Roy Ayers
Roy Ayers
Roy Ayersis an American funk, soul, and jazz composer and vibraphone player. Ayers began his career as a post-bop jazz artist, releasing several albums with Atlantic Records, before his tenure at Polydor Records beginning in the 1970s, during which he helped pioneer jazz-funk. He is a key figure in the acid jazz movement, which is a mixture of jazz into hip-hop and funk, and has been dubbed by many as "The Godfather of Neo Soul". He is most well known...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionComposer
Date of Birth10 September 1940
CityLos Angeles, CA
Polydor used to release me at different times around the world. You get your royalty statement: sales here, here, but never over there!
The true beauty of music is that it connects people.
But I did mine through a production company. All the music I did, I gave to the production company. Then the production company would give the record company the album. I used to do all my albums like that. It was fantastic. But now, understand, I have never planned to do anything with these other tapes. The one that are released, like the Virgin Ubiquity you have there, I wasn't going to do anything with that music. One day, I was talking to this guy that owns BBE over in England, and I said I've got some tapes and stuff that you might be interested in, and he went berserk.
When I was recording from '70 to '82, I always played piano and laid the tracks down. But I used to talk to the other musicians while the track was playing.
A lot of the hip hop artists don't write music. They write words.
I've been sampled so much and I'm glad it's happened, it's a great compliment.