A Conversation with Musician Dick Hyman
by Mark Feinman
Throughout a busy musical career that got underway in the early ‘50s, Dick Hyman has worked as pianist, organist, arranger, music director, and composer. His versatility in all of these areas has resulted in film scores, orchestral compositions, concert appearances and well over 100 albums recorded under his name.
He has served as composer/ arranger/ conductor/ pianist for the Woody Allen films Zelig, The Purple Rose of Cairo, Broadway Danny Rose, Stardust Memories, Hanna and Her Sisters, Radio Days, Bullets Over Broadway, Mighty Aphrodite, Everyone Says “I Love You”, Sweet and Lowdown, The Curse of the Jade Scorpion, and Melinda and Melinda. His encyclopedic Century of Jazz Piano, an extended history on 6 discs, has been released by Arbors Records.
Mr. Hyman has been a guest clinician and performer internationally, including appearances at the University of South Florida. In 2004, he received an honorary doctorate from the University of South Florida.
This interview took place at Mr. Hyman’s office home in Venice, Florida, which is beautifully decorated with a grand piano, wall-to-wall LPs, CDs and cassettes, memorable concert posters and two rooms with carefully organized sheet music in manila envelopes on shelves floor to wall.
__________
Mark Feinman: How long have you lived in Florida?
Dick Hyman: We became Floridians about seventeen years ago, and we gradually moved down a little over twenty years ago. We made some serous decisions are got rid of the stuff at our places up north, so we’ve been here ever since.
MF: Does living in Florida motivate or inspire your art?
DH: The ease of life here makes us feel calm and productive. There’s much to be said for the other point of view, that the tension of life in NY makes you become productive in a driven sort of way, and that’s true too, but after a while ease wins out. We like it here because it allows us to do long projects. I don’t exactly do three gigs a day like in NY. I do a lot of writing here at home and I go out and do gigs around the country from time to time and concerts here in Florida.
MF: Before composing, arranging or choosing music for a film, do you read a script or synopsis?
DH: There are a couple of procedures when writing music for film. The neatest way is to have a script that everybody has OK-ed, and you go though it with the director and decide where you’ll have music. That’s an obvious way, but there are other circumstances too. Many of the things I did with Woody [Allen] came at the other end of that process. What sort of band would play at this kinda of place or or circumstance? I was supplying information without regard to the entire film, without knowing the foundation of things. Woody has everything firmly in mind I suppose, but occasionally a bit secretive about what it was. Sometimes a composer works that way; you think about, suggest, or supply music for a given sort of scene with your presumed expertise, but you do not have the big picture for a while.
MF: In the movie Sweet & Lowdown, the music is completely integral to the film, because the film’s main character is a musician.
DH: I understood, but I didn’t have a script, but I knew what the film was about and who the character was. I don’t think Woody [Allen] always has a script at the beginning also. In Sweet & Lowdown, I knew the character worshiper of Django [Reinhardt], so I was asked specifically if we can find a guitarist who understands the Django tradition, but not a copycat. That was my friend Howard Alden.
MF: Is there a connection/collaboration between literature and music?
DH: I was thinking we ought to look at a couple of thing I’ve done like that. I’ve set Shakespeare songs, and I’ve set a bunch of light verse by a man named William Esby.
Mr. Hyman was neighbors with Mr. Esby and began composing music to his poems without him knowing at the time. Those compositions are still performed today.
MF: What would you say to a musician or writer who is looking to collaborate with one another?
DH: A collaboration is necessary if you’re going to write a song, unless you are one of those very gifted people who can do both music and lyrics, if you want to write songs, then you have to find somebody to write whatever it is that’s not your specialty. I suppose it might be easier today with the social network; you can get online and find all kinds of people who are interested in collaborating.
After the interview, Mr. Hyman took me to his favorite lunch restaurant, a small and cozy NY style place, where everyone knew his name and he knew everyone by name too. He ordered his usual and I ordered the same. As we drove back to his house, he stopped the car in the street, pointed at the palm trees and then to the sky and said, “Look how beautiful, this is why I live in Florida.”
This interview originally appeared in Volume 6.
He has served as composer/ arranger/ conductor/ pianist for the Woody Allen films Zelig, The Purple Rose of Cairo, Broadway Danny Rose, Stardust Memories, Hanna and Her Sisters, Radio Days, Bullets Over Broadway, Mighty Aphrodite, Everyone Says “I Love You”, Sweet and Lowdown, The Curse of the Jade Scorpion, and Melinda and Melinda. His encyclopedic Century of Jazz Piano, an extended history on 6 discs, has been released by Arbors Records.
Mr. Hyman has been a guest clinician and performer internationally, including appearances at the University of South Florida. In 2004, he received an honorary doctorate from the University of South Florida.
This interview took place at Mr. Hyman’s office home in Venice, Florida, which is beautifully decorated with a grand piano, wall-to-wall LPs, CDs and cassettes, memorable concert posters and two rooms with carefully organized sheet music in manila envelopes on shelves floor to wall.
__________
Mark Feinman: How long have you lived in Florida?
Dick Hyman: We became Floridians about seventeen years ago, and we gradually moved down a little over twenty years ago. We made some serous decisions are got rid of the stuff at our places up north, so we’ve been here ever since.
MF: Does living in Florida motivate or inspire your art?
DH: The ease of life here makes us feel calm and productive. There’s much to be said for the other point of view, that the tension of life in NY makes you become productive in a driven sort of way, and that’s true too, but after a while ease wins out. We like it here because it allows us to do long projects. I don’t exactly do three gigs a day like in NY. I do a lot of writing here at home and I go out and do gigs around the country from time to time and concerts here in Florida.
MF: Before composing, arranging or choosing music for a film, do you read a script or synopsis?
DH: There are a couple of procedures when writing music for film. The neatest way is to have a script that everybody has OK-ed, and you go though it with the director and decide where you’ll have music. That’s an obvious way, but there are other circumstances too. Many of the things I did with Woody [Allen] came at the other end of that process. What sort of band would play at this kinda of place or or circumstance? I was supplying information without regard to the entire film, without knowing the foundation of things. Woody has everything firmly in mind I suppose, but occasionally a bit secretive about what it was. Sometimes a composer works that way; you think about, suggest, or supply music for a given sort of scene with your presumed expertise, but you do not have the big picture for a while.
MF: In the movie Sweet & Lowdown, the music is completely integral to the film, because the film’s main character is a musician.
DH: I understood, but I didn’t have a script, but I knew what the film was about and who the character was. I don’t think Woody [Allen] always has a script at the beginning also. In Sweet & Lowdown, I knew the character worshiper of Django [Reinhardt], so I was asked specifically if we can find a guitarist who understands the Django tradition, but not a copycat. That was my friend Howard Alden.
MF: Is there a connection/collaboration between literature and music?
DH: I was thinking we ought to look at a couple of thing I’ve done like that. I’ve set Shakespeare songs, and I’ve set a bunch of light verse by a man named William Esby.
Mr. Hyman was neighbors with Mr. Esby and began composing music to his poems without him knowing at the time. Those compositions are still performed today.
MF: What would you say to a musician or writer who is looking to collaborate with one another?
DH: A collaboration is necessary if you’re going to write a song, unless you are one of those very gifted people who can do both music and lyrics, if you want to write songs, then you have to find somebody to write whatever it is that’s not your specialty. I suppose it might be easier today with the social network; you can get online and find all kinds of people who are interested in collaborating.
After the interview, Mr. Hyman took me to his favorite lunch restaurant, a small and cozy NY style place, where everyone knew his name and he knew everyone by name too. He ordered his usual and I ordered the same. As we drove back to his house, he stopped the car in the street, pointed at the palm trees and then to the sky and said, “Look how beautiful, this is why I live in Florida.”
This interview originally appeared in Volume 6.
