What does it mean for you to be a jazz musician?

[kris]

Can you be a jazz musician without playing jazz?

[pauln]

Can you be a jazz musician without playing jazz?

A Jazz musician is still a Jazz musician while not playing Jazz music (if using Jazz musicianship to do so).
However, I have heard some self called Jazz musicians that didn't even play Jazz with Jazz musicianship.

[kris]

A Jazz musician is still a Jazz musician while not playing Jazz music (if using Jazz musicianship to do so).
However, I have heard some self called Jazz musicians that didn't even play Jazz with Jazz musicianship.

If a jazz musician needs to record a rock solo in the studio and does it brilliantly, how do you know it was recorded by a jazz musician?
I mean, you don't know who recorded it.

[vintagelove]

1 - I'm primarily an improviser.

2 - I know the tunes.

3 - I use complex harmony.



There's a great big and long spanning world of jazz, but this is what it all has in common.

[Litterick]

If a jazz musician improvises in a forest and no one is around to hear him, does he make a sound?

[kris]

If a jazz musician improvises in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does he make a sound?

Animals have brilliant hearing.

[Christian Miller]

You can take the boy out of jazz but you can’t take the jazz out of the boy

[Christian Miller]

If a jazz musician improvises in a forest and no one is around to hear him, does he make a sound?

And is there any difference between that and the standard background gig?

[ccroft]

If a jazz musician improvises in a forest and no one is around to hear him, does he make a sound?

How bout 'If a jazz musician improvises in a basement and no one is around to hear him, is it still jazz?'

[pauln]

How bout 'If a jazz musician improvises in a basement and no one is around to hear him, is it still jazz?'

The person singing to himself while spinning a potting wheel 2500 years ago had no idea that someone someday would try to scan, digitize, and demodulate the scratches left on the pot surface from his shaping tools to see if his singing could be recovered and played back...

[kris]

And is there any difference between that and the standard background gig?

Now there are guitar amps with rechargeable batteries.

[ragman1]

How bout 'If a jazz musician improvises in a basement and no one is around to hear him, is it still jazz?'

Now that is quite deep :-)

[StuartF]

How bout 'If a jazz musician improvises in a basement and no one is around to hear him, is it still jazz?'

That would be the same as playing in a restaurant or art museum while no one listens. If anyone listens, it isn't jazz.

[Peter C]

As it has been mentioned in this thread, can anyone post an example of a jazzbo convincingly rocking out?

Just curious.

[kris]

I played a gig with a rock band a long time ago...45 years ago...
It was very loud...but ok.Simple playing without combinations.

[starjasmine]

As it has been mentioned in this thread, can anyone post an example of a jazzbo convincingly rocking out?

Just curious.

Kreisberg was a fusionista before he went mainstream jazz. Robben Ford did lots of rock session work & played fusion with Miles; his fusion guitar work on the Yellowjackets' first disc shines. Of course, Larry Carlton can play jazz with the best of them and his rock pedigree is well-known. Barney Kessell was on many a Wrecking Crew session. And Jon Herington was a Wes clone before he decided to do something that could pay the bills.
UPDATE: I have no doubt that Matteo Mancuso can nail this :-)

[kris]

Kreisberg was a fusionista before he went mainstream jazz. Robben Ford did lots of rock session work & played fusion with Miles; his fusion guitar work on the Yellowjackets' first disc shines. Of course, Larry Carlton can play jazz with the best of them and his rock pedigree is well-known. Barney Kessell was on many a Wrecking Crew session. And Jon Herington was a Wes clone before he decided to do something that could pay the bills.

I love jazz musicians they are very talented people.

[lammie200]

You can take the boy out of jazz but you can’t take the jazz out of the boy

As far as instrument playing goes I didn't pick jazz. It picked me.

[Peter C]

Kreisberg was a fusionista before he went mainstream jazz. Robben Ford did lots of rock session work & played fusion with Miles; his fusion guitar work on the Yellowjackets' first disc shines. Of course, Larry Carlton can play jazz with the best of them and his rock pedigree is well-known. Barney Kessell was on many a Wrecking Crew session. And Jon Herington was a Wes clone before he decided to do something that could pay the bills.
UPDATE: I have no doubt that Matteo Mancuso can nail this :-)

It would be interesting to see a direct link to a clip of Kreisberg. Robben Ford is probably a genre unto himself and I've never heard Carlton playing straight ahead - perhaps I should.

So, as far as rocking out, maybe Matteo would be the guy.....(is he a bona fide jazzbo ?)

[sgcim]

It would be interesting to see a direct link to a clip of Kreisberg. Robben Ford is probably a genre unto himself and I've never heard Carlton playing straight ahead - perhaps I should.

So, as far as rocking out, maybe Matteo would be the guy.....(is he a bona fide jazzbo ?)

Yes, I love Carlton's work with Steely Dan, Michael Franks, etc..., but on his own albums, the closest I've heard him come to playing straight ahead was on "All Blues", which wasn't straight ahead IMHO.
Steely Dan didn't use many straight ahead jazz guitar players, except for Jon Herrington, who started out in Indiana as a great straight ahead player, but then had a mid-life existential 'jazz crisis' and devoted all his time to learning other styles of music, and Denny Dias, who studied with Billy Bauer (I know three guys who studied with him, and it wasn't a pleasant experience, according to them).
Frank Vignola played on one tune, and Kurt Rosenwinkel did too, but if you listen closely to him, he's not exactly SA either.

[kris]

Scof was interested in rock in his youth.
You can definitely hear elements of this style in his playing

[Christian Miller]

Now there are guitar amps with rechargeable batteries.

Better off with a proper lithium ion camping battery and then you can use whatever amp you like (provide it's not a marshal stack or something )

[zephyrregent]

As it has been mentioned in this thread, can anyone post an example of a jazzbo convincingly rocking out?

Just curious.

Check out all the rock sessions Barney Kessel did.

[jackalGreen]

Drink Scotch whisky, all night long.

But more seriously, play just what I feel. No, on any instrument I don't always play exactly what's in my ear...I can't do a Les McCann or George Benson, or any of the others who use this tool, "scat while playing," not with perfect honesty and accuracy, and this may sound odd, but I feel as a jazz musician, I can hang musicially with just about anything.

A whole lot of things I don't want to, and many I probably just couldn't, but c'mon, man! Who says a funk band can't play rock? Cheezits, who says a jazz player can't play some country, or anything else folk-music derived? Even legit music.

I don't call Alabama the Crimson Tide, but then they don't call me nothing either. Just a thing.

As a jazz musician, first I look at the purse. And that purse is not too full these days. So, I just play. No, not for play play. If I don't get paid, I don't play. Unfortunately, I don't play too much now! Ain't bringing my gear out to play for some comped beers and maybe get a few phone numbers to play with later! Maybe that's an arrogant jazz musician talking, but I just call myself a regular musician...who happens to be arrogant and would rather play to nobody or practice my craft than be shorted by some bar owner or whatever.

[kris]

Being a jazz musician is constant work on your jazz skills, daily practice and development, recording albums in the studio, club and festival concerts, listening to records ... etc.
That's what you did and do.