By Thierry De Clemensat
Bayou Blue Radio/ Paris-Move/ABS magazine
Mark Turner – Interview
It happened almost like fate: within twenty-four hours, I received two albums that seemed destined to be in conversation with each other. The first was Creole Renaissance by Aruán Ortiz (read here https://www.paris-move.com/reviews/aruan-ortiz-creole-renaissance-piano-solo-fr-review/) , a recording that immediately pulled me deep into my own reflections on history and identity. Shortly after, Mark Turner’s new album landed on my desk, a work rooted in James Weldon Johnson’s The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man. The juxtaposition was uncanny. One project explored history through music; the other confronted it through literature translated into sound. Turner, a saxophonist often described as one of the intellectual heavyweights of contemporary jazz, seemed the ideal interlocutor for such a conversation.
TDC: Mark, thank you so much for taking the time to do this interview.
Let’s start with the obvious question: what led you to build an entire album around Johnson’s The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man?
Mark Turner Well, firstly I would say that I built this music around a novel because initially I was looking for more points of departure/creative catalysts for writing music. I wanted more direct cultural, emotional, spiritual, and narrative input so that I could arrive at a greater understanding of the directional connection between these and the craft of music making. For the first try at this, I intuitively picked a book that was short with a clear story line and high cultural and emotional significance for myself. Secondly, the subject matter has direct significance to my family history. My mother can pass as well as two of my great great aunts. They chose the path of the protagonist in the book as my mother did not.
The difference in their decisions, my aunts and my mother’s, speaks volumes about race, ethnicity, religious/cultural beliefs etc and more importantly the human condition. I found that intriguing at least in the context of this book. In effect, how do people react/live with societal pressure? How do people react/live who are giving that pressure? The catalyst here is race but we all know this is not the only one.
TDC: You don’t simply allude to the book, you read excerpts on the album. How did you decide which passages to include?
Mark Turner: A word about that. Initially I was not going to read at all. As mentioned above this novel was merely a catalyst for writing. Over time it felt like reading a bit from the book would enhance the communicative value of the music. I decided to do it just before we first performed this music at the Village Vanguard back in 2018. Anyway, I chose excerpts that I felt were strong, thought provoking, and had something to do with the overall arc and themes of the book. In particular those of personal interest to myself. Sadly I could not include all of the themes. I had to keep the number in relative balance with the number of songs so in effect not too many, a little over half. A little like a golden mean proportion. Also I didn’t want the excerpts to overwhelm the music as they are only an enhancement.
TDC: Jazz has often been described as the music of emancipation. Do you see your project as continuing that legacy?
Mark Turner: I’m not exactly sure what you mean here. But I will say that this and any project that I do is a continuation of something larger than myself. Countless individuals ( ancestors and others ) have lived, worked, loved and died so that I and others can have the opportunities that we currently enjoy. And yes, since I am of Afro American descent I would like to think that this project, although more explicit, is a continuation of that legacy.
TDC: Johnson’s novel is more than a century old. Do you feel its themes, passing, identity, the negotiation of race, still resonate today?
Mark Turner: Yes. Everywhere on the planet. That said, I do not believe that these are or should be the sole drivers of meaning, culture, politics, etc…but they are here so we must deal with them, messy as they are.
TDC: The music on this record feels contemplative, almost austere, yet charged with tension. How did you approach the writing process?
Mark Turner: I first took the number chapters which are eleven, and sort of mapped out a general form of eleven songs for the whole record. Meaning balancing proportions of “weight”, high and low points, short and long, dense and open, bright and dark, tempos, keys etc. I ended up writing ten songs for compositional reasons although one of the pieces sort of counts as two. During this process I tried to write in each song, the “essence” of each of the themes/chapters in the book. Here I just relied on feeling and intuition but this is where narrative can be very helpful in writing music without words. As one ( music ) is quite abstract and the other ( prose) is a bit more concrete/tangible ( verbal language, characters, places, things, sensations etc). This helps to channel and direct one’s feelings, impressions, etc… making the writing process a much clearer transmission into melody, harmony, and rhythm.
TDC: You’ve been called one of the most cerebral saxophonists of your generation. Do you accept that label?
Mark Turner: That could be a description, compliment or a smear. Do I accept it? Maybe, as I do think a lot about the craft of music and the implementation of aesthetics. How to do these, embody them, live them. How to take what is inside ( emotional, psycho/spiritual, intuitional, cultural, identity, etc) and transmute it outside through musical craft ( rhythm, melody, harmony, form, instrumental technique or ability) and aesthetics.
TDC: Did you worry about how audiences would react to the blending of spoken text and music
Mark Turner: Not so much. Since the majority of music that most of us hear is with words in some form or another. I thought it might be somehow more familiar.
TDC: How do you see this project fitting into your larger artistic journey?
Mark Turner: Maybe a continuation of what I have been doing all along. The musical elements are all developments and additions to what I have done before. I play the long game. Just step by step.
TDC: Beyond music, how has literature shaped you as an artist?
Mark Turner: It’s helpful to see how another artist develops their craft and aesthetic in another medium. All mediums have limitations which is what makes them tantalizing and sort of forces creativity. At least for those who are interested in that. You get a different view point on things like tension and release, form, rhythm, color, line, narrative, pacing, technique, language, etc.
TDC: What do you hope listeners will carry with them after hearing this album?
Mark Turner: I have no wishes in terms of what they carry, just that maybe they will feel, know, understand something that they didn’t before. Like going to the Cinema, Theater, or Opera, as one person and coming out as someone else. I believe in the transformative ( for positive ends ) on a variety of levels.
Le nouveau CD de Mark Turner “The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man” paraitra, le 10 octobre 2025
Mark Turner’s new CD, “The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man,” will be released on October 10, 2025.