this everybody welcome to another episode of talking jazz and we just heard some jazz from and i'm so happy to have my guest on the show today we had musician  incredible like to be able to do both things at the same time rate well let's put it this way took me some work so tell our audience what was what were you doing there you had the harmonic obviously but what what type of harmonica is ok this is well obviously a chromatic harmonica but it is a hands free chromatic harmonicas so this guy that i met during a harmonica convention in dallas texas about an unknown in twelve thirteen years ago at some point showed me this device fifty years to build a hands free chromatic or mind wow you have to understand that everybody else who had fooled around with this green clothing myself had come to the same conclusion the foot pedal that would control this guy on the internet who became my personal friend subsequently nickleby but these that's who had built this guitar called d b guitar of himself you know which has four guitar strings and two bass strings any he did it for you know i just wanted to listen to to be able to play certain things in a certain way so he built it for himself so you've got to have like the bass lines you can have a little it's built in then you can have the more melodic things i saw so that makes me three men some point and i realized that this was going to be my like my trademark yeah and i really kept doing it we have one of the things i love to do about the show is i like to tell my viewers you know my guest coming on the show like what is the backgrounds like where you're beginning what was the that fire in the belly that got you into jazz and want to make jazz your life so what tell us where you're from and it's very simple i was born and raised in italy and i started studying classical guitar and i went all the way and i did my my degree taught concertizing and then at some point you know relatively late in life well when i say late i just mean that sometimes the some people start their careers when they're fourteen years old you know i was already my late twenty's when i discovered the harmonica and jazz music ok you know of course i would listen to jazz you know very often but i had never played it until i discovered the harmonica and there was album and that that did it for you see i you know i love stories like that because for me i found dave brubeck when i was fourteen so i listened i found that old forty five would take five and two rondo on a radio and those those were the things that that's a record that was the one that was all legendary chord so that speaks to you know so that and it speaks to so that piano and that rhythm spoke to me so the harmonica and that spoke to you so i find that interesting that what's the shift where did you say well you know what that's what i want that's what i've been looking for that's what i had you always played had your eyes played like music your whole life or well i mean i started relatively late i mean even just fooling around the with a guitar you know i picked up a guitar when i was fifteen years old for the first time and the first song that i that i learned had only three chords and i kept going in that direction for a few years and until i decided that i wanted to be a little bit more serious little more adventurous even though you know i wasn't thinking of becoming a professional musician but you notice that the learning my chords and stuff and then i went to the conservatory of music and i studied classical guitar and that was it but the you know jazz at that point was still very far from from i thought well i loved it and i loved jazz people that i considered much more pleasant to be with you had classical music that we were just talking about that like i've met some of the greatest people that you're going to meet are the people not only the musicians but the audience that comes to listen to jazz is some of the greatest people that you want to have in your life because they get it you know there are like minded people ther we're searching we're always searching for something you know as an improviser myself as a pianist i'm that that improvisation is always different every night and we're always going for something different you know and that's it's like you're going into your laboratory right you're making on t v there was somebody a very things a ranger who heard one of my recordings and he hired me you know to understand a big then i'm talking about the early eighty's that was literally no  the only one was really to the right right was not even american you know belgian bells and i think so anyway you know there was only one guy who would play every once in a while and pop records but you know just a few things and so i decided that i wanted to learn by myself and that's that was the only way that i could do it because nobody could teach them so i started listening to t and then you make your you manage your own style then yes and then i learned that this great job of this arranger hired me and i had a contract on a national t v for over for a whole year and i was playing in the orchestra  trying to take advantage of this opportunity what did i do i left everything and i came to this country because i wanted to take out the big apple and see what i have to do then to head as world and that's what happened that if you have family here did you have  family over in italy where you had a family in italy yeah obviously of enigma yes of course that all my family was in it but i i like many tens i did not have any relatives in this country so you just came over here and you took that now talk about you know we take risks in music we take risks as improvisers that's a huge risk right here to your coming to a country and you have this this dream this you know you've got this fire in the belly for the music so what did you first do when you get when you came here did you obviously go to new york yes i started going to gen sessions you know and i met a lot of people and you know i mean i was very adventurous maybe i mean i did things the right now if i think back when they were really at that as they were inspiring this gentleman here and that's why you know so at that point you know i mean at some point i ended up doing a record with them with was my first one with him with the with marc with fred and with them this but on drums you  and you know we're in rico also owns trump is jazz club up in new york and they were just named one of the top one hundred jazz clubs in the world from downbeat magazine that's right and i am my jazz quartet will have the pleasure playing there on may twenty sixth and has you've hosted a who's who of international national jazz musicians so a houston person benny golson us the only jordan a number of times all and you've got such a great and it's a great atmosphere it's a  real club and it's a great listening experience so we're looking forward to it we try to keep people quiet you know they are all right is that we know that's a that's a good thing so tell us now what are you what are you going to be playing next and he's already booking another gig here all right so that's got to tell our audience that's so that's a chromatic harmonica but hands free and i don't know if you can get a close up on there choking off what the there's a little bit of a slider right there is like  and that's what ok so basically it is a movable mouthpiece so instead of pressing the slide in order to go to the you know half of step above you know i push the mouthpiece down with my  little bit of about what's going on up the trumpets now what's helped how long have you been there now and tell us about you know your other endeavors that well and they're the this is a very interesting story i mean trumpets was just one of the places where i used to perform back i mean i must say very honestly there was never one of my ambitions it was my wife's idea you know we're always here so the place was was closed for about three and a half years and i guess you know my wife's decided she said you know instead of having a starving musician as a husband let's give them a job which you weren't going to get into her mean thankfully in my opinion and through my experience actually more difficult than the as well as a lot i'm sure it's a lie i mean just a it's got to be like a twenty four seven business anything restaurant wise and when you're dealing with hospitality in the public season but when you have the music on top of it it's even worse way to the greats like running a restaurant than a theater at the same time exactly but at the end at the same time though you by doing that you're making a lot of people happy which is which is a good thing because trumpets is really one of the top clubs out there so you've been written up and down be you've been in a lot of the jazz magazines and a lot of people know that nationally and internationally know your club so  and that's a good thing and i know it's and that's part of what we do and you want to leave a legacy that's what you're doing and i said hard work to do and i must say the directly or indirectly because of the club you know i also got some some that's so your how many years now eighteen eighteen years but the place has been there for about thirty ok thirty something and your local just sort of listeners know you're located where and we'll be putting this down on the screen number six again everybody enrico gratified thank you so much for joining me and thank you so much ladies gentlemen for turning into another episode of talking jazz and join us again because we've got a lot of really great guests coming on each week so thank you so much