{"id":103168,"date":"2025-10-25T09:54:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-25T09:54:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/103168\/"},"modified":"2025-10-25T09:54:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-25T09:54:07","slug":"lee-fields-looking-forward-to-cork-jazz-festival-performance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/103168\/","title":{"rendered":"Lee Fields looking forward to Cork Jazz Festival performance"},"content":{"rendered":"

The story of Lee Fields becoming an overnight success after decades of working hard has been told many times, but ahead of his concert at Guinness Cork Jazz Festival, he laughed at how he literally became Lee Fields. \u201cWhen I first started I was performing under my own name, we were playing a jook joint in North Carolina somewhere, the guy whose club it was asked my name to introduce the band, when I said it was Elmer, he wasn\u2019t impressed, \u201cwhat! do you have a middle name?\u201d I said, \u201cyeah, Lee\u201d and he said, \u201cthat\u2019s it, that\u2019s it!\u201d So from that moment there man, it has been Lee Fields on stage, and Elmer for the business and financial stuff!\u201d<\/p>\n

It is fair to say Lee has had a lot of business stuff to look after since he released his first single in 1969. Now 75, he has been at the heart of soul music since he was a teenager, quickly gaining the nickname of \u2018Little JB\u2019, because of his physical and vocal resemblance to James Brown. He released \u2018Let\u2019s Talk It Over\u2019 \u2013 ostensibly his debut album \u2013 in 1979, and it was a long wait until 2002 for \u2018Problems\u2019, his second album, to be released. Industry shifts and record label changes are mostly to blame for such a long gap in releasing albums, and Lee was guesting on other people\u2019s records and releasing occasional seven-inch singles in the timeframe, but 23 years is a very noticeable gap in anyone\u2019s discography.<\/p>\n

Lee looks back on all this without rancour. \u201cI get asked about anniversaries and dates, but I prefer to look at it by how well or how unwell my time was spent, because sometimes we veer off into things that absorb a lot of time, but we end up further from what we really want to achieve. So now I keep a close tab on time and facts and how they affect what I\u2019m doing, because I realise I\u2019m only allotted a certain amount of time and I\u2019m approaching the periphery of my time on this plane. Time is of the essence, and what I now do within this period is very important because I don\u2019t want to waste time. Time is more valuable than anything on this earth, because we leave all of this anyway; we are in a life game. I call it a game because it\u2019s not forever. To me, you have to make the best of that time possible until we move on to the next stage.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"LeeLee Fields plays Cork Opera House this weekend.<\/p>\n

For Lee, deciding to focus on time has made things more straightforward for him. \u201cAs an artist, it makes it easier because I realise when I\u2019m wasting my time very quickly now, sometimes it\u2019s the moment something\u2019s brought up, sometimes I can immediately tell that this is a good thing for me. I\u2019m not being selfish when I say \u2018for me\u2019, I\u2019m counting all of the people that I\u2019m involved with as \u2018for me\u2019. I\u2019m counting my manager, I\u2019m counting my band, I\u2019m counting my wife, I\u2019m counting my future endeavours. Is this going to take us in a negative direction, or is it going to take us in a positive direction? Every slight movement that we make affects the outcome of the future. So I\u2019m very, very careful about the moves that I make, because time is more precious than the money that we get here. Money is temporary, all this stuff is temporary.\u201d<\/p>\n

This mindset deeply influences his work ethic as a showman. \u201cSince every move that we make is very precious, I try to calculate things. I know I can\u2019t spend too much time doing one thing, because I need to be focusing on another thing. It\u2019s the same thing with my live shows. When I come out on stage, man, the band and I have been rehearsing all the way up until that moment, because I want to be my best. I know that there are artists like Prince and others that are proving themselves, as far as their work, as greater than me, but I believe that you don\u2019t have to be a superstar to be great, but you do need to be the greatest in your periphery.\u201d<\/p>\n

A case in point is how seriously he takes his live shows and connecting to the audience. \u201cIt\u2019s like a good conversation, man, if you have a conversation with somebody and you understand exactly what they saying, and they understand what you\u2019re saying, and it\u2019s a pleasant conversation, that conversation will be remembered for an indefinite period of time, both people can remember and reflect on it for the rest of their lives. Like if you see an old friend, and you think about things you did maybe 20 years ago, and all of a sudden, it becomes almost like you relive that moment. So when I sing and I perform for my audience, I try to connect with them, and try to get to that place called Euphoria. It\u2019s impossible to get there, but the fun part is trying to get there. You\u2019re not gonna really get all the way, but as you get happier and happier and happier, and when it\u2019s over, you say, \u2018Oh man! That was a good concert!\u2019 to each other. \u201d<\/p>\n

Continuing on that theme, Lee explained what makes it all worthwhile. \u201cThe other thing is you can\u2019t get to Euphoria on your own, you have to make it with others. I can think of euphoric ideas in my head, but if I\u2019m in front of an audience and I\u2019m singing, and I can feed that euphoric feeling, and it passes on to the next person and to the next person, all of a sudden, the whole audience and everybody is so happy. It\u2019s about being in a place, in a very content place, and you know that you can\u2019t stay that long, it\u2019s just for a moment. Those moments are worth everything. It\u2019s worth it for me getting on a plane and flying to Cork. It\u2019s worth my rehearsing the band time after time. It\u2019s worth the people, wherever they come from, travelling to the show. Because when they leave the show, they\u2019ll be saying, \u2018I feel good\u2019, you know? And it makes all the sacrifices worth it, that\u2019s what it\u2019s all about.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lee Fields & The Expressions play The Cork Opera House on Saturday, October 25, at 6pm, with support from Tosh\u00edn. Tickets available at www.corkoperahouse.ie<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The story of Lee Fields becoming an overnight success after decades of working hard has been told many…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":103169,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[35839,63692,63691,48760,61,60,63690,80],"class_list":["post-103168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-cork-entertainment","tag-cork-film","tag-cork-music","tag-downtown","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-stevie-g","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/103169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}