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Great words... today players and audience are often obsessed with perfection and accomplishment... often seems they tink they alredy know what shall be done before they even beginMiles Davis (a hero, but also one who was acutely aware of his image, and how to manipulate it, so one must sift through his various interview and other utterances and separate the wheat from the chaff) made a statement I very much like: He told his guys (this would be the '60s quintet) 'I pay you to practice in public'.
they forget that music is the thing that should be born right now at the moment of performance... that you not only witness but participate in it...
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02-28-2017 03:37 PM
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I would add to that that the audience are equal participants. They MUST be read: their mood, changes they may be going through, etc.---considered before we play note one. We are there for them, as they are there for us. The Big Picture.
Originally Posted by Jonah
I'm NOT saying cater to, or 'baby' people along. They'll smell that, and be right to resent it. Play neither down nor up to people, but TO them.
I mentioned elsewhere that my fave venue to play in NYC is Fat Cat (and I just got that gig back!). The band is integrated into the total experience---true 'social music'. If they want to listen they'll come up front by the band. Shoot, there's even a TIP CUP!
Re: freshness in performance: All I know can be simply stated: stop being so damn SET (I'm very guilty of this myself) and open up to the flow that supersedes everyday feelings. LISTEN to that, the other players (or vocalist), and the audience. Do that, and the chances will increase exponentially of the 'music playing us'...
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Yup, that's what you want :-) Originally Posted by fasstrack
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I feel that it's totally ok if musician is playing music only to him-/herself when it's played by itself for example in home. It can have even psychological meaning to one. But when player steps on stage wether it's background gig for non-clapping audience or cheering football stadium one should play for audience and honestly, from heart. One thing that lowers my mood is when I see and hear absolute talented players who are completely in their own bubble. They are not listening each other or audiences feelings. They would have the technicality and musical understanding for wonderful musical result but you can see how much they give energy and concentration for not making a one mistake. It's shame and unfortunately I see this too often.
Music truely has several meanings. We can play music to ourselves just for fun, music is been played just for money (sadly), Indian musicians think that music comes from god, in communist-era folk music was machine for propaganda in Bulgaria, music is played in weddings, funerals, christening etc. etc. In any case I think that player should love music and playing. Appreciate it, makers of it and the audience. Sometimes you can feel that no one is listening you but after gig people can come to you and tell how much they loved your playing (I don't know can it happen else where than Finland that audience is sometimes too afraid to clap
). Or some one can come afterwards and tell what good things they have had in their live through your music. That for one should alway appreciate listeners.
Some thought.
cheers.
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Depends what type of music you are playing. Originally Posted by mrcee
I find thinking within a key very useful for key based jazz.
Not quite so much use for jazz which has no key. Or three of them.
If someone I don't know kicks off a standard tune I'm a funny key without calling it, it's an interesting exercise to find the key (and not all that hard) but I would be thinking they were a bit of a dick on a professional level.
Otoh, doesn't Peter Bernstein have an excellent rant about how unnecessary the ritual of 'ok let's play days of wine and roses, f major, 1 2 1 2 3 4' is.
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I'm probably going to come across as a bit of a douche, so apologies, but this is how I see the creative process, I'm not contradicting you, just clarifying a point I think is important. Originally Posted by MikkoKarhula
You are right!
What I have worked out already is: IMO we are partly what has happened to us, good and bad things. Memories are attached to our feelings. And if we are not enchaining us to theory-only and technique-only thinking we might find different way to choose notes. When I compose often some memory comes to my mind and it's loaded with feelings. I try to carry with that feeling and choose harmonies that support it. So I think that we choose notes that affect us, notes that we find pleasant, unpleasant, scary, happy etc. and we all have lived different life and have different memories and feelings come out differently.
This is one way to be unique.
I'm sure that many can find that gibberish but I believe it because it happens in my head.
If some one is interested you can join my Facebook group "Creative Concepts for Guitar" and share your own ideas.
Kindest
Mikko
Don't seek to be unique. Don't seek to be original. Don't even seek to express your emotions.
Work on releasing all of that baggage and just play, or write. All of this stuff will come through in the most unexpected places.
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But the music.. was it really good?I once went to a show at a uni by a very respected jazz player, not a guitarist. He, and the band, walked on, played the set, and walked off. Not once did he, or they, acknowledge the audience and certainly ignored any encore. We may as well not have been there and the tickets weren't cheap.
I am asking because we too - as audience - pay attention to many non-musical details... so many times i heard people in classical concerts discussing hoe the artist looks, sits, waves his hand... (both in approving and critical way)... and nothing about how was the music.
He may be show-off trying ok... but if I close my eyes I hear great performance I do not care about his behaviour
Have you seen Horowitz in lkater years - he always played with the audiemce a bit of an entertainer.. he liked that image of ever favourite of everybody... but then he plays and oh... it's something unbelieveble... it is not even music it is life itself.
Of Gould - how people love to discuss his eccentreties... that he ignored Beethoven's tempo etc. but open your ears people.. this tempo sounds absolutely convicing - whatever he says in his interview his choice is absolutely muscal...
I just want to say - I try to make a line.. what ever a guy does on a stage it's up to him... I just try to listen to his music... he may be a jerk and if the music is really good.. I am ok with that... but if tries to cover lack of musicality with this BS then I do not care any nore about him...
I think the best respect to the audience that artist can do is to be as true to himself as he can.. I love GB but half of his autobiorgaphy is about explaining why he did that and this to sell better and why this is anyway musically good. Not always... if you try to please everybody you envitably move to nobody...
Democratic priciple could be good for politics but not for Arts...
He said a few times that he does not want to dissapoint people who paid to listen to 'That Maquarade' - ok... but to me it could be more dissapointment to hear great artist figuring out what majotiry hear wants and trying to please them. Good if for the moment he feels like doing 'That Masquarade' again.. but I saw GB shows where though he tried to look fun he played like he is frustrated and tired of these same songs and chages.
Again I love GB.. he is one of my major influences
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that's my point too...Don't seek to be unique. Don't seek to be original. Don't even seek to express your emotions.
Every personality is unique, every human being is a new attempt on life...
so if you just mange to be true to yourself will make everything you do unique original.
and that's another point I like... the process... the doing .... that's where all discoveries are...Work on releasing all of that baggage and just play, or write. All of this stuff will come through in the most unexpected places.
Realization always takes further than you might plan
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Interesting how you used the lower-case 'g' in 'god'. Originally Posted by MikkoKarhula
I'm a guitar player, not a theologian or clergyman. However, I am on a spiritual quest, as many of us are---I believe it is in part why we play.
I don't use the word 'god'---but am convinced that:
1. Music comes not FROM us, but THROUGH us. We are conduits or prisms for an energy force, a 'something'----bigger and more life-encompassing than our day-to-day lives, feelings, and FOR SURE egos. When we are 'in tune' something unexplainable will pulse through us, almost as if we are bystanders.
2. Egos are necessary. One guy at an ashram explain it thusly: '(your) ego is lke gas for your car'. You need ego, moxie, and balls to survive this heartless biz----indeed, to survive LIFE.
Does that sound like a contradiction of the preceding paragraph? Probably, and I don't claim to have the answers, BUT I aim to keep asking the right questions.
The book is that big talent comes with big egos. But that's not necessarily true, and even if it were the magical thing is that there are SO many examples of great musicians (egos, personalities and whatever else) getting together to play----and the love of music-making, in-the-moment creativity, comradeship---all things stemming from that larger energy spirit force---superseding the ego and petty stuff.
Then there is the 'flow' aspect---also, I believe, part of this idea b/c we are endeavoring to tap into this larger flow that great music (and human achievement generally) comes out of. Why do we sometimes play where it just flows like crazy, as if we weren't 'there', and someone or something is playing---then other days we cannot seem to get out the gate (past licks and recitations)?
I think that perhaps the answer, at least in part, may be to somehow have the strong (possibly ego-driven) opinions we express playing what we believe is 'right' reconcile, or at least co-exist with an openness that can lead to taking one to new and exciting musical terrain.
And it begins and ends with LISTENING...Last edited by fasstrack; 03-03-2017 at 05:27 PM.
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Great thought! My waking up for understanding that our personality chooses the notes that match with our feelings is more to help me trust myself than a method. But I have used it in composing method. I have had an idea for song and saw it in my head like movie or series of pictures. Then I have tried to keep that "story" in my head and compose song complete with using the help of this "story". But when I play I don't analyze these things I just want to play as beautiful as I can and be honest to music. Originally Posted by christianm77
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The lower-case in "g" was just mistake in my typing. I didn't mean anything. Originally Posted by fasstrack
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I didn't infer anything from it. Originally Posted by MikkoKarhula
It just reminded me of Cole Porter's lyric '...Why the gods above me....who must be in the know...'
Also, in Greek (and possibly Roman) myth, there were always gods, NOT God.
Then, along came Judeo-Christian monotheism, and.....
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That's pretty unrealistic, methinks. You get involved with the creative fields because of emotions to express. And is that such a bad thing, really? Originally Posted by christianm77
If you're saying work to GET PAST immediate feelings to get to that more 'spiritual' thing (sounds like Harry Kirschner-speak, I know), then I buy THAT...
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Well it's separating causes and effects, process and result. Originally Posted by fasstrack
If I get too excited when I perform, I rush, for instance.
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Big deal. So did Bill Evans, George Coleman, Cedar Walton, Tal Farlow---and Art Blakey sped up on his drum solos. And they all made great music and brought the listeners along to that special 'zone' that makes life worth living. Originally Posted by christianm77
We're HUMAN...
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Sure. Originally Posted by fasstrack
But I basically dig the idea that we shouldn't aim to inject feeling into music, but rather connect with something through music, which is a subtle distinction even if it just seems like semantics. These things are hard to talk about...
In terms of playing time - well a lot depends on who you play with. Some times steady is wrong. There's no hard and fast rules, but I do feel a degree of stepping away from you playing, so to speak, is important. I'm probably not making to much sense, but it makes sense in my own head and I find it helpful for playing music betterer.
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Didn't I just say that? Originally Posted by christianm77
IS THERE AN ECHO IN HERE?! LOL!
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The late, great Milt Hinton (AKA 'Fump' and 'The Judge)---a man I'll always regret never having met----said 2 things I loved, and wish people would duly note: Originally Posted by christianm77
1. 'Bass is a SERVICE'
2. 'If (the drummer or pianist, etc.) accelerates or decelreates the tempo---best to DO IT QUIETLY TOGETHER'.
If it's still in print, I highly recommend obtaining Mr. Hinton's Bassline---a kind of smorgasbord of great pics, stories about people he worked with (Pops and Goodman, for 2), philosophy---other stuff. It's wonderful, and he's a hell of a photographer (took color action film that was used in the documentary 'A Great Day in Harlem'...
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Limitations of language. You may have thought that's what you were saying, but it's not necessarily how it was interpreted. In the same way you may have thought I was saying something other to what you were saying. Originally Posted by fasstrack
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BTW Mikko, I really like your tune and your playing (I'm embarrassed to say I only just got a chance to check it out). I think you are definitely onto something.
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Thank you! Nice to hear that. It's interesting how this subject gains discuss. I actually posted this same video earlier in Finnish guitar forum and it got discussion boiling there too. To me this was just one of those crazy ideas that come to my mind. I certainly didn't want to suggest that I had found something that hasn't done before and I certainly didn't want to people think that I don't appreciate theory-knowledge. It was in some cases misunderstood. I have created some of my playing to lean on some theory and technique based things in my head and just wanted to try what happens when I'm not making the next move, next chord or melody by leaning on theory-knowledge so much. Originally Posted by christianm77
I played several years gypsy jazz. After some about five years of playing that style I got frustrated in couple of characters of that style and one was the heavily lick-based language. I could just play those solos really not thinking anything. It was all in my fingers. So sad to say. I tried brake that and I find it still sometimes hard in that style to improvise completely. Those manners are so attached in that language. Also the playing technique in that style drives me use certain note options.
I play several different styles nowadays and this video was something that was coming up from my combat in my head that gypsy jazz started. I still love that music. But IMO it's important to move on when things are endlessly spinning same circle and causing frustration.
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People think far too much about theory IMO. Originally Posted by MikkoKarhula
Yeah I play a lot of that type of thing. I have a very peculiar relationship with it.I played several years gypsy jazz. After some about five years of playing that style I got frustrated in couple of characters of that style and one was the heavily lick-based language.
I kind of avoid playing any gypsy jazz licks, and people still think I play GJ. It's weird. I see myself as a bebop improviser with a touch of modern/contemporary. Sure I've looked into Django, but he is completely beyond licks, and very adventurous harmonically for the time.
The technique and the instrument is what gives it much of its style. The joke is I never really WANTED to play Gypsy Jazz, and yet people think of me as a player in that style. I fell into it.I could just play those solos really not thinking anything. It was all in my fingers. So sad to say. I tried brake that and I find it still sometimes hard in that style to improvise completely. Those manners are so attached in that language. Also the playing technique in that style drives me use certain note options.
I rarely listen to any GJ players aside from Django, thought I do listen to US swing music. I've never been to Samois. I'm not really in that scene. I don't know the same licks as everyone else. I even - *gasp* - use different chord shapes on many of the songs, and I like to improvise voicings in accompaniment because - hey - I am jazz guitarist that happens to play 'gypsy jazz' music.
How did it happen?
1) Got playing swing music.
2) Needed a way to make the guitar louder acoustically - changed over to gypsy picking.
3) Needed a louder guitar, bought Maccaferri.
4) Oh shit.
But I've developed that approach to the point where I can play all of my language with that right hand (cheating a little if necessary.) I LOATHE the idea of having separate little corners of my playing. I want to be able to play all the bop heads, modern fusion stuff, modal intervallic stuff, middle eastern stuff, JS Bach, whatever using that technique. I want everything to be accessible whenever I want it.
Inner Urge is a struggle though - the up sweeps are hard to do!
After all, Django did not invent this technique. This is the same right hand used by classical mandolinists, oud players, tres Cubano players and so on. It's a really good way to play plectrum stringed instruments without an amp.
More recently I have started to bring more left hand into my playing - I don't like the machine gun thing - every note picked. I want a more flowing sound, even on acoustic.
The joke is people still say - ah you are a Gypsy player!
Indeed.I play several different styles nowadays and this video was something that was coming up from my combat in my head that gypsy jazz started. I still love that music. But IMO it's important to move on when things are endlessly spinning same circle and causing frustration.Last edited by christianm77; 03-05-2017 at 06:40 PM.
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christianm77.
One of the things that I'm very grateful for gypsy jazz is picking indeed. Arched right hand wrist and rest-stroke. As you said it's similar style than with oud and etc. The main thing to me is that this technique really gets the top of guitar vibrating. It's like classical guitar rest-stroke, we push the string also little towards the top and that gives more power to it. It's easy to examine and one can feel actual larger vibrating on the top.
I have tried also different techniques and different styles with gypsy guitar and it's possible but to me the hardest part comes when I got that la pompe behind me I have hard time to get out of gypsy jazz language. It's interesting that it happens better with other guitars but not so well with gypsy guitar. I feel that that it's due to the feel of the gypsy guitar. It needs more power to get the right sound and it's also more stiff from touch.
But I like the dramatic deep chords that this kind of guitar bears inside. Here is one example where I play my classical influenced composition with gypsy guitar.
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Beautiful - and the one Theme is very memorable .
I can see how people love the Tones of those Guitars when played well.
But on Gypsy Jazz - they rarely let the Chords ring !
The big Chords are very Piano - like ...not extremely different from a Big Martin Acoustic ( but different yes )...
But on the single lines which you play beautifully..( melodies on top of the chords are cool too even better )- that Guitar has a snarl that is different and distinctive.
Not that I'm an Authority on Classical Composition but that Song sounds like it was already there- meaning extremely well written ...lots of emotion ...excellent !
I keep wondering why the Gypsies keep such a narrow range of Music also.
I even like the way the Guitar was mic'd there is a long even piano like decay on the chords ...and I think a lot is the air inside the body of the Guitar ? ( I love resonance - even on electrics , but Acoustic Guitars like this have a purity/ timelessness that Electrics do not to my ears).
Congrats on that Composition...Last edited by Robertkoa; 03-12-2017 at 03:13 PM.
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Thank you Robertkoa for your beautiful words!
Gypsy guitar is quite limited in many senses but it can be very impressive and distinguishable when one finds the best qualities from it. When one plays this kind of classical style of songs with it, one have to be very accurate in moves on chords and positions. That's because the touch is harsh due to those special string that are like some kind of kitchen cutter. Originally Posted by Robertkoa
And they are also high from the top of guitar and that doesn't give same kind of comfortable feel like more usual guitars give.
That is nice to hear. This song has special meaning for me. It brought lot of views from my childhood's landscapes while I was composing it.Not that I'm an Authority on Classical Composition but that Song sounds like it was already there- meaning extremely well written ...lots of emotion ...excellent !
Yeah, I feel this guitar is as pure it gets. I was yesterday playing in balkan jam session with it. There was now amplification in the house but we didn't need it. People where dancing and singing but still I could play loud enough with it. It has a lot of bass too. When i play with it at home my children shout: it's too loud.I even like the way the Guitar was mic'd there is a long even piano like decay on the chords ...and I think a lot is the air inside the body of the Guitar ? ( I love resonance - even on electrics , but Acoustic Guitars like this have a purity/ timelessness that Electrics do not to my ears).
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