Jazz bassist Stanley Clarke embraces old Scouts motto

Stanley Clarke is a master virtuoso on acoustic and electric bass, and he applies those skills and sensibilities toward an open-ended musical journey through life.

“At a young age, I went to New York, was well-liked and quiet ... one year later, I'm playing with jazz icons like Chick Corea, Tony Williams and Stan Getz,” said Clarke, during a phone conversation. “How many 19-year-olds get that opportunity? If you equate those experiences to money, I'm a multimillionaire with the bestest and the mostest you can get.”

The Stanley Clarke Band, whose self-titled CD took home the 2011 Grammy award for Best Contemporary Jazz album, makes a stop at Lincolnshire's new Viper Alley for a 7 p.m. Wednesday show. Sharing the bill with Clarke is jazz guitarist Victor Wooten's band.

“We're looking forward to having these two respected bands, during this, our first month of operation,” said Paul Panicali, the venue's director of entertainment.

Clarke's past collaborations and stints in touring bands range from Jeff Beck and Pharaoh Sanders to a recurring role in Return To Forever with Corea, drummer Lenny White and guitarist Al Di Meola.

“We just finished a tour in Australia with the fourth version of the band that included Jean-Luc Ponty on violin, and it sounds better each time out,” he said. “My band is out on tour with Victor (Wooten) now, and I'm kind of between projects. What I'm personally doing is recording classical pieces on bass, Bach cello suites, for a CD. Later, there'll be a collection of pieces pulled from film scores that I've composed over the years.”

One of the collaborations he'd like to revisit is 1995's much-revered Rite Of Strings trio with Ponty, White and himself. “We'll see. The three of us, we could have recorded five albums ... the whole thing was right off the cuff, musicians getting ideas that just fell together in a very unique way, and the momentum carried us through a short tour.”

Some of Clarke's improvisational playing has been likened to John Coltrane's sax explorations in their adventurous phrasing and emotion. “I'm a big Coltrane fan. He was the first jazz musician to bring a spiritual quality to his music, not playing just to be hip. I was too young to know at the time, but to convey love, sadness, it was more than sheets of sound. Technique is easy but there has to be a meaning behind it. He was honest.

“I want to tap into that influence, although I'm not conscious of it in my playing,” he said. “I was 16 or 17, when the chance came to play for McCoy Tyner (of (the original Coltrane Quartet), and it was the most exciting thing ever, almost like soaking up the residue of Coltrane through McCoy ... I'd hate for all the piano player friends of mine to read this.”

Clarke also maintains his biggest life lesson is to be ready. “Be prepared. I just clicked on this ... as a kid, I was big into the Boy Scouts with piling up merit badges, camping and such. This one scoutmaster always harped on the ‘be prepared' motto, maybe 20 times a day. I think maybe he was gearing me up to carry a gun, or something. Yet, that motto and that discipline took hold, and to this day, I practice on bass like a demon.”