taken from an interview with ken Lewis
DX: What are some pros and cons of working with 'Ye? What’s the most fun to do with him, and what’s the worst to deal with?
Ken Lewis: Usually, I don’t work in the same room with him. He’ll call me up, ask me what he needs, and let me do my work at my studio. Most of what I do for Kanye involves me creating music in one way or another, and all of my tools to create music the best way are at my own studio.
There have been occasions…one time, he called me before the 2005 Grammy Awards. He asks me, “Ken, what are you doing today?” I say, “Whatever you want me to be doing.” [Laughs] That’s pretty much my stock answer whenever he calls. He says, “Come to New York. I need you to make an interlude for my Grammy performance, live.“ I’m like, “Okay.” So I literally brought my entire studio to Sony Music Studios, I think the only thing I used at Sony was their chair. Kanye comes in, and he’s like, “After 'Jesus Walks,' it’s going to be me up in silhouette, and then I want this big, cinematic, sweeping orchestral thing. Then there’s going to go into a car crash, I’m going to die, and the angels are going to take me away into a gospel song. I need you to do the big, sweeping orchestral thing.” I’m like, “Sure, I can do that, no problem.” He doesn’t say, “Do you know how to make the big, sweeping orchestral thing?” He just says, “This is what you’re doing.” This is Kanye, I’ll find a way to do this on an amazing level. He hums me a basic melody, and that’s it. It was a 10-minute meeting, he comes in, gives me this animated rundown of what he wants, hums a basic melody, and says, “Go.” He never came back to the studio. Fourteen hours later, I was finished creating the orchestral interlude, and a week later, I was sitting at the Staples Center on the floor at the Grammy Awards, watching Kanye perform “Jesus Walks” into my interlude.
You never know what a day is going to be like with Kanye. I think on of the craziest things about what I do with him and for him, is it’s never the same thing. Sometimes I’ll do sample recreations for him, because I’m pretty much the go-to guy for that—I hate doing them, but I’m good at them. It’s tedious, grueling work, but somebody’s got to do it, and I seem to be the best. I did the horn arrangements on
“All Of The Lights”
. Again, he gives me this really basic melody, he calls me up and he’s like, “Ken, I need you to do a horn section on this. Here’s the melody, I just need you to blow it up into this big,” whatever he was telling me he wanted it to sound like. That was extent of the conversation: five minutes. I went, brought in my horn section, did the whole thing here, sent it back to him and he loved it. That’s what made the record. But he didn’t ask me before he hired me, “Hey, do you know how to arrange horns?” [Laughs] You might think that would be the first question, but he never asks me. I guess I’ve come through for him in so many crazy roles over the past few years, he pretty much figures, “Ken will figure out how to do it, so we’ll send it to him.” It’s a pretty good position to be in. I seem to be not be one of his inner circle guys, but I work on every one of his albums, and he knows whatever he asks me to do, I’ll get it done in a great way—I hope.
from gs
As far as last minute Kanye requests, well, it would take an artist of almost equal caliber on my plate on a tight deadline for me to not drop everything else i'm doing when Kanye calls with a tight deadline. I've been working with him since long before the College Dropout and if he needs me, he's got me. If i lose another client over it, well, you know what, Kanye's been a great client for like 9 years now, I'll survive. And of course i would do everything in my power imaginable to not piss off any other clients ever, but if it came down to a choice, welllllll
As far as horn players not being available, thats exactly what happened for "New Day". It was a super last minute call. all my first call horn guys were unavailable, but they are all super pro's and they recommended other excellent players for me who showed up on a moments notice.
Someone asked if i write horn charges with a pen, or just musically, or ??? With "New Day" the turn around time for it was so short, i got the call at 1pm and had to deliver a finished section to the Mercer by 7pm. I wrote the horn parts mostly in my head in the car on the way to the studio in Manhattan with the song on loop. When i got to the studio, i just vibed with the horn players and worked them out, changed up a few things, tried a couple other ideas on the fly, it all worked out and i was at the Mercer by about 7:15pm with finished, comp'd, blended mixed horn section. It wasnt a hugely difficult part, and Kanye set out the basic melody for me, so i just had to arrange and record it for a section. Not easy but not overly challenging for me. All Of The Lights was MUCH more work.
you also gotta keep in mind that when you are dealing with great session players, they pick up on things really quickly, they mostly play really well in tune with feel. things go fast if i have my ish together.
