By Eric Alper.
Multi-platinum/gold selling and award-winning artist Jesse Cook wants to “Say Something” this year with the release of his new single — available now!
“It’s not often a song stops you in your tracks and demands your attention,” the internationally acclaimed guitarist, composer and producer shares, “but A Great Big World’s ‘Say Something’ did that for me.
“The first time I heard it, I think I cried,” Cook continues. “The lyrics were so raw and deeply personal... We’ve all been there, having to walk away from someone you love; its emotional honesty is what makes it so universal.”
Fans of both will recognize the song’s timeless arresting and enveloping effect artfully woven within Cook’s own brand of musical magic.
“I’ve never thought of myself as a singer,” he confesses. “Back when I was a guitar student, I used to practice 10 hours a day but, as for my singing, I never did any kind of training.
“I felt I wasn’t qualified.”
That was until one day, Cook realized that most of his favourite singers were also without formal training in that realm. “It comes down to three chords and the truth,” he says. “So I gave myself permission to try...”
Now... Just imagine the loss to the Canadian — if not global — music landscape if he hadn’t!
Jesse Cook holds ten gold and platinum studio albums with combined sales exceeding two million copies, five concert DVDs and live discs, five PBS specials, multiple awards including a JUNO win, 11 nominations, three Canadian Smooth Jazz Awards, a Gemini Award, and an Acoustic Guitar Magazine Player’s Choice Silver Award — plus thousands of concerts around the world over and above millions of views and streams across platforms.
This past year he celebrated the 25th anniversary of his breakthrough album, Tempest.
No stranger to the touring scene, Cook was initially set to mark the occasion with a 25-date cross-country concert special when the country shut down for COVID-19. The unforeseen delay inspired the Toronto-based artist to pivot; he rescheduled the dates for Fall 2021 and released a new version of “Tempest”— “Tempest 25”— the creation of which also served as an experiment of sorts along the way.
“The recording started as a simple idea,” he explains. “I’d use this pandemic time to record a new version of ‘Tempest’ and see if it would sound different.
“Have I changed as a musician, or as a producer?”
In the continued spirit of creative re-craftsmanship, Cook also re-released his 1997 hit “Wednesday Night at Etric’s” before this, his spin on A Great Big World’s 2013 sensation.
“As a composer, I’ve always felt honoured when other musicians would cover my music,” Cook considers. “The greatest compliment a musician can make to another artist is to perform their work.
“I hope it is in that light that A Great Big World will receive my humble interpretation.”
Ten platinum and gold studio albums. Five concert DVDs and live discs. Five PBS specials. One Juno Award. Eleven nominations. One Gemini Award. Three Canadian Smooth Jazz Awards. One Acoustic Guitar Magazine Player's Choice Silver Award. A wall full of similar accolades. Thousands of concerts indozens of countries. Millions of YouTube views and audio streams. Countless fans around the globe. And a career that is celebrating its 25th year and
counting.
Not a bad legacy for a guy who never planned to release an album.
"If you had asked me at age 22, I would have said that I would never, never make music for the public," Jesse Cook says with a laugh. "I would have told you that the public is much too fickle — they may love you one minute and forget you the next. Well, it turns out I did the thing I said I'd never do, and somehow it's worked out."
That's an understatement. Since launching his career with 1995's Tempest, Cook has blazed an incredible trail. Along with being a global-guitar virtuoso, he's honed his skills as a composer, producer, arranger, performer and, more recently, filmmaker and cultural ambassador. More incredibly, he started down many of those paths before he started school. Born in Paris to photographer John Cook and TV producer-director Heather Cook, young Jesse also lived in Barcelona, where he picked up an interest in flamenco as a toddler. At six, after his parents divorced and he moved to Toronto with his mother, the prodigy attended the prestigious Eli Kassner Guitar Academy. During summers with his father in Arles, he soaked up more flamenco from neighbour Nicolas Reyes, leader of the world-renowned Gipsy Kings. Despite this, Cook originally and surprisingly planned to attend art school, until a girlfriend set him straight: "She said, 'Your music is really good; your art, not so much.' So I changed tracks. I'm so glad I did."
After attending the Royal Conservatory, York University and Berklee College, a comfortable career as a composer seemed in the cards — until an Ontario cable TV company aired his music on the listings channel. "Their switchboard got flooded with calls," he recalls. "People even got my number somehow and started phoning me at home and asking for a CD. And I was saying, 'I don't have a CD, I'm a background composer guy. I don't make records.' "
He soon changed that tune: Seeing opportunity, Cook self-produced Tempest at home using an eight-track recorder and one microphone. Then he delivered the initial run of 1,000 CDs from the plant to the distributor in his car. Those humble beginnings quickly sparked a mighty international career. "It's been crazy," the 54-year-old says. "And it's a different story in every part of the world." In Canada, opportune spots on Canada AM and Peter Gzowski's Morningside started the ball rolling. In the U.S., it was a breakthrough gig at the Catalina Jazz Festival, where his playing earned a 10-minute standing ovation, sparked mob scenes — "It was like being The Beatles," he marvels — and prompted one store to order enough copies of Tempest to land it at No.14 in Billboard. In Poland, his 2004 live album Montreal took the country by storm. In India, he gained fame after one of his songs was plagiarized for a major Bollywood movie. ("In India, that's allowed," he explains. "They call it cultural appropriation — it obviously doesn't mean the same thing there.") In Iraq, his instrumentals score the nightly news. Elsewhere, they've accompanied gymnastics and skating routines at the Olympics. "In
Nagano, the Japanese skater and the Russian skater both competed using the same song. One of them won. I think I should have got bronze," he jokes.
So no wonder Cook also quips that his music "has had a way more interesting life" than he's had. But lately, that international appeal — reflected in a compositional style that mixes flamenco with everything from classical and jazz to Zydeco, blues and Brazilian samba — has become something he takes more seriously. "I've just always made the music that I love. But in recent years, it has started to feel like there's a political statement to be made. The music that makes up what I do comes from places some politicians rail against: Latin music and Mexican music and Arab music and all these things. There's a lot of fear-mongering out there, with people trying to separate us. But if music can come from around the world and interconnect so beautifully to create this beautiful tapestry, maybe there's something that
music can teach us."
And as Cook embarks on the next 25 years of his unexpected career — "I feel like I'm just getting started," he says — he is still learning and growing, still chasing dreams and goals. He's eager to discover the next stage in his musical evolution. He's eyeing a switch from albums to singles with videos. He wants to play Carnegie Hall. Mostly, he wants to keep travelling the globe, bringing people together with his art and message of unity.
Not a bad legacy at all.
Website: www.jessecook.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/JesseCookHQ
Instagram: www.instagram.com/musicianjessecook
