Playing the saxophone Snobbery over certain standards

[losaavedra]

Personally I love all music, with the possible exception of ANYTHING played on a Wurlitzer-type cinema organ. The one thing about 'standards' that scores is that if I get together with someone else to play it means one of us doesn't spend the first hour trying to figure out 'how something goes' by how the other tries to explain it. All that's needed is a key and a tempo and since we both more-or-less know the tune we can just get straight on and attempt playing it. Style-wise my preference is for Jazz and Blues ... but I haven't come across a single tune yet, whatever the genre, that can't be played in that style.

Sorry if I've offended any Wurlitzer players!!!

 

[old_git]

losaavedra wrote:
Personally I love all music, with the possible exception of ANYTHING played on a Wurlitzer-type cinema organ. The one thing about 'standards' that scores is that if I get together with someone else to play it means one of us doesn't spend the first hour trying to figure out 'how something goes' by how the other tries to explain it. All that's needed is a key and a tempo and since we both more-or-less know the tune we can just get straight on and attempt playing it. Style-wise my preference is for Jazz and Blues ... but I haven't come across a single tune yet, whatever the genre, that can't be played in that style.

Sorry if I've offended any Wurlitzer players!!!

4' 33".

 

[AlbionLass]

I wonder if the Associated Board would let me do 4'33" for my performance diploma? 😛



Coincidentally my son has been told to remember the name of John Cage for next weeks music lesson as they're doing minimalism.

 

[losaavedra]

... I stand corrected ... 4'33" does sound pretty good on a Wurlitzer!

 

[old_git]

Stephanie wrote:
OK, I don't want to sound whiney or anything, here, because what follows is genuine perplexity... ':S'

For me, it's not that I hate anything in particular (although I could probably live without hearing 'Summertime' again *rams tin hat on head*), but the amorphous list of songs I 'ought to know in order to be considered human enough to be able to play jazz' is so off putting, if, like me, you wouldn't recognise 4/5 of them if you heard them, and *clamps tin hat onto head more firmly* when you do hear them, can't work out what the fuss is about...

That, to me, feels more like snobbery and a closed shop. Never mind someone to watch over me, I want someone to explain why each one is so important! (And why they're all at least 40 years old...are there no 21st Century ones worth learning?)

Oh, and just for the avoidance of doubt - that's not an impression I've got on here! Wouldn't have joined if I did!

*gets coat*

Young Steph, (always get off to a good start)
Jazz is basically an art form that came to fruition in the Twentieth Century and there are more years, around a hundred in that century, than there are in the twenty-first. Take into account that the 'Standards' are those that were the best of the 20th. Does anyone else remember "Around the corner" or even want to? So a system of natural selection emerged in that the most appealing songs / melodies to the jazz orientated, became standards. Further the chord sequences were frequently nicked so that authorship could be claimed on various recording dates. Play a solo during a number by one of the named artist on the disc and you'll quite likely to hear what I am inferring.
At the end of the twenty-first century there will be a new set of standards that might still contain some examples of those acknowledged today.
Apologies for being serious.

 

[Mikec]

4' 33" in a jazz style? It's all in the hat...

 

[Djangette]

I remember going to a cinema in Grays (Essex) and an organ came up of the ground with flashing lights ...

Was it a Wurlitzer? It sure made me smile :-D

<getting to like pastiche of rap ... does that mean I like rap?

 

[losaavedra]

Probably something like this ...

http://www.trocadero-wurlitzer.org/menu.html

 

[AlanU]

Two pet hates spring to mind, I just don't understand how Duke Ellington could bring himself to play the tiresome 'Perdido' and 'Caravan' night after night.

 

[stephanie]

old git wrote:

Stephanie wrote:
OK, I don't want to sound whiney or anything, here, because what follows is genuine perplexity... ':S'

For me, it's not that I hate anything in particular (although I could probably live without hearing 'Summertime' again *rams tin hat on head*), but the amorphous list of songs I 'ought to know in order to be considered human enough to be able to play jazz' is so off putting, if, like me, you wouldn't recognise 4/5 of them if you heard them, and *clamps tin hat onto head more firmly* when you do hear them, can't work out what the fuss is about...

That, to me, feels more like snobbery and a closed shop. Never mind someone to watch over me, I want someone to explain why each one is so important! (And why they're all at least 40 years old...are there no 21st Century ones worth learning?)

Oh, and just for the avoidance of doubt - that's not an impression I've got on here! Wouldn't have joined if I did!

*gets coat*

Young Steph, (always get off to a good start)
Jazz is basically an art form that came to fruition in the Twentieth Century and there are more years, around a hundred in that century, than there are in the twenty-first. Take into account that the 'Standards' are those that were the best of the 20th. Does anyone else remember "Around the corner" or even want to? So a system of natural selection emerged in that the most appealing songs / melodies to the jazz orientated, became standards. Further the chord sequences were frequently nicked so that authorship could be claimed on various recording dates. Play a solo during a number by one of the named artist on the disc and you'll quite likely to hear what I am inferring.
At the end of the twenty-first century there will be a new set of standards that might still contain some examples of those acknowledged today.
Apologies for being serious.

Dear Old Git (did you know you have the same name as my husband?)

Feel free to be serious, Yoda. I was being partly serious too. When you pitch into jazz as a complete and utter amateur, with no background in it at all, there are perplexities which make you feel uninitiated and at sea. This thing about the standards is one of them. For example, I can listen to 21st C 'Heavenless' from Humph's band again and again, and am trying to learn it - just because I like it. To me it seems worth learning, whereas some others (naming no names - I enjoy living and would like to make it to a fortnight on here without being blacklisted!) sound just like noise to me.

So, if I understand you correctly, I ought to go and listen to (for example) some of the pieces from Pete's list of standards, and listen to the underlying chord sequences - which, I freely admit, I can hear but am not one of those lucky souls who can hear and name chords by ear - and the solo playing over them, after which I should realise that effectively they're pretty much the same from piece to piece? And listen to them thinking that they're going to be in the 'standard' sequences or pretty much thereof?

So, is the conclusion that there is only one jazz piece in existence, but in different keys and with different solos played over the top which may or may not approximate to a melody which the audience could recognise from somewhere else such as Gershwin or Cole Porter?

I did download about 15 of that list yesterday, so I will go and listen, and hope for enlightenment.

Yours,
Still slightly confused of North Yorkshire
:erm:

 

[tengu01]

I think that sometimes, if you attend a jam session regularly, there are some songs which get played to death. As a beginner, you play them because they're all you can manage and navigate around. I have inhabited that particular niche for a while now.

However, after going to the same jam session a number of times, I can understand why someone would perhaps want to pass on another rousing chorus of "Giant Steps" even if is stupidly difficult to play at speed and sound vaguely musical (nowhere near able to do that). Just the desire to hear some different tunes perhaps.

No hatred of standards, just nice to hear some different tunes every now and then. In the hands of the experts, standards can always sound fresh, but still.....

 

[Mikec]

I think the use of "standards" in jazz has several functions. As someone else pointed out it means that jazz musicians can get together anywhere, any time and just play as they will have a common repertoire. It's good to memorise and deeply ingrain music because improvisation can then be much more creative and meaningful, and jazz is supposed to contain much improvisation, after all. Standards also supply a nearly-universal vocabulary of harmonic relationships through their chord progressions and melodies, giving the newcomer a way in to what can be a rather impenetrable world.
The label "Standard" also has another meaning here, I think. As there is so much improvisation in jazz, it can be difficult for a listener to discern whether what they're hearing is good, free, creative music, or just random noise. The background of a standard aids one's judgement here.
There is plenty of Jazz that doesn't rely on standards, of course; and standards are being created all the time, it's just that they can't be called so until they've been played constantly for a few decades!

 

[Pete Thomas]

I've often wondered what would happen if you went to a typical jazz standards type jam session and called for Pink Panther theme or Pennsylvabia 65000. Bot tunes I used to pay on actual jazz gigs with my quintet (as opposed to jam sessions) from time to time.

 

[Stephen Howard]

Back when I used to do a lot of blues gigs I always got down off the stage when the band played "I'm On The Road Again".
Absolutely cannot stand that song and will not be associtated with it any way, shape or form.

But...back in my big band days popular standards were the bread and butter of dinner dance gigs.
If I had a quid for every time I played Stranger On The Shore or Moonlight Serenade...
But...I always played them as best as I could - because that was the job, and it made the punters happy.

 

[Zasterz]

Girl From Ipanema creeps me out a bit as an “ode to sexual harassment,” a bunch of codgers catcalling and whistling at a 17-year-old girl (aka a child.) Not a great theme in my opinion— happy to leave it behind as a relic of a different era!

 

[Pete Thomas]

Girl From Ipanema creeps me out a bit as an “ode to sexual harassment,” a bunch of codgers catcalling and whistling at a 17-year-old girl (aka a child.) Not a great theme in my opinion— happy to leave it behind as a relic of a different era!

Different era indeed. Along with Baby it's Cold Outside: "Say, what's in this drink?"..."what's the sense in hurting my pride?"

 

[mizmar]

"Young Girl"

Even our school kid version made it clear how bad the original was... Not "different times"

 

[Stephen Howard]

And let's not forget "Have a drink, have a drive..."

 

[skeller047]

Girl From Ipanema creeps me out a bit as an “ode to sexual harassment,” a bunch of codgers catcalling and whistling at a 17-year-old girl (aka a child.) Not a great theme in my opinion— happy to leave it behind as a relic of a different era!

I don’t recall the lyrics of this song mentioning the girl’s age…. Speaking as an old codger, I very much appreciate the vistas of feminine pulchritude at beaches near me. I don’t think that makes me a pedophile…

And you Brits don’t have to go to Brazil for examples of questionable morals in song. Have Some Madeira M’Dear.

We used to call that song “The Girl From Ipana”. Meaning it was a daily occurrence, as ubiquitous as toothpaste. It was unusual for a cocktail gig not to include it.

Proving my codgerhood, with associated tendency to ramble, I met a woman a couple weeks ago who calls herself “The Girl From Empanada”. She owns a well-known Chilean restaurant. Hmmm, must be near lunch time!

 

[Zasterz]

I don’t recall the lyrics of this song mentioning the girl’s age….

“When they wrote this iconic song in 1962, married composer Antonio Carlos Jobim was 35 years old, and lyricist Vinicius de Moraes, who would marry a total of 9 times, was 50. The object of their desire, Helô Pinheiro, was a 17-year-old schoolgirl.”

The Little-Known Story of the Real “Girl from Ipanema”

How an Unsavory Obsession Inspired One of the World’s Most Recognizable Songs

medium.com

“These days, the idea of adult men catcalling teenage girls is at once gross and possibly illegal. However, things were different in Brazil in the 1960s, as Helo Pinheiro, who was 17 years old at the time, would tell The Guardian. She would oft hear catcalls coming from the bars that lined Ipanema Beach when she walked along the shores.”

Read More: Who Is The Song The Girl From Ipanema Really About? - Grunge