A Piano, a Philosophy Degree, and All That Jazz
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
Morning isn’t the best time for jazz musicians.
The scene is the 2nd Street Cafe in Park Slope. It’s 10 a.m., and at first glance, Aaron Goldberg looks a bit disheveled. Last night’s 5 o’clock shadow darkens his cheeks; a precariously buttoned shirt exposes a tuft of chest hair; his tousled hair could use a combing.
But his eyes are bright. There’s life in his expression and excitement in his voice. His stomach may be growling, but his pancakes remain untouched: He has too much to say.
Mr. Goldberg is talking about jazz.
“When I’m practicing and listening to myself, I’m thinking: How much of myself is in this music, and how much of my influence is in this?” he says, the words passionate but precise. “I’m trying to push myself beyond my influences into unknown territory, into discovering myself.”
A pianist and composer, Mr. Goldberg is one of the top up-and-comers on the New York jazz scene. He has played extensively with saxophonist Joshua Redman, performed with legends like drummer Al Foster, and recorded three albums with his trio. He also serves as musical director of “All Souls at Sundown,” a monthly performance series at Lincoln Center that combines poetry and jazz. Mr. Goldberg plays at clubs throughout the city, most recently at the Jazz Standard. His newest album, “Worlds,” will be released later this year, and he continues to play in several cooperative groups.
Managing risk separates the good jazz musician from the great, Mr. Goldberg says.
“For me, that’s the source of the profundity of jazz – the command of creativity,” he says. “Every artist has a different ability to manage risk. The greatest improvisers are the ones who can manage the greatest risk and land on their feet.”
Mr. Goldberg’s career began with a risk.
Hailing from Brookline, Mass., Mr. Goldberg came from a family that placed a strong emphasis on academics. His parents, a molecular biochemist and a hematologist, enrolled their son in kindergarten a year early, and later sent him to exclusive Milton Academy, looking to ensure a “straight and narrow path” to the Ivy League.
“The irony of the whole thing is I probably never would have discovered jazz if I hadn’t gone to this preppy of prep schools, where there happened to be this guy,” Mr. Goldberg says.
“This guy” is Bob Sinicrope, an influential music educator who heads up Milton’s jazz department. He has now been teaching jazz to high schoolers for 31 years.
“It’s a blessing to have a student like Aaron,” Mr. Sinicrope, 54, says. “You had a sense [jazz] would certainly be a part of his life.”
The budding musician arrived in Mr. Sinicrope’s class with some piano experience, but he was more familiar with Rachmaninoff than Coltrane.
“He had a clunky feel and a brittle sound, but it didn’t take him long to get interested in the music,” Mr. Sinicrope recalls. “It took at least a year for him to really sound like he was speaking the language.”
Mr. Goldberg was a quick learner. “He’s an amazingly bright person, very hard worker. He’s very creative; he has a great right brain, left brain kind of balance,” Mr. Sinicrope says. He describes his student’s music as “spirited, contemplative, very versatile, he can swing like nobody’s business, and then he can make you cry with his beauty and expression.”
The protege still speaks of his mentor with reverence. “He was taking these kids who had never heard a note of jazz, and giving them a foundation that would last a lifetime,” Mr. Goldberg says.
As graduation neared, Mr. Goldberg found himself torn. His parents wanted him in the Ivy League, but his literary and artistic pursuits – he wrote poetry as passionately as he played piano – were leading him elsewhere. In the end, he enrolled at The New School Jazz and Contemporary Program in New York.
“I got sucked in by the mystery of it really,” Mr. Goldberg says. “These guy were supposed to be improvising this stuff – how the hell were they doing it? I wanted to understand the mystery of it, to solve that mystery, and approach it, get a little bit inside of it.”
For Mr. Goldberg’s parents, music as a career was not an easy note to swallow.
“Not in their wildest nightmares would it be something for me to do as a profession,” Mr. Goldberg says. The parental fears ranged from their son never attending college to a quick descent into drug addiction. It put a substantial strain on their relationship, one that has only recently been fully reconciled.
“There’s been a profound shift in perspective about what I do on their end that’s come from my having a certain degree of success with what I do,” Mr. Goldberg says. Today, the Goldbergs urge their friends to hear their son’s albums and attend his concerts.
Mr. Goldberg left the New School after a year and, faced with parental pressure and the prospect of supporting himself, transferred to Harvard. There he led a peripatetic life, shuttling between Boston and New York to jam with friends and stay in touch with the city scene. Between concerts and recording sessions, he managed to graduate magna cum laude in history and science, studying a mix of psychology, medicine, and philosophy.
Since leaving Cambridge, Mr. Goldberg has spent his time building up a reputation on the New York scene. But the academic in him hasn’t faded; this fall he will be returning to school, enrolling in a graduate program in philosophy at Tufts University. He has set himself a daunting challenge: commuting to Boston for classes, keeping up with his New York concert schedule, and touring Europe.
Having just turned 30, and resuming his formal education, Mr. Goldberg takes pride in the fact that he remains a student.
“Anything in life is a long journey. Anything you value, you want to do for the rest of your life, you have to think of as a long-term project,” he says. “One reason that I know that I will always be playing jazz music forever, is that you’re never good enough. I know that I’m someone who is going to try to push myself for the rest of my life beyond what I can do.”