Jaco clip causing some controversy

[peterpalmieri]

If anyone is interested in the logic behind Jaco's musical thought process Ray Peterson, a fine bassist and former student of Jaco's has written this book. Highly recommended.
http://www.amazon.com/Jaco-Pastorius-Bass-Method-CD/dp/0634020315

One of the few things I don't have, I now have one on the way.

 

[Altitude]

Heh, I guessed what tune it was before I even clipped on the link. I've heard (and seen in person) better takes, but the same opinions would probably hold. Joni knew what she was getting and dug it...'nuff said.

Right. She put that band together to feature Jaco as much as anyone else in it.

Any of us would get fired for walking into a gig and stepping on the soloist (and vocalist) like that - but in this case it was the design.

I love that tune and always have.

 

[neptoon]

that's a trip that the second dude dissed his playing...so, he could only find 7 seconds total throughout the entire tune to put up as rationale to slam jaco? i would say that is a weak argument...7 seconds doesn't warrant that level of criticism in my mind

 

[Tampabass]

1) The only "controversy" about Jaco is that some folks have yet to grasp the scope of his accomplishments and innovations as a bass player. Keep listening. It'll come to you.
2) He didn't particularly like your tone, either.

Carry on ...

 

[Gluvhand]

1) The only "controversy" about Jaco is that some folks have yet to grasp the scope of his accomplishments and innovations as a bass player. Keep listening. It'll come to you.
2) He didn't particularly like your tone, either.

Carry on ...

1) Typical. Grasping the scope of his accomplishments and his innovations is easy. Getting guys like you to just accept that some don't want to "keep listening" is the hard part.
2) And I couldn't care less.

Carrying on.

 

[Dave Grossman]

It has occurred to me that the lost beat that I complained about in an earlier post, right around the 2 minute mark, may have been due to a bad edit. It happens right after Joni gets cut off mid-sentence. So, I retract that statement. The lost beat was probably due to part of the performance being edited out.

 

[okcrum]

Jaco was influenced by many of course and he respected the cats that influenced him. But Jaco then changed everything EB-wise. Many others were huge influences. But when it comes to EB there is basically pre-Jaco and post-Jaco. Who loves ya, Jaco?

Agreed. By extension, there are only a few players left around who can claim peerage with Jaco. The rest of us (myself included) stand on their shoulders.

 

[Milk]

1) Typical. Grasping the scope of his accomplishments and his innovations is easy. Getting guys like you to just accept that some don't want to "keep listening" is the hard part.
2) And I couldn't care less.

Carrying on.

Pretty much. I don't dispute his originality. I just don't care for it. Thats different. No disrespect meant even. But i hate this idea some people have that if you play bass and love bass, then you have to love Jaco, otherwise there's something wrong with you....

 

[Roscoe East]

But i hate this idea some people have that if you play bass and love bass, then you have to love Jaco

Right. I think a much more fair and accurate statement would be "if you play bass and love bass, then you have to recognize & understand the influence that Jaco had on the instrument"

"Love" (or "like" or even "appreciate") doesn't really factor into it.

 

[lowfreq33]

As a player for hire, if you're known for doing a certain kind of thing, and someone hires you knowing full well what that thing is, then the general assumption would be that your thing is what they're looking for, and you should oblige.

 

[dougjwray]

+1 in the Omnibook Bird uses the same ii V patterns on many occasions. Just part of the Bebop language. Check out the amount of repetition in Giant Steps as well.

"Parker most often used a technique of improvisation known in musicology as the cento (or patchwork) method, where the performer draws from a corpus of formulae and arranges them into ever-new patterns. This aspect of Parker's art has been exhaustively investigated by Owens (Charlie Parker, 1974), who codified Parker's improvisational work according to about 400 formulae. Many of these were specific to certain keys (where they may have been easier to finger) or to particular pieces. Some occur in earlier swing music, particularly in the work of Lester Young, but others originated with Parker himself, and later became common property among musicians working in the bop style."
-- James Patrick, v. 2, p. 288, The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz (London : Macmillan Press Ltd., 1988)

 

[Tampabass]

1) Typical. Grasping the scope of his accomplishments and his innovations is easy. Getting guys like you to just accept that some don't want to "keep listening" is the hard part.
2) And I couldn't care less.

Carrying on.

No, not really.
Based on some of the typically ignorant comments here, some players really haven't grasped the scope of Jaco's accomplishments and innovations.
And they move from whining about disliking his tone to saying that he "overplayed" or some nonsense.
Nobody said you have to "keep listening." Particularly if you "couldn't care less."
Those who do get Jaco are just weary of hearing uninformed comments from those who have trouble appreciating his work.
What's ironic is that, while some bass players, in the context of a bass community like Talkbass,are slagging on Jaco, in the larger world he continues to be celebrated for other aspects of his work, beyond his technical mastery, and brilliance as an improviser and groundbreaking reinvention of bass playing.
As in -- his skills as a composer, and his ginormous influence on Weather Report, who, at their commercial peak with Jaco, played in front of huge audiences, practically becoming the "rock stars" of the jazz world.
So ... no "controversy" about Jaco -- just grooving, improvising and composing at a very high level, one reached by few bass players since.
But carry on with the silly nitpicking. Maybe it makes some folks feel better about their own playing.

 

[basschanges]

"Parker most often used a technique of improvisation known in musicology as the cento (or patchwork) method, where the performer draws from a corpus of formulae and arranges them into ever-new patterns. This aspect of Parker's art has been exhaustively investigated by Owens (Charlie Parker, 1974), who codified Parker's improvisational work according to about 400 formulae. Many of these were specific to certain keys (where they may have been easier to finger) or to particular pieces. Some occur in earlier swing music, particularly in the work of Lester Young, but others originated with Parker himself, and later became common property among musicians working in the bop style."
-- James Patrick, v. 2, p. 288, The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz (London : Macmillan Press Ltd., 1988)

Yea you don't need an academic to tell you that. But it's cool as hell that someone narrowed it down to about "400 formulae." Everyone has a limited vocabulary that they use when soloing. My original point had to do more with the contrast of Jaco's soloing style to that of players in the strict bebop idiom: using common tones and lead lines to weave through changes vs. playing staggered licks in each key.

 

[Marial]

Well, I can tell you this: I'd like Weather Report a whole lot more if there had been no Joe Zawinul in the mix. I'm sure this will tweek someone's nose hairs, but I just don't appreciate cheesy keyboards, no matter how technically proficient the playing is.

And Tampabass, I'm curious. When you say something like

Those who do get Jaco are just weary of hearing uninformed comments from those who have trouble appreciating his work.

are there any negative comments/criticisms of Jaco that would meet your acceptance?

 

[Roy Vogt]

"Parker most often used a technique of improvisation known in musicology as the cento (or patchwork) method, where the performer draws from a corpus of formulae and arranges them into ever-new patterns. This aspect of Parker's art has been exhaustively investigated by Owens (Charlie Parker, 1974), who codified Parker's improvisational work according to about 400 formulae. Many of these were specific to certain keys (where they may have been easier to finger) or to particular pieces. Some occur in earlier swing music, particularly in the work of Lester Young, but others originated with Parker himself, and later became common property among musicians working in the bop style."
-- James Patrick, v. 2, p. 288, The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz (London : Macmillan Press Ltd., 1988)

+1
One of my favorite columns Chick Corea wrote in Contemporary Keyboard Magazine was one called "The Myth of Improvisation" (wish I still had it-anyone out there have a copy?) which dealt with this. One of Jaco's favorite books to use was Nicholas Slominsky's Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns which was also one of Coltrane's favorites. I hear a lot more of that as well as pentatonics off the Root, 5th and 9th in Jaco's playing. He's definitely influenced by Be Bop, but he's playing a different vocabulary that uses more polychords (D/C for a Lydian sound, etc.) much as Pat Metheny and Ron Miller were doing at the time. Jeff Berlin was influenced by Sonny Rollins, Sonny Stitt and Pat Martino especially (I remember sitting and visiting with Jeff at MI and he was reading through a 10 page Pat Martino transcription he'd done) and plays more Bop vocabulary than Jaco did to my ear.
It figures. The first thing Joe Zawinul told Victor Bailey on the WR gig was, "Don't play any bebop on my gig. I was playing that stuff before you were born." He probably dug Jaco's freshness.

 

[basschanges]

+1
One of my favorite columns Chick Corea wrote in Contemporary Keyboard Magazine was one called "The Myth of Improvisation" (wish I still had it-anyone out there have a copy?) which dealt with this. One of Jaco's favorite books to use was Nicholas Slominsky's Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns which was also one of Coltrane's favorites. I hear a lot more of that as well as pentatonics off the Root, 5th and 9th in Jaco's playing. He's definitely influenced by Be Bop, but he's playing a different vocabulary that uses more polychords (D/C for a Lydian sound, etc.) much as Pat Metheny and Ron Miller were doing at the time. Jeff Berlin was influenced by Sonny Rollins, Sonny Stitt and Pat Martino especially (I remember sitting and visiting with Jeff at MI and he was reading through a 10 page Pat Martino transcription he'd done) and plays more Bop vocabulary than Jaco did to my ear.
It figures. The first thing Joe Zawinul told Victor Bailey on the WR gig was, "Don't play any bebop on my gig. I was playing that stuff before you were born." He probably dug Jaco's freshness.

I remember reading an interview with Scott Henderson, where he spoke about rehearsing with Zawinul and absolutely nailing all of the changes on a solo. Apparently Zawinul said something to the effect of, "cut that out! Just play the blues" I think at the point in time Jaco was in the fusion scene, many of the artists were tired of hearing the same ii Vs played over and over.

 

[Marial]

+1
One of Jaco's favorite books to use was Nicholas Slominsky's Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns which was also one of Coltrane's favorites.

And this is why I don't mind the Jaco threads. As I mentioned earlier, there is always some nugget of information that comes out of them. Thank you, Roy.

 

[peterpalmieri]

Oh man my Amazon bill is gonna be high this month.

 

[esa372]

One of my favorite columns Chick Corea wrote in Contemporary Keyboard Magazine was one called "The Myth of Improvisation" (wish I still had it-anyone out there have a copy?)

Here you go: The Myth Of Improvisation

 

[Marial]

Oh man my Amazon bill is gonna be high this month.