[Harp-L] Jazz and specific techniques

[Richard Hunter <turtlehill@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Winslow commented on one of my posts not too long ago to the effect that
specific techniques might in fact be intrinsic to jazz, and I've thought
about it quite a lot since then.  Ultimately, I've decided that Winslow
is partly right and mostly wrong (subject of course to further debate).

First, let's agree that jazz is a very big tent.  It includes people
whose sounds and conceptions are radically different.  Keith Jarrett is
jazz; so is Errol Garner; so is Bud Powell; so is Bill Evans.  Sidney
Bechet is jazz; so is Johnny Hodges; so is Charlie Parker; so is John
Coltrane.  This brief list should illustrate the point: you can do a lot
of different things on your instrument and still be playing jazz.

Where Winslow is right, I think, is that certain conceptual approaches,
and their associated techniques, are clearly associated with certain
jazz styles.  To take an obvious example, Coltrane's use of what critic
Martin Williams called "exploding harmonics" (multiple overtones played
simultaneously on the tenor sax) is clearly associated with his late
style.  However, one would never say that a saxophonist is not playing
jazz just because he or she is not using exploding harmonics.

To take an example closer to home, Howard Levy's jazz diatonic style
clearly demands overblows, and can't be duplicated without them. 
However, jazz is a big tent, and Howard's approach isn't the only viable
approach to playing jazz on the diatonic.  Using specially-tuned
diatonics is an obvious alternative, and in addition to my own work in
this area I can cite players whose use of special tunings is far more
radical than mine, and whose results are certainly jazz.

I categorically reject the idea that any single player's approach to any
instrument, no matter how brilliant, defines jazz, and therefore the
idea that any single set of techniques defines jazz.  To say otherwise
is equivalent to saying that jazz stops growing when the right player
comes along with the right set of ideas and techniques.  If that were
the case, jazz would have stopped growing with Armstrong.  Or Parker. 
Or Coltrane.  Or whoever. 

It's more accurate to say that every great player, and a lot of the
less-than-great ones, contribute something new to the evolving language
that is jazz.  And I certainly reject out of hand the reverse
implication -- that if a player is NOT using a certain set of
techniques, e.g. overblowing, that he or she by definition is not
playing jazz on the diatonic.

Like I said, subject to further debate.

Regards,
Richard Hunter
hunterharp.com