Jazz - what's it all about ?

[Jebo1]

For me, music is about sex. All the best music is in some way related to sex, and jazz is (apart from a few notable exceptions - Kind of Blue etc) the most UN-sexy music in the world.

It's a headache inducing racket that would have you humping like a 16 year old, with ADHD having an epileptic fit. It's all over the place.

I love indulgent music, but not the "nudge nudge, wink wink did you see how I referenced a Charlie Parker solo there mate" type of improvisation. That sucks.

It's all the over intellectualised notion of the jazz player as a 'thinker' that gets me. Jazz is a very simple form of music, that has bolt ons to make it appear more difficult. Take a standard 12 bar blues, chuck in a few substitutions, you got jazz baby. Modal jazz, well, don't even progress, just bash around on a mode.

You can teach someone to play a 12 bar walking line in a few minutes that would, with some improvisation, see them through your most general of jazz forms. You can then heap on the rest of the theory stuff, but if you think that a heroin addicted Charlie Parker was planning all those substitutions, or a drunk Django was playing freely whilst calculating the changes you're a fool!

[alexclaber]

[quote name='Jebo1' post='326695' date='Nov 11 2008, 12:59 PM']For me, music is about sex. All the best music is in some way related to sex, and jazz is (apart from a few notable exceptions - Kind of Blue etc) the most UN-sexy music in the world.[/quote]

Jazz is not just bebop!

And something else:

"But what about the word [jazz]? Unfortunately, its beginnings are especially obscure. It may have come from an African word, or from a performer's name, among other possibilities. But nobody would have dared include jazz in a respectable book or article a century ago because it was decidedly obscene, referring to sexual activity. Gradually, though, jazz came to mean any vigorous, enthusiastic activity, and eventually it became reputable enough to mention."

Alex

[Bilbo]

[quote name='BigBeefChief' post='326629' date='Nov 11 2008, 11:44 AM']Jazz fans do as much damage to the genre as the music itself.

You guys seem to think that there are 2 groups or people: Those who like Jazz and those that don't understand it.

Wrong!

There are those that (probably pretend) to like it and those that think it's utter sh*t.


I'm told you can't dismiss an entire genre. But I've yet to hear a jazz song I like. I'm not getting any younger, and I just don't have time to invest in music I need to force myself to like just so I can wear a blazer over a roll-neck sweater. Its the musical equivalent of Stockholm Syndrome. You fellas have spent a long time trying to like this stuff, that you have somehow fallen in love with it.

It reminds me of those annoying f***ers who recommend a film (usually something sh*t like The Beach or Fight Club). When you tell them that it was f***ing sh*t, they say"well you clearly didn't understand it". Yes I f***ing did, and I also understand that your opinion isn't worth sh*t!



Most improvisation is bollocks. Improvise when writing the thing, pick the best version, and there you go, you've got your song. Quite frankly, I couldn't care what mood you're in when you play it live.[/quote]

Ignoring the 87.6 generalisations you make in your post , you have to understand that music is just a thing and, like all things, is used by different people for different purposes. If you want to dance, Stravinsky is probably not going to work for you. If you want to chill, it is unlikely that you will be using Motorhead. If you want background noise, a bit of bland musak is the thing but if you want to stir some patriotic feelings in people, you get out the Elgar. Every piece of music requires something different from the listener.

Same with the films you refer to. If you want mindless drivel, Indiana Jones is the man. If you want something intellectually stimulating, try something else (don't I ask mem, I liek my movies 'lightweight'). If you abhor violence, the Saw movies are a no go but, if films with animals in turn you off, then Babe is going to really get on your thrupennys. If someone recommends something, you need to decide what they are actually recommending and why rather than simply the title of the specific product (If I hear one more person say their favourite film is 'THe Shawshank Redemption', I will spit).

There is s*** jazz out there (I've played hundreds of hours of it myself) but it is a high risk undertaking and that is going to happen. You aren't going to see the solos off the records, the pieces will change, the feelings that each piece creates in the listener will change everytime - that is what makes it attractive to me; ' the sound of surprise. The problem I have with most other genres is that hearing a tune played pretty much the same way everytime, using tired old cliches, is unstimulating - like reading books or watching films with the same plot over and over again. Watching angry young men (and it is mostly men) trashing their instruments and ranting about the things they care about doesn't do it for me (it did when I was 16 but no more). Straight drum beats leave me cold. Repetetive chord sequences are tired, repetetive anything is uninteresting especially repetetive set lists!- and what are 'choruses' for? repeat until hacked off?; 'yeah, you did that already, now do something else. Please!'. And as for covers bands - I HEARD IT ALREADY!!!

I am passionate about jazz because it holds my attention where other musics don't; simple as. After 20+ years of playing to tiny little audiences, I know its not popular. There are more bad jazz musicians than bad rock musicians and I have played with half of them; they are bad because they don't work hard enough on what is a very difficult music to play well. That is a self fulfilling prophecy - bad musician = bad gig = disatisfied audience = people slagging off jazz = low audience levels = fewer gigs = less reasons to practice = bad musician = bad gig etc etc.

But this is the bottom line for me; a neatly polished version of Mustang Sally is NOT better than bad jazz, not because it is not good, because it is not professional, not tight, not well delivered etc. It is not better because I know what's coming and don't care! I prefer jazz simply because I don't know what's coming! Not because it is difficult, elitist, 'classy', sophisticated or makes me look hard but because it keeps moving. I learned to like it organically; not by deciding one day to 'like' it, but by moving from one musician I liked to another and another and another. I 'get it' because I kept looking at it and listening to it because it excited me and warranted close attention, not so I could win at a pub quiz.

Like you, BBC, I am not getting any younger but I have no time to waste listening to MORE variations of the same tired old cliches that form the basis of 95% of popular music.

But that's just me

[The Funk]

[quote name='Jebo1' post='326695' date='Nov 11 2008, 12:59 PM']You can then heap on the rest of the theory stuff, but if you think that a heroin addicted Charlie Parker was planning all those substitutions, or a drunk Django was playing freely whilst calculating the changes you're a fool![/quote]

I respected what you were saying up until that point. Charlie Parker DID plan all those substitutions. That's like saying a blues-rock player doesn't know which notes he's playing in a solo before he plays them. Of course he does.

[chris_b]

[quote name='alexclaber' post='326699' date='Nov 11 2008, 01:06 PM']....But what about the word [jazz]?....[/quote]
Jazz wasn't called Jazz until approx 1915. Jass was a rude and derogatory term which was used to smear the music when it came up from New Orleans to Chicago. This evolved into the word Jazz.

[The Funk]

Jazz, Rock n' Roll - they both mean f***ing. Funk = the smell of f***ing. It's all filthy.

[Cantdosleepy]

[quote name='BigBeefChief' post='326629' date='Nov 11 2008, 11:44 AM']There are those that (probably pretend) to like it and those that think it's utter sh*t.[/quote]

The word 'to' should be inside the parentheses in this sentence, champ.

Here to help.

[Bilbo]

[quote name='Jebo1' post='326695' date='Nov 11 2008, 12:59 PM']You can teach someone to play a 12 bar walking line in a few minutes that would, with some improvisation, see them through your most general of jazz forms.[/quote]

Minutes to learn and a lifetime to master - what's wrong with that?

[quote]... if you think that a heroin addicted Charlie Parker was planning all those substitutions, or a drunk Django was playing freely whilst calculating the changes you're a fool![/quote]

The difference between a heroin addict and a non-heroin addict is the need for heroin, not the ability to think. Parker was considered to be a highly intelligent man by many who knew him. His knowledge of harmony was very advanced but his ability to function in the conventional sense was poor. Like a lot of people with that kind of focus, they are actually quite dysfunctional - I have often wondered whether Charlie Parker had Asperger's or some other autistic condition.

Geroge Orwell lived rough for some time before he wrote 1984 and Animal Farm. Aleister Crowley and William S. Burroughs both used H at one time or another. The world is full of creative, intelligent people who have got hooked.

As for intelligent alcoholics, where do I start...???

[Jebo1]

[quote]Geroge Orwell lived rough for some time before he wrote 1984 and Animal Farm.[/quote]

That's true, but it was research for his book called 'Down and out in London and Paris'. He was a very well off man, and never struggled for money.

As for this discussion I'm going to substitute my minor 5th of interest for a major 7th of drinking and see you later.

[mcgraham]

I'm of two minds about jazz. It's not that I can't make up my mind, it's more that jazz and more set/repertoire based music define opposite ends of the spectrum.

Taken to extremes, the point of jazz can be said to be to serve the purpose of freedom, improvisation and expression of the [i]performer[/i], and the point of set/repertoire based music being to supremely execute a set piece of music as flawlessly as possible to a set arrangement, typically for the benefit of the [i]audience[/i] (saying nothing about what that objectively means, or what that arrangement may be).

As Bilbo has said, jazz pieces can vary wildly in their styles of execution, depending on the mood they want, depending on the individual performers, how they listen, how they interact, how they play/don't play etc, it's heavily dependent on at least some spontaneous interaction between the performers, i.e. it is, at its root dependent on what the performers choose to do with it. And once you have even a slight bit of skill in this area, or a bit of appreciation for this, it is just so intense to listen to other performers and see where they're going with something.

That is very exciting to me.

However, as more experienced performers will tell you, when performing a set piece/arrangement, it is about serving the audience, to give them a great show, one that fulfills their needs as they are effectively your 'customers'. I for one love to hear songs that I've heard before when they have been excellently crafted and flawlessly executed, when an arrangement of individual instruments has been put together so that when they strike up as one there is a synergistic effect that exceeds the sum of its parts. Often, the whole point is to know what is coming so that you can feel the crescendo coming.

That is very exciting to me.

These ends of the spectrum are not mutually exclusive, but if you're more interested in expectancy of music in the latter, the former improv based music is less likely to hold your attention. If you're interested in the spontaneity and interaction of the former, it makes sense that rigid structure will be less appealing.

Neither is wrong or right, they're just different. Also bear in mind that these aspects are only as good as their representatives, if a band/performer is crap, regardless of what camp they're in it'll be poor. All IMO of course

Mark

[Wil]

[quote name='Jebo1' post='326756' date='Nov 11 2008, 02:02 PM']That's true, but it was research for his book called 'Down and out in London and Paris'. He was a very well off man, and never struggled for money.

As for this discussion I'm going to substitute my minor 5th of interest for a major 7th of drinking and see you later.[/quote]

Yeah, I don't think he was ever truely down and out. I think he did sleep in a "spike" in England and work as a dishwasher in Paris due to changing circustances, though.

Coincidently, Down and Out in Paris and London is my favourite book of all time

Edited November 11, 2008 by Wil

[Jebo1]

[quote name='Wil' post='326774' date='Nov 11 2008, 02:23 PM']Yeah, I don't think he was ever truely down and out. I think he did sleep in a "spike" in England and work as a dishwasher in Paris due to changing circustances, though.

Coincidently, Down and Out in Paris and London is my favourite book of all time [/quote]

Awesome book, the guy was a phenomenal writer, absolutely outstanding.

Homage to Catalunya is wonderful too.

[Bilbo]

[quote name='Wil' post='326774' date='Nov 11 2008, 02:23 PM']Yeah, I don't think he was ever truely down and out. I think he did sleep in a "spike" in England and work as a dishwasher in Paris due to changing circustances, though.

Coincidently, Down and Out in Paris and London is my favourite book of all time [/quote]

My second favourite after 'The Hobbit'

[Exile252]

I was thinking, the only Jazz song I really enjoyed listening to was a Jazz cover of Smells Like Teen Spirit. They had the improvising sections, but they also had a base to which they were working from, and didn't go off on weird solo tangents like they were not listening to the rest of the band.

[Bilbo]

[quote name='Exile252' post='327249' date='Nov 12 2008, 03:13 AM']I was thinking, the only Jazz song I really enjoyed listening to was a Jazz cover of Smells Like Teen Spirit. They had the improvising sections, but they also had a base to which they were working from, and didn't go off on weird solo tangents like they were not listening to the rest of the band.[/quote]

That sucked. Big time.

[Bilbo]

[url="http://www.jazzstandards.com/compositions/index.htm"]http://www.jazzstandards.com/compositions/index.htm[/url]

Useful resource for anyone looking to know a bit more about the standards that feature so heavily in jazz.

[ianrunci]

Don't know why everyone slags off Mustang Sally, its a classic soul tune by a classic soul singer.

[rasher80]

amen to that!

I'm not really a fan of jazz, although i've never given it that much of my time to be fair!

[Bilbo]

[quote name='ianrunci' post='327628' date='Nov 12 2008, 02:25 PM']Don't know why everyone slags off Mustang Sally, its a classic soul tune by a classic soul singer.[/quote]

Because I hear it every time I leave the house. It stopped being boring a long time ago. Then it got irritating. Now its like fingernails on a blackboard.

Don't anyone play it again, please.

Ever.

[mcgraham]

I look forward to checking that site out at home Bilbo (blocked at work; jazz = p0rn)

I've been feeling the urge to throw myself into some more jazz standards recently, thinking about working my way through Scott Pazera's list of 100 jazz tunes that every jazz musician should know.

I was also reading an interesting article/blog that someone wrote about Coltrane's (in)famous piece 'Giant Steps'. The guy effectively broke down how it worked (at least a few ways to look at it) and set out the demands it places on the performer. [i]However[/i], he then proceeded to explain why he felt that the actually piece itself severely lacked in creativity, in that he felt it had been arrived at primarily by mixing geometrically laying out chords.

Whilst it isn't always the most listenable of performed jazz, I enjoy listening to at least the original and relish the fun of playing over it.

Mark

[Bilbo]

I wouldn't necessarily disagree with this assessment of 'Giant Steps' but it is not alone. A lot of music is composed using 'artificial' stimulae e.g. tone rows are an obvious example but there are loads of other ways music has been created. Kenny Wheeler sometimes writes things and them flips them over and makes a musical palindrome. Gil Goldstein talks in his book on Jazz composing about using a skyline, for example, to inform a sequence of notes. Barrington Pheulong used the Morse code for Morse when determining the themn for the tv programme and has admitted to doing things like using the name of the murderer to inform the sequence of notes that forms the incidental themes in odd episodes. Classical composers have used church bells and marching soldiers, birdsong and 1,000 other things. Blues musicians have used train whistles. Isn't the opening theme of 'Tubular Bells' something classical played backwards.

You finds your inspiration where you finds it!

[bassace]

[quote name='bilbo230763' post='327620' date='Nov 12 2008, 02:19 PM'][url="http://www.jazzstandards.com/compositions/index.htm"]http://www.jazzstandards.com/compositions/index.htm[/url]

Useful resource for anyone looking to know a bit more about the standards that feature so heavily in jazz.[/quote]

Fascinating; I'll bookmark it. I was trying to find the chords, then realised 'lazy bugger, you can't have everything in one place' so I'll still have to dive into my Real Books etc. Incidentally, we were playing Georgia on my Mind last night with a four piece rhythm section. Bass, piano and guitar were all playing different chords and insisting each one of us was correct. Only the drummer was right. Funny how it usually happens with that tune.

[dangerboy]

What if you like listening to some jazz, dislike listening to some other jazz, but find jazz musicians, fans and students almost universally tedious and self-regarding? Obviously that's not unique to jazz, but they really do write the manual from which other musical bores learn.

[The Funk]

[quote name='bassace' post='327667' date='Nov 12 2008, 02:58 PM']Incidentally, we were playing Georgia on my Mind last night with a four piece rhythm section. Bass, piano and guitar were all playing different chords and insisting each one of us was correct. Only the drummer was right. Funny how it usually happens with that tune.[/quote]

That song is so hard to play well. I've never played a good version - only train wrecks.

[lowdown]

[quote name='The Funk' post='327808' date='Nov 12 2008, 06:03 PM']That song is so hard to play well. I've never played a good version - only train wrecks.[/quote]

Yer cos its a Blues tune really.Well Ray Charles version was.
1930's tune originally.
I hate it when you get some old fat bald tenor Sax player in
some dindgy back street pub honking all over it. In the name of Jazz



Garry

Edited November 12, 2008 by lowdown