Death of J*** Revisited

Historically, jazz is rooted in rhythm. In jazz, a melody materializes above a rhythmic line, which is pushing forward the harmony, the details of which are derived from the melody, or in opposition to the melody.

By jazz, I mean the jazz I have heard. That means it's a first person accounting.

By historically I mean two things : what I have read or spoken about with other musicians, and what I have actually experienced.

New Orleans musical tradition is my deepest musical association. Till I was 13, it was all I ever heard, and always live. I experienced many jazz funerals through a school window. The school was next to a graveyard and not air conditioned.

The opening paragraph of this post is my distillation of that tradition, modified by a 40 year passion for classical music.

These discussions are quite satisfying. I find myself in question more often, and only realized this opening paragraph as a result of explaining myself here on the forum.

That can only lead to more enjoyment of music, and more music to enjoy.

When I hear music like I describe in the opening paragraph, I instantly find my focus, and can maintain it without effort for as long as pleases me.

So Fred, what is my ear missing?

I'm trying to remember what the 70s were like. I was still playing music, and spending all my time around other musicians, well, at least from 1970 to 1975.

It was a very communal environment. People listened to each other, and incorporated elements they liked. I always thought this was what they meant by jazz fusion.

It became somewhat homogeneous. It's a hard thing to put your finger on, whatever gives it this quality.

The musicians that preceded them built original compositions, constructed from the materials available in the tune they chose. These tunes were things the listeners would know, or could learn to know. Something the listener might hum, or sing, or even play for themselves. That's where emotional attachment comes in, because the performer has put the tune in your heart.

It feels like a contraction in the range of expression, what happened between 1950 and 1980.

The musicians I knew in the 70s are the most prominent white jazz musicians in the city today. I went to hear them many times between 1997 and 2006. They all sound just the same. Quite successful, but not different.

The black music here grows out of tunes. Tunes are magical. The right tune can change everything. Like "Lush Life" :-)

This will be the last post, till some response.

Gave a listen to "Solo Monk" and "SoulTrane".

"Solo Monk" is the best jazz album ever made. Total freedom. Never a second without melody, go where it may. Lots of fun, this one.

"SoulTrane" stays in the harmonic framework suggested by the melody, but with leaky seams, always on the outer edge of bursting.

At the same time, tradition is observed, evidenced by a dialog between tenor sax and drums on track 1.

To me, the drums fit quite nicely, but don't make any sense.

Jazz is story telling. The drums don't contribute that way.

Lots of other people feel different.

This has been talked out.

quote:

Originally posted by mikeeschman:
This will be the last post, till some response.

To be honest Mike, I have given up on this thread. I don't see much point in it.

quote:

"Solo Monk" is the best jazz album ever made.

But I do have to comment on this. There are many thousands of jazz albums I would prefer to have in my collection than this. It does nothing for me - in fact I find little of jazz in it. To be honest I find it quite tedious, one of the few albums my foot does not tap along to.

Monk was a great original composer, and a sometimes interesting pianist, at least for me. My favorite Monk is the album "Monk's Dream" on Columbia(Sony). His solos on Bolivar Blues and Bright Mississippi are a hoot, and his quartet is smokin' on that initial date for a major label. He soon after settled into a routine and didn't do much except recycle his famous compositions. His Blue Note and Riverside periods are what made him legendary.

quote:

Originally posted by Lontano:

quote:

Originally posted by mikeeschman:
This will be the last post, till some response.

To be honest Mike, I have given up on this thread. I don't see much point in it.

quote:

"Solo Monk" is the best jazz album ever made.

But I do have to comment on this. There are many thousands of jazz albums I would prefer to have in my collection than this. It does nothing for me - in fact I find little of jazz in it. To be honest I find it quite tedious, one of the few albums my foot does not tap along to.

Lontano, I'm just telling you what I hear and what I like, just like you did.

I am always quite interested in other people's thoughts, especially if they diverge from mine.

I spread an answer to Fred Simon over five or six posts.

So if you're really over it, why am I responding to one of your posts?

"Solo Monk" is still my favorite, even if you don't get it :-)

I bought this today. This guy is from New Orleans and he is apparently the future of American jazz and one of the reviews of it said

"American jazz, it's often said, is too obsessed with its fabled past - and nowhere more so than in New Orleans, the music's birthplace. But here's a 26 year old trumpeter from the Crescent City who generates excitement without recreating the sound of Miles Davis....."
Review
and another..

quote:

Originally posted by mikeeschman:

So Fred, what is my ear missing?

Quite a bit, I'm afraid, and I say that with all good nature.

quote:

To my ear, the "Solo Monk" demonstrates a consummate sense of style and a freedom in improvisation unequaled. Every listen is fresh and exciting, even after 20+ years.

"Soultrane" demonstrates an intimate understanding of melody, with every phrase illuminating the potentials in the melody.

These are all qualities I find utterly lacking in jazz from the 70s, which I haven't had an appetite for in many years.

First, we have to know what jazz in the 70s you're talking about ... it's far from monolithic. Is it Miles Davis' free form psychedelic funk, or McCoy Tyner's great acoustic solo, trio, and quartet music? Weather Report's early acoustic-electric jazz hybrid, loose and highly improvisational yet exquisitely composed? Or their later, tighter, big-band and funk influenced material? Which of Keith Jarrett's two great, yet quite different, small groups: the Americans or the Europeans? Or Charles Mingus' two-volume Changes, Woody Shaw's Rosewood, Freddie Hubbard's Red Clay, Joe Henderson's Power to the People, Pat Metheny's Bright Size Life, and Wayne Shorter's great life-affirming masterpiece, the collaboration with Milton Nascimento, Native Dancer? Actually, taking all that and much, much more, the 1970s were incredibly fertile for jazz.

All of the above, by the way, absolutely adheres to the ideals you so eloquently expressed: "demonstrates a consummate sense of style and a freedom in improvisation unequaled. Every listen is fresh and exciting, even after 20+ years" and "demonstrates an intimate understanding of melody, with every phrase illuminating the potentials in the melody."

quote:

It was a very communal environment. People listened to each other, and incorporated elements they liked. I always thought this was what they meant by jazz fusion.

Jazz-fusion is conventionally considered to be a fusion of jazz and rock musics, and almost always mixes acoustic and electric instrumentation. Some of its most prominent proponents are Weather Report, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Herbie Hancock, and Chick Corea, and they all came up through Miles Davis, who really started it all.

But a deeper consideration is that jazz itself, by definition, is a fusion of African and European musics. What you put so well above, "People listened to each other, and incorporated elements they liked," is true for all good jazz of any genre and always has been since its birth.

quote:

In ten minutes of listening I was able to put my finger on why I have "Gnu High" in the jazz fusion stack. In jazz fusion, a theme is presented and discarded in favor of "free" improvisation. The initial theme is not so important to the cohesion of the tune. As a result, the tune has no cohesion. The development of lines is not a development of thematic material, as in Miles Davis "Seven Steps to Heaven". I find this tedious and boring. I have an expectation in all music that if a theme is presented it will be developed. Jazz fusion denies me that pleasure.

If I sat down with you, piano at hand, and we listened to the first ten minutes of Gnu High, I could easily demonstrate the tune's impeccable cohesion, and show you how their improvisation rigorously follows the written composition, its harmonic changes and its melody as thematic material, just as jazz musicians have always done with any given standard. Closer listening will reveal this.

That's not to say that they don't incorporate elements of free-improvisation in interludes interspersed throughout the album. But it's always based on the written thematic material of the surrounding compositions, even at its most advanced expansion.

And, again, to say that "I have an expectation in all music that if a theme is presented it will be developed. Jazz fusion denies me that pleasure" is to take all of jazz-fusion as one-dimensional, which it definitely isn't. More importantly, thematic development is a crucial component of all good jazz-fusion, of all good jazz improvisation, period.

quote:

When someone woodsheds a bundle of favored licks, then uses any excuse to put them into tunes, it destroys my focus and bores me.

I couldn't agree more. But surely you're not suggesting that the musicians on Gnu High are doing that, are you? Nor the masters I mentioned above. That's a big part of what makes them so great ... they're eternally fresh.

quote:

To be honest, I don't listen to jazz as closely as I do classical. Maybe I do jazz a disservice.

"Maybe"? Jazz requires equally close listening ... why wouldn't it?

All best,
Fred

Fred, you have me giving "Gnu High" another listen.

People on the forum discuss the utility of scores, but I would love it if I could buy a score of the tunes on "Gnu High" the way I might for a Beethoven symphony.

"Gnu High" loses me a lot quicker than "Solo Monk" does.

quote:

Originally posted by mikeeschman:
Fred, you have me giving "Gnu High" another listen.

People on the forum discuss the utility of scores, but I would love it if I could buy a score of the tunes on "Gnu High" the way I might for a Beethoven symphony.

Well, I'm sure you know that there is really no score for the total performance you hear on record because so much of it is improvised, as it would be with any jazz performance, but I do have a lead sheet for the first tune on Gnu High, "Heyoke." It's just a melody with chord symbols, but it does show the form of the tune. I'll email it to you.

Best,
Fred

Mike, I seem to have misplaced your email address.

Fred

quote:

Originally posted by fred simon:


Mike, I seem to have misplaced your email address.

Fred

Fred - it is in Mike's profile. Can you email it to me as well? I would like to see it - email in my profile as well. Thanks

quote:

Originally posted by fred simon:

quote:

Originally posted by mikeeschman:
Fred, you have me giving "Gnu High" another listen.

People on the forum discuss the utility of scores, but I would love it if I could buy a score of the tunes on "Gnu High" the way I might for a Beethoven symphony.

Well, I'm sure you know that there is really no score for the total performance you hear on record because so much of it is improvised, as it would be with any jazz performance, but I do have a lead sheet for the first tune on Gnu High, "Heyoke." It's just a melody with chord symbols, but it does show the form of the tune. I'll email it to you.

Best,
Fred

Thanks Fred! That's really special, I appreciate it very much.

On its way to you both ... my pleasure.

Best,
Fred

Fred,

I gave two complete listens to "Gnu High" last night, with concentration.

Then I spent some time looking at the lead sheet this morning.

I got a lot more out of the listens, but feel the improvisations meander, especially Keith Jarret on piano.

The four into three rhythm is the most prominent melodic feature of the melody, very nice. I think the problem is that the theme is not capable of supporting 20+ minutes of music making.

This would have made a great five minute track :-)

quote:

Originally posted by mikeeschman:

I spent some time looking at the lead sheet this morning.

I got a lot more out of the listens, but feel the improvisations meander, especially Keith Jarret on piano.

Hmmm ... I've spent literally hundreds and hundreds of hours listening to Jarrett over the decades, and have hardly ever heard him truly meander without purpose or direction, and certainly not on Gnu High. After the main body of the tune and the solos on its form, Jarrett does freely improvise some passages but always in service of thematic/harmonic development and spontaneous compositional rigor.

Were you able to follow along on the lead sheet through the solos? Not easy at all!

All best,
Fred

quote:

Originally posted by fred simon:

quote:

Originally posted by mikeeschman:

I spent some time looking at the lead sheet this morning.

I got a lot more out of the listens, but feel the improvisations meander, especially Keith Jarret on piano.

Hmmm ... I've spent literally hundreds and hundreds of hours listening to Jarrett over the decades, and have hardly ever heard him truly meander without purpose or direction, and certainly not on Gnu High. After the main body of the tune and the solos on its form, Jarrett does freely improvise some passages but always in service of thematic/harmonic development and spontaneous compositional rigor.

Were you able to follow along on the lead sheet through the solos? Not easy at all!

All best,
Fred

I know it's me meandering :-) "Heyoke" just never engages me so I follow out of instinct, despite it's clever syncopation. The changes are interesting too, but I have to bear down on it to follow.

I'm going through the same thing with the Haydn Piano Trios right now.

I'm hoping if I just do it for a couple of months, it'll get easier.

We'll see.

But this is not entertainment. This is work!

Still, it's got me excited about music again.

Amen to that Mike. You had me worried for a while.
Regards

Nic

quote:

Originally posted by mikeeschman:
Still, it's got me excited about music again.

Fred,

Last night I decided to seize the opportunity you presented me, by sending the lead sheet for "Heyoke" on "Gnu High", and am going to stick with it until I have unraveled its secrets, which I hope takes no more than a month.

I'm going to learn it as if I intended to play it.

My hope is that this will be a part of expanding my musical tastes and abilities, and that it will result in a more catholic appreciation of the jazz idiom.

I dug around the music library and found my old fake books, as I think this approach can be used on much other jazz.

Lontano:

Both of these by Christian Scott are superb. I have them in my collection!






Mike: Hope this might restore some of your faith in jazz!

By the way, do not forget Fred's latest which just gets better and better with repeated listening.

I already have Fred Simon's "Since Forever"

Mike:

Try any of Nguyen Le's albums. One of my favourite guitar players. Jazz meets Vietnamese, World and Classical music. This is my favourite:

Listening to "Since Forever" right now. Very nice indeed.

quote:

Originally posted by irwan shah:

By the way, do not forget Fred's latest which just gets better and better with repeated listening.

That's my hope. Thanks once again, Irwan.

All best,
Fred

quote:

Originally posted by winkyincanada:

Listening to "Since Forever" right now. Very nice indeed.

Thanks, I appreciate it. Glad you're digging it.

All best,
Fred