I know that this dulcet, liquid tone of Benny Goodman was also Matt’s point of entry into the world of music some 70 years prior.

Prior to meeting Matt, I had picked up the clarinet myself, solely from a book of fingerings and my ear. I mimic’ed, as well as I could, the Goodman “sound” and tried my best to learn his “licks” (musical phrases) off of remastered recordings from the 1930’s. I also learned the first exposition of the third movement of the Mozart clarinet concerto, from Goodman’s 1960’s recording of the piece with the Boston Symphony (which by chance I found tucked in a reader’s digest produced record treasury of Mozart’s music that my grandparents had in their collection). A real classicist, covering my musical bases with some “long hair” music I thought! The only problem was: I couldn’t read music.

This led to issues in my 6th grade band class as well as with the junior high level, afterschool swing band I joined called the Oregon Coast Lab Band (more on that in another blog). In rehearsals, I would sit miming the music in order hear it once or twice and then intuit what I thought I was supposed to play, completely by ear. After a few embarrassing experiences, I was considering giving music up. In a last ditch attempt to kick open the doorway to legitimacy, I convinced my grandparents to drive us up to Portland where I had (on my own as an 11 year old) arranged an audition with the Portland Youth Philharmonic, one of the premier youth symphonies in North America. I wasn’t sure what I was thinking as nobody would have driven me 4 hours to Portland each week for rehearsals, but I wanted to see how I stacked up to other young clarinetists (yes, I already considered myself a clarinetist!). Of course, I had my 30-seconds of Mozart together but absolutely folded on the reading. I was devastated but apparently, my eagerness and sincerity were apparent enough for the conductor, Mei Ann Chen, to call our home in coos bay to break the news to me personally that I wasn’t admitted into any of the 3 orchestras. She encouraged me to work on my reading and find a good teacher. How was I ever going to learn to read? Who even taught the clarinet in Coos Bay, Oregon?

Crossroads

I had heard the name Matt Utal brought up among local musical cognoscenti for some time as a revered local master and I knew that he taught sparingly, only the best kids and adults in town and that he didn’t teach students in their musical infancy, from square one. I had assumed I would need to apply to study with him once I had learned to read music and even then there was no guarantee he would have time or the desire to teach me.

After weeks of begging my parents to contact the master (“what would it cost?” “Is this just going to be another passing fad for Aaron?”), my mother left a voicemail explaining that her 11 year old son had begun to play the clarinet and was interested in private study. The next afternoon, our landline rang and on the other end, the gentlest and calmest voice sprang forth from the receiver. You could almost hear the perpetual twinkle in Matt’s eye, just in from that speaking voice.

“Mrs Johnson, I’m really sorry but I just don’t have time to take another student on but perhaps in the coming few years, my schedule will free up and Aaron can study with me going into high school.”

My mother casually asked if he could recommend anyone else locally as her little boy’s enthusiasm for the clarinet had now bordered on obsession, and that she didn’t know how much longer she could stand me marching up and down the hallway playing along with Benny Goodman for 4 hours every day after school. Something changed in his tone immediately and he asked “before I recommend someone else in town, can you do me a favor Mrs Johnson? Can you peek into Aaron’s bedroom and let me know what he’s currently reading?”

My mother walked into my room and saw my copy of Gulliver’s travels sitting on my nightstand.

“Gulliver’s travels?! That was my favorite book as a youngster. If it’s not too much trouble, I have a cancellation next Thursday at 3 pm and would be interested in meeting Aaron and hearing him play”.

My grandfather, an elegant local Chrysler dealer who wore a jacket and tie every day and spoke with a heavy Louisiana accent, drove me 5 minutes down ocean blvd to my first lesson on Oakway Drive. After exchanging pleasantries with Matt and his wife Lee, we descended down the one flight of carpeted stairs to Matt’s teaching studio. There, on the walls, were the relics of a life spent at the top of the music profession. Photos lined the wall of Bob Hope USO shows in Vietnam, photos of Matt performing for the King of Thailand, on the road in Billy May’s orchestra, in the NBC staff Orchestra prerecording the underscoring for long-cancelled tv programs such as Rowan and Martin’s laugh in, Name that Tune, the Dean Martin Show, Peggy Lee specials, The Andy Williams show. This thoroughly impressed my grandfather and I could see in his eyes the mounting realization that this humble, small statured man with the soft and relaxed voice, half Fred Rogers in his cardigan sweater and half Keebler elf with his striking white hair and a twinkle in his eye, was a master of his craft and acknowledged as such throughout his field. The elusive “real deal”.

“Why don’t we start with something you’re comfortable playing, Aaron”. I launched into my trusty Mozart 3rd movement and within 10 seconds Matt cut me off and said “wow- you taught yourself to play that?”. He then pulled out a very simple duet and asked me to read it. I gave it my best try and fell apart nearly immediately. Matt didn’t hesitate and immediately said “I’ll take you as a student but unfortunately, I can only fit you in on Thursday’s at 2:30 pm. If you pursue music, you’ll need to be able to read anything handed to you but with diligence, you’ll overcome this obstacle”.  I was in!

Though the 2:30 lesson presented a problem for me as school let out at 3, my grandfather said “Sounds good Matt- let us know what your rates are”. “10 dollars- I don’t teach to make money but that is the lowest I can charge and still write it off on my taxes”.

Wow.

On the way to the car, my grandfather said “Aaron, I will work this out with your school but you have to promise me that you will do everything that this man asks you to do. He knows what he is doing.” And with that, I commenced upon the course of study that formed and would serve as my foundation as an artist to this day. Eventually, lessons were moved to Wednesdays after school. In that first year, Matt taught me all of my major, melodic and harmonic minor scales, scales in thirds, triads and diatonic 7th chords. He taught me subdivision and (moveable-“do”) solfeggio- the foundations of sight reading and he began to open his unique world of music, art and fellowship up to me.

Through Matt, I received a recommendation to join a local big band called “It’s About Time” composed of the finest musicians local to the southern Oregon coast such as siblings and former child prodigies, trumpeter Wilbur Jensen and saxophonist/clarinetist Judy Snyder (who as children, legend has it, sat in with the major touring bands who passed through Coquille Oregon on their way to California from Portland such as Louis Armstrong, Ellington, Basie, Lionel Hampton and Claude thornhill- and there are pictures!) as well as retired professional musicians from major musical markets such as LA and Vegas (though not in the band, the legendary studio  guitarist Al Hendrickson was active in the area and slightly before my time, so was Howard Roberts). The guys in the band had played for bandleaders such as Stan Kenton, Woody Herman and Les Brown and the band was shockingly seasoned, in retrospect, for it being based in such a small town.

One of the saxophonists, Sherm Gregory, had passed away and I took the initiative to call the leader, a gruff trombonist named Ken Masters, and offer my services as a musician. There were two problems which both centered around the fact that I was 11 years old: “can he play 4th tenor book accurately” and that the recurring Sunday afternoon dance job was 21+ and held at a casino. Ken was gracious on the phone and said “let me call Matt first and I’ll get back to you”. An hour later, Ken called and said “you must really play your butt off kid, because Matt Utal just vouged for your playing and told me that while you aren’t sight reading at a high level yet, he will go over the book with you each week at your lessons until you have it together.” Wow! Employment! My first job! I was already financially planning my future as a professional musician, in 20 dollar increments.

From that point forward, I played the 4th tenor book in the band as well as many clarinet features for the next 4 years until I moved to Portland with my mom to further my musical education. Ken Masters took an interest in me and threw me solos every gig- I know he could be fiery but he was nothing short of beautiful to me and encouraged my talents all the way. It was in this band, seated next to Matt Utal and in front of the great Stan Kenton Orchestra solo trombonist Archie Lecoque, where I began to form the basis of the skillset which I continue to employ as a professional woodwind doubler on the New York scene. The traditions and culture of the midcentury journeyman musician were truly the bedrocks of my entire life in music and I am not too naive and unaware to recognize that the extra “thing” in my playing isn’t something i was born with but a lineage in which membership cannot be acquired through any way but induction by a master. My early musical education was a Dharma transmission from a now-departed generation of a largely forgotten world and though the culture of being a professional musician has certainly changed, I find a depth of purpose meaning by carrying forth and embodying those old world musical values and ethics even if it isn’t recognized or appreciated. It’s for me.

In addition to the it’s about time big band, Matt encouraged me to continue studying classical music in any way I could which led to my membership in the semi-professional, Oregon Coast Chamber Orchestra out of Florence, OR and spearheaded by conductor, pianist and psychologist, Robin DeVore. Another beautiful musician and human transplanted to the Oregon  coast from Southern California, Maestro DeVore was legally blind and was led to the podium by his seeing eye dog. Similar to the Ken Masters situation, I cold called the Maestro out of the phone book after attending an impressive concert he conducted at the local Presbyterian church and dropped Matt’s name. Hired. I was 12 years old. This orchestra was composed of musicians from as far south as Coos Bay and as far north as Eugene, broadening my “contacts” and giving me my first experiences “playing behind fiddles” as well as my first experiences playing the “A” clarinet (and if I remember correctly, I played my first Nutcracker Suite with this orchestra).

Perhaps more important than the chamber orchestra, Matt secured me an audition with the Bay Area Concert Band- a civic band in the grand tradition of Sousa, a musical time capsule harkening back to an era when bands bearing a similar likeness were a staple and feature of every small town in America and often performed summer concerts in a bandshell or on a bandstand located within the city park or town square. It is a direct link to civil war era brass bands as well as the pioneer culture (which still underlines the rural Pacific Northwest) when lumber mills often had a company brass band and civic bands were a dime a dozen in these small logging/fishing/homesteading communities. My involvement with this unique organization, the Bay Area Concert Band Association, continues to this day with hired summer concert appearances as a reoccurring soloist, often sharing soloist duties on summer programs with a now 89 year old Wilbur Jensen who sounds absolutely stunning to this day.

After concert band rehearsals (I played in the back of the clarinet section and Matt, at the front of the flutes) Matt and his wife Lee began to invite me to the Kozy Kitchen for breakfast-at-night before giving me a lift home. This is where my bond with Matt deepened and began to take on a more personal tone and character. My grandparents adored the Utals and semi-frequently had them over for dinner; They were invited to birthdays, Thanksgiving and even sat a row or two behind my grieving family at my grandfather’s funeral during my freshman year of high school. We often enjoyed dining at Kum Yon’s restaurant and Gerry’s on central avenue. We would frequent coffee shops such as the Cone 9, Books by the Bay and Sozo tea house where I would go to hear local jazz on Friday nights and sit at Matt’s table to drink tea and eat carrot cake.

In addition to larger ensembles, Matt decided i needed experience playing chamber music and while recovering from a successful glaucoma surgery, began to send me to sub in the “Sweet n Low” saxophone quartet, with his very close musical friends Judy Snyder, Ron Carpani and Rod Schweitz (the saxophone section from the it’s about time band). The group performed arrangements by the Hollywood Saxophone Quartet, lots of Lennie Niehaus, some classical things (and if I remember correctly also had a holiday book). More invaluable experience and it was during this time, I became very close to Judy and her late husband, the wonderful drummer Dale Snyder.

The Snyders had a pro-level recording studio behind their home and it was Dale who recorded (on a board, before recording was being done on computers nearly exclusively) my audition tape to Interlochen, which was another pivotal, life changing experience for me and led to 4 summers at camp and one school year at the academy. Again, a Matt connection that changed my life and remains strong in Judy and I’s deep and treasured  (for me) lifelong friendship. I’ll need to write a separate article soon to accurately express what the friendship I have with Wilbur Jensen and Judy Snyder (now in their late 80’s) and their families has meant to me and to my life. Back to Matt.

My lessons now included, in addition to scales- etudes from the French school, the solo literature of classical clarinet as well as duets with Matt on clarinet, saxophone and later, Flute. At the end of the lesson came the practical application of it all- preparing the “book” for the “gig”. To that generation of postwar musicians, there was nothing more holy and sanctified in music than the gig- an ethos sometimes lost today in the wilds of employment scarcity amongst musicians and the overwhelming influence academia has wielded upon instrumental performance as the work’s dried up over the years, but I digress! Matt would carefully take me through the casino dance sets, playing the lead alto part and clearing up the mysteries of section playing and blending. He taught me how to “mark up” a book of parts (tricky phrases were marked by a cartoon of eyeglasses, instrument switches highlighted, cues from the brass marked etc)-taught me the appropriate “blowing” style of big band tenor playing and urged me to, when improvising solos, to use the utmost discretion and to rely mostly on the melody of the song to guide my improvisation. “If a tenor player has 8 bars, play mostly the melody with a “jazz” sound- if it’s a 16 bar solo, play melody both times but the second 8 bars, play fills or runs in the “spaces” of the melody or into the next phrase.” This practical training indoctrinated me into a tradition of commercial dance band saxophone section playing that today is nearly a lost art. (One thing to note, Matt would handwrite my weekly lessons on manuscript paper, using a sharpie felt tip pen- he had impeccable musical manuscript as did many of the musicians of his generation.)

What Matt instilled in me more than anything nuts-and-bolts-tangible though, was taste and ultimately, a full induction into the culture of the mid 20th century professional musician. From the omnipresent date book he carried in his front pocket to his Casio digibank watch, he was a PRO. His mantra throughout his entire life (and a mantra shared by that generation of Hollywood woodwind artists) was “make every note….a gem”. He exposed me to the players he felt embodied that careful, responsible and even “zen” approach. Simple and correct is preferable to flailing about on the horn if the goal is to reach people and touch their heart with one’s playing (and even make a buck in the process). Lester Young, the President of the Tenor Saxophone, was God in Matt’s book. Johnny Hodges, Jimmy Hamilton, Benny Goodman, Paul Desmond, Stan Getz and Zoot Sims were all primary sources and he had played with or heard all of them in person. Matt connected me, over email, to his old buddy from the LA days (also an LA expat to the Northwest, living up in Port Townsend Washington), Bud Shank who was (despite his gruff reputation later in life) more than gracious in encouraging a young Alto/Flute player from rural Oregon. Matt had subbed for Bud in the Stan Kenton innovations in modern music orchestra (you know, the one that had Bud, Art Pepper, Bob Cooper, June Christy and Maynard Ferguson on the band).

Matt was an alum of the mythical and short-lived Westlake College of Commercial Music (the first “modern music” school- predating Boston’s schillinger house which would become Berklee as well as North Texas state’s jazz program) and had taken courses taught there by the best arrangers in Hollywood at the time- Russ Garcia, Paul Villepigue and Robert Graettinger were all on faculty there when he was a student. He loved Villepigue’s Ellington influenced writing for Ike Carpenter’s mid 40’s band and was still shaken by Villepigue’s untimely 1952 suicide, supposedly connected to his involvement in early Dianetics (L. Ron Hubbard) study groups. Matt even roomed with Bill Holman back in the day and was in his wedding!

As Matt settled into a life “off the road” and began to freelance around LA around 1954, he was fortunate to have a steady “day gig” running the music publishing department of Dick Bock’s “Pacific Jazz” record label. This put him right in the middle of the then-thriving “West Coast” style of Jazz, a softer and subtler antidote to the cauldron-hot bebop jazz happening in New York. Matt formed a drummerless trio featuring himself on flute and clarinet, Guitar (often Jim Hall) and Bass (Mel Pollan) and wrote a book of 20 arrangements of American songbook tunes and classical music. I have living room recordings of the group and hope to clean them up and making them available for free on YouTube as they are an incredible document of a special era in Jazz.

Of note to Clarinetists, Matt was one of Harry Keller’s two students (the other was Frank Sabin, principal clarinet in the Pasadena symphony and professor at occidental college). Keller was a reclusive and eccentric master of the clarinet- a virtuoso pianist and was the first clarinetist to pursue the playing of major violin solo works on the clarinet such as the Tchaikovsky and Mendelssohn concertos. He was also an autodidact, even working on his own set of encyclopedias! Keller’s work represents an unexposed avenue of midcentury clarinet performance and an interesting branch of the “Bellison tree”. (Simeon Bellison, noted clarinetist of Russia extraction (though he played a German system clarinet, his training was firmly Russian) who played principal in the New York Philharmonic for 28 years and as a pedagogue, is considered to be the foundation of the “New York school” of clarinet playing whose numerous notable students included David Weber, Kal Opperman, Leon Russianoff, David Oppenheim, jazz clarinetist Sol Yaged (and according to Kal Opperman…Benny Goodman!) as well as Harry Keller. Bellison also, from the 1920’s through the 40’s, maintained a clarinet choir of around 50 of his students. Harry Keller was likely the most influential musician to Matt’s life outside of his employer, Les Brown.

This was the unique world of Matt Utal- the world in which I was musically conceived, which determined my fundamental artistic  and personal values and a world that I have never strayed very far from despite moving across the United States to New York in 2009. Matt passed in September of 2019 and while I miss him tremendously, I am a little relieved that he didn’t have to witness the descent of our world into meanspiritedness, division and injustice. Matt believed deeply in the equality and intrinsic goodness of people-he had such a good faith in humanity that it would have been hard for me to ever see that love of people challenged by the times we are living through.

As I have grown into my adulthood, the thing I respect and appreciate about Matt the most was his beautiful, kind and empathetic heart- the sincerity of the easy-going sweetness he lived his life spreading was only matched by tenderness of his soul. To lead a life of love and music the way Matt Utal did, is so much more courageous and difficult than I had ever realized and an immense inspiration to me today as I navigate myself through life in a world that seems stuck in a depressing cultural rut where the celebration of negativity and meanness and peddling of hate and fear are norms.

It took me nearly 25 years to realize that, despite Matt being (by far) one of the greatest musicians I have ever known, the example he set for loving your fellow human being and enjoying your life through the celebration of Art and Beauty was the real gift that he gave his family and friends. We are all much better people for having known him, and in my own life, I definitely strayed from his example up until a few years ago but I wince thinking of where I could’ve ended up had Matt not been my “North Star” during these formative growing pains- years in which I walked around with a lot of hate in my heart.

When visiting Matt at various elderly care homes in his last years, he would almost ask me two things: “are you working?” and “are you happy? are you enjoying life?”. To be honest, during these “angry young man” years I wasn’t doing a whole of lot thinking about my career nor my happiness. All I wanted was to be a great musician, at any cost. Practicing 8 hours a day? Sure. Learning to play bebop? Absolutely. Working on becoming the finest professional musician and person I could in hopes of joining the workforce? Absolutely not! My personal life was miserable- failed romantic relationships, struggles with addiction, feuds with fellow musicians and in general, an ungrateful attitude and posture that had overshadowed “me” and my playing completely. It’s taken me quite some time (nearly a decade) to get my life together and to repair my heart, but I can say that while things still aren’t perfect- I am finally walking the path Matt laid out for me all of those years ago and I am actively striving to be a better human being who deserves a life in the arts and who deserves to have wonderful musicians and people as colleagues. Being a musician on this level is a deep responsibility- to the craft and lineage but also a responsibility to maintain one’s gratitude. Nobody I have ever known has embodied that particular ethic of graciousness and responsibility and lived it more sincerely than Matt Utal.

Thank you Matt-  I will continue to live my life striving to make every note a gem and learning from your example by choosing to live a life of music, love and fellowship in the face of noise, hate and division. Thank you for your belief in me- it has been the glue that has held my heart and soul together for all of these years, even when I didn’t realize it.

Notes from an Anachronistic Musician

I’ve lived intoxicated by even the fumes of the past, with very little regard for the limitations living in the past might place on my career in the present.

Since it has become quite obvious that we’ve shifted, as a scene (and broader society), toward an algorithm-driven reality where an artist’s good faith with the public and social standing within the musician community are tied to and determined by the nature and frequency of their digital presence, I feel that it is important to document and log my real-life experiences as a (very flawed but well-meaning!) human being who has chosen to live a life parallel to conventional society and come up as a musician the old fashioned way.

For as long as I have lived, I have felt trapped within the specter of the 20th century, hallucinating on its acrid fumes.

“Why so serious, Mr. Johnson?”

We’ll get into that.

I came up with a pathological reverence for tradition and correctness, which evolved into a set of closely adhered-to performance practices, values, and an ethos surrounding music. That shifted during the pandemic era into a caustic jazz-internet/disruptive performance art piece (jazz battle time!). Finally, after four members of my family died within a year (including my mother, in an uninvestigated single-car collision), I rolled my sleeves back up and returned to real music and the (most of the time) overwhelming feeling of responsibility to the craft of being a great musician via unending amounts of woodshedding.

Any worthwhile artist always remains a student, but I’ve reached the point where, if I’m going to continue growing musically, I also need to flesh out my life in writing. My music has become inseparable from my story, and the story deserves its own space.

This isn’t farewell to an anachronistic life spent in anonymity, sweating out my demons in my isolation booth/practice room, keeping my hand close to my chest online, and avoiding the pervasive trend of constant digital self-reporting… but it is farewell to the parts of that existence that don’t aid in my survival through increased work, collaborations, and touring.

I suppose that a pessimist could look at what I intend to do with this blog and accuse me of self promotion, but now is the time to document the people, experiences, and folklore that have had a profound influence on my life, as well as to create a place to update people interested in my present life and work as to my whereabouts, current projects, and so on.

The themes I plan to explore here include profiles of my mentors and teachers (musical and spiritual), the story of music on the Southern Oregon coast, surviving the Pacific Northwest opioid epidemic, New York in the 2010s, woodwind doubling (and other facets of old-world 20th-century musicianship), the state of music education today, as well as musings and meditations on what it means to be an artist joyfully careening toward the middle of the 21st century.

Alongside occasional career announcements and updates, I hope these essays become a kind of companion piece to my music—a canon of stories, ideas, and influences that explains not only the work itself, but the life behind it.

Time to shit or get off the pot!

—Aaron