What's Up With Jazz?

[Sam_Stone]

@WordMan

By the time you get to Free Jazz, it sometimes feels like that is what they are doing

Word of advice: don’t start with Free Jazz.

Go buy Kind of Blue by Miles Davis and give it a listen. It is jazz and it is sublime, melodic and brilliant - like a David Gilmour solo taken to the next level. If you like that, branch out from there.

I’ll second this - cautiously. Even Kind of Blue can leave you cold if you’re new to Jazz. But one thing that might help - Miles Davis once said that he considers the spaces between the notes as important as the notes themselves. Listen to that album with that in mind.

Consider that music is about listener expectations, which are informed by their understanding of how musical phrases fit together. We have learned that when certain notes are played, other specific notes should follow. Chords have certain progressions in different types of music. We learn to listen for those subconscously. Tension builds as we hear the phrase being played, and then when it’s resolved according to our expectation it satisfies us.

Simplistic songwriters simply follow that pattern. Anyone can learn to play a straight 12-bar blues shuffle. But if that’s all you’re doing, it may not be very interesting. Better songwriters know how to ramp up that tension, do things that are unexpected, and then resolve it in unique ways - or leave it unresolved in order to leave the listener with an emotion or simply to be memorable.

There is a wonderful book on this subject that I highly recommend - it’s called This is Your Brain on Music. The author is a record producer and also a Ph.D in Neuropsychology who runs a music lab at McGill. He really digs into the nature of music and why we like it, and he grounds the whole discussion in real samples of music.

The book has a companion web site, Your Brain on Music, which contains audio samples for every example in the book. So he tells you what the musician is doing, and why, and then you can go to the web site and actually hear the passage so you can understand what he’s saying. A wonderful use of the web to supplement learning.

For example, this is what he said about Miles Davis:

Reference made to his solos, and to the “air” - the empty space between notes: “Miles Davis famously described his improvisational technique as parallel to the way that Picasso described his use of a canvas: the most critical aspect of the work, both artists said, was not the objects themselves, but the space between objects. In Miles’ case, he described the most important part of his solos as the empty space between notes, the “air” that he placed between one note and the next. Knowing precisely when to hit the next note, and allowing the listener time to anticipate it, is a hallmark of Davis’ genius. This is particularly apparent in his album “Kind of Blue.””

Here’s a direct link to the page with the Miles Davis sample on it. It’s item #17. Give it a listen, and see if you can hear what he’s talking about.

Even if you don’t have the book, you can spend hours listening to the samples on those pages and reading his comments about them, and it will be a short course in music appreciation. But read the book along with it if you can.

[WordMan]

@infinitii

Well that IS probably a better person to follow, but Dolphy is more than just a side man on Coleman’s Free Jazz (heck, he’s a side man on Coltrane’s later stuff, and may have even been an influence!)

Yes, I know Eric Dolphy. Wonderful player. Wrong guy for the OP, given his complaint. Either the OP just wanted to vent about jazz - in which case, okay, YMMV and let’s move on - or there is a real question in there. Following Coltrane on his way “out” (the word used to describe when jazz players break more and more rules - one of Dolphy’s most well-known CD’s is called “Out There” for that reason). But Coltrane is kinda like Picasso - the art starts off anchored in the familiar but gets more out there over the years - which can be a good way to open your mind to possibilities…

[infinitii]

@WordMan

Yes, I know Eric Dolphy. Wonderful player. Wrong guy for the OP, given his complaint. Either the OP just wanted to vent about jazz - in which case, okay, YMMV and let’s move on - or there is a real question in there. Following Coltrane on his way “out” (the word used to describe when jazz players break more and more rules - one of Dolphy’s most well-known CD’s is called “Out There” for that reason). But Coltrane is kinda like Picasso - the art starts off anchored in the familiar but gets more out there over the years - which can be a good way to open your mind to possibilities…

Good point, I just love to have opportunities to mention Dolphy.

[Trom]

@friedo

One of the most interesting things I learned when studying music theory is how universal some concepts are. For example, the Pythagorean harmonies: take two frequencies with a whole-number ratio and play them at the same time, and they will sound very consonant. Take two frequencies with an “ugly” ratio and they sound horrible together. That has nothing to do with tunings or temperaments or scales that vary across cultures, it just is. Our brains are wired that way, the same way that certain color combinations match or complement each other by virtue of their fundamental properties, even though different cultures may have preferences for different specific combinations.

…

You might like this.

[Beware_of_Doug]

Saxophonist here - I’m a soprano doubler and, in fact, I briefly attended the same jazz performance class as Sam Newsome. Wonderful musician, and yes, firmly in the freedom camp stylistically. (He was learning Sidney Bechet solos at the time I met him, to get a grounding in the old style.)

The big thing to remember about jazz is that it covers a LOT of different sub-styles and sub-genres, not all of which want to acknowledge one another. And jazz’s public profile, and education about the music, are both at a low point these days. So whatever you encounter as a newbie will probably come without any owner’s manual, and it’s hard to put it in perspective.

Finally, please feel free to send all your unwanted soprano saxes to me; I’ll see that they’re disposed of properly.

[aruvqan]

@Chefguy

Oh, and someone should confiscate all of the soprano saxophones on the planet, place them in a pile, douse them with gasoline, and let her rip. I’ll be in the front row, cheering.

I was thinking sledgehammers …

[BigT]

I personally think that, after a certain point, even free jazz is no longer jazz, but some other type of contemporary music. There actually are varieties that really just amount to random notes: One version I know of uses a wheel that you spin to figure out your next note.

Jazz is all about the subversion of expectations. But for a subversion to exist, you have to build up anticipation in the first place. Just playing random notes does not set up the listener to expect anything, so nothing is subverted.

Jazz may be about dissonance, but it needs the existence of consonance, or it won’t work. It’s kinda a yin yang thing.

[pulykamell]

@BigT

One version I know of uses a wheel that you spin to figure out your next note.

How does this work during a performance? The nature of jazz is improvisational, so I don’t see how this can really be done well in real-time.

[friedo]

@BigT

Jazz is all about the subversion of expectations. But for a subversion to exist, you have to build up anticipation in the first place. Just playing random notes does not set up the listener to expect anything, so nothing is subverted.

Jazz may be about dissonance, but it needs the existence of consonance, or it won’t work. It’s kinda a yin yang thing.

This is a really excellent post, and eloquently sums up a lot of what I think about music in particular, and art in general. Thanks for articulating what I’ve been trying to convince people about for years.

[pulykamell]

@friedo

This is a really excellent post, and eloquently sums up a lot of what I think about music in particular, and art in general. Thanks for articulating what I’ve been trying to convince people about for years.

But I think that if you delve into jazz and modern art, you’ll find out that there is consonance and structure where you might not currently think there is any. I occasionally get into arguments with people who don’t care for contemporary art about certain artists, Jackson Pollack being one of the big ones (and he’s not at all contemporary or even “modern” anymore.) To me, it is obvious there’s a lot of structure and form in his work. It drives me mad people don’t see it. And, yet, there are a lot, maybe even the majority, of people who just think it’s haphazard drippy-drop-splash painting.

I personally am not that attuned to the free-er forms of jazz. But just because I can’t quite make sense of it doesn’t mean that there necessarily isn’t a form underpinning it all. Perhaps I just need some more familiarity and exposure to the genre to appreciate it or understand it. That said, even the more avant guard stuff I’ve heard has at least a rhythmic backbone or something I could latch on to.

[Least_Original_User_Name_Ever]

You’re welcome.

[Nunzio_Tavulari]

@Least_Original_User_Name_Ever

You’re welcome.

That’s like suggesting Sting to someone that doesn’t understand Metallica

[carnivorousplant]

@Chefguy

Oh, and someone should confiscate all of the soprano saxophones on the planet, place them in a pile, douse them with gasoline, and let her rip. I’ll be in the front row, cheering.

Darn you, Sir!
Darn you to Heck!

[Bryan_Ekers]

@Johnny_Q

Am I right in suspecting that every one of those annoying squawks(assuming this is the style I lovingly call “blowing small rodents out your spit valve”) is meticulously written down in the sheet music?

Well, yeah, but it’s hard for a nonmusician to read since it’s all covered in spit and tiny footprints.

[carnivorousplant]

Man, I vote you win the thread!

[Sam_Stone]

@Nunzio_Tavulari

That’s like suggesting Sting to someone that doesn’t understand Metallica

[WordMan]

@BigT

I personally think that, after a certain point, even free jazz is no longer jazz, but some other type of contemporary music. There actually are varieties that really just amount to random notes: One version I know of uses a wheel that you spin to figure out your next note.

Jazz is all about the subversion of expectations. But for a subversion to exist, you have to build up anticipation in the first place. Just playing random notes does not set up the listener to expect anything, so nothing is subverted.

Jazz may be about dissonance, but it needs the existence of consonance, or it won’t work. It’s kinda a yin yang thing.

I don’t know that I agree with this either. As is typicall, **pulykamell **does a nice job articulating the structural issues with your argument. Just because your expectations (you in a general way) have been subverted, doesn’t mean that every listener’s have been - if the listener is deeply geeky for Free Jazz (or the art viewer for Jackson Pollack, to use **puly’s **example) then there may be no subversion at all.

I view it this way: jazz is a conversation. A musical conversation. Back in the day, conversation in polite society was only done *just so *- many topics simply weren’t discussed, statements were made with a clear formality and quality of logic, structure and approach to formal debate were evaluated as a basis for judging the conversation along with the basic point being made. To me, that is Classical music - the piece is clear, formal, structured - as well as expressing artistic elements.

Jazz challenges that - I mean, sure, there is still an expectation that the musician is deeply versed in the discipline of music - Picasso could draw representational objects brilliantly before he started getting abstract - but a jazz musician is using that technical ability to have a different conversation. They want to “talk” about different things and try out different harmonic relationships. No different than George Carlin getting you to think by shocking folks back in the day with 7 words. That is not “subversion of expectations” - that is using non-formal approaches to make important points. That is guerrillas hiding out and taking shots at the formal regimented wall of soldiers out on a field of battle. We can say “that’s not fair fighting” all we want - but if it is effective, it’s effective.

[Sigmagirl]

@Chefguy

Not all jazz is the same, just as not all rock is the same. Listen to different genres before dismissing all of it as unworthy. I don’t mind swing; I prefer bop and post-bop. I love Brazilian and Cuban jazz. I cannot abide traditional jazz (from the 1920s era) and really hate the type of jazz you are describing, where someone like Ornette Coleman is squealing on his sax and everyone else is playing random bits of music. I don’t understand it, and it’s not pleasing to my ear.

Oh, and someone should confiscate all of the soprano saxophones on the planet, place them in a pile, douse them with gasoline, and let her rip. I’ll be in the front row, cheering.

I don’t like bop or bebop; I like swing and Brazilian and Cuban; I hate the noodly-noodly you describe; and I love ragtime and traditional '20s and '30s jazz, New Orleans, Chicago and St. Louis style.

And yet it’s all jazz. As you say, " Listen to different genres before dismissing all of it as unworthy."

[vdgg81]

I also hated the music linked to by the OP at first, but I was curious enough to listen to it a couple more times and it does start to make some sense after a while. It’s not pretty but it is very interesting - I didn’t even know you could sound two different notes at once on a saxophone. I might even end up buying the record to see what it’s like to listen to the music in longer portions and without the annoying guy talking over it. I also might not not, because interesting or not it that sax does sound terribly ugly.

I’ve been listening to a lot of jazz lately. I like the improvisational nature of it, the swing and the freedom. But still there’s lots and lots of jazz I dislike or simply don’t understand. Some jazz is easy: I’ve listened to Dave Brubeck’s Time Out for years and it’s pretty accessible stuff while still being adventurous and complex and I’ve had Kind of Blue for a long time as well and it’s been one of my favorite albums since I heard it for the first time (and I heard it for the first time while I still mostly listened to rock music exclusively). I’d recommed almost anything Brubeck to a jazz newbie, but Miles Davis is pretty hit and miss from my experience. He had great bands and did great music often and also had great bands and did boring/unlistenable/messy stuff almost as often. I’m really digging his 60’s quintet, but it’s not the kind of jazz I’d use to introduce somebody to the music.

I think that up to bebop there’s not much need to educate your ear to get what the music was about, but later it gets more complicated. I’m learning to like bebop and Charlie Parker is finally beginning to sound good to me. In fact, sometimes he sounds simply amazing, but it took a little while till I got used to the stuff. My new interest in jazz begun when I heard John Coltrane’s version of My Favorite Things; it was like a revelation. I agree with the posters who say that he’s a great artist to use as an introduction to the more out there stuff. I think anybody can follow his career up to and including A Love Supreme without trouble. His later albums are (to me, at least) a lot more tricky. Thelonious Monk and Charles Mingus are also new favorites.

I don’t understand all that much about jazz so I can’t go on about styles and genres. I can say that there’s a television program called Legends of Jazz that has introduced me to lots of brilliant artists and wonderful music and also a few stinkers. Marian MacPartland’s NPR program Piano Jazz is usually very good and there are tons of past shows available on the site.

@friedo

Jazz can be pretty weird. I don’t really know much about it. I do like a lot of (what I think is called) “smooth” jazz, which has a lot of pretty accessible sax melodies and a slow-tempo bass and rhythm backup, and fairly simple harmonies. I’ve also suffered through a performance at a tiny Brooklyn club that consisted of two hours of dissonant screeching backed up by (I’m not making this up) a cheap 1980’s drum machine. It was like somebody gave Lou Reed a trumpet.

Smooth Jazz bugs me, and I don’t get the attraction at all (not that there isn’t one). I assume, then, that you won’t be surprised to find out that Lou Reed is a big fan of Ornette Coleman.

[Chefguy]

@vdgg81

Thelonious Monk and Charles Mingus are also new favorites.

Thelonious Monk, much maligned in his time, was a fucking musical genius.