Just came from the Peter Erskine Trio concert at Jimmy Mak's. I wanted to stay for the second set, but my wife Kerry and I are exhausted due to the fact that our son Liam figured out how to get out of his crib; therefore, he gets up at 4 or 5 in the morning and comes in our room to try out some of his new words, like "bicycle." That aside, the first set was really world class. Erskine is a legend and has had a wonderful career as a leader and as a sideman. I first heard him with Maynard Ferguson and Weather Report, and then enjoyed his trio with pianist John Taylor and bassist Palle Danielsson. Tonight was my first time seeing him live, and it was very educational, as well as enjoyable.
Damian Erskine
The trio included Erskine's nephew Damian Erskine on electric bass and Armenian-born Vardan Ovsepian on piano. Erskine is teaching adjunct at PSU, so he has a major influence on the many electric bassists whom I come into contact with around the school. Erskine has blazing fast technique on his 6 string bass, but it never sounds awkward; indeed, his solos are rather lyrical and smooth. His timekeeping is solid, also, and he and his uncle Peter had a great connection. I would imagine that Erskine would be pretty easy to play with; for some reason, I never realized just how consistent Peter Erskine's time is. Many jazz drummers are very loosey-goosey with the time, and favor feeling over precision. I was impressed with Erskine's ability to make it "feel" good and metronomic simultaneously throughout the concert.
Pianist Ovsepian also impressed me. His solo on the first tune of the night, "Every Tomorrow" showed his classical piano pedigree; he has a lot of facility, a beautiful warm touch, and a lot of inventiveness.
Vardan Ovsepian
Later in the show, they performed a re-harmonization of Rodgers and Hammerstein's "I've Never Been In Love Before", which gave a very moody treatment to a song which I am accustomed to hearing in a much more lighthearted way. Ovsepian was featured a great deal during the the set, but he never showed off or tried to upstage the two Erskines that he shared the stage with. He seems like a real team player.
Erskine is incredibly tasteful, which is probably why he's had such a great career. Sometimes, I was hoping for a little more aggressiveness from the drums, but the more I listened, the more Erskine's drumming aesthetic made sense with the compositions. But Erskine played solos on almost every tune, except that his solos were extremely well crafted, as well as showing a great deal of dynamic control and technical agility. I started to wonder if I would ever get a chance to play with Erskine(maybe I'll have to bug Damian to put a trio session together, ha ha).
The music was mostly from the trio's new recording entitled "Joy Luck" and it is available on Itunes and Amazon. It's a great disc and a great band; hopefully, they'll be in your town soon. I was sort of wishing that more of the PSU drummers had attended the concert, because they would have learned a
lot about musical drumming. (This just in: I was told by a Canadian friend of mine that Neil Peart, the God of Canadian Rock Drumming was taking lessons from Erskine a few years back. You can read a little about what Peart had to say about that HERE on Peart's blog. He even talks about his love of Jack DeJohnette, which I can definitely relate to.....)
It's weird. I don't really consider myself a pop music person at all. However, I do remember spending Sunday afternoons in the 80's with my sister listening to Casey Kasem count down the Top 40 on the radio. I didn't buy too many of those pop albums, but my sister had some of them. I was more into jazz and classical music; however, if you are a high school student in any era, it's hard to avoid the "music of your generation". Now, like anybody who hears music from their youth, I get nostalgic when I hear Michael Jackson, or Duran Duran, or Prince, or Tears for Fears, or any of the one hit wonders from that era. But, even though I actually liked some of these songs at the time, I was still a bit of a snob. Though now, some of the 80's pop music could be considered high art compared to today's songs.(I mean 80's songs had INTROS, instrumental INTROS, for crying out loud. And sometimes, they even had cheesy tenor saxophone solos. Do any songs on the radio now have instrumental SOLOS? I'd like to know...)
Makes any music sound GREAT!
Furthermore, as a working adult, it's now actually easy to avoid that stuff. (See my anecdote about my Dad who had never heard of Cyndi Lauper, under "Blue Skies"...) I thought I was somewhat out of the loop, but not completely. Again, much of what I hear these days on the radio is really not listenable to me. I will give anything a chance, but my patience wears thin. I guess if you are high on ecstasy and/or absinthe, gyrating around one of those boom sic boom sic clubs at 3 in the morning, then songs don't have much need to be listenable. I have no problem with music that is only dance oriented. But can we also have music that is popular, danceable, and listenable? Is that too much to ask of the music industry?
Last week, my father-in-law was in Portland for a visit. He had rented a car, so we were driving to Toys-R-Us to get some toys and such for my son Liam. Mr. Politzer had set the Sirius station to Pop, and most of the music, which came to us via satellite, was horrendous. And then this song called "Someone Like You" came on, and I said, "Who is THAT?" I had never heard the song. And Mr. Politzer, who I don't think of as a musician at all, said,"that's Adele, she's the hottest thing in the music industry right now." And then it sort of rang a bell; another recent hit of hers (that melodically almost sounds like "Crazy" by Cee-Lo) called "Rolling In the Deep" I had heard before. But this song, "Someone Like You" was extremely refreshing in it's only-vocals-and-piano acoustic purity, something you rarely hear nowadays. Not only is Adele's contralto voice really rich and distinctive (also something you don't hear much on the radio, what with everything auto-tuned and robotic sounding), but the message of the song really struck me. If you've ever loved and lost (which I assume is a universal, unless you married your high school sweetheart and lived happily ever after, or you are a robot...), then you can feel Adele's pain.
Soon to Be Released in Canada.....
Those of you who DON'T live in the ivory tower of snobby musical academia are probably saying, "Ugh, we heard that song when it came out, liked it, and now we are sick of it. Get with the program." OK, don't be a jerk about it! In my defense, when the song came out in January of this year, I was living in Winnipeg, in Canada! They JUST got Michael Jackson's "Thiller" up there. I think next year, they are FINALLY getting Phil Collins "No Jacket Required".....Public Enemy's "Fear of A Black Planet" is probably still 10 years away from being released. ( I joke with my friends in the North, but they have a lot of rules concerning a certain amount of Canadian Content in their broadcasting, which is apparently why you cannot watch HULU in Canada. It's a quota system; supposedly no Canadians listened to Canadian music before 1971, when the Canadian Content system that, yes, they call MAPL(like the maple leaf, groan....), went into effect. They should have waited a few years, when the band RUSH became popular; then they would have something Canadian to listen to.....)
Indeed, anything very popular in the world nowadays has a pretty short shelf life, due to the constant media saturation of youtube and the internet. I read this about "Someone Like You" on Wikipedia:
"The song was banned from being played in the Opus ii store in Dublin because the workers were tired of customers trying to play the song on their keyboards.The workers put a sign on the store which stated "Strictly NO Adele". A shop assistant said "It's become the piano equivalent of 'Stairway To Heaven'. Everyone thinks they can play it. The sign was a bit of a joke, but the song can drive you mad." Joanna Corscadden, an assistant manager at the shop said: "It is a very popular song, and it gets played over and over again. You get sick of songs when you hear them so often. So after hearing the same song played about four to five times in about half an hour, one staff member put up a sign stating 'strictly no Adele'. We will remove it if people are genuinely offended by it but people are still entitled to play, and they are continuing to do so. They [customers] called us piano shop fascists but did not get the correct name of our shop."
The competition for people's attention is astounding, and because entertainment is so instantaneous, it's a wonder that any song can capture anyone's attention for more than 5 minutes before some video of a Indonesian orangutan doing bong hits and dancing to becomes the talk of the global village. However, Adele's song is still a popular song (hence the "Strictly No Adele" policy in the Dublin music shop, ha ha). What struck me was that I'm supposed to be a music teacher, and I was completely unaware of one of the most popular songs of the year. How did this happen? Why is there such a disconnect between music teachers and popular music?
There is a book I read a long time ago called "Highbrow/Lowbrow:The Emergence of Cultural Hierarchy in America" by Lawrence Levine, which talks about how between the 19th century and the later 20th century, the lines we re drawn between art for the masses and art for the elites. I think the effects of these lines are more prevalent than ever. Unfortunately, the definition of "elite" has changed. There was a time when the monied class was expected to have high cultural standards-expected to read certain books, to go to the symphony, to see certain plays. I think that idea has been dead for a long time. I question whether the Wall Street elites support the symphony, or go to museums, or read anything besides "The Seven Habits Of Highly Effective People". I'm not convinced that they listen to jazz; if so, jazz clubs would be booming and all the jazz musicians I know would be working 6 nights a week!
I think you could make a case that the elite culture and the mass culture have almost reversed, in a sense. When we think of intellectuals, we think of starving artists, or music students, or college professors, jazz musicians. Most in that group are not out clubbing with Paris Hilton. People like Hilton, with more money that God, are out spending their inherited cash, listening to the lowest of the lowbrow music there is. (I have not done the research, this is just a conclusion I have arrived at off the top of my head. Maybe I'll do my Doctoral Thesis on The Reversal Of The Cultural Elite in America. Yeah, that sounds scholarly....)
I'm constantly questioning the importance and relevance of my art and my teaching. I don't want to stay in the ivory tower all the time. I want to know what goes on in the real world, for better or for worse. We have known for a long time that the majority of music students don't make it in music. Why not? Is it because of the industry? Or is it because we as music teachers have our heads in the sand? I and most other music teachers teach what they know. Much of what I know comes from when I came on the jazz scene in the late 1980's and moved to New York in the mid 90's. The music scene, industry, whatever you want to call it, is in comparison almost unrecognizable now. So why should I continue to teach as if nothing has changed? How much of a dinosaur do I want to be?
"Yeah, my teacher is making me play this Lady Gaga song on my recital...."
Now, I do believe that students have to know the basics. I believe that if a music student can learn jazz,learn to read music, and develop their ears and technique on their instrument, that they theoretically can play anything. However, I want students to have an awareness of any and every avenue for success. Does this mean that we have to start teaching Adele songs, or God help me, Lady Gaga songs? I can't say for sure. In any case, I want to somehow bridge the gap between the study of music and the real music world. I think that is important, if music schools are going to continue to exist.
News, lads! My 22nd as a leader, is available on Itunes. It's called "Living For The City", and it features me on piano(duh!), Josh Ginsburg on Bass, and EJ Strickland on drums. It's on the Steeplechase label, a company based in Denmark. I've had a pretty long association with Steeplechase and it's proprietor, Nils Winther. I've lost track of how many I have recorded for Winther, but you can actually count as well as buy them on Itunes.
Here's a long boring story that goes nowhere: I actually did my first recording for Steeplechase in 1995, my first year in New York City! It came about due to a last minute cancellation by a well known pianist(I changed his name for the story). I was home from one of my first extended European tours, jet lagging pretty hard. It was 7pm, and I was ready to go to sleep. Just as I'm dozing off, I get a phone call from tenor saxophonist Jed Levy. "Harry Phillips didn't show up for my recording; can you be at Sound on Sound Studios in midtown in an hour?" I was in Brooklyn, and I knew I could be there, but I was afraid that Phillips might show and then I would have been dragged out of bed for nothing. "Can I get 100 bucks for my trouble?" Levy agreed and I threw on some clothes and ran to the subway. I made it to the studio, and sure enough, Phillips was not there. I met Winther, bassist Ron McClure, and drummer Gerry Gibbs. I sightread the music, and within 5 hours, we had finished a recording. Winther told me that Phillips was supposed to record a trio date in two days, and would I like to record a trio date of my own? That's what led to my first CD, "Activism", featuring Dwayne Burno on bass and Ralph Peterson on drums.
It's interesting, a decade and a half later,what has changed and what hasn't. Steeplechase records two CDs per studio day, so we usually don't expect more than 5 hours to make a 60 minute CD. It's a bit on the pressure side of things, but after years of doing Cds this way, I'm accustomed to it. It's a different mentality; it's nothing like doing pop recording, where you piece stuff together and spend hours trying to get the perfect take and so forth. It's almost like a live gig: whatever comes out is what goes on the recording. I like to try for one take if possible. It's actually a somewhat pure, honest way of recording. My first CD took 5 or 6 hours, probably because I was nervous. Now, 15 years later, I try to be done in 2 to 3 hours if possible.
"Living For The City", recorded in December of 2010, is a snapshot of a working trio; I've done a lot of gigs with Ginsburg and Strickland over the past few years. I picked music that was simple and spontaneous, music that we could just play and get a vibe. Good thing, too, because I was really sick while recording this. I think I had some kind of food poisoning, in addition to a bad cold, and it wasn't helped by the fact that my son Liam still wasn't sleeping through the night. I was taking a lot of Nyquil in order to sleep, and I had been out the night before recording with Greg Tardy(his new CD is called "Monuments", also available on Itunes). The studio was in New Jersey, and I and my family were staying on the Upper East Side. Josh Ginsburg was supposed to pick me up, and I slept through my alarm and Ginsburg's phone calls. Finally, somehow, I woke up, ran down to Ginsburg's car, and we made it to New Jersey just in time for the start of the recording.
I'm happy with how the CD came out. If you'd like to get a preview of what this trio sounds like, here are a few youtube links. I hope you'll be motivated to download the CD from what you hear on these clips.
Shameful Self Promotion Time! Here are some upcoming gigs that I will be frequently reminding people about:
November 10th PSU Noontime Concert featuring Guitar Hero and The Colligan Men November 28th PSU Jazz Night featuring PSU Big Band and Combos 7pm in LH 75
December 13th George Colligan's Portland Debut at the Mission Theater
December 17 George Colligan Quartet at Jazzway in Baltimore
December 21st George Colligan Trio at Cornelia St Cafe in New York
January 8th George Colligan with Jack DeJohnette at the Blue Note NYC
The concerts on the 10th will be in Lincoln Hall on the PSU Campus in LH 75 at NOON, HIGH NOON. The 10th features Guitar Heroes, which is a group consisting of four, yes four guitars and rhythm section. The 10th will also feature The Colligan Men, which is another ensemble I've been working with that is on the advanced side of things.
The PSU Jazz Night on the 28th (7pm in LH 75) will feature the PSU Big Band, which I and Charley Grey have been working with this term. Also featured will be the Bebop Ensemble, the Hard BopEnsemble, the Contemporary Ensemble, and the Park Avenue Trio. There might be some surprise guests(time permitting...)
December 13th is a big one; this is my debut concert as a leader in Portland. Here is some of the official P.R. from PDX Jazz:
Pianist George Colligan To Make Portland Debut
PDX Jazz @ The Mission Theater
December 13 @ 8pm
NY Transplant and PSU Professor to Perform Originals and
the Works of Piano Icon Andrew Hill
PSU Students and Faculty Receive $2 Off At The Door With I.D.
PDX Jazz, the presenting organization of the Portland Jazz Festival in partnership with the Mission Theater, along with The Crystal Hotel and our media sponsor KMHD Radio, is set to present the final PDX Jazz @ The Mission Theater show of 2011 with George Colligan on Tuesday, December 13th at 8pm. Colligan, who joined the music faculty at PSU this fall, will be joined by: guitarist Dan Balmer, bassist Eric Gruber, drummer Todd Strait, and special guest pianist Kerry Politzer. The esteemed composer, Colligan, will also play trumpet and melodica on original compositions for this debut performance, in addition to performing compositions by the late pianist and former PSU Professor, Andrew Hill.
Colligan earned a reputation as an elite session performer and sideman in the New York area during the late 1990s; appearing on upwards of 100 CDs.Most recently Colligan has toured and performed with artists such as Cassandra Wilson, Miguel Zenon, Don Byron, Gary Bartz, Jack DeJohnette, Michael Brecker, Ravi Coltrane, and many others.He is a Chamber Music America/Doris Duke Foundation grant recipient who just released his 22nd recording, Living For the City.Colligan was a faculty member at the Julliard School for two years and an assistant professor at the University of Manitoba for two years before moving to Portland. Colligan enthused, “I am very excited to join the PSU Jazz Department Faculty. So far, everything has been great. I love the University, the community, and Portland as a city could not be more perfect.”
Concerning Andrew Hill, Colligan remarked, “he was an important and unique figure as a composer and pianist. More young jazz musicians should be aware of him. I hope that this concert will spark some renewed interest in his music.“ Hill became one of the most prominent jazz pianists of the 1960s; playing with central figures of the era like: Roland Kirk, Elvin Jones, Freddie Hubbard, Tony Williams, Eric Dolphy, Joe Henderson, Bobby Hutcherson, among countless others. Hill recorded many classic albums for the Blue Note label and was the only artist to record for the storied imprint on three separate occasions.In the 70s Hill moved to Portland where he taught as an associate professor at PSU, and established a summer jazz-intensive program.
Colligan plays in a style that is down-to-earth, technically gifted and impressively improvisational.Some of his influences include Miles Davis, Chick Corea, McCoy Tyner, Wayne Shorter, Thelonious Monk, and Herbie Hancock.
“As a creative artist, he’s really up there…. In terms of technique, knowledge of music and improvisational creativity, there aren’t a whole lot of cats from his generation that are any better than him. As a matter of fact, I can’t think of any.” – Don Braden in a blindfold test for JazzTimes.
I will be reminding my readers of these events; hopefully it won't get too annoying......
These days, aspiring jazz drummers check out, in no particular order, Elvin Jones, Tony Williams, Jeff Watts, Brian Blade, Bill Stewart, and Eric Harland(there used to be a hilarious Jazz Robots video about Harland but I'm unable to locate it.). And maybe they check out Jack DeJohnette, Max Roach, Art Blakey, Ralph Peterson, and Lenny White. One drummer I think gets left out of the curriculum is Billy Higgins. Playing the drums musically means playing good time and serving the music; Higgins did just that, which is why he played on 700 recordings as a sideman. You may know him from Cedar Walton's Eastern Rebellion:
However, Higgins played on many of the pivotal Ornette Coleman recordings, as well as tons of classic Lee Morgan, Dexter Gordon, and Hank Mobley recordings. Lee Morgan said of Higgins, "He never overplays, but you always know he's there." Higgins' ride cymbal beat is fairly identifiable: it's more straight in the eighth notes than somebody like Jimmy Cobb or Ben Riley(two other underrated drummers in the jazz edumacational world).
My favorite Billy Higgins appearances are the following odd mix: Herbie Hancock's "Takin' Off", Charles Lloyd's "Hyperion With Higgins", Lee Morgan's "The Sidewinder", John Scofield's "Works For Me", and of course any of the Eastern Rebellion stuff.(I like the stuff with George Coleman and Bob Berg.)
Cedar Walton, WITH a shirt on....
I was fortunate to have one opportunity to record with Higgins. Years ago, Higgins was a guest on a recording by vocalist Vanessa Rubin, who I had been working with steadily for a number of years. Rubin had gotten the great Cedar Walton to write some arrangements for the album.(Which was another cool experience; getting to meet Cedar Walton. Rubin and I went over to Walton's apartment in Brooklyn to check out the arrangements. I was struck by the fact that Walton came to the door shirtless, because the air conditioning was on the fritz and it was a muggy New York City summer. I thought back to my first hearings of Walton and learning many of his great tunes, never expecting to meet him in the first place, and never thinking I would meet him at his door shirtless. Walton sat at the piano, played through his arrangements, and then said, "Why don't you give it a try?" That's the New York Pressure for you: where else do you meet the greats and then have to sit down in front of them and play?)
Two things that were really amazing about that session (at least concerning Higgins. What was also amazing was when the producer of the recording, John Clayton, during a break in the action, picked up Richie Goods bass and flawlessly fired off the double bass excerpt from Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. Impressive, to say the least). One was that Higgins never looked at the charts of Walton's arrangements, but after one run through, had all the hits nailed. I suppose all those years of playing with Walton gave Higgins a sense of where the music will most likely go. I suppose musicians who play together for 30 years are like an old married couple, finishing each other's sentences.....
The other thing that was amazing to me was when Higgins started singing. Again, during a break, I was messing around with Cedar Walton's waltz entitled "Clockwise". Higgins ran over to the piano and started singing these marvelous lyrics, very operatically, and doing an elegant dance around the studio. I was really impressed. I asked Higgins, " Who wrote those amazing lyrics?" He replied, " I did. Just now....."
Here's an interview with Higgins, who passed all too young while waiting for a liver transplant:
I got the chance to interview the great Kevin Hays for jazztruth two summers past, and it was really a hit.(You can go back and read it if you like!) Hays has always been an inspiration to me as a player, and he is starting to do more as a teacher as well. He's been doing some workshops in New York, and this is something he just sent out regarding an event taking place next weekend:
Dear Friends:
I am presenting a workshop this coming Saturday, November 5th from 2:30-5:30 in partnership with The Church Street School for Music and Art located at 74 Warren Street in Tribeca.
Participants may also take part in the workshop via Skype if you are outside of the NYC area and are unable to attend in person. Please follow the link below to register and for more information.
I am very happy to begin partnering with the Church Street School as a new member of their faculty and I look forward to working with you all, be that in private lessons, as part of this workshop series, or on the bandstand!
Hays has many recordings as a leader available, and he's well recorded as a sideman. Here's a little youtube sample if you are completely unfamiliar with this great pianist. It's from his third Blue Note release called "Andalucia", which features Ron Carter on bass and Jack DeJohnette on drums. You can buy this CD on Amazon by clicking this link:http://www.amazon.com/Andalucia-Kevin-Hays/dp/B000005H8Z/ref=ntt_mus_dp_dpt_2 http://kevinhays.com/
