Special Guest, Paul Croteau

Dr. Bob Lawrence (00:01.006)
Paul Croteau. Paul Arullo, baby. What's up? Man, you know, I've been threatening to have you on Jazz Piano Skills for a long time, dude. And here we are. Here we are. You know, why I've wanted you on for so long. Well, first of all, man, I'm just going to brag on you for a little bit. So yeah.

Paul Croteau (00:03.728)
Dr. Lawrence, how are you my friend? Bob Ruski.

Paul Croteau (00:14.817)
Yes you have.

Paul Croteau (00:26.584)
Please, please. Sit around.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (00:30.486)
You know, we go way back, dude. We go way back, 1984, North Texas State University, right? This young stud comes walking into the College of Music. Did you have hair back then, man? I don't even remember. Did you have hair back then? Okay, okay. Okay. So. And I tell people this all the time, man. I talk about you and I always say that without question, without question.

Paul Croteau (00:38.352)
Correct.

Paul Croteau (00:45.084)
I did have hair back then. I had hair. I swear to God.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:00.342)
the greatest sax player I've ever heard in my entire life.

Paul Croteau (01:07.212)
You should run for office with that line of thinking. Dude, we had a lot of fun.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:10.298)
No, man, I'm serious, man. There's something about your plane, brother, that I just, I don't know, man. It's unbelievable.

Paul Croteau (01:17.624)
We have the same experiences, lots of things we learned together. We sync. Some players just really mesh well together. Yeah, I always enjoy playing with you.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:26.018)
Yeah.

Yeah, so you know, and you as an instrumentalist, it's high time that on Jazz Piano Skills, that we have an instrumentalist come on to talk about jazz, jazz improvisation, because piano players have so much to learn from instrumentalists, and oftentimes, jazz piano players stay in their own little cubby hole, you know, listening to other jazz piano players, which is fine, which is great, but I want to,

Paul Croteau (01:51.384)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:58.402)
enlighten the listeners to you and an instrumentalist and get some golden nuggets about improvisation, the study of jazz, how you went about it, what you love to hear from a jazz pianist when you're playing with them and so forth. So.

Paul Croteau (02:08.226)
Sure.

Paul Croteau (02:13.952)
I can do that, but I'm a little distracted here, but I wanted to do some proof here that I did have hair at one time.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (02:19.957)
There, that's the ball! There you go, man!

Paul Croteau (02:24.332)
Those are prescription glasses, those are not shades. But that was in Sue's room. That was a party in Sue's room. Bruce Hall, C212.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (02:24.61)
Hehehe

Dr. Bob Lawrence (02:28.163)
Oh man, um, Bruce Hall, man, you're taking me back down memory lane now, brother.

Paul Croteau (02:35.98)
I am and Sue wanted me to make sure I send you her love. And for those watching, Bob gave me the honor of being part of my wedding party. So it was a great day. But we'll get there.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (02:40.529)
Oh, that's awesome.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (02:44.498)
Oh man. Oh that I loved it. Yeah, we'll talk about that too. That was awesome, man. So so okay

Paul Croteau (02:50.492)
So yeah, I'm an instrumentalist, I'm multi instrumentalist, all the stuff back here you see is real and I play it. But we did take a class together, my senior year in 88, you, me and I'm forgetting, was it Kent Ellingson? We took Dan Hurley's graduate improv class together. It was you two killer piano players, it was you two killer pianos and Paul the sax player trying to hack his way through the class, yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (02:56.129)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (03:02.626)
Kenny Henson.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (03:07.238)
Oh, that's right! That was awesome. I forgot about that. That was great. So, hey, all right, so before we get into all the jazz stuff, I want you to take time share with us a little bit about your life. Literally, I mean, go back. I want to hear because I don't know myself. I want to know more about your childhood, how you got into music, playing jazz, how you ended up at North Texas State.

uh... study in jazz there so wind back the clock a little bit here in philis and then the microphone is yours uh...

Paul Croteau (03:42.632)
I hope you got enough storage space, this could take a while. But we're good. So going back in the way of that machine, I grew up as an only child in Bloomfield, Connecticut, just on the edge of Blue Hills Avenue outside of Hartford, a nice little suburb of the hood. And my dad...

My parents were young when they had me in their teenage years. My dad was a saxophone player, wannabe. He was also an artist and he had a fantastic record collection. So I grew up listening to Oscar Peterson, Dave Brubeck, Charlie Parker, Phil Woods, Dexter Gordon, a lot of the jazz organ stuff as well, Jack McDuff. And that was in the house constantly. And then on weekends he'd throw on WWUH, University of Hartford.

the classical music stations. We hear lots of classical coming out of the house, all the regular literature. And then he was also a weightlifter. Not a bodybuilder, but a weightlifter. There's a difference. And he had a gym. He worked out in a basement. So during workouts, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, he was blaring the pop radio at the time. So Doobie Brothers and Tower of Power and things of that sort. So I grew up in a very musically filled small house, you know, a thousand square foot house in Forest Lane in Bloomfield, Connecticut, back in the day.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (04:40.343)
Right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (04:49.45)
Oh yeah, good stuff.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (04:57.976)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (04:58.032)
And my dad said when I was a baby, I used to bounce to the beat when music was on. I just kind of sat there and bounced. I wish I had good time like I did then. But anyway, I would bounce to the beat and he was playing music all the time. And fast forward to elementary school, fourth grade. That's the year we learned recorder. And so Miss Stigliano was the music teacher.

and we go to recorder class, we had to pay a dollar for this little black recorder, and she passed them out, and then they would teach us G, the first note, because of your little hands, three fingers can hold it, and they taught us G, and then A and B, and so after that little class, three blind my street, and so I know those three notes, and she gave us the recorders, and then went home, and I noodled, and I came back the next day, and I could play the whole scale.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (05:38.638)
Uh huh.

Paul Croteau (05:55.044)
Chromatically as well not just the C scale and then I found the range I could find that the different ways to make the notes Sound half steps and so I came back the next day playing the full scale on the recorder And I got in trouble in class because I was bored so I start messing around like I grabbed one of the kids recorders I played two recorders at the same time with my nose So I had two flutes on my nose playing, you know harmony three blind mice or counterpoint things of that sort

Dr. Bob Lawrence (06:17.506)
That's so you, man. Oh my gosh, that's so, so you.

Paul Croteau (06:19.692)
Totally so I obviously had some kind of useless gift of at a young age and so Then we get to fifth grade now that that's that summer between fourth grade and fifth grade Dad watched the Carson show best show ever Tonight Doc Severance's big Ben all those badasses And so I got always had great guests and then of course you grew up on PBS

Dr. Bob Lawrence (06:34.794)
Oh man, ever, yes. Oh my gosh. Yeah, always had great guests.

Paul Croteau (06:46.128)
Four o'clock was Sesame Street because I was a latchkey kid both parents worked so I come home and I had the place to myself And so four o'clock was Sesame Street for an hour five o'clock was mr. Rogers Johnny Costa. Oh my god, and then five Yeah, yeah, yeah white tape as a name given to him by Art Tatum a lot of folks don't realize that That's true. That's true. Yeah, and the electric company was on as well zoom was after that but

Dr. Bob Lawrence (06:49.695)
Uh-huh.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (06:57.531)
Oh my gosh, the white artatum.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (07:05.866)
Yes, that's right. That's tremendous. Yeah.

Paul Croteau (07:13.868)
But around music and of course the Charlie Brown Christmas, that just was the foundation of my life. I would love that. And my dad, Carson was on late, he would wake me up if someone cool was on the Carson show. He'd wake me up, hey check out, there's, I remember, excuse me, I remember Jerry Mulligan was on. And we were watching Jerry Mulligan play it and all these other cats, Big Mac, Clark Terry was always doing mumbles and things like that, Stump the Band, great memories. And then there was a show where Hal Lindon,

Dr. Bob Lawrence (07:15.35)
Right. Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (07:30.901)
Oh my gosh.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (07:40.686)
Mm-hmm. Well, Carson was such a big jazz lover, man. He loved jazz, yeah. So go ahead. I'm sorry to interrupt.

Paul Croteau (07:46.08)
He absolutely was for sure, for sure. So, um, so, uh, they had Hal Linden, Barney Miller from the old detective show, Barney Miller. Well, he was a great Dixieland clarinet player and he was on the show one time and he played some Dixieland stuff. Oh my God, that grabbed me as well. And so that was right before the school year started. So I said, I want to play clarinet because of that Dixieland stuff. He had Al Hurt on as well. But Hal Linden's episode caught me. And so we go to school the first day of school and I got banned on my.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (07:55.486)
Yeah, yeah, that's right.

Paul Croteau (08:16.112)
my schedule on the fifth grade. And I go to a band and we have everybody sit down and I don't know what to do. And Mr. Lihip, our band director says, well, where's your instrument? I'm like, don't you, you're to school. Don't you give them to me? He's like, no, we don't do that. You're not playing timpani or tuba, so no, you gotta bring your own. And I was stunned. I'm like, oh man, I don't know what to do. And so I kind of was despondent, went home that day. Dad saw I was kind of bummed. How was band? I'm like, dad, it didn't work. Man, they don't have clarinets.

He's like, well, they don't give him to you because he didn't know. And I mean, shoot, he was probably 25 at the time. And so my dad said, well, I've got this old saxophone in the closet. Literally is what he said. And I said, sure, I'll try that. And it was it was a Boozy and Hawks is off brand Sears catalog saxophone. We call it the junk of phone. It was a piece of crap. But it was my piece of crap. And I learned on that horn and

Dr. Bob Lawrence (08:47.17)
You're a br-

Dr. Bob Lawrence (08:51.467)
You're right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (09:08.142)
junk phone.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (09:12.214)
It was yours.

Paul Croteau (09:15.12)
I showed talent early on. I remember our Barry sax player. He was in seventh grade. Big guy named Wayne. He was playing that boogie woogie doodledoo doodledoo. I'm like, what is that? That's cool. And he showed me the riff. That was the first lick I ever stole. I'm like, OK, I'm getting this jazz thing. And I started listening to all these albums that dad had in the house. And I just started playing the saxophone all the time. It was like my third arm. They couldn't stop me.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (09:28.706)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (09:44.672)
my next door neighbor Alice, you know, our houses were such that my bedroom window faced her window and it was probably 20 feet between the two and she'd always get mad in the summer when I was practicing with windows open because she'd always hear it. She gives me crap to this day about it. And I would practice all the time and it went from playing by ear, playing along with records, like the Basie Jam records were great. Used by Basie Jam Volume 11. And that's like four tracks to each side. And so I started playing with those and then...

Dr. Bob Lawrence (09:44.686)
All right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (09:59.946)
That's great.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (10:09.166)
All right.

Paul Croteau (10:14.7)
My dad's buddy at work was a jazz fan, got me a Sonny Stitt album. Now I'm going into late junior high school now. A Sonny Stitt album called Only the Blues. Oscar Peterson Trio with Roy Eldridge and Sonny Stitt. Four tracks, two on each side, amazing. That's one of my top five Desert Island albums. Taught me how to play the blues. And Sonny's tone is so beautiful on that album. And of course Oscar being Oscar and Clark, and Terry and, sorry, Roy. It was a fantastic album. So I played along with that.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (10:20.346)
Oh geez. Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (10:27.598)
Oh, gosh.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (10:38.624)
Right.

Paul Croteau (10:44.572)
One of them was rhythm changes. One of them was the boogie-woogie blues, and two were just regular. One was a super slow blues, I wanna say, in B flat, the good key. And so I played along with records a ton. And then that same guy that got me the Sunnyset album got me Super Sax Plays Bird, Mel Florey in that six sax section playing all these harmonized charts of Charlie Parker solos. And I got the Omni Book, and I were going to Heart School of Music in West Hartford.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (11:04.318)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (11:14.128)
and they had a little tiny music store, it's probably as big as one of our dorm rooms and this walls of music and they had an Omni book. So I got the Charlie Parker Omni book and found the solos that didn't have all the double time stuff. And then I found the solos that they played on the Super Sax Plays Bird album and I play along with that. And then so I learned about the world of transcriptions. Well, someone wrote this stuff out and now we start getting into some debates here. Do you play transcriptions? Do you transcribe yourself? To me, I think it's the best of both worlds.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (11:40.714)
Yeah, yeah. All right, all right.

Paul Croteau (11:43.316)
Do you do the whole transcription and just get what you want out of it? I go with the latter. Depends on what you're trying to accomplish. Then I got a Phil Woods transcription book and went through that and I just started getting, I got a Joe Pass book, a Tom Harrell book. I started reading transcription books, playing along with the recordings. It's not just the notes, it's the time, it's the feel, it's the pitch, etc. That takes me through junior high school and then I got Maynard Ferguson, Chameleon, and the first solo I actually transcribed

Dr. Bob Lawrence (11:49.239)
Right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (12:02.531)
Yeah, right, right.

Paul Croteau (12:12.348)
was Gospel John, because our junior high school band was doing it, we had a little jazz band, and so we were doing it, so I transcribed that alto solo in there, and I didn't know the notation at all, so I just wrote the notes, and I could read it, and that's all that mattered. And I didn't start taking private lessons until, I want to say, eighth grade, and that's when my dad got me a real horn. I got a Summer Mark VII, turns out it was kind of a lemon, but I didn't know it was gorgeous, and he spent $2300 on it.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (12:14.238)
Oh yeah, right. Yeah.

Paul Croteau (12:41.616)
And that was huge for us back then. We didn't have much, but yeah. We didn't have much, but I was never wanting. So he backed me 1,000% as did my mom. And I got me a great horn. I started studying with Phil DeLibro. Fantastic saxophone. He was a professor at Hart School of Music for a while. I think he came out of UMass. Serious, serious, legit chops. And when we met, it turns out when I, my.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (12:44.091)
Right. That's a huge sacrifice. Yeah, that's right. Yeah.

Paul Croteau (13:09.304)
teacher said you need to get a saxophone instructor and I didn't know who to look for. It turns out that this very talented teacher literally lived a half mile down the street from me. No idea. And so I used to walk to lessons. And right away he saw that I had some skills and so as a classical teacher I wasn't taking jazz with him, I was taking classical lessons. So for the saxophone players out there that have been trained there's this famous book called the Furling Atoods book. Originally a bunch of atoods for oboe, transgraph for saxophone.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (13:29.442)
Wow.

Paul Croteau (13:39.128)
and each page has a slow piece in the top half and a faster piece in the bottom. One's for tone, one's for technique. And those solos these days are used in high school, all-state, regional type auditions. And a lot of students will practice a whole piece for a month or two or a semester. I had to do one of those each week because I had the skills to do it. So I was cranking out classic literature. It was a challenge. It was fun. I was like, oh, give it to me more. The faster, the better. I was a North Texas starter kit weight and a half and higher, louder, faster. Let's go.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (13:55.777)
Right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (14:00.782)
Oh my gosh. Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (14:08.651)
Yes, ma'am.

Paul Croteau (14:09.084)
Um, so, uh, I did really well at those and then I started doing, you know, all state competitions, all New England competitions, gotten to jazz, um, in junior high school, me and a couple of my friends were asked to play in the high school band, uh, cause they needed seats filled and then I, I became lead alto, um, uh, really quickly and, uh, got into solos. I did come home and I would, my parents be gone. I cranked, dropped the needle on the vinyl and just play. And, uh, I did a lot of that and got an improvisation.

I had a really good band director named John Erskine. I tried over and over again to find, if anyone watching this, here's a test, if anyone watching this knows how to get in touch with John Erskine in Connecticut, former band director, please reach out. I've tried Google, I'm a tech guy, I know how to search. I can't find the guy. I would love to get in touch with him because I haven't talked to him since I graduated. He played a big role. He taught us improvisation, how to record changes.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (14:57.911)
Wow.

Paul Croteau (15:07.708)
exposed us to great musicians. There was a concert series at Cigna Insurance, Bloomfield, my hometown, is where the headquarters of Cigna Insurance is, and every summer, they had these summer concerts. And I remember my senior year, he managed to get Oscar Peterson to come in. And so I got to set up Oscar's bench and put the water by the piano. I mean, it was amazing, and it was hot that day. He was, you know how he's playing, you know, 400 BPM, and he just, the hands, he's boogie woogie.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (15:25.751)
Oh my gosh. Wow.

Paul Croteau (15:35.488)
He grabs that handkerchief and wipes his head while he's still the boogie woogie, still going, you know. It was amazing. I didn't get to talk to him, but it was a blast. I sat on his bench at his piano. Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (15:41.89)
So you sat on Oscar Peterson's bench?

Yeah, well, I'm going to have to rub your butt next time I see you, man.

Paul Croteau (15:50.476)
Again? Okay. Also saw the big bands. Got into the big bands big time. So I was a typical 80s kid following Maynard. We saw Maynard a bunch of times. But Maynard, Buddy, Woody, Lionel Hampton, those bands were everywhere. I mean it was funny because I looked back at some of those concerts and there were guys that we went to North Texas with or that were there before us that were in those bands when I was a kid watching Maynard.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (16:01.727)
Oh yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (16:06.671)
All the time, yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (16:12.289)
Yeah.

Oh yeah.

Paul Croteau (16:16.914)
I was at concert when Steve Weiss was in the band, but I didn't know him until...

Dr. Bob Lawrence (16:19.166)
Well, it's so funny that you say that because I went to see Maynard before I went to North Texas about two weeks before I started school at North Texas. I went to see Maynard and Steve Weist was the trombonist in the band. So now fast forward two weeks later, I'm in Paris Rutherford's arranging class and he's taking attendance, right? And he goes, Bob Lawrence, I go here. And then he goes, Steve Weist, and the guy next to me says here. And I go, wait a minute.

Paul Croteau (16:30.305)
Yep, yep, yep.

Paul Croteau (16:38.887)
Oh. Haha, yeah.

Paul Croteau (16:47.475)
What are you doing here?

Dr. Bob Lawrence (16:48.378)
Yes, are you Steve Weiss? Wait a minute Maynard Ferguson goes, yeah, I just left the band I'm coming back to go to grad school, you know And oh my gosh so funny But yeah, that was all that was an awesome time with those bands always playing high school venues all over the place

Paul Croteau (16:54.424)
Yeah, I remember that. I remember that for sure. Yeah.

Paul Croteau (17:03.536)
Yeah, yeah, it was amazing. And I got to perform with Maynard. We were in the Connecticut Valley Youth Wind Ensemble and we did a joint concert with Maynard's band and there was this big piece we did for Big Band and Wind Ensemble. So while you and I have tons of friends that played with Maynard, I can say, I played with Maynard once. I was on the same stage with him, but it was just like high school ensemble with the Maynard band. But yeah, so I was just listening to lots of music. I was a jazz snob.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (17:09.959)
Oh wow.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (17:27.104)
Thank you.

Paul Croteau (17:31.892)
In the 80s, synth pop became really popular. Punk was there. I also grew up in a largely urban neighborhood. My high school at the time was two thirds black. I think today, Bluefoot High is probably 95% black. I grew up in that urban environment with all that fantastic music and food. And it was such a wonderful mixing pot at the time. So I grew up on hip hop, early hip hop, early rap, Jaze Brown, Stevie Wonder.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (17:45.79)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (17:57.038)
Mm-hmm.

Paul Croteau (17:58.164)
all the Motown stacks records, et cetera. So that was part of my vibe as well. Had a lot of black influences in my life. And the music was just fantastic.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (18:08.434)
Yeah, but the depth of your, I remember man, in 84, so you were a freshman at North Texas in 84. And you were a force to be reckoned with, man. I mean, no doubt. I mean, because the depth of your understanding of, just think about that for a second, man. At 18 years of age, what you were playing, what you knew, the stuff that you were doing musically, your technique, your sound, your maturity as an

Paul Croteau (18:15.906)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (18:20.484)
Hehehe

Dr. Bob Lawrence (18:38.11)
as a jazz player and an improviser. I mean, there's just not, Paul, there's just not that many freshmen that walk into a college anywhere with that skill set. I mean, they just don't.

Paul Croteau (18:51.068)
It's so kind of, it's really kind of you to say, but man, here's the deal though. When I, my senior in high school, I was, you know, all state on New England. That we did it, you know, in being in New England, we would regularly go to the, the high school competition, jazz competition at Berkeley. And the senior year I was featured on a couple songs and I did this really, you know, slow blues in G, a shuffle thing. And, and, and I, I play a double E.

and the stadium is full of people, they're screaming. Then I squeeze it up an octave, like let me pick it, that high squeal. They go nuts, raaah! So that filled my ego, and I thought I, you know, was a cat's meow, for lack of a better phrase. But the thing is, when we got to North Texas, all the guys and gals were like that. All the folks were big fish. So when you get to a school like in North Texas, and going to North Texas in the 80s, or going to Eastman or Miami, that was like playing

Dr. Bob Lawrence (19:30.624)
Right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (19:34.998)
Yeah, well, that's just it.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (19:42.433)
Oh.

Paul Croteau (19:46.488)
basketball at Duke or North Carolina in the 80s. That was the place to be. There weren't a lot of those schools. I mean, we didn't have, the new school wasn't there. You know, Northern Florida, Rich hadn't done Northern Florida yet. You know, Colorado was, there weren't as many. Now there's a bunch. So the pop, it's diluted a bit, but it wasn't that way back then. And so when you get there, you know, you had two options. And here's the thing, all the kind words you just said, when I got to North Texas, I didn't make a lab band.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (19:49.558)
That's no doubt. There's no doubt about that. Absolutely no.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (19:59.862)
Yeah, right. Yeah, right. Right. Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (20:07.509)
No way.

Paul Croteau (20:16.956)
So when I left Connecticut, I'm still seeing it when my buddy William Space, Bill Space, his backyard, his dad was superintendent of the school district. When his backyard with my good friends in the jazz band, we were grilling tuna steaks and just hanging out. And like our last time as friends together before college, he went to Harvard and I went to North Texas. And we're talking and he said, Paul, do you think you're gonna make the one o'clock? And I kinda like, you know, man.

I got bebopped down and we read really well. I think I've got a shot. And so I had no clue. Zero clue. And so when I got there and we auditioned and Jim Riggs had the music across the stands and like, read this, read this, oh my god, did a bird poop on that? What is all that stuff there? For the saxophone auditions they had some lead sheet stuff and a couple of solos and they had a Cannonball solo transcription book you'd have to read and those were a nightmare.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (21:06.09)
Ha!

Paul Croteau (21:15.328)
And so I made a reading band on Barry, because Riggs thought, he's a big guy, he can hold the Barry, you know, so, yeah. But let me add how I got to North Texas. I forgot that's the part. I told you I could talk for a long time. Folks, if you, hey, wake up out there. I'm still here, look what I got, here we go. I'll get to the music eventually. No, so why did I go to North Texas? Why did a kid from Connecticut go to North Texas?

Dr. Bob Lawrence (21:17.78)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (21:24.636)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (21:28.17)
Yeah. I love it, man.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (21:38.647)
Yeah.

other than it was the greatest jazz school in the world. But okay, yeah.

Paul Croteau (21:44.18)
Not knowing that. So I asked my teacher, Phil DeLibro, I said, Phil, this is my junior year in high school. I said, yeah, I'm obviously I want to major in music, I want to be a saxophone player. I want to be, you know, on a tour and do that cool stuff. I want to play with Buddy and Maynard and Woody. And he said, well, there's really three places you can go. You want to stay close, you can go to Eastman, upstate in Rochester, New York. You can go to Miami. Great school there. Or you can go to this place north of Dallas called North Texas State. I've never heard of it.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (22:05.454)
Right?

Paul Croteau (22:12.928)
and I applied to all three. I got accepted by all three, and so then you look at tuition. Eastman was 12 grand a semester, or 12 grand a year. Miami was 13 grand a year. North Texas was four grand a year. So guess where Paul's going? We're going to Texas, because it's a third of the cost.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (22:21.326)
Gosh.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (22:31.89)
Well, yeah, Paul, let me let me enter interject here on this. I remember that. It's so funny because you're telling saying things that is like almost like my childhood, you know, the whole Carson thing, Dad waking you up, all that kind of stuff. And so I was going to go to Eastman in Miami, same schools, right. So I guess we're all looking at the same. We're all looking at the same school, right. So I get

Paul Croteau (22:35.384)
Go ahead.

Paul Croteau (22:42.784)
Yeah. Yep.

Paul Croteau (22:52.576)
Yep, those are the ones. We're old.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (22:59.638)
the tuition at all and i also was looking at new england conservatory for some reason yeah so uh... so that the tuition like you were saying was ridiculous and so i get the catalog from north texas and it says it says in the tuition page uh... out-of-state tuition forty dollars a credit hour

Paul Croteau (23:04.701)
That was an option for me too. I think Lynn Clark was a saxophone professor there. Yeah, but I wanted to go to a jazz place.

Paul Croteau (23:16.484)
Mm-hmm.

Paul Croteau (23:29.176)
Mm-hmm.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (23:29.694)
I picked up the phone, I called the office, admissions office at North Texas and I said, hey, there's a typo in your catalog.

Paul Croteau (23:39.73)
Excuse me, sir. Sir, there's a mistake, sir.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (23:42.91)
I actually did. I said, and she goes, oh my gosh, where? I said, on the tuition page. She said, are you kidding me? And I said, no, I'm not kidding you. It's right there. And she goes, where? And she's looking, she's looking, you know. She goes, where is it? I said, right there where it says, in-state tuition, $4 a credit hour and out-of-state, $40 a credit hour. She goes, no, she goes, that's right. And I said, I'm heading to Texas.

Paul Croteau (24:07.252)
Yeah. Now, see, the thing is I'm the first person in my family to go to college, so there's no guidance or suggestions. I wish I had done what you did because I would have gone to Texas, worked for a year to get in-state tuition, but I didn't. I see you were smart. That's why you're a PhD and I'm just Paulie. That's why you're a PhD and I'm an MBA. There's a huge difference. But yeah, so I played, I paid out of state.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (24:22.242)
That's what I did. Yeah. Ha ha ha.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (24:30.394)
Did the bear okay?

Paul Croteau (24:35.284)
All four years, I stayed four and a half years. I changed majors from jazz to arranging briefly, then back to jazz studies. But that switch kind of glitched me and I had to take an extra semester. And that last semester, fall of 88, I got a one o'clock scholarship and I got in-state tuition. I'm like, damn, this is cool, I'm paying in-state now. But yeah, so yeah, I chose North Texas because of finance. We were poor and had nowhere to go. I paid for college on my own.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (24:53.982)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (24:59.83)
but what a grip you know if you're gonna go to school because you're poor and what better school to go to and study jazz right than that i mean the north

Paul Croteau (25:08.704)
Yep. There's not a lot going on in Denton. I mean, there's a good, great scene, but there's not a lot to do outside of that.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (25:13.63)
yeah no that you know that was such a great vibe though you know i remember man remember like where they'd have the meeting at the beginning of school year with all the jazzers and in uh... it wasn't kenton hall that was the performance hall or whatever there you know that

Paul Croteau (25:22.967)
Yep.

Paul Croteau (25:28.296)
Yeah, the area where Dan taught his theory classes and the lecture series would take place. Is it Lyceum? Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (25:33.098)
Yeah, and I remember, yeah, that's it. And I remember he got up, the first meeting I attended, you know, where all the jazzers are in there, and Dan literally got up and said on the microphone, welcome to the Little Apple. Because all the, right? And I remember that just stuck with me. I thought, how cool is this?

Paul Croteau (25:47.596)
There you go. Yeah.

Paul Croteau (25:53.285)
the numbers are staggering there were around 230 or 240 sax majors there I mean that's crazy it is so when you get there so you know I'm so me and my buddy yeah I think I got a shot at I go I audition and then I go to the outside of the one o'clock out of Canton Hall there's the wall the paper where's the paper looking the bands one o'clock no two click three

Dr. Bob Lawrence (25:59.506)
Yeah, it's ridiculous, right?

Dr. Bob Lawrence (26:18.41)
I remember. You called the office and said, hey, there must be a typo.

Paul Croteau (26:21.06)
There's another sheet over here for the reading band.

There's a mistake on here and I wasn't an alto and I didn't I like I'm not anywhere and I look oh they put me on freaking Barry and Cool part about that is I act up. I got to play the schools the school had an instrument this time I go play their mark six Barry for a year and so I remember looking at the at the at the at the board and then this guy this Haas Cartwright kind of looking big dude was up next to me and He's looking and he's hey man. How'd you do? What band you make I said yeah, I made a reading band. He's like

No, dude, that's cool. That's good. And you know, that's a good place. You're going to learn a lot. And I said, what'd you make? He said, Oh, the four. And I'm like, Oh man, that was Chris McGuire. Okay. One of the most humble, nicest cats you'll ever meet. And one of the best tenor players I've had the pleasure of knowing. Fantastic. And Dixley and clarinet. Anyway. Yeah. So he was in the four. Um, and that same, that same week, my roommate, uh, situation was strange when I got into Bruce Hall.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (27:10.459)
I remember. Yeah.

Paul Croteau (27:24.076)
I met a guy, we ended up changing roommates and it worked out good, his name was Dave Pietro. And so he got to school late. There wasn't a lot of good communication from the jazz studies office, so I didn't know about lab-bound editions, I didn't know we had to audition for a studio for classical saxophone, I did not know I'd be studying classical saxophone for four years. I thought I was done with Phil DeLibro in Connecticut. I thought I had to go buy a new Ferling etude book because I left mine at home because I didn't know I was going to need it. And so...

Dr. Bob Lawrence (27:28.031)
Oh yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (27:48.611)
Oh my gosh! Right.

Paul Croteau (27:52.32)
So yes, Dave Pietroco, he gets there late. He actually missed lab band invitations. He didn't know about him He had a special audition on Saturday before classes start and then he freaking makes the one o'clock He freaking makes the one o'clock and so my roommate for two years was Dave Pietroco lead alto player now for Toshiko and He plays with the Vanguard Orchestra New York. He teaches. He's a junk professor of jazz at NYU Fantastic fantastic player. He was a roommate for two years a lot of great memories there. So the competition was nuts and so

Dr. Bob Lawrence (28:01.867)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (28:08.113)
Uh-huh.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (28:16.583)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (28:21.292)
When you get there, here I am, the big fish in the little pond in New England, thinking I'm going to be good. Well, there's 250 other saxophone players in the same spot, and all the drummers, the piano players, the bass players. And so at that moment in time, you have a choice. I got to really work hard or I got to change majors. So some folks didn't. And so I thought right away, I just traveled 1600 miles. I left my family and my friends and moved, went from Connecticut to Texas.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (28:32.47)
Oh.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (28:36.234)
Yeah. Yes. Right. Yeah, right. Or leave.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (28:49.77)
Yeah, yeah, you did great, man. You know, I said this to Bert Leggin when he was on Jazz Piano Skills, and I think you would agree with this. I said, you know, Bert, North Texas was an amazing experience. I learned so much in the classroom, but I have to be honest, the real education took place in the hallways, right? And he totally...

Paul Croteau (28:50.201)
I gotta figure this out. And I busted my butt and things got better.

Paul Croteau (29:08.974)
Mm-hmm.

Paul Croteau (29:14.588)
absolutely it was your jam sessions down the lobby of bruce or at the at the rock bottom lounge or at the library of the club called the library in someone's room the practice module is down underneath the basement so the buildings are the practice building itself or in kenton hall later and going to people's recitals and going to con we used to go to it was eight dollars for student night at caravan of dreams in fort worth to go see the greatest names in jazz thursday night was student night eight bucks um

Dr. Bob Lawrence (29:22.254)
to hanging out with everybody, just learning, talking. Yes, right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (29:30.56)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (29:42.862)
Caravana dreams.

Paul Croteau (29:43.052)
Yeah, just playing with everybody. Burt Liggin, Burt played piano, I want to say, in the four o'clock. Rick Peckham was the director. He now teaches at Berklee Guitar. And we did it, Burt's arrangement. I think so, yeah. And we did Burt's arrangement of Take Me Out to the Ballpark. So swinging. If you can find that, it's a really good chart. He wrote that in the band that semester. Yeah, there's just so much great music there. And as Neil Slater, former director of the program, said, there's a sign on the board. Every day is an audition.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (29:51.977)
Yeah, right. Is he still there? Wow.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (30:12.046)
Every day's an audition. That's right, that's exactly right. Yeah, and you know, and on top of all that, man, we would be remiss not to bring up the Texas pickup, right? I mean, come on. Burger and, oh man, that was the best, man. I used to hang out there all the time. There's some.

Paul Croteau (30:12.248)
Just because you got in a band didn't mean you were going to stay in that band.

Paul Croteau (30:23.34)
Ha ha ha, burger and fries, my buddy Ken Mullen used to be a waiter there. He steamed me a free drink, yeah.

Paul Croteau (30:31.736)
That place is no longer there. I lived at the apartment complex right behind it. That's not there. They've got soccer fields or something there now.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (30:36.446)
Yeah, so sad, man. I miss the 80s Denton scene, man. That was a lot of fun, a lot of fun. Yeah, right. Fry Street, oh my gosh.

Paul Croteau (30:42.86)
The Flying Tomato Pizza place was fantastic. On Corner Fry Street, yeah, next to, yeah, it was good, good times. I mean, it was just, there were just musicians everywhere, bands forming, and I mean, a lot of folks have heard of Snarky Puppy, that's a North Texas band. A lot of fan tech musicians there. You know, Nora Jones was there. She was a music major. You know, the...

Dr. Bob Lawrence (30:57.13)
Yeah, that's right. Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (31:02.73)
Yeah, and every year, right? I mean, every year, great musicians flock to Norta every year. Still, still.

Paul Croteau (31:08.768)
Still, yeah. And if you do the research, so these days careers in music are getting more and more difficult as far as if you're younger and you wanna talk about whether you should do it or not, where can you play? The big bands don't really exist anymore, they're all ghost bands, they're not quite the same. But the military jazz bands are solid. The Air Force has the Airmen of No, you got the Commodores and the Army. Those bands are rock solid swinging bands. And I did the math on it a while back. Something like two thirds, like 60 to 70% of all the members in the top military jazz bands are North Texas grads.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (31:20.77)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (31:25.488)
Right, right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (31:38.866)
Oh, yeah. You know, it's hard to it's hard to watch the credits of a movie or watch you write it. It's hard to go anywhere and not find North Texas cats.

Paul Croteau (31:39.236)
I mean it's really serious and the re-

Paul Croteau (31:52.516)
They're everywhere. And then, you know, it's fantastic. I mean, you know, if you like the band Chicago, Ray Herman is the saxophone player in Chicago, the Chicago. He was in the one o'clock in the 80s when you and I got there. I didn't know him personally. We saw each other and he wouldn't know me if you saw me, but he was a one o'clock tenor player. He now has one of the greatest saxophone gigs in all of pop music. And then our friend Jeff Goffin, I think has the best great saxophone gig in pop music. He plays for Dave Matthews Band.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (32:01.153)
Yeah.

Yeah, I remember.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (32:08.993)
Yep.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (32:12.738)
Wow. Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (32:18.251)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (32:18.364)
That's a band that he just lets them blow and stretch as long as he wants to. And Dave's been with them for, I mean, Jay's been with Dave for a long time. So, and then you look at Greg and Matt Chamberlain, you know, bass and drums, you know, Matt, I'm sorry, Greg and Matt Piazzonet. Matt Chamberlain was a drummer for Edie Raquel. Um, but the Bissonelli brothers, you know, uh, fanta, there's so much talent back then. And there was, there was a scene in Dallas, the jingle writing scene. Paris was a big part of that. Um, musicians like,

Dr. Bob Lawrence (32:23.821)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (32:30.442)
Yes, yes, right, right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (32:37.814)
Thank you. It was amazing, so.

Paul Croteau (32:45.62)
Randy Lee on saxophone, Pete Brewer on saxophone. You know, they were just powerhouses, still are, they still play. There was a great music scene in Dallas. I live in San Antonio now, I miss very much so, the Dallas music scene.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (32:48.364)
Oh my gosh. Right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (32:58.91)
Yeah, yeah, it's yeah. Well, we want you back, man. We want you. We want you. We want you back, man. Yeah, so

Paul Croteau (33:00.905)
I've taken 40 minutes to talk about me.

Let's do it. I'd like to get back there. I've thought about that. I got a kid in college, another kid just got a new job. I want to get back to the Metroplex.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (33:08.649)
So.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (33:13.826)
So okay, so let's talk a little jazz. Let's talk, you know, here you are an instrumentalist. I wanted you to come on Jazz Piano Skills because I mentioned a lot of times, especially to the group of folks that we get together a master class on Thursday evening. And I mentioned it in the podcast as well from time to time, how important it is for jazz pianists to listen to instrumentalists. And I know you play piano, man. You're one of those guys that us jazz piano players hate because you.

you blow a great sax and you put the sax down and then you go over to the piano and you start playing hip changes and walking bass lines. It's like, okay, shut up. Yeah, we just go like, okay, shut up. And so talk to us a little bit about what advice would you give a pianist, because you have piano experience, what advice would you give a pianist wanting to develop their

Paul Croteau (33:48.979)
That's part of my learning process.

Paul Croteau (34:10.148)
Sure.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (34:12.438)
the benefits of hanging out and listening to great instrumentalist whether they be saxophone players trumpet players trombonist whatever

Paul Croteau (34:20.076)
Yeah. Lots of stuff in that question. I wanna tie this back for a second. For the non-piano players listening, the instrumentalists, I taught myself piano because my jazz director at summer camp at Hart School Music said to my dad as we're leaving, your son's really good, he needs to get a piano. You need to get him a piano. And my dad got me a piano. And he referred to this.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (34:29.633)
Okay.

Paul Croteau (34:48.74)
there's a Dizzy Gillespie interview, I think it was on 60 Minutes, where they asked him, because Dizzy played piano. He played piano on so much bird's sides. And he asked why, and Dizzy had a cigar in his mouth. He said, it's all here in front of you. 88 keys, every note's there. You can see the relationships, et cetera. And so I started playing piano and learned how to read changes. And so as an instrumentalist, I kind of see the changes, kind of like you see a keyboard. You can see the relationships, which mean the imagery of the half steps, where's the third and the seventh?

Dr. Bob Lawrence (34:53.994)
Right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (35:13.518)
the imagery the imagery yeah yes right

Paul Croteau (35:18.24)
Where are the color tones? How do I get to them? Double chromatic from below, from above, all that. It's there. So instrumentalists, I encourage you to learn piano. You can get a cheap keyboard for 100 bucks these days. But...

Dr. Bob Lawrence (35:29.73)
Yeah, because it visually makes sense, right? It visually makes sense. A half step on a... You can see it, correct.

Paul Croteau (35:33.268)
Yeah. Not the fretboard. The fretboard's stupid. The piano octave fifth, you can see it, you know?

And then I got into Dan Hurley's jazz voicings from his jazz theory book, 379, 369, 735, 736. I still use those voicings to this day.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (35:49.258)
Yeah. Those are those are classic three note shells. I mean, those are there. You can't go wrong. Yeah. Right.

Paul Croteau (35:59.729)
I use them all the time. I write music all the time for TV and film, and when I do jazz stuff, that's there all the time. I do more, but yeah. So as pianists, lots of different parts of that question, like you heard me talking about playing along with the musicians that when I was younger, you're never too old to start. Play along with records. Put your headphones on, I mean.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (36:19.735)
Right.

Paul Croteau (36:22.12)
I had to drop a needle to go back and forth to go back to the solo again. I couldn't just hit pause or a computer or something like that. You kids today. Yeah, the looper, you can slow it down without changing the pitch. Come on, man. That's cheating. Transcribing solo. I mean, I know you transcribe Oscar. If you could slow it down at half tempo now, you need to. So number one is play with...

Dr. Bob Lawrence (36:27.494)
loop. Yeah, they got the looper, you know, they can just loop it.

Yep, yeah, right, yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (36:43.798)
Dude, Paul, I cheated, man. Back in the 80s, I bought that Marantz tape deck. Remember the Marantz deck that you could, you could edit the switch where you can cut it in half? Well, yeah, I did, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Paul Croteau (36:50.051)
I do remember that, yep.

Paul Croteau (36:54.092)
You could, that's right. You could for sure. Yes, yeah, I remember that Dan Morantz thing. There were a few of those at school. But play along with the recordings or the music you like. Generally, you will play the music that you grew up listening to. So if you haven't ever listened to jazz until you as an adult, you got a little more challenged than the average person. I grew up around jazz and around classical and around rock, so I had a lot of stuff, but you could just immerse yourself in the music. And...

Dr. Bob Lawrence (37:16.339)
Right.

Paul Croteau (37:22.436)
Play along with the recordings, and don't just go for the notes, but go for the feel. It's all about time. Time is so important. Wynton Marsalis talks about that all the time. Time is important. Breathing is important. I was talking to somebody the other day about this. There's a fantastic blues guitar solo. No, I was watching a video of Tina Guo. She's the cellist for Hans Zimmer.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (37:28.149)
Yes.

Paul Croteau (37:46.996)
all the famous themes gladiators theme and wonder woman and all the marvelies she's a fantastic cello player and I was watching her uh... she's doing some uh... a duet with herself like a Bach cello thing and you see her play but even though it's not a wind instrument you can see her breathe between the phrases and you ask her watch ask her play and before he starts with those killer runs he's like brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Dr. Bob Lawrence (38:03.687)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (38:09.418)
Yeah, yeah. Well, breathing creates space. It creates space.

Paul Croteau (38:15.844)
You listen to me and I'm a double-time bebop talker. I never stop. I keep on talking about this, blah, blah. You don't play like that, you know? We paused. Even I paused to breathe. You've got to, you're singing. Whether it's a piano, even a drum or whatever, a violin or saxophone, a trumpet, you're singing. And so play your melody as though you're breathing it. One of the things I do, I mentor some people on how to compose music for television and how to get realistic sounding strings and winds, et cetera, horns. And I'm like, guys,

Try singing what you just played. Play it back, not try singing along. You left no place for a real musician to breathe. You've got to breathe. So phrasing is incredibly important. Playing time, playing around with folks, phrase. And keep it simple. And don't think, a lot of folks will think about every note or a part of the measure. Think more phrases. We don't speak in letters, we speak in words and phrases. So don't think note to note, you're just gonna make your brain explode.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (38:50.606)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (39:06.164)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (39:09.675)
Yeah.

yeah you know it's funny i took a chart into the one o'clock lab and that i wrote and i can't remember you probably remember the dude i can't remember his name a redheaded alto sax player and the one o'clock this you go he was from like minnesota many at was any from like minneapolis area something like that well unbelievable right so i take a chart in and in this is what i realized i really realize that we have it

Paul Croteau (39:24.428)
Pat Ballinger. Yep.

Yeah. Killer player.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (39:41.482)
I have to stop thinking like a piano player because I wrote all these lines out. The sax parts were written like they were piano lines. They were like what a piano player would play, right? And they didn't translate to the sax section. So they get about eight, right? So they get about eight, 16 measures into the tune and I, you know, do this, cut it off and I said...

Paul Croteau (39:45.25)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (39:48.972)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (39:54.349)
That's hard.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (40:06.99)
I said, what are you, because I was kind of stunned because it was like really bad. And I said, what are you, sax players, guys, what are you playing? And he says, he looks up, he goes, what you wrote?

Paul Croteau (40:11.245)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (40:19.832)
Oh! Hahaha! Yeah, that could be direct. Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (40:23.61)
Yeah, that was what you wrote. And I said, OK, well, pass it in, because I need to go rewrite. You know? Yeah, because I realized at that time, I was thinking that I was thinking like a pianist, and I need to think more like an instrumentalist. And when you start thinking as a pianist, when you start thinking more like an instrumentalist, your playing becomes much more melodic. It becomes much more realistic, like a vocal line, like a vocal line, like what you're talking about.

Paul Croteau (40:28.273)
I need to rewrite this, yeah.

Paul Croteau (40:46.016)
Yeah, yeah, you gotta think about it. So, I think one of my favorite piano players ever, Keith Jarrett, I think he is so incredibly melodic. He plays like a bebop sax player. He's noodling around with that technique and all that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But he is playing beautiful melodic lines. He's playing like Tom Harrell or like a Joe Pass or a Charlie Parker. He thinks melodically. He's not thinking arpeggios.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (40:56.888)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (41:04.776)
Yeah. Right.

Right. So.

Paul Croteau (41:13.132)
And as piano players, I think a lot of y'all will sit back on arpeggios because you've practiced them so much and they're easy to do. Don't think of chords, think of color tones and target notes. Instead, think melodically.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (41:23.562)
Yes. Yeah. You know, it's you mentioned earlier transcriptions and I love that you mentioned something and I'm just going to go back to this because you said it so quickly. I want to expound upon it. You said, you know, there's the debate between whether you transcribe the whole solo or take snippets of the solo and you said I prefer the latter, you know, taking snippets and

Paul Croteau (41:42.977)
Oh yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (41:50.542)
And I do too, right? I like to, I like to trans, if I hear something I like, I go, I'm gonna transcribe that. I don't need the whole solo, I need that, right? Or I like to take, I like to take transcriptions of instrumentalists like Chet Baker and take a solo of his and I will literally, Paul, I will literally circle like, I will circle like little ideas that he plays that I like, then I'll...

Paul Croteau (41:57.123)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (42:06.759)
Mmm.

Paul Croteau (42:12.576)
Yes, I was just going to say that.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (42:19.154)
understand that idea and then I and then correct me if I'm wrong but I take that idea then and start using it as a launchpad to start develop my own kind of embellishment to that concept and I move it around in different keys and that's how I develop vocabulary.

Paul Croteau (42:37.18)
You're developing vocabulary. You have to, like my Ami book, my Charlie Parker book, I had all sorts of circles of this, something that just turned my ear. Oh my God, why does that sound so good? So I'd circle it in pencil and then play it and I'd figure it out, get my fingers, start slowly to make it work, and then get it up to tempo, and then I'd transpose it to the other. I wouldn't do 12 keys. I'm gonna swear, being honest, I would do the common keys for a while.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (42:46.002)
Yeah, right. Right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (42:52.62)
Right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (43:00.65)
That's, yeah, right. Yeah, like C, E, I always tell students, use the C minor pentatonic scale as your base. C, E flat, F, G, B flat. Do those keys and you're good, you know.

Paul Croteau (43:10.624)
Yeah, it covers them all pretty much. Yeah. That's true. Because if you go G major pentatonic, those are all your rock keys. G-A-B-D-E. So, dude, I like that. That's a... Yeah. That's fantastic. I'm gonna steal that, bro. Yeah, so transcribing licks is cool. Sometimes transcribing a whole chorus to get the shape, because you can analyze the phrases. I mean, with...

Dr. Bob Lawrence (43:19.77)
Yeah, right. Yeah. So I just use I just I just used to see minor pentatonic as my structure. Yeah. So it's yours, man.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (43:35.946)
Yeah, that's good.

Paul Croteau (43:37.764)
Riggs is forming analysis class, you know, you were analyzing the heck out of solos and finding why, where's the motivic development and what are, and there are all these terms about how did you approach the seventh, you know, because there's the concept of color tones. If you, well, piano players should know this because they're playing chords. Soloists should know this because you want to sound good, you know it, you got to know your scales because the scales identify all the notes in the key. You got, and what makes the key, this is the Dan Hurley thing, first class. He's like, you know,

Dr. Bob Lawrence (43:41.466)
Oh man.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (43:46.379)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (44:06.152)
Okay, what notes are important? Because when he taught the three, seven, nine, three, six, nine voicings, he was like, okay. Root bass player's got that. Fifth doesn't add anything. He played a C open fifth, nothing there. Is that major or minor? Don't care. Now if I add an E or an E minor, it's major or minor. If I add the seventh or the B flat or the B, that changes things. The third and the seventh are your magical color tones. Those are the ones that give you the flavor of that chord. And then jazz and theory and harmony.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (44:25.802)
Yep, right. That's right.

That's right.

Paul Croteau (44:33.644)
what a song sounds like is the movement of the chord changes and finding tones that are moving from, if you're going two five one, you've got G minor seven, that F, and then C seven goes to an E, and then you're back to F, and then that E could be your major seven, or go to F as the root, but all those notes are staying, just like traditional voicings, keeping the movement minimal in your hands when you're comping. I think that way when I'm playing, what are the color tones in this chord progression, that I can just play a riff.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (44:40.364)
Right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (44:55.754)
Yeah right right.

Paul Croteau (45:02.764)
that circles around this small area, and that will sound really cool, because I'm hitting all the color tones, and how you get to those color tones is part of the fun.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (45:12.842)
Right. So, okay, so what was a, what was a, for you, what was a, uh, share, shine a little light on what was a typical practice session like for you? When you went to your bedroom or you went to the practice room at North Texas and you were going to practice, talk to us about what your approach was and why.

Paul Croteau (45:32.608)
Yeah. Okay, so there's different things. So there's classical, you're just going through the sections, playing it perfectly and not going on until that section is done. I had this phrase I said quite a bit, if you're walking through the school and someone sounds amazing in the practice room, they're not practicing, they're playing. Or they're practicing some subtle nuance I'm not hip to yet. A vibrato thing here, a technical thing, a feel. Maybe they're doing a piano riff and they're trying to get the proper fingering, so.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (45:50.198)
That's right. That's 100% correct.

Paul Croteau (46:02.048)
So that's not practice. You know, if they sound good, you're not practicing. Practicing should sound bad. So in the classical space and scales, I mean, the fundamentals I've gotta emphasize for everyone. Just like athletes, they're running, they're sprinting, they're pushups, they're weights, they're strengths, they're conditioning. You've got to do your scales and your arpeggios. You've got to do that. Bebop is scales. Arpeggios in classical music is everywhere, but that's also jazz. So you've gotta have those fundamentals. If you look at a...

Dr. Bob Lawrence (46:06.178)
You're right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (46:12.942)
Thanks for watching!

Dr. Bob Lawrence (46:28.236)
Yep.

Paul Croteau (46:31.776)
Solo look at some Oscar does and you see it's a bebop scale or it's an arpeggio the four octave arpeggio He's doing an augmented seventh and they could resolve to this big-ass chord Those are fundamental scales arpeggios and scales. I'm saying major minor that means melodic minor and harmonic minor Um, I don't get into modes. We had to because we learned them at school I don't think modally even when it's a modal tune. I don't do that What are the color tones?

Dr. Bob Lawrence (46:53.722)
Right. I don't either. Right. I don't either. In fact, you said, in fact, going back to saying something, you know, learning more in the hallways, I was hanging out in the hallway one day at North Texas, and you were there, and you were talking, and you had actually said, and this was a light bulb moment for me, you had actually said to the group, you said, you know, I don't know anybody who actually, I don't know any...

Paul Croteau (47:04.269)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (47:21.25)
uh... player who actually thinks modes really do you guys know it yet you actually said you do i don't know anybody i think smalls yeah right and i remember thinking he's right i mean that's like sandbags wrapped around your ankles really i mean do you really need to think that the c dominant scale is the f major scale starting on c yeah who cares and paul that's why i

Paul Croteau (47:24.185)
Really?

I could see myself saying it, I don't remember it, but I could see myself saying it.

Paul Croteau (47:43.008)
Who cares if it's super Locrian or whatever? I mean, I don't think about that. I mean, it can be useful as a vocabulary piece to communicate with your other musicians, you know.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (47:52.742)
Well, yeah, and I also, I explain it this way. I tell students all the time, I go, look, I'm gonna teach you modes as an academic explanation of the origin of a sound, to validate why you need to practice this. But the faster that you can play the C dominant scale and think of it as a C dominant scale and not the F major scale starting on C, the better.

Paul Croteau (48:02.368)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (48:12.364)
Right. Improvisationally, you know, I don't think about modes. So when I'm starting to learn tunes, like I practice with the April salts, like a million kids did. And the earlier books they showed, he had the diagram and the color tone was actually, I think that's actually where I picked up the concept of color tones before, because I was in junior high school. So playing along with those things, you could go and try things over and over again.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (48:23.86)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (48:28.862)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (48:41.148)
So practicing knowing the color tones, how to get to them, when to emphasize them, always playing with good time. I had a point to make about the ever saws and I completely forgot it, cause this happens to me. Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (48:52.818)
Well, I think maybe I think maybe where you're going with this, you know, you mentioned this earlier, too, which is really important. How how you know the importance of practicing time and the importance of practicing feel and articulation, right? You know, I remember doing a red garland transcription. And I believe it was off. The garland of red, you know, the I think it was foggy day in London town.

Paul Croteau (48:59.464)
Oh, both. I got it. Go ahead.

Paul Croteau (49:06.861)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (49:21.27)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (49:21.486)
and he's doing it in F and I remember the opening of his solo was it's F major chord and in the line I remember transcribing F A C E and I went that can't be it and then I listened to it again at F A C E I said that can't be it I got my ears suck and I listened to it again it's F A C E I said that sounds way too hip for him to be playing the root third the fifth and the seventh of the chord right but it's that time it's that feel right it's that feel

Paul Croteau (49:33.048)
Heh heh.

Paul Croteau (49:42.696)
be playing face. Yeah.

Paul Croteau (49:48.736)
Yep. And that one instance. What I was thinking about the ever solids is, when they saw the changes, people, like I said earlier, don't focus on every note or every half measure or even every chord change. Sometimes to make yourself feel more comfortable on a track, look at the chord change and make a bracket over the key center. These four measures are in F. It's a one, six, two, five, but it's all in F.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (50:01.983)
Yes.

Paul Croteau (50:16.852)
Now is it the major six or the minor six? If it's the minor six, we're still good, F is still good. If this is a one major six, major two, now you got some color tones. That F sharp in the second measure of that form or your phrase is gonna bring color and make us, oh man, he's nailing the changes. When they say, man, that guy's nailing the changes, it's because they're playing, hey, that F, it's the key of the song, there's an F sharp. That's because it's a third of the major six. And oh, it's a major, it's a two five one, but it's a major two major five one.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (50:38.966)
Right.

Paul Croteau (50:43.096)
So that B natural in the key of F. Who's playing F sharp and B natural in the key of F? Well, in a 1-6-2-5 it works if they're major turnarounds. So identify your key centers. People freak out, Giant Steps, there's a video. Hardest song of all time, no. Giant Steps is two five ones and three keys. That's all Giant Steps is. That's it. So just map it out. And there's some color tones, of course, but life is not as difficult as we wanna make it sometimes. So map out the key centers.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (50:43.202)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (50:50.199)
That's right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (51:00.798)
right. Yeah.

Paul Croteau (51:10.552)
Know your scales, know your arpeggios, know what color tones are, play in good time, play in tune, listen to the masters, know your key centers. It's easy.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (51:20.799)
Yeah, and like you said, it seems like the further down the road you get, I think this is the case in any discipline, right? The further down the road you get in that discipline, the faster you run back to the fundamentals, the faster you run back to the beginning, right? Because you finally realize, wow, I have to have those, a command of those, if I'm going to...

Paul Croteau (51:43.328)
Yeah, but know your chords. I mean, and do ear training. Listen, you know, piano players, listen to what the great compers are doing. Listen to why does Red Garland sound different from Bill Evans? There's so many great videos out there. Why, what does Dave Rubik sound like? What does Oscar sound like? What's he doing? Okay, what makes McCoy McCoy? That big fifth slamming and those fourths. Chick Corea, I mean.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (52:00.205)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (52:08.946)
Right. Yeah.

Paul Croteau (52:12.228)
Talk about time, that guy's got amazing time. You know, what are they doing for voicings? And there's so many great videos, and nowadays with YouTube, you've got the solo and the transcription rolling right by. It's just crazy, man. So there's no reason not to be good at this stuff. But yeah, you gotta know your theory. Don't be proud that you can't read. I deal with that all the time in the TV music business. I don't know how to read, I'm doing fine. That's great, yet you're an exception. But if you could read, you could do so much more.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (52:13.951)
Oh my gosh.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (52:22.914)
It's unbelievable. Right.

Paul Croteau (52:40.564)
I think back when you started the school, long ago, long ago, you talked about, you know, if you want to take lessons, yeah, I could teach you a song and you could know a song this week. Why don't I teach you to read and you can know every song? You know, something along those lines about learn how to read the basics and the whole world is your oyster, you know.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (52:54.994)
That's right. Right, right.

That's right. Right. Yeah. And you know, speaking of the ear, how important would you say, I think I know the answer to this because I know what I preach here. I tell piano players, listen and understand tunes. Listen for root movement, you have to listen for it. Is it going one going to a two? Is it going to six? Is it good? Right. So I call it the harmonic DNA of a piece, right?

if you if you don't know if you can't hear the root movement then and you're worried about whether it's major dominant minor have to mention diminish i think you can get the card ahead of the horse you know it he you gotta know it's six first and then what kind of six is it so hard

Paul Croteau (53:36.301)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (53:40.224)
Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. You asked me, I kind of neglected your question earlier about what should piano players be doing behind soloists. Stay the hell out of my way. No, I'm just kidding. No.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (53:49.586)
Yes. Well, that's hey, I think that's very valid, though, Paul. I think that's very valid.

Paul Croteau (53:56.212)
less is more, don't force me to play a change. Follow the changes I'm playing. Now, if the player sucks and they're crashing, you're hammering that third and that seventh. Where in, it's a C7, not a minor seventh. What was that story you did, it was Rich Madison, improv class, was it the, you missed the augmented fifth or something like that, and you nailed it the second time? What was that story?

Dr. Bob Lawrence (54:18.282)
You know, we were doing improv and Rich said, let's play what is this thing called Love, right? And so it's got that half diminished G minor seven flat five, right? And there's a trombone player in the back of the room and he keeps playing G minor seven and Rich, you know, in his big voice goes, whoa, whoa. And he said, why do you insist on playing a D natural, landing on a D natural when it's a G half diminished with a D flat?

Paul Croteau (54:28.918)
Yeah.

Paul Croteau (54:36.856)
WOOOOOOAH

Dr. Bob Lawrence (54:47.91)
and that and that kid goes up why I heard it that way and rich goes within get out you know if you know you yeah I am yeah right so he goes so rich goes if you're gonna if you're not if that's how you're gonna approach it you know then you he said you either gotta you're either make a decision to do it right or you're gonna make a decision to get out so you pick right

Paul Croteau (54:52.113)
Ah, ha ha.

Paul Croteau (54:56.32)
That sounds like something Joe Jackson would say. But he wouldn't be in improv class. Ha ha ha.

Paul Croteau (55:16.128)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (55:17.246)
So there's like silence in the room, this really uncomfortable silence. So he said, let's pick, he goes, let's pick it back up and he points to me to take the next solo. So now I'm like doing octaves on the half diminished. Yeah, I'm doing octaves like, yeah. And he looks over, he looks over and he goes, like this. Yeah.

Paul Croteau (55:21.664)
Tension, yeah.

Paul Croteau (55:30.18)
the flat fifth. You're nailing it. Look Rich, I got it. Yeah.

Paul Croteau (55:37.612)
Yeah man, yeah man. Rich was great. You know it's great, and you know, I love Rich, I mean he was a great influence on us. He played with Louis Armstrong. He recorded with Louis Armstrong. Yeah, yeah, fantastic stuff.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (55:42.614)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (55:50.039)
I know that. Isn't that amazing? That was always fun in those improv classes when that door would fly open. That door would fly open. He'd come down that stairs and he'd have his euphonium. You'd go like, uh-oh, we're going to be playing today.

Paul Croteau (55:56.372)
Stories.

Paul Croteau (56:00.212)
Yep. Yeah. We're going to learn something today.

Yeah, you know he um rich, uh, you know told the story when he in improv class He said he talked about playing with louis armstrong in the hot seven or something like that. He was playing euphonium and uh, And he did it. He did his louis impersonation. Basically he said Now we're all going to play this he talked to the engineer I'm good. This is going to be between me and god you all can come along for the ride if you want That's it. That's that's hearing those stories man. It was great. Um But piano players so

Dr. Bob Lawrence (56:30.33)
Yeah, that's pretty neat. Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah. I thought.

Paul Croteau (56:36.492)
behind for me if I'm playing and I'm largely thinking jazz I will play the heck out of funk and soul and rhythm blues to your no hearts content I can do a Brecker and Sam Warner heartbeat but just one just singing traditional jazz right now don't force the sax player or though the soloist to go where you want stay where they are and they may give you clues like if I start say we're playing a blues and F and I start doing something and then a new chorus comes around and instead of just playing F for a couple bars I play

Dr. Bob Lawrence (56:55.862)
All right.

Paul Croteau (57:06.276)
F and then E, A, D, G, C minor, F. I throw in a bird blues chains so you might not catch it the first time But I'm gonna I'm gonna make eye contact hopefully or if not you're gonna hear that and you'll do it the same time This is that next course rhythm changes the all the monk the monk substitutions the force back and forth off the flat six Yeah, so listen if the sort if the player implies something you gotta go along with it, but don't force it There's a famous video of Michael Brecker in North, Texas

Dr. Bob Lawrence (57:11.907)
The bird, yep.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (57:19.039)
Absolutely right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (57:23.553)
Yep.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (57:31.939)
You're right.

Paul Croteau (57:35.664)
and I put it out on the internet years ago. And they start playing, it's the first track, I think it's a B flat blues playing Sonny Moon for two. And the bass player, the Winniacock bass player's got his Jacop S-Storia fretless bass. And soon as they get out of the head, and then boom, he drops to the sharp four on the bass. He's like, Mike, take it out, you know? I'm like, dude, you know, don't, let Mike decide when he's gonna take it out. Don't just say, hey Mike, I'm playing bass with Mike Brecker. We're gonna take it out on the first chorus, you know?

That's not your role, man. You are accompanying him, not leading him, not attacking him. But Mike went for it, he's used to it.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (58:07.306)
that's exactly right i remember yeah i remember with breaker was at north texas and uh... do it plain and neil slater i'll stand back stage with and next to neil and breaker was taken a solo and slater looks at me goes man this cat's got his breaker lex down

Paul Croteau (58:32.172)
Man, this guy's got his Recolix, yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (58:36.49)
I get that is Brecker, you know, yeah. I know you were talk about that for a second.

Paul Croteau (58:38.328)
That's hysterical. I was friends with Mike. I want to hear a good story. Yeah, so in the mid-90s I went to graduate school at Texas A&M and in fall of 1994 I started and the web was born that year. The first web browser, Netscape, Mozilla. And I saw this thing happening. This internet. The internet has been around since the 60s but the web as we know web browsers and stuff was born.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (58:58.911)
Right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (59:04.854)
Right.

Paul Croteau (59:06.72)
and I saw this technology was really, really important and so I decided to build a website when no one really had them. I needed some content, an idea, and I said, well shoot, there's nothing out here for Michael Brecker. I'm talking, Yahoo was a gray page with blue words and then when they upgraded it, we had now tables. You can put things in tables and add images and that's what I'm talking about. And so I said, I'm gonna just use Michael Brecker as a content topic because I love his music and let's do that. And so I created this webpage with albums and discographies and things I knew and...

About a week after it went live, I got a phone call on my answering machine. Hey Paul, this is Michael Brecker. I saw your website online, I'd like to talk to you about that. I'm like, oh shoot, maybe I'll take it down or what? And I'm thinking, is somebody doing a trick on me? But it sounded like Mike. But he left his phone number, so I called, it was at 212 in New York, and so I called him back and he's like, hello, and I said, Mike, this is Paul Gaulteau. Hey Paul, hey man, what's going on? We start talking like we're buddies. He's like, man.

I really, really dig what you did, man. I wanna help you out with that. I've been wanting to do this, but I don't know how to do it. And so, this is in, I wanna say, summer of 95. And I'm like, yeah, man, I would love that. And I need photos, I wanna talk to you about your setup and all the things that you get asked all the time at gigs. What kind of reed do you use and blah, blah. But I wanna know more. And so he's like, yeah, let's do it, man. And of course, he had been playing the ewey, the electronic wind instrument, which I have one as well. And so we became friends.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:00:23.071)
All right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:00:29.874)
Yeah, right, right.

Paul Croteau (01:00:34.496)
I actually became his Mac help desk. He was a Mac user as well. He'd start calling me, hey Paul, my Mac's doing this weird thing. I get phone calls, help desk for Mike. And so he sent me, I got a lot of his recordings before they were released, so I could have him ready for the website. And he was really obsessed with the website being fast. He didn't want to be slow. And so yeah, we became great friends. And I did that until 2000, so five, six years. Then my daughter was born, and then I was busy with the IT world.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:00:42.85)
That's hilarious!

Paul Croteau (01:01:03.392)
And I couldn't manage both, so I said, I gotta get this back to the record company. And so they took it and they pretty much destroyed it and made it a brochure site. And then I saw Mike in San Antonio in, I wanna say, oh five, no, oh three. And he was there with Herbie Hancock and we crossed paths. That's the first time I actually met him in person after doing his website for eight years. And it was great, Sue was with me and we saw him in an elevator and I said, Mike, he's like, yeah, and I'm Paul. Paul, he gave me a big hug. And he said,

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:01:03.405)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:01:23.298)
Wow.

Paul Croteau (01:01:33.undefined)
So he gets to a big hug and we had dinner together and I said Mike I missed doing the work with you but I'm not really digging what the what you know impulse has done with your website he's like Paul I fucking hate that site it's just a promotion and I said well I've got an idea I want to do a new website for you but it's Michael Brecker.com is owned by the record company so let's do iBrecker because the iPhone the iPad she's like Paul I love it let's do it and so then I did iBrecker.com that stayed up until he died.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:01:34.374)
Oh, that's awesome, man.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:01:44.592)
Hahaha!

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:02:02.551)
Wow.

Paul Croteau (01:02:03.088)
And I got my last email from him about two weeks before he died. That was very, very sad. But he was so cool, forthcoming with information, et cetera. He introduced me to Dave Sanborn, because I said, I'd like to do a website for Dave. He's like, yeah. So he introduced me to Dave's management. Dave was the exact opposite. He had zero interest in technology. I told Dave, because Dave was actually more famous, could we say, than Mike was. He was on Letterman and all the fun stuff. And

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:02:06.337)
Oh my gosh.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:02:24.843)
Yeah, right, right.

Paul Croteau (01:02:29.616)
And I said, Dave, you know, you could monitor, we could sell your CDs online. You could sell autographed posters. Say, oh man, this is a lot of work. I just want to play. So I was trying to do the e-commerce thing with him, you know, make a little coin for myself as well, but it didn't work out. But yeah. And speaking of Mike, let me get this thing here real quick here. I just got, I just got this in the mail a month or so ago. This, so they released some, some of Mike's practice notebooks. It's the practice that you had a practice notebooks.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:02:37.27)
I, yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:02:44.647)
Well, you tried. You tried, man.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:02:54.558)
Oh, oh wow.

Paul Croteau (01:02:59.028)
of Michael Brecker. This is just a sample.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:03:00.13)
See, that's fantastic.

Paul Croteau (01:03:02.984)
and you open it up and there's just a, I don't know if it's backwards or not, but it's all these little riffs. I see one I think I can play. That's F-A-B-E. So it's not, it's a diminished triad. Play chromatically down over two fives. All these great licks, blah, blah. And I try playing some and like, they're all absurdly difficult, but they all sound exactly like Mike. So I think I'm gonna start a video series of me learning a lick. This is how stupidly hard it is.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:03:19.185)
Eh... right?

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:03:26.803)
Yes.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:03:33.059)
There you go.

Paul Croteau (01:03:33.116)
and he didn't write it out in 12 keys. This is something your students might want. He didn't write all that stuff out. You learn it once, and then he would take it through all 12 keys. But he would practice it through the riff and do a whole tone scale instead of half steps.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:03:43.098)
All right. Yeah. I heard an interview with him where he talked about what you were just talking about earlier. He said that he rarely ever, ever did a full transcription. It was always snippets that he would, you know, oh, I like that and I'm gonna take that, you know.

Paul Croteau (01:03:53.815)
Right.

Paul Croteau (01:03:58.204)
That's a personality trait. It applies to reading too. There's a, if you, some folks, there's a, there's a category of Gallup polls. I think Gallup polls did a, has done a study for many, many years of these personality traits. There's 34 of them. It's called Strengths Finder. And one of the, one of the traits of the 34 is learner. And one of the traits of learners is that they get what they need out of something and they move on. If you're reading a business book about how to sell or whatever, you get what you need. I don't need to hold it whole book. I got what I need. Same thing applies to solos.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:04:20.358)
Yeah. Right.

Yeah, right. I think you're right.

Paul Croteau (01:04:27.24)
I just wanted that turn around sounded so amazing. I needed that. Just, exactly.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:04:29.99)
I need to know that, yeah, right. So, Paul, man, you and I could like chat all night long.

Paul Croteau (01:04:37.384)
We could do it in round two if you want to get deeper into the theory. We spent 35 minutes talking about me. I want to talk about stuff to help your kids and your players.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:04:42.482)
we're gonna we're gonna we're gonna we're gonna have around to there's no doubt about it but uh... you know what we gotta do now bro you know what's good we gotta we gotta wrap things up because the rangers are gonna play game one in the world series which. Let's go rangers rights i who would have ever thunk it right here we go Texas.

Paul Croteau (01:04:45.644)
Let's do that.

with that.

Paul Croteau (01:04:55.undefined)
Let's go Rangers baby, let's go, let's go.

Paul Croteau (01:05:00.948)
I mean the way they, I mean they were dominant all year. Houston was up their butt and then Rangers could have clinched and they got shut out one nothing in the last game of the season. And then they go and spank Houston and then Houston comes back. I just want, I just want the UMPs to be consistent in the series. They were in the ALCS, they were inconsistent on both sides. Let's lock down that strike zone guys and let the players play.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:05:05.684)
Yeah.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:05:12.416)
I know it.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:05:16.087)
That's right.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:05:22.874)
that's exactly right. Paul, I can't thank you enough man for coming on jazz piano skills you know I know all the listeners are going to love getting to know you and I can't wait to have you back and we'll have some very specific jazz skills that there we go we'll get into some pedagogy so I want to do this real quick ladies and gentlemen Paul Croteau listen

Paul Croteau (01:05:41.024)
Yeah, now we got the bio section done, let's get into some pedagogy.

Paul Croteau (01:05:52.225)
Yeah, I-

Paul Croteau (01:05:57.96)
I love it, you are high tech my friend. Look at that, that's great. What a crowd, what a crowd.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:05:59.54)
Yeah, see? All right, man. Paul, thank you so much, man. I can't wait to have you back, and let me know when you're back in Dallas again so we can hang out.

Paul Croteau (01:06:12.112)
I was in your office just the other day, but you were not there, so I will give you advance notice next time. Love you, brother. You take care. We'll talk soon.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (01:06:16.117)
I know brother. Thank you, Paul. Love you too, man. Bye bye.