Greg Hutchinson on Teaching Jazz, "Forgetting" Vocabulary, and Mentorship in The Internet Age

Greg and I have had a few conversations over the years. I took a lesson from him way back in the early 20-teens. We spoke most recently this past February, when internet connectivity unfortunately interfered.

But Greg graciously agreed to come back for another chat, and this time the quality came out great.

If you know Hutch at all, you know him as the outspoken, funny, larger-than-life presence he is, and look no further than his instagram to see him weighing in and not holding back on…well pretty much whatever crosses his mind.

And if you’re an OG fan, you probably remember that he was one of a small group of musicians who - practically on their own - rekindled acoustic/”straight ahead” jazz, after it had been “left for dead” after 2 decades of fusion. The Marsalis brothers and Jeff “Tain” Watts arguably started the trend, but it grew to encompass artists like Josh Redman, Brad Mehldau, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Mark Turner, and drummers like Brian Blade and Greg.

If you listen to Greg’s playing on any early-2000s recording, it sounds fresh and retro at the same time. One of a number of “new benchmarks” for drummers learning the art, who wanted avatars of contemporary players interpreting the past greats. Drummers like me.

The punchline is that though Hutch can be fiery and iconoclastic in his opinions, at his core he’s a very warm and generous human, and it doesn’t take much conversation to uncover how much he cares about mentoring the next generation of musicians.

I know you’ll enjoy this multifaceted chat with the one and only Hutch.

Chapters

2:28 - how do you build swing from the ground up 5:20 - bridging the gap bet swinging and improvising 8:02 - Greg and John Riley 10:55 - the boundaries of "jazz" 15:26 - let's talk about flurries without talking about flurries 21:30 - Greg's Betty Carter story 23:58 - being "over" your playing 26:15 - the young lions and Greg 29:55 - why are people interested in jazz drumming 35:40 - how do musicians in 2023 find mentorship