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"I get ideas from all over the place. I follow some of the news, I'm interested in history, what's happening currently, what's gone on in the past how it affects the present. You can see patterns over period of time and every once in a while something sticks out." Taj Mahal

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Taj Mahal has been making music for 40 years, and the two musicians making up his trio have been at it for more than 30 years. They’ve played throughout the United States, Europe, South Africa, Canada and the Caribbean.

Throughout all of that, Mahal said one thing stands out: "Music is the language of our planet. That’s it, hands down. Whenever I’ve gone somewhere, it’s been proven to me that music is our planetary language."

Redding’s Cascade Theatre is the next stop on that global journey, when the Taj Mahal Trio will add a little more to the universal language with a performance at 7:30 p.m. Friday. Tickets are priced from $36 to $45 and are available by calling 243-8877 or visiting www.cascadetheatre.org. While music is played and enjoyed the world over, Mahal said in a telephone interview, in the United States it’s become such a huge business that sometimes the essential spirit of music is obscured.

"It’s like our government: They don’t want you to see the truth behind a lot of things, but if you’re an inquisitive person and into finding things for yourself, you might find out there’s a lot more out there than meets the eye'" he said.

Mahal said he’s on the road a lot because "the conventional way to build an audience is to go play for them. You can jumpstart that audience by having a record company broadcast the sounds all over the place to the point that eventually they hate it. I haven’t had that privilege. "We’re making our living making music. The industry was focused on record companies making all the music, but we’ve been able to turn all those tables around and make a good living at it," Mahal said.

Mahal said he’s been touring with his trio for the past five years and finds that it’s an economical way to travel and allows him to open up a little more on guitar, piano and banjo. He is accompanied by Bill Rich on bass and Kester Smith on drums.

Mahal said the trio will play three or four tunes from "Maestro: Celebrating 40 Years," a CD scheduled for release on Tuesday. The 12-track disc mixes originals and classics and features performances by Ben Harper, Jack Johnson, Ziggy Marley, Angelique Kidjo, Los Lobos and others.

Mahal said the songwriting muse will strike at anytime. "I get ideas from all over the place. I follow some of the news, I’m interested in history, what’s happening currently, what’s gone on in the past how it affects the present. You can see patterns over period of time and every once in a while something sticks out."

Mahal was born Henry St. Claire Fredericks in Harlem on May 17, 1942, and he grew up in Springfield, Mass. His father was a jazz pianist, composer and arranger of Caribbean descent, and his mother was a gospel singing schoolteacher from South Carolina. Both parents encouraged their children to take pride in their diverse ethnic and cultural roots. His father had an extensive record collection and a shortwave radio that brought sounds from near and far into the home. His parents also started him on classical piano lessons, but after only two weeks, young Henry already had other plans about what and how he wanted to play.

In addition to piano, the young musician learned to play the clarinet, trombone and harmonica, and he loved to sing. He discovered his stepfather’s guitar and became serious about it in his early teens when a guitarist from North Carolina moved in next door and taught him the various styles of Muddy Waters, Lightnin’ Hopkins, John Lee Hooker, Jimmy Reed and other titans of Delta and Chicago blues.

Jon Lewis is a freelance writer from Redding.