We recently connected with Nic Hale and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Nic, thanks for joining us today. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

I’ve been through all the traditional forms of studying music. I started taking trumpet lessons when I was a kid, went to music school, got a college degree in jazz studies and composition. That all laid a really solid foundation for me with my musical skills and knowledge. But honestly, the biggest growth I’ve ever experienced came when I was out of school and starting my career, from getting thrown in the fire on gigs and having to figure things out quickly! When you’re a young professional trying to make a name for yourself, you wind up saying yes to a lot of things that you might not feel completely confident in, and you have to prove real fast that you belong in the room. Maybe that’s what they mean by ‘paying your dues?’

As a musician, so much of what we do is mental – it’s about making great choices, not just playing great. There are lots of players out there with amazing chops, but if they’re not making musical choices, not playing things that serve the music as a whole, who cares? Same goes for music production. The longer I produce music and the more tricks I learn, it can be tempting to throw all these things on a track just to prove how hip or sophisticated I can be. But if it’s not making the song better, if it’s not moving people, then what’s the point? People are going to remember a great melody and a story they can relate to, not how many reverbs you can sidechain or whatever.

There’s a great book by Victor Wooten called “The Music Lesson.” In it, the teacher/guru character is asked what instrument he plays, and he answers, “I don’t play an instrument, I play music.” As a trumpet player, producer, and everything else, I always try to make sure I’m truly thinking as a musician, rather than some sort of glorified instrument operator.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I’ve been active at a freelance trumpet player on the Los Angeles music scene for decades. Some of the artists I’ve performed with include Wu Tang Clan, Thievery Corporation, and Belle and Sebastian, to name a few. I’ve toured the world, performing at festivals such as Glastonbury, Coachella, and my personal favorite, High Sierra Music Festival. Of course, that’s all been as a “sideman,” but in my heart I’ve always been a band guy. My life changed when I played with the OG Long Beach funk band OO Soul at Long Beach Funk Fest, and festival founder Bobby Easton from Delta Nove hit me up about joining them. Once I found Delta Nove, I found my musical home. For the first time, I was able to integrate all the things that got me excited about music; jazz, funk, world music, psychedelic effects, and tons of jamming! Those guys became like family, and the times on the road with the Delta Nove crew are some of my most cherished memories. Unfortunately, our drummer Dominic passed away in 2019, and we decided that it would be impossible to replace him and maintain the integrity of the band, so that chapter came to an end. However, we did start recording our last album before Dominic passed, and we released that record in 2022. It’s definitely the most meaningful musical project I’ve completed to date.

Around the time Delta Nove stopped playing, our old percussionist Heath Bennet called me from Alabama and asked me to join the electronic act that he’d been touring with for the past decade, BoomBox. I didn’t have much experience in the electronic music scene, but I knew that the BoomBox fellas were steeped in the jam band tradition (to say the least – their parents were actually members of the Grateful Dead), so I was sure I’d be able to figure out how to fit in. My old Delta Nove saxohonist Rob Covacevich joined me to form the BackBeat Brass, and we spent several years on the road with BoomBox. This was eye-opening to me, as I discovered a whole new world of music that I’d kind of written off before because it wasn’t a traditional band setup. I discovered just how much soul there can be in dance music. The fans on the road with BoomBox were incredible, and even before that had run its course, I began learning Abelton and started writing my own productions, which eventually became the Nic Hale project.

As a ‘band guy,’ I’ve been recording music since high school. My buddy Kevin and I started with a cassette 4-track, worked up to a digital 8-track, eventually got a ProTools rig, and opened a studio in Long Beach called The Woodshed. As such, production is something I’ve pretty much always done. In my opinion, it’s one of the most self-actualizing experiences I can have. Going into the studio to a blank canvas and leaving a few hours later with a song is an amazing experience. It’s like creating your own child each and every day. I guess the only thing that’s really changed with the Nic Hale project is that I’m creating my own children now, rather than helping other bands and artists to realize their vision. Of course, I always feel like I’m just getting started, and I am excited to continue down this road and see where the journey leads!

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

To me, the act of being creative has always been the reward, that’s what makes me feel most alive. I’ve been lucky to do this a long time, I’ve developed a lot of little niche skills in the process, and I’ve discovered a lot of musical styles and elements that speak to me. When I get to go into my studio and do my thing, it’s the best feeling, because I just get to go in there with no pretenses and play around with the sounds I love, like a little kid on a playground! In fact, that was the title of my first single with the Nic Hale project, ‘Playground.’ I can’t help but to include all the little elements I’ve loved about the music I’ve made throughout the years; the Brazilian percussion I learned with Delta Nove, the house beats I soaked in through BoomBox, the psychedelic effects that became my unique trumpet sound, and of course lots and lots of horns!

The EP I released this year is titled ‘West LA Fadeaway,’ after the Grateful Dead cover that I included on it. The 5-song record is a pretty good tour of these styles that I love. It starts with a chill R&B jazz tune, then gets super funky with the Dead cover. The next track borders dangerously on smooth jazz, and the record finishes out with two dance tracks that I think are kind of ‘bangers.’ Of course, the Grateful Dead basically invented the modern jam band, so my cover of their song is a way of saying thank you to them; not just for creating this vibrant scene that carries through to this day, but even more so to build on the sort of genre-bending that they gave musicians the license to do. Jerry Garcia’s sound was never genre-specific, but his sound was his and his alone. I’m hoping I can bounce between neighboring and/or diverse genres in a similar way, but always still make music that sounds uniquely like me. People come up to me after shows and say things like “I’ve never heard music like that before, with the horns and the beats and the electronics and the effects.” I love hearing that from them, but I think to myself, “Dude, this is the music I’ve been hearing in my head my whole life!” It’s incredibly rewarding to be able to get those sounds out of my imagination and out into the world, and, God willing, I don’t see the well running dry anytime soon.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

I don’t talk about it much, but I actually spent my first few years after college working a full-time marketing job at a musical instruments corporation. When I was there, I remember looking around a a bunch of older guys who gave up their dreams of music careers for the stability of a steady paycheck, and I vowed not to become that. I recall one of them telling me “the music business is a game of attrition, it’s all about seeing how long you can keep standing.” Well, it’s been a long time since I’ve had the steady day job, and I’m still here, so I guess I’m doing alright.

Of course there are challenges. If you don’t live for the music, then you’ll never last. But by keeping the act of being creative first and foremost, there’s always a reason to keep going. When Delta Nove tragically lost our brother to cancer, we pressed on and finished the record that we had begun together. That was probably the best therapy we all could have done together. When my time with BoomBox came to an end, I went from touring full time to not knowing when I’d be on stage next. So I just kept creating, going back to the roots of what I started doing this for. That feeling I get when I go into my studio and play my trumpet or write a song hasn’t changed since I started doing it as a kid. In fact, there’s a song on my EP about this, called ‘Rise and Shine.’ It says “When they hold you to the fire, you gotta stay inspired.” I believe those words. When my career has been challenging, as long as I just stayed in a present mindset and kept working on making music good intentions in my heart, there has always been a light at the end of the tunnel. Those small battles won, like learning a new lick, writing a lyric, finishing a song, putting out a record, booking a show… they turn into winning the war in the end.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://nichalemusic.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nhale_music/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nhalemusic
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@nhale_music
• Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/nic-hale-29325493
• Other: https://nichale.bandcamp.com/

Image Credits

All photos except for the two album covers by Nani Gross