Saturday, August 7, 2010

" The Worst Music I've Ever Heard!"



Recently, I was reminiscing( not in tempo, unfortunately) about my early experiences as a jazz listener. What has never ceased to amaze me is how many people can hear great music and just LOATHE it with passion. You might say, " Maybe they need to give it a chance..." No, they've given it a chance, they've listened for an hour or more , and they would rather be forced to watch reruns of " Joanie Loves Chachi" than listen to jazz music.

Two separate yet similar experiences come to mind. I remember sitting out on the playground on my street with some friends. Someone had brought what we used to call a " boom-box"( those of you born before 1990 will remember). We were listening to the music of the 80's on the radio: Def Leppard, Duran Duran, a band called Midnight Star  (anybody remember that song Freakazoid?), and so on. And then someone started tuning the dial to different radio stations, and all of a sudden, ever so faintly, some jazz leaped forth from the massive speakers. I proudly proclaimed, " I know this,it's Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie from Live at Massey Hall. I love this!" And I started sing along with the Bird solo on All The Thing You Are. My friends immediately looked at me with disgust, as if I had told a foul joke involving a Priest, a Rabbi, and a 12 year- old stripper. "You LIKE this CRAP?" and immediately they changed the station, back to some superior sounding Quiet Riot. I began to protest, but my friends defensively blocked the boom-box. As the lilting strains of " Come On Feel The Noize" floated with the summer air, I hung my head low and walked back into my house.

I also remember an incident from the same era in which a concert was performed at Harper's Choice Middle School during a special afternoon assembly. The band was a quartet of African-American men. The instrumentation was piano, bass, drums, and tenor saxophone. I remember that the saxophonist and band leader informed the young audience that the music they were about to hear was jazz, gospel, and R&B influenced. The band performed for an hour: I had not witnessed many professional concerts at this young age, and this concert was very impressive to say the least. I really got caught up in the energy of the music. The tenor player took lengthy, emotive solos and he would bend his body to the side on occasion, say, if he had played a particularly sour blues note. I was in a trance: I recall thinking that this was the greatest music I had ever heard. (Now, I imagine if I heard this band today, I would probably not be affected in the slightest. But at age 12, this might as well have been The John Coltrane Quartet featuring McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Garrison, and Elvin Jones.)

The concert ended. Still kind of in a happy trance, I returned to Mr. Zigenfuss' math class, sat down at my desk, and said openly and with vulnerability, almost to the point of tears, to anyone within earshot,
"Wow, that was really great music. I've never heard music like that from a live band." One of the tall, popular boys immediately disputed my testimony with, "You LIKED that CRAP?"

And so, even as an adult and a somewhat professional musician and educator, proud as I am to be interested and involved in jazz and creative music, I always have experiences like these weighing on my conscience. How can music so unquestionably amazing and beautiful be so HATED? Like Art Blakey said, " Maybe WE'RE wrong..."

In the onset of the 1990's, I was doing my steady weekend  solo piano gig at the Omni Inner Harbor in Baltimore ( ironically named in that it was at least 10 blocks away from the Inner Harbor). I will admit that since I was alone and, most of the time, no one paid any attention to me, I used the job to practice. I might play songs I didn't know well, or maybe I would noodle around certain harmonies, or maybe try to compose something spontaneously. I certainly had a repertoire, albeit meager, since I had only recently decided to make an attempt to be serious about jazz piano as a career option. One night I was playing, well, practicing a tune called "Night Dreamer" when an old woman, maybe in her seventies, sidled up to the piano and said to me, "That is THE WORST MUSIC I HAVE EVER HEARD!" I blankly stared at her as she slithered into the night and silently argued, "But, it's Wayne Shorter's Night Dreamer..."

OK, not everybody gets it the way jazz fans do. But what about simple politeness? Especially in the case of a live performer, to approach him or her and toss insults so casually? When they say " Don't Shoot The Piano Player," that also implies don't shoot him down with rudeness and harshities! ( I made up a word: Harshity ( noun) -the opposite of " nicety". Don't look it up cause it's not there...yet...)

You might think maybe only the solo pianist gets harassed. I used to think that as well: I had this theory that as long as there were at least two performers, then dissidents would leave you alone. Nevertheless, I was onstage in a sold out 2500- seat theater in Lisbon, Portugal back in the autumn of 1999. Cassandra Wilson had taken time out after a handful of songs to introduce the band. The room was quiet and attentive. Without warning, a lightning bolt of protest broke the calm: an angry male voice with a heavy Portuguese accent cried out, "THIS EES THE MOST BORRINGG MUSIK I HAVE HEARRD EEN ALL OF MY LIFE!" Ironically, everyone applauded, because the Portuguese natives didn't understand what the disgruntled man had shouted. Cassandra didn't skip a beat. "Thank you, we love you..." she announced, as if the man had yelled something totally the opposite.

Would this insane Portuguese putz have shouted at the Lisbon Symphony Orchestra? Would he have voiced his displeasure in such a manner at a Quiet Riot concert? ( In the latter case, any shouting would probably be drowned out by everyone else shouting and " feeling the Noize...") What is it about jazz, whether it's me at age 20 fiddling on the ivories in a hotel lobby, or Cassandra Wilson at the height of her powers, to illicit such strong negativity?

My favorite heckler experience occurred in the late summer of 1994. My father had hired me and  vocalist Heidi Martin to perform twice for something called the Hospice Cup Regatta, a charity event, held near Henderson Harbor in upstate New York. A local bassist and drummer were hired to round out the band. We played standards while people ate buffet meals on soft paper plates. Mostly the people just ignored us, but we were enjoying our music. I was playing on some kind of keyboard.

I was very excited at that time because in a few weeks after the Regatta, I was headed off with saxophonist Gary Thomas for my first tour of Europe. So while we were playing somewhat recognizable standards, I was getting geared up to play with Thomas. If you are familiar with Thomas' music, you will understand that he has a very modern and complex melodic and harmonic language. This language has made a huge impact on my playing, and this was reflected in all of my solos during the Regatta performances. So you can imagine that if one of the Regatta-goers would have ignored their soggy potato salad for a few minutes and actually listened to what we were playing, they might have been a little confused. But as I said, they were ignoring us, so I went about my business of trying to play "The Days of Wine And Roses" as jaggedly as possible.

So at the mid-point of our second performance, immediately after a highly chromatic rendition of "Star Eyes", a white-haired, slightly bald, thin man wearing glasses approached the bandstand, which was probably right next to the soggy potato salad tray. " Can you guys play Mack The Knife, something like that?" He seemed like a kindly old man. I offered " Why, I think I can get through that tune..." Angrily, with an evil eye beaming into my skull, he grunted "....BECAUSE WHAT YOU WERE PLAYING WAS BULLSHIT!" I kind of gasped..." Uh, ok..." I stammered. The old man shook his head and walked away. " I'm sorry , but...what  you were playing was BULLSHIT!" and then he was gone from view.

I tried to maintain my composure. " OK, let's play Mack The Knife, then." But I couldn't do it. I was frozen with rage. I was shaking. " OK, let's take a break." So I got up from the keyboard, paced around outdoors for a few minutes, and then planned my retaliation. I walked right towards the old man, who was sitting with his younger family members at a table. " Excuse me, sir", my fists were clenched,"You have the right to your opinion, but you have NO right to speak to me that way." Seated but still powerful, the devil eye reappeared and bore a hole right through me. "WHAT YOU WERE PLAYING WAS BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!", he cried in a ghostly voice.

Out of nowhere comes my father. " Jack, you're drunk" my father states. " If you don't sit the fuck down and stop bothering my son, I'm going to take you outside and kick your ass!"( Sometimes it helps in a pinch to have a father from Brooklyn to defend you now and then.) At that point, the gig was declared over and in my view, there were no winners. Heidi and I drove back to Washington, D.C. in a very quiet mood.

But this was not the last that I heard from Drunk Jack. Six months later, out of the blue, I receive a letter from upstate New York, from this crazy old man with devil eyes. The letter went something like this:

                Dear George,
I am writing this letter to ask for you to forgive me for my behavior during  your  performance at the Hospice Cup Regatta. I was very drunk that afternoon and I did not mean the awful things I said to you. I have had alcohol problems for many years and have proved to be an embarrassment to my family and  friends. I hope you will find it in your heart to forgive me for my shameful behavior. Your music is wonderful.  I wish you the best of luck in your career.

                                                                                                         Sincerely,   
                                                                                                                          Jack

Jack, you crazy drunk, wherever you are, I forgive you. And I'm sorry you never got to hear my Gary Thomas-inspired version of Mack The Knife.

25 comments:

  1. Priceless stories. Thank you GC.

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  2. I think it's pretty common to-if not hide your jazz taste from your teen pals-at least not to share it. If you're lucky, you meet a kindred spirit along the way, which I luckily did. We mourned Trane's death (alone) together.

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  3. Beautiful story...nice resolution. You need to submit this to Jazz Times or somebody. It's a well-written piece worthy of payment. They have a section in the mag (occasionally) called First Person. I'll be that editor Lee Mergner would be interested in running this. Just a thought.

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  4. Bill, I'm always interested in doing something worthy of payment. How do I contact Mr. Mergner? Maybe I'll look on the website. Can you vouch for me? I've never submitted anything like that. Although I did write some hate mail to Stan Lee at Marvel Comics for allowing the writers of the X-Men to kill Jean Grey during the Phoenix Saga of 1980. That probably doesn't count.

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  5. George -- excellent article, as usual. This reminds me of the story about the premiere of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, for the Diaghalev ballet in Paris. The audience was incensed and threw rotten fruit, jeered, etc. Jean Cocteau stood up and jeered back at them, declaring the piece a work of genius and telling the audience members they were idiots. What I always wondered was, In order to have thrown rotten fruit, the audience had to have brought it with them, right? Which means they never wanted to give the music (or the ballet) a chance to begin with. Your junior high school friends obviously were the same way, reacting that way to Bird after 10 seconds (unless they were reacting to the less than perfect sound quality. :-)) Regardless of people's opinions (and refusal to open up their minds to new experiences), civility is the only thing that keeps us from killing each other on a wholesale basis. We need more of it for sure. Andy.

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  6. I appreciate what George is trying to do here, but I have a few issues with it:

    (I'm a jazz pianist who has had similar experiences).

    1) In two of the anecdotes he was using the gig to practice. On some level, that's kind of arrogant. He wasn't hired to practice. He was hired to contribute to an experience for other people, and he failed to do that to such a degree that someone called him on it. It really isn't up to him to decide that a gig isn't "important". That's kinda unprofessional and I would never hire him no matter how good he is if I knew he had that attitude. Being a pro musician doesn't mean that you care about music more than anyone else; if that were true there couldn't even be a music business. It exists because people do care passionately about music -- to the point where they will get violent if the music is pissing them off. It's nice that George forgives the drunkard, but the apology is off target; it should be "I'm sorry I ruined your experience at that party with my distortions of music you love." (Btw, re the Lisbon anecdote: the Stravinsky story shows that people will indeed get loud and rude at "respectable" venues. And who is Cassandra Wilson that she's exempt from being boring? Fortunately, she has the class to "return blessing for cursing").

    2) Jazz is not inherently better, more beautiful, deep or meaningful than any other music. So get over the amazement/dismay that few people relate to it the way we do. It meets our needs in vital ways, but that doesn't mean it must for anyone else. That inner need is met in uncountable ways for other people, including religion, all the other arts, sports, sex...whatever.

    3) It's not always bad to get a loud negative reaction to what you're doing (as long as it doesn't involve assault :). In these stories, George got dumped on for pushing well beyond someone's comfort zone. That's valuable information. A wise artist takes that and thinks about it long and hard -- not necessarily to avoid doing it again; rather to understand more deeply how one's art affects others, and the means and ends of one's art in the large and small picture. Pissing people off is a perfectly honourable artistic goal; when it happens, you really want to analyze the data.

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  7. Dear Anonymous....if that is your real name.....
    I have my own issues with your critique of my story. First off, when I say practice, I meant it in a tongue-in-cheek way. I meant more that I would play tunes that I was not as comfortable with while no one was listening, which was 95 percent of the time. And all jazz pianists spend time on those gigs "working their stuff out." I was in a hotel lobby 4 hours a night, between two to four days a week, for a few years. I'm not just playing everything like a robot every time.


    Anonymous, are you really a jazz pianist? If you read interviews with other jazz pianists,or any other jazz musicians for that matter, or if you know any really good players, you'll know that a certain amount of early gigging consists of
    "working it out on the bandstand." You make it sound like I was practicing Hanon exercises, or scale fingerings, which is just simply not true.

    And I don't appreciate you calling me arrogant. How can you assume that I didn't think these gigs were important? I have earned the respect of my peers, even back then when I could barely play, because I was responsible, and I always gave 100 percent to the music, regardless of the pay or the situation. I've made 3000 dollars for half a concert and I've played gigs where I LOST 500 dollars.And everything in between. And I pretty much treat them all the same way- show up on time, learn the music, try to make the band sound good, etc..... I have paid plenty of dues: I don't know your background, sir, but you can't even imagine the kind of sacrifices I have made to be a professional musician. And I certainly don't appreciate you implying that I'm unprofessional because of some gigs I did in the 90's when I was first learning to play. WTF?

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  8. I would never apologize to that drunk asshole. He was totally rude. My father hired me to play whatever we wanted . No one said, "you have to play IN THE MOOD for 20 minutes and then play STRING OF PEARLS for 10 minutes." And you make it sound like I was totally butchering the songs on purpose which was most certainly not the case. I was playing the way that I play. To some, Charlie Parker at his best sounds like cacophony. That's what happened in this case.(I'm not saying I'm as great as Charlie Parker, I'm just trying to explain what happened.) We were doing our job according to what my father asked us to do. And you also don't understand sarcasm. The last sentence of the article is a joke.

    2) I never said jazz is better than any other music. That's ridiculous. I like a lot of different music. My question was If I like it, why do so many people not like it? And I also said in the article " Not everybody gets it the way jazz fans do." So I stated clearly that I have resigned myself to this truth, that it is not and never will be super popular. My complaint is people insulting me while I'm playing, which, if you've ever been on a gig, you will know is annoying to say the least.
    3)I said initially that some of these experiences weigh on my conscience as I play in different settings. I am very aware of the audience. But to some degree, we as artists have to be true to ourselves. Jazz musicians are not like people that play in Top 40 bands every weekend. We are trying to come up with our own way of doing things, not be a human jukebox. I realize that this is why we jazz musicians might sit at home many a weekend. But I am really really lucky to have been able to play with artists who have pursued their own way of doing things DESPITE the protests from the small minded such as Drunk Jack. And these people have found their audience in places like Europe and Japan and Australia, and I've been all over the world with these kinds of musicians, which is something that Top 40 bands almost never do.

    "Pissing people off is a perfectly honourable artistic goal" Man, that has never been a goal of mine, why would I want my music to piss people off? I want people to like it, but I'm hoping they'll see it my way. Good art communicates but the audience has to give the artist the respect to express what they are thinking and feeling. The blues came out of people who were enslaved, forced to serve other people's bidding. The Blues gave them an outlet to tell THEIR inner story. The Blues were not about singing so that they "contribute to an experience for other people". It was not entertainment, it was ART. I accept that art doesn't always work in some situations.

    Anonymous, and anybody else who is reading my fledgling blog, I am sorry if this comment seems like too harsh a rebuttal, but I'll admit I'm a little defensive these days. I just don't like to be criticized by somebody that has no idea what I'm talking about and calling me arrogant and unprofessional and saying I had a bad attitude. I'm willing to have contrary opinions here but there needs to be some boundaries. Anonymous, I think you crossed the line.

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  9. G, anyone who uses anonymous as their name can't stand behind their word(s)...sounds like they identify with the folks u are sheddin' some light on here and he wants to validate being rude and mouthy...

    what did he say ...
    (Pissing people off is a perfectly honourable artistic goal; when it happens, you really want to analyze the data.) something weird here...

    but to the point he's missing it...you blog was about why do people feel so at ease and free to be rude and highly negative toward musicians playing Jazz music...and that is another blog...get to it!!!!

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  10. Hey George,

    I'm enjoying your blog so far, thanks for taking the time to write. I've definitely been in similar situations with less than polite audience members. I get the feeling that a lot of people think we're just trained monkeys ready to dance for their entertainment. Generally if someone requests a song that I don't want to play, I'll just stare at them blankly and repeat, "I've never heard of that song, Take 5 by Dave Brubeck? Nah, never heard of it. Who's Dave Brubeck?" :)

    Secondly, as someone that has a blog. I LOVE it when people get all upset and write things to me. I was writing on my blog a year about a year ago about mixing my album and mentioned we had to splice an ending from an alternate track and some guy wrote to me and told me I wasn't a 'real jazz musician' and that 'real jazz albums don't have any edits or splices'.

    That shit is HILARIOUS!

    Enjoy the shit talkers, you know what's REALLY up.

    -JC

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  11. I don't know who said it, but I feel it's an appropriate quote "You don't have the right to an opinion. You have the right to an INFORMED opinion!"....;)

    Nice Blog btw.

    Victor

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  12. How can you question the reputation of Anonymous? He has written some of the most beautiful melodies in the history of music!

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  13. George for Chrissake keep the hit hat on 2 and 4 so that good Republicans and John Birchers like Anonymous won't get upset
    Sincerely,
    Mike Clark

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  14. First of all, I would like to thank you for posting a thoughtful well written blog and not just a rant like so many out there. To get back to the original question I think this blog presents as to why people don't really like jazz is an extremely hard one to answer. Of course with everyone having different life experiences everyone's reason for liking or disliking something will inevitably be different. I think an overriding factor is the multitude of sounds that the word "jazz" has come to incorporate. It has been around for so long that everyone has a different opinion of what they expect to hear when told they will be listening to "jazz". I think this may be an important factor in the examples you stated above. Maybe the lady from the solo set had only heard Errol Garner and upon hearing those "haunting" Wayne melodies was thrown off. Obviously the drunk man, by requesting Mack the Knife, had his preconceived notions. So I think any performance billed as "jazz" is probably never going to please everyone there. But why do people feel the need to yell at the perform? Maybe cause they spent money and expected something else, or maybe it's just their own arrogance. They possibly feel that they need to educate the performer on what should be being played. I don't think everyone is like this though. At the clubs alcohol definitely plays a part in giving someone the confidence to go up to a performer and belittle them, just as it gives greasy dudes the confidence to try to pick up women. I've seen you play on number of occasions in New York City and must say your extremely talented. On a personal note I found this blog encouraging in that these type of experiences even happen to musicians of your caliber. I myself am nowhere near (and probably will never be) the level of capability you and the musicians you play with are at. I'm just another kid that moved to NYC and left after giving it a go and not really succeeding. But, after moving back to my midwestern city have been able to work and have run into the same type of people (can you say rednecks). So thanks for reminding me that this type of shit goes on everywhere and happens at all levels. Keep blogging.

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  15. You are arrogant especially in all the stuff you wrote. Get off your high horse please.

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  16. I will, Mr. Anonymous. Thanks for pointing that out. Maybe you'll enjoy my latest post (re: Duke Ellington and Jimmie Lunceford) more than the last. I'm just getting started, so hopefully you and other readers will give me a chance. If not, there are plenty of other blogs out there.

    Keep in mind, from this point on, if I feel like someone is posting something that is over the top offensive or attacking me personally, I reserve the right to delete the comment. I didn't think I was going to have to deal with this so early in the proceedings, but it's my blog so I don't think I should have to have people calling me names on a site which at this juncture is a labor of love. I welcome dissent, just don't be a jerk about it. And I'll do the same. Sometimes I get pretty worked up over things, but my goal with this site is CIVILIZED INTELLECTUAL DISCOURSE. And even if I might be critical, I want it to be fair fighting, NOT name calling.

    Cool? I hope so. Now, on to my interview with the great Lonnie Plaxico...

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  17. I can't wait to read this interview! so much more interesting than unfounded attacks on your character.

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  18. Maybe you could interview Anonymous.

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  19. In college I worked as a singing waiter on the Bay Lady, a lunch and dinner cruise ship in the Baltimore inner harbor. It was a great learning experience, working with the live bands, the first time I'd ever really been in that environment with talented professional musicians. (Can I count the times you played in the pit band for CHS drama productions, George?)

    We had a little cabaret show we performed nightly, with set lists drawn up by the band leader. During dinner the band would play standards. One night I noticed a passenger out on the stern deck, eating her dinner alone, leaning against the rail. "Is there a problem I can help you with?" I asked her. "You can make that horrible singer stop!" she said. "There's no way I can eat with that noise ruining my appetite."

    The singer, for the record, was a fabulous performer with a silky smooth voice and effortless technique. But something about her rubbed this passenger the wrong way, and the passenger had a strong emotional reaction. Who knows what baggage she brought with her that night.

    Most live performers have experienced someone come up after a show bursting with praise, unable to contain themselves, having enjoyed the show to an extreme degree, seemingly more than anyone else in the audience. Somehow they were touched and moved by something we did in a deep, meaningful way, and experienced true bliss. So I guess it's not unexpected that occasionally we'd trigger the opposite extreme.

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  20. Hi George


    We've never met but we've a lot of mutual friends in the music. Just discovered your blog and have really enjoyed reading all of your posts. I started my own blog because I felt there wasn't enough blogs out there written by working musicians, writing about the music - your blog really helps to redress that.

    In relation to this post, I don't think jazz is alone in receiving the 'worst music I ever heard' treatment - music is so personal and the backgrounds and experiences of listeners is so varied it's impossible to know what people are hearing when they listen to music. As a teenager with an evangelical streak as far as jazz was concerned I quickly learned to keep my opinions to myself! But I also noticed that others got similar abuse for liking music that was very different to jazz. As Homer Simpson says 'Rule No. 1 of the schoolyard is NEVER voice an opinion until you're sure everyone else agrees with you!'

    One final thing regarding comments - on Blogger you can moderate your comments before they're published, which is something I discovered on my own blog after several weird emails from 'anonymous' kinds of people. I almost never decide not to publish a comment unless it's obviously emanating from a crazy person, a stalker or it's spam. Another thing I won't do is publish anything from an anonymous source. If someone has an opinion let them identify themselves and stand over it.

    Look forward to reading more!

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  21. Love reading intellegent writing about the music. 95% is pure drivel.
    Thanks George

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  22. Long strings of commentary seem to follow you wherever you go, George. First Facebook, and now your blog. You're a buzz magnet. Ever think of getting into publicity? :P

    Looking forward to studying with you again in the fall...

    LJ

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  23. Late to the party, but this was great, and brought back many memories of my own (which are either painful or humorous or both, depending on my mood that day). My favorite was playing at a venue which had "jazz" in their name, and being asked at the break by a waitress, "Uh, can you guys play something jazzier? We usually have jazzier jazz."

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  24. hey dude, absolutely loving the blog. you may not remember me but we met briefly in montreal during the jazz festival this summer- i'm an alto player with kalmunity, where you and kendrick scott sat in.

    i hadn't realized that you played with gary thomas' band! i am a huge fan of his- discovered him through osby, who's my #1 guy. anyway, it's great to learn this as i thought i detected a bit of that sort of influence in your playing when you sat in, and even told someone that the bass line you started up on one tune was particularly cool and "very steve coleman-esque, which is wild because i don't think they're related but george has clearly done his homework". amazing to see that i was wrong and that you are in fact related to that circle- the approach is undeniable.

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  25. If you are talking about free jazz, I can understand people not getting it.It took me a short time to "get" and ultimately love Ornette and Ayler and others but I can see why some people never make the jump. It's difficult.

    But how they can listen to say, a standard from Duke's orchstra with a lovely solo by Hodges, and not dig it? I got into jazz via the Basie band and all those great bluesy riffs. Then in my adolescence, I discovered Miles electric stuff, fusion (chick corea and Weather Report and Mahavishnu Orch.)Guess what? The younger generation coming up didn't get soaked in blues based music like I did in the 60`s..Muddy Waters, the blues based British invasion, the Robert Johnson box set on Columbia that sold a million copies.


    There;s something in being able to feel the blues (IMO) that prepares you for the jazz experience. I think it was Wray Downes who told me that! He was in my small town of Sault Ste. Marie and we had a long chat during a break about why "I" liked jazz since I was seemingly a long haired head banger best suited for a Black Sabbath concert..hee hee..

    I think people just love to feel the beat. A lot of music hammers the beat out so that everyone can feel it easily but I almost always think it oppressive and soul-less. Not always as I do like some Mississippi hill country blues that employs that kind of metronome thing.

    Anyway, some not very coherent thoughts on jazz. It's a beautiful music with so many styles taht I don't understand why some people can't find pleasure in it. For some people. music is purely functionary. I need to dance. I want to bop my head. I want to cry in my beer to a country tune. All good and worthy things. But jazz can supply you with those things as well but perhaps you need to put a little more time into exploring it and thus appreciating it. Sadly I don't waste much time with people who aren't interested in it. I am not an evangelist.Life is too short and I need to get back to Louis playing "West End Blues" or Miles and group playing "Freedom Jazz Dance" or ....

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