Among the recent accomplishments of Richmonder Nate Smith — in addition to netting a pair of Grammy Awards — is his appointment as artistic director of the Newport Jazz Festival, an event in Rhode Island that since 1954 has served as an annual overview of the contemporary jazz scene.
The drummer’s in rarified company: Only festival founder George Wein and bassist Christian McBride have booked the show’s lineup. This July, Smith’s overseeing a bill that includes sets by Richmond’s Butcher Brown, as well as another performance by the group’s drummer, Corey Fonville.
As preparation, Smith — who will helm his own Live-Action band at the festival — reviewed a list of ensembles that played at the Rhode Island event during the past five years.
“There's a responsibility I feel to maintain what I think was the main legacy of George Wein — which was number one to platform these artists who are playing incredible music, but also to present the full spectrum of jazz,” the drummer said during an interview at a University of Richmond music rehearsal space. “His first Newport, he presented it as jazz from J to Z. In his mind, it's not just swing, it's not just bebop — it's all of it. ... It's a little daunting.”
Smith’s own history at Newport includes multiple appearances that stretch back to 2004, when he first played there with bassist Dave Holland, a bandleader the Chesapeake-born drummer connected with while attending grad school at Virginia Commonwealth University.
Holland, who still records and tours, did stints in groups led by Miles Davis, Chick Corea and scores of others while also issuing work under his own name. The bassist was in town working with VCU students and, as Smith recalled, picked him out of the class to say the two should keep in touch.
Calls to pick up gigs with the bassist began in 1999 and 2000 with Smith eventually joining Holland’s band full-time in New York the following fall. About a week after arriving, the Sept. 11th attacks happened, sending not just the city, but the country into a panic. It shut down performances, Smith said, recalling empty streets and subways.
He’d picked up a part-time teaching gig and worked live gigs when he could, but said that time was a “freak-out moment” for him.
“No one was really working or touring for a while after that. I was just kind of doing jam sessions and hanging, and making my little check from this thing — you know, crashing on my homeboy's couch,” the drummer said.
After a sense of normalcy returned to the city, Smith accompanied the bassist on a 3-month European excursion and became a member of the Chris Potter Underground, led by the well-known saxophonist.
During the next decade, the drummer toured and recorded with a litany of performers. But by the early 2010s, Smith said, he’d hit a rough patch. There were still gigs to play — just fewer of them. But he also reached a place in his own development where he was able to tell his own story through composition.
“I started to understand the intersection I occupy,” he said, while “playing stuff that had a little bit more hip-hop or breakbeat information.”
What resulted was a pair of “Kinfolk” albums, insinuating a world of influence tied as much to his father’s listening habits as to his own jazz education and a decade’s worth of playing in New York.
Since that first “Kinfolk” album in 2017, Smith’s appeared on dozens of recordings that span rock, soul, funk and jazz — and realized during the pandemic that he didn’t need to be in New York. After a brief stop in Nashville, he moved back to Richmond in 2023 — in part, he said to be closer to his family.
“I got a chance to sort of hang out in Richmond for a couple days. And I was like, ‘Man, this feels different than how I remember. This feels really different, you know?” Smith said about coming to town in 2021 with pianist Jason Moran to perform at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. “It was kind of like reintroducing myself to the city.”
Fathers — the drummer’s latest project — issued its self-titled debut on Blue Note this summer. The trio, which also counts keyboardist Keifer and bassist Carrtoons, relies on Smith’s mix of American musics and sets the compositions alongside a rich cast of vocal collaborators.
Carrtoons — a New York-based performer, whose name is Ben Carr — said he’s been a fan of the drummer for years.
“I just thought it would be a cool little thing that we do at a jazz festival, as you do sometimes. And sometimes, you get to rub shoulders with people that you admire and it's over,” Carr said about Smith putting the ensemble together for a residency a few years back. “Luckily, this was a situation where Nate really has taken me and Keifer under his wing — taking us on the road quite a bit.”
Smith said the album felt “really personal” — a fitting emotion for a musician returning home while maintaining an international audience.
“I've enjoyed the warmth of the city, the warmth of the people,” he said about Richmond, while discussing the occupational need to travel. “I can still get where I need to go, you know what I mean? I'll just budget in a connection, and it's fine.”