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E-mail StoryThe jazz kid: Bakersfield prodigy capturing attention of genre’s heavyweights
| Wednesday, May 14 2008 3:11 PM
Last Updated: Wednesday, May 14 2008 2:52 PM
He’s only 18 and already jazz saxophonist Isaiah Morfin has imitators.
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Isaiah Morfin shows his stuff during a performance at the Bakersfield Jazz Workshop jam session.
Jazz saxophonist Isaiah Morfin plays at the Bakersfield Jazz Workshop jam session late last month. He had the honor of playing the Lionel Hampton Jazz Festival in Idaho.
Isaiah Morfin enjoys listening to others jam during a Bakersfield Jazz Workshop jam session.
Isaiah Morfin, left, and CSUB music professor Doug Davis share a laugh after jamming together at the Bakersfield Jazz Workshop.
Teenaged jazz saxophonist Isaiah Morfin shows a little bit of jazzman confidence as he waits to be called on stage to play at the Bakersfield Jazz Workshop jam session.
Jazz saxophonist Isaiah Morfin plays at the Bakersfield Jazz Workshop jam session.
Jazz saxophonist Isaiah Morfin warms up a bit before taking the stage at the Bakersfield Jazz Workshop jam session.
Jazz saxophonist Isaiah Morfin plays at the Bakersfield Jazz Workshop jam session.
Isaiah Morfin will perform 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Friday at Kern Central Credit Union, 2100 H St., for the Arts Council of Kern’s “California Seasons” exhibit by Greg Iger.
Acclaimed jazz pianist Gerald Clayton does a “dead-on” Morfin. If we were talking human speech, it would be equivalent to putting on an Irish accent, quips Cal State Bakersfield music department chairman Doug Davis.
Morfin, a Valley Oaks Charter School student, nabbed a spot in Idaho’s prestigious Lionel Hampton International Jazz Festival in February, where he jammed with his heroes.
He’s been recognized by jazz publication Down Beat magazine as an outstanding high school performer and he’s won the Shelly Manne award for new talent from the Los Angeles Jazz Society.
And he has Carnegie Hall on his resume after a performance in eighth grade with Stockdale Christian School’s advanced band.
Morfin frequents the Tuesday night jazz workshops at the Nile Bar & Grill and performs at downtown’s First Fridays street fairs. He played the Bakersfield Jazz Festival at CSUB last year.
Davis welcomed him to the university jazz band two years ago. For his age, Davis says, he’s “ridiculously accomplished.” He’s on the jazz circuit’s radar as one of the most talented high school jazz musicians around.
Now the big guys are clamoring to work with him.
At last year’s jazz festival, trumpeter Terell Stafford hoped to get into Bakersfield early so he could play with the prodigy.
“More and more, his own individual voice comes out,” Davis says of Morfin’s compositions. “It’s just pure heart and soul. When he’s playing it’s coming from the center of his being.”
Gerald Clayton’s father John Clayton Jr., a Grammy-winning bassist who’s performed with Diana Krall, invited him to the Idaho festival.
The two met through a Colorado jazz camp where professional musicians mentor young talents.
Morfin played with the festival’s house band, which included Clayton-Krall collaborator Jeff Hamilton on drums. They performed one of Morfin’s compositions, the bouncy “Praise the Lord.”
“When I thought of the song, I said, ‘OK, I’m gonna open with this and make people smile, tap their foot when they hear it,’” he says.
He doesn’t drop his music into any particular subgenre of jazz, although he’s keen on swing. His tastes lean toward funk and soul — favorites include “If You Really Love Me” by Stevie Wonder and James Brown’s “I Feel Good.”
“When you say swing, you think of one kind of sound and I try to use my imagination to be different,” he says.
The coolest part of the festival was the continuous stream of music from top-notch artists.
“You get to hear such great music live and it is a special treat for the audience and everybody loves it,” he says.
He played a late-night jam session with trumpeter Roy Hargrove, who headlined this year’s Bakersfield Jazz Festival.
“He was cheering me on, ‘Yeah, yeah, man!’” Morfin says.
Morfin took up the sax when he was 10 years old, intrigued by its sound.
“I think that’s just how I’m wired, that’s how God made me, that I really have this passion about music,” he says.
He’s been writing songs for the last three years.
“It’s really such a special thing to me, because it’s your own tune that you wrote and you can give what you have to the world, and share that with others,” he says.
Morfin hopes to attend the prestigious Berklee College of Music next spring. The school has offered him a scholarship, he says.
His mother, Angela, says he gives the glory of his talent to God.
“People say, ‘If you don’t see and you just hear him, they think it’s some 65-year-old guy playing jazz,” she says. “They’re just blown away by his talent for such a young age.”