lowquality.net

Sometimes as a music teacher, one finds themselves falling into the familiar pitfalls of their students. I am the worst offender of the “do as I say, not as I do” teaching philosophy. I am trying hard to overcome my personal hang-ups in order to be more of the “lead by example” type of instructor, but it’s easier said than done.

One sobering lesson for any musician is realizing that the answers to all of our musical problems lie in the music itself. Sometimes, we look everywhere but the music. We look in method books, music schools, bizarre technical exercises, hand-strengthening gadgets– we look everywhere but the recordings. If someone said they wanted to learn how to solo like Charlie Parker, the Omnibook would be a good marker stone on your way to accomplish that task, but you have no business reading down those solos until you’ve actually listened to them. I mean really listened to them, over and over again. The answers are all on the records.

Since I began teaching at the Governor’s School, I have been on a personal mission to really improve my Jazz playing. In the past, I’ve fallen into the same pitfalls: giving myself academic assignments like writing out bass lines or analyzing charts. These techniques have proved valuable and have worked for me in the past to achieve a greater understanding of Jazz, but they have not directly affected my ability to play the music competantly. A couple of nights ago I just sat down with my bass, put on “Speak No Evil” by Wayne Shorter and, just deliberately, played along like I would do with James Brown or The Meters. I did eventually take the real book out to help with some of the changes, but because I was relating them directly to the music my sense of form was being challenged by the natural push and pull of the rhythm section. I found myself listening more the the phrasing of the musicians and the dialouge between them — not just the act of playing the right notes or knowing how one chord works with the next, but how everything works with everything. Thats what Jazz is all about. Jazz is about self-expression to the fullest extent of the word.

Let me make something clear, this isn’t the first time I played along with a Jazz recording, it’s just the first time it made sense to me. I’ve played Jazz with people, in bands, in front of audiences, and it didn’t make sense. I thought it made sense, but now I know that it didn’t. The lightbulb was on, but it wasn’t very bright. I was still thinking like an R&B guy, or a Rock guy, or a Latin guy, like an overintellectualizing musician who places one style of music way above all of the others.

The truth is that all music is working from the same language. There are different contexts, under which you would use different phrasings, rhythms, and note choices (much like the difference between writing a letter to grandma and writing a cover letter to a resume– same language, different context). This is evident to anyone who plays the bass and notices that “root-fifth” concepts are rampant throughout literally every style of music but slightly different in each.

I would not have come to this revelation without listening to recordings, but I may not have found the answers in the records if I had not been playing in bands and practicing on my own. These approaches are all valuable and essential in the progress of a musician, but we have to remember to be sensible about our discipline. A musician plays music and listening to music provides all of the questions and answers we could possibly need.