Miles Davis?
Okay. But I have to ask:
Has anyone heard of Dutch Mason? That’s blues.
What about Downchild? This is a blues band that will knock your socks off.
::going back to lurk mode::
jazz is all that.
and a bag of chips.
If your head is wax, don’t walk in the sun.
-Benjamin Franklin
Sax: Your gangsta roommate knew Bird’s music?? I’m shocked.
What really sold me on jazz: Hearing it live. I liked it ok before, but hearing improvisational jazz (not like the kind from This Is Spinal Tap) in a smoke filled room full of people is the only way to go.
“I hear the mermaids singing, each to each. I do not think that they will sing to me.”
-T.S. Eliot
Am I the only person to see the deep down humor in this? 
your humble TubaDiva
Was Brando looking in the mirror when he said this?
“God is in the house.” No lie.
your humble TubaDiva
To run back about three TubaDiva posts and hijack the thread back to Miles:
Davis is not a guy I reach for a lot when I’m fixin’ to play myself some tunes. Granted, he makes a nice contrast with Bird in the mid-to-late '40s stuff, and I LOVE his work as a leader with the nine-piece “Birth of the Cool” ensemble.
But his '50s stuff with the Coltrane-quintet doesn’t get played much, and his '60s stuff with the Shorter-quintet gets played even less. KIND OF BLUE I listened to so many times before I turned 21 I don’t really need to hear it again. And I never bothered with the BITCHES BREW and post-BITCHES BREW electric fusion.
And while Rysdad is a little over-enthusiastic, there is a point lurking in there about Miles’s 1980s work. The guy would play a total of about seven notes during a set, and long tones at that.
But hell…the guy gave Bill Evans a high-profile job. Bless 'im for that. (Go back and put on that 1957 “On Green Dolphin Street”…mmmmmmmm, yeah.)
Uke
I love to say “I hate jazz! Jazz sucks!” to people who are into jazz, because they get SOOOO defensive and it’s funny to watch. I mean if someone says “I hate rock!” to me, I couldn’t give a crap. But them Jazz fanz, them’s some FANZ! Now it’s a bit harsh of me to say “I hate jazz, jazz sucks” like I mean it, because really, I only hate about 95% of the jazz I’ve heard. The rest was ok. And I’m sure there is some jazz out there that I’d really get into…even if it’s only one song, by one band, in someone’s cellar… I’m sure it’s out there. Most of the jazz I’ve heard though, is mind-bogglingly lame and I just can’t stand it. I don’t care if I don’t “get” it or if I’m just not hearing it live, or whatever, the point is that what I’ve heard I really disenjoy. (is that a word?)
Same with blues. The rock station I listened to most of the time in Tucson had a 3 hour Blues show on sunday nights, and I’d try to listen to it, but it would seriously make me start drooling on myself in boredom.
Now I gotta defend the OP which was NOT a troll. It was one of those venting things that we all do. It was overstated for the sake of humor (same as my “die, die, suffer and die” post to techchick in the “you’re so vain” thread in MPSIMS… sentiment was exaggerated for humor) and it’s even more fun when you know the people who will be defending it are gonna be all extra-gung-ho like jazz fans tend to be.
–
Teeming Millions: http://fathom.org/teemingmillions
“Meat flaps, yellow!” - DrainBead, naked co-ed Twister chat
O p a l C a t
www.opalcat.com
TubaDiva-
By stating my experience as a professional performing jazz player, I was trying to establish that my distaste for Davis is not wholly based on his being a jerk. I enjoy a range of music both more and less complex than his. I merely opin that he’s a sloppy, overrated player, who had more than his share of lucky breaks. And yes, his playing live or otherwise was completely worthless in the last decade or so of his life. His biggest talents, I think, were his ability to establish and flagship new styles, and make famous players of his sidemen.
Sweet Basil
OpalCat - thanks for understanding.
And now for a true story. Many years ago, in my one and only foray into the music business, I was in a recording studio overseeing the production of a demo tape for a song I had written. During a break in the session, the keyboard player observed that the extended instrumental passage in the middle of the song sounded a lot like Thelonius Monk, and asked if I listened to him much. To which I replied something like, “Huh?”
I shopped the tape around for a while in my hopelessly amateurish fashion, got no interest, and eventually lost interest myself. I figure it was that Monk sound that did me in.
DWD:
Nah, it wasn’t the fact that the instrumental sounded a little like Monk that killed you whilst you walked among music professionals.
It was your fucking ignorance.
“Hmmm…the vocal sounds a bit like Dylan.” “What a nice counterpoint; do you listen to a lot of Bach?” If you’d straed blank-eyed and said “Huh?” to these statements, you’ve been bounced out on your ass too.
Uke
Oh, and it’s “Thelonious.”
Thelonious Sphere Monk, to put a point on it.
www.monkinstitute.com
What do I believe in? Not much that can’t be proven by logic and scientific experiment, and you better believe, I want to see the logic and laboratory equipment. --P.J. O’Rourke–
Uke, don’t you think that, for whatever reasons, Bach and Dylan might be a teensier bit better known than Monk? (I just think the ignorance has to be more egregious before it becomes “fucking ignorance.”)
Sturgeons’ law probably applies as well to jazz as anything–90% of it is crap, but 90% of everything is crap.
Bucky
Buckaroo:
Sointenly, if you’re talking about the Man in the Street (actually, I wouldn’t trust the Man in the Street to have heard of Bach or Dylan, either).
But if one wishes to pose as a musician, one should be more “up” on one’s forebears than the Man in the Street. Monk’s light has by no means been hidden under a bushel.
I have a question for serious devotees of jazz: how many “types,” if you will, of jazz are there? Do you distinguish “types” of jazz by periods, performers, or genres?
I have heard music termed “jazz” that was melodious and beautiful, and I have heard music (in the loosest sense of the word) termed “jazz” that was cacophanous noodling.
And can anyone defend the cacophanous noodling? Please don’t just tell me I don’t “get it,” tell me what there is to get. I have studied music and play several instruments, so you can use musical terms in your explanation without too much trepidation.
Or, if this is too tall an order, direct me to some good books.
Thanks,
Eden
Ike, can I interest you in the notion that I’m a noble savage, nourished at the breast of nature, unspoiled by culture or sophistication?
No?
Well, shit, it was worth a try.
Seriously, though, are you saying that if a person ignorant of Bach could somehow produce a polyphonic masterpiece, that it would not only not get, but would not even merit, consideration by serious musicians? That you put more value on the trappings of professionalism than on music itself?
Ukelele Ike, on second thought, don’t even bother answering my last questions.
I had fun blowing off steam, I explained my motivation as well as I could (although OpalCat explained it even better in fewer words), and I should have left it at that. I never intended to get drawn into an argument over something that can’t be argued rationally on either side, anyway.
Can we get through just ONE thread without bringing up felching???
Seriously, I like just about every* type of music to some degree. I can even listen to rap in short doses. The great thing about jazz is that you can listen to it over dinner. It doesn’t interfere with the conversation, or put your guests to sleep. Rather, it’s lively without being oppressive.
- Except “talking singers”, like Rosemary Clooney and Frank Sinatra. “It’s. up. to. you. New. York. New. York.” They’re not SINGING, for pete’s sake! They’re giving a speech!
eden:
Thanks for asking. A lot of this thread is confusing to me, as I rarely think of most jazz as “cacaphonous noodling.”
I’ll do the Jazz 101 thing, which has been questioned by umpteen critics since the 1970s, but is still the thing thrown at most neophytes…if TubaDiva or Saxface or anyone else wants to secondguess me, please do…
Hokay. Jazz arose from the blues, field hollers, ragtime, brass band music, and various strains of European folk music around the turn of the century in New Orleans. Early stuff (1900-1920) involved simultaneous polyphonic improvisation within a group (usually) made up of clarinet, cornet, trombone (front line) and banjo, tuba, piano, and drums (rhythm section). Examples: King Oliver’s Creole Jazz Band, Original Dixieland Jazz Band,
In the 1920s, the idea of the individual soloist came to the fore, mainly because Louis Armstrong (cornet) and Sidney Bechet (clarinet and soprano sax) were such strong voices. Instrumentation remained the same, more or less, and jazz influences spread into American popular music through Chicago to New York, Kansas City, California, and everywhere else. White kids in the Chicago area developed the “Chicago sound,” which relied more on individual soloing. Paul Whiteman brought jazz to the concert hall in 1924, showcasing various styles and premiering Gershwin’s RHAPSODY IN BLUE (which isn’t jazz, but is infuenced by it). Examples of this period can be heard in Armstrong’s Hot Five and Hot Seven sessions, Bix Beiderbecke’s recordings with Frank Trumbauer and Paul Whiteman’s orchestra, Jelly Roll Morton’s and Fats Waller’s bands.
In the '30s, larger groups took over…Fletcher Henderson was a groundbreaker, writing arrangements for bigger bands, followed by Duke Ellington…the augmented trumpet, trombone, and saxophone sections were capable of weaving tapestries of sound, backing soloists. The tuba and the banjo gave way to the mellower string bass and guitar. Heavy rhythm and a “swing” feeling made the new jazz excellent dance music. By the late 1930s, jazz became for the first and only time America’s great popular music. Examples of this period: the big bands of Count Basie, Benny Goodman, Jimmy Lunceford, Charlie Barnet, Chick Webb, and Ellington, of course.
In the early 1940s things were brewing at Minton’s, a Harlem nightclub…young bandsmen Dizzy Gillespie (trumpet), Charlie Parker (alto sax), Kenny Clarke (drums), Bud Powell (piano) were working up a totally new kind of jazz, “Bebop”…an art movement with its own ideology. The tempos increased geometrically, long solos developed, jagged, driving rhythms predominated.
Simultaneously, on the west coast, another antiSwing movement was underway…a reactionary move backward to the roots of polyphonic jazz in the New Orleans tradition. Revamped New Orleans style is often called “Dixieland” in order to differentiate it from the original.
The U.S. economy now made it difficult to sustain large dance orchestras, and they were supplanted by small ensembles, usually two or three horns with rhythm section.
Bebop was too hot and sweaty to remain unadulterated for long. By the early 1950s things had sheared two ways: the West Coast developed the “Cool jazz” style (Gerry Mulligan, Chet Baker, Stan Getz, Jimmy Giuffre), which relied more on arrangements as settings for the soloists, who played in a relaxed, non-emotional style based on the swing-era saxophone legend Lester Young. New York leaned more toward the “Hard bop” style (Art Blakey’s bands, Sonny Rollins, Horace Silver, Kenny Dorham) – straightforward “blowing sessions,” with simple “heads” and extended soloing.
By the late '50s, a funky, “soul” sound had entered the hard-bop lexicon. In the early '60s, “Free jazz” was developing, spurred on by the experiments of John Coltrane, and by out-and-out radicals Ornette Coleman, Cecil Taylor, Archie Shepp, etc.
During the 1970s, Miles Davis’s late '60s groups introduced “Fusion,” which was meant to appeal to rock fans. Less said about that, the better. See Chick Corea’s Return to Forever, Weather Report, etc.
In the 1980s and '90s, anything went. Jazz was beginning to cannibalize itself…publicity hound Wynton Marsalis wears tailored suits and calls for a return to pre-Bop melodicism, Don Byron swipes Kletzmer music, the nightclubs are filled with musicians honking and bleating Free-style, zipping through Bop changes, whatever. Big corporations decide that jazz can be marketed to neo-hipsters, and clowns like Joshua Redman arise. Kids dance to big-band swing, and variants thereof.
Let’s see…I’ve completely left out the evolution of piano styles, anything about vocalists, everything about post-Swing big bands. But my fingers are tired. Okay, everyone, start firing at me.
Uke