Interview with Leland Sklar
Thursday / October 1, 2026
About Leland Sklar
American session bassist who has played on thousands of records since the early 1970s, with artists including James Taylor, Phil Collins, Jackson Browne and Carole King.
Source: Rick Beato on YouTube
These answers are taken from The Leland Sklar Interview on Rick Beato's YouTube channel. You! Backstage did not conduct this interview.
What do you enjoy most about making music?
One of the things that made all of it as special as it was is that it was always a band making the records. It was a room full of creative musicians, and we would feed each other. There was this constant energy in the room, this juice flowing. So when a guy like Jackson would come in with a song like Jamaica Say You Will, or James would pull out one of his songs, everybody jumped on it and almost immediately found their place, because everybody listened to each other. In an hour you ended up with a pretty complete picture of what the song was going to be.
No matter who the artist was, as soon as I came in, we were forming a band at that point. It wasn't just a gig. Everybody was really on their A-game, everybody went in, listened to playbacks and threw out suggestions. It was a real team effort.
How did your career as a musician unfold?
When I came to James Taylor, I was coming out of stone hard rock and roll bands. When I walked into my first sessions, I'd never been in a studio recording except for one demo, and all of a sudden I was working every day. So I was trying to create my own thing on the spot, figuring out how DIs worked. I had a little Univox amp with a single 15. We suddenly got busy, and it's all because of James Taylor. It was like driving a Top Fueler: going from zero to 350 miles an hour in four seconds. That's how our careers went. It was a ferocious schedule.
When synths came in, work slowed down in the studio, but I was one of the fortunate ones, because I wasn't just a studio player. I had cultivated being a touring musician. I was on the road a good chunk of the year every year, so it didn't affect me like it affected some guys who were really focused strictly on studio work, and all of a sudden there was a DX7 sitting there replacing them.
What advice do you have for new musicians?
My motto for myself is that everything I do is as a chameleon, because if you're going to do this gig as a studio player, you really have to be a chameleon. You wear many, many hats. Throughout one day you could be doing three different projects and working with different drummers on each one, and you have to readjust a little bit with each one.
I think the most important thing from my standpoint is be a listener. Don't impose yourself on the stuff you're working on. You listen to where the pocket is.
At the end of the day, for me it still comes down to: do you have a great song? And if you have a great song, put together the best musicians that can convey that song, and you have great music.
How do you keep communication clear with the band and the people you record with?
With the plethora of drummers I've worked with, each time you have to tweak a little bit. You could be working with a drummer like Ed Greene, who was right on the money, and then when I work with Russ Kunkel, he has a unique style where his snare leans in and his kick sits back, and he's got this wider berth in it. Each guy requires a whole different headspace.
When I would work with Jeff Porcaro and then go work with Carlos Vega, and then end up working with Simon Phillips or Dave Weckl, it's all over the place, but each one is completely valid. So you have to figure out how you assimilate together. I've been very fortunate that all those guys are of that like mind, where we just kind of lock in.
Of all the records and tours you have done, which is your favorite?
In 84, Phil Collins called me to do No Jacket Required. When we started that tour we were playing theaters, and all of a sudden Sussudio hit, and next thing we know we're completely rescheduling the tour into arenas. His pop sensibility is so strong. He's got these internal songs on the albums, like Long Long Way to Go, that are so beautiful and don't really see the light of day in concerts.
He's so self-deprecating. If you were walking down the street and met him not knowing who he is, and you said to him, 'So what do you do?' the first thing he would say is, 'I'm a drummer.' To him, that's really his world. And he's one of the best drummers, with an amazing pocket. I always tell people that playing with Phil was like rummaging through the closet and finding that old pair of slippers, and you put them on and go, oh yeah, this is really good. I love Phil dearly. He's a really special friend.
Who is your favorite musician, and why?
When I started with James Taylor, it was the advent of the singer-songwriter movement, and James was a game changer. He brought a sophistication to his playing, to his songwriting, to his lyricism, and it opened the door for a lot of these other writers and performers, like the Jackson Brownes, that came along through that wave.
He has one of the most comprehensive ways of playing guitar. Literally, he's like a one-man band. He's playing percussively, he's got a moving bass line, he's playing chords, he's playing all these lead lines. He's a remarkable guitarist, and good musicians recognize him for it, but I think in general that's not the front of what James is about. James really set the bar incredibly high.
Describe your style.
When James started playing guitar, I would listen to him and go: I can either ape him and copy his line, or I have to figure out parts to weave around him, just to justify why the hell I was there. It was a great education working with him. I was a huge fan of McCartney and the melodic style of bass playing, so with James it really allowed me to explore that avenue, as compared to being in a rock band with a guitar player who's just flat picking and strumming along.
In the early sessions there was rarely a chart or a demo for anything. If we were doing Jackson Browne, he would just sit down and play Doctor My Eyes, and we would figure out what the song needed. I would say probably 75% of everything I've done, it's been up to me to find the parts.
Tell me something I may not know from reading your credits.
I'm not patting myself on the back, but I never drank or did drugs or any of that stuff. So I do still have a clarity about the early days, where some guys can't remember that decade.
I was a classical pianist as a child, and I was a classical snob. When I think back to my parents' record collection, it was a sophisticated record collection, from classical to Martin Denny to, you name it.
I'm an insomniac, so I'm up in the wee hours of the morning, and I love perusing YouTube and finding all kinds of great stuff there. And my wife, at every opportunity, tells people I'm a blabbermouth. I love the idea of storytelling and sharing the back stories of these things.
Leland Sklar's Full Biography
Leland Sklar was born on 27 May 1947 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA. He is an actor and composer, known for Man of Steel (2013), Galaxy Quest (1999) and Moana 2 (2024).