The impact and legacy of singer-songwriter Jim Croce is significant. Though his professional career was relatively short due to his tragic early passing, the quality and durability of the songs he wrote and performed is indisputable. People throw the word “timeless” around liberally, but you’d be hard-pressed to describe songs like “Operator (That’s Not the Way it Feels)” and “I got a name” any other way. Though they evoke the era they’re from (The early 70’s to be exact), they resonate to this day. Croce’s stature has only increased with time, with new generations discovering and rediscovering his classic catalog.
Another one of Croce’s many legacies is his son A.J. While A.J. was very young when his father passed, he carried on his father’s musical tradition in a major way. An immensely talented and versatile piano player that has blossomed into an immensely talented multi-instrumentalist with eleven studio albums under his belt, A.J. is by now long-established as a musical force in his own right. His acclaimed catalog is eclectic and deep, and his career has seen him cross paths with a veritable who’s who of music royalty. In March, A.J. released Heart of The Eternal, a fantastic and varied eleven song album produced by Shooter Jennings.
With such a long career, and with his connection to such a famous body of work, it may come as a surprise to some that A.J. hasn’t until recently regularly performed his father’s music. In recent years however, that has changed. On shows dubbed “Croce plays Croce” A.J. has paid tribute to his father’s work, and his many connections to it. On Friday October 3rd, A.J. brings the Croce plays Croce tour to Minneapolis for a show at the Pantages theatre. The show, which sees A.J., and his band mix his father’s music with his own, and more. In our conversation, A.J. discussed how special performing this music has been, and the deep connection he feels to his father through music. It promises to be a very unique show and a must-see for fans of either Croce.
Below is an Interview with A.J. Croce. The following has been edited for consistency.
Music in Minnesota: I do want to start by asking about Croce plays Croce. What has been the most rewarding part of performing that catalog?
A.J. Croce: I think probably the most rewarding factor is the emotion I feel from the audience. People come to the show with a certain expectation of nostalgia, which of course they’re gonna have-we’re gonna play the hits and all of that. There’s so much more to it though and I think what happens in the show and what’s rewarding is that people come for a little piece of the past and what they get is they get brought to the present and they see this is three dimensional-something that is familiar for most of their lives- and then there’s this thing that brings It present. Me physically being there is one facet of it, but it creates an emotion that’s really profound and probably the most wonderful thing I felt from the show.
MIM: You balance your own musical voice with your father’s and these recordings. Do you ever feel pressure to play these songs in certain ways?
AC: There are certain songs that I will play a lot closer to the record because I Think there’s something about those songs that people feel is somehow sacred in it’s way. There are songs I treat with reverence in that regard. But music should be alive, and trying to recreate a recording to me is useless. There’s nothing artistic about that, that’s karaoke. I don’t want to be a cover band. This is a tribute to a legacy of music, a legacy of storytelling, live music and performance. The thing I learned most from my father was his gift of storytelling. So for me to just copy the records exactly would be disrespectful to the art of what he created.
MIM: You started on piano but also have played a lot of guitar throughout your career, do you bounce back and forth in this show?
AC: Yeah of course, a lot. This concert, Croce Plays Croce, I did a few shows in 2019 and a few in 2020 and a few in 2021, it was just trying to develop this concept of a show. It’s a lot more than me just standing up there playing music. We’ve got video behind us, there are stories that are tied to it. I wanted to make sure some of my music was a part of it as it related to the story. The music that Inspired my father and I as well, that was really critical to me as well in making a show that was living and breathing. There’s a song list every night, where there’s a beginning a middle and an end, I know we’re gonna play the hits for the people because they want to hear them but also every night we take requests. The audience is really in charge of deciding what they want to hear and creating the concert. They kind of choose their own adventure when they shout the song out that they want to hear. To me, that’s so much fun. As a musician who grew up improvising, playing jazz and blues and rock’n’roll-improvisational music-It gives me the chance to go from one place to another. Am I playing piano? Am I playing guitar? Electric piano on this? I’m moving around the stage a lot to play the songs that people want to hear. I think because every night is different, and every audience is different, and the mood of the venue is different, that’s really the reason why there’s so many people that have come to three or four concerts on a given tour. Every time they come it’s a little different.
MIM: I want to hone in on one thing you said that relates to something else. You talked about the music that inspired both you and your father. I know you’ve spoken about your father’s extensive and eclectic record collection being an inspiration. Can you speak to those shared early influences, and what inspired you to pick up the piano?
AC: There was a piano at my grandmother’s house in Philadelphia. From the earliest memories I had I was crawling up to that thing and plunking on it. It just drew me in. As a kid, I lost my sight. There was a piano at my house, an upright piano and I just gravitated towards it. Listening to the records, I always joke that Ray Charles was my gateway drug. When I couldn’t see, I would go through the records and put everything I loved on the left side, being left-handed. There was Mississippi John Hurt, and The Rolling Stones and Ray Charles and Solomon Burke and Otis Redding and Woody Guthrie and Jimmie Rodgers and Lefty Frizzell and Billie Holiday and there was all of this 50’s rock and roll-Fats Domino and Little Richard. Then when I was in my early thirties and just picking up guitar for the first time, there was this recording where he plays all of these songs, really obscure tunes that I Had been playing since I was twelve or thirteen. Never heard him play them, didn’t even know they were part of the record collection if they ever were. These were deep cuts by Fats Waller, Bessie Smith, Pink Anderson, all of these different artists and I had covered every one of these, as he was, preparing to play a little bar outside of Philly. And so, it was this connection that we had, it was more than just DNA, it was like we had the same tastes with the same artists. It was really deep, really obscure stuff. Not many people knew “You’re Not the Only Oyster in the Stew.” People didn’t know a lot of these songs so I realized that was kind of the foundation of how I thought if I were to ever do a Croce Plays Croce show at that time, that was how I thought, it had to have a piece of that connection.
MIM: That’s profound. You speak to the connection that you have to your father and the music. It’s crazy that you had so much in common.
AC: Oh, it gave me chills man, I’ll tell you, as this thing was playing and the next song came up, I was like “I can’t even believe this.” I was just completely in awe of what I was listening to at the time and archiving. That was the foundation of this, was the absolute love and inspiration of American music.
MIM: That last piece touches on something I wanted to ask about. So much of what you talk about connects to the “great American songbook” so to speak. You are, in the music you play-and certainly your father’s music as well-a piece of that songbook of great American music. I wanted to ask about another one of the great contributors to that that you’ve worked with. A hero of mine, and I imagine yours, was the late great Allen Toussaint. I wanted to ask you about him. He’s such an inspiration and a great piano-forward songwriter. What was working with him like and what did you learn from him?
AC: Man, we could talk about A.T. for such a long time because I was such a huge fan. As a kid, my mom used to sing me Lee Dorsey songs that my dad and her used to sing together when they were a duo in the 60’s. They used to do “Working in the Coal Mine” and some of those Allen Toussaint Songs. I didn’t really connect those songs to Allen until I was about thirteen. I went and saw a Jim Jasmusch Movie called “Stranger than Paradise” and “It’s raining” was used. I needed to know everything about it. I fell in love with Irma Thomas, but I fell in love with the whole sound, “how did they make this?” I knew Motown, I knew Stax, and I knew Muscle Shoals, but this Sound was familiar, and I didn’t know where it came from. It came from my childhood. It came from hearing Allen Toussaint songs performed by Lee Dorsey, and Irma Thomas, and Glen Campbell, and all of these wonderful artists who covered his songs and it’s all him.
We first met in southern California; I got a last-minute call to go and play a show with him. We ended up playing together and had this really cool connection. He ended the show by inviting me out and we played four-handed boogies together. And then every time I was in New Orleans after that playing-It didn’t matter if it was a hundred seat club or a bigger venue-he would pull up and come in and sit in with me. So I asked him if he would be interested in producing something, and I went to his house in New Orleans and played for him for two hours, which was a little terrifying because he’s sitting there taking notes, and writing chord chords and lyrics at the same time. I couldn’t tell if he likes it or doesn’t like it. I must have played for two hours straight. He said “alright, let’s do this thing.” It was only to do to two songs. After that, we just really connected. I kind of realized in working with him-and I’ve been so fortunate to work with so many great producers and arrangers that I’ve learned from-I think what I learned and discovered from working with him was that there’s a consistency among great producers, they are looking for this happy accident. Every one of them is open to a deviation in plans. If something goes sideways, there might be something that can be beautiful and magical and maybe make the song better. If someone plays something different than they were supposed to, the drummer plays a different groove in the B-section than was originally written, all of a sudden the song takes on a new life. With Allen and with every great producer I’ve worked with-John Simon or Mitchell Froom or Cowboy Jack Clement, you name it-they were always really open to those happy accidents and I remember with Allen asking “I hear a harmony part here and I hear a horn part here” and he said “we’ll do another pass.” So we do another pass on song, it was a song I had written with Leon Russell Called “Rollin On,” and I come in and he’s humming this part. I asked about it, and he said, “That’s the trombone part.” So all of a sudden, we had a horn section. And then we listened to it again. He calls his daughter, who was helping him, and asks her to call Erica Falls and a couple folks to sing. It was just like, right after I mentioned it, he didn’t really hear it at first, but he thought about it and it didn’t take a second of just hearing the way we played it the next pass that went “Oh, I hear what he’s saying, I think I hear the part too,” and that’s what ended up being on the recording. I just love his work.
