Wednesday, 6/25/2025, 10pm - Judy Carmichael's Jazz Inspired

Jim Self.

Tuba virtuoso, Jim Self wants more respect for his instrument. “I want someone to write something romantic for the tuba,” Jim lamented to me. I’m called when a there’s someone fat on screen or an elephant. Fat people make love too.”

Yes, it was a fun conversation with this man who DOES get respect from every corner of the music business. Jim has worked with everyone from Placido Domingo and Mel Torme to Frank Sinatra and Barbra Streisand, not to mention, his playing on over 1500 movie soundtracks and hundreds of TV shows and records. Among tuba-enthusiasts, Jim Self is especially celebrated as the voice from the Mother Ship in Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Spoiler alert: that was Jim Self playing those tuba tones, not an alien.