Analyzing Transcriptions of Solos?

[damonsmith]

Originally Posted by fingers

As mostly an observer you guys are all arguing valuable points but no one is really LISTENING to each other. It is getting comical and turning into a 'who's on first' routine. I love TB.

This is the one I have always found interesting - people making decisions or assumptions about whether others are listening and to what extent.
I remember a trio gig I saw with a to be unnamed but just terrible bassist and Hamid Drake.
When Hamid played louder than the bass, the music was great - when he came down it sucked. Where many may accuse him of "not listening" I'd say he has big ears!
The point being what a musician "hears" and how they choose to respond (if at all) is not dictated by any one rule.

[PocketGroove82]

Any bets that the OP gave up on his unsuspecting thread after post #5?

My head hurts reading from Ed and Damon talking AT each other with no real connection; One very practically, if not jadedly, sharing experience and advice as to what making improvisational music is really about, while the other babbling the beautiful, sophomoric pseudo-philosophy of a guy who just applied to grad. school.

How can one person be discussing "4:33" while the other talks about hack jazz players, Aebersold warriors, and insensitivity on the band stand? Inadvertently, I now have a new appreciated for the vastness of the word LISTEN.

Granted, this thread does contain some classic Fuquaisms,

Originally Posted by Ed Fuqua

Continue to embrace whatever belief system makes you feel most comfortable....

Originally Posted by Ed Fuqua

The difference is, I understand that this is MY concern, not everyone else's. You seem to think that this is your concern and SHOULD be everyone else's.

I can't wait to see this one hit page 10

[damonsmith]

In a funny way I feel some of the other more jazz based players were pushing Cage-like philosophy and I was actually relaying bandstand experience (I never applied to grad school, everything I have brought up has just been about my own experiences playing music).

Again, I don't think Ed or I were talking at each other even arguing. We were both offering different perspectives on the same advice.
I mean, at no point did I advocate not listening - which is pretty near impossible if some one is standing next to you.

Also, even if a lot of concepts I am talking about come from more experimental musics, they can still be applied to more traditional forms.

Again my main points were:

1. Jazz and related improvised music isn't "about" any one thing.

2. Listening and having something to contribute are equally important.

I think this is an interesting discussion. I think along the way various aspects of the music we take as a given need to be examined and questioned if not totally changed.

[damonsmith]

Originally Posted by PocketGroove82

How can one person be discussing "4:33" while the other talks about hack jazz players, Aebersold warriors, and insensitivity on the band stand?

- John Cage is every bit as important an American composer as Duke Ellington and Mingus.
His music and research contains a ton of valuable information that can be very useful for any musician.

[Mark Perna]

Damon:

You continually seem to be confusing listening with not playing. Jazz at a high level is all about listening while playing and responding either with or against what you hear. At no point do you stop and just listen. There is never a point where you aren't bringing something to the table. This is true whether you are playing a free jazz piece or Satin Doll. You do it all at the same time. It's what makes playing this music really hard to do well.

If we use a standard as an example. You have the basic roadmap of the tune or the chord changes. Everyone just playing over the changes is always the fallback option. Maybe the pianist changes the harmony. As a soloist or bassist, you can either ignore it, go with it or find something else to play against it. All are valid but when you all do it together, when that telepathy thing happens, everything moves to another level. As bassists, we have a lot of opportunities to start the conversation. We can pedal, we can play an ostinato, we can change the root note of the chord and we can outline substitute changes. All of these throw options to the sensitive soloist to change things up. And if we are sensitive, we can also follow where the soloist goes. Of course, these are only some examples of harmonic variations. There are rhythmic variations as well and variations that change the harmony and rhythm together.

The point is at no time is anyone just stopping to listen. They are continuously contributing while actively and simultaneously responding to what others are contributing. When the whole band is on, it is just better than sex.

Ok. Not as articulate as Ed but maybe you get the point now?

mark

[damonsmith]

Originally Posted by calivox

Damon:

You continually seem to be confusing listening with not playing. Jazz at a high level is all about listening while playing and responding either with or against what you hear. At no point do you stop and just listen. There is never a point where you aren't bringing something to the table. This is true whether you are playing a free jazz piece or Satin Doll. You do it all at the same time. It's what makes playing this music really hard to do well.

If we use a standard as an example. You have the basic roadmap of the tune or the chord changes. Everyone just playing over the changes is always the fallback option. Maybe the pianist changes the harmony. As a soloist or bassist, you can either ignore it, go with it or find something else to play against it. All are valid but when you all do it together, when that telepathy thing happens, everything moves to another level. As bassists, we have a lot of opportunities to start the conversation. We can pedal, we can play an ostinato, we can change the root note of the chord and we can outline substitute changes. All of these throw options to the sensitive soloist to change things up. And if we are sensitive, we can also follow where the soloist goes. Of course, these are only some examples of harmonic variations. There are rhythmic variations as well and variations that change the harmony and rhythm together.

The point is at no time is anyone just stopping to listen. They are continuously contributing while actively and simultaneously responding to what others are contributing. When the whole band is on, it is just better than sex.

Ok. Not as articulate as Ed but maybe you get the point now?

mark

This is pretty much what my first post said, Peter Kowald's quote "Listen while you play."
What Ed said was jazz was about listening. Which could be taken to mean listening is more important than playing where I would say it is just as important.

[Ed Fuqua]

Originally Posted by PocketGroove82

My head hurts reading from Ed and Damon talking AT each other with no real connection;

Originally Posted by POKE IT GROVE

Granted, this thread does contain some classic Fuquaisms,

I exist but to serve....

[onlyclave]

Originally Posted by Leroy La Qua

I am curious as to how you guys go about analyzing your transcriptions of various solos or even if you do so?

Do you sit down and analyse how the notes that comprise the solo relate to the harmony ( thinking in terms of concepts such as intervals, chord tones, modes, guide tones ets) or do you just learn solos to connect the sound of the solo to the fretboard without giving too much thought to the underlying harmony putting more of an emphasis on the ear and muscle memory side of things rather than the theoretical approach?

Absolutely! That's the number one reason that I transcribe. If I hear something that I think sounds cool I want to find out how it works so I can play something like that.

I used to transcribe Jaco bass lines a lot, not so I could walk into the guitar store and regurgitate them on the demo basses but so I could play a Jaco-style line over a new chord progression. I should have a bracelet that says "WWJD".

Anyway, transcribing just for transcribing's sake helps out your ears and gets your counting and rhythm in shape. Analyzing what you've transcribed gets to the nuts and bolts and gears of how another player thinks.

You should try recording and transcribing one of your own solos from a gig. It's very eye opening.

[Ed Fuqua]

Originally Posted by damonsmith

What Ed said was jazz was about listening. Which could be taken to mean listening is more important than playing where I would say it is just as important.

And I would not. Point being that most players do exactly what you are doing, concentrating MORE on what they thought about what they wanted to say than actually taking part in the CONVERSATION by LISTENING (well, in this case READING). If you were more assiduous about the EXCHANGE and less about your AGENDA you might have taken note that I did NOT say "jazz is about listening". What I said was "jazz is MORE about listening than it is about playing".

Again, this is only my experience but the same folks who seem to feel the way you do are pretty much the same folks who think that rests are the same thing as "not playing". I think that they're notes too.


As far as getting of the OP topic, well ain't that what we do best? I mean, if I was home I'd be practicing. But I'm sitting at my desk, so if all I got to do is bat a dead mouse around, well ya see where I'm going.

They don't call me DEAD HORSEFLAY for nothing....

[Chris Fitzgerald]

Originally Posted by Leroy La Qua

I am curious as to how you guys go about analyzing your transcriptions of various solos or even if you do so?

Do you sit down and analyse how the notes that comprise the solo relate to the harmony ( thinking in terms of concepts such as intervals, chord tones, modes, guide tones ets) or do you just learn solos to connect the sound of the solo to the fretboard without giving too much thought to the underlying harmony putting more of an emphasis on the ear and muscle memory side of things rather than the theoretical approach?

I do both. When I do a transcription, I learn to sing it a little at a time, them enter it in Sibelius. Rather than get into a big philosophical hoo-ha about why/whether it's better to do something else, let me just nip that in the bud by saying that I use the notation program because my memory sucks and I might want to pick up a transcription months or years from now and dive right back in (also because I use them as tools for my classes at the U).

Most of the time, it's the sound that I'm after, and that's what sticks with me. Other times, though, I want to know the answers to questions like:
- What makes player X sound so damn good over that part of "Dolphin Dance" where I never seem to be able to complete a meaningful phrase?
- How does player X get into and out of that spot?
- Where does player X seem to be playing big tonalities and where is he playing changes?
- How come Wayne Shorter can ignore so many of the weird changes on his own tunes and still sound great?
- What is the essence of Kenny Barron's melodic/harmonic concept?
- What the hell exactly is Fred Hersch doing when he plays over the barline for nearly an entire chorus? How can I do that?
- etc.

For these kinds of things, I like to be be able to look at the score of the solo and break things down so I can then work on some specific things stolen from the solo in the shed.

[damonsmith]

If I have an agenda it is to add to some qualifiers to the just listen advice. Improvised music is coming out of 10 year stretch of musicians standing around doing little or nothing and I hear a lot of tentative jazz and jazz based music.

I believe this comes from educators and older musicians stressing listening above all else - so I have seen that advice get taken way too far too many times.
On a basic level I agree with you, and in general I feel you are right on and give a ton of valuable wisdom.

[bassbuddie]

Originally Posted by Chris Fitzgerald

Most of the time, it's the sound that I'm after, and that's what sticks with me. Other times, though, I want to know the answers to questions like:
- What makes player X sound so damn good over that part of "Dolphin Dance" where I never seem to be able to complete a meaningful phrase?
- How does player X get into and out of that spot?
- Where does player X seem to be playing big tonalities and where is he playing changes?
- How come Wayne Shorter can ignore so many of the weird changes on his own tunes and still sound great?
- What is the essence of Kenny Barron's melodic/harmonic concept?
- What the hell exactly is Fred Hersch doing when he plays over the barline for nearly an entire chorus? How can I do that?
- etc.

+1 I agree totally with Chris, I transcribe parts that I like, for whatever reason, and try to understand whats going on.

[Ed Fuqua]

Originally Posted by jumpinin

"Frankly, these days, without a theory to go with it, I can't see a painting" - Hilton Kramer (in Tom Wolfe's The Painted Word)

This is an apocryphal attribution to a nameless French academic, but pretty funny...."While that may work in actuality, I don't see how it can possibly work in theory."

[Bruce Lindfield]

Originally Posted by calivox

At no point do you stop and just listen.

I'm not sure about this - isn't this what we are doing now!

But seriously - I have been to many gigs and seen great players listening intently and not playing - it is one of the nice things about Jazz.

Originally Posted by Chris Fitzgerald

- How come Wayne Shorter can ignore so many of the weird changes on his own tunes and still sound great?

It's something to do with Buddhism!

Originally Posted by damonsmith

If I have an agenda it is to add to some qualifiers to the just listen advice. Improvised music is coming out of 10 year stretch of musicians standing around doing little or nothing and I hear a lot of tentative jazz and jazz based music.

Well - if there is an argument - this to me is the crux of the disagreement - so have we had a decade of "tentative Jazz"...?

So I listen to "Jazz on 3" (BBC Radio3) each week and it does concentrate on the "best" (from their point of view) Free Jazz from the US - I think this is a personal preference of the presenter?

I find that what I hear is anything but tentative!! In fact each week I long for something a bit more reflective, a bit gentler and I think - why does Free Jazz have to be so "intense", so "in your face" - so brash and loud, sounding as if everybody is clamouring to be heard and wants to play all the time...?

In my experience whenever a US -based Free band is announced - I know I am going to hear somebody strangling their instrument and playing as intensely as it seems they can?

Now I know it's not all like that - I have heard things that Ed has played on - like Grandma Micky - where there is a nice balance of dynamics, light and shade, composition vs. improvisation etc.

But - and I am asking the question of you all - I don't get the impression that the US Free Jazz "scene" could be called tentative?