by Bob Makin

When Maceo Parker was the musical director of the JBs for funk architect James Brown throughout the 1960s, '70s and '80s, the Godfather of Soul used to shout, "Maceo, take us to the bridge!" And Parker would blow a wicked funky sax solo to get from one point to the other of such hits as "Say It Loud, I'm Black and I'm Proud" and "Sex Machine." Throughout the '70s, the North Carolina native did the same thing for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame funk act Parliament-Funkadelic.

As frontman of his own successful band, Parker is still taking it to the bridge, but in more ways than ever. By combining jazz, R&B, rock and rap with groove-ilicious funky music, he is appealing to an equally diverse audience. Among the many fans of Parker's magical mix are Prince, Ani DiFranco, James Taylor and Sheryl Crow, all of whom appeared on the saxman's sixth solo album, "Dial: M-A-C-E-O," released earlier this year on the Boulder, Colo.-based indie What Are Records? The horn legend returned the favor to Prince and DiFranco by blowing some funk into their latest releases.

Over the past weeks Parker brought his "funky stuff" to two big-time jazz festivals, while sharing the stage with several fellow icons of the jam scene: Bruce Hornsby at the JVC Jazz Festival in New York and Wayne Shorter, Al DiMeola, Chick Corea, John Zorn, Taj Mahal, Ray Charles, Jimmy Cliff and Medeski, Martin and Wood at the Montreal Jazz Festival.

Parker also recently reunited with James Brown for the first time in three years at the grand opening of Experience Music Project, an interactive museum in Seattle. Coming up, he'll play Walther's Grass Roots Music Festival with MMW, Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, the David Grisman Quintet, Jazz Mandolin Project and Lake Trout. The festival will be 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Aug. 19 at Oregon Ridge Park in Cockeysville, Md. For more information, call 410-887-1818 or visit the website.

Always on the road with his band, which includes his rapper son Corey Parker, Parker spoke to me between gigs about the past, present and future of his groove-ilicious career. For more information, visit W.A.R.? Records' website at www.war.com

BM: Congratulations. You may be the only musician who's made James Taylor sound funky.

(Laughs) No, James Taylor's funky, man. He can be funky when he wants to be. He did a tune called 'Mockingbird' that was soooo funky.

BM: That's true, with Carly Simon.

Oh yeah.

BM: Now you've been working with Ani DiFranco and Prince a lot in recent years. Comment on what you've liked most about working with them.

Well, you get to the point where you appreciate greatness (laughs). Ani, I just love her. She has a great voice. She can sing anything she likes. She chooses to sing folk with the acoustic guitar and all of that, but I knew she could do something funky. That's why I wrote the song ("Coin Toss"). I just appreciate the fact that I could be that close to someone who can be really, really good at all these different styles.

And Prince, what more can you say? I would say he's as close to genius as ever someone that I've been in contact with. He can do almost anything very well: play all the rhythm instruments very well and all the other stuff that he can do. I'm just in awe to be in the same room. Now I've gotten to the point where he'll show me a video or something. And I'm there watching the video and I'm watching him at the same time. It just makes me feel that I have come full circle. I have done something right to make all this possible. I can smile and say that the trip has been worthwhile if it leads to the company of Prince.

BM: Other than your saxophone, Prince plays all the instruments on the 'Dial: M-A-C-E-O' track 'The Greatest Romance Ever Sold.' It sounds like you hold Prince in higher regard than James Brown and P-Funk, which are two of his biggest influences.

Well he's done more I'd say. I can't think of anybody else who's done the different movies that he's done, had all the big, big, big, big hits, can work all the instruments really well like he can do and run the studio board. That's why I hold him a little bit higher than anybody else. Everybody's experts in their own little thing, but he has so many other things that he's expert in. He can sing really, really high and then really, really low. His range is uncommon too.

BM: What do you like most about working with your rapper son Corey Parker? What does he bring to your music that wouldn't be there otherwise?

I never envisioned any of my kids working with me. He was an engineering major at North Carolina State. He got to a point where he wasn't sure if he wanted to complete that to become an engineer. Before some of my music was released, I let him hear it. So he had some of my music and words just started coming to him. I don't know if he tried his hand at writing rap before, but he tried and it came to the point where he was like, 'I think I'll let dad hear this.' And I was like, 'Wow, you did this?' He thought at the time that somebody else could rap it, and I said, 'No, no. Ain't nobody else can rap your words like you can do it. They probably wouldn't even interpret it the same way. Why don't you came out and try it?' So he decided to give it a shot.

And he loves the stage. He loves what he's doing. And what it brings is another level of excitement and energy. Rap is part of what's happening today. It makes the show well-rounded now. We have a female vocalist now. We have the instrumental music. I fool around with the microphone a little bit. I've got another guy that fools around a little. We can do some Sam & Dave stuff. And we can do the rap now. So all the elements are there. It just makes for a nice, well-rounded show. And I'm very, very happy that I also can say that Corey is my son (laughs).

BM: How does it make you feel to be a veteran musician whose energy, whose groove not only draws but exhausts a young crowd, gets them to shake their booties till they're tired?

(Laughs) Most times I have to count on my fingers, 'Wait, how old am I?' These people come year after year after year, month after month. They like what we do. I just feel that what we do is worthwhile because so many people are there, so many people come back and really like and support what we do. Maybe they can draw something from what we do. As long as I feel that it's worthwhile, I'll continue to try to do it. We go continuously throughout the world to different places and people come to where we are. New doors are opening continuously. We feel it's almost to the point where it's never ending. I've been feeling the past five or six years that finally all that I've done that led up to this -- having my own group, first of all, and people liking what we do and the direction that we've gone and the saxophone playing and all of that -- it just makes you know that you've done something worthwhile and that you've made the right decisions.

BM:You mentioned that you think some people are drawing from what you do. That's definitely true with a band like Deep Banana Blackout and the other jam 'n' groove bands you've inspired. What do you think of the young bands influenced by your funky stuff?

I'm at a loss. Maybe we're in a position where we can inspire groups. I don't know. People have to go with what's within. If we can inspire, that's great, but I don't know what lured me to funky music. I just know that something inside me did. I'm very comfortable with it. I love it. I enjoy playing funky music. I enjoy seeing people have fun and have joy. I know that it has become important for me because it is important for people to have a situation where they can sort of forget all the problems, forget all the troubles and just have fun. Funky music or music period, besides funky music, has a quality that can do that. That's why we feel that what we do is important. But I'm still at a lost for other groups and all of that because we're constantly doing what we do and trying to make that better and better.

BM: Given how much you're revered in funk and rock circles, do you think your jazz chops sometimes get overlooked? There's a couple of tunes on 'Dial: M-A-C-E-O' that could be played on contemporary jazz stations.

Maybe, but I don't care about that. I don't mind that because if somebody out there discovers, 'Hey, wait a minute, that sounds a little jazzy,' then that's a plus. They feel that they're getting something extra and that's all right, that's OK.

I came up with a phrase a while back, '2 percent jazz, 98 percent funky stuff.' That's sort of how we do it. We just like to hint at jazz here and there. I really do love to do the ballads, but we really put the funky sound in everything.

I have yet to walk into a place or be in the car, when a radio DJ plays one of our tunes. I haven't heard it yet. I've done a lot of interviews where they're playing stuff in the background, but I've yet to hear any of the new stuff. But that's OK too.

BM: Are you going to play on the forthcoming P-Funk reunion albums?

No. I stay so busy. You know what I mean? I really do. But some of the old James Brown musicians are going to get together in Seattle on the 25th (of June). James Brown is going to be part of that too. There's a museum that some people put together and part of it is dedicated to funky music. And James Brown is highlighted in the funky music. So he went back and got people like me and Fred Wesley and Bootsy (Collins) and my brother, Melvin, to play what we were doing way back then. We're doing a live thing to open it. That's going to be very fun and exciting.

BM: When was the last time you played with James Brown?

We were doing the same festival in Europe about three years ago.

BM: How do you approach being a frontman differently from him or George Clinton, especially James Brown, because without you, half of his schtick would have been out the window.

I don't rule with an iron fist. I figure if somebody wants their job, they know what they have to do. So I don't have to preach punctuality and decorum and how to act in the hotels and stuff because everybody's wearing my name and all this. Everybody knows all this. On stage, they have a certain freedom to do what they want to, to play a little bit when it's time for it individually. But there's a very thin line between a group of guys just getting together, calling some tunes, and actually a group who's really together and there to entertain the people. If someone's really careful and watchful, they can pick them out. I don't want to appear like we're just a bunch of folks just getting together. We have fun, but I do like for us to be on the same page. It's a little looser, but we're still together. And we can do it in such a way that it looks like we're just there, but we are really together.

I am the leader, so to speak, and I control how long and how short and how loud and all this stuff. I control it all. If I decided maybe somebody needs to play this part, that's what they'll do. If decide maybe not, then that's what they do. A lot of the stuff is dictated by how much time we have. That's why you have to have a leader, somebody to shape and mold it so that it can be done correctly to fit into that particular time slot.

BM: Throughout your career, what would you say was your proudest musical moment? You've done so many amazing things, but which one has stuck with you? When you're playing a good set, sometimes you'll think back on it.

Oh boy. Whew! We did a tune with James Brown called 'Phase IV (Damn Right I'm Somebody') that I sort of mentally said to myself, 'I can get really funky and involved in this solo.' My kids were really little at the time, 7, 8, 9 years old. But they talk about that particular solo now, like, 'Man, I don't know what you were thinking about.' They now can hear, since they're older, what I was trying to do at that particular recording session. But that's a toughie. It's really hard.

I remember when I was in Bootsy's (Rubber) Band, I did an emcee thing to get the crowd to say, 'Bootsy! Bootsy!' I remember playing the L.A. Coliseum. We must have 85,000 people. I could see that whole 85,000 stand and say 'Bootsy!' on my command. That sort of sticks out a little bit. Just to hear that roar. You know what I mean?

BM: It sounds like an airplane flying over your head.

That was incredible. When we landed the Mothership with George many times, that was special. And the early James Brown stuff when you knew everybody in the world was going to attend a James Brown concert. What was fascinating about working with him in those early days, the question wouldn't be if you were going to the James Brown, the question would be what you're going to wear because it was already understood, if he's somewhere near, you're going to go. And that's what gave you a great pride for working in a group like a James Brown band.

All the Apollo stuff. His very first Apollo thing when I was in high school is what grabbed me. One tune went right into another and all that. It's a million things, man.

BM: Louis Armstrong fans and scholars will be celebrating the centennial of Satchmo's birth for the entire year between his mythical birthday of July 4, 1900, and his actual birthday of Aug. 4, 1901. Comment on why you think celebrating significant Satchmo contribution to American is important.

Although conditions were what they were at the time of Louis Armstrong, he still bridged gaps between races and different groups of people in this country and out of the country. He was the ambassador that equalized the black race with the world. He was one of the first to represent the black race and black musicians in a whole lot of different countries through his music. That was very, very, very important because it opened the door for other entertainers to come. He was followed by all the other greats, like Sammy Davis Jr. and Ella Fitzgerald.

I can remember as a child him being the first black entertainer often on television. Again that was a very important step. But the man with the horn was clearly Satchmo. That was what I believe put the halo around his head. The spotlight will always be there.

Bob Makin is an entertainment writer for Gannett NJ. Jam bands are welcome to send him material at Courier News, P.O. Box 6600, Bridgewater, NJ 08807 and email information to makinclan@aol.com