The incomparable musical figure Quincy Jones, who passed on Nov. 3 at the age of 91, had a long relationship with the Frost School of Music, Dean Shelton G. Berg, and the University of Miami.
Jones received an honorary degree from the University of Miami in 1999, together with Cuban musical icon Celia Cruz. It’s one more testament to the enormous breadth of Jones’s career and influence, a 28-GRAMMY winning producer, composer, bandleader, and arranger with a tremendous capacity for connecting people, genres, and scenes.
Jones, who lived in Los Angeles, was a longtime friend of Berg, who spent 26 years at the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music as a professor, chair of jazz studies, and endowed professor until coming to lead the Frost School in 2007. An acclaimed pianist, arranger and composer, Berg became friends with Jones in the course of performing and working with him multiple times.
Berg’s memories of Jones, or ‘Q,’ as he was known, provide a glimpse of the warmth, charisma, and brilliance that helped make him such an influential and beloved figure.
“He remembered everyone, and I’m sure he knew thousands of people by name,” remembers Berg. “He treated everyone the same. If you were with him, he was interested in you and gave you his attention.”
“Any evening at Q’s house lasted until the following morning. Even then, I wished it hadn’t ended, because of all of the stories, anecdotes, and words of wisdom.”
Berg was privileged to get close-up glimpses of Jones’s brilliance, like at one show they did together at the Hollywood Bowl.
“As we rehearsed a piece with the orchestra that he had composed decades earlier, Q said, “This is missing 16 measures at the opening”,” Berg recalls. “He called for some score paper and, within minutes, had re-written the orchestra passage from memory. That was a ‘wow’ moment for me.”
A big part of Jones’s career was as a composer of film scores, including “The Color Purple” and “The Out-of-Towners.” He was an admirer of Henry Mancini, the legendary film and television composer whose legacy is carried on at the Frost School’s Henry Mancini Institute (HMI), which Berg brought to the Frost School from L.A. The HMI Orchestra frequently performs at events honoring their namesake, like a recent concert they played at the Library of Congress.
In 2017, Jones joined the HMI Orchestra at a benefit concert in L.A., which included luminaries like Julie Andrews and Kristin Chenoweth. Afterward, Jones took time to talk with the awestruck Frost School students. The moment was one more example of how Jones’s generosity and love for music helped him influence so many.
