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Double Bass Why no new Jazz Standards?

#41
damonsmith said:
That is a terrible idea and they should know better.
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I only learned about this last night through a friend and I honestly do have mixed feelings about this idea over all. At the very least the songs don't seem to bad. Still the three of them are definitely doing good things with what they're on their own and I would much rather listen to their originals any day. At the very least this would be a worthwhile opportunity to record some compositions by Anthony Braxton, Henry Threadgill, Roscoe Mitchell, Albert Ayler, Ornette Coleman, etc
 
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#42
I think a lot of responders here are thinking that a new "jazz standard" would be written by a jazz composer for jazz musicians. In my view this is just not how standards work at all. A standard is a popular tune -- one that musicians play on the stand all the time -- and a jazz standard is a standard that jazz musicians play all the time. (There are also, of course, country standards, R&B standards, Latin standards in many flavors, folk standards, bluegrass standards, rock standards, etc.) There are lots of tunes in the RB series written as jazz, but those are not standards. Jazz is the act of adapting and extending tunes rhythmically and harmonically, imho.

Examples of 'non-jazz' tunes I've played in the jazz context that would be jazz standards if more people played them:
Brotherhood of Man
Here Comes the Bride
Hard Times Come No More
Still Crazy After All These Years
Spooky
What's Goin' On
Ain't Gonna Let You Break My Heart Again
Colour My World
It Can't Be Wrong
Everybody's Cryin' Mercy
Here, There and Everywhere
Blackbird
If I Fell
Seduced
Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye
Up from the Skies

And if you really want to hear a great talent surfing the edge between pop and jazz, dig up some Nat King Cole.
Give me any tune and I think I can give it back to you as some kinda jazz.
 
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#43
Steven Ayres said:
I think a lot of responders here are thinking that a new "jazz standard" would be written by a jazz composer for jazz musicians. In my view this is just not how standards work at all. A standard is a popular tune -- one that musicians play on the stand all the time -- and a jazz standard is a standard that jazz musicians play all the time. (There are also, of course, country standards, R&B standards, Latin standards in many flavors, folk standards, bluegrass standards, rock standards, etc.) There are lots of tunes in the RB series written as jazz, but those are not standards. Jazz is the act of adapting and extending tunes rhythmically and harmonically, imho.

Examples of 'non-jazz' tunes I've played in the jazz context that would be jazz standards if more people played them:
Brotherhood of Man
Here Comes the Bride
Hard Times Come No More
Still Crazy After All These Years
Spooky
What's Goin' On
Ain't Gonna Let You Break My Heart Again
Colour My World
It Can't Be Wrong
Everybody's Cryin' Mercy
Here, There and Everywhere
Blackbird
If I Fell
Seduced
Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye
Up from the Skies

And if you really want to hear a great talent surfing the edge between pop and jazz, dig up some Nat King Cole.
Give me any tune and I think I can give it back to you as some kinda jazz.
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Who let the dogs out? Go!

And, I think you're confusing the Great American Songbook with jazz standards. My definition of a jazz standard is anything commonly played in the repertoire, including Nardis, not really a Broadway tune, while the songbook went from Tin Pan Alley through the musicals in the 60s and included pop tunes from the 20s through the 50s.
 
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#45
Steven Ayres said:
A standard is a popular tune -- one that musicians play on the stand all the time -- and a jazz standard is a standard that jazz musicians play all the time.
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That's not accurate, a jazz standard is a composition by a jazz musician that has entered the common repertoire. Of jazz musicians. Tunes like KILLER JOE, STROLLIN', SONG FOR MY FATHER, etc.
 
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#47
I think one of the main reasons that there aren't a lot of 'new standards' is that much of what is considered 'standard' type jazz, is based on harmonic movements and concepts that were very popular and current in in the 1920's to 1960's... basically Tin Pan Alley, II-V-I's, show tunes, bebop, Coltrane changes, modal stuff... blablabla. The melodic and soloist content developed along with that harmonic evolution.

Once you get into later pop music, from the 70's on, you don't really get harmonic content that is compatible with the sort of language and vocabulary that was developed in the decades prior... the harmony becomes much simpler, and more diatonic until we get up to the modern times... where there is basically not even a song, just some diatonic BS that provides fodder for studio production.

Maybe the real book publishers just need to start adding Radiohead, Nick Drake, Apex Twin, Elliot Smith, etc tunes to the real books, and then we'll have new standards.... get people playing them at jam sessions, etc...

John
 
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#49
Much like a shark that needs to keep moving in order to stay alive, jazz will, (as it always has done in the past), continue to expand and incorporate & absorb new concepts, energies and influences or it risks becoming nothing more than a calcified museum piece.
There always seems to be a faction of older "Moldy Figs" complaining about the current young "whippersnappers", (who often later become known as "innovators".) These whippersnappers/innovators are not afraid of stepping outside of the often rigid, dogmatic boundaries and limitations imposed by "the tradition".
My hat is off to anyone involved in keeping the shark alive - even if I don't personally care for the music. The alternative is stagnation, and is not a healthy option.
IMFO.
 
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#52
Chris Fitzgerald said:
Beautiful! Yet more proof that if you have a tune you like and believe in, you can make it sound good in spite of what naysayers on the internet may think.
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Very true.

Mr. Pasqua touches on some lovely but occasionally abstract harmonies here. (That's a compliment.) The song is his promise not to strand us, so even the less-adventurous in the audience are willing to go exploring.

If you build trust with your audience they will travel with you to some very far-out locations. For me, that's always been one of the central points of playing standards in the first place.
 
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#53
The truth of the matter is, very few people have exhausted the standards we have. There are lots of great standard tunes that get played less often.
While I am against modern pop in a jazz style, this is not a discussion about the success or failure of that approach, it is about what music can and will enter a common ground of material.
The reason modern pop tunes won't become common ground no matter how successful any "jazz" version is has to do with the generational divide. No matter how many people like a pop group or band even more people dislike them. So, as far as new Standard material pop will not be it. The best place to look for new material is jazz originals.
Far fewer jazz musicians dislike Andrew Hill than Nirvana, so more of his tunes could become common ground. Kenny Wheeler wrote reams of great jazz tunes. How many lifetimes would any of us need to learn all of Ellington's book and exhaust the improvisational ideas therein? And Mingus?

When Steve Lacy and a few others started doing Monk projects in the late '50s, Monk's music was not widely played. Even I have several Monk tunes memorized!
As bass players we should just push Mingus, Dave Holland and Steve Swallow tunes every chance we get.

This can be had for $3.53:
Amazon.com: Buying Choices: Charles Mingus - More Than a Fake Book (Fake Books)
Any so called jazz bassist screwing around with dumb contemporary pop that has not played this book cover to cover should just pawn their bass.
 
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#54
I attend a Saturday afternoon jazz combo class (part of the Adult Education dept extension of our local jazz school) and lately we've been adding charts from this great collection of modern-day jazz compositions to the mix of Real Book stuff, with great effect:

The Jazz Canvas: Link Removed

Treble/bass/Bb/Eb charts from Ingrid Jensen, Wycliffe Gordon, Chris Potter, Linda Oh, Vijay Iyer...a welcome addition to Autumn Leaves and All The Things You Are. :) :)
 
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#55
I went onto Jazz Canvas, and listened. Lots there -- but without lead sheets to make it easy for local musicians to play them, they ain't gonna become standards. At least Pat Metheny has come out with his own Real Book so some of his songs can become oft-played songs. I know Hal Leonard is coming out with Artist series real books that may help.
 
#56
PauFerro said:
I went onto Jazz Canvas, and listened. Lots there -- but without lead sheets to make it easy for local musicians to play them, they ain't gonna become standards. At least Pat Metheny has come out with his own Real Book so some of his songs can become oft-played songs. I know Hal Leonard is coming out with Artist series real books that may help.
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The book *is* lead sheets... 4 pdf's of 'em. :) :)
 
#57
With all due respect and bass brotherly love..

damonsmith said:
The reason is people who want new jazz tunes to play are too lazy to research jazz history which is just brimming with incredible music that is seldom played!
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damonsmith said:
Any so called jazz bassist screwing around with dumb contemporary pop that has not played this book cover to cover should just pawn their bass.
Click to expand...

Hyper, meet bole.
Icono, meet clasm.

I just love playing matchmaker! :)
 
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#58
Vince Waldon said:
The book *is* lead sheets... 4 pdf's of 'em. :) :)
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Oops! I missed that part of it. Great they have the book and charts too. It makes listening to each of them much more of a serious thing, then. I got all distracted with the Spotify login barrier and forgot about the book aspect. I will have to go back and do it more justice.

I will say this -- the melodies have to really stand out to me. They have to become earworms. And I do give a song about five spins if I really want to appreciate it, and I do give most new music I am serious about that much airplay on my computer or CD player to give it a chance.

I think most of the standards we play Blue bossa, Mr. PC, Green Dolphin Street -- they all have that quality. Pat Metheny said the same thing in the preface to his real book that its the melody that makes it work.

One thing I really like is they have given backing tracks to the tunes so people can play along with them -- they have really facilitated the learning and dissemination of the tunes.

However, I think if you really want to change the scene, and raise the charts to the status the real book charts, you unfortunately have to start giving the book away in large volumes, or allowing it to be distributed digitally. And the tunes have to be accessible/playable by the average local musician. Not a pet project because you like the artist, but because you really like the song.
 
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#59
Chris Fitzgerald said:
With all due respect and bass brotherly love..

Hyper, meet bole.
Icono, meet clasm.

I just love playing matchmaker! :)
Click to expand...

I think your statements above just obscure enough to be considered art :). I think you are saying this discussion is one that is aimed at altering the existing establishment, tradition of the songs, correct? Due to your use of the term iconoclasm?
 
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#60
damonsmith said:
The reason modern pop tunes won't become common ground no matter how successful any "jazz" version is has to do with the generational divide. No matter how many people like a pop group or band even more people dislike them.
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It's also fair to say that the majority of successful pop tunes these days are so disposable that the very people that love them, leave them and never return in very short order. It's not for example, like my parents generation (and/or older) that continued to hold the music they grew up on in high esteem all the way into adulthood.
 
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