Last month I came across a random clip of a guy playing the saxophone along to Fetty Wap's "Again" and was so transfixed that I proceeded to write a post and play that 30-second clip over 30 times (much to my co-workers' atypical enjoyment). In the post I wrote about needing to know who this genius was on the sax and if a full version of this amazing, quite jiggy cover existed. Well, the young Coltrane in question happens to be 20-year-old Corey Staggz, and while there's no full version of "Again" his Instagram page offers the next best thing in a multitude of other song covers.
I hopped on the phone with Corey to talk about why he started doing these covers, what possessed him to hit that hilarious jig that he does in the "Again" clip (he basically "Hotline Bling"-ed the Internet—his less popular clips pre-"Again" had no dancing), and if his endgame is to drop a sax-filled mixtape or what. Flip through for all his quotes paired with his five best sax covers.
This Is How Corey Came Up
His Favorite Rappers—and Saxophonists—Are:
Rappers Are Now Showing Him Love Back
He's Getting Plenty of Local Love Too
"I walk around every day, everyone wants to talk about me on the sax, every single day. But they like it, so it’s fun. I like how everybody push me and all that."
But Right Now, He's Trying to Stay in School
"I would [love to] tour with a live band. I don’t know if you know Joshua Ledet; he was on American Idol. He hit me up on Twitter one day to tell me how he would like me to be in his band, but he’s in L.A. So it’d be hard, I’m still in school, I wanna finish and all that. It’s my third year so I still have another year, or two or three. [Laughs.] Depends on how I do. I do a lot of live bands at bars and clubs, stuff like that. I usually do one first Friday of every month at Talk of the Town Hands in Connecticut. But now I’m at the point where I have to cut down on gigs and stop worrying about money so much and focus on school so I can finish and then the music will come after.
"I mean I just wanna finish school and then whatever after school happens, happens you know? I wanna blow up, but it depends on the offers I get right now. If I were to get any offers to do big bands or something like that [my plans might change], but right now I’m still trying to stay focused [on school]."
