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"Birth of the Cool!" A {Jazz} Thread.
Matthew
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
With my recent purchase of various Jazz albums, I thought it was time that we have a proper Jazz thread. Jazz is one of the longest lasting forms of American music, from classics like....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxibMBV3nFo
To the Fusion filled 70's, embodied in such songs as...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSksWyHsYw8
To the kind of stuff you tend to hear on the weather channel like...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7en3HLWcq3w
To more modern stuff like....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqkVeytyifM
All this is considered Jazz in one form or another.
The music we call Jazz has it's origins in the early twentieth century, and perhaps sooner, as stated by wikipedia....
"within the African-American communities of the Southern United States. Its roots lie in the combining by African-Americans of certain European harmony and form elements, with their existing African-based music."
It is mostly associated with Horns, though any musical instrument can be used for Jazz music (Guitarist John Mclaughlin is a personal favorite of mine,) though the horn is still the most prevalent instrument in Jazz.
What about you guys? What are your thoughts in Jazz, how often do you listen to it?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxibMBV3nFoTo the Fusion filled 70's, embodied in such songs as...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSksWyHsYw8To the kind of stuff you tend to hear on the weather channel like...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7en3HLWcq3wTo more modern stuff like....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqkVeytyifMAll this is considered Jazz in one form or another.
The music we call Jazz has it's origins in the early twentieth century, and perhaps sooner, as stated by wikipedia....
"within the African-American communities of the Southern United States. Its roots lie in the combining by African-Americans of certain European harmony and form elements, with their existing African-based music."
It is mostly associated with Horns, though any musical instrument can be used for Jazz music (Guitarist John Mclaughlin is a personal favorite of mine,) though the horn is still the most prevalent instrument in Jazz.
What about you guys? What are your thoughts in Jazz, how often do you listen to it?
+3
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I had wanted to get into jazz as early as elementary school. But it didn't really happen until I started listening to Charles Mingus toward the end of my teen years. This was the composition that got me hooked, and this is probably my favorite performance of it.
I've tried, I really have.
When I lived on the east side, I would go to a jazz club on my block a few times a month and listen to a broad variety of really great stuff.
Yeah, I dig it.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Albert Ayler is possibly my favorite musician ever.
Yeah, a lot of the newer or more experimental stuff really doesn't strike my fancy. However, Miles Davis is one of the best terrible people ever.
Gonna be lurking this thread a lot
Only a few songs in, but I'm really enjoying this
Here is the sound of him reworking his own Jazz Standard Watermelon Man on the massively influential album Headhunters
I made a game, it has penguins in it. It's pay what you like on Gumroad.
Currently Ebaying Nothing at all but I might do in the future.
Here's some Wynton tearing up some Jelly Roll. Good stuff.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
Those of you who know your stuff, what would be really handy, if you could find the time, would be a guide for laypersons to the different kinds and styles of jazz. What is cool jazz? What does it sound like> What is hard bop? What is fusion? What about stuff like big band or swing? Et cetera. I feel like this might be more helpful than recommending individual artists because, like, someone liking Kind of Blue is no guarantee that they'll be into Bitches Brew, y'know?
I'll get on this later tonight. It won't be exhaustive, but at least a good starting point for people to build from.
and apparently the doors
My personal experience in learning to like jazz may be helpful for anyone looking for a way in - cool jazz and the Kind of Blue era modal jazz is what most people, including myself, find to be their entry point. I think the melodies are more at the front of the music and easier to listen to and appreciate. The recordings available from this period are of a far better quality than many classic bebop or big band recordings. Besides the obvious Kind of Blue, acolytes may want to try Herbie Hancock's 'Maiden Voyage'.
Bebop is great, but it took me a long time to appreciate it. IMO, this style relies on the listener being better able to follow (hear) the way the soloist works his way through and resolves complex harmonic changes, often at fast tempos. To a less experienced listener, as I was (and to some extent have become again), the resolutions can't be heard. Music's like many things: you can learn to like things you're exposed to repeatedly, and this is relevant because the harmonic structures used in bebop aren't much like what you'll hear constantly in pop music these days. Unless you train your ears to pick up on what's going on, it may sound like just a jumble of notes to you (or maybe not, I'm not saying this is the case with everyone).
I found I could never really dig big band music all that much. It's awesome to play in a big band, mind you. Not really sure why, but I've just never really come around to the classic swing style of the big band era, it just sounds too old-fashioned for me. But, as above, I'm sure i could change that! I just haven't put in the required listening hours.
What probably features most in my personal collection is often called 'hard-bop'. I've never been all that clear on strict boundaries of this sub-genre. I suppose hard-bop tends to have similar instrumentation to bebop, but it reverts to a bluesier, funkier feel than bebop, and doesn't have the same incessant harmonic movement. The lines played by the horns probably rely more on rhythmic development and motifs than constant melodic development.
For my obligatory Youtube link I'm going to put in Kenny Dorham's 'Buffalo', off the album Whistle Stop, because I think it's a little less well-known and I might have the pleasure of introducing some people to it. The tune is a blues. The first solo by Hank Mobley is one of my favourites of all time. Not over-played, just interesting, with great delivery and of a length that doesn't make you wonder when it will end. It's one of the few solos I managed to transcribe, learn, and play by heart before switching out of my jazz program.
What about jazz clubs? How about you all name-drop all the famous jazz clubs you've been to and who you saw performing there? Not having been to the US (or Europe or Japan) I can't say I've been to any clubs that are legendary in jazz history.
I reckon the best show I actually saw was, believe it or not, in a club on Le Loi in Saigon called Sax N Art. The internet now tells me that the guy who I saw performing, Tran Manh Tuan, is actually the owner of the club. He had some guests from New York whose names I do not recall, a trumpet player and a drummer, who were fantastic too.
The experience was brought down a little by the expensive drinks and the unadvertised cover charge which appeared on the bill, but this thread is about the music.
http://newnations.bandcamp.com
Cool jazz came on around the same time as bebop in the 40's (IIRC). It was an alternative to bebop played by guys like Lee Konitz, Warne Marsh, and Lennie Tristano. The tunes still have a lot of chord changes but the musicians approached improvisation in a different way than the beboppers.
Hard bop is the most direct continuation of the bebop tradition. It sounds a lot like bebop, guys still played standards but in many cases the music was more overtly funky/bluesy...the solos could also be edgier (both harmonically and rhythmically) than the bebop of the 40's. Musicians that come to mind are Clifford Brown, Wes Montgomery, and Charles Mingus.
Swing was the popular music of the 20's and 30's. Think guys like Louis Armstrong, Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins, etc. Improvisers tended to play more off the melody and more vertically than the beboppers who came later. Rhythm sections tended to play 4-on-the-floor and players used a more exaggerated dotted-quarter / sixteenth-note swing feel.
Fusion came on in the late sixties...IIRC Miles Davis 'going electric' in 1969 was one of the big moments that ushered in this era although like all styles of music the exact beginning is never that well defined. Fusion is basically the combination of rock/funk rhythms with jazz harmony. Think Alan Holdsworth, John Mclaughlin, Weather Report, and a ton of electric guitarists. Sometimes fusion can sound a lot like progressive rock (which is another hard to define genre).
Big band is more of an ensemble format than a style of music, typically the following: 4 trumpets, 4 trombones, 5 saxes, 3 or 4 rhythm and occasionally fronted by a singer. I don't remember when the big bands were in their heyday, I'm going to say 30's to 50's. Big band music has evolved with the times, and although there are still big bands that emulate specific eras or styles there are modern big bands at the forefront of jazz. Maria Schneider and Darcy James Argue are two modern big band leaders. The oldschool big bands are sometimes referred to as dance bands because they played music that was intended for swing dancing (one of the biggest dance-band tunes I can think of is Sing, Sing, Sing by the Glenn Miller band).
http://www.hotribscooljazz.org/
I'm definitely going.
Not to mention this.
http://steamcommunity.com/id/pablocampy
This is my go-to relaxing song.
And it isn't just me, lots of modern non-jazz music owes a debt to jazz.