Agree or disagree?

[MartinMusicMan]

Bernstein was a notorious chickenhawk.

Oh yeah, the stories I've heard ...

[paulwl]

OK, I'm glad to hear the composing scene was a little looser outside the conservatories. I am no specialist in that era or genre, only curious. But if I know one thing about artists in that era, it's that they had to be "joiners" - at least socially if not artistically - or the going was all the tougher.

Still, artistic politics is only real if we make it real, and only bs if we overcome it. Some take pride in it and draw strength from it. This book, by a U. of Michigan professor, lays out a thesis that the gay music community was the only one really receptive to the lessons of French impressionist composers, and because of that, they were the only ones who were free to write modern music that the American public could really relate to.

The thesis doesn't pass the smell test with me, but I imagine there was a lot of pressure to fall into line back in the day, and that some fell in, some didn't.

[JL]

Getting back to the OP, now that I've seen the video clip, I agree with what KB said. I think some of the discussion here may have gone beyond the basic concept he was discussing, but that's fine of course.

Since I grew up in the late '60s, early '70s listening to live jazz, and was lucky enough to hear many of the real top players from the 'golden era' of jazz who were still alive at the time, I think Pete hits the crux of my take on it here:

So for me it's all down to jazz becoming taught academically as opposed to people learning it by osmosis "on the job" as it was in the old days.

The difference between now and then has a lot to do with how, and in what environment, musicians are learning to play jazz. Back in the day, players tended to develop unique and individual sounds, rather than just all learn the same technique (many of them certainly had great technique, but the overall sound and a certain 'raw' element was a big part of it).

Think of players like Gene Ammons, Dexter Gordon, Ben Webster, Sonny Rollins, Johnny Hodges, Miles Davis, Dizzy, Freddie Hubbard (to include some trumpet players), Roland Kirk, Bird, Lester Young, Eddie Lockjaw Davis, Jackie Mclean, Art Pepper, and many more I could list. They all had a recognizable and unique SOUND. They probably also developed some techniques and embouchure methods that would be considered "wrong" in an academic environment.

Finally, I'll say it again; the blues was a big element in jazz back then, and that has been lost in a lot of present-day players. I guess they consider it too basic, or crude, or something. But you need that grit in there.

[gary]

Were his three children chores begrudgingly done by a dutiful husband?

[hakukani]

Were his three children chores begrudgingly done by a dutiful husband?

...or a turkey baster...

[piwikiwi]

Where did you get that impression?



They don't.

They will expect you to play with expression.

[warp x]

They will expect you to play with expression.

Sure they will, but I replied to:

And does this conservatory try to teach expressiveness, or leave time out for the student to start absorbing it?

Which they don't.

[piwikiwi]

Sure they will, but I replied to:



Which they don't.

Okay sorry that I misunderstood your post. Who was you're teacher in amsterdam?

[warp x]

I was in The Hague for tenor, with Ruud Brink, Sal Nistico, Ferdinand Povel and John Ruocco, for jazz. Leo van Oostrom and André Hemmers for classical. I studied bass clarinet in Amsterdam with Harry Sparnaay.

[Jacques5646]

I'm the Jazz correspondent for a regional newspaper and, one month ago, I had the luck to make an interview with Al Di Meola before a concert over here with his present band featuring the fantastic Cuban pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba. Al started, as a rock teen, with private jazz lessons, went to Berklee and the rest is history. He pushed "fusion" much farther than the combination of rock and jazz, encompassing a full range of "alien" musics like tango, middle-Eastern, Cuban, etc. His present career is a huge commercial success. His view of present jazz is interesting and leads us back to the question of the materials to be used for impro :

Q: « Jazz » seems to me in a state of indecision, no clear trend seeming to appear, opposite to the time where, e.g. « free jazz », « fusion », « mainstream » all had strong fans and stars and a large audience. Do you think the ways you explore, with many « exotic » influences is the only way for it to survive and develop ? A: Yes, jazz is lost and quite boring because most Jazz artists are oblivious to the audience getting bored with their way too long solos. Half of them are oblivious and half don't care! Audiences get tired of long bass, drum and even sax, guitar and piano solos that don't find their way back to the composition in due time fast enough. In our case I think this timing and focus much more so on strong composition is key to the survival and future!

[shotgun]

(Al Di Meola) "Yes, jazz is lost and quite boring because most Jazz artists are oblivious to the audience getting bored with their way too long solos. Half of them are oblivious and half don't care! Audiences get tired of long bass, drum and even sax, guitar and piano solos that don't find their way back to the composition in due time fast enough."

This has always been obvious to me. Very few audiences are comprised of enough dedicated jazz fans to warrant stretching out for chorus after chorus. The people I play for don't want to hear it. They want a tune — a "song" — that they can identify as a melodic head, even if they're not familiar with it. They want to hear the permutations of the tune in the instrumental solo. They want to hear how the different soloists treat the tune. They enjoy watching interaction within the band — trading fours, background riffs, those occasional chuckles of amazement — and they're looking forward to the next tune. They're not interested in listening to someone wandering through a long solo that has no apparent underpinnings, and they're not interested in trying to figure out the "hook", some involved structure which substitutes for changes and differentiates the music from total improvisation.

It wasn't always this way. I remember seeing avant garde concerts in the 60's and the cats had the crowd going wild; the image of Pharoah Sanders with a long string of saliva hanging off his mouthpiece, the Ayler brothers playing nursery tunes, Black Power harangues, hours of polyrhythmic percussion with no discernible beat — we ate it all up. But it would be crazy to try to present that style in the venues I play these days. So maybe I'm not doing anything cutting edge and I'm not really playing "jazz" — I really wonder why it matters.

[piwikiwi]

I was in The Hague for tenor, with Ruud Brink, Sal Nistico, Ferdinand Povel and John Ruocco, for jazz. Leo van Oostrom and André Hemmers for classical. I studied bass clarinet in Amsterdam with Harry Sparnaay.

Wow that's quite impressive. Did you feel you got a lot out of your education(I have my audition in about 6 weeks)?

[Jacques5646]

Very few audiences are comprised of enough dedicated jazz fans to warrant stretching out for chorus after chorus. The people I play for don't want to hear it. They want a tune — a "song" — that they can identify as a melodic head, even if they're not familiar with it. They want to hear the permutations of the tune in the instrumental solo. They want to hear how the different soloists treat the tune. They enjoy watching interaction within the band — trading fours, background riffs, those occasional chuckles of amazement — and they're looking forward to the next tune. They're not interested in listening to someone wandering through a long solo that has no apparent underpinnings, and they're not interested in trying to figure out the "hook", some involved structure which substitutes for changes and differentiates the music from total improvisation.

So maybe I'm not doing anything cutting edge and I'm not really playing "jazz" — I really wonder why it matters.

Pretty sure you really play jazz and pretty sure it doesn't matter, as long as it swings, rocks, develops interesting ideas on good tunes, as long as you love it and your audience does the same.
BTW, with a 2-sax outifit "à la" Gene Ammons-Sonny Stitt that a good friend of mine and yours truly initiated some months ago, we make exactly the same discoveries as you do: people love it.
J

[warp x]

Wow that's quite impressive. Did you feel you got a lot out of your education(I have my audition in about 6 weeks)?

Yes I did, and still do. The conservatory is not the hard part of becoming a musician. You practice your *ss off for some years, take up a double (flute or clarinet) and generally take as many lessons and see as many concerts as you possibly can. The hard part IMHO is after the conservatory, trying to get back to the uncomplicated feeling of just loving to play music and enjoying that as much as possible together with your audience. Basically what it comes down to is you try to forget all you've learned and just have fun making great music.

[paulwl]

Just don't do it backwards. I played in a "natural" way before going back for a few freshman rudiments such as ear training, class piano and theory. No woodwind or ensembles at all. Even piano class took the desire to play music, sing, etc., right out of me. Music wasn't something to love anymore. It was just drill.

I finally had to disenroll because of moving house, and altho I feel like a bit of a quitter, it really was the right decision.

[simon196]

Esperanza Spalding, Snarky Puppy (an amazing band, check them out) and Robert Glasper were top 3 in the iTunes jazz charts last I checked. While the charts themselves don't set anything in stone, they do show that jazz can be accessible without being too "Kenny G-ish." G man is good at what he does, it just lacks in honesty.

[allenlowe]

well, I think the question is irrelevant and even inappropriate; just asking it implies an anti-intellectualism that is contrary to the freedom musicians need in order to create. One could have said the same about a host of classical music post 1920. As for jazz's intellectuality, it's much more than Diz's glasses. A whole school of early avant gardists moved things along in the '50s- Hal McKusick and Teddy Charles (both recently deceased); Paul Bley, Hall Overton, George Handy, Gil Melle, John LaPorta, Charles Mingus, Gil Evans, George Russell - this movement is over 50 years old and to question it all indicates that there are just too many gaps in our knowledge of jazz. Check it out - it's deep and serious (all of the above) but swings and is very satisfying, intellectually and emotionally.

[paulwl]

How do you think it compares to the young cats running changes today? Could they stand to learn from it? I can't see how jazz pedagogy is likely to be filling in those gaps in the knowledge, considering that out of that group, only Mingus is really part of the canon (and not much of him).

It wouldn't surprise me one bit if any area of academic study was "intellectual" in some ways and "anti-intellectual" in others. Especially not music, which has to serve many masters.

[Jacques5646]

(...) Snarky Puppy (an amazing band, check them out) . While the charts themselves don't set anything in stone, they do show that jazz can be accessible without being too "Kenny G-ish."

Wow! Great and nice surprise! Thanks for the tip (they're unknown over here)
J

[simon196]

Wow! Great and nice surprise! Thanks for the tip (they're unknown over here)
J

You're welcome