Outsider, Outlier: Hannah Marks Speaks
Album art by TJ Huff.
by Sarah Thomas
Bassist and composer Hannah Marks plays The Jazz Gallery on Friday, November to celebrate the release of her debut album, Outsider, Outlier. The album brings together her jazz roots with rock influences that have been permeating in her music-making for years. We caught up with Hannah earlier this week to talk about the album, current influences on her work, and what it’s like to work on a long-term project.
The Jazz Gallery: Your debut album just came out earlier this month! Are you playing that music on your Gallery show?
Hannah Marks: Yes, this is my album release show. We're playing the whole record down, plus probably one new song. The record is around forty minutes, so I want to make sure we have an hour-long set.
TJG: Could you tell me a little bit about your album?
HM: The record is called Outsider, Outlier, and it's my first album as a leader. We're not really classifying it as a jazz record. I think of it more as experimental rock with some jazz influences. All the musicians on the record are jazz musicians and improvisers, but I’ve mainly focused on songwriting for the past four years. Almost all the songs have lyrics. There are some improvised sections, but it’s definitely more influenced by rock music.
TJG: Is this a new focus for you stylistically?
HM: I've always wanted to play rock and roll, and I just never really got the opportunity. I played with some singer-songwriters briefly here and there, but I've always been a jazz musician and I’m classically trained. So this is the first time I really allowed myself to embrace my rock influences. I've been listening to rock and going to rock shows for a really long time, so I’ve finally channeled everything I've been hearing and combined that with my jazz training.
TJG: In your album writeup you mentioned quite a lot of different influences, from Sonic Youth to Esperanza Spalding. What have some of those influences meant for you as you've been working on this album?
HM: Esperanza Spalding—not only is she a huge musical influence for me, but her whole career and persona as an artist is fascinating to me. I was inspired by her ability to write in so many different genres and exist in so many different spheres of music over the course of her career. I felt like, “Okay, I can do this too.”
She did start with more jazz-centric records. But then she had her album Chamber Music Society, which was more classical, and then Radio Music Society, which was more R&B and soul. Later, her album Emily's D+Evolution was very influential—that was sort of her prog/art rock album. She's an amazing chameleon, and I hope that I can also have a career where no matter what genre I'm inhabiting or being inspired by at the time, my audience will follow me and I'll gain new fans by branching out.
TJG: She is such an incredible example of that. You've been working on songs from this album over the course of quite a few years. What has it been like working on such a big project over that span of time?
HM: In general, unless something dramatically changes about my writing style, I'd have to guess that most of my projects will be these longer-span things. The beauty of this album is that it unveiled itself to me over time. I didn't set out to write this album, but by the time I was halfway through writing and collecting compositions over the years, I realized what the themes were that I was dealing with and what the unifying sonic world was. That came to me during the pandemic, and I started taking songwriting lessons with Becca Stevens in spring of 2020.
That was really huge for me. I would say that I benefited a lot from the extra time during the pandemic. Before the pandemic started, I had just moved to New York and I was going out every night and trying to play and meet as many people as possible. But that didn't really allow for any self-reflection time. So the opportunity to slow down and develop this album was super crucial, and probably wouldn't have happened without the pandemic.
TJG: Talk to me a little bit about your band. You met a lot of them at Banff at the International Workshop for Jazz and Creative Music, right?
HM: I did—pianist Lex Korten, alto saxophonist Nathan Reising, and vocalist Sarah Rossy. I met all of them at Banff and have had a wonderful relationship with all of them for the past five years.
I'm not a vocalist. I've sung occasionally and I did sing on my previous album with a collective band I was in. But it's not my forte. So with Sarah in particular, I've really been imagining her singing my songs for the longest time. It was amazing to really cement our relationship together on this project.
I also have Connor Parks playing drums and Lee Meadvin, who is my guitarist and producer. Those two also did an incredible job playing on the album, and Lee really shaped the sonic aspect of the record through his mixing and mastering.
TJG: Do you have other shows or projects you want folks to know about?
HM: After this, my jazz quartet is playing at Smalls on December 6. That’s with Lex and Nathan, as well as Steven Crammer on the drums. This is probably the next album I will record—the next big project I'm working on. Like I said, I'm kind of a slow writer so I think if I do another album of songs it'll take me a long time to write it. But I have a decent amount of quartet music that we've been working on for the past few years, and we're making our Smalls debut on December 6 for the early set.
Hannah Marks plays The Jazz Gallery on Friday, November 3 for her Outsider, Outlier album release. The group features Hannah Marks on electric bass & background vocals, Sarah Rossy on lead vocals, Nathan Reising on alto sax, Lee Meadvin on guitar, Lex Korten on piano, and Connor Parks on drums. Sets are at 7:30 and 9:30 p.m. ET. $20 general admission ($15 for members), $30 cabaret seating ($20 for members), $20 Livestream (FREE for members). Purchase tickets here.