At Home with Jim Turner

Jim Turner is the first to admit it.

“My house is a mess right now,” said one of the East End’s favorite musicians. “It’s either feast or famine out here and I’m just coming off a really full summer of gigs.”

Although Mr. Turner calls Sag Harbor home, like many performers he spends many nights on the road. As a solo performer and leader of the four-piece Jim Turner Band, the laid-back singer/songwriter, guitarist and harmonica player typically books 200 engagements a year, performing at concert halls, nightclubs, music festivals, private parties, weddings, schools and libraries throughout Long Island, Manhattan and Connecticut.

“When I’m home, this is where I spend most of my time writing songs, rehearsing, playing and teaching,” he said, sitting down in his living room, which was overflowing with paperwork, CDs, guitars, speakers, amps and other musical equipment. “I’ve had as many as eight players in here at one time. We just move the drums in and move the sofa out.”

For Mr. Turner, his tiny two bedroom cottage—which was built in 1960 and purchased 10 years ago by the musician—is primarily a place where he can groove to and make music, eat, sleep, and do yoga (a passion of his for the last 30 years).

While some people adhere to the adage that their home is their castle, it’s obvious that fancy furnishings and dust-accumulating “things” mean very little to this child of the 60s.

But Mr. Turner does indeed have some treasured possessions.

There’s the priceless view of Sag Harbor Cove, for instance, which can be seen out the large window of his living room. And there are the photos of his 23-year-old son, Toby: an old one showing a little boy riding a unicycle in England, and another one showing the same ear-to-ear dimpled grin he inherited from his father.

As one might expect, the musician has proudly amassed quite a collection of guitars over the years. There’s his 1976 Fender Stratocaster, a 1966 Gibson 330 model, a 1917 Gibson, and a cherry 1969 Les Paul Goldtop guitar.

“Out of all of these, one guitar has emerged as my favorite,” he said. “You can’t find any better than this beat-up old 1973 Martin D-18 which I bought off a waiter at a restaurant. When you hold it, you can really feel its experience.”

Looking around his living room, Mr. Turner acknowledged he’s not a man into decorating.

“The things in my home are placed by accident, not purpose,” he said, holding up a smiling rubber ducky that lives on the mantle of the brick fireplace. “This duck was a party favor. Next to it is a stone I got somewhere, and a little toy guitar someone gave me.”

A few family heirlooms also have a place of honor on the mantle, including a chrome vintage car hood ornament of a woman that once belonged to his mother, Jane. He’s also fond of a little sculpture his brother made, as well as the turn-of-the-century photograph of his great-grandparents riding camels in front of the Great Sphinx and the Pyramids of Giza in Egypt.

Mr. Turner’s great-grandfather, Thomas Dimond, was quite an interesting man, it turns out. In the early 1900s, he sold some Manhattan real estate he owned around 8th Avenue and 31st Street to the Pennsylvania Railroad. Today you might recognize that parcel of property as Penn Station.

Mr. Turner’s father, Richardson (Dick) Turner, also garnered some fame in the 1920s and 1930s as a trumpet player with the Princeton Triangle Jazz Band. This band of well-bred Ivy Leaguers exemplified the spirit of jazz innovation and helped usher in the swing era. One of the band’s 1928 recordings even featured vocals by Hollywood actor Jimmy Stewart. While the elder Turner eventually put his trumpet down for a career on Wall Street, he instilled a love of jazz music in his son.

“Growing up, I had a huge four-way hit of musical influences from my family. My father had the jazz thing going on, and my mother loved classical music and Broadway show tunes,” said Mr. Turner, who was born in Manhattan and raised in Northport.

His older sister, Joan Jonas, turned him onto the folk music scene of the 1960s. Ms. Jonas went on to become a pioneer of avant-garde video and performance art and is considered one of the most important female artists to emerge in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

“The fourth knock-out was my brother, who started bringing home rock ‘n roll records that really turned my world upside down,” he said, smiling.

Looking back, it was the music of the King himself, Elvis Presley, which changed his life.

“When I first heard Elvis, I was never the same again,” said Mr. Turner, who remembers singing the songs “Heartbreak Hotel” and “Don’t Be Cruel” at the top of his lungs while in the shower of his dorm at the Woodstock Country School, a private school he attended in Vermont as a teenager.

Music was a heavy influence at this very progressive liberal school, and classmates included the son of Carlos Montoya, the famous flamenco player, so it seemed natural for Mr. Turner to pick up a guitar and harmonica and start jamming.

“I moved to New York City when I was 21, but didn’t want to be a musician back then. I worked at photo labs and took acting lessons,” he remembered. “But New York City was a hotbed of creativity, and I started bringing my guitar to open mic nights downtown. It was terrifying for me; I was a small noodle in this big, scary world, but I kept on playing.”

By age 23, things had changed. Influenced by the “primal emotion” of blues music, he became quite an accomplished harmonica player and even recorded his first harmonica album.

“I finally made the jump that I wanted to be a professional musician. I was a freak with long hair, but I learned to balance the total freedom of the music with the total professionalism needed to do it for a living.”

His music and interest in acting helped him land a role in director Doug Dyer’s 1970 Off Broadway production of “Blood,” which earned him an Actors Equity Card. Two years later, he was cast in the short-lived Broadway rock musical, “Dude (The Highway Life),” an allegory about good and evil, which featured a book and lyrics by Gerome Ragni and music by Galt MacDermot (of “Hair” fame). Although the show ran for only 16 performances, it proved “a great learning ground” for Mr. Turner.

“I overcame my stage fright,” said the performer, who went on to share the stage with many music greats, including Paul McCartney, B.B. King, Phoebe Snow, Buddy Guy, Dave Mason, Taj Mahal and G.E. Smith.

With a repertoire that includes more than 1,500 songs, Mr. Turner is just as comfortable playing such crowd-pleasers as “Margaritaville” and “Sweet Home Alabama” as he is performing his own original compositions (he’s recorded three CDs and is working on another).

“I love all kind of music and play it all, from Woody Guthrie to Jimi Hendrix. Rock, blues, country, folk, jazz, reggae, Celtic, world … it’s all within me,” he said. “Some musicians get mature right away. I still feel like I’m growing.”