The last time I saw Ned Goold, he was playing to a packed house in a high profile club in New York with the Harry Connick Jr. quartet. The group was playing opposite the Branford Marsalis quartet, who, 20 years earlier, was touring the world and gracing the cover of Downbeat while Ned was delivering packages and losing his meager salary in a Grand Central area game of three card monty. What sequence of events could have brought about such a quantum leap?
Well, it's a long story. Charles Edward Goold was born in Hammond, Ind. (suburb of Chicago) in 1959. At the age of five his father's career brought the family to Venezuela where they stayed for three years. This was a unique environment for an American boy. Even at this early age Ned showed an affinity for music. His mother still has old home movies (silent) of Ned playing guitar with local musicians on the street. The next stop for the Goolds came when Ned was eight. They moved to the outskirts of Pittsburgh. This was the year that he first started taking music lessons. Ned's mother arranged for lessons on the recorder (don't ask me why). His teacher said that he had the best ear of all of her students. From the recorder he switched to the flute. When it came time to join the sixth grade band, there were about fifty floutists (all girls), and two saxophonists. To retain his macho image, Ned quickly took up the alto saxophone. He developed rapidly and was by eighth grade, the best musician in the school. There was a tape (now lost) of Ned playing on a local talent show and even receiving kudos from the host: "wowie, zowie, a groovy baritone saxophone solo from Ned Gold (sic)". When Ned got home and heard the tape, he buried his head in his pillow in mortification.
In his first year of high school, Ned was primed to take over the Jazz band. He told me, "if I had the amoral ambition that I had in eighth grade now, I'd be a lot more successful." With the slings and arrows of puberty, being an extremely late bloomer, he gradually mellowed. Music became his whole life and he gradually started hearing more Jazz music on record. After he graduated, Ned enrolled in the University of Pittsburgh. That didn't last long. After three months he quit, "I have to do things on my own schedule". In Pittsburgh, in these late teenage years, Goold began what would be his routine for the next twenty years.
Over the years, Ned would always have one or two major projects that he would put most of his time and effort into. At this time, his fascination was with the music of John Coltrane (later to be relegated to a much lower status). This went on for years along with forays into other sixties music, avant-garde, rock, etc. Eventually he realized the value of origins. This led to indepth study of the music of Bird, Pres, Hawk, Bix, Bach, Kern, Rogers, etc. But that was only a part of his work. "Any ambitious jazz musician dreams of being an innovator". This is why Goold was so interested in avant-garde Jazz and Rock music, being the latest developements. But, studies of earlier musics led Goold to a deeper realization. He developed a great respect for the Jazz of what has been called the golden era, meaning the '20's through the '40's, roughly. "My goal is to retain the complexity and essence of Bebop within my own system of harmony." The steps that led to what he is now able to do are too many for my lazy-ass to deliniate here. Suffice it to say that it is fairly well documented on his available and soon to be released recordings.
In 1983, after many tortuous years of dreaming, Ned finally eliminated future irrevocable regrets by moving to New York. He moved into an apartment in Brooklyn whose lease was held by fellow former Pittsburgher, Jeff Watts, who was now running things, thanks to his big-time status as the drummer for the wildy popular Wynton Marsalis. Ned got his first taste of racial prejudice on the rebound, being the onliest ofay on the premises filled with hostile negroes (at least that's how it appeared to one bred in the whitest of white suburbs). This did little to allay the feeling which at one time or another is felt by most white Jazz musicians, namely that they are incapable by nature of playing Jazz music. Nevertheless, he labored on. He eventually moved in with people on a much lower level of soul status; white Canadiens.
Around this time Ned got his first semi-break when he was hired to play with the great Jack McDuff. This lasted only two months, as he completely shrivelled under the pressure of trying to please McDuff, with whom he was fundamentally incompatible, "that cool shit has its place...this ain't it." After months of struggle which included a stint at the United Cerebral Palsy center of New York, he started what was to be a three and a half year odyssey with Haitian super group, Tabou Combo. With Tabou he traveled to Haiti and all the french speaking islands in the Caribbean, as well as Paris and other french towns. Once again my sloth prevents me from telling the of the endless hours of mindless torture that are the inevitable result of such a gig (which is not to say that they weren't a great band). The upside was that most of the time he had all week to practice and develop his system; and the best result of his time with Tabou was that, on a gig, he met his beautiful future wife, Margarette. It wasn't until his first son, Charles, was a year old, and his wife pregnant with a second, Albert (the master of this site), that Goold got the call from Harry Connick Jr. with whom he has worked to this day. This gig has allowed Ned all the time he needs for his own developement, as well as being a valuable experience working with someone who is a master of harmony.
As can be seen in the discography, Ned made many records with Harry since 1991. On almost every CD there is feature for Ned's tenor. On 1997's "To See You", Ned is featured on every track with a symphony orchestra. "Other Hours", a quartet CD from 2003 is Ned's greatest exposure to date on a high profile Harry record. Although his own records aren't huge sellors, they are the clearest (though far from perfect) statement of his artistic goals. The new CD, "The Flows", which was taken from a tour the Ned Goold Trio did, opening up for the Harry Connick Jr. Big Band, is probably his best to date. His fourth, "Thanks Ira", is to be released in the near future. His most recent accomplishment is the winning of a grant from Chamber Music America for which he wrote his most advanced composition, "Variations on a Theme By Irving Berlin".
So, although he hasn't yet established his own group (which now includes his son on drums) on the world stage, Gooooooooold is hoping that a groundswell of enormous proportions will cast his trio/quartet into the stratosphere of regular work.