Amos Lee and Freddy Berman: Singer, drummer, bandmates, friends

Kensington-born singer-songwriter Amos Lee, with his funky, chic new album,

Spirit

, appears at the Academy of Music on Sunday. When he hits that stage, he will, as always, be with his oldest pal and longtime drummer, Freddie Berman.

"Our friendship is key to what I do," Lee says.

He brings up the early gigs - open mics at the Fire on Girard Avenue; bartending stints turned impromptu showcases at Tin Angel in Old City. "It was me, Devin Greenwood, Birdie Busch, Cowmuddy, Freddie playing every night, wherever they would let us," Lee says before a rehearsal.

"We would pull out tables at North Third, and set up without there even being live music there," he says with a laugh. "I may not remember every exact moment, but I do recall each and every feeling. I remember feeling free, playing my heart out, and full of inspiration then . . . not a lot of hustle, but lots of heart. I think that's true now, too."

Berman laughs, too, remembering the first time he played with Lee. "One second he's behind the bar at Tin Angel during a Kenn Kweder gig. Minutes later, he's calling me up to play with him." How did he negotiate between Freddy the Drummer and Freddy the Friend? "It was a gradual transition, but a realization that we had to make; it's the way it is," Berman says. "We have two distinct relationships that we succeed doing."

"Freddie and I were both born at Einstein Hospital and were both delivered by Dr. Isadore Foreman, his uncle," Lee says. "How's that for going back, way back?" The thing Lee says he loves most about Berman, then and now, is that the drummer is down for an adventure, "an exquisite quality in a collaborator and a friend."

Spirit is Lee's first album for Republic Records after being with Blue Note for more than a decade. He lost a guiding light when Blue Note president and CEO Bruce Lundvall died in 2015. "He wasn't just my mentor; he was music's mentor," says Lee, whom Lundvall encouraged not only to stay connected to the diversity of music ("He was always playing me other people's records"), but also to produce himself, to do what he felt. "He always encouraged me to take that next chance." Thus, he was producer on Spirit.

The biggest risk (other than producing) Lee and company took for this album was in the writing. It is his most sensual and soulful record, an album that in live performance is downright funky. "The progression of the live show definitely inspired where Spirit went," Lee says. "Freddie is as R&B a drumming dude as you can find."

Berman later confesses to a lifelong love of Motown and the Temptations, which only seconds Lee's emotion. "He's deep in the pocket," singer says of drummer.

Before he picked up the acoustic guitar and slipped into singer-songwriter mode, Lee was a hip-hop and R&B fan, with an equal feeling for Al Green and KRS-One (then) and Robert Glasper and Frank Ocean (now). "When I hang with Glasper" - a pal from Blue Note days - "we listen to '90s rap and R&B, of which I know everything. I used to listen to Power 99 every night and tape the countdown."

Lee's last album, 2013's Mountains of Sorrow, Rivers of Song, was more country - but there is a definite progression. "A soul song is a country song to me, and that's where I have grown the most, how you can build a record dynamically," Lee says. "This, too, is something I've gleaned from working with Freddie and the rest of the band." Lee says his earlier albums were probably gentler and acoustic because, once signed, he toured with Norah Jones as her opener, doing cafe folk stuff. "It's taken me a long time to get focused as a bandleader and think about song structure. I'm usually the guy sitting at home doing the simpler chordal stuff."

Berman says Lee has definitely matured as a songwriter and arranger, while he as a drummer has found his groove: "I'm playing less but meaning more on the new stuff."

On Spirit, Lee's lyrics speak more than ever of escape, freedom, and sensuality - darker on "Hurt Me," lighter on "New Love." "Hurt Me" is a character study. "New Love," however - "That's just how it feels, transporting, you can't even feel a part of this world," he says. "Highways and Clouds," too, is about transcendence that keeps connected to the past: "It is about escaping but loving where you're from, allowing yourself to be rooted to everything and nothing."

And when not playing or recording or touring, singer and drummer work on . . . being friends. "We definitely make time to hang outside of the music," Berman says. "It's all organic."

"I've got good people by my side," Lee says.

Amos Lee

8 p.m. Sunday at the Academy of Music, 240 S. Broad St. Tickets: $69.50-$39.50. Information: 800-745-3000, ticketmaster.

com, kimmelcenter.

org.

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