Dealing With Cliches in Jazz

[NSJ]

Yesterday, I had the privilege and honor of having dinner with a truly outstanding jazz and flamenco musician. (as brief background, in the 1950s, as a teenager, he used to hang out and learn saxophone and reed instruments from Art Pepper, Zoot Sims, et al in LA--Ornette Coleman was in LA around that time and wrote a song for his group--that promptly got them fired from their coffeehouse gig!. Studying formally with Harold Land, Mr. Land, after hearing him at a gig, barked out, "don't play what I taught you, that's just the alphabet, play what you were thinking and feeling about on the way to the gig, play what you're feeling right now!". Around 1960, he moved to Japan and later Spain, where he became an accomplished flamenco musician, recording with Paco De Lucia and playing places such as Albert hall in England. Around 1980, he moved back to the US, and wound up in Chicago, playing with many AACM musicians on saxophone and flamenco guitar, including the Ethnic Heritage Ensemble).

Any way, his basic point on improvisation was: every jazz musician must learn to play and deal with cliches, which are fundamental to the music. It's what bonds you to the music, he said, it's what gives you affinity to the music. What you do with them, how you exit from them, how you develop them, however, is what defines your own personality as an individual musician.

He pointed to an old Wardell Gray solo transcription he had with him. "See this line from bars 7-11. That's a jazz cliche. You need to study what came afterwards and see what he did, how he developed it, how the line evolved from this cliche".

How do you understand jazz cliches? How do you incorporate them in your practice?

[3625]

Any way, his basic point on improvisation was: every jazz musician must learn to play and deal with cliches, which are fundamental to the music. It's what bonds you to the music, he said, it's what gives you affinity to the music. What you do with them, how you exit from them, how you develop them, however, is what defines your own personality as an individual musician.

That's a really well articulated insight, I hope this thread takes off - but right now the above quote for me has it locked up pretty good. Gonna give it some thought...

NSJ - you've started some really interesting threads lately

[jseaberry]

I am working more and more on trying to think polyphonically instead of single lines as much as possible, so for me, just adding a 2nd or 3rd note above or below a note in a line cliche opens it up for me.

[Tom Karol]

This thread poses a real problem for me - lately I feel like everything I play is a cliche!

[Vladan]

This thread poses a real problem for me - lately I feel like everything I play is a cliche!

Sometimes I get sick of myself, thinking I always play one same thing, but then I listen to some celebrity player, always playing one same thing, and realise people perceive that as style.

(Call it comfort giving approach.)

[bondmorkret]

Any genre is full of cliches, it what defines it as a style. Either you embrace them at the risk of being a very genre specific player (not necessarily a problem!) or you renounce them and try to be truly original at all time. A difficult task though I must say!

[MarkRhodes]

I look at this differently. If you don't want to play the sort of cool jazz lines (cliches) that made you fall in love with jazz, why learn to play jazz?

[monk]

Most of us have been programmed, usually from a language/grammar class or a creative writing class, that cliches are a bad thing. A friend of mine who writes for a living once told me that sports writing is especially difficult because it's so riddled with cliches that it's hard to describe something in a fresh way.

I was surprised when I attended GIT to hear Howard Roberts and other teachers speak of musical cliches in a positive way. Howard said that all styles of music are defined by their cliches. It's what distinguishes Swing from Bop or Chicago Blues from West Coast Blues or Country from Bluegrass or Baroque from Romantic.

Howard said that one of the easiest ways to sound stylistically authentic was to identify, assimilate and employ as many cliches as possible. Studio players routinely do this.

Cliches also provide a challenge in that the player can ask the question "How can I make this sound fresh?". Many of the players we admire as innovators pursued that line of thought.

The core of any style of music is its cliches. The thing to remember is that, in the beginning, those cliches were innovations.

[NSJ]

Most of us have been programmed, usually from a language/grammar class or a creative writing class, that cliches are a bad thing. A friend of mine who writes for a living once told me that sports writing is especially difficult because it's so riddled with cliches that it's hard to describe something in a fresh way.

I was surprised when I attended GIT to hear Howard Roberts and other teachers speak of musical cliches in a positive way. Howard said that all styles of music are defined by their cliches. It's what distinguishes Swing from Bop or Chicago Blues from West Coast Blues or Country from Bluegrass or Baroque from Romantic.

Howard said that one of the easiest ways to sound stylistically authentic was to identify, assimilate and employ as many cliches as possible. Studio players routinely do this.

Cliches also provide a challenge in that the player can ask the question "How can I make this sound fresh?". Many of the players we admire as innovators pursued that line of thought.

The core of any style of music is its cliches. The thing to remember is that, in the beginning, those cliches were innovations.

Bingo. That's exactly what he was saying--think of it as a positive thing. It's a way to make the music alive and refreshed.

[rkwestcoast]

I went to a Dave Liebman masterclass in Limerick last year and he spoke about the importance of standards from 2 perspectives - firstly standards give jazz musicians a common, shared framework with in which (with minimal and at times zero preperation) to play together and secondly the songs' interpretation by great players set the standard in terms of individual and collective musicianship and creative. At the heart of this insight seems to be the idea of a shared and common musical currency which we can all access and use & I think this relates to the idea of cliche as articulated above - in so far as it gives us a commonly understood & shared language but it is our mastery and use of this language that lifts & elevates the music beyond just churning out licks in rote fashion.

It would be impractical if not impossible for each generation of musicians to learn and create a new musical jazz language - we have to deal with the legacy of the past - and part of that legacy is dealing with cliches

[Stevebol]

Any good blues player will tell you- if something is working for you then you wear it out. That's part of the music. Jazz is a little different. You can get away with some repitition in older jazz but with bop it won't work.

I'm the biggest cliche' around. I know what works for me by now but it's not going to be enough in bop.

When someone say's, 'he plays with a lot style' all it means is repitition. Repitition allows the listener to get into a comfort zone. Bop is lacking in so many areas right now all I can do is try to fill in some gaps if I see them.

Hell yes, I'm a cliche. Hope I can have some fun before I get caught.

[Stevebol]

Any genre is full of cliches, it what defines it as a style. Either you embrace them at the risk of being a very genre specific player (not necessarily a problem!) or you renounce them and try to be truly original at all time. A difficult task though I must say!

Exactly. I'm a cliche' but I have nothing against those that renounce them. You do have to choose though.

[Stevebol]

I incorporate cliche's in practice by learning the melody of certain songs above and beyond the call of duty. I have my blues cliches' but I can only do so much with that. I take the melody and do variations and fragments of it. Experiment like crazy. Mix it up with my stuff. I 'think' melody, melody, melody- but don't play it. Think the melody but don't play it.


Like BB King said, -"melody is the common link between ALL music"
Red Rodney did variations on the melody in his solos. He stuck close to it. Bird didn't do that. Bird did variations on chord sequences by writing a new melody. Then he would start a solo and go back to the ideas he established at the beginning of the solo. Not much connection between the head and the solo in Bird's case. Rodney was the opposite.

I go by what BB said and Rodney did.

[jmz]

When beginners/intermediates are encouraged to learn the "jazz vocabulary," it seems as if they are referring in large part towards such cliches, while at the same time being encouraged to experiment with rhythm, note placement, phrasing, etc, of the phrase. In other words, it seems as if cliches are almost unavoidable in learning the jazz lexicon, since there's somewhat of a homologous relation between the language and so-called cliches. Perhaps this is less so among other musical genres/ languages.

[Stevebol]

When beginners/intermediates are encouraged to learn the "jazz vocabulary," it seems as if they are referring in large part towards such cliches, while at the same time being encouraged to experiment with rhythm, note placement, phrasing, etc, of the phrase. In other words, it seems as if cliches are almost unavoidable in learning the jazz lexicon, since there's somewhat of a homologous relation between the language and so-called cliches. Perhaps this is less so among other musical genres/ languages.

It's definitely less in other genres. If you're coming from another genre and have a lot of experience already with improvization you don't need to study the vocabulary, which is basically Charlie Parker. You still have to study his compositions. It's just a matter of learning the songs in bop and being able to solo fluidly over the chord changes. The fast tempos you find in bop can be very challenging. That's the biggest obstical for me.

In bop you have a central figure for the vocabulary. I don't know if that would apply to any other music.

[MattC]

This is a good thread.

Most of us have been programmed, usually from a language/grammar class or a creative writing class, that cliches are a bad thing. A friend of mine who writes for a living once told me that sports writing is especially difficult because it's so riddled with cliches that it's hard to describe something in a fresh way.

I was surprised when I attended GIT to hear Howard Roberts and other teachers speak of musical cliches in a positive way. Howard said that all styles of music are defined by their cliches. It's what distinguishes Swing from Bop or Chicago Blues from West Coast Blues or Country from Bluegrass or Baroque from Romantic.

Howard said that one of the easiest ways to sound stylistically authentic was to identify, assimilate and employ as many cliches as possible. Studio players routinely do this.

Cliches also provide a challenge in that the player can ask the question "How can I make this sound fresh?". Many of the players we admire as innovators pursued that line of thought.

The core of any style of music is its cliches. The thing to remember is that, in the beginning, those cliches were innovations.

Interesting. To respond to your last sentence there-I think it's exciting when you hear an old recording with a line you've heard dozens of players play and then you realize-this is the guy that first played that thing-or perhaps at least the first that recorded it. Louis Armstrong would be an obvious example of this-for instance that repeated, descending 16th-note blues lick he plays at the climax at the end of "West End Blues." Playing that line is like saying "when it rains it pours" in conversation. But people still do both all the time. And in the case of the lick, Louis was perhaps the first guy that said it, and when he did, it knocked people's socks off.

Perhaps the only problem is if the cliches are all you have to say, or if there is no context.

Matt

[JohnRoss]

This is a good thread.

It is, isn't it?

Perhaps the only problem is if the cliches are all you have to say, or if there is no context.

Yup. Years ago, a saxophonist/clarinetist friend of mine got thrown out of a trad band, one of the reasons being his habit of what was then called "quoting." It was a customary trick in those circles to throw in a musical phrase that everyone recognizes even quite out of context, e.g., that "da-da-da dum dum" (Bb A Bb go down an octave Bb Bb) from the "Sailors' Hornpipe". Judiciously used, it's a good trick, witty, creates a connection with even untutored audiences, and so on, but... if you use the same phrases night after night, your colleagues and even better educated members of the audience start to find it grating on their teeth.

[Stevebol]

You don't choose cliche's, they choose you. Like they say in Russia, you don't own guns, they own you.

[docbop]

Jazz is a language and like learning any language you start with basic vocabulary, phrases or in music cliches. As you grow more proficient you start using those basics/cliches in your own way and they become part of how you express yourself. Do you worry about sounding like someone else when you talk?

As Herbie, Miles and other have said you steal/learn from everyone, then forget it all and play.

What is the worry about learning cliches, your going to play in your own way after you have internalized them.