Brilliant Corners, a Boston Jazz Blog.

More Jazz Necessities

2012-01-27T15:48:00.001-05:00

Previously, the introduction of the Chet Baker watch inspired me to release these new products, essential for any jazz fan:

Charlie Parker Day Planner

Trumbauer Guide To Linux

G.I. Lennie Action Figure

Joe Newman Sump Pump

Bill Evans Chest Expander

Keith Jarrett Beard Trimmer

The iTrane

We did so well with these that we are moving into publishing:

Sun Ra: Five Tips for a Groovy Luau

Benny Goodman: Guide to Jazz Etiquette

Eddie Condon: Why Proust Still Matters

Django & Klugh: 10-Days to Perfect Nails

Charles Mingus: Why Mitt? Why Now?

Ornette Coleman: Conquering the II-V-I
Bix Beiderbecke: Monetize Your Blog!

More Jazz Necessities

2012-01-27T15:47:00.004-05:00

Previously, the introduction of the Chet Baker watch inspired me to release these new products, essential for any jazz fan:

Charlie Parker Day Planner

Trumbauer Guide To Linux

G.I. Lennie Action Figure

Joe Newman Sump Pump

Bill Evans Chest Expander

Keith Jarrett Beard Trimmer

The iTrane

We did so well with these that we are moving into publishing:

Sun Ra: Five Tips for a Groovy Luau

Benny Goodman: Guide to Jazz Etiquette

Eddie Condon: Why Proust Still Matters

Django & Klugh: 10-Days to Perfect Nails

Charles Mingus: Why Mitt? Why Now?

Ornette Coleman: Conquering the II-V-I
Bix Beiderbecke: Monetize Your Blog!

More Jazz Necessities

2012-01-27T15:47:00.000-05:00

Previously, the introduction of the Chet Baker watch inspired me to release these new products, essential for any jazz fan:

Charlie Parker Day Planner

Trumbauer Guide To Linux

G.I. Lennie Action Figure

Joe Newman Sump Pump

Bill Evans Chest Expander

Keith Jarrett Beard Trimmer

The iTrane

We did so well with these that we are moving into publishing:

Sun Ra: Five Tips for a Groovy Luau

Benny Goodman: Guide to Jazz Etiquette

Eddie Condon: Why Proust Still Matters

Django & Klugh: 10-Days to Perfect Nails

Charles Mingus: Why Mitt? Why Now?

Ornette Coleman: Conquering the II-V-I

Bix Beiderbecke: Monetize Your Blog!

Name the Blog; Arbitrary New Rule Imposed

2012-01-25T11:04:00.001-05:00

The Rules Committee, having been released en masse from Wormwood Scrubs, has finally met and tweaked the rules of the contest as follows:

An example

Any contestant who wants to make it to the next round of judging is now required to submit a photo of him or herself in a bathing suit; the more revealing, the better.

Candid shots welcome

Submit to: s.improviz@comcast.net.

On With the Nonsense!

2012-01-24T15:43:00.000-05:00

As one of the dozen scam mailings my mother gets everyday would say:

"Dear Entrant: You are one of a very small pool of residents in your area to be chosen to proceed to the next level of competition! Please send in $25 so we may confirm your certified platinum level registration number."

Well, in this here Name the Blog contest, everyone's a winner-at least in this round-and we will absolutely not be swayed by kickbacks (unless you actually send one).

Only first names are given, to protect the innocent.

Enjoy some Salieri while you contemplate these worthy entries:

Felonius Junk -Di

You got a problem with 'Brilliant Corners,' bub?" -Larry

Brilliant Jazz and Other Joys (from BOSTON) -Brew

Third Balcony Jump -Harvey

Jazz speaks for life -Dave

Jazz Hands!!! Bleeding Gums Murphy Speaks -Aaron

Dizzy Atmosphere, Six Flats Unfurnished -Rob

Snap Diddley Squirt: A Jazz Blog -Kiddo

Jazz Pants, Learn a New Word Everyday, Life Improv, Carried Away with Steve, Jazz Scratch Fever, Jazz Happy, Sharps and Flats, The Flying Jazz Project, Captain Jazz, Jazz Serious, Jazz Kidding -Amy and Ken

Not Just Another Jazz Blog -Dick

ImProvizing or ImProvizer  or ProVizions,   See Sharp,   Sounding, Brass  Sections,   Mouth Pieces  Horning In,   MOTS (acronym for: Music Of The. Sphere's)(French for "words" too, ErSatch, UrSatch, Dauntless, Iterations -Ed

The Jazz Id-Me

It's not a popularity contest, but groundswells of support will no doubt influence my highly disorganized adjudication methodology.

Exchanges on Pops' Tone

2012-01-22T13:16:00.001-05:00

Doug Ramsay was kind enough to feature my Louis Armstrong: Operatic at the Core post on his blog Rifftides. Author of the Armstrong book Ricky Riccardi responded, as did Brew and all concerned have said I could put the conversation on this blog. So, here it is, with an extension:

Brew says:
January 17, 2012 at 5:14 am
There is also a great similarity in attitude, and stage appearance of Pops and many stars of the opera: Love for good food, the company of nice folks (Armstrong’s backstage room was always crowded), and …
… the inevitable white handkerchief which for example Pavarotti used, too (he had his own of course!).
Pops’ phrasing, and his tone, and authority in the 1950′s are indeed not to top, except by Maria Callas, Kathleen Ferrier & Mario Lanza who possessed the most unique operatic voices in the 1950′s.
Come on, folks, the time machine problem has not been solved yet!
REPLY
Ricky Riccardi says:
January 17, 2012 at 5:34 am
Agree with every word, Doug and Steve. No one–and there’s been some that have come close–has ever equalled Louis’s tone. Even in his last years, when the chops were hurting and his range was decreasing, the tone was still there; you could still tell it was him, even on the recordings that survive from 1971 (which I’ll be sharing in my next blog). I now work as Archivist at the Louis Armstrong House Museum and that’s where all of Louis’s private tapes and records are kept. I cannot tell you how many opera records he owned and listened to on his tapes. Naturally, a big chunk of Louis’s concept was rooted in opera but I also love the quotes he sometimes played from specific operas. He always played a lick on “Muskrat Ramble” in the 1950s that sounded so familiar, but I couldn’t place it. One of my readers finally nailed it as being from Sigmund Romberg’s “The Student Prince.” I went to check Louis’s collection and sure enough, he had “The Student Prince” on vinyl and on his tapes! Here’s a blog I did about that, where you can hear the lick:
Anyway, thanks to you both and thanks for reminding your readers that Louis was great–and had that tone–from the beginning to the end.
Yours in Pops,
Ricky
Steve responded:
Ricky-
What do you think about my idea of Pops’ vulnerability via a vis the love of the audience? (I ask knowing that it’s seldom that anyone whose book I review agrees with anything I say).
- REPLY
  - Ricky Riccardi says:
    January 22, 2012 at 5:07 am
    Fine with me, too, Steve. And please, fire away with any other questions and comments you have. Regarding the vulnerability aspect, yes, I think Armstrong’s connection with audiences and the obvious effort he put into his performances could make him seem somewhat vulnerable. But I don’t think I would connect vulnerability with that tone. That tone is one of the most identifiable sounds in jazz and it’s what set Louis apart from other trumpet players. He himself claimed to be a “freak about tonation” and even when discussing King Oliver, he wasn’t afraid to knock Oliver’s tone. In fact, in a 1956 Voice of America interview, Louis complained that the 1923 Oliver recordings were hard to listen to because Oliver’s tone wasn’t strong and Oliver should have let Louis play more lead and more solos. Armstrong astutely brought up Erskine Hawkins’s hit records that featured solos by Dud Bascomb, but had Hawkins’s name on the record and brought Erskine the fame and money.
    So Louis knew what he had. He worked tirelessly on that tone and was very proud of it. He used to like to talk about a time he sat in with the Count Basie Orchestra in Miami in 1958. Basie called “Royal Garden Blues” and in addition to soloing, Louis played in the trumpet section. According to Louis, Basie couldn’t get over it, saying he had never heard a tone like that in a trumpet section before. Louis would tell the story proudly and then would say that all of the trumpet players in Basie’s band were fine musicians but they were too lazy to work on their playing to get a tone and sound like Louis had.
    I share these two stories because they illustrate something that not everyone associates with gentle, smiling Louis: the man had an ego. And that is not a bad thing. I’ve listened to thousands of hours of Armstrong’s interview and I can tell you that he knew 100% how special his sound was and he worked very hard to get it and wasn’t bashful to let anyone know about it. He was confident in his music, he was confident that audiences would love it and he was confident in his ability to put on the best show in jazz.
    So when you weigh in those feelings of ego and confidence, that’s where I think the vulnerability aspect loses a little steam. Audiences might view Louis as vulnerable (and surely, his playing could be completely vulnerable at times, in addition to the soaring operatic statements; look up an unissued “Lonesome Road” on my blog from 1956 to hear both sides in one performance), but that tone was shaped by hard work and determination and was carried out by a genius with absolute, supreme confidence in what he was doing.
    That’s just my feeling about the vulnerability angle but every other word your wrote about Louis’s tone and operatic tendencies is spot on. Thanks for writing it and thanks for mentioning the book (though man, a “work-man like effort”? I devoted every day of half my life to that thing! haha, just kidding, any publicity is good publicity….).
    Yours in Pops,
    Ricky
    
    Steve responds:
    I realize it's counter-intuitive to call the strongest sound in jazz trumpet history "vulnerable." I'm not talking about an ego-based process. In fact, the opposite. There's always some artifice in a performance and Pops' careful planning is testament to that. But the tone, ore that he assiduously burnished throughout his life, was a kind of "cri de coeur;" a direct look into the (vulnerable) heart of another person. It's not about weakness or lack of confidence. In fact, how strong must a person be to expose so much?
    That's the sense in which I use the word vulnerable.
    Thanks,
    Steve

Name That Blog!

2012-01-16T15:45:00.003-05:00

It's been about a year since I became the sole proprietor of Brilliant Corners. Time for a new name. Since I don't have the interest, money or spare precious bodily fluid to do market research, I am soliciting suggestions from YOU.

So, go through the site. Read a few older posts. Try to distill the nature of the Brilliant Corners balderdash down to its essence. Submit as many names as you want, be they barbaric, cuddly, esoteric, moldy fig-friendly, demographically astute or legally actionable. Let not your ideas be bounded by the strictures of so-called "common sense."

Each submission will be carefully scorned, er, scanned by our crack squad of lackeys. If your submission is chosen, your name will become synonymous with squandered energy throughout the jazz blog-o-lalia. As a special bonus, you will be given keys to the city of Boston by Mayor Menino, or by someone else who is a registered mesomorph.

Now, go muzzle the dog, lock the kids in the basement, give the maid and butler the day off, crack the Armagnac, spin some wax and put on your thinking cap. Good luck, one and all. You may already be a winner.

Louis Armstrong: Operatic at the Core.

2012-01-05T16:42:00.001-05:00

The jazz world started to get down on Louis Armstrong starting around 1950-the beginning of his ascension from jazz star to Star. And since the 1980's, at least, jazz people have been trying to make up for calling Pops an Uncle Tom, a sellout and a cultural irrelevancy.

"What a Wonderful World," Ricky Riccardi's biography covering the last part of Armstrong's career, might be one of the last chapters in the jazz community's process of expiating its sins.

This book is what's known as a "workman-like effort" and a "good read." The writing is fine, if not compelling. The level of detail about his concerts, recordings and band personnel seems sufficient. The book does little to place Armstrong in the broader American musical context, but it deals with one issue pretty thoroughly and pretty well-Armstrong's complicated attitude toward race, including how it plays out with his long-time manager, Joe Glaser.

The book covers many bases, but it does not fully address what is, for me, the essential question about Armstrong: What really made him the ablest communicator in jazz history?

Yes, he had fabulous musical skills, incredible gifts as a showman and the willingness to work like a horse. But I think there was something else at work.

Armstrong said many times that he loved each note, whether he was playing it or singing it-and his singing voice was emotional twin to his trumpet tone. What I think he was talking about was not the pitch or the combination of the notes, it was the tone and the weight of each note.

Hundreds of gifted and proficient trumpet players have come and gone through jazz history, but no one has ever had that tone. Not even close. Yes, others have had an identifiable sound, but their tone basically falls within the parameters of a given historical era. Give me the name of an early jazz player, a swing era player, a bop player, a free player, a neo-mainstream player and I can name you other trumpeters from that era who had a sound that was very similar.

Even though he always talked about his debt to his mentor Joe Oliver, Armstrong seems not to have been subject to that need for identification. His tone rides over jazz history as freely as his solos rode over orchestras and rhythm sections. I believe that Armstrong's singular tone sent a unique message to the listener: "I am making myself completely vulnerable to you. While part of me is acting (and Armstrong's acting talent was unassailable, if underutilized), part of me will die if you don't love what I am giving to you."

Emotionally, his performances were not pitched at a jazz performance level. They were operatic in intention. And, as Armstrong aged and took on lesser pop material, this became easier to see. He was able to impart a depth to those tunes beyond that ever imagined by the songwriters and arrangers. Because, really, it wasn't about the notes. It was about The Note.

Nearing the end of his life, who did Pops draw on as reference points when voicing his distaste at the pessimistic media coverage of his declining health? Not jazz people. As quoted in Riccardi's book, he says: "Everyone wants to know how I am going to die...I never was interested in the life of Caruso or the death of Mario Lanza..." He loved his fellow jazz musicians, but in some way, he knew his peers were opera stars.

Successful "Wrong" Trumpet Embouchures

2011-12-27T14:42:00.001-05:00

Jon Faddis

My wife calls my trumpet my mistress. Don't think so. It's way too high maintenance.

The fact is, for many of us, the struggle to find the right embouchure can seem sisyphean. There is so much bad information-especially for young players (see my post on mouthpieces); so much cant, rhetoric and conflicting theories. Right now, I have put myself in the hands of John Lynch. Previously, I have been indentured to Pivot-Master Donald Reinhardt, Mr. Superchops Jerome Callet, the carefree John Coffey and, finally, my first teacher, who told me not to tell my mother he told me, but that I had to bear down like I was taking a poop.

The fact is, there is no single right way to do it and for those of us who have chased this unholy grail through the years, it can be a comfort and an inspiration to see people do it the wrong way and yet become masters. In that spirit, here are a few examples of how right wrong can be:

Here is the great bop player Bill Hardman. Note how far off to the left side he plays:

Here's cornettist Ruby Braff who, if anything, plays even more off to the left than Hardman:

High note king Maynard Ferguson plays way over the the right of his chops.

Don't want to shortchange the swing players. Here's Ziggy Elman, playing off to the left.

Jon Faddis plays off to the left and also uses very exaggerated head movements to change register. Jon-don't ya know you're not supposed to move your head?

I always love an excuse to post this video. Here are two of the greatest-Diz and Pops. Pops played off to the right and Dizzy is the most famous "wrong-way to-play" genius in jazz history.

Trumpet players are an admixture of masochist and dreamer, as those who live with us know. In exchange for the head, neck and backaches and cyclical depression, we thirst for the daily chance to live several lifetimes in one practice session. To us, beyond every crumbling G there lurks a golden double G, crystalline, centered and in tune, or a perfect negotiation of Rhythm Changes.

Sex may be a rival to this experience; but little else.

Introducing the Secular Football League.

2011-12-21T15:51:00.000-05:00

We all remember the struggle the new AFL had when it first tried to crack the National Football League monopoly-playing in baseball stadiums and college stadiums, etc. It was a real American success story: one flock of rich guys who, by throwing enough money into the hopper, convinced the other flock of rich guys to take them seriously.

Now it's our turn.

I know the odds are against us. Our pockets aren't deep. In fact, they're only pocket simulacra. Nonetheless, the rise of evangelism in professional football, along with the attendant cant and rhetoric about family values and god in general (plus another highly annoying half hour of ads stuck into the game), has inspired me to invite people LIKE YOURSELVES to put together a league that will blow the current bunch of pseudo-Jesuits out of the water.

Finally, after a strict 6-month regimen of Armagnac, Setlitz Powder and Ambien, we at The Institute are ready to make the announcement and open the process to YOU!

The following teams are, even now, being formed in the new, fabulous Secular Football League (SFL). Peruse the list and submit your own squad. We'll see that a publicly-financed stadium is built in your hometown tout de suite:

The Paducah Pagans
The Cambridge Sophists
The Aqaba Atheists
The Somerville Shamen
The Dracut Druids
The Newton Non-Newtonians
The Zagreb Zoroastrians
The Detroit Doveners
The Malibu Sufis
The Nome Gnostics
The Death Valley Taoists
The Akron Agnostics
The Brooklyn Buddhists
and, of course,
The San Antonio Sadhus

Each of these squads brings a mental toughness currently unknown in the NFL. I'd like to see those lummoxes do the Little Thunderbolt Pose at all, never mind naked in the Arctic.

You know you harbor a secret desire to own your own professional sports team. Now's your chance. It's up to you. You'll either end up canoodling with a cheerleader in the Skybox or rotting on your couch with a box of stale corn chex.

Act now and you get my personal guarantee: No "under god" in the Pledge of Allegiance*.

*Written by Christian Socialist Edward Bellamy; amended against his opposition "under the leadership of the American Legion and The Daughters of the American Revolution."

It's Not Sci-Fi; It's Radio! by Steve Provizer

2011-12-16T16:53:00.000-05:00

You see this object?

Yea.

Recognize it?

Vaguely familiar.

It’s called a radio.

Ra-di-o.

Yea, it’s a device that lets you listen to different kinds of sounds.

Oh, an mp3 player. Looks like an ipod with a really clever skin.

It's different. You don’t have to put anything into this thing to make stuff come out of it.

No downloading? Where does the sound come from?

You just turn it on, like this:

[RADIO SFX FADE UP AND UNDER]

and the sounds coming through the air are caught and brought into the radio by this metal rod.

Oh, you’re just screwin’ me around. Stop it.

Gospel truth.

What about those other gizmos?

They're called tuning dials. All you have to do is turn them and different kinds of music pops out. You can even hear people talking-live.

Talking about what?

Politics, sports, Hollywood, the weather, weight loss pills.

Is it interactive? Can I text them if I want to comment on something?

More than that, big guy, you can actually call in to their studios and then YOUR voice would come out of this little box too.

Sounds impossible. These things must be just for the military, right?

No, regular people are allowed to use them. They're a little hard to find, but I might be able to hook you up.

Must cost a fortune.

You might well believe that, my friend, but you can get one of these things for the cost of a bag of munchkins.

And once you buy one, that’s it. You never have to pay another red cent.

No set-up charges?

No.

No rental fees?

Absolutely not.

It’s all a little overwhelming.

Technology can be that way, my friend.

Well, put me down for one of these babies, cause I want to be on the cutting edge.

That’s my man.

Ra-di-o, you say.

Yea. Imagine the possibilities.

[RADIO SFX FADE IN AND OUT]

"The 7 Ages of Jazz-Kind" by Steve Provizer

2011-12-15T14:52:00.000-05:00

With apologies to Shakespeare.

I. The Infant:
Muling and puking. Parents play music at home and, too young to put up a struggle, he is exposed to Ellington or Basie, maybe Miles; Nancy Wilson, Sammy Davis Loves Broadway.

II. Whining Schoolboy:
Creeps unwillingly to his trumpet lesson. Is drafted into stage band at school and learns how to play "swing eight notes" in Sal Nistico arrangements.

III. The Lover:
Simultaneously experiences the first pangs of love gone sour and the aching balladry of Billie Holiday, Stan Getz and Ben Webster. Rejects all other musics as unworthy of his devotion.

IV. The Soldier
Full of strange oaths; i.e., II-V-I, arco, flat thirteen. Looks for respect in the jazz-session trenches and is willing even to face the Medusa Donna Lee in Dflat. Draws his sword against any who would denigrate his jazz gods. Soul-patched, like the pard Gillespie.

V. The Justice:
In fair round belly, with wise lese majeste, he accepts the endless cycles of "Kind Of Blue" on jazz radio. He learns to shrug off the hype surrounding the latest wunderkind and begins to find truth in the notes of the elders.

VI. Spectacled and Slippered:
The search for the right mouthpiece fades, as does his once robust tone. The silence becomes more meaningful than the notes.

VII. Second Childhood. Taps his toe to Louis and then is heard no more.

"An Open Letter to Occupy Boston." Steve Provizer

2011-12-07T18:40:00.001-05:00

It's always tough to move to the next thing, but it would have been delusional to think that Occupy Boston and other Occupy groups would be allowed to continue camping.

In her ruling, a Boston judge said: “while Occupy Boston protesters may be exercising their expressive rights during the protest, they have no privilege under the First Amendment to seize and hold the land on which they sit.” I hope this First Amendment skirmish does not become the END IN ITSELF. I know this in the foreground and serious points have to be made, but please don't get bogged down. Don't hand it over to the lawyers (even the good ones) and don't rely on the judicial branch to solve any problems for you. Start thinking about YOUR NEXT MOVES.

It will be very difficult. I'm sure the encampment, the publicity, the joy of being a living symbol of what you believe and witnessing the large number of people who have rallied to support you has been a potent experience. Marshaling the same level of energy for continuing the struggle in what may now be a less visible and adrenalin-fueled process, is a tremendous challenge. Equally difficult will be maintaining your extremely high level of inclusive participation when this movement gets down to the irritating and grinding process of getting people to agree on specific demands and political moves.

But, the creativity that Occupiers have shown to this point makes me optimistic that you will not get drawn into a court-centric approach; that you will demonstrate great agility and find and implement new dazzling tactics to move the process ahead. I'm not alone in thinking of you as a vanguard, as people with the will and commitment to continue to be leaders. To win, you've got to be several steps ahead. Go ahead, do it. We'll be there.

Occupy Jazz? by Steve Provizer

2011-12-02T16:04:00.002-05:00

Economically, there was never much of a middle class among jazz musicians, but to steal an Occupy Wall St. slogan, we are now in a 99%/1% situation. In this post, I'll take a look at whether it's useful or folly to apply the OWS paradigm to the jazz financial picture.

In the Occupy Wall St. realm, when you sweep away the bologna covering the pro and con arguments, what's left is a disagreement about meritocracy and the Myth of Mobility:

Side One

If the unemployed sleeping out in urban parks across the US were just a little bit smarter and talented, a little bit more persistent, a little more "social" that rag-tag bunch might have landed in the Wall St. or State St. offices that look down upon them.

Side Two

Meritocracy and mobility have been undermined by an unholy admixture of big business and the Government that has created rules and conditions that grossly favor the "ins" and "haves" over the "outs" and "have nots." The game is rigged.

Meritocracy and the Myth of Mobility seem to come wrapped in a bundle, with Manifest Destiny. I.e., our nation was destined to reach from coast to coast and bring, er, civilization to the Cubans, Filipinos, Panamanians, etc. Of course, there has always been dissonance between pulling together as the UNITED States and the myth of the "rugged individualist" (a dissonance, by the way, which jazz has taken on as a fundamental challenge and successfully dealt with). Right now, this conflict continues to play out as "We need a Safety Net" versus "Why should they get a Handout."

So, what about it? Are meritocracy and mobility alive and well in jazz?

The young-uns must still believe. Jazz blogs, including this one, have devoted a lot of virtual ink to the gap between the growth of college jazz programs (and tuition) and the dearth of jobs graduates can expect to find. Yet, young musicians still cough up the dough, matriculate and flock to jam sessions, believing that if their skill shines brightly enough in ten choruses of Cherokee, they will climb into the elite. Evidence says this is magical thinking.

Non-musical elements have always been at play in the jazz economy, but has the balance dramatically shifted between musical and non-musical factors and is there anything we can do about it?

The Marsalis' leap over the bar

How about the role of "connections"? Is belonging to a well-known jazz family the equivalent of being born on third base? I think that's always been a double-edged sword. In terms of knowing the music, it's certainly an advantage to grow up in a hothouse jazz environment, but the fame of the parent can mean the bar is raised much higher for the offspring. But, if you're from the right family, have musical talent and a gift for self-promotion, you're on the fast track to the 1%.

Ella

Diana. Plus, she's talented.

What about "looks?" Most jazz careers are built on more-or-less solid musical fundamentals and not cute YouTube videos. But, does cute help even in jazz? Damn right it does, although there does seem to be a shift. Where once there might have been room for both the more talented, less attractive and the good looking and less talented, the slots are now so few that having "enough" talent and good looks seems to be more and more the winning combination. Great looks and talent=+/-1%.

What about the world of jazz journalism? The few remaining daily papers mostly ignore this music, but there is still a large network of coverage: internet, magazines and broadcasters. Many critics are concerned about new talent and sift through enormous quantities of cd's, generating abundant articles and Top 10 lists.

Certainly, this activity is vital to the infra-jazz circle, but the gap between critics' choices and the money in the pocket of those tapped for recognition is wide. When was the last time Michael Buble was praised by critics? Yet, his Holiday album is outselling even Nickelback's, while Steve Coleman's latest was nowhere in sight. If a jazz musician does breaks through on the charts, you know he or she will either be playing an easier-listening version of the music, or they'll be dead.

The Donald

At the top, I mentioned the kind of skills that financial top dogs are purported to have in abundance, i.e., persistence, intelligence and social skills. Do these matter in jazz? To some degree, yes, and these skills are present in both the 1% and the 99%. But, to the extent they can be taught or instilled, jazz educational institutions have an obligation to try to instill and hone these skills in students.

What part, if any, does government regulation play here? Unlike in the financial world, there seems to be no unholy government-music industry liaison squashing the 99%. The tax codes are an abomination for us all, inside music or out. Some would make a case for more government arts funding and yea, it'd be nice, but it will never come close to reducing the bottom 99% to anything less than the bottom 95%.

The licensing/royalty distribution organizations-BMI, ASCAP and SESAC-are a definite problem. This triumvirate is involved in its own form of wealth redistribution. Unfortunately, this redistribution results from formulas that give proportionally more income per unit to those at the top and less to those at the bottom. In terms of activism, this is something that needs more attention. Occupy BMI.

How about club owners and concert producers? Fewer gigs and a steep drop in album sales means that the tried-and-true and formulaic are firmly in control. Mucho bucks go to the same crowd; a short-run path to solvency, but a long-term disaster in terms of building audience. Collective action, as I've noted before, is the best response. Make your own co-op venues, rent out cheap spaces, promote each other's gigs. It's not Occupation, but it is useful activism.

A diminished jazz audience and file-downloading seem to be the 900-lb. gorillas here. There will be turnover in the 1%, but that's merely a "replacement" scenario. The talent pool actually seems to be expanding, but it has not resulted in a growing audience and an expansion of the jazz musician-middle class. In that respect, it seems to be a zero sum game.

Sound defeatist? Don't mean it to be. Yea, I think it's hard to do much about most of this stuff, just as it's hard to let go of the easy griping about unfairness, lack of exposure, government inactivity, etc. and concentrate on those things that activism might actually impact: Hold the feet of licensing organizations and jazz teaching institutions to the fire and work collectively to increase gigs and promotion of jazz events.

Personal change is very tough, but if possible, learn to schmooze even if it kills you. Teach yourself available technologies. Utilize all pathways of promotion and generally, do whatever you can to project yourself in the world as a vital musical force. I'm sure my insightful readers have many other ideas.

Specific demands are the way to go. I hope jazz activists see that and I hope the Occupy movement sees it too.

Postscript: After I posted this, I read Nicholas Peyton's famous/infamous post on why jazz is not cool anymore. He too uses the expression "Occupy Jazz."

"The Shadow of Kitty Genovese" by Stephen Provizer (reprised)

2011-11-29T17:45:00.000-05:00

This is a re-written version of a piece from last April, which I'm reprising as a pre-quel to a post later this week about the Occupy movement. I think it's timely.

I recently re-discovered the unusual Phil Ochs LP "Pleasures of the Harbor." A song from that album, "Outside of a Small Circle of Friends," and another song from 1967-"All's Quiet on West 23rd," by a group called "Jetstream"-were inspired by a 1964 incident in Queens where the murder and rape of a woman named Kitty Genovese went unreported by neighbors.

The degree of passivity and non-involvement on the part of Genovese's neighbors is not clear (Good explanation here), but the incident inspired a flurry of research, which in turn generated a sociological premise called The Bystander Effect. The gist of this is that the larger the size of a group of people witnessing a "reportable" activity, the less likely any one person is to take action.

No doubt the Bystander Effect is second cousin to what's been called Charity or Compassion Fatigue, a more diffused phenomenon-about an accumulation of events than a specific one.

What has yet to be found is an explanation for a phenomenon I've been puzzling over for a long time: that people are willing to de-prioritize their own well-being in order to make sure that some one or some other group of people does not make out better than they do. The key example is believing that unions don't represent a way for lots of people to get a fair deal from employers, but a threat to one's own well-being.

I despise but at least understand why we humans are willing to ignore the physical harming of someone else-it's a self-protective reaction. Ditto that stressed financial resources can explain a person's ignoring the plight of someone else with a disease or handicap.

But how to explain the widespread belief that the decent wages and job security of a fellow working person are more of a threat to your well-being than the massive accumulation of wealth at the top, or the enormous military expenditures used to support a decaying American empire around the world? This is sheer masochism, rooted in a massive disinformation campaign, combined with a bizarre belief that people born on third base deserve help getting to home plate.

It may be time to let go of the "I'm not poor, I'm just not wealthy-yet" mythology, to recognize that we have been divided and are well down the road to being conquered-and that your local teacher or pipe-fitter are not your enemies. Kitty Genovese, collector for Clean Water Action, the Hyatt 100, what's become known as the 99%-we're all in it together.

"Republicans Candidates Separated At Birth" by Steve Provizer

2011-11-24T12:11:00.003-05:00

It's a hoary concept, but still viable. Although it's possible that some of the non-candidates are not Republican. I have tried to err on the side of deeper psychic similarities:

Michelle Bachmann and VIncent Price

Herman Cain and RIchard Nixon-Spiro Agnew (a 3-way)

Newt Gingrich and Charlie Weaver

Jon Huntsman Jr. and George Plimpton

Ron Paul and Sir John Gielgood

Rick Perry and Jackie (one of the Little Rascals)

Mitt Romney and Evel Knievel

Rick Santorum and

Sugar Ray Leonard

Review: "Jammin' at the Margins"

2011-11-17T15:14:00.003-05:00

Once again, the academic slavies in Brilliant Corners U. (Uber-Graduate division) have been plowing through a book about jazz and popular culture: "Jammin at the Margins" by the prolific Krin Gabbard, who's been reviewed here before ("Horns and Hormones"). Published in 1996, the book might seem like old news, but as far as I can see, no one ever wrote a review of this book longer than a paragraph.

Having other Gabbard tomes under my belt, I anticipated his approach: an academic/general reader hybrid, using cultural theory, some historical research and, in this case, plot summaries to back up his theses. All such theses stem from a central precept, which we've seen before from Gabbard: jazz as manifestation of black sexuality and the ways that white culture attempts to come to terms with/subvert/co-opt this sexuality.

On the plus side, Gabbard is a close observer. Looking at a movie with enough detachment to notice details of how music is used, placing on and off screen musicians in jazz history and tracking character interactions has value.

Hoagy is Cricket

I liked the author's analysis of Hoagy Carmichael's film persona. Gabbard is convincing in classifying Hoagy as a kind of benign trickster and asserting that Hoagy's parts actually fall within the scope of those that a black performer might have been allowed to do.

Tony is instant trumpet player

I also appreciate Gabbard noting the bizarre fact that whenever a (white) character picks up a horn, whether he hasn't played it in years or never touched it at all, he is able to pick it up and deliver dazzling jazz (improvising and playing a horn is oh so easy). He also makes the valid point that in a number of movies, the "natural" skill that blacks bring to jazz needs the white man's touch to bring it to fruition.

But what is telling and enervating in this book is the number of times Gabbard uses "maybe," "perhaps," "it is tempting," etc. to leap from observation to theory. My analytical antenna start to twitch when such equivocators start to pile up. And, so much of this conjecture is based on parsing the shades of people's skin. Not just white/ black, but lighter skin/darker skin. Yes, much can be explained by racism, sexuality, prurience, censorship and sublimation, but sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Sometimes people show up in a band or onscreen because the regular guy has the flu, they happen to be in town, or the producer happens to actually like their music; not because they're cyphers plugging a cultural hole. To co-opt a phrase, the whole approach seems "over-determined" to me.

Here is the last footnote in the book: "In the late 1940's, [Annie] Ross bore a child to the canonical bop drummer Kenny Clarke while they were both living in Paris; she has had long-lasting affairs with Lenny Bruce and Tony Bennett and she was married to the Irish actor Sean Lynch for twelve years."

Such unadorned presentation of facts is too rare here. Maybe the approach is middlebrow, but at least such things have the ring of flesh and blood, not of people being moved around by The Man as if on some giant pathological chess board. Extrapolating theories-ok, but citing only one or two examples per decade fuels the thought that the theory came first and that evidence was chosen to support it. Where have you gone when you posit that a black musician going to college has undermined his sexual potency?

Herr Adorno

Finally, we get a fistful of Theodor Adorno dragged into the mix. If you don't know Adorno (part of the "Frankfurt School"), he's been a university cultural studies department's best friend for a while. I struggled through some of his stuff myself and saw a sharp mind there, but I also saw that Adorno is a dope when it comes to jazz. Pardon my German, but he doesn't know shit about it. Mr Gabbard keeps bringing Adorno in to try and decide whether he agrees with him or not. Well, jimmy crack corn. I don't care.

The author draws on much work previously done on jazz in film and, to his credit, has created a framework in which the subject can be approached. He does give those less familiar with this area data to discover. Unfortunately, his pre-selection of examples to buttress questionable theories narrows the potential range of that discovery.

To get my previous take on jazz and movies go here. I dished it out. I hope I can take it.

"An Untold Boston Jazz Story" by Steve Provizer

2011-10-26T17:54:00.002-04:00

In 1971, this callow trumpet player enrolled in the Jack's Drum Shop (J.D.S.) School of Music. Even though the institution flashed only briefly through the dense Boston musical educational firmament, it was The Real Funk and deserves a nod.

The old, but not oldest Berklee

I started out at Berklee College of Music (changed from "School of Music" in 1970) which, at that point, was not the enormous operation it has become. Berklee was housed in an ornate and slightly decrepit hotel at the other end of Boylston St. from J.D.S. Walking down Berklee's one central staircase was largely a question of avoiding bruises from a minefield of saxophone and drum cases (at that time, there were relatively few guitarists).

In my third semester, I was publicly humiliated by a composition teacher for building a "free" section into my final composition and, fed up, I left. I saw an ad in the back of Downbeat magazine for J.D.S. and signed on.

J.D.S. occupied the second floor of an office building in Park Square, a smaller scale and less ornate version of the late 19th century Boston architectural style that brought us Filene's department store (the site of which is now two walls with a 3-year-old construction hole behind it, but I digress).

Filene's 3-year-old hole

Leave the Driving to Us

Interior of the Hillbilly Ranch

Other useful businesses on that side of Park Square were the bus station, the Playboy Club (fleetingly), the Hillbilly Ranch (yes, country music in Boston) and the "Teddy Bare" Lounge (see photo below).

Jacks Drum Shop

For a couple of years, all three floors of the building were busy. Jack's Drum Shop founder, Jack Adams, had two grandsons, Alan and Ron Vater. Their godfather, Fred Maichele was making drumsticks in the basement (eventually, Vater drumsticks would be used by Philly Jo Jones and Buddy Rich), the store was on street level and the hero of our story, Jack's Drum Shop (J.D.S.) School of Music was upstairs, behind a large plate glass window that looked out onto the Boston Public Gardens.

Jack Wertheimer (center)

The school was organized for JDS by Jack Wertheimer, a trombone player and teacher. I was able to locate Jack through jazzhistorydatabase.com. Turns out he's been active in jazz in Central Mass and has a record label called Brownstone Recordings. Jack very kindly sent me the original JDS material you see interspersed through this post.

Jack's Record Company

There may have been an interior staircase leading from the drum shop on street level, but the only way I remember going in was by a fire escape outside the building. I recall that it had been converted to carpeted wooden steps and that not only the carpet but the steps themselves were worn to the nub; a surprise in every step.

The interior was compact. I remember a room that could accommodate a few people for classes, a larger space, with risers good for big band rehearsal, and 3 or 4 practice rooms. There were locks on the practice rooms, but the usual method of entry was a credit-or most likely a library-card slipped down a loose door jamb. Sound proofing was a couple extra ceiling panels nailed to the walls.

The extraordinary teachers were Stanton Davis and Jeff Stout (trumpet), Jack Wertheimer (trombone), Bob Mover and Tony Viola (sax), Art Matthews, Paul Neves and Dan Fagell (piano), Allan Wilson, Basil Good (guitar), John Neves (bass) Ted Lagodmos (mallet instruments), Harvey Simons, Reid Jorgensen and Jerry Shellmer (drums). A bunch of brilliant Brazilians signed on as students, but were already accomplished pros and ended up teaching: Victor Brasil (sax, piano), Claudio Roditi (trumpet, piano), Zeca Assumpcao (bass).

At J.D.S. I found a place where people were serious, but the gloss of professionalism was tempered by the love of the hang and mutual empathy for others locked in The Jazz Struggle. Students came from across the country, but I think many were, like me, refugees from more mainstream institutions.

I don't remember classes starting before 11 AM. It was not a crowd of early risers. By noon the place was littered with cigarette butts tossed into coffee cups and occasionally, by mid-afternoon, a pint or half pint of Old Crow would make its surreptitious way around the room.

JDS created the Jazz Wagon, to give free concerts in Boston neighborhoods. I played a few of those gigs, usually in gyms with basketballs flying over our heads. Hey-there's Larry the Trumpet Player in the middle!

There was a minor rivalry between me and Larry (last name?) for top spot on the lowly trumpet ladder, but if there was any serious sense of competitiveness among us, it was between Victor Brasil and Bob Mover. For those who don't know Victor's playing, check it out here: http://youtu.be/2zbPWUkj_os Now, check out Bob (they got the same gansta alto lean)- http://youtu.be/ifOU_4mobH8

Now, imagine those two doing battle during what was supposed to be a big band rehearsal. One comping on piano, the other channeling Bird/Konitz/Woods on the alto, then switching, each riff growing increasingly ferocious and aggressive. MInton's recreated. Or imagine Claudio Roditi, standing in the narrow hallway, demonstrating how different trumpet players would handle a set of changes: "So, if Freddie was gonna play this, this is what it would be..." "And Clifford would play it like this..." We flunkies sitting there with our chops hanging out.

Combat Zone-1968

The Teddy Bare Lounge down the street, like other strip clubs at the time, used an organ trio; always with a tenor player as the horn. At J.D.S., you could climb the tenor player ladder from being ignored, to being asked to sit in, being asked to sub and finally getting the gig when the tenor player went on to something better. When one of our own, Jim Davis, did just that, we aspirants all felt as though that seemy, infinitely desirable world was actually available to us.

One morning, in the middle of a semester (I guess we had semesters), a guy with horn-rimmed glasses wandered in. He walked through the rooms, seeming to take an unusual interest in the furniture and the condition of the walls, taking notes on a pad of paper. No one said anything except "who was that guy," but everyone knew who he might be. When we showed up the next morning, Jack told us the school had been closed down.

Notice the cost of a course: $30.00

I recognize that this blog post is closer to a impressionistic retelling than an authoritative one. Mea culpa. But in an era when U.S. economics are working so strongly against those in the middle and below, there was something of the working class about this place that should be noted and esteemed. Like pawn shops, places like the J.D.S. School of Music were affordable and no nonsense, but not the zero-sum game that conservatories seemed to me to be. The teachers were Us, or at least we hoped they were and with no walls between us, we could imagine it was so. JDS thought seriously about its responsibility to the community, making jazz education affordable, sponsoring concerts, creating the Jazz Wagon and offering music programs for children.

At this point, the cost of jazz education has skyrocketed and Park Sq. has been de-natured and up-scaled. What now stands on the spot occupied by J.D.S., The Teddy Bare Lounge and the bus terminal? The Four Seasons Hotel (Minimum $495 per night) and the Heritage on the Common (studio condos start at half a million bucks).

News of Questionable Interest

2011-10-12T20:13:00.002-04:00

A tip 'o the hat to my progenitors at this blog-Chris, Matt and other guests, on whose shoulders I stand. Brilliant Corners, the Little Shop of Jazz Horrors we call our own, has gone over the 100,000 visits mark. Now, how to monetize this financially-challenged demographic...

Go, Occupy Boston!

My band-SLSAPS, laying a little groove on the nefarious proceedings

"The Truth About Mouthpieces" by Steve Provizer

2011-09-27T17:33:00.001-04:00

The neglect that I experienced around mouthpiece choice and which I believe continues in early brass playing education in 2011, is sickening. Young players: You need to know how important mouthpieces are.

You can play almost any trumpet, unless it's a real piece of junk, but having the wrong mouthpiece can absolutely stunt your musical growth. When you pick up this beast of an axe, you need positive reinforcement to stick with it. The wrong mouthpiece can make it so much more difficult to play that it can erode morale and no doubt has led many to ditch the horn.

As far as I know, to this day, when instruments are handed out, mouthpieces are a "one size fits all" proposition. No attempt is made to find one that suits the player. And chances are, the stock mouthpiece dished out-a 7C Bach-is not what the student needs. Yea, it's hard to get an accurate reading on this the first time someone picks up a horn, but you can revisit it 6 months or a year later and see what's up.

It makes no sense to think that someone would intuitively know about this.

There are hundreds, maybe thousands of different mouthpieces out there. This just shows that the most infinitesimal difference in outside and inside diameter, cup size, shape, throat size, etc can make a big difference. In fact, there are so many variations that to be firmly convinced you have the mouthpiece that works best for you, you'd have to spend big bucks. About the least you can spend per unit is $50 and the price goes up from there into the $$thousands.

Even then, you're not done, because optimally, you'd have different mouthpieces to help you perform different kinds of music. You might want a more brilliant sound, a more diffused sound, darker, lighter, fatter, brighter, etc.

I was fortunate enough to hear Lou Soloff play this week. He's a guy who carries about a half dozen mouthpieces in his pocket and as the music changes, gives serious consideration to which one he'll use. Combine that with a battery of mutes and you have a musician with the potential to produce a vast range of colors, which he did.

This is knowledge that is widespread in the "grown-up" world of trumpet playing, but there's no reason young players should not be hipped to it. I think we've lost some good ones because they weren't. I only hope they didn't feel as though they had to pick up the saxophone...

"Bass Bow-Masters"

2011-09-22T16:46:00.002-04:00

Since the 1960's, it's become common for bass players to keep a bow handy, and many became adept users-Jimmy Garrison, Ray Brown, Eddie Gomez, George Mraz, Christian McBride, Michael Moore, and others. BUT-99% of the time, they use it only for long tones that are meant to add dramatic underpinning to an intro, in interlude or an ending. Actual bowed (known as "arco") solos are rare.

The recent birthday of Leroy Elliot "Slam" Stewart (b. 9/21/14) reminded me what a virtuoso bass player can do with a bow and how few such players there have been. In fact, I can count them on three fingers, Slam Stewart, Major Holley and Paul Chambers.

Slam may be most well-known as half of "Slim and Slam," with singer/pianist/guitarist Slim Gaillard, a popular musical act that straddled swing/bop and early R&B. Here's "Tutti-Frutti," a 1938 example of their style, and of Slam's throwaway bowing virtuosity:

In that tune, Slam does just a bowed solo, but in this well-known 1945 version of "I Got Rhythm" with tenor Don Byas, he's in full voice, singing both in unison and in harmony with his complicated bass lines:

The Major

Major Holley was a decade younger than Slam (7/10/24). Stylistically, he was a swing and "mainstream" player who, like Slam, also knew how to work a crowd. His soloing is very similar to Slam's, but his voice is distinguishable by the fact that it's both more nasal and also commands the deepest registers. The guy can basically go as low as the bass can:

Finally, here are Slam and Major together, with a parodic version of "Close Your Eyes." After this primer, you should be able to tell who goes first and who goes second:

Paul Chambers

The third member of this triumvirate was Paul Lawrence Dunbar Chambers (known as P.C.). He could "walk" the bass as well as anyone ever has in jazz, but he also moved the bowed solo into the rarified harmony and velocity realms of Bop. Chambers was, appropriately, about a decade younger than Holley (4/22/35). He takes the last solo here, but I don't think you'll suffer too much listening to the other guys blow:

The chronological pattern established by these 3 guys says that someone born in 1944 or 45 should have been the next link in the chain, but I don't think any bass player has arisen to advance the art of arco playing since Chambers, who died in 1969. I welcome further elucidation on the topic by my erudite readership.

Mute-a-bility (Pt.3) by Steve Provizer

2011-09-20T16:05:00.001-04:00

Mute regrets, I've had a few. Like, Why did the great Roy Eldridge start using a harmon mute?

Roy's tone was a pile-driver; epic, a mover of mountains. It vibrated at the highest energies. Just listen to what I think is the ripest performance in the history of swing:

Roy may have used mutes earlier, but in the 1950's, he started using them a lot and it almost reduces his sound to the level of a common mute user. Not quite. He still exudes some power; has some growl, but that only makes it harder to understand-his style doesn't really change with the adoption of the mute. He's still a power player. Roy: why did you begrudge us hearing that beautiful sound full out!!

The muted Roy

Dizzy also began using a mute-at least recording with one-in the 1950's. It makes more sense with Diz. Yes, he had a powerful and beautifully idiosyncratic sound, but he also drew from a wider palette of influences than Roy. He was a slyer player and, of course, there was the Latin influence. Here's Diz playing his composition Con Alma on open horn:

You can hear how he bends notes, dances between phrases and shapes his rhythmic patterns in unusual ways. Also, how he varies the loudness and softness of the solo. It seems very reasonable for him to undertake similar tunes with a harmon mute. Here's a beautiful duet with bass player Chris White:

Now, here are Diz and Roy, side by muted side, in their great 1954 collaboration:

Rare shot of Freddie w. mute

Many great players mostly eschewed mutes. Fats Navarro, Kenny Dorham, Booker Little, Red Rodney and Donald Byrd. As far as I know, Clifford used them not at all. Sweets Edison's use in later life makes sense, given the bendy, inflected style he developed.

If they wanted a change in sound, it seems like the choice of some great players after 1960 was not to use mutes, but to double on fluegelhorn. See: Freddie Hubbard, Lee Morgan, Art Farmer, Chet Baker and Woody Shaw. I have a vaguely curmudgeonly take on the fluegelhorn, but we can take that up another time.

I haven't talked much about the cup mute, which was played at one time another by all the swing era players and some boppers (especially Navarro). I will close this session with some cup work by one of our greatest players-Charlie Shavers. A man with a powerhouse delivery and tone, Charlie also shaped individual tones, used a lot of smears, slides and shakes. To me, he adapts his style perfectly to the cup mute and his obligatos behind Billie are sublime.

"Mutes and Other Distortionary Audio Lenses" by Steve Provizer

2011-09-15T16:45:00.001-04:00

My last post showed some of ways mutes have been used in jazz trumpet playing. The technological extension of the sound alteration/manipulation done by mutes is, of course, electronics. Or, before that-mechanics. The photo below shows the mechanical trumpeter constructed by Friedrich Kaufman in 1810. Obviously, after a very tough gig.

T. Blanchard w. wireless mic

Note that I'm not talking about simply updating the means of amplification by having a wireless mic attached to the bell of the horn; that simply allows the player to move away from a stationary mic and still be heard.

You do need to run through a mic so that the sound becomes an electronic signal. Then, you can run it through an effects box. Initially that process involved re-shaping an analog wave, but for the last couple of decades, like everything else, this has moved into the digital domain; domain being the appropriate word for the hegemony of this technology.

The effects used most often are reverb, wah-wah, fuzztone, flanging and plain old distortion-all long used and abused, by guitar and bass players. In a recent rash of tweets, I listed some early rock and pop examples, which I put at the bottom of the post for your leisurely perusal.

Tape Echoplex

In electronics, as in the use of harmon mute without a stem, Miles was very influential. However, the trumpet player who explored it first was Don Ellis, who recorded using an Echoplex in 1967. Ellis also incorporated Indian scales, used a 4-valved trumpet and did some Third Stream work. Here's his lovely "Open Beauty":

As a relict of the 1960's, I can tell you that many of us who played the trumpet and also had a foot in the avant-garde "classical" music camp collaborated to make odd sounds with

early synth manipulators. Moog and Buchla were the chief makers. In that context, the goal was less alteration than obliteration of the trumpet sound; the reduction of the note to a waveform that could have just as easily been produced by dropping bricks onto bedsprings with an electronic pickup(which, come to think of it, I did).

Buchla Synth

As noted, Miles was a key figure in this story. He'd been incorporating electronic instruments-keyboard, bass and guitar-since about 1967. Then, in Bitches Brew, electronic manipulation became a big player, but in post-production. Finally, in late 1970, Miles began putting his horn through a box with a pedal and ran the wah-wah down, as in this track from Live-Evil:

Interestingly, on Live at the Fillmore, recorded earlier in 1970, Miles was still playing acoustic (un-modified) trumpet. From 1971 on, he rolled with electronics.

Since that time, many trumpet players have incorporated electronics into their music. More mainstream guys tend to use it lightly-Roy Hargrove, Tim Hagans, Jeremy Pelt, Christian Scott, Dave Douglas; and more outside players, more radically-Coung Vu and Rob Mazurek.

Jon Hassell has probably been the most wide-ranging practitioner of electronics with trumpet. Sometimes New-Age-y, World-y, Tranc-y, occasionally Inside-ish, Minimalist-ish, etc. He calls his stuff "Fourth World."

The logical extension of all this is a combination synthesizer and trumpet, a little item resembling a machine gun that generates a midi-signal, needs no conversion into the digital domain and can be controlled by breath and fingers. It's a little ironic that James Morrison, a trumpet player who has mastered the "old" technology of playing the trumpet, designs and markets a digital-trumpet.

Here's Mike Metheny blowing a well-known version of such devices, the EVI (Electronic Valve Instrument). Mike's a great trumpet player.

The sound is, obviously, extremely adaptable, but also somewhat de-natured. I'm not much for the Puritan work ethic, but the human struggle to play a normal trumpet-mastering breath and chops-can be heard in the sound. It gives weight and meaning to the notes.

Like mutes, electronics can be another arrow in the quiver, but will never be a replacement for natural sound.

A FEW EARLY AUDIO DISTORTION LENSES

Of all things, Marty Robbins - Don't Worry. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V40lF4SQhCE&feature=share

See. Ann could do more than dance. Early fuzztone. Ann Margret-I Just Don't Understand. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wujv5SN0CR4&feature=share

Always on the edge of distortion-Howlin' Wolf-Highway Man. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EglRs981VYs&feature=share

A Fuzztone pioneer. Rocket 88-Ike Turner/Jackie Brenston. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gbfnh1oVTk0&feature=share

The Ventures- 2,000 lb Bee Pt 1 (1st use of a fuzz box 11/62). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gvhPb6se6E&feature=share

You know The Lads knew a good fuzzy thing when they heard it. Think for Yourself. #Beatles http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzkhSJkx7GY&feature=share

Zappa-Willie The Pimp. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aIRKbwATvM&feature=share

The Lure of the Mute by Steve Provizer

2011-09-11T19:44:00.001-04:00

I. e., the thing you stick in the bell of your horn to change the sound and/or make it softer. Could be anything. I'll do a quick recap here and get into it more next time.

The trumpet in its present state is a relatively new phenomenon-final evolution in the mid-1800's. It's a good bet that early on, the complaints of neighbors got some horn players to jam a rag into their bells to keep peace in the 'hood. Of course, there was sometimes a quiet woodshed to go to, but the idea of sticking something in the end of the horn to alter the sound didn't pick up steam until some time later.

As far as I know, there is no notation in a classical score asking for a mute (fancy Italian word: sordina) until well into the 20th century. After all, you choose to write for a trumpet because the thing is so damned loud. Likewise, no mutes in Sousa, or James Reese Europe.

We pick up the use of muting in full bloom with King Oliver in the early 1920's. By all accounts, he was apt to use anything that was close to hand-bottles, glasses, hats... No doubt Oliver had progenitors in New Orleans, but of recorded evidence, there is none. This may be his most famous muted solo:

People ask, who was the first person to eat a tomato?

More importantly, who was the first brave soul to use a plunger mute?

The deftest lineage of mute practitioners were the plunger players associated with Ellington: Bubber Miley in the 20's, then Cootie Williams, then Ray Nance. On the trombone side, "Tricky" Sam Nanton. Here's a famous Bubber example:

There was a school of players who used the Harmon mute in what we think of now as a ricky-ticky way-stem left in, hand moving over the end to get a wah-wah effect. Henry Busse was a well-known practitioner (one odd article claims: "He and singer Bing Crosby invented the mute for trumpet").
Here's Busse in "Hot Lips."

The Lunceford band was known for flashy choreography, which extended to flashy sectional use of mutes. It comes near the end of this 1936 compendium, but the whole thing is great, so you'll hang in:

In 1938, Tommy Dorsey used it to achieve a putatively "exotic" quality in "Song of India" (don't forget to listen to the great Bunny Berigan solo, too):

The cup mute got some traction in the 30's-40's. Here is the alt take of Bird's "Embraceable You." Miles uses cup mute in his solo:

Miles is responsible for the last significant change in mute use. He took the stem out of the harmon mute and played right up on the mic. This is the sound we most closely associate with Miles and with trumpet mute use in general. Used famously here:

Next time: Mute: Threat or Menace?

Jazz Evolution: Filling Up The Holes by S.G.Provizer

2011-09-01T19:28:00.002-04:00

A recent post on Playjazz, a site with much to offer aspiring jazz musicians, said this:

This is why it's so important to listen to music from the whole history of jazz - because familiarity with the roots of the music allows us to hear the notes that aren't being played in later forms. Without knowledge of the earlier idioms, the brain is unable to 'fill in the gaps' when a modern musician implies certain material instead of stating it explicitly.

My reaction is that he kind of got it backwards. Jazz has evolved to fill up all the holes. Listening to the old stuff is imperative, but ironically, because jazz history has moved in a certain direction (more notes), it's natural for aspiring jazz players to want to jump on the continuum.

Lots of notes

This does not necessarily constitute "progress." In fact, it seems to me to be Art's version of the Progress juggernaut. Namely, the truism that an artist needs to be of and reflecting his or her time. This has never struck me as anything but a Romantic cliche. Or, often, a way to move the merchandise.

I would argue that accepting this change in jazz vocabulary ipso facto as Progress is simply capitulation to a social construction and not rooted in any demonstrable aesthetic advancement (Whew; quite a sentence).

Hector

I remember trying to pull the same kind of socio-musical sleight-of-hand in a report I did on Hector Berlioz. It went something like: "His repeated use of semi-quavers represents the repressed feeling of nationalism that the exiled Berlioz could not otherwise express..." Right.

Herb Clarke

There seems to be more people with great chops than ever before (although Herbert Clarke could double and triple tongue as well as Wynton). But, whether or not you buy into the advancement of technique, does it lead inexorably to better music? Or, can permission to use more notes in an improvisation merely mean more places for the soloist to hide? (the same when-is-less-more-vector I was following on the Art Tatum post below).

Clifford Brown

I grew up under the sway of those musicians who were the fleetest and most agile-bop and post-bop players (and I don't care what you say, Mile had prodigious

You know who

technique. But consider this: it was his use of space that set him apart from others).

I attempted to fashion a playing style that was appropriately verbose and chromatic and my ratio of good to bad solos was not enviable. I always listened to older styles of jazz, but to go in that direction was to lose street cred.

I remember somehow ending up in a trad situation and playing the Saints. The audience reaction was like none I'd ever had, but instead of trying to probe for musical reasons for this great response, I just assumed they were squares and could never dig the likes of hip me.

My jaundiced perception of that music definitively changed when I began playing in a band in which I solo on many trad songs-Just A Little While, Bye and Bye, Riverside...This kind of soloing forces you to make direct statements. Ideas need to be formed, clarified and expressed with emotion. Succeeding in such an approach constitutes an artistic achievement on the level of anything created later in the history of jazz.

Freddie Keppard