Famed for his seamless fusing of soul, jazz, funk and pop flavours, veteran keyboard wizard GEORGE DUKE has a new album out called 'Déjà Vu.' As he explains to Black Sheep's Charles Waring, it's an eclectic set whose source of inspiration is Duke's own rich and varied musical past.

"It was a trip," laughs big, bearded, George Duke, who's recalling the time some 33 years ago when he received the news that his song 'Reach For It' – a funky soul groove with a hint of jazz - was rocketing up the R&B singles charts in the USA. The year was 1977. "I was in Europe with my band," says Duke, who's 65 next year and still going strong. "I was over there doing a tour with Joan Armatrading – we were opening for her - when we got a call from Epic Records saying 'you've got a hit record; you've got to leave Europe now and come back.'" Duke, not realizing the magnitude of his record's success, ignored his record company and finished the tour. "I figured they were probably just joking anyway and it wasn't all they were making it out to be" he says.

Up to that point in time, Duke hadn't made any music that was deemed as having any big commercial potential – after all, he'd played with jazz saxophonist Cannonball Adderley at the start of the '70s following a mind-opening year with jazz-rock maverick Frank Zappa, whom he rejoined for a further two-year stint before branching out and doing some funky stuff with Billy Cobham in the Billy Cobham-George Duke Band. When he got a deal with Epic in '77, he changed direction with 'Reach For It' and discovered that his music reached a new audience.

"It just went crazy," says Duke, explaining how 'Reach For It's' success affected his public profile. "We went from playing nightclubs to selling out stadiums. We'd do double shows and we'd sell-out both shows. All of a sudden, 98.9 percent of our audience was black, where before with the fusion we had been doing the audience was predominantly white. It was a different perspective. Even looking at the audience was different - I was like 'whoa!' I said 'I like this; this is my folk' because I always wondered why more black folks didn't come to see me. But we only had one funk tune that they knew, all the other stuff we were doing was like we normally do. So at the end of the night we'd do 'Reach For It' and everybody would go crazy. Now all of a sudden, I got women trying to break into my dressing room so I figured we had a success. That was the funk explosion."

Duke's new album, 'Déjà Vu,' finds the keyboardist and Grammy winning producer revisiting his past and stylistically embracing the music he used to make. "It's a look back at some of the things that I loved about jazz, soul and funk, but looking at it through the prism of my lenses, through what I feel about it. I even brought in people like (flautist) Hubert Laws and (trumpeter) Nicholas Payton to play on the tune called 'Stupid Is As Stupid Does,' which is kind of a jazz blowing tune that everybody in the band can play.' If that track recalls the glory years of 'Reach For It,' then the opening cut, 'A Melody' is reminiscent of the material Duke did on his popular 'Brazilian Love Affair' album. Of that album he says: "I will probably do another record like 'Brazilian Love Affair' before I check out."

The Californian-born musician's enthusiasm for music-making – whether in the guise of performer, writer, or producer – knows no bounds. He's eligible for retirement now but says: "I love it, man! What else would I do? I love playing music. I love playing live because you get an immediate response. You know what you're doing, whether you're reaching somebody and that's where the rubber meets the road, playing live. And now that the whole record industry has kind of turned topsy-turvy it's very important."

And as regards today's music industry – or what's left of it – Duke has some interesting views.
"The business is very strange," he muses. "The paradigm has changed. The whole business model has changed. I think that recordings now are basically what they used to be in the beginning. We're at the start of something and I don't know where it's going to end up. I may not even be around to see where it ends up but one thing's for sure, it's going to change. That's the one constant you can be sure of, that everything is going to change and I never thought in my lifetime I'd see the business change so drastically. The thinking used to be 'if I get a record contract, I've got it made for the rest of my life' kind of thing. That ain't happening. So now it's gone back to live performance. CDs, downloading and all that is basically a promotion tool for live performance. I really think it's gone back to that and if a musician can't play live, they're in trouble."

'Déjà Vu' is released by heads Up on August 30th