For DJ Jazzy Jeff and son Cory, Labor Day jam will be a family affair

Cory Townes spent the Christmas holiday break last year in Lagos, Nigeria, playing his first DJ gig outside of the United States.

Excited, he texted his father — known to the world as DJ Jazzy Jeff — to share a life goal for 2020.

“He was in New Zealand, getting ready for his own gig,” Cory recalls. “I told him that one of my main goals was for us to be on the same bill together in 2020. He said, ‘Let’s do it. It’s going to happen.’”

On Monday, it finally will. The Live-In Drive-In summer series in the Citizens Bank Park parking lot will conclude with the two Towneses serving as opening acts at the Labor Day Comedy Jam headlined by comedian Michael Blackson.

In non-pandemic circumstances, the challenge of getting a Townes team together would be to coordinate around busy schedules. Instead, father and son have faced obstacles presented by a virus that brought the nightlife industry to a halt, and also threatened Jeff Townes’ life.

Before the shutdown, Cory, 33, was holding down a residency at Brooklyn club Kinfolk, though he’s only been DJing since the beginning of 2019.

Pre-pandemic DJ Jazzy Jeff, 55, was working the world-travel schedule he’s maintained since his rise to fame with Will Smith, which began when he sampled the I Dream of Jeannie theme song on “Girls Ain’t Nothing but Trouble” in 1986.

But Jeff Townes’ musical history goes back further than his alliance with Smith, with whom he’ll reunite along with the cast of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air in a 30th anniversary special on HBO Max this fall.

Speaking from his Delaware home where he’s been quarantining with his wife, Lynette, as well as Cory and four other family members, Jeff says he discovered his life’s work when he went to a West Philly block party in 1975.

“The DJ made me feel like he was the Pied Piper, the way he made everybody move to the music,” he says.

The youngest of six children also got a rich musical education at home. “My Dad was an emcee for Count Basie,” Jeff says. “My brothers were into the Mahavishnu Orchestra and Chick Corea. My sisters loved Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye.”

Jeff already made a name for himself in Philly by the time of his impromptu pairing with Smith. It came about when he showed up at a gig in Southwest Philly without his then-rapper partner, who hadn’t been home when Townes called to tell him about the gig.

The party was at 59th and Woodland, next door to Smith’s house. “He was like, ’So do you mind if I rock with you, then?’” Jeff recalls. “I said, ‘Sure.’ And the chemistry was so great, there was never a conversation.” Before they knew it, DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince were flying to London to perform on Top of the Pops.

Jeff has been a turntable innovator ever since he blew minds with “the transformer scratch” effect on “The Magnificent Jazzy Jeff” in 1987. After he and Smith split in 1993, he nurtured Philadelphia talents like Jill Scott and Musiq Soulchild with his A Touch of Jazz production company.

In March, he played a ski resort in Ketchum, Idaho. When he got home, he felt achy. He took a turn for the worse on March 11, “and I don’t remember the next 14 days of my life,” he says. A doctor didn’t test for COVID, but diagnosed pneumonia.

“I couldn’t eat, and I didn’t open my mouth to speak for about 10 days.”

He became convinced he had the virus after his wife got a call from a journalist. “He said about 10 people had passed away from COVID that had been at the ski resort. I was freaked out.”

As was Cory, then living in Brooklyn. His father had told him he wasn’t feeling well, but “then someone texted me and said they heard the news and were so sorry.”

Confused, he saw reports his father had contracted the virus, with online rumors suggesting he was on life support in an ICU unit. “As a celebrity’s kid, I’ve always had that fear I’ll find out something through the media,” Cory says.

The rumors were false. His father recovered by April, and wrote on Instagram: “Please take this serious … it does not care who you are, what you do or what your plans are. Stay safe.”

In April, Jeff began performing DJ sets from his home studio for the Adidas show The Do-Over. The response surprised him: “I got like nine or 10 thousand people watching it online.”

Those shows have been joyous, except for the one he did after the death of George Floyd at the end of May.

When he told his wife he wasn’t up for playing, she told him he had a duty to his fans: “You’re their comfort.”

Inspired by Donny Hathaway’s “Someday We’ll All Be Free,” he built a two-hour mix of protest songs by Curtis Mayfield, Kendrick Lamar, and Beyonce. He called it “The Magnificent Resistance.” It’s posted on the free streaming platform Mixcloud.

Jeff won’t be putting much socially-conscious seriousness into his set on Monday, though. “My job is to take people on a musical journey and eliminate some of their stress,” he says. “You don’t want to completely forget about what’s going on. But this is going to be the first time being outside for me and for a lot of these people. I want everybody to throw their hands in the air and have a good time.”

Cory, he says, “always had a great feel for music. But I didn’t treat DJing as the family business, like I was a plumber, and I was going to take my son to work. Because this is an art, and I never wanted to push it on him. I wanted him to want it for himself.”

When the younger Townes decided he did, his father presented him with a controller — an all-in-one DJ setup. Cory got to work, practicing in the kitchen of the Brooklyn apartment.

He proved a quick study. Soundcloud named him a DJ to watch. When Philly hip-hop promoter Charlie Mack approached Jeff about the Labor Day jam, he had an idea: Why not have Cory open?

“This is the first time I’m going to be on a bill with my son,” Jeff says. “It’s just a level of pride” — he pauses — “I don’t know how to feel right now. I never thought this would happen.”

Cory will come on first. “I have zero problem opening for the legendary DJ Jazzy Jeff,” he says, and laughs. “2020 has been a roller coaster for many different reasons. I remembered that text exchange we had last year, and to see that come full circle after all we’ve had to deal with? It’s a blessing.”