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Funk is ending up like the Blues
- Thread starter Dr. Cheese
- Start date
Groove ain’t natural to every person, culture or creed. I think some things need to be learned early in life. I’ve played Latin music on a few records... One even was signed to Sony, but the artist’s wife let me know when I played it wrong... And she was spot on...
And it can be just as elusive. You can feel like you're playing the right notes and still...
You can fake it to everyone except someone who knows. I know that I know when I'm faking it. The difference can be just shy of imperceptible.
But some people get offended and can’t face the reality of not being true funk soldiers.
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Because you'll be eternally asking yourself..."what if... You are an incurable collector. No harm in that!
I know. It's the danger of expressing a strong opinion.
I remember growing up and hearing a groove or lick I hadn't heard the day before. I'm lucky enough to have come up when a lot of the "language " was being established. I think that's different than having everything in no time sequence. You got to learn this stuff in small pieces in real time.
My sentiments also. I'm 58, and if you ask me what is funk is, I'll be old school and say Rocco, Bootsey, Larry Graham, etc. Some of the younger cats are phenomenal within their own funk also. It's funny. Before funk was labeled as "funk", it known as "syncopation". Funk sounds better, though.
Hello;
Some of our greatest musicians are getting to a point where they cant do as they used to! I for one am glad to see young players take the Torch of funk and "run with it!"
Lets face it! What I saw was not individual efforts but "group" efforts that take planning as well as execution to pull off!!!!
Bruce
Some of our greatest musicians are getting to a point where they cant do as they used to! I for one am glad to see young players take the Torch of funk and "run with it!"
Lets face it! What I saw was not individual efforts but "group" efforts that take planning as well as execution to pull off!!!!
Bruce
Oh, I thought you were going to say it had a bunch of talentless over-weight hacks playing the same old tired patterns at jam night while some poor bassist has to sit there and hold down the I-IV-V through 4 guitar solos per song....
DiabolusInMusic
Functionless Art is Merely Tolerated Vandalism
Times change. You mention church music as a bastion of culture. Much like you complain about the changing face of funk, I am sure at one point in time (and even now) that some crotchety old white man complained about the changing face of gospel music. I think it is best not to dwell on the past although I do enjoy a good drink of nostalgia tea myself.
Pleasure was a funk band that understood Jazz.Many equate slap bass with funk. For a primer on relative busy bass in a funk environment check out Aaron Mills with Cameo on cuts like "Cameosis". Larry Blackmon is a master in drum placement and just doing what the song needs vs. a barrage of polyrhythmic stuff.
Or Nathaniel Phillips with Pleasure. That's where we though Funk was headed.
I "hear" what the original intent of the thread is addressing. I discovered Led Zeppelin as a kid, maybe 8th grade, and from them searched for the origins of what they were all about, fell onto Canned Heat and from them John Lee Hooker, and that changed my life forever. Nothing against where L.Z. went after the first album, as they were constantly exploring new influences and ideas, but it lost the deep influence of the blues of the first album, and others used later L.Z. to take their own styles even further, which was ultimately further away from the blues roots of the first L.Z. album. Now I teach at a community college and most of my students not only have no idea of what blues music even is, but they have no idea of who Led Zeppelin are. In fact many only listen to "processed" music which to me is like eating veleeta and saying you love fine cheese or having ramen noodles for dinner instead of going to a local Chinese restaurant that makes their own noodles daily and not knowing the difference. There is a definite
culture shift going on.
I have also witnessed the same change in music throughout other stylistic developments. I love "classic" soul music, but I have witnessed the same type of progression from 50's RnB to Motown to Funk to today's processed sounds, and many of my students have no clue as to who Hank Ballard, Jackie Wilson, Four Tops, Funkadelic or Earth, Wind and Fire are.
I teach art classes, my area of specialty is clay, but the same synthesis is going on here too. To many of the students that I have in classes, if it isn't part of what they see on TV, their computer or their smartphones, they don't understand it's value, or see a use for it. It is the same culture shift, and it is to the point that even administrators and the academic policy makers have bought into it. (Tell me a student doesn't learn more about music from learning to play an instrument then they would in a music appreciation class or more about art in learning to draw, paint or throw a pot then they would in an art appreciation class, and I will show you someone what buys into processed music or art.) Do you realize that in many states, studio art and music, theatre and dance performance classes NO LONGER count towards Humanities credit, even within a Liberal Arts curriculum?
Put musical instruments and/or art supplies into the hands of kids, and keep positive reinforcement going in their direction! When you do that, the human touch remains, as well as the need to explore the roots of the arts and humanities.
Sorry for being winded, but as a Faculty Chair over Art, Music, Theatre and Dance at my school, I live these thoughts and concerns on a daily basis.
culture shift going on.
I have also witnessed the same change in music throughout other stylistic developments. I love "classic" soul music, but I have witnessed the same type of progression from 50's RnB to Motown to Funk to today's processed sounds, and many of my students have no clue as to who Hank Ballard, Jackie Wilson, Four Tops, Funkadelic or Earth, Wind and Fire are.
I teach art classes, my area of specialty is clay, but the same synthesis is going on here too. To many of the students that I have in classes, if it isn't part of what they see on TV, their computer or their smartphones, they don't understand it's value, or see a use for it. It is the same culture shift, and it is to the point that even administrators and the academic policy makers have bought into it. (Tell me a student doesn't learn more about music from learning to play an instrument then they would in a music appreciation class or more about art in learning to draw, paint or throw a pot then they would in an art appreciation class, and I will show you someone what buys into processed music or art.) Do you realize that in many states, studio art and music, theatre and dance performance classes NO LONGER count towards Humanities credit, even within a Liberal Arts curriculum?
Put musical instruments and/or art supplies into the hands of kids, and keep positive reinforcement going in their direction! When you do that, the human touch remains, as well as the need to explore the roots of the arts and humanities.
Sorry for being winded, but as a Faculty Chair over Art, Music, Theatre and Dance at my school, I live these thoughts and concerns on a daily basis.
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Thank you so much for clarifying, Dr. Cheese.
It's becoming tougher and tougher to simply make a statement or give an opinion, especially about change, without folks automatically thinking you're upset or going on a rose-colored-glasses, stuck-in-my-own-world, get-off-my lawn, old-man rant.
Merely mentioning change does not mean you refuse to accept it.
