Hi gang. Hope everyone is healthy and feeling inspired. I have to say that I feel more inspired than I have in a long time. For the first time in my life I have had the opportunity to play every night for a month in a row. Man, there is no better way to get one's chops and connection with the instrument together than to do this. We left June 31st for Tbilisi in ex-Soviet Georgia (Phil Markowitz, Jay Anderson, and John Riley). Our reception there was overwhelming! People were such great listeners, and appreciated the music so much. Givi, the big band leader of the Tbilisi Concert Jazz Orchestra transcribed 10 of my big band arrangements (with all the right notes!!) and even made some very hip alterations of the arrangements. What an honor! I was almost in tears. We played two concerts with quartet there and joined the big band as well.
Next we were off to Berne, Switzerland, and did a residency at George Robert's jazz school. It was a very inspiring event for students and teachers alike to have the input of a whole quartet, especially guys like Jay, John, and Phil. I learned an awful lot! We played a nice concert in Geneva with the quartet at the end of the week.
After this I met the Yellowjackets in Spain and did 2 1/2 weeks of touring. The band got really tight, and we went to some places I had never been before. In Moscow we went to see Lenin at Red Square. He looked pretty cool for being dead for 80 years. Our soundman asked "Is that really him?". Haslip said "yeah",and the guard said "shhhh!!".
After all this my family and I wound up in Zeillern, Austria, where I attended a jazz workshop that was a real gas. The other teachers were great, and the students were extremely dedicated. A very nice workshop indeed!
We spent a day in Vienna before proceeding to the Italian Alps for some R & R. What struck me as really weird was the fact that everywhere you turned in Vienna there were guys dressed up like Mozart selling tickets to chamber music concerts. In the souvenir shops you could buy Mozart candies and busts of the composer. This is a town where Mozart could barely get a gig when he was alive! It just goes to show you that if your not as busy as you would like when you are alive it doesnt mean that your music is not good. Its just the wacky music scene, which hasn't changed much in the last several hundred years.
If you are trying to be a musician keep working on the music! The rewards are many. They generally dont come for a long while, but when they do it makes all the scuffling and self-doubt well worth it. It has taken me 50 years of living to start to get to where I want to be as a working musician. I'm not there yet, but Im very grateful for the opportunities I have had along the way.
I´ve been giving some thought to the process of working things out in the practice room, and how this translates into actual playing situations. What I came up with lately is that this process of finding new things to play is perpetually at work, especially when one is playing on a regular basis. For example, I was playing a cadenza the other night on the tune Easy Livin, and I stumbled upon a pattern that I began to move around in a variety of ways. It had a nice sound, abstract and melodic at the same time. The germ was C, down to A, F, D, then up to E. and then G. The next starting note can be A or A flat. (A,Fsharp;D,B,Csharp,E).
つづき〜。 What I realized is that, as a composer and a player, the act of composing in the moment is always in play - the ability to be fluid and fresh results from the act of feeling relaxed, confident, and open to what is going by. In a sense, I feel like I´m not playing the notes. I don't put my opinion or agenda on the music. I merely let it come out and interact with the other players in a gracious and unassuming way. What a relief! It is so much easier this way.
I did practice for 6 hours a day when I was younger. This deffinitely was an integral part of developing the musicianship I have today. But the recent growth has come mainly from being vigilant in live playing situations.
Be an instigator. Write some music, get it played and recorded. Hook up a performance of the music in a bar, school, church, community center, art gallery, jail ... whatever. It is on us to get it happening.
Sorry for the delay in coming up with a new column. Sometimes life gets very thick. I’ve been busy with preparing big band arrangements for publication (from Gently), finishing up teaching at Manhattan School of Music, gigging, tending to my family, etc. I played a beautiful concert last week at Manhattan School of Music with the jazz philharmonic. This is a symphony orchestra augmented by big band essentially. We did an older piece I composed for the American Jazz Philharmonic out in L.A. in the 80s called “Then and Now”. It is an amazing experience to play an orchestral piece you have composed and have the insight to know where the composed material lies, and play in and around it.
The orchestra did a beautiful job playing with maturity and empathy. A really gratifying experience! I’m surprised more university music programs don’t have this type of orchestra. For one, it bridges the gap between various styles of music and provides An opportunity to find new combinations of those styles. Secondly, a jazz philharmonic gives all the players a shot at playing these different types of music, which is essential training for anyone who wants to do performing and recording in a diverse way. This is essential nowadays for survival. Diversity is a big help in the quest for staying busy in music.
The Yellowjackets just released the first cd for the Heads Up label called Time Squared. I urge you all to check it out at Yellowjackets.com. It's yet another step in the evolution of the jackets music. I have been playing in the band for 13 years now, and I’m constantly amazed how the music continues to grow and expand. There is strength in numbers! This cd is one of the best 'jackets cds, I think, for combining swing and funk grooves. The band functions equally well in each area, and in the process, finds some new grooves and textures by combining the two. The compositions are all filled with little twists and turns that you may not hear on first listen. I certainly didn’t hear them on first playing. But we got to play this music quite a lot before recording it. I hope you enjoy this cd.
I’ve been listening to Art Tatum lately, and am amazed how modern an approach he takes on interpreting standards. It is clear to me that all the great pianists have listened to Tatum. Aside from the fact that it is unbelievable that someone can play that much piano with two hands, the lyricism and musicality that exudes from Art Tatum’s playing is a study that I recommend all musicians check out.
Keep the faith, keep playing, keep enjoying, keep at it! Bob