Dave Koz

His high school wasn’t integrated until his senior year, and even then, there was only one Black student in his graduating class.

It wasn’t until James attended the University of Michigan that his interest in jazz became the driving force behind his career.

“Some of my early interest in jazz was rebellion against my mother, who wanted me to practice too much,” James recalled. “There was too much discipline in the classical world. But also, I was falling in love with the sound of jazz and the feeling of it. I began to realize I could play on a level where the jazz musicians I was encountering were taking me seriously.”

One of those musicians is fellow Michigander and bassist Ron Brooks.

“It wasn’t an accident that I mentioned him first,” James said. “Ron was quite important to me— he’s playing bass on my first album, Bold Conceptions. Brooks lived in Ann Arbor when I was in college. He was the b assist in my first trio, and he was very much a part of the beginning of my career.”

James, Brooks and drummer Bob Pozar competed as a trio and won “Finest Jazz Group of 1962” at the prestigious Notre Dame Collegiate Jazz Festival. The judges included Henry Mancini and Quincy Jones, who helped James get a recording contract.

“Talk about lucky timing,” James said. “We basically went down there as a goof. We were playing avantgarde jazz at that time. We had no expectation we would win, but Quincy loved it.”

James became music director and accompanist for vocalist Sarah Vaughan from 1964-68, a time when he witnessed the best and worst of the American civil rights movement.

“I guess the first shocking experience was when I was working with Sarah Vaughan,” James recalled. “I was treated more easily than she was, even with her fame.”

Vaughan and the Bob James Trio experienced the best of times when they received an invitation to perform at the White House in 1964, the year that President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act into law.

James made another spontaneous decision at the event, one that remains a lasting memory.

“We performed in the East Room, and we were able to go to a formal dinner afterward,” James said. “The Royal Air Force Band was playing. We saw Johnson come walking toward us, and he asked Sarah to dance, which was a huge deal for her. I looked over and thought this is my big opportunity. I went over and asked Lady Bird to dance. I’ll never forget it. “

Throughout his career, James has accepted encouragement and inspiration from many Black artists, and last month, he felt compelled to let the world know how jazz, an original American art form created by Black lives, made him feel.

“They let me in when there was a lot of potential for reverse prejudice towards white musicians going into a Black art form,” James explained. “I felt that there was a different kind of purity in Black culture. They let me in because of the music. They let me in because I played from my heart. They heard it, felt it, and they weren’t going to just shut me out because I was white.”

And, James is showing his immense respect for and support of them now.

For more information on James, visit www.bobjames.com.

By Marcia Manna WHEN THE NATION WITNESSED THE MURDER

OF GEORGE FLOYD and

responded to the Black Lives Matter movement, Grammy-nominated saxophonist Dave Koz thought about the impact of racism, and how he might be an instrument of change.

“This is a time when we need to re-examine how we feel about this subject,” Koz said during a recent phone interview from his Los Angeles-area home. “I thought I had a good sense of this, but I needed to break it down completely—start from scratch and think about how

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Photo: Peter Morey

Dave Koz with Nelson Mandela, South Africa’s first Black president

I feel about the disadvantage Blacks have had to go through for years.”

As a child, Koz learned to embrace diversity. He and his brother and sister grew up in a Jewish family, and his parents, who had a zest for international travel, encouraged their children to explore different cultures.

“We grew up with curiosity as opposed to fear,” Koz said. “That one thing made all the difference in the world for us as adults. We have a genuine interest in how other people live. I’m grateful to my parents for that.”

Throughout his career, Koz has collaborated with Black artists. He was a frequent guest on “The Arsenio Hall Show,” a session player for Natalie Cole, and his Christmas tours have included artists such as singer Oleta Adams and guitarist Jonathan Butler. He has helped to promote many Black instrumentalists on his radio shows, the nationally syndicated “The Dave Koz Radio Show” and his weekly “The Dave Koz Lounge” each Sunday on SiriusXM satellite radio. And, he has felt great pride performing for the Black heroes in his life, namely Nelson Mandela and President Barack Obama.

“I got the chance to meet Nelson Mandela in South Africa on the occasion of his 92nd birthday,” Koz enthused. “I was there for the Cape Town International Jazz Festival with Jonathan Butler and BeBe Winans. We were all invited to his birthday luncheon. I remember being ushered into the room where he was and getting to have a moment with him, and I remember the feeling of shaking his hand. There was an energy rushing through my system, almost like coming into contact with a higher being. How could he remain so pure and be such a happy man given what he had to endure? That’s about as good as it gets.”

It got even better for Koz when, in 2015, he was officially invited to perform for Obama at the U.N. General Assembly in New York City.

“That was special,” Koz said. “I felt strongly about his ascension to the highest office in the land and the significance of it. He was very complimentary—he knew me and my music from WNUA, a radio station in Chicago he used to listen to. He was a fan of smooth jazz.”

Despite the progress America has made, Koz wanted to examine civil rights issues beyond his personal experiences. After a lot of deliberation about how it might affect his career, Koz revealed that he was gay more than a decade ago.

“Prejudice has been around for generations, but this situation is different,” Koz explained. “People don’t know you are gay by looking at you. This is an opportunity to look inside and re-examine our experiences and understand that we have had an upper hand. We have the benefit of white privilege.” Koz was inspired by the Share the Mic Now Campaign, an event initiated last month in which white female celebrities handed over their social media platforms to Black women to expand the reach of Black voices.

Koz contacted sax player Marcus Anderson and invited him to share his experience as a Black man in America with Koz’s nearly 200,000 Facebook followers.

“Marcus is a young father, 35 years old, with so much to say,” Koz said. “I called him and asked, ‘What do you think of this idea?’ He’s like, ‘Are you kidding me, you trust me like that?’ He posted for 24 hours, and, at the end of the day, I think my fans are his fans. It was a chance for us to all learn.”

For more than a dozen years, Koz has hosted the Dave Koz & Friends at Sea full-ship charter, where there