Jazz for aficionados

Thats what I'm talking about!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvNMbbNdWEk

O-10, as I have said many times previously I admire that you put jazz musicians on such a high pedestal; and deservedly so. Jazz obviously reaches you on a very deep and personal level and that’s a beautiful thing. But the achievement of jazz musicians in the area of expression or ability to reach the soul of the listener is no greater than that of a great Classical musician and I don’t understand the need to knock one down in order to build up the other; at least that’s how it seems.

Excellent comments by rok, pryso and acman3; and very accurate. Some further thoughts and sorry for the long post; but if you’re going to tell me that I am “totally wrong”.....😎...all in good fun.

The often referenced account of Miles “fixing” Herbie’s “mistake” is interesting, but as with many things “Miles” it has been somewhat overblown because, while it certainly is not an “easy” thing to do, it really is the kind of thing that all musicians do all the time to varying degrees and in different ways. Herbie played a “wrong” note in a chord; wrong as defined by being a deviation from the “strict and predetermined framework of harmony” that comprised whatever tune they happened to be playing. Miles heard that wrong note (as most good musicians would) and incorporated that note in his improvised solo. That is exactly what Rok described, and he also pointed out they were not “starting from zero and making something up”; it simply doesn’t work that way. In this case it was an astute musical reaction/interaction by Miles in the realm of the harmony of the tune. Fundametally, this is really no more impressive than what a concert pianist has to do in the realm of rhythm during a performance of, say, a piano concerto with orchestra by having to react and “adjust” to varying tempo changes, very subtle or large, by the players in the orchestra; or even having to react and adjust to a mistake by a player or conductor while still making it all sound seamless. Yes, those mistakes do happen. Unless we are talking about “free jazz”, a jazz musician has to memorize the harmonic progression of a tune, know the form of the tune and understand harmony in a very deep way that allows him to compose a solo that makes sense; and that, like most what we are touching on here, is just scratching the surface. Acman3’s description re your experience with watching those bebop players just show up a play together is very good and, as concerns this topic, analogous to, say, an “All Star” baseball game. They may have never played together before, but they speak the same language; a “language” that had to be learned. The musicians had all learned the frameworks of the various tunes.

O-10, there has to be a willingness to understand some basics about the music making process for any of this to make sense. Most of these basics are what pryso correctly referred to as the “tie” between jazz and Classical (and any genre, really). My observation is that you have an aversion to understanding any of these basics because (I think) you feel that somehow going to that place detracts from the emotional part of the experience and somehow shortens the pedestal that you put jazz musicians on. All I can say is that it doesn’t. As always, no problem if you’re not interested in going there; we all approach listening to music differently and have different emotional agendas for its place in our lives.

Speaking of Herbie and Rok’s recent mention of Gershwin. While I always hesitate to speak about my personal professional experiences perhaps this may help, in a roundabout way, illustrate some of what we are talking about re jazz vs classical musicians and the fact that while they are different disciplines in some ways they share a lot of common ground as far as fundamental musical values are concerned. Both disciplines come from the same place as concerns emotion which seems to be the point of contention.

Over the last few years it has become very “in vogue” in the Classical concert scene for jazz pianists to appear as soloists playing Gershwin’s “Rhapsody In Blue” for piano and orchestra; one of the most popular works in orchestral music. Also related to Rok’s earlier comment about Gershwin and Third Stream is that while the piece, as composed and as traditionally performed, has no improvisation, this new “approach” to Rhapsody is for the jazz piano soloist to improvise during some of the extended solo sections that do not include the orchestra. I have had the privilege of being part of performances of this piece with various orchestras with four well known jazz pianists, Herbie, Makoto Ozone, Marcus Roberts and Chick Corea. No name dropping intended and I was a just a humble player in the orchestra. Now, it is generally acknowledged by musicians and critics (for whatever that may be worth) that with very few and rare exceptions these “experiments” with Rhapsody fall flat and dismally at that. Why? Two main reasons. One could point to the fact that, inevitably, the soloist strays too far away from the style of the music as intended by the composer (Gershwin) and the piece loses coherence. Interestingly, it was Marcus Roberts who did the best job of improvising within the style of Gershwin. However, that wasn’t the most glaring problem with the performances and what is usually cited; and here is the punchline of where I am going with all this. All four are great piano players (duh!). They all played all the correct notes as written on the page and played them with great technical skill. But, and this is a big but, compared to what a great Classical soloist can do with the written parts of that work the jazz payers all sounded somewhat stiff, hesitant to a degree, and emotionally flat. Great jazz players falling short in the very area that is being suggested is the purview of jazz players. Obviously no disrespect intended toward these amazing players; only meant to point out that a classical pianist who understands that language on a higher level than a jazz musician and who perfected that particular discipline can do a better job of doing justice to the music and touching the listener on an emotional level.  Just as a good jazz player can do a better job with a jazz tune than a classical musician can.

The Cooker is an album by the jazz trumpeter Lee Morgan, released on the Blue Note label in 1958 as BLP 1578. It was recorded on September 29, 1957, and features a quintet with Morgan, Pepper Adams, Bobby Timmons, Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones.

This is the first album to feature his own compositions, and the first without any compositions by Benny Golson.

Some people say this is the best "Night In Tunisia" ever; who am I to argue, for sure it's a contender for the best "Hard Bop" ever. Talking about an "All Star" cast, here it is; I could listen to this every other day and point out something new.


        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cooker


This is sweet sweet music to my ears.

Frogman, you sometime mix apples and oranges and I don't know what you call the finished product. That's what you're doing when you mix classical and jazz.


""Obviously no disrespect intended toward these amazing players; only meant to point out that a classical pianist who understands that language on a higher level than a jazz musician and who perfected that particular discipline can generally do a better of doing justice to the music and touching the listener on an emotional level; just as a jazz player can generally do a better job with a jazz tune than a classical musician can.""


This is what you stated, and it sounds like gospel truth to me. Classical pianists are accustomed to playing written music, and for jazz musicians, when the music is written, that's just the ball park they are supposed to play in.


" But the achievement of jazz musicians in the area of expression or ability to reach the soul of the listener is no greater than that of a great Classical musician and I don’t understand the need to knock one down in order to build up the other; at least that’s how it seems."


I absolutely can not comprehend that; but here again we're speaking of apples and oranges; when some guy played the same identical "Bach Concerto" as another guy the night before, and someone else the night before that, I don't see any latitude for improvisation; and in all cases the music is precisely written down, and must be precisely executed as noted.


I have seen jazz musicians come into a room with no "formal" education in music, but acquired his ability to play his instrument through a lifetime of desire and dedication, and set the crowd on fire.

Now when ever I mention a lack of formal education, you interpret that as though it somehow makes that musician superior to one who has formal training, but it's just a matter of fact nothing more; I'm sure musicians who lacked formal education would have gone to a conservatory if they could have.

I absolutely put this musician on a pedestal higher than the classical musician who went to "Juilliard". The improvising jazz musician begins his night with nothing but his instrument, and an audience who is going to give him the thumbs down if he doesn't produce big time. This musician has to come up with original "hard bop" that's going to be spontaneous and improvisational for the whole night to please his always tough audience.

The classical musician comes into the concert hall to play something he's played many times before, to an audience that knows exactly what to expect; how can he fail?

"Wikipedia"

Theodore "Fats" Navarro (September 24, 1923 – July 6, 1950[1]) was an American jazz trumpet player. He was a pioneer of the bebop style of jazz improvisation in the 1940s. He had a strong stylistic influence on many other players, most notably Clifford Brown.


  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dT9Zb9ykj68


Here he sounds a lot like "Clifford Brown", or if properly stated, Clifford Brown sounds like him.