Approaching his 80th birthday, and having been in and around the music biz since he was a preteen, George Benson is a force of nature wrapped up in a package that’s consistently blurred the lines between jazz, blues and soul. Carl Marsh spoke to the guitar-slinging bossman ahead of a Cardiff show.
Over the years, have you performed in Wales a fair few times?
I don’t know if it’s many times, but I have played there. And I’m connected to there via my grandfather, who was Irish and Welsh! He also had two other parts, those being African and Native American.
Did he ever find out where in Wales his ancestry was from?
No, that’s too far back! [Laughs]
One question I’ve always wanted to ask you if I ever got a chance: what’s the secret to your 70 years of longevity and success in the music industry? You got your first record deal aged just nine!
Oh, maybe it’s that I don’t stop and examine and just keep going [laughs]. The thing is, I never thought about it. I just kept doing what I was doing. And it seems to invigorate me. I get a chance to see what’s going on all over the world: to experience new musicians and new music. And people keep me abreast of what’s good and not so good.
And this makes you still hungry to tour more and keep recording more music?
I’m always looking for good material because people love new stuff. And if you can shock them with something slightly different, maybe something that they didn’t expect from you. In my case, perhaps, Give Me The Night or Turn Your Love Around. One that really gets mentioned is Lady Love Me (One More Time). That’s so different from everything else out there, you know? Those things sparked my career from ending. And they give it a nice boost.
Actually, I wanted to ask about Give Me The Night: it’s slightly different, like you say, as it’s got those Patti Austin scat vocals on it.
It was written by Rod Temperton. And when he wrote it, it was the last song on my album – we had no title yet, and I was on my way home. I’d been in the studio with Quincy Jones every day for a whole month, recording the album. We thought we had the album… and then Quincy called me while I was getting ready to go in a taxi to the airport. “You can’t go!” he said.
“What do you mean I can’t go?” He said, “George, we’ve got one more song – Rod Temperton has written a new song.” I just said, “No, man! I haven’t seen my family. I’m going home!” Quincy went, “Just do this one song. It won’t take that long.”
So I said, “Look, Quincy! I will spend this day in the studio and then tomorrow, I’m outta here. Right?” He said “Yeah…” [Laughs] When I got to the studio, they had this highly unusual song, Give Me The Night, all finished and ready to go.
I had Lee Ritenour as my partner on guitar – he and I played in unison and got into a nice groove. Quincy finally convinced me to change my voice – he wanted some attitude – so I had to change from the normal way of singing nice to something with some character. And I ended up with that [George sings the words to me] “give me the night”.
George Benson, St David’s Hall, Cardiff, Sun 19 June. Tickets: £43-£71. Info: here
words CARL MARSH