Jazz Continuum workshop notes – John Hibbard

Hi All,

Thanks for listening and kudos to you for following up on these notes…

How to be a jazz musician:

Listen

Play with others

Practice

Compose

Transcribe

-Choose your favourite musician and be like them. Play like them, be serious like them. Be creative and switched on like them. Fake it ’til you make it. When you’re starting out, it’s hard to know what to play when you get a solo. Well, play how xxx would play. If you can’t think of anyone to pretend to be, you’re not listening enough.

-When playing a solo:

WHAT you are playing is less important than,

WHEN you’re playing, that is, the groove and rhythmic vocabulary you bring to your solo, and

HOW you’re playing, that is expressive techniques (often mimicking vocal effects)

A real jazz musician can tell within a few notes whether you understand jazz with the above points. Any hip jazz musician can play a swinging one note solo. Try it. Get good at it. IT will bring you closer to jazz. And how does one know WHEN to play? Well, it’s terrifically hard, if not impossible, to notate groove, so you’ll just have to LISTEN like crazy.

-Become conversant in jazz. ie. Have something to talk about with your fellow enthusiasts. You can never know enough about the minutia of jazz, from rhythmic, harmonic or melodic elements, through to gear, famous concerts, albums and of course players.

-Defer to your elders but remember, they can show you only how to play their music, not your own.

-Don’t forget jazz is a small part of all music. Value and include all the music you love in your music making. Radiohead digs Miles Davis. You dig Miles Davis. Why not dig Radiohead?

-Listen to the most important artists of jazz:

This is by no means exhaustive. Start here and then explore wildly.

Louis Armstrong (Hot Fives and Sevens)
Charlie Parker/Dizzy Gillespie (Live at Massey Hall, Bird with Strings) (who dug Stravinsky, who dug Gershwin, who dug Benny Goodman, etc. etc.)
Miles Davis (Kind of Blue, Miles Smiles)
John Coltrane (A Love Supreme, Crescent)

and also:

Duke Ellington
Thelonius Monk
Charles Mingus
Ornette Coleman

and today:

Kurt Rosenwinkel (guitar)
Brad Mehldau (piano) (who digs Radiohead, who dig Miles Davis who dig… you get the idea…)
Nils Wogram (trombone)
Wynton Marsalis (trumpet)
Joe Lovano (saxophone)

…and anyone else who floats your boat. Especially anyone who floats your boat.

-Be nice to people with money. Hopefully your parents can support you. If you are sufficiently attractive and exceptionally talented and promising you may attract the enthusiasm of a rich benefactor. This is possible, but so unlikely as to not be counted on at all. Jazz is now a middle and upper-middle class domain. Who else can afford to do something so self indulgent?! It requires a huge investment of time and money. But offer them a solid return on your investment. Be poor, humble, sensitive, fleet fingered and beautiful on the horn. Be totally exceptional and all the money will be worth it. Less than totally, however, and you may have some explaining to do.

-Jazz is an aural and oral tradition. You will not learn it from a book. You will not learn it from reading and playing big band charts. You will learn it by listening to the myriad recordings, from hanging out with musicians, attending concerts, and now, from watching video on the internet:

youtube

vimeo

itunes

emusic

thebadplus.typepad.com

Start adventuring on these sites immediately. There has never been a more powerful tool for the learning of jazz. There is no longer any excuse to be anything less than completely hip to what jazz is. It’s all on the net, most of it’s free and the rest of it is exceptionally cheap.

I repeat:

YOU WILL NOT LEARN TO PLAY JAZZ UNLESS YOU LISTEN TO JAZZ.

It is not like classical music. It is an aural (listen to the records!) and oral (hunt down every jazz musician older than you and listen to what they play, how they play etc. Don’t be shy.) tradition.

Being a jazz musician in Sydney, today:

Most of the time, you probably won’t be performing as a jazz musician, alas. Jazz is not a wildly popular music and never has been. In the olden days musicians did a great variety of jobs that are now mostly performed by CD players, DJs and computers. They played “their music”, jazz, after work, in little clubs, for themselves. They were, however able to work full time as a musician, in ,much the way a plumber or electrician might today.

Since you won’t be playing jazz, make sure you know how to play your instrument exceptionally well, be able to read music and be able to comport yourself with dignity. Get a cool haircut and wear cool clothes (whatever they are!). You will need to be a jazz musician in disguise. You will have to practice your jazz skills with great stealth, because as previously stated, jazz isn’t very popular.

The skills of a jazz musician, however, are quite useful:

-virtuosic on instrument

-excellent relative pitch (interval recognition, melodic and rhythmic dictation)

-adventurous and creative musical mind

-deep theoretical knowledge (calligraphy, harmony, arranging)

-omnivorous and educated musical tastes

-a deep appreciation for groove

The only disadvantage a jazz musician presents to any potential employer is their very desire, to solo over everything, to play the cleverest harmonic and rhythmic material they can think of. So button it up, and save it for…

The few jazz gigs there are in Sydney:

Jazzgroove

SIMA

…um

Gigs come and go in this town, but Jazzgroove and SIMA have been kicking for a long time and shall continue to. Through your relationships with your fellow enthusiasts you will quickly know of any new jazz venture.

Well, I’ve exhausted myself. I hope it is coherent and inspiring. I am available for lessons, where you would receive weekly variations on the above forever.

Cheers,

John Hibbard

The Showdown (Mondays, Noon – 2pm)