Photo by Andrew Haworth
Skipp Pearson
Age: 76
Hometown: Born in Orangeburg; now living in Columbia
Careers: 32 years as a music educator in Bamberg, Clarendon and Orangeburg counties; jazz performer since his late teens
Favorite Haunt: Le Café Jazz in Columbia
Names: Christened as Thales Thomas Pearson; nicknamed “Skipp,” by a girl in high school who declined his company because he “skipped around too much”; also answers to “Pops”
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When the music starts, Skipp Pearson moves. Even seated, he dances—shoulders lifting, torso swaying, fingers snapping, head bobbing, foot tapping.
“That’s where jazz is, in the spaces between the two and the four,” Pearson explains, counting the beats.
When he plays his tenor sax—“my girl,” he says—it’s clear the jazz is also in the man.
Jazz music resonated with Pearson from the first time he heard it as a boy. He spent much of his youth sneaking around juke joints and peeking through flaps on concert tents so he could hear what the jazz musicians inside were playing. When he sat in on a schoolmate’s saxophone lesson, he knew: “I need to know how to do that.”
He picked up tips from experienced players, taught himself to read music, paid the high school band director 50 cents for lessons.
“That’s partially how you get it done—you get the training,” says Pearson, who later earned a music degree from Claflin College. “The music comes from the heart. It has to be you.”
After living a jazzman’s life—playing clubs in U.S. and European cities, performing for President Obama and S.C. governors, sharing a stage with the likes of Patti LaBelle, Wynton Marsalis and Otis Redding—Pearson is the state’s own treasure-trove of jazz experience. Wherever possible, he passes along his knowledge to talented younger musicians.
“You don’t learn from books—you learn from generations that knew before,” Pearson says, a gentle rasp in his velvety voice. “Sharing the music, playing, talking about it, jamming, listening to each other.”
Duly designated our official ambassador of jazz by the S.C. legislature, Pearson aims to inspire South Carolina to embrace its deep jazz heritage.
“I want jazz to be recognized here,” Pearson says, “because it’s been played here for a long time.”