Saxophone beginners Going to jam session tomorrow night

[mrblackbat]

There’s definitely some truth in that. I don’t get many drummers down to the jam night I run, but we do get bassists. A couple are really good, a couple are good but make mistakes from time to time. I try to make sure I look at the songs that are being called, and swap out for the house bassist if I think there’s a chance of issues due to chart geography or it’s just a hard tune etc. and also sometimes just to give other people the chance to play with a top quality bassist.

Though as the jam gets busier and busier that gets harder trying to accommodate everyone!

 

[mrblackbat]

I would rather absorb the energy of Chet’s playing through the enjoyment of listening than taking every note he played as gospel. I mean, once it’s been played it’s no longer original. To be spontaneous you need to let go of what you want to do and just let it happen. That means no preconceived musical ideas matter even though we can enjoy them when we listen to music, I don’t think we are meant to copy directly, even while practicing, because it enforces contrived and unemotional playing, devoid of meaning. It’s easier to let go and let creativity happen on its own than to stifle oneself with transcribing. Play with purpose by giving space to our playing through listening. Listening to the other musicians, is one way to create space and meaning. When we listen, we can hear everything there is to know about where we are going and the sounds around us are a guide to know what to play in the moment to be truly original. Do you want to be original or sound like something or someone else? I am me and you makes we and we are all together, right now. So let’s contribute something that is uniquely our own. It just takes forgetting for a second, what you think you know about music, or anything for that matter. Try it. Put down the transcriptions and clear your mind and just play whatever you want. It’s about expressing yourself so don’t express someone else’s self, as that is just a copy. You do you.

To be spontaneous improvising, you need the language and facility to do so.

And that’s what transcribing is really about. It’s not about getting up on the band stand and reeling off a fully memorised transcription, but about the process of improving your ear (converting what you hear to what you can play on the instrument) and learning the language of jazz (the types of phrases that are played over certain chord phrase fragments).

Taking your point of Chet.

Imagine rather than music, Chet was speaking a different language and reciting fully improvised poetry. The way I view how you describe it: “I’d rather absorb the energy through listening rather than taking every note as gospel”. Well in this analogy that would be like trying to sound like you were speaking the language without ever actually learning the words. Just making noises that sound like that language but actually are just nonsense. It’s impossible to be spontaneous in that situation without having done the up front work.

I personally fell into that trap for a long time with my saxophone playing. But there absolutely is vocabulary that you need to know, need to be able to recite and need to have practised. Then, when you start to play, you can actually truly be spontaneous.

 

[mrblackbat]

You “respectfully disagree” @AlonW but this is how Chet will have learned to play the solos he did. So if you want to play like him, it make sense to follow his approach. Unless you think you’re somehow better than him?

 

[jazzdoh]

Personally do want ever makes you happy, take the music, don't take the music it matters not, jam sessions, gigs, nobody cares whether you have the music in front of you, have gigged for many years and always took the music on a stand even when i didn't need it, especially gigs when we very often had a person out of the audience ask to do a number or two and you had to put the chords out of Ireal pro up, all musicians don't know every tune, and nobody cares either way.

 

[Merryfisher]

Just blow your horn, if you good at it good for you, if you not very good, who cares as long as you getting enjoyment out of it

 

[skeller047]

Most of the jams I go to in the SF Bay Area, iPads or phones predominate. Interestingly, horn players are less likely to use them than bassists or keyboardists; possibly because of the realities of being a working musician these days, as @turf3 implies with his experiences as a bassist. Most horn players I know don’t have more than 2 or 3 gigs a week, and those that do are often in particular groups with a set repertoire, like a corporate or wedding band.

The thing I dislike about having music on a stand is that listening is not at as high a level when people are reading. That said, I have often enjoyed playing a tune I don’t know, and in some cases have gone on to really learn a new tune that I got exposed to at the jam.

The other thing I dislike is that not all rhythm section players emphasize keeping a groove very much. If you have 3 players with different conceptions of how time works, the tempo will slow down and occasionally people lose track. If they are reading a chord chart, it just gets worse.

I do memorize tunes I am studying, but as a retired person with nothing to do but practice and write long posts on forums, I’m aware it’s a luxury. I will spend a half hour a day for a week or two on a new tune. When I was a full-time saxophonist, I often had 3 or 4 tunes a week in the practice schedule. But as a guy with a $DAYJOB, I didn’t have time to do that.

In videos of high level jams (like those at Small’s in NYC) it’s common to see people reading. This is also true of high level jazz gigs; most these days are one offs, bands do not often tour as a unit like they used to. Or even play in one venue for a full week. It was refreshing to see the Emmet Cohen quintet a couple months ago on their Miles-Trane 100th anniversary tour, they had a good repertoire of tunes and arrangements they all knew well, and the performances were outstanding as a result. This is not very common these days.

Times change, and not always for the better.

 

[JayeNM]

To be spontaneous improvising, you need the language and facility to do so.

And that’s what transcribing is really about. It’s not about getting up on the band stand and reeling off a fully memorised transcription, but about the process of improving your ear (converting what you hear to what you can play on the instrument) and learning the language of jazz (the types of phrases that are played over certain chord phrase fragments).

Taking your point of Chet.

Imagine rather than music, Chet was speaking a different language and reciting fully improvised poetry. The way I view how you describe it: “I’d rather absorb the energy through listening rather than taking every note as gospel”. Well in this analogy that would be like trying to sound like you were speaking the language without ever actually learning the words. Just making noises that sound like that language but actually are just nonsense. It’s impossible to be spontaneous in that situation without having done the up front work.

I personally fell into that trap for a long time with my saxophone playing. But there absolutely is vocabulary that you need to know, need to be able to recite and need to have practised. Then, when you start to play, you can actually truly be spontaneous.

It isn't a 'trap', really, imho....just an alternative point of view or methodology. A version or microcosm of the classic argument in the Arts:

Does learning and studying the rules and conventions actually STIFLE creativity rather than promote it ?

Or...

Doesn't one need to learn the conventions and rules IN ORDER to then utilize (or discard or pick and choose...or even then intentionally undermine) them, thinking of them as 'tools' in your 'toolbelt' to be employed in the creative process ?

Classic debate.

When I was young and more iconoclastic I leaned towards the former...but in time began to understand the latter.

In music, more than, say, visual art....oftentimes going the former path, while I understand it...can result...many times...in one's playing (or composing)...just sounding, um....bad. So music has that additional weight on it. It can actually grate the aural senses.

 

[JSL]

Doesn't one need to learn the conventions and rules IN ORDER to then utilize (or discard or pick and choose...or even then intentionally undermine) them, thinking of them as 'tools' in your 'toolbelt' to be employed in the creative process ?

This ^^^^^^^^^^^ is what I would agree with. At least it has been true in my experience.

 

[JayeNM]

Just another thought on jam sessions; something I've always been aware of. Without a good drummer (especially the drummer) and bass player, no matter who else shows up the jam will be a disaster. So, in terms of the drummer and to some extent the bass player, I say something similar to Grumps. If they can't play well, they don't belong there. I feel bad saying that because beginning drummers and bass players deserve to have an opportunity to learn to play with others, but it would be best if they did that with a private rehearsal band. The issue is, without a solid drummer/bass duo, no one else on the bandstand will have much chance of sounding good.

Is that too "hard line"? I'm not trying to start trouble, just stating my opinion. Please feel free to disagree; I won't mind.

Still gonna disagree, although you make a valid point. Jams are not hazing mechanisms.

To your example - I think that yeah, it only takes a woefully unprepared musician ONE jam event to learn the lesson 'yipes, I was woefully unprepared'....hopefully...
let's say ...70% of the time.
The other 30%, people still miss entirely how 'bad' they actually did.
Interestingly, this DOES happen with drummers quite a bit. They show up, think they can 'jazz'...and from bar 1 the train is off the rails.


But the comment that I still remain critical of, despite the commenter's repeated attempt to recharacterize it...was that if one needs sheet music, they aren't ready to be public (jazz) jamming.

That is just completely passe...superceded... by the realities of contemporary jam sessions.

Example - Trumpet Mafia, New Orleans. A jam that has been going on for, gosh, two decades or more, different venues over time. Mostly a set rhythm section of regular players and then hotshot, mostly young trumpeters primarily (although by the 'rules' a trombonist or reeds player COULD attend, but for most part do not) flood the jams and try to outdo each other with their bravado. It has become a New Orleans attraction in and of itself, it historically has drawn patrons over the years..
I know of this because our trumpet player moved there and dove right into it, quite bravely.

Those hotshots....have their iPads or phones on hand. Most of them. Quite advanced players with good chops, massive egos, and testosterone overflowing...they bring music. Because they wanna play on tunes they might not know, rather than sit out...

The notion that this is inappropriate, or that they are not 'ready' to be attending one of the penultimate shred sessions in the US...is not supported by reality. One can wonder 'with all the apparent work they HAVE put into becoming that level of player, why DON'T they have the 300 most common tunes memorized ?"....but there really are several obvious answers to this, eh ?

Likewise the notion that a developing player should not attend or sit out tunes like Watermelon Man, Song For My Father, etc...because they rely on a chart to get thru it.....makes no sense. If they have a rudimentary grasp of the changes they see in front of them...they have every reason to be there. If they flub the tune because they had no place to mount their pad and refer to the chart...the next time, just bring the stand...rather than necessarily memorizing the chart.

In an instance where this was the first session attended by a player, and said player HAS been developing pretty well (compare Alon's recordings in '26 with ones from two years ago - night and day) and has begun to grasp and employ some fundamental improv theory...and has developed a respectable tone and has decent mechanical fundamentals .....

...the checklist item of "Do I have any/many songs memorized ?"....is completely moot, IMHO. It carries little weight in swaying the question of 'should I dive in there or no ?"

 

[JayeNM]

This ^^^^^^^^^^^ is what I would agree with. At least it has been true in my experience.

I think at the end of the day most musicians, artists, etc...do end up moving to this camp.

But I understand the youthful exhuberance in the other camp as well..I can respect that hypothesis...that conventions detour or suppress 'pure creativity'. Again, not where I am, but...it is worthy of healthy debate, at least.

 

[jazzdoh]

The thing I dislike about having music on a stand is that listening is not at as high a level when people are reading

Do you think this applies to the best orchestras,

 

[JSL]

Well, of course you don't want to play someone else's solo note for note when improvising

I quoted myself above because I just thought of a rather rare exception to what I said in that quote. It won't apply to most jazz tunes, but there are tunes with a 'signature solo' that you'd want to learn and then use that solo because the other musicians and those 'in the know' in the audience will expect to hear it. The main example I can think of is the blues tune "Honky Tonk". You just have to know both the horn intro part as well as sax solo (which follows the signature guitar solo). That doesn't mean you necessarily have to play it exactly note for note, but you'd want to get pretty close to it. Then, if you want, you could go off on your own improvised solo for another chorus or two.

Like I said, a rare exception, but on more than one occasion when I came up on the bandstand at a blues jam or to sit in with a blues/R&B band, upon seeing the tenor in my hands, the guitarist immediately called "Honky Tonk in F". The very first time, years ago, I didn't know the tune well. After that, I went home and learned it, so from then on, I was ready for it. And it was eventually added to the set list in my band.

 

[mark_addy]

The trumpet solo from 'Moanin' is like that. I might have said that already.

 

[PiccoloPirate]

Do you think this applies to the best orchestras,

There's a big difference between a group of players, at various levels, getting together to "jam", and a well rehearsed big band and orchestra.
Leaning up against the stage, while a major symphony is rehearsing, for a young teenage student, is a fantastic experience.

Playing that literature, a tempo, only for the best of the best.

Tell a giant of jazz, that they are the greatest, they most likely, if in NYC, will take you to Carnegie, in days of old. 🎯

 

[JSL]

The trumpet solo from 'Moanin' is like that. I might have said that already.

If you mean the Art Blakey version with Lee Morgan on trumpet, yeah, it's full of great bluesy jazz 'vocabulary'. I think his solo goes well beyond the kind of 'signature solo' I mentioned, but he concludes it with a definite signature lick at the end of his solo, and the sax comes right in and repeats it. If you listen to different versions of this tune, the solos are pretty unique, but that signature lick is often there in some context.

Speaking of Moanin', I ran into this version by Chad LB and man he just tears it up in his solo. Hopefully not too far off topic, but I have to share it. Listen the whole thing!

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyQm1kE41os&list=RDkyQm1kE41os&start_radio=1

 

[AlonW]

I went to a workshop at the World Stage today. The energy was great, so many good musicians in one room, my friend was there who plays clarinet, guitar, and tap dances. I got to play my horn for a couple of minutes with the band, I was a bit disoriented and felt like I didn't know how to figure out what to blow. I wasn't letting go right away. Afterwards the teacher asked me what I was thinking about, so I told him how I felt. Then the session was over. There was a flautist, an alto, a few drummers, piano players, bass players, and more musicians in the audience. I didn't have a chance to set up my iPad, so there was no sheet music involved. I hope to have better luck next time at expressing myself in a more meaningfully in terms of the way I was playing. There's a lot more I wanted to do and say in that setting. It just didn't come to me today but what did was a lot of joy from finding my community. I really enjoyed meeting as many people as I could and I'm definitely going to go back to this to gain more experience. I intend to play my arrangement of "I'm Late" from Alice in Wonderland in an uptempo swing style if given the opportunity next time.

Here's the way I played it in my studio. I have a dream of playing this live with the others. And other songs too.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_vjz_0wuUY

 

[mark_addy]

If you mean the Art Blakey version with Lee Morgan on trumpet, yeah, it's full of great bluesy jazz 'vocabulary'. I think his solo goes well beyond the kind of 'signature solo' I mentioned, but he concludes it with a definite signature lick at the end of his solo, and the sax comes right in and repeats it. If you listen to different versions of this tune, the solos are pretty unique, but that signature lick is often there in some context.

Speaking of Moanin', I ran into this version by Chad LB and man he just tears it up in his solo. Hopefully not too far off topic, but I have to share it. Listen the whole thing!

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyQm1kE41os&list=RDkyQm1kE41os&start_radio=1

Nice version...even if the tenor player fancies himself 🙂 Yes, I did mean an (the?) Art Blakey version, which seems to originate those lines - dwoop dapp dee-dapp - that the pianist gets into here. I really like the piano stuff in the version you post here. Imagine being able to solo in chords (not just to imply them) - and lines too. It makes my head hurt.

 

[mark_addy]

I went to a workshop at the World Stage today. The energy was great, so many good musicians in one room, my friend was there who plays clarinet, guitar, and tap dances. I got to play my horn for a couple of minutes with the band, I was a bit disoriented and felt like I didn't know how to figure out what to blow. I wasn't letting go right away. Afterwards the teacher asked me what I was thinking about, so I told him how I felt. Then the session was over. There was a flautist, an alto, a few drummers, piano players, bass players, and more musicians in the audience. I didn't have a chance to set up my iPad, so there was no sheet music involved. I hope to have better luck next time at expressing myself in a more meaningfully in terms of the way I was playing. There's a lot more I wanted to do and say in that setting. It just didn't come to me today but what did was a lot of joy from finding my community. I really enjoyed meeting as many people as I could and I'm definitely going to go back to this to gain more experience. I intend to play my arrangement of "I'm Late" from Alice in Wonderland in an uptempo swing style if given the opportunity next time.

Here's the way I played it in my studio. I have a dream of playing this live with the others. And other songs too.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_vjz_0wuUY

I enojyed your post, reading through on here, but something funny happened which you might enjoy - I listened to the version of Moanin' just upthread, and clicked on yours just as it came to an end (I thought it would play out and stop) - but for some reason youtube (?) chose something from my playlist to follow it with automatically, so I got a video of you, with Tubby Hayes playing 'Dear Johnny B.' in the background (rather louder than you - nice tone - so it looked like you were him for a minute). It took me a moment to work out what was going on...check it out!

 

[jazzdoh]

There's a big difference between a group of players, at various levels, getting together to "jam", and a well rehearsed big band and orchestra.
Leaning up against the stage, while a major symphony is rehearsing, for a young teenage student, is a fantastic experience.

Playing that literature, a tempo, only for the best of the best.

Tell a giant of jazz, that they are the greatest, they most likely, if in NYC, will take you to Carnegie, in days of old. 🎯

Yes i get that, musicians in top orchestras are some of the best there is, it's never held me back having the music in front of me.

 

[Grumps]

I don't think everyone realizes how much music they have actually internalized just by listening to it. Take something easy, like pop. When I play or sit in with rock/pop/contemporary groups, they'll call a tune and I'll play it. It doesn't matter what key. Maybe never having ever played it before. But I know it, because I've heard it. Lots of times. Or maybe just a few times. Rhythm players often think it's some sort of voodoo savant thing, but it's just taking the tune through your ears to your fingers; without going through your eyes. Eventually, you just do it. Or not. You never know till you put away the pages.