Subject: Re: [Harp-L] What's a scale really mean anyway?

[EGS1217@xxxxxxx]

Scott puts my feelings into words by writing: 
 
 "allowed me to understand the
horn hiding inside the  harmonica."
 
.....and that said a lot of it for me.  Of course the  REST of his post was 
absolutely beautiful.....one of the best things I've  read here recently (aside 
from Jason Ricci  & Smo-Joe's posts,  that is).....but he nailed how I think 
of the harmonica with this one  phrase....and made some really pithy points 
about the audience knowing  when a musician is "giving it up"  as well as 
playing from the  heart (the only way to play, imho).   Great storytelling,  
Terrific post..... Thanks!
 
Elizabeth
 
"Message: 6
Date: Fri, 8 Dec 2006 13:07:05 -0500
From: "Splash"  <celtiac@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [Harp-L] What's a scale  really mean anyway?
To: <harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx>
Message-ID:  <02dc01c71af3$abf231e0$6fc5fea9@w4pj>
Content-Type:  text/plain;    charset="iso-8859-1"

----- Original  Message -----
From: "samblancato" <snip>
Blues harmonica, on  the other hand, was something I could really get behind.
I could feel  what I was playing and still can even though it's all by ear
now.   What an interesting schism.  I wonder if this is common  among
musicians.

Sam Blancato,  Pittsburg
--------end--------


I started my musical career at  about 4 when my grandfather gave me one of
his old banjos.  A Vega  tenor open back.  I remember learning my first song,
I'm Looking  Over a Four-Leaf lover.  Out of a Mel Bay book, if I'm  not
mistaken.  I got pretty fair at that instrument so much that I  was invited
to the "musicales" that my Grandfather and his buddies held  weekly in the
music room/hamshack.  I might have been about 6  then.  I learned songs such
as On Green Dolphin Street, Buttermilk  Rag, Bill Bailey, Oh When The
Saints...

Then there was my very  very short stint as a bagpiper... I joke that I had
to give it up for  health reasons, they were going to kill me if I didn't
shut up with  that damned thing!  But I digress...

In the early-mid 60's My  Mom became friends with Les Brown and a number of
members of the Band  of Renown and I got a great Jazz education growing up.
Les Brown's band  was the house band for Jackie Gleason's show down in Miami
Beach and a  number of the guys spent time at our house playing cards and
drinking  etc. (quite a bit of etc. too, but I was supposedly too young to
know  about that stuff.)  Also my Dad was involved in things that gave him  an
insider's knowledge of when the greats would be in town, playing at  either
the Fontainbleu on Miami Beach, or the Diplomat in Hollywood,  and where they
would be playing afterward.  It was the era of  segregation and these guys
weren't allowed in the front door of the  hotels and had to stay across town.

So after the show they would go  to the 'hood' to jam until the wee hours. I
was about 10 years old when  I would sit in these smokey rooms with my Dad
and we would listen to  Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald, Miles
Davis, John  Coultrane, B.B.King and others that I can't remember.  I
remember  Sammy Davis Jr. once playing cards in our back room with members of
the  band.  Jackie Gleason would stop by on occasion.  That's what  our house
was like back then.

I learned tablature on the banjo  and guitar but didn't learn to read music
till I got to Junior High  School Chorale and composing classes.  I learned
to sight-read  too.  Then one day a family friend gave me a C-Melody
saxophone  and I was in the groove.  I quickly picked up a flute and  started
taking weekly lessons on both sax and flute.  My knowledge  of scales and
modes previously learned in Chorale and composing classes  allowed me to
rapidly progress to the point where I had a decision to  make.  Was I going
to pursue a classical music career reading  music from a piece of paper, or a
popular music career having  fun?  The choice was easy.  I wanted to be a
Jazz  musician.  Besides I was already playing by ear almost everything  I
could listen to on the record player.

During high school I  played 5-string banjo after switching from tenor, and
guitar for a few  years with some friends and it was just natural for us to
start a Rock  and Roll, Rythm and Blues band.  Actually, though I didn't
realize  it at the time, we were a fusion band.  A fusion of Bluegrass,  Folk,
Rock and Roll, Rythm and Blues, and Jazz.  We even turned a  few standards
into Reggae when we felt like it.  By then a friend  had turned me on to John
Mayall and Canned heat and I discovered  musicians like Howlin' Wolf and
Robert Johnson.

Suddenly, that  "toy" harmonica that I had been playing around with took on a
much more  serious attitude.  One day I was goofing around and  accidentally
bent the 3 draw and I was hooked.  In our band, two  brothers played trumpet
and trombone and I played the sax and we worked  out horn section
arrangements to all our tunes.  And when the time  for the harp solo came, it
was pure improvisation.  That education  really allowed me to understand the
horn hiding inside the  harmonica.

The days of reading the music off a piece paper were  gone.  I entered a
place of inspiration.  And that's the only  way I can play now.  It comes
from somewhere else it seems, just  flowing through me to everybody else's
ears.  And when I'm in the  groove, there's no better feeling on earth.

I still have all that  technical knowledge locked away somewhere and I
believe the  understanding of the keys and modes and time signatures,
progressions,  sharps and flats etc. are a valuable part of my musical
toolchest, and  certainly help my songwriting greatly, but it's completely
under the  surface.

I prefer to play every song from the heart, every time,  instead of off some
written page.  Once I learn the tune, reading  it off the page is just too
sterile for me anymore.

It don't  mean a thing if it ain't got that swing.  Doowop doowop  doowop
doowop.

And although not everybody gets it, there are  still people in the audience
who can tell when you're "givin' it up"  and when you're "mailing it in."
And there are some times when alot  less means alot more.  The trick is
knowing the  diference.

"Sometimes nuthin's a real cool hand."  --   Paul Newman (Cool Hand Luke)

PEACE
Scott
Believe in  Magic!"