Sax player and ex-city resident Dyer to perform in Tina Turner tribute at NYC 4th event

WORCESTER - Not only is there going to be plenty of fireworks across the nation this Fourth of July. There is going to be one explosive sax solo from Tina Turner’s saxophonist and former Worcester resident Deric Dyer.

In the '70s, Dyer lived in Worcester for roughly five years but still regularly plays Worcester with Mad Dogs Unchained (featuring Worcester musical institutions Cliff Goodwin and Mitch Chakour, who, with Dyer, are all former Joe Cocker Band members) and often sits in with the Silverbacks.

Born in Ireland, Dyer grew up in Bermuda. By age 16, Dyer was already an accomplished sax player, playing seven nights a week in nightclubs on the island. In the early ‘70s, the American Standard Band (featuring Goodwin and singer Kevin Falvey) came to Bermuda to play and asked Dyer to join the band and come back to America. Dyer, only 19 at the time, took their invitation. A few years later, the American Standard Band became Joe Cocker's backup band. Dyer left the sandy beaches of sunny Bermuda behind for the dirt-floor basement of Goodwin’s childhood home on 55 Institute Road in Worcester.

“Tina changed my world,” Dyer said Thursday, en route to Joe’s Albums in downtown Worcester. “Working with her, being around her, being a part of her team, was always nothing but respectful and kind and thoughtful and funny. I lived in rarefied air, 230-plus shows everywhere in the world, Rio, the biggest show probably that she ever did. I was the lucky guy. I got to be a part of it.”

With only 24 hours' notice, Dyer auditioned for Tina Turner’s “Break Every Rule World Tour” on Jan. 24, 1987. He got the gig and his life changed forever, he said. Highlights of the tour including 13 nights in a row at Wembley Arena in London and playing in front of a record-breaking crowd of 200,000 in Brazil for HBO’s “Tina Turner, Live From Rio” special in 1988, which was broadcast live.Dyer - who did plenty of interviews with local print and media, including the Telegram & Gazette when news broke of Turner’s death on May 24 - will be performing at “Macy’s Fourth of July Fireworks,” which starts at 8 p.m. July 4 and is being held between East 26th and East 40th streets in New York City, along the East River.

“God bless Tina. She brought something again to my world. Wow!” Dyer said. “It’s sad to be the guy but, if I can ever paint a picture of Tina being a special person still to this day is to me, then I’m always happy to do it.”

A tribute to Tina

The Fourth of July program was all set before Turner died. But, with the news of her death, the show organizers wanted to add a one-song tribute to the iconic singer and her hit “The Best” was the obvious choice, Dyer said.

The show’s music director, Ray Chew, who has been the music director of ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars” since 2014, wanted Turner alumni to be part of the celebration, so he asked Grammy Award-winning singer Lisa Fischer - who sang backup for Turner, Sting and Luther Vandross and toured with the Rolling Stones from 1989 to 2015 - to sing the Turner part.

Out of the blue, Dyer’s manager, James Roach of JJR Productions, got a call from Los Angeles about his client playing saxophone, including a hefty sax solo, in the performance of “The Best” for the Fourth of July telecast.

“All of a sudden, my agent got a call from (Ray Chew's) right-hand person and they were looking for me to consider playing the saxophone,” Dyer said. ”My agent didn’t believe it at first. I get a lot of calls people talking that they can help me. So he finally figured it out that it was real and put the deal together.”

Dyer is slated to perform “The Best” during the fireworks in the last half-hour of the two-hour broadcast.

“I got the big saxophone solo but then there is the outro,” Dyer said. “And Ray (Chew) said, ‘Listen. Do whatever you want. You’re good to go.’ His approach of putting music together was right in my wheelhouse.”

Dyer, who’s already a dapper dresser, said he was planning to get a haircut on Thursday and dress accordingly.

'We will be ready'

“I got some nice clothes that I will put on,” Dyer said. “Tina’s thing was when you’re onstage, you have to look like you belong onstage. And that’s what we’ll do. We will be ready.”

Dyer, whose sax playing is prominently featured all over Turner’s 1988 Grammy-winning release “Tina Live in Europe,” can also be heard on Cliff Goodwin's latest disc "Double It Up" and the Trilbee Kings Band's self-titled record, both available at Joe’s Albums and various streaming services.

Calling the upcoming telecast “the icing on the cake,” Dyer said it doesn’t escape him about the significance and importance of paying tribute to Turner, his former boss and bandleader. And he added he sees similarities between the Fourth of July performance and when he first auditioned for Turner.

“When I went into that audition, I was completely prepared. I read her book. I had a good overview of the kind of person that she was and I had studied all the saxophone stuff that had been presented to the public at that point. I was a little nervous but I wasn’t afraid. I knew what I had to do. And I was going down swinging,” Dyer said. “And this particular situation is very much in the same category. It’s really pressurized. It’s one of those moments where you got to stand up and do your job. And I promise you I’m going to give it everything I got. I enjoy those moments.”

This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: Saxophonist Deric Dyer to perform at Tina Turner tribute in NYC