Shining Star: Groovin' with Maurice White

Jun 19, 2007 3:02 AM, By Michael Molenda

           

How do you track the live musicians?
The drummer plays to the MIDI tracks, and I usually record three to four guys at one time. The reason I do that is because I like the energy to flow between the musicians. I find you get better performances that way than if you overdub the drums and bass and other rhythm instruments separately. On the other hand, I don’t want a lot of musicians in there playing together because I need them to focus on their parts and really interact with the other players. It can be rough when you’re listening to the MIDI stuff and too many live players on headphones because there’s just so much sound. It’s difficult to concentrate.

So how do you usually track your horn section? Do you overdub an entire section at once?
I do the section all at once, and I always double or triple my horns. I’ve been doing that for years. I think that’s why we get such a tremendous horn sound. Of course, it’s important for the horns to be in a room that has the right atmosphere.

What type of room usually works best for recording horns?
It’s kind of a catch as catch can because you never know until you try. Every room has its own characteristics, but I usually look for a live room. I’m a horn freak, so the studio I’m building now is very, very live. The room isn’t that big, actually, but I think it will be a good environment for recording horns and drums.

What about the actual horn arrangements? How do you develop those?
I write out charts, but, normally, they’re lines that I’ve already tried using sequenced simulations. Sometimes, I’ll just sing the parts against the track and see how the horn parts work with the vocals. Then I’ll write the horn parts around the vocal. Often, I’ll be faced with the problem of having too many parts. For example, I may have to eliminate the horns during the verse and not use them until the chorus. It all depends on the feeling of the song.

Given the evolution of dance music into subgenres such as jungle, drum and bass, and techno, do you approach the funk idiom differently than you did in Earth, Wind & Fire’s classic years?
As far as a groove is concerned, I think that a lot of things have remained the same. You still have to get guys to play together, and you still have to program something that moves. The only difference nowadays is, for tracking drums and bass live, we have the opportunity to simulate the groove before it’s recorded. You can spend fifteen minutes programming something, and then you can see what the groove will sound like when you do it with a studio full of musicians.

Are you a stickler for absolutely locked-down grooves, or do you let things get loose?
I allow a little bit of space because I want that human element. You don’t want things to be perfect! You can hear it when someone is trying too hard to be precise — I certainly hear that on a lot of songs these days. I’ll think, “Oh, he’s just trying too hard.” Sometimes, I’ll purposely leave a mistake on a record because it’s a human thing. Obviously, the “mistake” has to be cool, or at least presentable, but I don’t automatically erase errors.

You’ve worked with some amazing vocalists. Do you give them much leeway?
I see where the vocalist is coming from with the song. If I think where they’re coming from is good, we’ll go in that direction. If not, I’ll take hold of the reins and kind of steer them in the right direction. I’ve found it’s usually rewarding to let the vocalist create as he or she works through the song. We’ll have a certain motif or melody, and I’ll let the vocalist take that melody and experiment with it. But I’ll typically impose some boundaries regarding the phrasing and how far the vocalist can stray from the original melody.

Often, the melody will change because the vocalist has the chops to let us experiment with dynamics, and he or she will show us a different side of the song. There have been many times where I’ve come in with a basic melodic idea, listened to the vocalist sing the song, and then changed the whole thing around the vocalist’s performance. You can discover new things about the work based on the interpretations of the musicians, but to get there you have to allow creative freedom.

A fair amount of producers like the vocalist to sing the melody as written or to stick to the demo version.
You can do that. I think that probably works with artists who are inexperienced. But I’ve been fortunate enough to work with a lot of experienced, talented artists. I trust where they’re going. If they go off-key or miss the direction, I’ll bring them back to where I want them to be. But I definitely feel that it’s important to give the vocalist the freedom to experiment.

Where do you stand on technique versus passion?
I’m kind of fifty-fifty on that one. I like emotional involvement, but I still want the song represented in a technically high form.

The hype floating around the world-beat scene must be somewhat amusing to you, especially because you were juggling ethnic styles twenty years ago. Some of today’s musicians—who tend to integrate the styles badly—consider themselves pioneers of the genre.
Well, there were a lot of people who did it badly twenty years ago, too! I use world instruments as colors, as a way to expose people to different sides of the music. I don’t think you can just sit down and decide to play those things. Integrating styles is usually something that happens spontaneously.

Obviously, if you have broad life and musical experiences, those influences will creep into your compositions.
And I also think you have to be open to all types of music. I listen to a lot of jazz, but I also listen to classical music. I listen to a lot of roots music — a lot of the old blues and folk recordings, the real old stuff. I listen to all different types of music because when you experience different sounds, you add tonal colors to your ears. Then when you’re in the studio creating something, your subconscious calls on a lot of this stuff. It’s easy to access different styles and colors when you’ve got them in your heart.

Do you feel chained to the musical heritage of Earth, Wind & Fire? What I mean is, do you feel like you must always be true to the style of your biggest hits?
No. I only feel freedom, and I always approach the music that way. I don’t feel like I have to rewrite our hits because I think in terms of “that was then, and this is now.” We [Earth, Wind & Fire] can be our toughest competition, and each one of us is out there experiencing new music and new things. When you allow yourself the freedom to approach music without limitations, everything you experience can be channeled through your songs. You just have to try to stay in a place where all those experiences help you produce good music.

But, even if the band is listening to different records, I doubt that it would be stylistically appropriate for Earth, Wind & Fire to produce an ambient dance track.
Probably not. I hear a lot of weird tracks, and some stuff is just so unmusical. Some records are all about sound; they have no spirit. For example, some of the kids today can’t write a song, so they wind up sampling somebody else’s.

Well, classic songwriting does seem to be in a slump. Also, I don’t hear a lot of current artists putting their mark on past song forms and carrying music forward a step. In the early 1960s, for example, British kids heard the blues and translated it into something else.
It’s the training! What’s happening with me and a lot of other people who made good records is that we understand composition. We know how to construct a song. And we had an appreciation for the music we were influenced by, but at the same time, we were able to put our own identification on it. You must always try to give the music your identity. In other words, if I copy a line from a Muddy Waters song, even though the line was inspired by him, my version of it will probably not sound anything like his original.

What do you consider as your fundamental approach to record production?
Well, my production style definitely comes from being a drummer. You see, the drummer knows what all the musicians are playing because he or she must accentuate all the instruments and play the groove, too. Coming from that space, you have an opportunity to expand the music into any direction you want because you already know what everybody is playing.

For example, you can suggest a line for the bass player that will fit with what the guitar player is playing. In fact, I would say that all my productions are not very far removed from the drummer’s role. The sounds in the mix fit in rhythmically and sonically — just like a drummer playing the bass drum, the snare, the hi-hat, the toms, and the cymbals. So you’ve got the lows, you’ve got the highs, and all the parts fit together as a whole. Believe me, you have to have big ears to be a drummer!