Bob James

Bob James stands out as a remarkably productive, top-selling, Grammy-honored figure who has excelled as a composer, arranger, producer, and pianist. With Grover Washington, Jr., he helped shape smooth and contemporary jazz by blending elements that range from bop through pop, classical, and R&B. His writing favors memorable, elegant melodies supported by rich harmonies and layered sonic and production textures that frequently rest on lithe, funky grooves. The four numerically titled albums he made for CTI in the mid-'70s fused jazz, pop, and classical approaches through sophisticated arrangements and funky grooves and have since been sampled extensively. He has also written music for film and television. “Angela,” taken from the chart-topping Touchdown in 1978, served as the iconic theme for the hit television show Taxi. He has further composed and arranged material for The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. Beyond jazz, he put out three successful classical titles during the '80s. His jazz masterwork, Grand Piano Canyon, appeared in 1990; following that release, he co-founded the jazz supergroup Fourplay. Among his 21st-century projects stands the concert offering Angels of Shanghai, which presents compositions performed by Fourplay together with a quintet of Chinese conservatory students on traditional folk instruments and a DJ. In 2013 he issued Alone: Kaleidoscope by Solo Piano, and in 2015 he recorded The New Cool, a duet with bassist Nathan East. In 2020 he cut On Vacation in France with trumpeter/vocalist Till Brönner. In 2023 he released Jazz Hands, the most eclectic album in his career.

James was born in Marshall, Missouri, the youngest of two children to Albert Lamkin James and Alice (née McElhiney) James. He started playing piano at age four, and at seven he realized he possessed perfect pitch. His professional career began while he was still an adolescent. Early engagements included a stint with the Earle Parsons Dance Band, for whom he wrote his first large-band composition. He received additional music instruction while in high school. Besides piano, he studied trumpet, timpani, and percussion. From 1950 to 1956 he entered Missouri State Fair piano competitions and collected several blue ribbons. He first enrolled at the University of Michigan intending to complete a Bachelor’s and Master’s in music. During the opening semester of his sophomore year he transferred to Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. There he immersed himself in free jazz alongside local musicians and assembled his own trio. In 1962 his group participated in the Notre Dame Collegiate Jazz Festival, whose judges included Henry Mancini and Quincy Jones. After his band won the contest, Jones signed him to Mercury Records, resulting in the debut album Bold Conceptions (1963), a free bop exploration produced by Jones. Following graduation from Berklee, James relocated to New York, where he encountered Bernard Stollman of ESP-Disk. He presented the impresario with a tape he had produced featuring his own trio and several classmates from his Ann Arbor period, including composers/sound artists Robert Ashley and Gordon Mumma from the Once Group. His ESP-Disk release Explosions came out in 1965. He also served as arranger and piano accompanist for Sarah Vaughan.

He reconnected with Jones in the late '60s and handled arrangements for studio sessions that yielded Hubert Laws’ Crying Song and Jones’ own Walking in Space. Producer and entrepreneur Creed Taylor, founder of CTI, sat in on some of those sessions, was impressed, and signed James to the label as producer, arranger, and studio musician. While working with Taylor he earned recognition as an arranger and producer, collaborating with Grover Washington, Jr., Hank Crawford, Gabor Szabo, Esther Phillips, and numerous others before issuing his label debut One in 1974. Between that record and BJ4, his 1977 CTI swan song, James joined Don Sebesky as one of the label’s principal arranging and producing anchors.

James departed CTI to establish his own Tappan Zee imprint. In 1978 he delivered his breakthrough album Touchdown, which included the mega hit “Angela.” Because the song became so closely identified with the hit sitcom Taxi, the album received platinum certification, an uncommon achievement for a jazz LP. He eventually wrote all the series’ original music across its five-season run. In 1980 James and Earl Klugh recorded the duet album One on One, the first of three collaborations over the next decade; it sold more than a million copies and earned a Grammy in 1980 for Best Pop Instrumental Performance.

A contrasting side of James’ artistry surfaced on the three classical albums he made for the CBS Masterworks division, beginning with Rameau in 1984, which featured his interpretations of the composer’s works on contemporary instruments including synthesizer. After the release of Double Vision with saxophonist David Sanborn in 1986, another platinum seller and Grammy winner, he completed two further classical titles for Masterworks: The Scarlatti Dialogues in 1986 and Concertos for Two & Three Keyboards BWV 1060, 1061, 1063 with Güher and Süher Pekinel in 1989. While tracking Grand Piano Canyon in 1990, James reunited with longtime friend drummer Harvey Mason, Jr. He also worked with guitarist Lee Ritenour and bassist Nathan East for the first time during those sessions, an encounter that sparked a creative connection and led to the formation of Fourplay, whose self-titled debut appeared in 1991. In 1994 James released the jazz-funk album Restless, featuring Michael Brecker and East along with a charting contribution from Luther Vandross on the track “Under Me.” James and daughter Hilary shared billing on Flesh & Blood and issued a self-titled album in 1995, after which they toured fifteen American cities. He also pursued separate projects with Earl Klugh (Cool) and Kirk Whalum (Joined at the Hip), both of which received Grammy nominations. After four albums Ritenour exited Fourplay in 1998 and was succeeded by Larry Carlton. James’ 1999 solo effort Joyride earned yet another Grammy nomination.

In 2001 Dancing on the Water incorporated contributions from pianists Keiko Matsui and Joe Sample, double bassist Dave Holland, and Loeb. With Fourplay he issued Heartfelt in 2002 and toured internationally. He also released his own Morning, Noon, & Night, whose title track reached the top position on the Contemporary Jazz Radio chart. While performing at New York’s Blue Note in 2003, James entered the Hit Factory with a rhythm section of drummer Billy Kilson and bassist James Genus. The resulting album, Take It from the Top, stood as a sterling tribute to pianists who had inspired him, among them Ahmad Jamal, Duke Ellington, Bill Evans, and Oscar Peterson.

Fourplay released Journey in 2004 and continued touring through December of the following year. In Bangkok, Thailand, James gave the world-premiere concert performance of The Angels of Shanghai; the recording appeared in 2006. The work was later presented that same year at the prestigious Seongnam Arts Center in Seoul, South Korea. He also issued Urban Flamingo in February 2006 and received the George Benson Lifetime Achievement Award from the Canadian Smooth Jazz Awards. Summer brought Fourplay’s tenth album, aptly titled X, followed by a world tour.

In 2008 James and Hilary released Christmas Eyes, after which came the Fourplay album Energy featuring Esperanza Spalding. It garnered another Grammy nomination for its first single, “Fortune Teller.” The year closed with James receiving an International Achievement Award from the State of Michigan.

James and guitarist Jack Lee released the collaborative album Botero in 2009, which contained music composed for the Broadway play Impressionism. He also recorded Across the Groove, a project with Japanese sax player Masato Honda that led to a tour spanning Asia, Europe, and the U.S.

The year 2010 saw the release of Fourplay’s twelfth album. It prompted another world tour that culminated in an unforgettable collaboration with the New Japan Philharmonic in Tokyo that December. The event introduced new orchestral pieces arranged specifically for the concert and marked Fourplay’s first appearance with a symphony orchestra. Fourplay was voted Best Group of the Year at the American Smooth Jazz Awards. Later that year Carlton departed to focus on his own work, and longtime associate Chuck Loeb assumed the guitar chair.

James had long felt a kinship with Japan, a country that had shown him consistent generosity throughout his career. In 2011, following the Fukushima and earthquake disasters, he helped bring about the Jazz for Japan benefit album and the later Benefit Concert, which he headlined. The concert’s success became the foundational event behind the creation of the annual Iwate Jazz Festival.

That September Altair & Vega, a four-handed piano duet collaboration with Keiko Matsui, was released. The distinctive partnership had taken nearly ten years to assemble from memorable live performances between the pair and was issued with a performance DVD recorded at the Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild. Fourplay headlined the Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl shortly afterward and received the Oasis Contemporary Jazz Award for Group of the Year. In November James released another collaboration, Just Friends: The Hamilton Hall Sessions with guitarist Howard Paul. The pianist was also honored in Marshall, Missouri with the inaugural Bob James Jazz Festival.

In 2012 Fourplay resumed recording and delivered Esprit de Four, which peaked at number two on the Jazz Albums chart. The album yielded several singles, including “Put Our Hearts Together,” featuring vocals by Seiko Matsuda, a tribute to the regions of Japan affected by the natural and nuclear disasters. In 2013 James and Sanborn collaborated on Quartette Humaine, marking the first recorded creative partnership between the two since Double Vision twenty-five years earlier. In 2014 the University of Michigan School of Music inducted James into its Hall of Fame and marked the occasion with a week of events.

Live at the Milliken Auditorium, captured solo during a single night in Traverse City, Michigan, appeared in 2015. The same year also brought The New Cool, the first duo release from James and East. Still active, James and Fourplay issued the full-length Silver, recorded live to tape at Sunset Sound Studios to commemorate the band’s first recording session twenty-five years earlier.

James’ first piano concerto received its premiere in 2015 by the Tokyo Philharmonic and its U.S. premiere with the Traverse City Orchestra in June 2016. The following year he became the first recipient of the Traverse City Opera House Ambassador for the Arts Award. In March pianist and flutist Nancy Stagnitta, an Interlochen Arts Academy instructor, recorded a series of duets live in concert at the Interlochen Center for the Arts’ Dendrinos Chapel; the performances were released in early 2018 as In the Chapel in the Moonlight. That August James released Espresso, his first studio date leading a jazz piano trio in twelve years. Featuring drummer Kilson and the young Detroit bassist Michael Palazzo, the album drew inspiration from a week of performances by the group at New York City’s Blue Note the previous fall. An archival album, Once Upon a Time: The Lost 1965 New York Studio Sessions, arrived in 2020 and presented the pianist in two early trio dates, one with bassist Larry Rockwell and drummer Robert Pozar and another with Bill Wood and drummer Omar Clay.

In 2019 German trumpeter Till Brönner invited James to meet him at the legendary La Fabrique Studio in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, France. The two-hundred-year-old manor, functioning as both luxury residence and state-of-the-art recording facility, is known for hosting sessions by Charles Aznavour, Kanye West, Etienne Daho, Morrissey, and Nick Cave among others. The pair quickly settled into the vibrant creative atmosphere of their surroundings. They tracked a dozen pieces and released them as On Vacation in October 2020.

While quarantined during the pandemic, James remained in his studio composing and recording demos along with new tunes. Once restrictions eased he resumed touring and issued Feel Like Makin’ Live! in 2022. Turning to the wide-ranging body of music he had written during and after quarantine, he assembled an A-list studio cast that included production assistance from DJ Jazzy Jeff, who had been among the first to sample James’ work for hip-hop. CeeLo Green (Goodie Mob, Gnarls Barkley) supplied vocals for the title track single. Jazz Hands was released in September of 2023.