Duncan Hopkins’ latest album pays tribute to two unsung Canadian jazz heroes

Local jazz bassist Duncan Hopkins’ new album is the tale of two unsung legends.

The more obvious subject of “Who Are You? The Music of Kenny Wheeler” is the late Toronto-born trumpeter, flugelhorn player and educator who spent the majority of his career across the Atlantic, carving out a rather enviable niche for himself as a prolific composer and recording artist while working with jazz icons like John Dankworth, Keith Jarrett and Norma Winstone, with whom he formed the trio Azimuth.

The less obvious legend is one confined to the Niagara region and to whom the album is dedicated: Warren Stirtzinger.

The connection?

“Warren introduced me to Kenny,” said Hopkins, a former member of the Grammy- and Juno-winning Rob McConnell and the Boss Brass who, like Wheeler and Stirtzinger, grew up in St. Catharines, Ont.

“He showed me everything. Musically, I don’t think there’s a day that goes by where I don’t think, ‘Oh yeah, I remember Warren told me about this.’ And Kenny was one of my main musical influences.”

Hopkins is premiering a few Wheeler works with the new album, including the three-song “St. Catharines Suite” that includes “Salina Street” — which the trumpeter called home — and “Kitts,” after the city’s nickname “St. Kitts.” Hopkins rounds out the suite with a composition of his own, “Montebello,” named after a large park in the city.

“Ken’s formative years were all in St. Catharines,” said Hopkins, who recruited ace Toronto guitarists Reg Schwager and Ted Quinlan, and drummer Michel Lambert for the eight-song effort that features seven Wheeler compositions.

“The story that I heard is that his dad gave him money to go to McGill (University in Montreal) and he basically took the money, got on a boat, went to England, married quickly, set himself up and he never left,” Hopkins said.

Additional research revealed that Wheeler was born in Toronto on Jan. 14, 1930; his family moved around Ontario before settling in St. Catharines 15 years later; his semi-pro trombonist father introduced his son to the cornet and, after becoming smitten with the music of notable jazz trumpet players Roy Eldridge, Clifford Brown and Art Farmer, Kenny Wheeler graduated from the Royal Conservatory of Music.

He pursued a career in England rather than the U.S. because he wanted to avoid the draft (in those days, visiting residents of the U.S. could be pressed into military service), relocated to Leytonstone, East London; married wife Doreen and quickly established himself as a first-rate composer, recording “Windmill Tilter: The Story of Don Quixote” in 1968 with John Dankworth.

In the ’70s, Wheeler began recording both as a leader and a sideman for the German ECM label.

Aside from being comfortable with traditionalist jazz. Wheeler also dabbled in free improv with such pioneers of the movement as Derek Bailey and Anthony Braxton — and was well-received by British and European artists for his trail-blazing work.

And although he lived in England, he would visit his hometown a few times a year, seeking out musicians he appreciated to either jam or record with.

One of the musicians he sought out was Stirtzinger, whose Warren Stirtzinger Group filled the Port Mansion bar with a weekly residency.

Unlike Wheeler, guitarist Stirtzinger had found his niche locally and had no interest in performing beyond the Niagara region and Buffalo. Stirtzinger often accompanied Guido Basso and pianist John Sherwood, and was also a revered banjo player, performing with a number of Dixieland combos in Niagara.

One day while in town, Wheeler stopped at a Tim Hortons where the jazz players hung out and asked Stirtzinger what he was up to musically.

“Warren mentioned that he was playing in a six-guitar band in Buffalo and, the next morning, Kenny showed up to the Tim Hortons and he had an 18- to 20-page score of a six-guitar-part composition that he had written,” Hopkins recalled. “I remember it clearly: on the front of it, it said, ‘This could be part of the St. Catharines Suite … if it’s any good’ … the usual self-deprecating Kenny Wheeler humour.”

Stirtzinger took the composition — the aforementioned “Salina Street” — to his Buffalo guitar ensemble, but they couldn’t play it.

“Warren said it was beyond their capability, maybe a little too modern,” said Hopkins, who kept the manuscript until he was able to put it on this latest album, which he’ll celebrate with two gigs at the Ethiopian restaurant Hirut on June 15 and 16.

Hopkins later studied with Wheeler in Banff, where the latter taught students a few weeks every year.

“At that time of meeting him, I didn’t have a clue as to who he was,” Hopkins admitted. “I didn’t know his music. I was very young …

“I loved his writing. It was full of the tradition of jazz, but at the same time it was very different and modern. It was written in almost the way classical music was written.”

Despite their 35-year age difference, Hopkins and Wheeler formed a fast friendship and, when Hopkins relocated to England to teach at the Royal Academy of Music, Wheeler took him to his favourite Indian restaurant and told him “so many wonderful stories of being on the road with different people, including (jazz saxophonist) Stan Getz; things I had no idea about.”

Wheeler also played on Hopkins’ first album, “La Rouge,” in 1994.

Wheeler died in 2014; Stirtzinger died two years later.

“Who Are You? The Music of Kenny Wheeler” is Hopkins’ opportunity to pay tribute to both and shed more light on Wheeler, whom he calls “an unsung hero.”

“When you travel the world you see a better picture of his impact, certainly in Europe; they really appreciated him a little more, and more in Europe than even in England …

“For me, it’s important for me to be an ambassador of his music. This project is to keep Kenny’s music alive and play it forward if I can.”

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