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I only alluded to the Carcassi experience to say Joe had been exposed, signficantly, to classical playing. I have no idea beyond that what he might have heard or learned. He liked the nylon stringed guitar, but never in my personal correspondence with him did I ever hear him express any particular liking for the classical repertoire. He respected classical players, to be sure, but wasn't a huge fan of reading from a sheet or reciting from memory.
Originally Posted by Veritas
It's sad really. Improvisation and playing by ear were once the bread and butter of the music we now call "classical" but classical players sometimes now just remind me of very complex wind-up toys. They can read, they can play from memory, but the ability to improvise, to compose and arrange, do themes and variations, playing inside and outside, on the fly... it isn't there.
Like a lot of blues playing, classical guitar seems more or less to be an end-stopped genre.
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05-02-2017 10:30 AM
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True, Graham, but Williams only played the first eight bars over and over. Tedious as well. It would be like playing the first eight of Misty repeatedly.
Immediately following the first eight bars, Bach develops the theme progressively in the next eight and so forth in the next eight. The "chord changes" are not identical at all. The Chaconne continually develops the thematic material to a remarkable degree. There are pieces which lend themselves to improvisation, but imo the Chaconne is not one of them. Not a big deal, just an opinion. In any case, I think it was a poor idea on Williams' part to put Joe on the spot.Last edited by Veritas; 05-02-2017 at 10:37 AM.
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To a large degree I agree with you, Lawson. Unless improvisation is written into the score ("improvise here") which you sometimes see in contemporary "classical" music, it is rare to hear the Boston Symphony improvise over Mozart or Beethoven. The scores are tightly arranged in classical music, despite the fact that Mozart and perhaps Bach were also know to improvise when they played music live. Then again, in some ways the music of their time was "contemporary" at that time, perhaps like jazz was in the thirties and forties.
It is that stultification that todays' musicians have imposed upon the classics which makes them feel like artifacts from the past. Of course, in the days of John Dowland, lutenists did put their own touches on themes.
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I hope you didn't think I was imagining a whole orchestra improvising. Still, first chair soloists could be offered the chance to improvise while the orchestra plays "the changes." It almost never happens. And guitarists in the past did improvise. Originally Posted by Veritas
Improvisation is not "putting ones own touches" on a melody. It's taking the harmonic framework and underlying melodic idea and reframing it, re-expressing it, even replacing large elements of it, on the fly, drawing on one's inner reservoir of musical ideas and experience.
This does not happen in the classical guitar world. It's why 30 years ago, when I decided to get serious about guitar, I chose jazz over classical. I wanted an improvisational form, not music I could only read from a sheet or recite from memory.
Classical people also generally not only cannot improvise, they almost have no concept of what it actually is. They think it's customizing the melody, or adding some little flourishes here and there. Andre Previn probably is the best example of a classically trained person who "gets" improvisation. And he recorded with... JOE PASS and RAY BROWN! It's a killer album, too! Andre can play, but ironically, he says that a classical player doing jazz needs an "insurance policy" and that policy for him was Pass and Brown! I'm sure it was a modest statement, of course, but interesting what jest he chose to make his statement.
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My teacher set up a couple of projects for Joe, using his connections with European classical world. The first one was a duet record with John Williams, and he got them together to start planning that out. The second one was a series of concerts of Joe performing with symphony orchestras.
Unfortunately, Joe died before those two projects could come to for fruition.
So the last people heard of Joe was I think the six string Santa record and the duet with Roy Clark.
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" Andre Previn probably is the best example of a classically trained person who "gets" improvisation. And he recorded with... JOE PASS and RAY BROWN"
a bit off topic, but back in the day Previn and Brown came to town w/Mundell Lowe on guitar.
memorable evening, once during a solo, the endpin on Ray's bass slipped and the bass dropped down.
w/out stopping his solo he reached down w/the other hand and re-extended/tightened it.
it was dead quiet in the concert hall and the audience gasped...
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There was the "Joe Pass in Hamburg" recording that featured the NDR Big Band with strings, and it's in my view a splendid recording. Joe's tone is perfect, the arrangements create wonderful spaces for him, and it sounds to me like he was inspired by that context. Originally Posted by NSJ
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I was about to refer to Andre Previn in the past tense, but the poor guy is still living at the ripe age of 88 apparently. He was a fine pianist, though I didn't always feel he was in league with a McCoy Tyner or Bill Evans. Still he could straddle both the jazz and classical worlds.
You are right that there are few classical musicians including classical guitarists who can improvise at the level of a Joe Pass or Mundell Lowe. I like both worlds, but I, too, prefer playing jazz. Or at least attempting to.
Sorry if I misspoke regarding improvisation. I meant that in the time of Elizabethan music lutenists often took liberties with well known themes. Or at least that is my understanding. I do not pretend to be an expert, though I do play lute music and classical guitar. Not much anymore by comparison to jazz or my version thereof.Last edited by Veritas; 05-02-2017 at 09:01 PM.
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I think there are a few classical musicians who are getting interested in improvisation these days. I heard a guy interviewed on Radio 3 a while back (forget the name) who said he completely improvises the cadenza when he plays a piano concerto (I think most people play one of the 'written-out' cadenzas associated with each concerto).
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Going back to the original post, I can give one little insight about Joe Pass, straight from the man himself. I once had a drink with him in the bar at Ronnie Scotts and the one thing I can remember is that I asked him why, when he started his set with 2 or 3 tunes in a row, he could only tell the audience what the last tune was. He could never remember the previous couple of tunes that he had played before it (in fact he would ask the audience to tell him!).
Joe said it was because he was so utterly focussed with his concentration on what he was playing in the moment, that everything that had gone before it was forgotten.
So maybe that's something we can learn from Joe: total concentration at any moment on what you are playing, and nothing else.
I might add, he was a very friendly, nice guy, especially once he knew I played the guitar. He even bought me a drink!
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Joe's solo playing on nylon really speaks to me - especially the I Remember Charlie Parker album.
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That really is an incredible album. The last solo album he did, "Songs for Ellen" (?) was also poignant. Each tune on that album cost him a lot in terms of pain as his cancer was eating him up. Originally Posted by destinytot
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I always liked Joe's playing on this LP ... Carter's swing/arpeggio-based style sits surprisingly nicely with Dizzy's bop phrasing. Joe's playing - especially on the song "The Courtship" is really nice.
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This has long been a favourite, too:
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I just looked that one up, and it turns out that I have a CD other tunes from that session: Unforgettable. Originally Posted by lawson-stone
Today I've been looking at the part of the tune Joe's noodling at the start of the clip in post no.34, but on nylon (via amp with headphones). To think I've had those albums all these years without studying the parts that speak to me.
(Time flies - gonna fix that PDQ.)
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I think actually "Unforgettable" is the one I was thinking of! Originally Posted by destinytot
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
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Hey thanks Jeff. I found a bargain used copy of "Grab This", and I am very glad I did! In my mind, the album is mainly about Johnny Griffin (tenor), Paul Bryant (organ), and a superb rhythm section. Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
As far as Joe's contribution goes, I am going to have to listen to the album again, and more carefully. I thought Joe's solos, while great, were not primo Joe, and his comping got a bit lost in the mix. Compared to some of his comping for Ella Fitzgerald (or Barney Kessel's comping for Julie London), Joe's comping on "Grab This" was not easily discernible to me. Perhaps that is this point and I am missing it?
In any case, thanks again. I enjoyed this album thoroughly!
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Thats John Williams on the left. Originally Posted by Doctor Jeff
Heavy hitters in that group
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Back in the late 70s I used to go hear Joe Pass play solo jazz guitar at The King Of France Tavern in Annapolis, MD which was owned by Charlie Byrd and Paul Pearson. Joe would play every night for the entire week and then another famous jazz guitarist would come in and play the following week. Those were the days!
Joe would start every set by asking the audience which songs they wanted to hear. He would then pick a song from the various titles that were called out and proceed to play numerous variations of the song by changing keys, changing time signatures, re-harmonizing the chord progressions, throwing in walking bass lines and single note improvised solos all without breaking a sweat!
It was absolutely remarkable to sit there in front of a genius who just so happened to play jazz guitar! Joe and his loyal D'Aquisto set the bar awfully high for the rest of us mere mortals!
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And seriously... Joe Pass was the first to do that so consistently and so often and so brilliantly. That's what he gave us. Others did it, but not so frequently, consistently and mind-blowingly well.
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I heard Pass live at The Lighthouse in Hermosa Beach CA (some say this is were the West Coast cool school originated). I don't have anything to add with regards to his playing. Originally Posted by Steven Herron
He wasn't too happy about all the fog we had one evening. He said he left his D'Aquisto in the car too long and that it impacted his sound (but I couldn't tell).
Great to see MD had such fine jazz guitar acts. Living in So Cal we got all the L.A. Studio musicians (e.g. Howard Roberts was someone I saw many times) as well as touring groups, at the various jazz clubs in the area (but mostly in North Hollywood). Those were the days (because today even in L.A. there are few jazz clubs).
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Learning Joe Pass tunes note for note, pushes 2 or more other arrangement out the back of my head. When he used that 1/2 pick of his, he was able to pick notes with speed and clarity yet, he jumped around and up and over strings that would challenge a fingerstyle player.
After playing his stuff all morning, me and my son had lunch in the town he was born in today. Ironically my son was born in the same town..
I love Joe Pass. Thank you everyone for keeping his brilliance alive..
Joe D
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I never heard Joe there, but I have heard some great music, including Herb Ellis on guitar. Not the same, I know, but still excellent. Sadly KOF closed some time back. I loved that place. Originally Posted by Steven Herron
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Is there a book or individual sheet music of the Virtuoso recordings without tab? Tab gets in my way and makes the page longer with stuff I don't want or need. I have searched online, contacted Sher Music, perused Jazzbooks.com, Mel Bay and Amazon.com and everything I find includes tab and notation.
Alternatively, of the online sites I have seen that have transcribed Joe's work can I pay an additional fee and have you drop the tab? I know from using Print Music Notation software that this is possible and the software supports doing it but I see no site offering notation only.
There has got to be some professional transcribers out there that offer this.
Thanks
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The "Omnibook" by Joe Pass has some transcriptions from the various "Virtuoso" albums in it. They are all written out in standard notation and tab.
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