Harry Connick Jr.

try to deny it. For over thirty five years, his chart topping musical explorations of helped popularize jazz titans many from his beloved hometown of New Orleans, and introduced the Great American Songbook to a whole new generation. After decades of dazzling millions with his skills on the keys, he's here to let fans in on the fun of playing piano,

play being the operative word. On March twenty nine, he's launching Piano Party, an online course designed to teach the basics of piano through lessons he's learned over the course of his legendary career. Consisting of nine on demand videos plus two interactive live session the Piano Party courses are meant for all ages and skill levels, so please don't be intimidated by all the Grammys, all are welcome. The only requirement is that you want to learn and you

want to have a good time. So if you've been thinking about taking up the piano, now as your chance to learn from one of the best. It's never too late. Give it a shot. The Piano Party project is part of his new metaverse platform he calls the Neutral Ground. It's an online community designed to connect his fans and sharing his passion for music, food, and family. We talked about that, a little bit of New Orleans jazz, his songwriting techniques, and his latest album, Alone with My Faith,

recorded completely solo during the Pandemic Lockdown. I'm so happy to welcome Mr Harry Connick Jr. I hope you enjoy our conversation. When I was first getting into music, I really wanted to play jazz piano so badly. I mean the Coal Porters stuff, Rogerson Heart, the Gershwins, and I can play chords, mess around a little bit, but but nothing flashy. And I'm so happy to talk to you today because I feel like there's this conception out there,

a misconception. I should say that if you don't start training for this when you're four or five years old, like you and Mozart, it's too late for you. You're never gonna wait a hold on a second, there's a profound flaw in your conversation with me that we need to address. You can't just lump me in with Mozart right off the bat. I mean seriously, man, it's like talk about high expectations. Well, you both started as what like age four age five only similarity. But I really

appreciate that. Well, I mean it's something I feel like a lot of people think that they don't start really really early. It's too late for them. They're never gonna get it, so why bother. And that's what I think is so cool about this Piano Party project because it really it's so inclusive and it's so for everybody. So you're here to tell me that is a that misconception. Really, uh,

we should all put that aside. Yeah, it's really true. Um. I think that we all have some type of an eight musical talent, and I think it's different for everyone. I mean, some people say I can never play because I'm toned up, or I can never play because I can't you know, make my hands work together at the same time, or whatever the reasons that they think they can't play. Yet at the same time, I think we're

all moved to um to music in some way. It's almost like I would love to be a football player, and I don't have the natural ability to ever be a football player, and I'm too old to ever have those dreams come true. But I like throwing a ball

around and that's really fun. So you know, the whole idea behind Piano Party was, let's just find some some easier ways to get this information to people that's not quite as um intimidating, and and maybe try to try to convey some things that like I never thought about this, like when I look when I look at a piano keyboard, I don't I don't see a D eight key. I see these twelve keys that repeat, and that's so basic and I don't think about it anymore. But a lot

of people say, oh, there's so many keys. So the very first episode is there's really only twelve and they repeat, and if you can just kind of learn those twelve, which takes about thirty seconds, then you can, oh, that's how the piano works. And it just I think it makes it more accessible. Oh absolutely, I mean it's for for listeners it's a series of nine videos that bring

the basics of piano to life. And I just think it's such a cool way to get back to fans and empower them because after years of listening to you and getting all this joy from you and your music, it's kind of returning the favor and saying, you know what, you can do this too. I think it's such a cool way to put the power and listen those hands. It's such a great I think it's neat man, and

I appreciate that. And you know that I've spent time talking to people, like, for example, when I talked to my kids and I explained to them just the most basic stuff. It changes the way they listen to music and it opens up a whole different world. And I think, you know, scientifically, we know that you know music and exposure to music and understanding music can it's good for you. It's just good for your brains. So you know, if I can help um, you know, expose people to that

that that's really what this is all about. It's not about you know, people need to know. This isn't me like playing some real complicated New Orleans piano and showing you how to do it maybe at some point this is about you know, what are these black and white keys? And how did they function? And it's a it's a very basic course that also includes stuff about my personal history, and I show off a bunch of my keyboards that

I have. So it's it's really fun. Yeah, I mean that's I feel like fun is the operative word here. I mean, it's sharing the joy of music. I mean, I feel like there's such a prevalent thought of weal if you can't, you know, get paid to go do it up on stage, and why bother? And well, it's fun, it's fun. It's it's it is and you know what else Jordan's is um this this is the first thing

I've ever seen that really exists in the metaverse. And a lot of people get peaked out by the term metaverse because they're thinking univirtual reality goggles or augmented reality, but really the metaverse is just about being immersive on

a different level. So every tenth episode of Piano Party is people who buy the premium package can get together and we hang out and and it's like it's like I have a bunch of students and we're all getting together and talking about what we learned, and it's it's it's just a way of connecting in a different way

that I haven't seen before. Oh, I was gonna say that is one of the coolest parts to me because I feel like, you know, you can sit in your room and you can learn the notes and you can you can get the song down, but actually playing with other people is a whole other ball game. And you know,

I played in bands and things. I practice alone in my room and then as soon as you get into a room with the other people, it can be tough to jel And I feel like in in lessons and tutorials, that's a part that's really absent in the teaching process of learning how to listen to other people and engage with the musically. So I love that there's this engaging part of it right there too. I'm glad I'm because

that's that's really fun for me. And again, it's you know, this isn't some uh, you know, really high level you know, competitive pianistic uh series. It's it's it's really about having a good time. And you know, just a I had to think, like, like if I want to study painting, like I don't even know, like the bit like what what way? What do you mean there's a difference between acrylics and or like you know, like I mean, I

go way back to the beginning. And it's actually good for me too, because I'm talking about things I haven't thought about in a while, and I just want to help, you know, maybe bring people together through music, which is I think ultimately going to be a good thing. Oh. Absolutely,

I think it's an incredible project now. I it made me think about my early days learning music too, and I just think everybody when they're starting out on an instrument, has that first song that they learned where they impressed themselves in a way. It goes from doing scales and exercises to oh my god, this is fun. I can

express myself. Do you remember that moment? Do you remember the first piece of music that you learned that you were really proud of that got you going When the Saints go marching in That was a big one for me. I was a kid. But you said something that's really interesting. When people learn how to play their first song. Everybody learns how to play a song. And what I want to try to do is if you understand a few of the basic fundamentals, you'll be able to play whatever

you want. Going back to the painting analogy, if somebody teaches you how to draw a face, you'll draw that face a hundred times. You just keep drawing faces. But if somebody teaches you how to draw, you can draw whatever you want. And I want to teach people the basic fundamentals of music so they can pick songs out on their own. And because not everybody wants to play the same thing. I mean, you might want to play an Adele song, somebody might want to play a Cold

Porter song, whatever it is. If you learn just some really basic fundamentals, literally, anyone can in time start to figure out things on their own. And that's that's what I think is good for your brain, is you know, the eye hand coordination, the stimulation from these sounds, and learning how to play chords. So yeah, I'll show you how to play some songs, but it's it's a lot more than that. And you're you're passing on all this knowledge to all these people who were some of your teachers.

You've had some incredible names, I mean James Booker among them, I mean just so many. Who are some of the people that either personally or either just even just listening to their music made you want to pursue music. Well, a guy like James Booker, I mean he was a teacher in a in an extremely unorthodox way. I mean, he wasn't James Booker for your for your listeners and viewers who may not know, was probably the greatest piano

player to ever come out of New Orleans. But he he was a unique player, like nobody ever played like him. So if you wanted to play like him, you had to ask him. And I don't know how many people asked him. I you know, maybe I don't know anyone who asked him, but I did when I was younger, and he showed me how to play some things. But he wasn't a teacher in the way that say Ellis marsa Alice was, who was another teacher of mine, who was, you know, a real intellectual or real academic and and

was great at sort of breaking things down. But these are like super high level teachers. So the things that I'm doing in Piano Party are not those things yet they're they're they're very very basic things. But like if you listen to Errol Garner play the piano, if you don't want to go sit at the piano and you know, or tap your feet after hearing that. I mean, it's just incredible. But then I listened to Freddie Mercury played the Introduction to Death on two Legs, and I just

I love I love that. You know, it's not that's not hard. You listen to Billy Joel or Elton John and those people, or or Stevie or Ray Charles, and it's just these are all people that you know, make me smile when I hear different ways of playing the piano, different keyboards, your career from New Orleans. There are so many incredible people when you mentioned them, and you've got Jelly Roal Martin, Professor long Hair, I mean, such an

incredible convergence of influences. I'm always fascinated by what makes someone go from being a performer who plays other people's music to making the jump into being a writer. I mean me as an example, but I'm sure a lot of people that are gonna be learning on your on your piano party courses. Um, they'll learn the basics and at some point some of them will want to make the jump into writing their own music. Um, I've never done that yet I've never felt able to use music

to communicate. But I want to ask you how did you make the jump from performer to writer? But that's you. Listen, by the time we finished talking, you're gonna be inspired to go start writing, because it's man, I've tried, no, no, no, dig this. A lot of people think of writing as I want to go write a song, or I want to write a novel, or I want to go, you know, write a screenplay, And I always tell them, don't, don't

think about any of that. Just start putting ideas down and eventually the form of whatever you're trying to write is gonna sort of start to assemble itself. You have to give yourself something to edit. But a lot a lot of people get sort of daunted by the notion of writing a song because when you think of a song, whatever that song form is. If you're if you're co porter,

you're probably writing a A B A song. If you're a pop writer, you might write in you know, verse, verse, pre chorus, chorus or whatever the that that can that can really turn people off. But if if you and I are talking and you think I want to write a song about conversation, okay, conversation, hanging out talking. You know, before you know it, something will start to emerge to which you can then edit. So I don't know specifically

when that process happened for me. I guess I was pretty young, like nine or two when I did kind of putting ideas down. But whether it's lyrics or melodies or a painting, just start, just start. Good buddy of mine for fifteen years that I want to write a mystery novel, and he's never done it because he's trying to write a novel as opposed to express himself, you know, with a sentence here or a word there, an idea there.

And I'm telling you, if you're passionate enough to want to do it, it's just a matter of giving yourself something to edit. That is a great message. I mean, that was I mean a lot of people are intimidated to start the piano. As you mentioned earlier, eight keys. That's a lot of keys. But you're approaching it in this really accessible, logical way to break it down and demystify it and make it something it's more accessible. And then the next step from learning to play is learning

to express yourself with your own ideas. And I think that's such a cool And and also if yeah, you're right, and I'm going on Instagram and and search for piano. The level of virtuosity that exists up there right now, you talk about intimidating to somebody who's just starting out. There's there's kids, like literally children that are playing so much,

so fast. You know, there are one video I saw this, this young woman sitting in the closet playing John Coltrane solos and octaves like upside down like insane amounts of virtuosity. That's not what this is. This, This isn't a competition, This isn't about you know, I look how much I know this is. Hey, hold my hand. Let's start at step one and let's look at what's going on in the world right now. This is a crazy, very sad and turbulent, confusing time. This is designed to give us

some peace, to bring us together. Um, when we have some control over that. We we don't have control over everything, but we do have control over how we're gonna spend our time. And you know, ten fifteen minutes, you know, watching this, learning a little bit, sharing story, reason and then at the end, seeing a bunch of people I did a on this platform, I have neutral ground on

which the Piano Party exists. We did our first UM discord meeting and the person that was running it did a a zoom link and all of a sudden, I'm talking to you know, fifty people and it just you know, it brings us together. And I think that's what we need right now. Oh absolutely could say that again. I mean I noticed that that play seems to be the operative word. I know your your most recent tour was Time to Play, and this is Piano Party. It's it seems to be focusing on. You know, what we need

right now is something joyful. I mean, it's it's to me, it's that basic. I mean again, it is such a confusing time and we're going to our third year of COVID. I mean, I think everybody could agree we're you know, hopefully nearing the end and it's definitely not as as

acute as it was. But you know, it seems like just as we're going through that, we're hearing all of this nightmares news come out of Ukraine, and you know, it's just a sad time, you know, And and I would like to try to create something where we could get a respite from that we could we can enjoy one another, learn from one another. UM, celebrate our common humanity, but UM also celebrate our diversity at the same time, UM,

and realize that we're human beings. We all love each other, and you know, let's let's try to you know, get get through this crazy life together. And as well said I, the last two years has been transformative for all of us for in so many ways. Uh, maybe some good, mostly bad. But UM, has it changed your relationship to

music in any way? It has? Um? In uh in the sense that like the way I record has changed because you know, especially right at the very beginning of the pandemic, you know, you couldn't go out of your house at least, you know, I was one of the

fortunate ones who was able to stay at home. When I think about all of the men and women who were out there on the front lines, you know, providing as much semblance of normalcy for the rest of us as they could, I feel very fortunate to have been one of the ones who was able to kind of stay home. UM. And you know I was, there was nobody here. You know, it's not you have a recording

engineer or another musician. So you know, I started doing a lot more recording by myself, which I've always done, but this was like a lot and you know it's and like you were saying before, like you know, playing by yourself is a lot differ than playing with other people. And when you're when you're by yourself, you you you have no distractions, so it sort of forces you too if you feel like it, you know, work on the

things that you need to work on. So yeah, if it affected me musically, I think, I mean the songs and the sessions you're talking about along with my faith or into a Grammy nomination our Best Roots Gospel Album. Uh. And you quite literally played everything on your own engineer to yourself, producing yourself. Were you did you intentionally set out to make a record when you were doing that

or was that purely he like healing for you? Yeah, it was healing for me because this this may be hard to understand, but music, I just it's just what I do. It's all, it's all I do. It's like breathing, So I never really think about it. Like if I go fishing, I go fishing because it's fun to relax. Like I never like really sit around at home and like play for my own enjoyment. It's just it's just so much a part of me that I don't ever

think of it like that. But I found myself thinking about my faith a lot, and to be quite honest, sometimes my faith was really, really, really strong during especially the first few months of the pandemic, and sometimes I questioned things, and I found myself thinking about gospel mut music, and you know, I would sit down and play Amazing Grace because it made me feel good. I've never done that before. I would play Amazing Grace to make other people feel good, and I felt good as a result

of it. But I was actually functionally playing this music to help me cope with things over which I had no control. And then I would play another song. Before I knew it, I'm like, well, let me write a song about how I'm feeling. And then I had I'm like, let me just press record, and you know, I recorded the whole album. I played, you know, all these keyboards and trumpets and trombones and basses and everything else, and it took about eight months, but it was highly therapeutic.

It was really a fun process. I don't know the answer to this question, but I. I am so fascinated by by the healing properties of music. I mean, it's something that's able to bring comfort and solace to so many, including ourselves when we make it, and I can't for the life and they figure out why, what is it about music that makes it such an effective conduit of

of emotion and healing. I'd love to hear your thoughts and insights on what is it about music that that makes it just makes it filled with such a motion that can really just touch us in so many deep ways. Yeah, yeah, it's it's it really is incredible. And and my sister is a psychiatrist, and I asked her once, I said, do you find yourself like in social contexts, like analyzing

people without even realizing? And she goes, no, not, not really, And she goes, do you find yourself analyzing music, you know, and at a restaurant? And and I don't. And and for somebody like me, you know, who's so deeply immersed in the technical part of music, it's equally as thereft of technique and complete emotion as it is super technical. So I can start crying when I hear a piece of music. Doesn't matter if it's good or bad, whatever it's like. And your question is why, why, why does

that affect you? And I don't know, man, It's just it's like, you know, art takes over where any kind of rational articulation stops, and I think it's a gift from God. And um, I don't know. There's a there's a guy named Dr David Eagleman who has this series called Brain. I think it's it's like a six part documentary on Apple TV or something, and I watched that and he and he deals with that a little bit about you know, what is it like, what is actually

happening in our brains? And in a way I want to know, In a way I kind of don't want to know, because you know, it's like I talked about that piano introduction to Death on Two Legs when Freddie Mercury starts playing and it just overwhelms me. It just gives me a certain kind of feeling. And I wish I knew why. I just I feel so lucky to be able to be a person who can potentially make someone feels something with music. That that is like something

I'm so grateful for. I mean, it's like seeing an amazing magic trick you almost don't want to hear how the trick is done. You don't want to learn how that parts played, because you just wanted to exist as this thing that it's It's amazing you said that because, um, I had a daytime talk show for a couple of years, and every once in a while we would have like a mentalist or a magician come on, and they always they meaning to producers wanted me to know, you know,

what was happening. So I said, I don't want to know that. I believe in that stuff like the time leor Suchard the incredible mentalist guess my pin number on a mat on the James Gordon Show and I had to change my bad Like, I don't know how the hell he did that, and I don't want to know. Um, but I you know, I love magic. I love mystery and wonder and you know why do we feel this way? You know, it's just that's what makes life, you know,

more exciting. I think there's a fundamental mystery and music. I mean, we we find in traces of ancient civilizations, when when human beings were just struggling to eat and survive, we found traces of primitive instruments so clearly this was a priority from the earliest days when we were just trying to live. And it's amazing cool, it's so important, it's so so important. So that's that's why this whole piano party things important to me, you know, just because

it's it's just hanging out in a different way. It's it's using music too, just to bring us together. That's all it is. Right on. I the last couple of years, I feel like, you know, in times of stress, I've been I've been listening to music that I haven't listened to in decades. I call it musical comfort food. Have you been doing that too, stuff that just like returns me to a different time, different place in my life.

Have you been doing that? You know? Yes? And no. I've been working so hard on my own music that you know, it's rare that I actually sit down and listen to stuff. But but sometimes I'll go down that rabbit hole and yeah, man, like you just started listening to stuff. I was talking to my sister about a song that um Gordon Lifefoot song if you could read my mind, and you know, I hadn't heard that like the last time I heard it was out of a

car stereo in the nine on an eight track. Yeah, so you know, you put headphones on and you look, it's like, oh my god. First of all, you hear things you didn't know we're there because the quality is better now at least you know, yeah, with headphones and stuff. But it's like whoa, Like immediately it's like a time capsule. You know, you go down that that rabbit hole and start listening to stuff. It's just amazing. Oh man, that

is a that is a great track. I mean, that's I hope that's something that comes with some of your your hangout sessions on the Piano Party two. I mean just swapping you know, music to check out and stuff, like a lot of people probably don't don't know that song. Well. The cool thing about the metaverse because this notion of decentralization and everybody kind of being a part of it, This is going to evolve. This is this series over time is going the breadth of it is going to increase.

There's gonna be all different kinds of offshoots that I wouldn't even be able to predict because a lot of it's going to be driven by the members of the community. So although I'm starting in a very basic way at some point. I mean, I have specific ideas about where it's gonna go, but there's you know, this community will organically grow and and provide um, you know, whatever the

community itself wants. So that's what I'm excited about to see, like in the first what I call land yapp session, which land yap means bonus in where I come from in the world, and to see what folks are saying, like we really like this, but would you show us this or there's no way to know that because if if I'm a teacher and I'm teaching one person, immediately I can see with the relations and ship is. But on piano party, I don't know who's gonna be watching.

You could be five years old, you could be ninety five years old. You could play a little bit, you could have never played. So I have to learn you know who this is for. So I'm excited to see it involved. I meant to mention this earlier. The name neutral ground, um, I mean, has a wonderful double meaning, but it means something personal to you and where you're from. Can you tell me a little about how you landed

on that title? Yeah? Sure, so I was trying to come up with some type of platform where a whole bunch of people could just get together and love each other and celebrate all the things that we love. Some of the things I love are music and food, like I love to smoke barbecue, Um, I love traveling, you know, whatever it is, you know, recipes or family or whatever it is. And so I created the Neutral Ground, which is this online free, you know, brand new immersive social experience.

And on the Neutral Ground will be lots of different things. Among those things will be piano party and things that I can't talk about yet, but a lot of different content, shows and music and hangouts and all this. So I was trying to think of a name for it, and I wanted to name it something that meant something to me. In New Orleans, a median, that grassy strip between two streets is called a neutral ground, and that comes from

the eighteen hundreds. UM. One of the earliest meanings of that was Canal Street, where on one side of Canal Street you had one type of people, as they were referred to in that they and on the other side of Canal Street you had another type of people. There were the French creoles on one side and the Anglo Americans on the other side, and they had this area where once in a while they would come together in trade, and that was called a neutral ground because they didn't

particularly get along well. That stuck in any grassy media in New Orleans is called a neutral ground. And my wife always thought she could never understand it because I say neutral ground, so she thought it was like neutra like almost like a neutrient rat And a lot of people say neutral ground. They put the emphasis on ground. But if you go to New Orleans and say, hey, I'll meet you on the neutral ground, that's where you watch a martycra parade, or that's you know where pignicke

or whatever. Depending on the neutral ground, you can do lots of different things. But essentially it's a median. But I thought, well, that name means something to me, and it's also a place where we are all the same. This this zoom call I had the other day with all of these members of this discord community on neutral ground. One woman was driving to her daughter's fourth surgery. That was a tiny little girl, like two years old. You'd see this woman walking on the street, you know, nice lady,

wouldn't think anything. Little would you know that she's got this child that's suffering so immensely, and consequently she's suffering, and the little girl's brothers suffering, and like she came on a neutral ground too, to just be together, you know. And that really knocked me back, because all of us have stuff, and on the neutral ground, anything that's waiting you down doesn't. It's a place to love, to come

and be loved, you know what I'm saying. I mean, things that might be burdening you in one part of your life. We want to celebrate you and that and that's what I want. And I'm neutral with everybody else. I got my own problems. We all have our own problems. But the neutral grounds to come to the place you come to forget all of that in order to share

it and and be loved for it. And the stories I've been reading on discorded by people and the personal struggles are going through, it's like, come come with us, Come come be with us. We're gonna love. We're gonna love you. We're not gonna accept you, We're gonna love you. You know what I mean. It's not like, Okay, we understand the things about you are different than me, So we're gonna accept no, no, no, we love you wholeheartedly. Come be with us. Let's talk about the things that

we love and the things that bring us together. So that's that's what the Neutral Ground is all about. That is absolutely beautiful. That is an incredible project. I am so glad you're putting this out into this world. I think that is an absolutely amazing thing because the one thing I'll say, we live in a very divisive time. I mean, nobody really wants to talk about politics anymore because you know it's there's gonna invariably be some kind

of argument or whatever. I mean, that's great that we think different things, but in our totality, we're so much more than that. And and for something like that too keep us from loving each other, talking to each other. I don't ever remember a time in my life where things were so on edge, like you know, you know, every everybody kind of wants to shy away from from dialogue about this stuff. That Neutral Ground is not a

place for that. There are places for that, and there should be places for that, But this is not a place where you come to argue politics or religion. This is a place you come with your set of beliefs and they are to be respected. And and it's amazing what happens when you actually listen, really listen to someone. You might actually learn a little something. You may not agree with it, but you might say, oh, okay, I never really understood it like that, and that's what makes

it great. It's not like in New Orleans. We weren't raised to be color blind. We were raised to see the beauty and our differences. We're not all the same. We're we're a melting pot. This country is a melting pot. New Orleans is a melting pot. So there's different cultures that come together and we celebrate that. That's that's what the neutral ground is. Well said, I don't want to take up too much more of your time. My last question, uh, touch on us a little bit earlier. That's been and

incredibly challenging last two years, incredibly difficult. Has it taught you anything new about yourself? Have you learned anything new about yourself in the last two years? Um that I need to work harder to be a better person. Um that I'm driven to be a better husband, a better dad. Um if I want to live on the highest level of existence. That I can live. I need to love more. I need to have more humility in my life. Um.

I need to listen more. Um, because everything's quiet, you know, during the pandemic, you know, it's it's craziness in the world. But when you're alone by yourself, you know, you really have a chance to think. You know, how how can I use this opportunity, opportunity to make myself better? You know, there's no distractions, you know, at least there weren't for for a long time. How can I become a better musician?

You know? How can I What can I do? And and uh along the way, you know, I learned that I can. I can definitely work on all of that stuff. And I'm glad I had a chance to reflect and think about it. We're all works in progress. You got that, right, Oh, Harry. Thank you so much for your time today, and most importantly your music is such an honor to speak to you. Thank you so very much. Thank you, Jordan, And you need to write that song. Man, Let's go, I'll try

all right, here we go. We hope you enjoyed this episode of Inside the Studio, a production of I Heart Radio. For more episodes of Inside the Studio or other fantastic shows. Check out the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast forever you listen to your favorite podcast.