Stuck in the 50s

**grahambop** · 02-09-2016, 04:33 AM

Originally Posted by christianm77

It's a bit like the Spanish Inquisition sketch....

Best thing about Jimi was his vibrato... oh and his funky rhythm feel.... hang on
Best two things about Jimi was his vibrato and his funky rhythm feel..... oh and his fantastic tone
Best three things about Jimi.....

I'll come in a gain shall I?

The R&B thing certainly marked him out from the Brit players.... I prefer Jimi's vibrato to Clapton's though, which is no diss of Eric. And Eric certainly has solid time, certainly in comparison to most rock guitar players - but I never felt that Eric was a polymetric player like Jimi - he's very much 1/8s and 1/16s locked in. It's interesting to compare styles of time...

Sorry to be a pedantic bastard, but I think you mean the 'What have the Romans ever done for us?' sketch.

**christianm77** · 02-09-2016, 06:00 AM

Originally Posted by grahambop

Sorry to be a pedantic bastard, but I think you mean the 'What have the Romans ever done for us?' sketch.

The structure is basically the same for both sketches. It's the Rhythm Changes of Monty Python.

**sunnysideup** · 02-09-2016, 09:11 AM

When I saw Nate's OP I thought it was a spoof, but after reading 3 pages of discussion, I'm not so sure.

I see "jazz" as having come to an end around 1965, and have seen it that way for a few decades; not because it's outdated or fossilised, but because it evolved to the point where a variety of new species mutated and branched off on their own tracks.

At age 18 or so I was listening to Coltrane, Love Supreme period (and Django, McLaughlin, Robert Johnson, Hendrix, Zappa, but mostly Coltrane).

Then I discovered Coltrane had used to play bebop, so I listened to tons of bebop which at the time I knew nothing about. Then I discovered Coltrane had evolved from his Love Supreme period to "free, atonal" jazz, and "world music", so I listend to tons of that. That marks the end of jazz as an art form, not because it's bad music, but because there is nowhere to go to from there within that jazz tradition. Coltrane (and a few others) deconstructed "jazz" to where there's nothing left.

There have been many great players in the "jazz" idiom since, there still are, but they're not doing anything new, no more than a contemporary composer of baroque music is doing anything new, or a retro hippy or punk band would be.

But "jazz" is in itself only one branch of improvised musics - there are many "world" musics which are traditional and improvised and continue to flourish.

Then there's the massive socio-cultural change since the '50s-'60s. The reality is that most music these days is not live, and most jazz guitarists play in their bedroom on youtube. blah blah blah

**christianm77** · 02-09-2016, 09:48 AM

Originally Posted by sunnysideup

When I saw Nate's OP I thought it was a spoof, but after reading 3 pages of discussion, I'm not so sure.

I see "jazz" as having come to an end around 1965, and have seen it that way for a few decades; not because it's outdated or fossilised, but because it evolved to the point where a variety of new species mutated and branched off on their own tracks.

At age 18 or so I was listening to Coltrane, Love Supreme period (and Django, McLaughlin, Robert Johnson, Hendrix, Zappa, but mostly Coltrane).

Then I discovered Coltrane had used to play bebop, so I listened to tons of bebop which at the time I knew nothing about. Then I discovered Coltrane had evolved from his Love Supreme period to "free, atonal" jazz, and "world music", so I listend to tons of that. That marks the end of jazz as an art form, not because it's bad music, but because there is nowhere to go to from there within that jazz tradition. Coltrane (and a few others) deconstructed "jazz" to where there's nothing left.

There have been many great players in the "jazz" idiom since, there still are, but they're not doing anything new, no more than a contemporary composer of baroque music is doing anything new, or a retro hippy or punk band would be.

But "jazz" is in itself only one branch of improvised musics - there are many "world" musics which are traditional and improvised and continue to flourish.

Then there's the massive socio-cultural change since the '50s-'60s. The reality is that most music these days is not live, and most jazz guitarists play in their bedroom on youtube. blah blah blah

Well jazz kind of ran it's course in terms of the extremes in the 1960s. Contemporary jazz & jazz influenced music seems to uber-traditionalist playing of historical styles, freely improvised musics of various kinds (which may not in fact be jazz), or the sort of slightly uncomfortable middle ground...

The middle ground of 'common practice' is being explored by musicians like Brad Meldhau, Kurt, Chris Potter etc etc, but is rather tame by the standards of earlier music. There's not much 'stretching' going on here, because the Coltrane generation blew the bloody doors of in the '60s. There is however, potential for beauty and excitement, and I believe a lot of jazz's importance as a background is that it allows musicians to unify 'high' and 'low' cultural aesthetics - which has often been European harmony and an African American dance music pulse.

Much of the contemporary jazz influenced music I have most enjoyed has been created by jazz musicians working with musicians from other backgrounds, or sometimes musicians from other backgrounds taking their music into a more recognisably jazz sphere (often jazz listeners will hear world music, for example, and world music listeners will hear jazz.) Anouar Brahem springs to mind, for example... As does Lionel Loueke...

**Nate Miller** · 02-09-2016, 09:53 AM

well Sunnyside, if you go listen to me play Paper Moon over on the showcase thread, what you'll hear is that my sound is not modern. I don't have a pretty, chorused up electrified sound at all. Granted that take is just me plugged strait into a computer, but still my point is that I don't have a modern sound. A dry single take recorded in mono is good enough for me.

also, I have no idea who Peter Bernstein is. Honestly, never heard of him.

what I'm saying is that my sound and my approach was "stuck in the 50s"

I'll grant that really, I should extend that to "stuck in the 60s", but I really don't like modal jazz, so I called the 50s

So that post bop era in the 50s is really where I'm at. I learned to play jazz from the old guys I was doing gigs with as a young fella and I 've had a trio (guitar upright bass and drums) here on the east coast for the last 18 years.

so no, its no joke. I don't want to play like contemporary players. Never did. don't care if any contemporary players like the way I play, either. Regular folks seem to enjoy the way I play and contemporary jazz guitar players run people off. That's what the bar owners say.

and not for nothing, but I know all about the "massive socio-cultural change since the '50s-'60s". remember, I was there.

**Jonah** · 02-09-2016, 10:00 AM

This is definitely Bach;

This Menuhin's record is one of the greatest Bach's records ever...

The only one I can put next to it is this Horowitz... it's much beyond music.

Bach was really a 5th Evangelist

**christianm77** · 02-09-2016, 10:12 AM

Originally Posted by Nate Miller

well Sunnyside, if you go listen to me play Paper Moon over on the showcase thread, what you'll hear is that my sound is not modern. I don't have a pretty, chorused up electrified sound at all. Granted that take is just me plugged strait into a computer, but still my point is that I don't have a modern sound. A dry single take recorded in mono is good enough for me.

also, I have no idea who Peter Bernstein is. Honestly, never heard of him.

what I'm saying is that my sound and my approach was "stuck in the 50s"

I'll grant that really, I should extend that to "stuck in the 60s", but I really don't like modal jazz, so I called the 50s

So that post bop era in the 50s is really where I'm at. I learned to play jazz from the old guys I was doing gigs with as a young fella and I 've had a trio (guitar upright bass and drums) here on the east coast for the last 18 years.

so no, its no joke. I don't want to play like contemporary players. Never did. don't care if any contemporary players like the way I play, either. Regular folks seem to enjoy the way I play and contemporary jazz guitar players run people off. That's what the bar owners say.

and not for nothing, but I know all about the "massive socio-cultural change since the '50s-'60s". remember, I was there.

Please listen to Peter Bernstein. I think you would really enjoy his playing and you would relate to his aesthetic unlike some other players who get discussed here. He is up there with the greats, IMO.

He does some nice straight-ahead blowing on other people's records. I've been listening a lot to Wycliffe Gordon's record Dig This!!! which is just standards - just bought that one randomly for some reason. Great playing from Peter as always.

His stuff with the Larry Goldings Trio (which is one of the best touring jazz groups in the world ATM, I don't think anyone would disagree) tends to more original stuff, but I think you would love their Wes influenced take on Puttin' on the Ritz off Earth Tones... I can't link to good version of it one youtube I'm afraid, but it's a hip album...

Bill Stewart also - what unbelievable player of time...

I'm finding it hard to track down clips of Peter with good audio, but this might get you started:

**sunnysideup** · 02-09-2016, 10:17 AM

Nate, I'd love to hear your Paper Moon, but the only active link on your soundcloud clip post is to the soundcloud cookie policy... zzzz....so I went on to soundcloud and there are too many papermoons and nates and millers to figure out which one is you! arrrghhh... so much for the socio-cultural change malarkey...

The last time I heard Paper Moon played live was by a good but very eccentric pianist friend who thought Duke Ellington (whose tunes he played nightly) was actually an English Duke!

**Stevebol** · 02-09-2016, 10:22 AM

Originally Posted by Jonah

This Menuhin's record is one of the greatest Bach's records ever...

The only one I can put next to it is this Horowitz... it's much beyond music.

Bach was really a 5th Evangelist

Vlad's mom taught him and his sister Regina. Regina taught my mom and her sister.

**Jonah** · 02-09-2016, 10:27 AM

The Christmas Oratorio isn't very good though is it? ;-P

Why?

Though I do not know any good records of it ... it's for sure...

I think I can name only few Bach's works that are secular, all the rest are relisgious (including violine sonatas and WTK)

**christianm77** · 02-09-2016, 10:34 AM

Originally Posted by Jonah

Why?

Though I do not know any good records of it ... it's for sure...

I think I can name only few Bach's works that are secular, all the rest are religious (including violine sonatas and WTK)

Haha I was being a bit of dick, and I deleted my post...

I'm not a big fan of that work. It possibly just needs a bit of a prune... But things like 'Grosser Herr und Starker Koenig' (which I used to have to sing) seem like they are treading water..

Now this is a proper Bass aria:

See, you can do it when you put your mind to it JS! :-) Makes me sad he never wrote an opera.* Almost.

I suppose he had to pump out them Oratorios every Sunday. Many beautiful moments though...

*It would probably be too hard for opera singers to bother with. Eilt is a absolute bloodbath for the singer, perhaps even more so than most Bach arias, where either you a) have perfect technique or b) go blue from lack of oxygen.

**Stevebol** · 02-09-2016, 10:34 AM

Originally Posted by Jonah

Why?

Though I do not know any good records of it ... it's for sure...

I think I can name only few Bach's works that are secular, all the rest are relisgious (including violine sonatas and WTK)

I'm not sure the Partitas are religious/sacred. I think he landed the big church gig right after he wrote the violin and cello Partitas (chaconne, etc..).
Doesn't really matter at this point for most players. It might not even matter to the churches but I wouldn't know about that. There was a excellent doc recently about Bach. They get into details about all that.

**Jonah** · 02-09-2016, 10:36 AM

Enescu was also great... though already very old at the moment of record but I really do not care about the mistakes...

**Nate Miller** · 02-09-2016, 10:46 AM

Originally Posted by sunnysideup

Nate, I'd love to hear your Paper Moon, but the only active link on your soundcloud clip post is to the soundcloud cookie policy... zzzz....so I went on to soundcloud and there are too many papermoons and nates and millers to figure out which one is you! arrrghhh... so much for the socio-cultural change malarkey...

The last time I heard Paper Moon played live was by a good but very eccentric pianist friend who thought Duke Ellington (whose tunes he played nightly) was actually an English Duke!

that's a drag...I'm sorry, man. At home I can't open my sound cloud links, either.

I guess that's another aspect of being stuck in the 50s...nobody was uploading back then, so I'm completely hopeless

but you aren't missing out of a whole lot. A dry guitar sound is a dry guitar sound

and you know, I realize now that I might have seemed kinda snarky about that last thing I said about the socio economic changes...but you'll laugh your ass off at why that got me on my hind legs...

Back when I was a teenager, there was live music all over. I really thought I was going to be working musician for a career. then CDs came out and all the live bands were getting replaced by DJs. I'd remember going by a club I used to play at with Stan and there was a salad bar where the bandstand used to be. It got harder and harder to stay booked

then somewhere along the way society collapsed. Women started smoking cigarettes and drinking whiskey and dancing the hootchi-coo....wait, sorry there, I was thinking back to the bop era again

but now I have to jockey a keyboard working as a code monkey....because of the socio-economic changes since the 50s and 60s

**Jonah** · 02-09-2016, 10:50 AM

I'm not sure the Partitas are religious/sacred. I think he landed the big church gig right after he wrote the violin and cello Partitas (chaconne, etc..).
Doesn't really matter at this point for most players. It might not even matter to the churches but I wouldn't know about that. There was a excellent doc recently about Bach. They get into details about all that.

I do not say it was meant for the churches... I mean that he used music as an tool for his passionate religious darings... he is real theologist in art

First I notices it after going deeply into St. Matthew passions... then in cantatas and I noticed that many 'ideas' were repeated in his WTK - I play music from WTK quite often - just open any prelude and fugue and play it through (not that I am a good player - just for myself) - every time I feel something new about it...

So I found that he uses the same motives or harmonic ideas under the same text or textual meaning... then when you come across it in instrumental pieces you get that he means the same thing...
The deeper I got into it the more naturally I began to feel it...
I of course also read Schweitzer's work who first noticed that, and later I came across Boleslav Yavorsky's lectures - Russian musicologist of 1930's - who actually tried to collect all his investigation and give it more systematically...

I do not say it is necessarily literal meaning - it could be a general idea...
But for example I always though that d-minor prelude and fugue in WTK is connected with Lamentation of Mary... and Yavorsky also noted it.

And I think it's not necessarily to know it for the player if he feels it... I think Enescu, Furtwangker, Menuhin, Horowitz, Guld... they still had strong connection with tradition.. they kind of learn ti 'directly' from Bach... they just could hear these musical logics because it was kept also in music of Schumann or Bruckner and they exisited int...
I mean not only music but enviroment... paintings, religious rituals, cathedrals... it all was living language...

**sunnysideup** · 02-09-2016, 11:02 AM

Wow Nate, you went from swing guitarist in the 1950s to code jockey in the 2010s.. a man for all seasons to be sure.

**Nate Miller** · 02-09-2016, 11:17 AM

Originally Posted by sunnysideup

Wow Nate, you went from swing guitarist in the 1950s to code jockey in the 2010s.. a man for all seasons to be sure.

jazzman's got to be able to do a lot of things to make rent

**rkwestcoast** · 02-09-2016, 02:39 PM

Funny thing is no one in the 1950s said they played 1950s jazz - that distinction is applied retrospectively by critics, journalists, historians & fans - the music going on in real time in that period was pretty diverse & doesn't really lend it self to neat bookending. In fact the 1950s was looking back (trad & swing); consolidating (hard bop) & looking forward (free / modal / cool)

For Example:
1950 - L Armstrong is 50 years old & touring his All-Stars band
1951 - Tristano's approach to improvising is starting to impact on other players & the emergent "cool school"
1952 - Parker, Gillespie, Mingus & Roach play Massey Hall & George Russell's Lydian Chromatic Concept book is published
1953 - emergence of "mainstream / swing" style harking back to the late 30s / 40s - cf Ruby Braff
1954 - Silver / Blakey Jazz Messengers formed - hard bop
1955 - hard bop develops with Clifford Brown & Max Roach
1956 - Cecil Taylor starts recording
1957 - Jimmy Smith starts working in NYC
1958 - Ornette Coleman is making waves
1959 - Miles Davis / Bill Evans Kind of Blue

**christianm77** · 02-09-2016, 02:44 PM

Originally Posted by rkwestcoast

Funny thing is no one in the 1950s said they played 1950s jazz - that distinction is applied retrospectively by critics, journalists, historians & fans - the music going on in real time in that period was pretty diverse & doesn't really lend it self to neat bookending. In fact the 1950s was looking back (trad & swing); consolidating (hard bop) & looking forward (free / modal / cool)

For Example:
1950 - L Armstrong is 50 years old & touring his All-Stars band
1951 - Tristano's approach to improvising is starting to impact on other players & the emergent "cool school"
1952 - Parker, Gillespie, Mingus & Roach play Massey Hall & George Russell's Lydian Chromatic Concept book is published
1953 - emergence of "mainstream / swing" style harking back to the late 30s / 40s - cf Ruby Braff
1954 - Silver / Blakey Jazz Messengers formed - hard bop
1955 - hard bop develops with Clifford Brown & Max Roach
1956 - Cecil Taylor starts recording
1957 - Jimmy Smith starts working in NYC
1958 - Ornette Coleman is making waves
1959 - Miles Davis / Bill Evans Kind of Blue

Plus we have 'third stream' around 57 - some of those pieces are dodecaphonic. Not exactly lounge music...

**christianm77** · 02-09-2016, 02:48 PM

I know Bach gets the props, but I'm also a bit of a Beliber... ;-)

**Jonah** · 02-09-2016, 04:21 PM

Funny thing is no one in the 1950s said they played 1950s jazz - that distinction is applied retrospectively by critics, journalists, historians & fans - the music going on in real time in that period was pretty diverse & doesn't really lend it self to neat bookending. In fact the 1950s was looking back (trad & swing); consolidating (hard bop) & looking forward (free / modal / cool)

For Example:
1950 - L Armstrong is 50 years old & touring his All-Stars band
1951 - Tristano's approach to improvising is starting to impact on other players & the emergent "cool school"
1952 - Parker, Gillespie, Mingus & Roach play Massey Hall & George Russell's Lydian Chromatic Concept book is published
1953 - emergence of "mainstream / swing" style harking back to the late 30s / 40s - cf Ruby Braff
1954 - Silver / Blakey Jazz Messengers formed - hard bop
1955 - hard bop develops with Clifford Brown & Max Roach
1956 - Cecil Taylor starts recording
1957 - Jimmy Smith starts working in NYC
1958 - Ornette Coleman is making waves
1959 - Miles Davis / Bill Evans Kind of Blue

And Wynton Marsalis was not even born...

**Jonah** · 02-09-2016, 04:50 PM

I know Bach gets the props, but I'm also a bit of a Beliber... ;-)

Bach is really special in the whole history of music... and for baroque period too.

But there's also historical reason 'why Bach gets the props')...
In Italy baroque was a decline of great musical tradition... in France it was the climax...

But in Germany baroque period in music was only a flourish of new musical tradition that was followed by classisism and them through romatics to neo--venniese school...
And we are more or less at the end of this tradition.... I think Adorno said: classical music is German music.
And for cultural picture it's true...
Solid classical education is built mostly on German tradition... even countries like Italy and France that had their own school in the past adopted it...
And so was the study of history of music... Bach was appointed to be the 'source' of this tradition... though only in retrospective way

By the way that's why I think early 20th centuries records are mostly better than modern... they are naturally 'authentic'...

As per baroque composers in general - I believe it was a period in music like rennaissance in painting... when the language was developed to such an extent that every deligent studen with some imagination could develope himself into a good master.

There was plenty of interesting and creative composers... just a few more of those that I really love

**Jonah** · 02-09-2016, 05:56 PM

I know Bach gets the props, but I'm also a bit of a Beliber... ;-)

It's nice... but being involved in early music I played plenty of Chaconas and Passacaglias... I think it is important with this form to have the whole picture...
I mean if you take virginal English Passacaglias... or Passacaglias of Spanish baroque guitar... or French lute and guitar chaconnas.. or Folias.. they are different but still they have they same idea usually to develope the form through variations...

I think this form is a significant mark between rennaissance with it's narrative endless flow and baroque withits centered musical universe...

Basically it's very simple... but the skills and talent of composer show in how manages to create this overall development throughout variations... actually many of them use just cliches...
today we often get encharmed by sweed harmonic changes, tone, magical repetitiveness of the pattern... like Pachelbel's cannon... sometimes I wonder does general audience really get this music?

What Bach did with Chaconna is just astonishing.. in comparison to other Chaconnas it's like.. I do not know... like Chartre to a nice little parish church...

You know whe I heard Menuhin play it for the first time I really felt that when these arpegiated chords... in this music Bach really followed Christ to Hell and he came through all of it came back with Resurrection...