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As a boy in his high school band, David Newman made up for not being able to read music by learning all the band’s pieces by heart. He would have gotten away with it, but the band teacher caught him with sheet music placed upside down on his music stand. This moment is etched in jazz history because of the fateful words the music teacher used at that moment: “Why, you fathead!” It's a nickname he's grown to live with, although, as his wife Karen points, out, it can be carried too far: "I read one article that referred to him as David 'Fathead' Newman, Jr. What...his father's a fathead too?" David Newman has learned a lot about music since then: at school (yes, those were the days of music education), from Buster Smith, the great Kansas City alto saxophonist who also taught Charlie Parker, and from Ray Charles, back in the 1950s and 60s, when his blistering tenor sax solos did so much to define the great Ray Charles sound. “Ah, yes, Music Appreciation from Ray,” Newman reminisces. “I learned to appreciate it if it’s music, and if it’s good. This American music has had so many names, and what’s really important about it is the feeling.” Some of the names of the music Ray Charles played were blues, jazz, R&B, soul, and even country. David Newman has absorbed all of that, and moved ahead in his own direction. He has worked with Ornette Coleman (in a Texas R&B band), blues greats T-Bone Walker and Lowell Fulsom, and jazzmen Red Garland, Herbie Mann and Junior Mance. He’s recorded 32 albums as a leader, beginning with Ray Charles presents “Fathead", and going through such recent gems as Bluesiana Triangle (a trio session with Dr. John and Hank Crawford), Mr. Gentle, Mr. Cool (a tribute to Duke Ellington) and Under a Woodstock Moon, a collection of nature-inspired standards and originals, reflecting Newman’s new roots in the Woodstock countryside. “I don’t distinguish between one label and another,” Newman says of his music. “I consider myself a stylist, not a blues player or a jazz player. I play what I feel, and I try to add my personal touch to whatever I’m called on to play.” Newman is called upon in a wide variety of contexts – jazz sessions, blues sessions, R&B sessions. His upcoming gigs this summer include a reunion with Ray Charles at the Chicago Blues Festival (there was an earlier reunion this winter in Europe), an appearance with jazz/funksters Hank Crawford and Brother Jack MacDuff at the JVC Jazz Festival in New York, and a club date at the Jazz Standard club, also in the Big Apple. “I’ve matured musically,” Newman says. “When you’re young, you have a tendency to overplay. You try to include so many notes, because you think it’s necessary – but to be effective, it’s the right notes that count, not how many. It’s better for the listener, too – if you put in too much complication, the listener can’t feel what you’re doing. “
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