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Candy
Originally Posted by christianm77
Close to You (Bacharach)
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09-19-2017 03:55 AM
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Thankyou thankyou ! Originally Posted by PMB
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"Remember" (from Soul Station no less!) Originally Posted by christianm77
"Almost Like Being In Love"
interestingly, neither of these go to ivm.
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Lost? I've lost track of the times I've played Stardust with bands. Still very popular, and requested a lot. Originally Posted by NSJ
But FWIW I don't think it's Hoagy's best tune (maybe because it's been sung and played to death). I prefer Winter Moon, I Get Along Without You Very Well and The Nearness of You as ballads. Winter Moon is downright spooky in that minor key, and kinda unique. (I know he wrote rhythm tunes too, like with Bix and maybe Bing in mind. Just can't think of any now)...
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[QUOTE=PMB;732058]Tunes like...Lush Life...have an almost through-composed quality...[QUOTE]To me, Lush Life is so complete a statement that you almost ruin it by soloing. Also, as great as Coltrane was I don't like what he did to Strayhorn's contrary motion at the end (both times he recorded it), replacing it with parallel #9 chords. If it ain't broke...
It's really interesting, too, to hear the composer sing it with Duke's band. He never gets in a tempo, and they just follow him. (There's also a 2-piano version I've heard w/him and Duke, and the changes on the minor part of the verse ('Then---you came along...') are different than what's usually played---almost modal. If we're gonna learn a song, what better way than to study how the composer plays it?
But I like what Fred Hersch said about Lush Life (paraphrasing): 'Why do people solo on Lush Life? Sing the song and get the hell off the stage!'...
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Joe Henderson was equally in awe of Lush Life, considering it one of the greatest tunes of all time. His solo rendition on the eponymous album is quite free and expands upon the melody from the inside out. Maybe Joe also felt that it was impossible to add anything after a statement of the head. Originally Posted by fasstrack
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It's nothing less than remarkable that Strayhorn could write---sophisticated harmonic architecture aside---a lyric so bitter at between 16 and 22 (according to bios that's when he wrote both Lush Life and Something to Live For). How could he ever have perceived that much about life so young? Genius is the only answer. Originally Posted by PMB
And speaking of being in awe, Sinatra recorded it with a Riddle arrangement---but stopped at the verse, conceding that he needed to study the song more. (Said verse survives on recording). What more respect could there be given than a bow from the dean of the American Songbook interpreters?
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Don't you find some are at their most world weary when 22?
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Maybe. Don't wanna tell tales outta school, but b/c of certain events in my life I was pretty world-weary at 24. But we move on, learn and re-evaluate---and in our '20s we hardly know our own minds. And I'm definitely not inside Strayhorn's----only know what came out of it... Originally Posted by christianm77
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- but... nah! "Do I dare to eat a peach?" or "I've a good mind to give up living / And go shopping instead" beat those teenage blues.
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Knew THAT one was coming... Originally Posted by destinytot
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I wish I'd seen this before!
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Anita O'Day, Live at Mingo's, great album:
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Hi, two interesting questions in the OP
1, -How to internalize ?
2, -What about Stardust?
Here are my thoughts;
A song becomes a standard for a reason. Always check out the composer and other songs he wrote. Hoagy Carmichael is one of the greatest composers of popular music in the 20th century. The musical quality is outstanding in the genre. His catalogue is a treasure of art and quite unique in the sense it's easy to connect but challenging to perform. The songs represent a time in history when top hits had strong melodies over intriguing changes - perfect for chord melody.
I played in a swing band and we always played Stardust for the last dance. I loved it. every night. I still love it and even secretly named one of my guitars after it. The song was one of my first transcriptions for solo guitar many years ago. I've played it many, many times and know the song inside out by ear and hart. I have internalized it, forgot the finger arrangement, re-internalized it and documented the arrangement so that I would never have to reinvent the wheel. But here's the thing; I have about 100 other chord melody songs that I have internalized as well, but unfortunately it's not possible to keep them all fresh at the same time, so you've got to document them for the future and rehearse them before a gig. I can keep about 20 advanced finger arrangements in access memory, but then it's first in-first out. If you don't play it regularly you will forget it.
The challenge of internalizing a finger arrangement consist of three parts 1, know the song, listen, play and document. 2, Rehearse, work the finger arrangement into muscle memory. 3 keep it simple and make room for more songs in memory by improvisation (compare a bar piano player that can fake hundreds of songs on request). You've got to make a decision; -Do you want to be able to fake hundreds of songs or do you want to make some of them justice the way the composer intended? You can't do both unless you are equipped with a very special talent. Or you can sing the melody and strum the changes (that's the easy way out and truly boring unless you're a great vocalist)
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Great tune, but not easy to memorise. I did this arrangement some time back, and afterwards I wrote out the chord voicings I used. I can usually play most melodies ok from memory, so seeing the chord voicings is enough for me to reconstruct it. But this is probably one of the most ‘arranged’ things I’ve ever done, I usually try to keep them a bit ‘looser’ and more spontaneous.
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Thank you! - I'd forgotten I had that album, not to hijack the thread... but I like this version too. Originally Posted by PMB
I think the lyrics to Johnny Mandel's MASH theme tune (Suicide is painless ?) were written by his 14 Yr old son...
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I did a rather straight solo version some time ago, one of my very rare ones. I've always meant to spice it up a bit with some runs etc but never got round to it.
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Today, I've been learning the Kenneth Tse classical sax version of Stardust, it's so well played, the orchestra gives a great backing.
The song has such a great melody, almost pentatonic/blues scale(ish) in parts.
https://myweb.uiowa.edu/ketse/mp3s/Star_Dust.mp3
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Another old thread resurrected, but anyway...
Here's a recent resurrection of Stardust, with Samara Joy accompanied by Pasquale Grasso:
And proof that it's possible, although perhaps not so easy, to improvise over Stardust. Charlie did it well enough to impress Goodman, who was reputed to be not easily impressed:
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Don’t get better than this for me.
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Clifford Brown - Stardust
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