View Poll Results: How many Charlie Parker tunes do you know?
- Voters
- 75. You may not vote on this poll
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I don't know any
16 21.33% -
A couple
32 42.67% -
A half dozen or so
17 22.67% -
At least a dozen, probably a few more
6 8.00% -
Twenty, easy, probably more
4 5.33%
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Originally Posted by Broyale
Wow!!! Shocking statement!!! Everyone has their personal likes and dislikes about music....but on a Jazz Guitar Forum to say this about CP ??? I'm still stunned in shock....wait....is it April 1st today? ...unfortunately not.
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03-24-2015 07:31 PM
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Here we go again... make up your mind, can we be objective about what makes great art, or not? If the appreciation of all art is subjective, then how did "great art" get to be become great art?
Are Bird and Trane "great"? Or were they just accidentally deified by "a la mode" media forces and/or public hysteria in much the same way that fashion pushes "artists" like Kanye West and Jayzee up the charts?
That's right, there's no answer, so stop trying to have it both ways. You can't say that no art is greater than any other, and then decide that there is "great" art, which implies that some art must be less than great! LOL!
I do not want to continue this too here, and appologize if being too emotional provoked this off-top. Just wanted to let you know that I do not take it that simple... if you wich I can always keep the discussion in another thread or in private...
And yes Mark, let's get back to what your thread asks. It's a great topic. I often wonder how far into Parker us guitarists should really go, by pondering- "How far into Wes should sax players really go"...
Guitar has its place in jazz, it has even certain 'image' in profane audience and it is not associated with horn imitation... the fact that CC or Wes tried to imitate horns is connected more with vocal nature of jazz, they tried to sound voice... it is more difficult on guitar than on the horn... but it does not mean they put themselves behind the horns, just took the best and applied it to guitar possibilities...
No sax can imitate chordal colo of Wes.. special drive of his octaves, sharp attack of Grant Green... broken arpeggiato style of chord melodies played with a pick... and all that is also associated with jazz sound
As per Wes... he is great, but his impact is very instrumental... say.. if he were a sax player he would not have been Parker or Trane.
Bird really had something Mozartian in his approach to music, he obviously had some revelations of which he himself probalbly was both enchanted and terrified, music was a kind of mystical experience for him... I remember in one interview he said something like: I here a note that I have to play but I cannot hit it, i get very close to it but cannot get into it... It was not metaphorical he did not seem to be this kind of guy... I am sure he spoke about 'tritone' in certain context ('close to it') - when he plays I feel at moments that he is getting into point where local functiional relations between tonic and dominant like get 'froxen' - the point of balance - neither makes more tension... and I litterally feel that he tries to use this point as a gate.. he tries to go further... obviously it is impossible because then he would have lost connection with the context... but it was not needed, that aspiration that what was needed... he really had mystical experince with I am more than sure... and probably more than Trane who conciously developed a system for it.
And Wes was a great story-teller, he was here, one of us, he was not obsessed with it just ame out and told great stories about what he loved best... about what we loveLast edited by Jonah; 03-25-2015 at 04:16 AM.
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Originally Posted by Jonah
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Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
The Adderleys, of course were no slouches themselves...
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03-25-2015, 08:18 AM #205destinytot GuestOriginally Posted by Jonah
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Originally Posted by princeplanet
perhaps Jeff means his compositions weren't innovative.
Wes innovated musically in a number of ways, which are very easy to list.
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Some odd statistics,
at the moment, there are more than 200 posts in this thread, 41 vote, less than 10 people gave the names of, or the list of the tunes they know (to play), one of the only two who posted their playing is me and I voted "I don't know any".
Honorable mention of destinytot for posting own composition in notation.
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Originally Posted by fumblefingers
I think there's a few obvious things, like the thumb, which had never been done like that before...but guitar players everywhere didn't throw away all their picks...Wes also could solo in octaves like no one else, but he didn't invent that idea.
I dunno...I stick to my guns--Wes definitely changed the way guitar was played, but not through innovation--he did it by raising the bar. So I don't think jazz as a whole changed it's sound because of Wes...I just think a new standard was set for guitar players. A lot of cats might have thought they were hot stuff...and then they heard Wes.
But maybe this is a different thread for a different day. But it could be an interesting one...I think the list of real game changers in jazz is pretty small...and very horn-dominated.
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Originally Posted by princeplanet
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Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
but,
you nailed it, the thumb playing, octaves, and three part solo approach (horn lines, octaves, chords).
Wes was the only major jazz player who extensively used the thumb, and played melodies and improvised solos in octaves. Others certainly played octaves but not like him, not the way he featured them so emphatically.
the test? when someone plays the guitar like him, it is immediately obvious who they are aping, err i mean copying, err i mean ripping off, err i mean emulating. they aren't referencing someone before him, or someone after. it's him.
case for innovation, made.
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Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
Though it is not as well known, even among guitarists, as it should be, Barney Kessel's playing on Her Name Is Julie" (-her voice, his guitar and an upright bass made all the sounds on that great record) had a huge influence on what came to be known as Bossa Nova. When Jobim met Kessell later, he (Jobim) thanked Kessel for giving him so many harmonic ideas!
Here's Barney backing Julie London on "Cry Me A River." This was a huge hit and shows one reason Barney was such an important guitarist.
Here's "I'm In The Mood For Love," a track I prefer. Barney's playing here set a new standard for comping for singers.
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Originally Posted by MarkRhodes
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Originally Posted by MarkRhodes
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Originally Posted by fumblefingers
Who knows why horns and piano players don't really copy the guitar greats (if Miles copied CC, then I can't hear it!). I hang out on sax forums, and when the topic comes up, quite a few players say things like "yeah, there's a few guitar things I wish we could play, like Hendrix..." They seem to like Rock/Blues bendy licks, the kind we're all too embarrassed to admit we used to play! HahaLast edited by princeplanet; 03-25-2015 at 10:40 AM.
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Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
To stir the pot a little, I've read in more than a few interviews with the older players that Charlie didn't bring all that much new material to the table. In the Mr B quote above, just substitute Bird for Wes, and that about sums up their view on Bird. They say that apart from the rhythmic displacement and some new licks using upper chord partials, he was just a "sped up Lester Young". I'm not saying I can agree or disagree, I can't be sure, I mean I hear a difference between Bird and the predecessors, as well as the copycats. But then I can say the same thing for Wes.
The fact that Bird influenced everyone and Wes influenced only some guitarists should not diminish Wes's stature as an innovative genius. I might even (subjectively!!) offer that Wes was Bird's equal in many ways, whether the history books say so or not!
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Well, I certainly hope I'm not diminishing Wes in any way...I think he's the best there ever was.
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Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
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Best damn hard bop guitar player ever, and on the Mt. Rushmore of hard bop in general
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Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
Great idea for a new monument! Maybe Bill Clinton can pull some strings at the next Skull and Crossbones meet...
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Lol...
Hmmm...for me, Lee Morgan, Ron Carter, Sonny Clark, Art Blakey, Benny Golson, maybe Cannonball...
It's probably just some iteration of the Messengers, right?
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Back to Parker's music, the music is where it all happens.
The Classic Yardbird Suite.
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Originally Posted by MarkRhodes
Thank you for that. I did not know about the connection between Kessel/Julie is Her Name and Jobim. This work was influential in other ways too:
Originally Posted by HighSpeedSpoon
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03-25-2015, 11:51 AM #223destinytot GuestThey say that apart from the rhythmic displacement and some new licks using upper chord partials, he was just a "sped up Lester Young".
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Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
But yeah, back to Bird. I think I learned the Koko and Billie's Bounce solos a few years back. But the lines, or even the cells, never seem to appear in my playing. I guess at bottom I just don't wanna sound like that, as great as it is... I probably prefer all the greats who stole shit of Bird and straightened it out a little. And yes Mr B, just about every soloist that Blakey ever found for the Messengers is right up my alley too.
Art Blakey- please, at the very least, can we have an Art Blakey monument?
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Originally Posted by princeplanet
NGD and a Mystery - Epiphone Content
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