Hal Willner knows his Charles Mingus. Not only did Willner, a veteran record producer and music director for “Saturday Night Live”, see every Mingus performance in New York from 1974 to 1977, he also had several chance encounters with the jazz great. When Willner was in college, he lived on the same block as Mingus. And when Willner first began working in music, he was sometimes surprised to see Mingus at parties for Led Zeppelin and Crosby, Stills & Nash. “You’d see him at these things, talking to people, so I thought there was some interest for him,” Willner said jokingly during Zócalo’s panel celebrating Mingus. The real story? “He came for the free food.” Read more about Willner below.
Q. What do you wake up to?
A. Confusion.
Q. What music have you listened to today?
A. Bluegrass, jazz, rock, avant garde, everything. I have an iPod on shuffle. And I put on a CD of Dizzy Gillespie.
Q. What do you find beautiful?
A. The ocean.
Q. How would you describe yourself in five words or fewer?
A. Almost a missed opportunity.
Q. If you could take only one more journey, where would you go?
A. Venice.
Q. When you were a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
A. A children’s TV show host.
Q. What is your favorite holiday and why?
A. Christmas day, because I’m Jewish and I don’t have to do anything.
Q. What is your greatest extravagance?
A. DVDs.
Q. What is your most prized material possession?
A. A personal letter from Fellini….the first record I produced was music from his movies done by jazz artists.
Q. What should you throw away but haven’t been able to part with?
A. My big collection of Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smith ventriloquist dummies.
Q. What promise do you make to yourself that you break the most often?
A. That I’ll be organized.
Q. Who is the one person living or dead with whom you would most want to have a drink?
A. W.C. Fields.
To read about the Mingus celebration featuring Willner, click here.
*Photo by Aaron Salcido.