City Paper
Walk the Walk
music
issue
April
13&endash;20, 2000
Father John D'Amico's music for his son.
by Noel Weyric
Jazz pianist "Father John"
D'Amico says he plays his own
compositions because "music
should reflect, to some extent,
what is going on in your life,
the events that surround your
life, impact your life."
Given the theme of the John D'Amico
Trio's new CD, it's surprising D'Amico hasn't switched to
the blues. The liner notes of Darius Walk (Dreambox)
describe the 10-tune collection as a tribute to his
first-born son, Darius, who is currently serving a 10-year
sentence for bank robbery. From the cheery title number,
inspired by the boy's first steps decades ago, to the somber
"Silhouette of a Lonely Man," ("Our son's separation from
his family and friends"),D'Amico's trio charges through a
song-cycle of hope, love and tragedy in a strong, melodic
and warmhearted mainstream jazz idiom that has long been
Father John's signature style.
The collection's tunes, he says,
"express the ups and downs of life, and of finding your
place in the world." Only "Darius Walk" was composed
expressly for his son, but with the other pieces, he says,
"I could see parallels in my own life with what he had to go
through being convicted of armed robbery, the trials and
tribulations. It was a metaphor that aptly fit what I felt
life was about."
In 1996 Darius D'Amico was convicted
along with three other young men of robbing a Southwest
Philadelphia Mellon Bank branch. It was the second trial for
the young man (the first ended in a hung jury) and Darius
Walk's liner notes make clear how Father John feels about
the case: "This CD calls attention to the controversial and
questionable techniques employed by [a justice
system] founded on the concept of 'Justice for All', but
perverted to 'Justice for those who can afford an expensive
private attorney.'"
Father John D'Amico truly was once a
Father John. A graduate of St. Charles Seminary in
Wynnewood, D'Amico was a parish priest in Puerto Rico and
Kennett Square, Chester County, before leaving the
priesthood and starting a family. Nine years in the seminary
and the priesthood had left little time for his music,
though, and when he returned to the jazz scene in the late
'60s, he had some adjusting to do. "The '50s bebop era was
over, and that was pretty much where I cut my teeth, in that
era," he recalls. "There were definitely changes, there were
things I was doing that were no longer considered sacrosanct
for a jazz pianist."
D'Amico explains that in the '50s,
jazz pianists like Bud Powell and Oscar Peterson put
themselves in the forefront of their groups. But by the late
'60s, bass and drum players had started asserting
themselves. "You had to learn to play within that context,"
he says.
The trio is rounded out by Kenny Davis
on on bass and Butch Reed on drums. As with their previous
CD, Street Blues, all the compositions on Darius Walk are
D'Amico's own. "On one side," he notes, "it takes guts to do
your own work, because it has to stand up against the work
of other jazz artists like Bill Evans, Miles Davis or Dave
Brubeck. At the same time you can also feel more comfortable
in terms of what you're trying to say within your own
compositions. An artist is creating out of the impact of
people and events that occur in his life, in his
lifetime."
Now in his 60th year, D'Amico has
released another new CD with the playfully suggestive title,
Father John and His Ladies, featuring the trio playing
behind local singers Zan Gardner, Ella Csircsu and Miss
Justine. When he's not at his day job as a probation officer
with Philadelphia Family Court, Father John has been playing
three nights a week at the William Penn Inn in Gwynedd for
the past nine years. The trio shows up Friday nights, while
D'Amico solos on Thursdays and Saturdays.
The critics, he says, have always been
appreciative of a style that doesn't seek innovation for
novelty's sake. Wrote one some years ago, " 'Pianist D'Amico
is what one wishes Brubeck would get back to: pure, sheer
pleasure.' "
His compositions, he says, "aren't
trying to make any statements except that I'm a jazz artist
and this is how I express the art. I'm not trying to say
this is what's happening now, in terms of this is the
direction it's all moving in. That's not important to me
now. That can be judged in another time, I guess."