Indigestible Jazz: I'm stuck in the "Classical" idiom!

[Spin Doctor]

Swingin' like mad...

 

[gflat]

Swingin' like mad...

Yeah, I thought so too. They really do. And until I heard this concert I had no idea that in addition to everything else he does so well, Vinnie is a truly amazing jazz drummer.

 

[Spin Doctor]

Yeah, I thought so too. They really do. And until I heard this concert I had no idea that in addition to everything else he does so well, Vinnie is a truly amazing jazz drummer.

OMG, Vinnie?? Any drummer I know that's any good will take a knee if you mention Vinnie's name.

 

[sean_on_bass]

Hello Chaps.

I've been struggling a bit with some new Jazz tunes lately. In the absence of lessons or a band to play with (due to lockdown) I've been using iReal Pro to provide some backing tracks to play along to to try and keep things going as much as I can.

I don't know or listen to a lot of Jazz, and maybe that's what's defeating me here, but I've been trying to learn about it as a way of keeping the boredom at bay. Most of the songs on the app seem to be Jazz tunes and I've been reading a bit of the musical theory presented on REALLY Learning a tune and other websites.

The thing is, some of the songs just completely defeat me. I don't mean that in the sense of difficulty, although clearly there are some really fast, hard-to-play songs on there. What I mean, I think, is that they just don't make any damn kind of sense.

When I read the websites, it's all unfamiliar content, but the understanding is straightforward. Without meaning to sound like a **** - I know a lot of theory. Terms and signage, harmonic progressions and the stuff they write out to explain it all - I get it. I'm classically-trained, play the organ, piano, guitar, sing, etc., so when they talk about ii7-V7-I7, substitutions and interpolations, I promise you, I really get it.

I think the problem is the Jazz idiom. I see something like this:

View attachment 3870968

and I can spot the patterns, interpolation, modulations, quite a bit of chromaticism and it seems to make a kind of sense in my head. I can play around it all pretty well - runs, arpeggios / melodic bass, walking bass - it's near enough to what I'm used to to make a good hash of it with some improv thrown in.

Then I look at something like this:

View attachment 3871019

And I'm ashamed to admit, I'm dumbfounded. *** and all that. It. Just. Doesn't. Make. Any. Musical. Sense.

So I go and read and I learn about how it's all constructed from swapping 3rds / 7ths and then altering them to smooth things out; read the examples; understand the harmony. I read about Coltrane changes and think they're wacky but make a kind of sense. I go to YouTube and listen to the recordings and sure enough it sounds like the bassist is basically playing 1-1-2-3 in every bar, starting on a different root each time. Sounds easy enough, even at 240bpm.

But then I play through the chords without the backing track and I just can't find any route between the roots (let alone making things interesting) that doesn't sound like a pile of crap. I put the backing track on and its just the same, except now I know I can't keep up with the beat either.

The whole thing just feels like an unconnected jumble of notes and it makes me feel like I should just give up and go and hide in a Double Open Diapason somewhere (really big organ pipe) until I expire from the shame of it. I mean - I'm a serious musician, semi-professional on some of my other instruments, of about 30 years experience now. What's wrong with me? Why can't I get this?

I want to be able to play this stuff and I'm pretty sure that it's my previous musical experience and a total inability to "think Jazz" is what's stopping me from getting there. Is it even possible when I've got this much "structured diatonic Classical harmony" loaded into my head? What do I do? How do I learn to think the right way about this stuff?

Any and all advice will be welcome at this point. I know lockdown is getting a lot of us down, but my teacher has gone AWOL and I'm finding the struggle to make any kind of progress really demoralizing at the moment.

Thanks,

Adam.

It's hard to pick up a random tune(or style!) and just play it, especially from a chord sheet with no melody on the page. The only skill i see that developing is sight reading a chord sheet, which will happen on it's own. You should be listening to the tune to really understand it, not playing it on the bass. Once you understand it via a recording, then you play it on the bass and it will then make more sense. Having trouble improvising a line on the changes? Learn/analyze what the bassist on the recording did, and reference more than one recording of the same tune.

Check out this exercise. It is on the double bass side but applies to electric bass too. It's hard NOT to learn a song this way:

REALLY Learning a tune

 

[gflat]

I suspect it would also make me feel better about failing to play them if I could always fall back to something like How Deep Is The Ocean and say to myself, "well, I can't play Humpty Dumpty yet, but I can do this...".

This is a nice duet version of "How Deep Is The Ocean."

I don't know if you're still interested in working with this tune, but it's possibly easier to hear the bass in this duo setting. If it's not helpful from a learning perspective, it's still a great listen. Two of the best.

 

[Bob_Ross]

OMG, Vinnie?? Any drummer I know that's any good will take a knee if you mention Vinnie's name.

Thread Drift: my favorite Vinnie Colaiuta story comes by way of Terry Bozzio..circa 1979 or 80 maybe? ...I'm paraphrasing here: Terry said something like

>>Frank Zappa wrote "The Black Page" for me. And here I am thinking "whoa, I'm hot schidt, I can play "The Black Page" I must be the most awesomest drummer on earth!!! Look at me! I shedded my butt off to learn that tune, and now I'm the only drummer on earth who can play it!"

...and then one week later Vinnie Colaiuta is onstage playing "The Black Page" fml<<

 

[gflat]

Thread Drift: my favorite Vinnie Coliuta story comes by way of Terry Bozzio..circa 1979 or 80 maybe?

I'm sorry if I'm turning this into a complete thread hijack, but I have a favorite Vinnie story too. A close drummer friend of mine who really loves Vinnie sent me this once in an email. It's basically an example of Vinnie's insane sight-reading and independence ability. And also the incredible level of ease he has playing the most difficult and complicated things.

Steve Vai talking about Vinnie Colaiuta:

He's one of the most amazing sight-readers that ever existed on the instrument. One day we were in a Frank rehearsal, this was early '80s, and Frank brought in this piece of music called "Mo 'N Herb's Vacation." Just unbelievably complex. All the drums were written out, just like "The Black Page" except even more complex. There were these runs of like 17 over 3 and every drumhead is notated differently. And there were a whole bunch of people there, I think Bozzio was there. Vinnie had this piece of music on the stand to his right. To his left he had another music stand with a plate of sushi on it, okay? Now the tempo of the piece was very slow, like "The Black Page." And then the first riff came in, [mimics bizarre Zappa-esque drum rhythm patterns] with all these choking of cymbals, and hi-hat, ruffs, spinning of rototoms and all this crazy stuff. And I saw Vinnie reading this thing. Now, Vinnie has this habit of pushing his glasses up with the middle finger of his right hand. Well I saw him look at this one bar of music, it was the last bar of music on the page. He started to play it as he was turning the page with one hand, and then once the page was turned he continued playing the riff with his right hand, as he reached over with his left hand, grabbed a piece of sushi and put it in his mouth, continued the riff with his left hand and feet, pushed his glasses up, and then played the remaining part of the bar. It was the sickest thing I have ever seen. Frank threw his music up in the air. Bozzio turned around and walked away. I just started laughing.

 

[Cricket55]

A few thoughts on this, in no particular order… take from them whatever you can use. Lots of good advice here already. Even so….


Listening is the real key. Otherwise, it's like you're trying to learn a foreign language without ever having heard it spoken. Kind Of Blue has already been recommended, which is a great "gateway" album. For me, the gateway to Coltrane is A Love Supreme, which kind of incorporates the things he had done up to that point and foreshadows his next moves, while being relatively accessible listening… for him, that is.


As a couple others have said, Humpty Dumpty is hard. Maybe not where you want to start if you're just getting into jazz. One thought, though… the chord chart for it is not particularly informative. A lead sheet, with the melody as well as the changes, might help things make more sense.


One of my teachers, the drummer Bob Moses, always used to talk about "living the music," by which he meant being able to hear it in your head, sing it, dance to it. So again, listening to get the idiom in your head. But then practicing away from your instrument… singing the grooves, melodies, bass lines etc. All at once even: "dee-YA (shaka-BAP, shaka-BAP) dee-boo-dee-dot-dee-YAA (bap-a-da-BOOM / dum-dum-dum)...." Even better if you can get the feel in your whole body and dance around while you do this. It can be some of the most effective practicing you do. Seriously.


If I were going to make some suggestions on material to get started, first: listen, listen, listen. Then, I might suggest:


So What, from Miles' Kind Of Blue. Really only 2 chords so you can stretch out and get a feel for it.


Blues in Bb: something along the lines of Tenor Madness, by Sonny Rollins. Very important to have a grasp on the blues and how it informs jazz, and learning how to bring some of the blues into your playing on standards.


Minor blues, maybe like Mr. P.C., by Coltrane. Again, see above.


Hopefully, through listening, you will find a standard you REALLY like. Take that tune and listen to as many versions as possible. Maybe even in chronological order. So, for a tune like Stella By Starlight, you could listen to the original movie soundtrack version from the 40s. Then maybe Frank, then maybe Ella, then Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Sonny Rollins, Dexter Gordon, Joe Pass, Bill Evans, Keith Jarrett, Lyle Mays… you get the idea.


After that, take that standard that you really like and start working on it, from plain vanilla to as far as you can hear. You'll be able to return to it for the rest of your life, so don't worry about how long you spend. The more you learn on any one tune will eventually translate to your playing on other tunes. The Ed Fuqua method someone else linked is super comprehensive, so definitely read that.


Finally, a few thoughts on "modern harmony." To my way of thinking, it's as complex or as simple as you want it to be. I prefer to simplify. So, to me, I think you're playing one of 2 things at all times: tension or resolution. So you have a tonal center, you move away from it (tension), then you return to it (resolution). Still, you want your playing to have a logic to it… something to make it musical. Some ideas: symmetrical movement by whole steps, minor thirds, major thirds? Quartal harmony… structures that can function as more than one chord? Repeated geometric or intervallic patterns? Superimposing another key… so, while the notes you play don't necessarily relate to the established tonal center, they relate to each other in a familiar and logical way? Combinations of any of the above? One cool thing about a modal tune like So What is you can try out this sort of stuff without worrying about the key center moving around on you too much.


Just some ideas. Hopefully something in there is useful and/or sparks interest.


Peace,


Cricket