The Independent Ear

Jazz Styles: a definitive jazz text

Posted on September 17, 2009 by The Independent Ear

 

Prentice Hall has released the 10th edition of Jazz Styles

 

Jazz Styles has long been one of the most concise, comprehensive and useful jazz text books.  Although the characterization here is of Jazz Styles as a textbook, it should certainly not be taken as some weighty, dry, academic tome to only be encountered by those to whom it has been assigned reading for some jazz course or other.  Jazz Styles is a very useful book for anyone wishing to explores the whys & wherefores of jazz, from both historical and stylistic perspectives.

 

True confession: I’ve employed the book very effectively for university jazz courses I’ve taught and referred it frequently to those I encounter who simply want to get a better grip on how jazz is made.  The author of Jazz Styles is Mark C. Gridley, a professor at Heidelberg College in Tiffin, OH who is also an accomplished flutist.  The 10th edition of Jazz Styles, which as with each subsequent edition since the first, has been suitably updated to reflect where jazz is at in 2009,  The book is accompanied by a comprehensive demo CD as well as the 6th edition of Mark’s companion book Concise Guide to Jazz, a particularly essential resource for teachers.

 

 

The 6th edition Concise Guide to Jazz

 

I’ve been fortunate to have known Cleveland’s own Mark Gridley for years so on the release of these new editions I reached out to him for his take on how Jazz Styles has endured through ten editions.

 

What have been your standard tweaks in subsequent editions through the years?

 

Certain processes have to be a part of each revision.  For instance, once we whet your appetite to hear a jazz giant we want to make sure you can actually get his best recordings.  The status of reissues is changing all the time, so Bill Anderson, my discographer of many years, verifies that all of the references to recordings are as current as possible; and there are over 500 footnotes to do this.

 

I am sad to say that many of the giants of jazz history are passing away, so part of my mission is to make sure the reader is aware of their passing by updating the book with accurate death dates.  Then I have the unhappy task of putting the paragraphs about them in the past tense.  I also spend a few months tweaking the phrasing of selected passages.

 

A pleasure for the researcher and jazz fan in me is always the process of adding names of new musicians who reflect the influence of the profiled figures, in order to put the new names in perspective and document the reach of the profiled figures.

 

Finally, I am also continually on the lookout for new or better photos of musicians.

 

What have been the major additions to the book, not just standard tweaks, over the years?

 

Little by little, over the past 9 editions, I’ve added more about the origination of the earliest jazz in New Orleans and the development of new styles elsewhere; these have included jazz-rock fusion, acid jazz, Klezmer jazz, Latin jazz, new age, and smooth jazz.  But most of all, adding recordings and listening guides have been the major additions with each successive edition.  For example, the first two editions didn’t come with recordings, so the serious student had to search for vinyl.  Remember, the first edition was published in 1978.  It did have listening guides, however, for selections on the Kind of Blue album by Miles Davis and a few classic Duke Ellington recordings, such as the 1940 "Cottontail" and "Take the ‘A’ Train."

 

The third edition in 1988 introduced an audiocassette that had 177 narrated demonstrations of instrument sounds and methods that musicians use to make jazz.  We called it the Jazz Styles Demonstration Cassette, and it eventually came out in CD format.  The fourth edition, which came out in 1991, added a 90-minute audiocassette of historic recordings along with minute-by-minute, solo-by-solo listening guides for most of its contents.  We called it the Jazz Classics Cassette. 

 

Successive editions have gone from cassette formats to CDs, from one CD of historic recordings to two CDs, to the new 10th edition which adds a third CD containing examples of styles ranging from hard bop to Latin jazz, jazz-rock fusion to Klezmer jazz, and ECM style to neoclassic jazz.  The 10th edition also includes 17 new listening guides, and we now have a DVD format for the Demonstration CD and another DVD that samples historic jazz films.  Who knows what technology may bring in the future?

 

Throughout the years I’ve been fortunate to have input from musicians, jazz historians, educators, and musicologists.  I’ve also been able to test my materials on students to make sure that what I’m trying to convey is as clear as possible.  I take all of their contributions into consideration each time I revise the book.  For example, analyzing the recordings to prepare 17 additional listening guides for the 10th edition required about a year of steady work with the aid of 11 consultants.  These helpers included musicians from my own bands, musicologists who specialized in the period or performer in question, and other jazz history instructors.  In some cases, I received assistance from the same musicians who played on the recordings that I was analyzing.  In a few very lucky cases I managed to obtain scores from the composers themselves.  After preliminary drafts were completed, I tested my new listening guides on non-musician students.  Then after crafting rewrites based on the reactions of the students, I submitted later drafts to eagle-eyed friends for two or three more rounds of copy edits and proof-readings.  Such proof-reading often led to more rewrites and further testing on students.

 

What is it about Jazz Styles that has made it such an enduring and valuable teaching tool?

 

Musicians, editors, instructors, and students have told me that the book is scholarly and user-friendly at the same time.  It seems to appeal to readers on every level from the complete novice to the jazz expert.  And although it’s marketed as a textbook, any individual who is interested in learning about jazz can use it without enrolling in a formal course.  When combined with the CDs, it can provide a self-paced introduction to jazz.

 

Teachers don’t want to be confined to teaching the material in one pre-determined way.  The omnibus format of the book is so flexible that a course can be designed around it in any number of different ways.  I’ve received a lot of feedback indicating that people who are knowledgeable about jazz agree with my choice of musical selections for the listening guides and CDs.  This means that regardless of whether you’re enrolled in a class or studying on your own, you have everything you need to get started without running around searching for classic recordings.

 

Many readers have said the writing "is so clear".  For example, in a course that requires Jazz Styles at Berklee College of Music one student told me that his instructor held the book up and told his class "I wish I was as organized as this guy is."  A number of readers have told me that they like how I put the giants in perspective by tallying the musical reasons they are important and documenting their influence by the "bloodlines."  Readers have said they like that I point out how each innovator has drawn from previous giants, and, as paraphrased here from Herbie Hancock’s Grammy acceptance speech, how "we stand on the shoulders of those who came before us."

 

Additionally, instead of focusing just on the soloists, my work is exceptional in directing listeners’ attention to the accompanying sounds in jazz, such as piano comping, bass lines, drumming figures and how they differ depending on whose hands they are in.  The goal of Jazz Styles is to develop a knowledgeable and appreciative listener.

 

For many this music we call jazz remains a bit of a mystery.  How have you gone about "demystifying" jazz through the various volumes of Jazz Styles?

 

Without insulting the reader’s intelligence, I start with the basics.  For example, I’ve got photographs of the various instruments and recorded examples of how each one sounds.  I take the time to explain how to count, keep track of measures, and follow the form of a tune.  Next, I provide an explanation and recorded examples for the roles of the different instruments in a group.  For those who want more technical information, it’s in the appendix of the book.

 

The listening guides throughout the book offer moment-by-moment accounts of what is happening in the music, how the players are responding to the form of the underlying composition and the unwritten rules of interactive performance.  My emphasis is always on listening to music.  One reviewer wrote that he was impressed that I urged readers initially to listen to the same piece five different times, each time paying attention to a different aspect.  I believe that the only way to become a skilled listener is to practice listening!

 

I strongly believe that the music is what’s important, which is why I don’t speculate about sociopolitical origins for the styles or gossip about the private lives of its creators.

 

What would be your recommendation for the most useful means of engaging this book to educate people who know nothing about jazz music?

 

First listen to the Demonstration CD’s 157 narrated examples of instrument sounds and the basic elements for making jazz.  Then coordinate that with studying Chapter 3: Appreciating Jazz Improvisation.  Listen to the historic recordings on the Jazz Classics CDs while following the book’s listening guides.  Listen to each one lots of times and give it a chance to "soak in."  Practice paying attention to the basic elements of jazz whenever you are listening to jazz recordings and live performances.  Don’t get discouraged if you don’t "get it" right away.  Fine music is an acquired taste, just like fine wine.  The more you listen, the more you understand, and the more you enjoy.

 

What do you foresee for an 11th edition of Jazz Styles?

 

Jazz is a continuously evolving art form.  Therefore, I am constantly on the lookout for new directions.  And occasionally a historic recording or document will come to light — like the Coltrane-Monk Carnegie Hall concert from 1957 that was "found" in 2005 — giving me something new from the past to share with my readers.  Jazz Styles will always be a work in progress.

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One Man’s take on the Jazz Audience Discussion

Posted on September 17, 2009 by The Independent Ear

 

The contributor of this piece is jazz activist Ron Washington.  Besides being a stalwart jazz diehard and tireless observer of the scene, he is proprietor of Ron "Slim" Washington Productions, which provides jazz and other music for festivals, clubs and restaurants.

 

Ron "Slim" Washington (with mic) onstage at one of his jazz productions

 

 

 

How Can a “Music of the Spirit” Die?

 

 

 

   Jazz is dead! Here we go again; i.e. the recent Wall Street Journal article by Terry Teachout declaring that no one is listening to jazz and featuring a prominent cartoon of a “black Jazz musician” being wheeled out on a cart speaks volumes to a continued bourgeois, arrogant Eurocentric lack of understanding of jazz.

 

 

 

   Mr. Treachout’s methodology is the classic case of someone going out to investigate the flowers, but never getting off the horse to “smell the flowers.” Hence the article is so “lightweight” I had to keep a paper-weight on it to keep it from elevating and floating away on its own. Put another way, as Amiri Baraka in his latest book “Digging” would say, “The lack of knowledge about America’s richest contribution to world culture is a reflection as well of the deadly ignorance which stalks this country from the New York City Hall to the halls of Congress to the corporate offices to academic classrooms, like a ubiquitous serial killer…”

 

 

   Treachout uses a number of useless (without context!) numbers from a National Endowment of the Arts survey to conclude that only those with their head in the sand cannot see a larger picture of “lack of mass support for jazz” leading to its demise. There were fewer people attending a jazz concert; the audience is (graying) growing older; older people are less likely to attend jazz performances today than yesterday; and the audience among college educated adults is also shrinking. On the surface, this kind of approach can scare or misinform a great many people into following the ever present “jazz is dead” attacks upon the music. This kind of approach is not the approach of someone who wants to help jazz survive, but one that serves to drive people away from exploring and learning about jazz.

 

 

   How about we come at the non arguable “less than healthy’ state of jazz another way? Once again we call on America’s foremost jazz critic for guidance. Why not investigate and raise the question as to the “domination of US popular culture by an outrageously reactionary commercial culture of mindlessness, mediocrity, violence and pornography means that it is increasingly more difficult for the innovative, serious, genuinely expressive, or authentically popular artist to get the same kind of production and the anti-creative garbage that the corporations thrive on.” (Digging, Amiri Baraka). I suggest that this is the inquiry that the Wall Street Journal should be making into the subject matter, the health state of jazz. But when you’re part of the problem, it’s difficult. From the standpoint of the WSJ, jazz’s mystery can/cannot be solved by market forces. “Look here are the numbers!”

 

 

   From the great work “Blues People,” to his other book, “Black Music,” and the latest contribution from the peoples’ critic, “Digging,” there is one thing that stands out. Amiri Baraka insists that the music, from blues to jazz, is a creation and reflection of the struggles of the Afro-American people. The music is an expression of a people’s culture and cannot be separated from such. Jazz, Afro-American in origin, universal in content and expression, is nonetheless tied to a people, expressing their greatest fears and joys, hopes for the future and repository of the past, that it can said, “the music is the people.” Hence the music can never die, because the people live. Bill Cosby is quoted in Digging as saying, “There’s a wonderful story I like to tell. It’s the end of the world…gray, blowing, turbulent… and there is this tombstone that says, ‘Jazz: It Broke Even!’ The music has its high and lows, but it can never die.”   

 

 

 

   Art is a reflection of a people’s culture. As Baraka says, “Whether African Song, Work Song, Spiritual, Hollers, Blues, Jazz, Gospel, etc., no matter the genre, the ideas contained in Afro-American art, in the main, oppose slavery and desire freedom.” (Digging). For jazz to die, the entire history and Afro-American people would have to die. This is the content that an interloper like Treachout cannot understand.

  

 

   But since jazz is what the great trumpet player Ahmed Abdullah calls, “the music of the spirit,” it can never die. While the WSJ declares jazz dead, refuses to get off the horse and smell the flowers, the music continues to thrive and fight for its life, for its expression. In New Jersey , new small clubs are opening up all over the place, anchored by Cecil’s in West Orange . You have the work of Newark’s own Stan Myers, who has run a successful Tuesday night Jam session at Crossroads for years;  Papillion, Skipper’s, the Priory, Trumpets, John Lee’s annual concerts in South Orange, and countless other venues all testify to the fact that the “spirit” is alive. 

  

 

    Jazz is not popular culture. To compare and demand that Jazz be equated with the lowest common denominator cultural expression, packaged for the most extreme exploitation by monopoly capitalism is to have no understanding of the music. By its very nature it is “rebel” music. Treachout complains that it is not the music of the masses, of the youth, as determined by corporate measuring sticks. Well of course. I like hip-hop but I’m not going to any concerts. That’s youth music. Not particularly challenging.

 

   When we say jazz is “a music of the spirit,” sitting in on a jazz program has the possibility of elevating the listener to heights never experienced by a poplar culture event. For many it is a shared communal experience, as witnessed by the common clapping in appreciation of a musical interlude, or the strictly individual experience of the music. Some can appreciate the full recipe of musical virtuosity on display, some may connect deeply in an emotional way with the music, some relate to the democratic display of the skills of the musicians, and some may not have liked the particular performance.

  

 

Amiri Baraka’s latest volume on jazz Digging

 

Ron Washington, September 10, 2009

blacktel4justice@gmail.com 

  

Posted in General Discussion | 5 Comments

The Artist’s responsibility

Posted on September 17, 2009 by The Independent Ear

The robust audience at the Arena stage at the Monterey Jazz Festival

 

Much has been written about the reportedly dwindling jazz audience recently, including several ‘oh jazz, ‘po jazz, woe is jazz…" red flag wavings and various gnashing of teeth.  (See elsewhere in The Independent Ear one writer’s righteous indignation over Terry Teachout waving that red flag and all but planting a R.I.P. sticker on the nearest jazz artist in the Wall Street Journal.)  All kidding aside (as Jon Hendricks would say "I’m only serious") we are simply not fully developing the potential audience for this music.  Teaching a jazz course for lay people (i.e. non-music students) at Kent State University titled Jazz Imagines Africa has been quite a view into some of the reasons we are failing to maximize the audience for jazz.  Each semester never fails to reveal just how many of my students are experiencing jazz for the first time; and for a majority of them their testimony indicates that the course has opened them up to a world of music they never knew previously!  Yes, our education system shares some blame here, perhaps the many excellent jazz educators in our community could and should do more to educate the non-music student populace on this music.  But a major share of the blame must go to the musicians.

 

Simply put, today’s musicians could do so much more to make jazz music more audience-friendly and be more welcoming towards their audiences, and by turns more inviting of that audience’s return to future performances.  Do you really think that arriving on stage carelessly dressed, bearing aloof expressions with an overall hipper-than-thou demeanor that suggests to the audience that is they who are truly privileged that you’ve consented to come down from on high and inform them of your glorious artistry, does anything for cultivating an audience!?  I can’t count the number of times my relative novice students write about how put-off they were by jazz musicians’ attitudes at performances they’ve attended on assignment.

 

Do you truly think that going a complete set without saying a mumbling word to your audience does anything to make that audience feel invited, welcome, or encouraged to continue supporting jazz?  I’m afraid Miles Davis ruined it for some musicians, suggesting that they could get away without saying a word to an audience for an entire performance.  Did you forget that Miles’ voice was shot and the audience probably wouldn’t have understood a damn thing he was saying anyway, so why bother?  On the other hand, is your voice shot?  If not, then why is it so burdensome and such a seeming chore for you to offer one word of explanation to your audience about the music you’re playing, much less introduce the members of your band in a welcoming way that enables them to at least feel as though they know you better?  Are you that aloof and disdainful of your audience that you would shoot yourself in the foot — and the art form — by being so seemingly dismissive of that audience?

 

Case in point, a recent performance by an exceptional band that was crackling and full of energy.  The artist’s manager introduced the band with copious remarks that bordered on babbling after awhile.  OK, so now we all knew who the players were…  The music was completely original and fresh, but the leader offered no words of introduction or explanation, barely even an acknowledgement that there was an audience in the house!  Do you suppose anyone who may have witnessed this artist for the first time was overly encouraged by this lack of information or interaction?

 

Programming is also a major concern as far as being welcoming of and informative towards your audience and keeping your set fresh.  Does every soloist in your band need to solo on every piece?  NO…  Should every soloist be presented in the same order on every piece?  Ho-hum… only if your aim is to anesthetize your audience…  That kind of presentation glazes an audience over pretty quickly; and one suspects that boring your audience is the last thing you set out to do.  But maybe not; that same set I mentioned in the last paragraph featured the band performing in the same soloist sequence ON EVERY PIECE!  Artists please… that becomes deadly counterproductive after awhile, even for folks so seemingly immersed in the music as the small coterie of cognoscenti I sat with that evening.  As I looked around the room at the remainder of the audience however I could see a lot of eyes glazed over, a lot of quizzical looks, a lot of ‘I can’t wait until this is over’ or ‘what the hell is this’ looks. 

 

Yes, a huge measure of the jazz audience development responsibility falls directly on the shoulders of the practitioners of this great art form… the musicians!

 

Anyone wishing to take up the matter of jazz audience development in any kind of extended way beyond the Comments box below is invited to do so.  Hit me back at willard@openskyjazz.com.

Posted in The Tip | 5 Comments

Ancient Future – the radio program 9/17/09

Posted on September 17, 2009 by The Independent Ear

Ancient Future is produced & hosted by Willard Jenkins for WPFW 89.3 FM, 50,000 watt Pacifica Radio in Washington, DC.

 

ARTIST            TUNE                ALBUM TITLE            LABEL

 

3RD Thursday special: Jazz in South Africa

Nancy Jacbs & Her Sisters    Meadowlands    Soweto Blues    Sheer

Voice        Scullery Department        Soweto Blues        Sheer

Bheki Mseleku    Homeboyz        Timelessness        Verve

Bheki Mseleku    Yukani (Wake Up)    Timelessness    Verve

McCoy Mrubata    Amasabekwelangeni        Hoelykit?        Sheer

McCoy Mrubata    Romeo & Alek Will Never Rhyme        Hoelykit?    Sheer

Simphiwe Dana    Sizophum elokuluami        On Bantu Biko Street    Gallo

Bheki Mseleku        Closer to the Source        Celebration        World Circuit

McCoy Mrubata/Greg Georgiades    Rasta of the Burning Sands    Vivid Afrika    Sheer

Simphiwe Dana    Troubled Soldier    Zandisile    Gallo

Simphiwe Dana    Tribe                    Zandisile    Galla

 

Soundviews Feature new release

Robert Glasper     No Worries        Double Booked    Blue Note

Robert Glasper    Open Mind        Double Booked    Blue Note

Robert Glasper    4Eva                Double Booked    Blue Note

Robert Glasper    South                Double Booked    Blue Note

 

What’s New: the new release hour

U.O. Project        The Maestro Blues    It’s Time For U     (No Label)

Marc Courtney Johnson    Brand New Day    Dream of Sunny Days    (No Label)

Marcus Strickland    You’ve Got it Bad Girl    Idiosyncracies    Strick Muzik

John Beasley        Shatita Boom Boom    Positootly!    Resonance

Matt Wigler        Boogie Au Privave    Epiphony    Vista

Mark Levine and the Latin Tinge        Kathy    Off & On         Left Coast Clave

Kobie Watkins    Third Pew    Involved        Origin

Pete Rodriguez    My Patience    Alchemist    Conde Music

 

Contact:

Willard Jenkins

Open Sky

5268-G Nicholson Lane

#281

Kensington, MD 20895

Posted in Playlists | 2 Comments

Is your artist website truly useful, or a waste of space?

Posted on September 15, 2009 by The Independent Ear

My good friend and colleague Sara Donnelly (who many in the jazz community may remember as the former Sara Warner), has matriculated through the National Endowment for the Arts, worked at the late National Jazz Service Organization,  and later the Association of Performing Arts Presenters, currently runs the JazzNext funding initiative for the Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation in Baltimore.  Sara has always been one of the keenest observers of the jazz scene and the jazz condition that I know, and one whose first concern is always the plight of the artists.  Sara recently forwarded me an excellent blog post titled The Jazz Challenge (www.fistfulayen.com/blog) that I highly recommend you check out.

 

In that blog the author takes jazz artists to task for being so far behind the tech curve of their peers in other performing arts, particularly pop music.  The suggestions in that blog are quite pragmatic and wouldn’t necessarily require huge cash outlays or arduous hard work on the part of artists with web sites.  I have to concur with The Jazz Challenge’s contentions as I surf the growing universe of jazz artist web sites.  I cannot tell you how many jazz artist web sites are hopelessly deficient and outdated (I went to one just today that boasted a blog… the most recent blog post was from 2005!!!), and as presently constituted a complete waste of the artists’ money.  Many are thoroughly deficient in user friendly information, lacking certain essential information, and completely sans interactive capabilities which might entice and invite future fans. 

 

 In a curious head-scratching twist I have yet to figure out, it seems many jazz musicians work hard to keep their direct contact information private, as though they were some high-level politician or celebrity with security concerns!  This is your public face dude/dudette, let folks know how to reach you for God’s sake!  Yeah, your manager, agent or even your publicist’s information might be useful when I’m wearing my concert/festival presenter’s hat, but exactly how many such people do you think surf your site?  Most folks who go to your site would find some simple contact information DIRECTLY TO YOU to be quite useful.  What have you got to lose by posting a simple email contact address on your web site?  It doesn’t even have to be your primary and largely private email address; get a gmail or hotmail account for free!  Are you afraid some groupee might put a hit out on you?  Come on folks, get real with the contact information, get interactive with your fans and potential audience, and be more forthcoming with your information and more up-to-date with what’s going on with your career! I recently wanted to send a simple complimentary, encouraging note to a certain singer whose spouse is a high profile bassist and the email address listed on her web site bounced back!  So, you’ve got a brand new record out and nowhere for folks to contact you directly! 

 

One of the blogger’s citations at www.fistfulayen.com/blog dealt with certain artists’ crying lack of a web presence.  One such artist was  Wayne Shorter, who doesn’t appear to have a web presence for crying out loud!  I’ve recently been in the midst of endeavoring to communicate with a certain hall-of-fame level jazz artist about a concert opportunity and since his web site is so thoroughly lacking in contact information, I’ve been referred to his My Space page of all juvenalia!  I asked Sara Donnelly for her follow-up thoughts on this issue and here’s what she wrote:

 

No Wayne Shorter website?

 

"An artist of Wayne Shorter’s stature can choose whatever he’d like in the way of promoting himself, but the best way to go is to be on top of best business practices that popular culture relies on.  Artists should have high-end websites, period, because that will often be where any interested party goes first.  Someone mentioned Wayne not having a site is like Springsteen not having a site.  But take the comparision to the arts world, and say the same for [choreographers] Merce Cunningham or Paul Taylor [who are pretty much to their dance world what Wayne Shorter is to the jazz world] not having sites… their sites exist and are of high quality.  Jazz should represent the same way, and artists need to look at the bigger picture when they fear how much an initial set-up costs.  Those costs will be more than paid for in the future."

                                        — Sara Donnelly, Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation

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