A Conversation with Taj Mahal (continued)

PM: Along with scoring movies, I read that you also acted some.

TM: Oh, yeah, quite a bit. Starting out with a pilot called The Sheriff, with Gilbert Roland, years ago, went to Rising Sons. And then the first big piece that really did stay around was Sounder.

PM: Right.

TM: And then from there, Man Who Broke a Thousand Chains. And Once Upon a Time When We Were Colored.

PM: Would you do more of that?

TM: Correct roles, yes--I mean, I'm really particular about it. This business has the ability where you can do a really good thing for a long time, and all you have to do is mess up once, and that's the one thing that they'll bring the cameras in and stamp indelibly into everybody's mind.

PM: Ain't it the truth.

TM: So you have to really come from being correct in the first place. There's a lot of stuff out there, but my idea is to really do stuff that 50 years from now, 100 years, somebody looks at it and they'll go, "I wonder who that guy was. That's pretty interesting." Or see you totally in the role that you're in and not feel that you gave something weird to it or you played for less value than it really was.

PM: And microcosms of that idea exist already in your lifetime, where someone can go back to Taj Mahal, Natch'l Blues, or Giant Step, and say, "Damn, those stand the test of time. They're as good now as they sounded then."

TM: Oh, yeah, and even better--now that you've been through a whole bunch of stuff that may have taken you in some other directions, you hear it and go like, "Wow, this stayed up, man. This stayed." But that was the whole point, a lot of these guys were playing off the vapors of what the music was about. They didn't stop to figure out how to actually do some cooking that could smell good down the road.

PM: [laughs]

TM: Well, I mean, people don't think. It's like the herd mentality in lots of different ways. "Oh, wow, it's blues now. Put on some blue jeans and look like a funky guy, and get a Telecaster, Stratocaster, whatever. Get the B.B. King guitar, a 335." Man, I mean, it's actually all good, but that's not all it took. I mean, Little Walter was playing what he wanted to play for himself. That's become like the language of harp in the world--

PM: Right.

TM: But then there's a whole other harmonica style. But that's the big blue--the really hardcore blues harp.

PM: I wish more people took up a chromatic harmonica and started learning that. But that never happens, it's too hard.

TM: No, yeah, right. Yeah, well, there's some cats that do, they'll play a few numbers. But Walter really, I mean, changed that whole thing.

PM: It's still the spookiest thing.

TM: Yeah, it still is. It still is. It's great music.

PM: Along with film, you did music for theater, music for children, almost everything you can think of to do with music. Has there ever been a documentary about your life?

TM: Well, they're working on some different stuff. A lot of people are approaching that now. All of a sudden it's become some kind of thing where they're going like, "Wow, this guy's been busy." But I mean, it's like, "Okay, guys, you're sleeping. I'm not." I mean, it's like, "You can go ahead and do the obvious, but here it is." So I got to wait around for people, man. I don't really sit there properly with my legs crossed and my hands folded just waiting on them, because I saw that what they do is they'll ignore you. You have to put a log in their way, and they need to trip, and you have to walk over and say, "Do you need some help?"

PM: [laughs]

TM: That's how it works with that. That's the way it is. Whatever, I'm not making an issue of it, because the music proves that I'm not standing around waiting. The work's getting done.

PM: Right. Considering the width and the breadth of what you've already done, are there things you haven't yet attempted you'd like to try?

TM: Well, most things I've attempted--I mean, really, I'm not so much trying this stuff out. I already know it works, because I don't deal on like, "Well, gee, I wonder if an egg would really taste good inside of this mango."

PM: [laughs]

TM: I don't think that way. "Hmm, there's a giraffe over there. Now, if I cross it with a fish..." No, that's not my style. My style is to hear the music come in complete inside my head. It comes to me, and what you hear is what comes to me, not something that I go chasing around to find. I'm not going through the bins and looking for the Africans. It's not like that. It comes to me in complete musical sentences and phrases or fragments thereof.

PM: Well, I do a lot of these interviews. And once in a while you get a guy on the phone who sounds like you think he might be, and that was what I got today. And I sure appreciate your time, Taj.

TM: Well, my pleasure, man.

PM: You're really a hell of a guy, and I can't wait to spread the word about this new record. It's great.

TM: Oh, yeah. Do me a good favor and make sure that you also put in www.musicmaker.org

PM: Sure. What is that?

TM: That's a very great organization down in North Carolina that handles a lot of beautiful old blues singers and country music people, men and women who are singers in their golden years, and making sure that they get recorded if they never got recorded, and looking out for them. They're on fixed income. We took them out on the road. There's a lot of great stuff happening. And I think if you plugged into that, you would be extremely excited. They're in Hillsborough, North Carolina. Tim and Denise Duffy.

PM: Musicmaker.org. We're on it. [In addition to donations, this non-profit organization is seeking volunteers--they also have an intern program. How they describe their mission is they're "dedicated to helping the true pioneers and forgotten heroes of Southern musical traditions gain recognition and meet their day to day needs."]

TM: Yeah, please do.

PM: Thanks a lot, Taj.

TM: All right, man.

PM: Take care of yourself.

TM: Yeah, you got it. Bye.

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