By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
Mike Williams has been blowing his horn for the enjoyment and inspiration of Bowling Green listeners since he arrived in town a dozen years ago lured by the stadium lights.
As a high school student he loved marching bands, and in searching for a college, he was looking at the schools with the showiest bands in the land. His parents suggested he give BGSU a look as well.
“They convinced me to take a tour of Bowling Green,” Williams recalls. “I saw the football stadium and knew that was where I was going to go. I knew for sure I was going here. It just had this gravitational pull. It felt so special. It gave me a different sensation than any other place.”
And that attraction hasn’t faded. He still lives in town and his alto saxophone with its soulful blend of funk, smooth jazz, gospel and rhythm and blues, has become part of the sonic landscape heard at clubs, festivals, church, and sporting events.
He performs with the folk-rock trio Moths in the Attic, and he has a solo act with backing tracks he’s created.
For two years in a row he’s opened the Juneteenth Celebration hosted by BRAVE at Wooster Green.
In 2020, the event’s first year, “I was just having a ball,” he said. “I didn’t realize how much an impact there was just to perform. It’s all about giving people a hope and inspiration. There’s different kind of energy you have to bring to those events.”
Now he’s working on his first full length album. Taking a tip from Zack Fletcher, the founder of Moths in the Attic, “Wine Night” will be released a single at a time. The first, “The Truth,” is now available to stream. (For details check out his website.)
Williams started playing saxophone when he was 10. He’d already started studying classical piano and voice with the Cincinnati Boychoir. Williams wanted to be a drummer like his father and brother, but the drum spots were already taken, so saxophone was a fall back at the time. But it turned into his musical future.
When Williams was in middle school, noted Cincy saxophonist Ed “Sax” Thomas took Williams under his wing. In time he let the young saxophonist sit in with his band. Thomas’ soul style was one Williams sought to emulate.
In school, Williams played in concert band, jazz band, and studied music theory.
Marching band may have been part of the draw to attend college, but he majored in business with a minor in recording technology. That fits with his view of himself as a musician and entrepreneur, and gave him the tools he uses to produce and promote his music. He took advantage of the COVID-19 slowdown to earn his Master of Business Administration through BGSU’s online program. He was active on the message boards interacting with other students. “I couldn’t believe how well it complements what I was doing.”
Williams played in the Falcon Marching Band his first year, but he felt like he was missing out on some of the social aspects of school. He wanted more freedom than the demands of marching band allowed.
To satisfy his musical side, he formed a band, Live Muzik, which performed around BG and on campus at events for the College of Business, the Office of Multicultural Affairs, and the Career Center.
As he approached graduation, Live Muzik started to fade. Other members were moving away. He’d met Fletcher when he’d recorded Fletcher’s previous band Hot Flaming Marbles as a recording technology project.
Fletcher asked Williams: “Why don’t you throw some sax on top of this?”
Williams said “I thought it was the craziest idea. But it worked.”
A year or so later, Fletcher asked him to sit in on the few dates. From that Moths in the Attic evolved with songwriter Fletcher on vocals and guitar, Kevin Jorrey on percussion, and Williams on alto saxophone.
The instrumentation is unusual, with neither keyboards nor bass.
“It forced me to learn how to support a vocalist and other artists,” Williams said. “Before then I was more the up-front person. This forced me to learn to blend.” And he had to grow comfortable playing in the key signatures that are suited for guitar, but not as usual for saxophone.
“It’s been fun,” Williams said. “It’s opened my eyes to different types of venues and festivals.” The band is suited to play in a variety of settings – breweries, coffee shops, clubs, the farmers market, parking lots, and large festivals, including the Black Swamp Arts Festival.
Williams said he’s learned to adapt.
Every Sunday he plays at Family Baptist Church. That’s complemented his band work. People want to hear the choir, he said. His role is “to squeeze in a few notes in support.”
With Moths in the Attic’s schedule lightening up, Williams has more time to work on the forthcoming album.
“Wine Night” follows his first recording, “Inspiration,” which focused on songs that inspired him, and were more familiar to listeners. His next project “Sax & Chill” had more of a hip hop, rhythm & blues, and smooth jazz elements.
The overarching theme of “Wine Night” will be the kind of sound “people would want to listen to after work when they just want to pour a beverage and hit play.”
It was inspired by his time right after graduation before music became his full-time occupation when he was employed by Enterprise Rent-a-Car. He’d work long hours, and when he got home he turned to music for relaxation.
“The Truth” is the first song on the album, though, it’s been in the works for a long time.
“I’m big on breaking the musical rules, kind of getting my hands dirty. ‘The Truth’ is about remaining true to yourself.”
Williams’ first video, which will be released soon, is for “The Truth.”
He taped the video at the Ohio Theatre in Toledo. The setting was fitting because that’s the first place he performed the song as part of the Lagrange Music Festival just as the composition was taking shape in 2018.
He’ll be dropping singles every couple months leading up to the fall, 2022, release of “Wine Night.” The album, he said, “feels like a fall thing.”
Williams expects to put out some holiday music as well.
He also continues to offer and draw inspiration performing the National Anthem at sporting events. He’s played for the Toledo Mud Hens and for the Falcon women’s and men’s basketball games, and women’s volleyball.
“That’s always been a dream of mine,” he said. “It’s 60 seconds of you having the opportunity to express what the National Anthem means for you. Your heart is always beating out of your chest. It’s a thrill.
“It’s so much bigger than those notes for me. It’s the emotion and the responses of the audience, the cheers. It’s very exciting.”
This year the Black Swamp Arts Festival asked him to play the anthem as a remembrance of the 9/11 attacks. Williams said he felt honored.
On his way to the festival, he drove by the memorial service at the county court house. “That gave me something extra to think about – all the people who lost their lives and those who served. I wanted to honor them in the best way possible.”
For Williams, that means projecting that emotion through his saxophone so his listeners can share the moment.
