Recently, I had the opportunity to catch up with Hewett to find out what he has been up to this year as well as what’s on the agenda for the coming months. Read on to find out where you can see a chronicle of Howard’s career and how a skycap at LAX helped him pen his greatest hit.<\/p>\n CP:<\/strong> What have you been up to in 2011 and 2012?<\/em><\/p>\n HH:<\/strong> I would say about 80% of my situation right now is about my personal appearances. The whole recording situation was bleak and really not something I wanted to be that involved in because of the way things were going as far as major record companies were concerned. As far as the independents were concerned, independents weren\u2019t like they are now. So my whole thing was thinking hey, there are a lot of different aspects of my career. I told my manager I wanted to concentrate on my personal appearances and getting back in front of my audience. That\u2019s something that\u2019s always been fun for me. I\u2019ve been a performing artist since I was 10 years old. I can\u2019t see ever not performing at some point in my life. Some of my heroes are Tony Bennett, Smokey Robinson, people like that who have just been reinventing themselves through the years. They really have fun with their careers. That\u2019s how I am, and that\u2019s what I like to do.<\/em><\/p>\n For the last ten years or so, I\u2019ve really been hitting the domestic personal appearance situation, then some overseas in Africa, the UK, throughout Europe and Asia.<\/em><\/p>\n CP:<\/strong> I\u2019m curious to get your opinion on this. You\u2019ve been in the music business for so many years now, so between technological innovations and the economic situation, what have you done to continue to be successful in this business? I know you touched on making more personal appearances, so has that been the main change?<\/em><\/p>\n HH:\u00a0<\/strong> For the last 10-13 years or so, that really has been my main thing. During that time, I did my inspirational album called, \u201cThe Journey\u201d. Then I did another R&B album called, \u201cIf Only\u201d, and then I\u2019ve also done a ton of other stuff with different people like George Duke, Brian Culbertson. I\u2019ve done a whole bunch of different projects with them.<\/em><\/p>\n As far as the recording situation now, it\u2019s really funny. The state that it\u2019s in now is one that I really dig; I really like it. I dig the fact that you can control your own product. I like the fact that you don\u2019t have to put out a total complete album before you can put anything out. If I\u2019m working on something and I think it\u2019s hot and I think the public and my fans will dig it, then we can put a single out there on iTunes and Amazon. Get a good digital distribution company behind you, and then just put it out there. Get someone that\u2019s really into the whole internet situation\u2014 YouTube, Facebook, all that. Put together a nice little package, and you\u2019re set. When you do videos nowadays, it\u2019s not made for the big screen anymore like it was with Michael and all those people back in the day. Now it\u2019s made for this little iPhone that I\u2019m talking on right now. Someone can do an internet campaign and a YouTube campaign and get some buzz going.<\/em><\/p>\n With the recording industry right now, you don\u2019t really make records to make money. I\u2019m not going to make a lot of money on $.99 per track. But if you make a lot of noise, and people out there start acknowledging it, you can do it.<\/em><\/p>\n One thing about me is that I always know where I am in my career and in certain aspects of it.\u00a0 Right now, commercial radio and Howard Hewett, we\u2019re not bedfellows, you know what I mean? There were times when we were, times when we weren\u2019t, times when we were again, and times when we weren\u2019t. The whole thing is how you deal with the ebbs and flows of your career. When you put out a project now, it\u2019s not really to make money from it always; it\u2019s meant to fuel the peripherals like your appearances and other things you want to get into, some other branding situations.<\/em><\/p>\n I love the way the business is now. I absolutely love it. You just have so much more control.<\/em><\/p>\n CP:<\/strong> I saw a tweet from you a few weeks ago that you mentioned working in your home studio. Are you self-producing and recording everything from your house these days?<\/em><\/p>\n HH:<\/strong> I have a work studio at the house where I work on ideas and stuff. If I was to bring in someone that would deal with the equipment that I had, like an engineer or something, I could probably do some good projects here. Basically I put something together here and then go into the studio and do it.<\/em><\/p>\n CP:<\/strong> Do you still write a good majority of your own material?<\/em><\/p>\n HH:<\/strong> I write a lot of it. I never say that I only do my own material because you never know where a hit song or a great song is going to come from. For example, I always use that song I did back in the day, \u201cOnce, Twice, Three Times\u201d. I got the track for that song from this guy named Kenny Aubrey who was a skycap at LAX!<\/em><\/p>\n CP:<\/strong> (Laughs) Now how did that happen?<\/em><\/p>\n HH:<\/strong> I would fly in and out of LAX all the time, and I would see this guy all the time. He used to say, \u201cHoward, I got this track for you!\u201d It was just a rough track of an idea he had. And now, this will tell you how far back it was, but I told him to put it on a cassette for me (laughs).<\/em><\/p>\n Finally one day I flew in, and I saw him, and sure enough he had that cassette! So I took it from him and listened to it at Hancock Park. It was a real rough track\u2014 it sounded like he did it on a four track or something. But I could hear where the music was going. It put me in the mind of one of those slow grind songs. So I called my band, and we tweaked and rerecorded everything, and I wrote the lyrics and the melody to it.<\/em><\/p>\n You never know where you\u2019re going to get a hit song. When I say I write most of my stuff, ok, I wrote \u201cSay Amen\u201d, \u201cI\u2019m For Real\u201d, but those things were collaborations. I wrote, \u201cI\u2019m For Real\u201d with Stanley Clarke! We produced that one together. I write a lot of my stuff, but I don\u2019t limit myself to that.<\/em><\/p>\n CP:<\/strong> What\u2019s usually your jumping off point for a song?<\/em><\/p>\n HH:<\/strong> It\u2019s a lot of different things. The majority of it has to do with inspiration for me anyway. But a lot of times I get a track from somebody or a keyboard player or a guitar player, and then I sit down and put some scraps together. There\u2019s a lot of different ways to get to the main thing, which is a good solid song! I\u2019ve always been about solid songs. It\u2019s really hard for me to write a nonsense song that doesn\u2019t really mean anything. Like I said, there\u2019s different ways that I come to that one common place.<\/em><\/p>\n On my album \u201cIf Only\u201d there\u2019s a tune called \u201cEnough\u201d. I had the hook of that song:<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cWas I there enough\/ Did we share enough\/ Was there times when we made love and chilled in the tub enough\/ Is it fair enough to say in the end it really wasn\u2019t real enough\/ Did we feel enough\/ Was our commitment to honesty enough to say that enough is enough?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n I had that floating around in my head for about 2 years before Mickey Howard\u2019s son, Brandon Howard, who I\u2019ve known since he was like 5 years old used to come and run around at gigs that Mickey and I used to do back in the day. Now he\u2019s in his late twenties or something, and he\u2019s a great writer and producer. He brought me this track that was perfect for the mood of the thing. So I finished the rest of the song, and then I took it to George Duke and he and I produced it together.<\/em><\/p>\n In that case, the inspiration was the lyric and hook I already had before I wrote the rest of the song.<\/em><\/p>\n CP:<\/strong> Looking back on your career, you\u2019ve had a ton of accomplishments, and you\u2019ve really been an iconic voice of contemporary R&B.<\/em><\/p>\n HH:<\/strong> I\u2019ll tell you one of the things that has happened, and you\u2019re the first person I\u2019ll say this to because I haven\u2019t sent all of the materials to them yet, but I\u2019ve had something that made me sit down and think about it and really look at my whole career come up recently. As you\u2019re going, you\u2019re just going. You\u2019re just doing your thing working your butt off, resting, having fun, then working your butt off, resting, and having more fun (laughs). But a few months ago, I got a letter from the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C. and they\u2019re building a wing for the history of black music. They got in touch with me wanting me to be a part of that whole thing and send something in that really chronicles my entire career.<\/em><\/p>\n CP:<\/strong> Wow, that\u2019s an honor!<\/em><\/p>\n HH:<\/strong> Yes. And when we talk about Howard Hewett and the recording stage of the whole thing, there was a whole other part before that. I started recording when I was twenty-two or so. I was twenty-three when I first got with Shalamar. But I\u2019ve been singing professionally since I was 10 years old. So now they want me to span all the way from 10 years old to now. That made me kind of sit down and take pause for a minute and praise the Lord because I\u2019m still viable in this thing. That\u2019s a long long time, and it\u2019s something I\u2019m very proud of.<\/em><\/p>\n When I first got into this, my first thing was asking myself how I could achieve longevity in this thing.\u00a0 This is a business that I love; it\u2019s a business that I respect. It wasn\u2019t like I wanted to get in, make a bunch of money, and get out. I am a musician, a vocal musician. Even when I was a kid, I wanted to develop a style. I wanted to sound like Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye, and then when I looked at what made them unique, I realized that they were just unique. When you hear Marvin, you know it\u2019s Marvin. When you hear Stevie or Donnie Hathaway, you know it\u2019s them. My thing was always for people to say, \u201cOh, I know this is Howard Hewett.\u201d So I had to take my foundation, my influences, and then roll them up and put my own thing on top of there that would become a unique sound. That was one of my goals at 14 or 15 years old.<\/em><\/p>\n CP:<\/strong> Well congratulations! Looks like you nailed it!<\/em><\/p>\n HH:<\/strong> Thank you.<\/em><\/p>\n CP:<\/strong> Tell me a little about your upcoming show at Anthology!<\/em><\/p>\n HH:<\/strong> We\u2019re going to have a lot of fun! I\u2019m doing this show with a partner of mine who has been my musical director on and off for years. We wrote \u201cSay Amen\u201d together. His name is Monty Seward. He\u2019s going to be there with me, and he may do a song during the course of the show. But the other really exciting part of the show is that I\u2019m doing this one with my son, Christopher. He\u2019s played guitar since he was 5, he\u2019s got an incredible voice, and I\u2019ve taken him out on the road with me periodically over the last few years. He\u2019s 22 now, and that\u2019s just really exciting to me. We\u2019ll probably do an acoustic version of \u201cEnough\u201d, so it\u2019ll be really nice.<\/em><\/p>\n I want this to be a really nice laid back show. The club really lends itself to that. I played there with Brian Culbertson a few years ago, and so it really lends itself to that intimacy. I want everyone to have a good time and have fun!<\/em><\/p>\n Special thanks to Howard for his time! Be sure to come on out, and get ready for some romance!<\/p>\n Howard Hewett on Spotify<\/a><\/p>\n WHAT: <\/em>This is for the Lover in You featuring Howard Hewett<\/strong><\/em> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" An Interview with Howard Hewett By: Casey Pukl Howard Hewett may be best known for his time with the group Shalamar and his string of solo hits including, “Say Amen”, but his career reaches back over a full decade before he appeared on Soul Train. Recently, I had the opportunity to catch up with Hewett […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":5906,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1442],"tags":[11512],"class_list":["post-5875","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artists","tag-artist-interviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5875","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5875"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5875\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32922,"href":"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5875\/revisions\/32922"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/anthologysd.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/howardhewett_lg.jpeg\" "\\"howardhewett_lg\\"")
<\/a>Howard Hewett may be best known for his time with the group Shalamar and his string of solo hits including, “Say Amen”, but his career reaches back over a full decade before he appeared on Soul Train.<\/p>\n
\nWHEN: <\/span>Saturday, April 21, 7:30 & 9:30 pm<\/strong><\/em>
\nTICKETS: $13-$46 <\/span>Buy Tickets<\/a><\/em>
\nMORE INFO: <\/span>Artist Profile<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n