Re: [Harp-L] Questing For a Basic Competency in Jazz

[Richard Hunter <turtlehill@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

"Elizabeth Hess" wrote:
>What does a decent jazz player do when a song is called that he/she
>doesn't know?"  What SHOULD he or she do?

It's important to start with this point: jazz, like bluegrass or baroque, is formal music with an established repertoire and clear stylistic conventions, in which the "decent" players are expected to be very capable on their instruments. (Unlike rock and roll, for example, where even the pro players don't have to be any better on their instruments than Lou Reed. Not that Reed doesn't get the job done.  But it's not the same job.)  

One of the implications is that a decent player is expected to know the repertoire.  And that repertoire is pretty complex.  A number of people on this list have said "learn the common chord patterns"--in other words, and I don't mean this in a pejorative way, learn to fake it. (We've all faked it at one time or another, and the pros fake it more spectacularly than anyone, as per the recent comments on this forum about Adler faking Milhaud.) In my opinion, that's not workable for very long.  First of all, you can't fake the head--you either know the tune or you don't, just like in bluegrass.  Further, plenty of jazz tunes are composed in a way that makes the harmonic movements difficult to anticipate if you don't know the tune.  Often you can guess the destination--the chord where things are going to end up--but that doesn't mean you can guess where the harmony is going on the way to that destination.

In short, there is no substitute in jazz (or bluegrass, or baroque) for knowing the repertoire.  That's why fake books exist--they're a quick guide to the essential repertoire.  

"But there's so much of it!" Yes, there certainly is.  And that, in a nutshell, is why you can either dabble in jazz, or play jazz.  If you play jazz, it's a lifelong study.  If you dabble, you pick up pieces of the sound, the approach to improvisation, the thinking behind the music, and so on, and you apply them to anything else you play.  You know some tunes, not the full canon, and you play those well.  And you sit down and listen when you don't know the tune, at least when you're playing with pros.  Or you learn to read well enough to use a fake book effectively, and you rely on the fake book when you're jamming off-stage. 

There's nothing wrong with dabbling in jazz--I think everyone should study jazz for at least a little while, and make a point of transcribing some of the great solos and studying what's going on in those solos. You learn a hell of a lot that way.  But if you want to be a solid jazz player, you've got to make it your focus.

My opinion, and I'm sure there are others on this forum.

Regards, Richard Hunter    

author, "Jazz Harp" 
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