Photo by Don Berryman
"Sometimes you go to a club to play, and you're 19, and your entire audience is between 50 and 90, and it's like 'Wow! This is strange, I'm not playing for any of my peers whatsoever.'"

Young trumpeter Greg Paulus is barely out of his teens but already is a veteran performer at St. Paul's Artists Quarter. On breaks from the Manhattan School of Music (where he has a full scholarship), Twin Citians will likely have a few times each year to catch this monster-in-the-making when he has some down time in his studies, but don't wait. In another year, we'll probably have to travel to New York to hear him play.

Paulus comes by his musical chops honestly as the son of acclaimed St. Paul composer Stephen Paulus. In fifth grade, he decided on the trumpet, the same instrument some older friends played. Initially drawn to hip hop, he joined his middle school jazz band, and was soon hooked on big band and bebop. But he didn't take music seriously until his teacher at St. Paul Academy introduced him to improvisation, which young Greg adapted to hip hop charts. Improvisation opened a new world for Paulus, who notes that "you can play a song 15,000 times, and every time you play it, it's gonna be completely different...it's like you can take it in a million directions and half the time not even recognize it's the same tune you just played."

By age 14, Greg Paulus was spending every possible weekend listening to jazz at the Artists Quarter in St. Paul, chaperoned at first by his mother but eventually just getting dropped off and picked up, and hanging out and learning from the musicians he met. He also became a regular at the Dakota (then in St. Paul). He boldly introduced himself to performers, and his assertiveness served him well when he moved to New York for school and started jamming at every opportunity. "School can teach you arranging and chord theory, but the most important things happen in those jam sessions. You learn to get up in front of anybody, play with anybody, play anything. And you learn that when you're improvising, there are no wrong notes. You're just composing on the spot."

Photo by Don Berryman

During his first year at the Manhattan School of Music, Paulus spent many evenings jamming at Cleopatra's Needle. One night he spotted AQ owner Kenny Horst in the audience, and their meeting led to an invitation for Paulus to perform at the AQ when he was home on vacation. Says Horst about Paulus' dedication, "A lot of kids just give up because it's hard. Depends how hard you want do it and I see him as wanting to do it pretty badly. So, Greg will play his whole life... he's got it in him. You can't get it out. It's incurable."

Has Greg Paulus the jazz musician been influenced by Stephen Paulus, the classical composer? "His music is not atonal or really out, but he uses a lot of really interesting harmonies and dissonances that I've kind of picked up on," says the younger Paulus. "You have to kind of revamp your mind into thinking like 'Oh well, that's not a right note but it sounds interesting'... I've heard so much of his music and it doesn't sound wrong..."

He's still young and learning, more concerned with the freedom to improvise than music theory or reading charts, picking up sounds and ideas as he encounters them. "I'm just trying to play interesting things and still sound melodic. Hopefully, my own sound will come out of that," Paulus says. "I've put a ton of time into listening to Miles and Louis and Dizzy, and then there's Roy Hargrove and all the young trumpet players on the scene in New York. If I wind up sounding like Freddie Hubbard or Lee Morgan, that's not a bad thing at all."

This past March, Paulus appeared in the Twin Cities as a special guest, along with Wessell Anderson, with the Jazz is NOW! Orchestra. This weekend, he'll play with a local quartet. Catch him now while you can!