Today, Hancock, who lives in West Hollywood, no longer drinks or smokes (he gave up both two decades ago). One thing I was glad about, I was glad that it was going to be over,” he recalls. Immediately I went, ‘Oh no, I shouldn’t have done this.’ You know what it does? It goes right to the pleasure centres of your brain and overloads it.”Īshamed and terrified of being caught, he hid his habit, only stopping when his wife, daughter and two close friends held an intervention in 1999. Although he had snorted cocaine before (“it mostly just wakes you up like several cups of coffee”) he was curious about smoking it. Hancock realised that firsthand when he found himself accidentally addicted to crack. For the only person that is responsible for your happiness is you.” “It’s to let the other person be who they are, let them develop themselves and not make them responsible for your happiness. “Absolutely, I’ll tell you,” he says in his slow drawl, a drawl made for confessions and confidences. Helping him along has been his 50-plus-year marriage to his wife, Gigi, with whom he has a daughter. Standing on the shoulders of giants: a masterclass in jazz at the Sydney Opera House with Herbie Hancock. That’s a good lesson that we as humans need to learn … what other purpose can explain our existence?” “For me the most important thing is that it is about sharing … Jazz is famous for being the kind of music that really supports the people that are performing. “Freedom to express,” another band member adds. “The first thing that comes to mind is freedom,” says someone. But Hancock, like a genial headmaster, gets up from his chair to probe each of his wards. With Hancock sitting down, out of the way, the Institute Fellows look panicked, then mortified, sheepishly shifting their legs, willing themselves not to be picked to speak in public. “Can you give me a good definition of jazz?” an audience member asks the ensemble on Friday. I felt like I stood on the shoulders of giants and now it’s my turn.” “That’s how I learned: from people who are older than me. Performing events such as the Opera House masterclass is critical, he says. As his career progressed, he helped to redefine jazz, taking it electric in the 1970s and mixing in different genres, including funk and pop. In his early 20s, he joined the Miles Davis Quintet, and later worked with the likes of Joni Mitchell and Paul Simon. “And I said: I want to learn how to improvise,” he remembers. Aged 14, following a diet of classical, rhythm and blues, and doo-wop groups, he discovered the joys of jazz at a school concert. Photograph: Steve MundingerĪ child prodigy, Hancock, 79, grew up in Chicago where his mother worked as a secretary and his father a government meat inspector. It’s not like I’m a Hollywood movie star.”Īn attentive, adoring audience of mostly teenage music students attended Herbie Hancock’s masterclass. “And I haven’t heard anybody yet who has come after him.” But as Hancock puts it, with quintessential humility and a warm laugh, “It’s jazz. “Herbie was the step after Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk,” Miles Davis wrote in his autobiography. This is a man who has won an Oscar (in 1987, for the film score of Round Midnight), 14 Grammys (too many albums to list), and in 1994 received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. You have to ask”), and when children are wheeled in for a photo op, he makes sure there is time to ask them questions and show them his callused piano hands. When a woman gives him a hug, he pauses to check it’s OK (“Hashtag MeToo. Dressed when we first meet in a suit and blue checked shirt, he is unfalteringly polite, with the gracious, gentlemanly air of your favourite grandpa. Afterwards the novice confides to me: “What a man! I wish someone had filmed it. As he leaves, he stops to fist-bomb a geeky 19-year-old, who audibly gasps. Watching him is an attentive, adoring audience of mostly teenage music students. In the intimate Friday class (really more of a concert) Hancock, along with the Australian musician James Morrison and Hancock Institute Fellows, plays everything from ragtime to his own most famous compositions, including 1962’s Watermelon Man.
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