Swing and twang

This marks the 38th year for the North Carolina Jazz Festival, which returns to the Hilton Wilmington Riverside Feb. 1-3.

Along with the many top players who are returning for the festival, there's a first-timer in the mix: Jazz banjo player and singer Cynthia Sayer, who'll join more than a dozen other jazz musicians for a series of improv-heavy, traditional jazz sets at the festival.

Actually, calling Sayer a first-timer seems a little unfair. She's been an acclaimed player for decades, a swing-heavy genre-jumper who can transition between hot jazz, classical, Great American Songbook classics and more with ease. She's a member of The American Banjo Hall of Fame and a founding member of Woody Allen's jazz band, and has been called one of the best 4-string banjo players in the world.

In recent years, the New-York-based Sayer has taken a deeper interest in music education -- she helped develop a popular play-along program called "You're IN the Band" -- and will teach a workshop to students at the Girls Leadership Academy of Wilmington while she's in town for the festival.

I caught up with Sayer via phone to ask her a few questions about jazz, the banjo and being a woman in what is still a largely male-dominated field. The interview has been condensed for length and clarity.

Need a break? Play the USA TODAY Daily Crossword Puzzle.

This is your first time playing the N.C. Jazz Festival. Had you heard of it before?

Oh yes. There are many colleagues (on the bill) I've played with a zillion times over the years, so the quality of players, that makes a statement about the festival right there. Also, I was just knocked out by (festival director) Sandy (Evans). What an impressive woman.

How did you get into playing jazz?

Music was a hobby for me, but I didn't know anything about jazz. I had no exposure to it at all. I grew up in New Jersey. I took piano lessons starting from when I was 6 years old, and then in school music programs I took viola, and then it was popular to play guitar so I bought a guitar. I was master of none. It was just sort of fun. And then one day at our school talent show I watched what was called '"the dance band." It wasn't called the jazz band, I don't even know if I knew the word jazz. I saw the drum set and I went home and said, "I want a drum set!"

Every parent's nightmare.

Yes. And they said, "Absolutely not" (laughs). We had kind of a battle about it, and I came back from school two weeks later and there was a banjo lying on my bed. I knew instantly that I wouldn't get my drums. I mean, banjos in New Jersey, I had literally never seen one before. It ended up, just by a sheer fluke, that there was a woman in our town who had placed an ad in the local paper to teach banjo. So my parents had called her, "Listen, we're trying to distract our daughter from drums." I had no idea at the time how rare it was that there would be a woman banjo player. She was a professional player (named Patty Fischer) and she had moved to the suburbs, but she had played all over the world. She was a very important influence on me, and ended up being the one who introduced me to jazz.

When do you realize you were pretty good at this banjo thing?

It wasn't that I thought I was good. I was an English major planning to go to law school. And somehow, I don't even know how I was smart enough to do this, I decided to take some time and wait a year and have fun being a musician because I was already playing gigs. And then I never went (to law school) and I felt guilty about it for years. It took me a while to figure out that giving joy and pleasure to the world is a nice contribution to make, and it was perfectly OK to do for a living something that you love.

It sounds like you're going to return the favor when you're in Wilmington by playing a workshop for GLOW, the Girls' Leadership Academy of Wilmington.

That's right. Doing programs for kids and especially for girls, when I started -- and it is so not this way anymore -- I knew two women who played. That was it. I was touring for a good 10 or 15 years before I ever saw another woman instrumentalist in my genre (of traditional jazz). It was like a desert out there. Now, it's so uplifting to see wonderful talent of all ages, women artists in this genre.

Are you going to sing at the festival as well as play?

Yes. I consider myself a player first and a singer second. And by the way, that's a long, funny prejudice people have. As soon as they see you're female, they just assume you're the band singer. I'll do a concert where I'll play every tune and maybe sing three, and someone will go, "Oh, there's the singer."

Being in a profession that's so male-dominated, have you had to deal with sexism over the years?

When I was younger, yes. It was a problem and I did have to deal with it on a pretty regular basis. Once in a blue moon from musicians, but most musicians only care if you can play. If you can play, they love you. If you can't play, they're like, 'Eh.'

Has how people perceive banjo changed over the years? For a time it was associated strictly with bluegrass, but maybe people like you and Rhiannon Giddens of the Carolina Chocolate Drops have started to change that.

And, of course, Bela Fleck has really been the original one who broke out the stereotypes of banjo. Now banjo's totally cool, and for years it wasn't. I'm definitely grateful to be able to feel that and have that appreciation for my instrument.

You played for years with Woody Allen, whose reputation has taken a beating recently in light of the #MeToo movement. Does that give you pause to continue to associate yourself with him when other people, mostly actors, have said they won't work with him again?

I don't know if this is being a little naive or Pollyanna-ish or whatever, but I think of music as a healer and a joiner. We're so separated now, we're so polarized, I guess I'm reluctant to take any stance through music that's divisive. (Editor's note: After this story published, Sayer reached out via email to clarify her answer to this question: "I can’t comment about Woody Allen. I’ve heard both sides and don’t presume to know the truth. However, as one of the literally countless number of #MeToo women and men, I can comment that this movement affects me to my core. I’m so hopeful that true cultural change is actually happening! And I think of music as a healer and a joiner. It’s one of many things that I find so rewarding about doing this for my living.")

Contact John Staton at 910-343-2343 or John.Staton@StarNewsOnline.com.

Want to go?

What: 38th annual North Carolina Jazz Festival

When: Feb. 1-3

Where: Hilton Wilmington Riverside, 301 N. Water St., Wilmington

Info: Tickets are $15-$40 for Feb. 1; $15-$60 for Feb. 2-3.

Details: NCjazzfestival.com

SCHEDULE

Feb. 1

• 7:35 p.m. Mangroove, presenting a tribute to Horace Silver
• 8:20 p.m. The Nicki Parrott Trio
• 9:35 p.m. Rossano Sportiello, solo jazz piano
• 9:55 p.m. Traditional jazz jam led by Adrian Cunningham

Feb. 2-3

Starting at 7:30 p.m., seven sets featuring different jazz musicians, each set with a different bandleader. Musicians include Cynthia Sayer (banjo), Nate Najar (guitar), Jonathan Russell (violin), Debbie Kennedy and Herman Burney (bass), Chuck Redd and Eddie Metz Jr. (drums), Rossano Sportiello and Conal Fowkes (piano), Adrian Cunningham and Scott Robinson (reeds), and Bruce Harris and Ed Polcer (trumpet/cornet).