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And let me tell something to all of those who have an angst against bebop.
Bebop developed in a time when talented black artists could not get a gig because of the color of their skin.
That’s why bebop was created. One can’t separate from discussing race without even expressing the word “bebop.”
These cats created a music that in its time couldn’t be played by the average musician. Think about that.
Why would some musicians resort to creating a music that was untouchable by the masses?
Why do you think that happened?
Do you believe bebop was created as a middle finger to “dance music?”
I believe the answer can’t be found without discussing the times.
Heck, over ten years later, in the later 50’s Miles was hit over the head, bloodied, and arrested while standing outside his own gig smoking a cigarette.
You don’t think these musicians weren’t angry during the creation of this music?
Of course they were. And their music reflected their internal anger. These were hellish times to be a black artist in America.
One can’t discuss bebop without having a greater discussion of our collective history.
Bebop, should always be honored. It was a gift. And these cats who created it were musical giants.
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08-04-2020 01:13 PM
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Originally Posted by 2bornot2bop
(BTW ive never got the impression from the bop players themselves that bop was a ‘middle finger to dancers’; jazz ‘history’ is full of dodgy or simplified narratives that don’t line up. Ken Burns of course is a prime culprit.
Some jazz writers are also very lazy at research to be brutally honest
Anyway you can go to the source on this one PRX)
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Originally Posted by 2bornot2bop
Note that this specific magazine is being discussed since the actress, Olivia deHavilland is on the cover and she just died last week at 104.
(I have the actual magazine since I'm a fan of Olivia, but loved the fact there was this bebop musical article from the late 40s.Last edited by jameslovestal; 08-04-2020 at 03:28 PM.
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Originally Posted by christianm77
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Originally Posted by jameslovestal
Yes, there were outrageous articles written about bebop in its time by people who didn’t have a clue about the music. Is this music? Hilarious!
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Originally Posted by christianm77
But what did these big band leaders think of bebop? Were they threatened by it? I think not because they had a good gig going. But man did things ever change in the 50’s. R&R was a threat and then there was Miles. Miles who had kicked his habit and had a very successful showing at Newport in 1957. Miles was taking no prisoners while being on top of the musical world - However brief. But man did he have a run. People were spellbound by his muted horn. Women threw their panties at him while he had his back turned playing to the audience.
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Originally Posted by 2bornot2bop
But what did these big band leaders think of bebop? Were they threatened by it? I think not because they had a good gig going. But man did things ever change in the 50’s. R&R was a threat and then there was Miles. Miles who had kicked his habit and had a very successful showing at Newport in 1957. Miles was taking no prisoners while being on top of the musical world - However brief. But man did he have a run. People were spellbound by his muted horn. Women threw their panties at him while he had his back turned playing to the audience.
And the big band era was pretty brief too. The whole of jazz history is brief until you get the Berklee era. There post modal era is about half the history of the music...
As I understand it, the main reason why the dance circuit dried up is that it paid like shit. The Baisie orchestra in the late 30s and 40s lived a pretty basic life; but it was still better than the alternative of abject penury. The jazz clubs, the new thing, OTOH, paid a lot better.
Obviously there are famously disparaging comments by Cab Calloway and Louis; of course the reality is that Miles hung out with Pops and so on. And the swing feel changed so radically after the war, that everyone was influenced by bop to some extent.
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Originally Posted by christianm77
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Originally Posted by 2bornot2bop
Parker didn't come from a vacuum, and he didn't totally revolutionise the music as much as has been made out, sure he and the others introduced some new ideas (the b5, faster tempi, angular lines, irregular phrasing, rhythmic sophistication, "hip" subs etc etc) but many at the time thought he was basically a sped up version of Pres. Players like Don Byas must have felt rather annoyed that Parker stole everyone's thunder, without being all that different to what had come before, I mean, certainly not different the way that say Coltrane became different...
Anyway, I was just musing how the fine art of Jazz improv, - using all 12 notes to create this lingua franca, all the licks and tricks and embellishments that still form the basis of what we still recognise as Jazz today - had already been perfected in the early stylings of Swing greats like Benny G. If we separate the music from the hype, I can hear the odd line in Benny's playing that is devastatingly hip, by any standards. Sure, some of his stuff does sound corny, but you can say that about of lot of Charlie Parker's stuff too! In fact, now that I think of it, even the uber cool hipster cats from the great Hard Bop era are guilty of their own fair share of schmaltz, right? And we don't hold that against them, do we? ... Just sayin'...
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Originally Posted by princeplanet
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Originally Posted by 2bornot2bop
Here is more "the carefully disorganized music began again,,, bop was a very serious business - just as swing used to be".
It talks about how Duke had been 'kind' (towards bop), while Armstrong "critical". "Dizzy Gillespie, the high cockalorum of bop, was getting top billing at the Strand Theater". "Clique Club opened it doors, and a velvet-skinned Negro named Sarah Vaughan squeezed her toothpaste-smooth voice out amongst the customers, singing in a style like a kazoo".
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Originally Posted by jameslovestal
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Originally Posted by christianm77
Although group aesthetics(contemporary) are constantly in flux(agreed), there are timeless elements to all Art whether it be Music, Visual Art, or Literature.If this were not the case, how could sentient beings of the Y2K appreciate the haunting portraits of Vermeer, the deep visceral emotionalism of Beethoven, or the pathos and humor of Cervantes' "Don Quixote?" with a biased 21st Century perspective of Art? The answer is that these gems are timeless unlike the fleeting, temporal, herd-driven aesthetics as witnessed by the "Beat" poets of the 50's, Richard Bach's abysmal "Johnathon Livingston Seagull," the cornball pathos of Rod McKuen's poems, the undecipherable cacophony of the Sun Ra Arkestra, or the entire Abstract Expressionist Movement in Art where splatters of paint are intended to represent the profundity of the human condition. Great Art transcends time. Simple Play live! . . . Marinero
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Originally Posted by neatomic
Makes the modern music scene seem limp by comparison.
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Originally Posted by Marinero
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Originally Posted by neatomic
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Originally Posted by Marinero
I suppose Art is simple if the only art you choose is that which is validated by the test of time. Of course Cervantes and Beethoven are good. BFD. However, all that art was once very much of its time. Timelessness - the test we associate with quality - is not something we can establish in the moment.... appreciating, let alone producing contemporary work requires more imagination and risk (and yes there are a lot of posers around who just latch onto whatever is fashionable because that too is safe and comforting.)
(And do bear in mind this is a flipping straight-ahead jazz guitarist saying this. Takes one to know one.)
The timeless quality of art. Well that's not so simple is it? When my 2 year old daughter hears the Mozart Wind Quintet and goes completely quiet saying only, with wonder '...music...' I find it very hard to dispute there's something immutable about great Art.
However, that doesn't make it the case. For instance, my daughter is also someone who has heard me play gigs, heard musicians perform; and even through simplistic and to me incredibly grating children's songs and the Peppa Pig album etc, now knows the basic language of Western tonality (so Edwin Gordon would say.) Kids are SPONGES.
So, would someone who didn't have all of that by osmosis by the age of 2 understand Mozart?
And the answer to that is, as far as we can determine from science, no. Music is not a universal language in that way.
And this should be obvious to people who can see beyond their own immediate surroundings. Think about how well you understand or appreciate musical cultures remote from yourself. Probably not very well unless you have studied them. TBH even the music of the 19th century is remote to me. I have no real feeling for symphonic form, for instance, because I have not studied it. Ask me where the development section is and I'll be hopeless.
And my dad used to blast Beethoven and Brahms at me when I was growing up too. Not much hope for me...
Is there a transcendent quality that great musicians can put into their music, beyond its language and conventions. Yes. I do believe that. For instance, someone who does not appreciate (even if they do not understand the musical language) Fateh Ali Kahn at first listening should be forbidden from going near a musical instrument ever again.
Precisely because it is these things that represent the magic of music and transcend its technical banalities, it is also not something you can formulate into a science of aesthetics. To quote Kant word for word; 'The only function of aesthetics is so that sensible people can point and laugh at the foolish (usually Germans) who spend their lives doing it. Throwing rotten fruit and vegetables is optional, but to be encouraged. They must crawl back into the musicology departments from whence they issued and trouble no more the sunlit world.'
(I am of course kidding, but not entirely)
So, I am sort of a Romantic. I also hate the idea (sometimes suggested if not stated) that music education should be purely praxis oriented. I find that patronising. Music needs an aesthetic. There's nothing wrong with doing something that sounds good (by whatever subjective criteria.) If I didn't think beauty was important I would scarcely bother playing jazz, would I?
An interesting sidebar; Western classical music is in fact becoming more of an international lingua franca with every year. On my course is a classical piano teacher from India; classical music is very popular throughout Asia, for example. So there's something that appeals; who knows. Probably prestige, but maybe other things too.
An aesthetic that is frozen in one era - say the era of functional tonality - has the comforting quality of being known. That's one thing that makes it an aesthetic really. I find it interesting that Reimann's great work on functional harmony wasn't published until Wagner and Strauss set about breaking all its rules. An aesthetic is always in the process of being destroyed. That's part of the fun.
By now of course, Wagner, Strauss, and for that matter Schoenberg and Boulez are ancient history. (There's a thought - perhaps a mistake of High Modernism was specifying an aesthetic rather than allowing it naturally to emerge, as it had in previous eras?) Barnett Newman and Pollock are ancient history too for that matter. Those aesthetics have been attacked and destroyed, too. TBF, there's not much that hasn't, so finding a dominant aesthetic of our era is quite hard; it is probably to be found in commercial music, as always.
As a human being I usually react, often quite viscerally. I think there's value in that too. I'm growing more and more cautious of trying to make up bullshit rationalisations of my feelings and reactions to music and art in general, and certainly trying to make out that my feelings and reactions to music are somehow more based in 'objectivity' than someone else's. Such a belief will lead you straight to the musicology department, and we all know how that goes, mark my words.Last edited by christianm77; 08-04-2020 at 06:40 PM.
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*Ahem* Anyway, as you were lol....
Last edited by christianm77; 08-04-2020 at 06:50 PM.
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Originally Posted by 2bornot2bop
Swing dance band work dried up because that generation was growing up and, you know, after also fighting in the largest conflict in world history probably keen to settle down, raise a family and listen to Frank.
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Originally Posted by jameslovestal
There's a lot of stuff about the Benny/Artie Shaw rivalry for instance. So I feel I should put some of Artie's small band music on the thread, because it is lit, as the kids say. Some crispy early Barney for your delight.
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Originally Posted by Marinero
Interesting discussion though, isn't it? How often have we all wondered why "such and such", from the dim dark past, doesn't get the respect and attention we feel is deserved? Forgotten Philosophers, Poets, Painters, Composers etc, that have faded to obscurity seemingly with little chance of resurrection, whilst select obscure names can sometimes be suddenly re-ignited and catapulted into the Pantheon of the Greats. I can supply a long list of such redeemed artists in many fields (just as I'm sure you all can), but on the other hand I think we can all think of many names that we feel are still waiting for their due recognition...
I often welcome the resurrected, like when they rescued the great tenor sax player Tina Brooks from obscurity. But like many, he needed a respected champion to come along, make a fuss and draw attention to the lost recordings. The intriguing back story seemed to help too, and now the Jazz world treasures the lost unreleased Blue Notes, and rightly so. But what about all the others waiting to be re floated? Where is their champion? Is it down to dumb luck? Current Fashion? Or do you believe that everything of great merit eventually gets it's rightful place on the mantle? As though its inevitable that the herd eventually gets it right?
But does it? Surely contemporary social mores dictate what is "in" one year or out the next? Just look at every comedian considered non PC from the past 100 years, how are they faring today? How will they fare in 100 years from now? (hopefully better!) Sometimes the failure to accord due respect to artists from the past is just inexplicable, perhaps just bad luck. To help make my point here I'll offer the example of Benny's band mate, a certain Mr Charlie Christian. OK, so he is a Godhead to us here of this Jazz Guitar Forum - as he should be - but outside of the Jazz guitar community, especially outside of the US, his name continues to draw a blank. Yet ask anyone if they've heard of Chuck Berry, or Keith Richards, and of course everyone knows them. But the source of most of their simple dumbed down licks? , as well as the source and inspiration for protoBop, Western Swing, Jump Blues, Rockabilly, heck even Rock'nRoll ?? ... I'll bet you 95% of guitarists don't know who Charlie Christian is, let alone why they should!
So you can't always rely on the fullness of time, nor the wisdom of the herd to set the ledger straight. History, like the herd, often gets it wrong. Just sayin'...
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Many, if not most, of the painters whose work now sells for 6 or 7 or more figures, struggled to make a living during their lifetimes. Tastes change, and what is considered banal today may be lionized tomorrow, and vice versa.
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Jazz, it's a Floor Wax and a Dessert Topping!
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This is fun in itself and Benny G. shows up at about 17:50 (via Herbie H.) :
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Originally Posted by christianm77
Unlike Bartok, Stravinsky, Debussy, Ravel, Hindemith, Honegger, Copland, etc..., AS' 12-tone method specified a mathematical formula to compose music that had nothing to do with Wagner. Even his "Transfigured Night" was ersatz Wagner, IMHO, and hardly qualified him as a "Master".
What music did it emege from? Nothing I can think of. Every other type of music had a tonal center, and his "all notes are equal" theory emerged only from AS' theories.
As time went on, and the 12-tone system took over academia, classical music began to whither away.
Even Gunther Schuller, Schoenberg's biggest champion of AS' 12-tone method of composition in the US, wrote in an essay on the subject, "The concert halls are emptying, we have to do something about it."
He then compared the 12-tone system to other innovations in music, and said, "Genius is often ten or twenty years ahead of his time, but it's been over 50 years (this was back in 1960, so add another 60 years to that-120 years!!!!), and there is still no indication that this music has been accepted by any fraction of the public".
I can hear the theory heads replying to this (noses slightly out of joint), "But the 12-tone system is the only valid method of writing truly 'new' music!
You're just not up with the times. WE all use it."
To which I can only reply FY.
I was recently amused to find out that Milton Babbitt was a full professor of Mathematics at Princeton U., but when many in the music faculty got drafted one year, he filled in the gap, and became a professor of music!
Chief Xian aTunde Adjuah (Christian Scott)
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