A few short years ago, guitarist and songwriter Joyce Cooling took a good, hard look at her life. Glued to the TV like the rest of us, Cooling remembers the days after 9/11 and found her perspective on life jolted. "I asked myself," she recalls, "Is what I'm doing as a musician meaningful?" After lengthy, ardent talks with her long-time collaborator and partner Jay Wagner about a potential life without a career in music, Cooling proclaimed, "I don't know about you, but this girl's got to play."
Cooling has always wanted to make music.
Growing up in New Jersey and New York, she absorbed a wide variety of music and amassed a huge record collection. "My collection contains Ornette Coleman, João Bosco, and Bill Evans, but it also includes James Brown, Maurice Ravel, Jimi Hendrix, Abbey Lincoln and Aerosmith as well music from all over the world," she notes. "I like R&B. I like folk. I like heavy metal and headbanger stuff. I like punk. I like rap. I just like good music. There are no boundaries with me."
Cooling's penchant for the eclectic continued when she moved to the San Francisco Bay Area in the early 1980s and began dabbling in keyboards and percussion. Music had long been the most passionate part of her life, but an actual career as a musician started taking shape only after she began hanging around an African drumming class taught by C.K. Ladzekpo, a renowned Ghanaian percussionist. Integrating the polyrhythmic sophistication of West African music with her passion for melody and harmony, Cooling focused her attention on playing, singing, and songwriting. "Everything crystallized when I heard Wes Montgomery's solo on If You Could See Me Now. From then on, it was as if guitar had chosen me."
Teaching herself to play guitar by ear, she developed a personal style of finger picking that has given her playing its unique sound and feel.
Her introduction to producer Jay Wagner, a keyboardist on San Francisco's Brazilian circuit, gave her the energy that her self-taught chops needed. Before long, she was playing that same circuit and working with Jay on a full-time basis. Becoming a top attraction, Cooling appeared at many of the major West Coast jazz
festivals and expanded her reach by playing in the Philippines, Mexico, and Colombia, performing with such jazz giants as Joe Henderson, Stan Getz, and Charlie Byrd.
Bay Area and festival jazz fans knew and loved Joyce Cooling as one of the region's most dynamic and popular contemporary jazz guitarists when, in 1997, her San Francisco-inspired chart-topping single, South of Market, took the jazz world by storm. Since then, Cooling has thrilled audiences around the world with her fluid, swinging style, garnering critical praise and a bevy of industry awards along the way. The single and her Heads Up debut album, Playing It Cool soared to ..1 on the Gavin Report and R&R's NAC/smooth jazz charts where it remained there for five consecutive weeks. Cooling was a nominee for Gavin's Smooth Jazz Artist of the Year, named Best New Talent in the JazzizReader's Poll, and was an easy choice for Artist of the Year by the nationally-syndicated radio program, Jazz Trax. Her 1999 follow-up, Keeping Cool , likewise dominated the charts and boasted a ..1 hit, Callie, and earned Joyce the Gibson Guitar Award as Best Jazz Guitarist Of the Year.
The accolades continued streaming in with Cooling's 2001 release on GRP, Third Wish , which features a stellar performance by Al Jarreau and produced two more top ten radio hits. She then went on to record a track for a holiday release with the legendary guitarist, Lee Ritenour. When Cooling and Wagner entered the studio to record the CD Cooling knew exactly what they were going for. She wanted to provide contemporary-jazz that was accessible and groove-oriented but chock full of substance and creativity - a characteristic that has become a trademark for Cooling's and Wagner's imaginative compositions.
"Writing has always been an integral part of who I am as a musician. Both Jay and I absolutely love composing and it is impossible to imagine our lives without it. When we start putting songs together, it is very much a collaborative process - a back and forth ping pong game." This held true as Cooling and Wagner began preparing all the original tunes for her Narada Jazz debut, THIS GIRL'S GOT TO PLAY . "The time leading up to the album was, musically speaking, a very restless one for me. I was anxious to experiment with new ideas." Shirking complacency, Cooling enjoys testing her comfort level. "For me, it's a good thing to be on the edge. It keeps me focused and looking forward to the next project." With straight-ahead roots and a Brazilian jazz background, she boldly branches out on THIS GIRL'S GOT TO PLAY with harmonies, sophisticated melodies, and - for the first time - a stronger emphasis on vocals. "I love to sing and lyrics can sometimes reach people in completely different ways than an instrumental melody can."
Cooling's tendency to drift outside the mainstream is reflected in the album's title track - a virtual narrative of her zest to be on the edge. "This song is loosely autobiographical," she confides. "As a kid, I just had to play music. All I wanted was to be in a band." She adds, with a slight grin, "No, I wasn't a cheerleader in high school." A microcosm of Cooling's creativity is the song, Camelback. "Jay and I were experimenting with sounds and this quirky little groove inspired the whole track. The loping feel conjured up what it might be like to ride a camel." The Wizard draws upon Cooling's passion for Brazilian music." We love Hermeto Pascoal and, just as we started to write this tune, we had gone to one of his shows and done a workshop with him. He looks like a wizard with long white hair and musically....well, it just goes without saying that he is one. The song seemed a natural fit with his spirit."
THIS GIRL'S GOT TO PLAY is a powerful statement by an artist at the top of her game. "This is a cross-roads album and I really wanted to go for it without any regrets." Giving it an edge that's strong, sexy, and savvy, Cooling boldly declares who she is and what she can do...and man, oh man, can she play.
JOYCE COOLING
REVOLVING DOOR
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