You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - 7 Favorite Scat Singers

Episode Date: March 15, 2019

PM and AM end the week with a countdown of their favorite scat singers. Wanna send a SpeakPipe of your own? Check out the bottom of the page at http://www.openstudionetwork.com/podcast. Today's question comes from Charles, who just completed transcriptions for Greg Hutchinson's Fundamentals of Jazz Drumming course. You can check it out on the Open Studio website here: https://www.openstudionetwork.com/project/fjd-overview/Favorite Scat SingersSarah Vaughan (listen to Sarah Vaughan at Mister Kelly's)Dianne Reeves (have a look at her Open Studio course: Define Your Voice, and listen to her album The Calling)Chet Baker (listen to Chet Baker Sings)Ella FitzgeraldClark TerryBetty CarterLouis ArmstrongBonus: George BensonToday's episode is sponsored by the Oxford American. The Oxford American is a magazine dedicated to documenting the complexity and vitality of the American South. Its award-winning annual music issue comes with a CD sampler and digital download - a must-have for any serious music fan. Recent issues have featured Nina Simone, Thelonious Monk, John Cage, and John Cage. Visit https://www.oxfordamerican.org/yhi today for a special subscription discount!Let us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel and leave a comment for this episode.Interested in more jazz advice? Go here to browse our catalog of jazz lessons and courses available for purchase.Follow us on Facebook, Twitter & Instagram at:https://www.facebook.com/heyopenstudiohttps://twitter.com/heyopenstudiohttps://www.instagram.com/heyopenstudio See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Shoe doby dooby doby. This again. Shabababababab scat. Skatop. Skittlittlittles singing. Jazz hands. I'm Adamannis. And I'm Peter Hart.

And you're listening to the ULherit podcast. Daily Jazz advice. That was horrible. I apologize. We can't even redo it. We can't even redo it because we don't have time on our memory cards. We've got to go. Let's go.

We've got to go. But that just look, this is in the moment. We don't edit. Everybody thinks that we scripted and edit this. Oh, man. Who are we professional? YouTubers over here. This is spontaneous.

every day come in action. Well, today's episode of You'll Hear a podcast is sponsored by the Oxford American. For a limited time, you'll hear at listeners can subscribe to the Oxford American for only 25 bucks. Visit Oxford American.org slash YHI to subscribe today. And I'm not going to reiterate my personal guarantee from yesterday, but I would just point, because it makes you so nervous. I'll just point you to yesterday's episode if you'd like to hear that. That's it. So anyway.

So you scattered, I know it doesn't seem like there's any reason for anything we do here, Peter was scatting at the beginning because we have a voice message about scatting. Well, dude, it's the title of this is, I know you have trouble going into the future because you're like all about the moment. Everybody knows what this has to do is because it's our four favorite scat singers. Oh, right. Okay. Sorry. Yeah.

This comes from a speakpipe. You know, you can go to you'll hear it.com and leave us a speak pipe. That's a voice message on a tape. Could you make that sound any fussier and ridiculous? But you know, this is, I'm going to shout out. This is from Charles. Charles is an extremely gifted drum transcriber. He just completed the last transcriptions on Greg Hutchinson's Fundamentals of Jazz Drumming Course, and I mean, he crushed it.

Oh, no, respect. I mean, what he did on that, I didn't know that could be done. I've never seen drum transcriptions like that. I mean, I'm talking about the different craft symbols or on different lines. The precision that he did it was. A solo. Out of time solo, and he, like, nailed the transcribers. So good. Even if you're not a drummer, just watch it. It's like an artistic thing happening in the notation there.

Anyway, here's Charles's question. Okay. Scabababadubi tweeta. What's up, Peter? Adam, this is Charles in Atlanta. I'm curious to know who you guys's favorite seven and a bonus scatters are. As always, the podcast is great. Keep up the fantastic work. Thanks. Well, Charles, that's a great question, but as we said, we don't have time for seven and a bonus. We're doing four today. So we're doing four today. Get what you pay for. All right. Number one, can I go with number one?

Please do. Okay, Sarah Vaughn. Obviously. I mean, obviously, well, yeah, I love Sarah Vaughn. I love her improvisation, her scat singing. It's almost like pulling it down to call it scat singing in a way. But, I mean, such a complete musician from her, it's just seamless. Like her improvising, her piano playing originally, the way that she fashioned and stylized melodies.

I mean, and then the way she would. And I always think back to the great Clifford Brown, Sarvon recordings, you know, Lullaby of Birdland. Like, her soloing is like spontaneous composition, her scat singing. It's so interesting and lyrical and harmonically and melodically. Her sense of swing. I mean, just the complete package. And then obviously her voice is amazing.

Yeah, number one for a reason. Number one in your heart. I mean, it's just like incredible, incredible soloist. Number two. Oh, and let me just say real quick, since we reduced down to number four. I mean, four. I mean, we got through number one. We might as well go for seven.

Okay, maybe we can't. So there's a record that I always thought was kind of famous, but whenever I mentioned, not whenever, but a lot of folks don't know about it, especially young folks, live at Mr. Kelly's. I don't know if you know that record, but that, check that out for Saravon fans. I mean, I love live recordings anyway. You know, Ella Fitzgerald.

It's a great live recording, so many. But that's one of my favorite ones for Saravan. Nice. Number two is Diane Reeves. Ever heard of her? Yes, I have. And that's very bold of us to put it right by Sarah Vaugh. But what a direct lineage there.

Dude, she's incredible at it, though. What's the Pat Metini tune you guys play? Minuanu. Man, she kills it on that. Yeah, she does. And I think that's so Diane has the ability to do, I mean, she's so influenced by Saravan. So a lot of people think, okay, her scat comes from there

and certainly is influenced by there. But a tune like that with a little bit more modern and three with kind of a groove. She has this ability to scat, but to not have it corny when it's layered over these different grooves. I mean, I think she's truly the bridge into different kinds of singing, but improvising in a totally organic and natural way. It's really incredible.

If you haven't checked out Diane Reeves' scat singing, give it a go. And, you know, a way you can kind of hear her influences is on the calling, which was a record she did quite a few, well, yeah, quite a few years ago, 15 years or more, that's sort of an homage to Saravan. But they really extend the arrangements and the stylistic things on there, getting some of the kind of Brazilian Saravan stuff. and she's always like improvising in a super interesting way. And then, you know, I play with her a bunch of times

and people think like, well, there's certain tunes she likes to scat in a more traditional way. But even though she'll change up, like that's all. I've done it probably 500 times with her. But she'll do it like, occasionally she'll turn to me and be like, as soon as a ballot. And she'll just start singing it like that. And she still improvises and scats, you know.

Keeping you on your toes, man. That's what it's all about. Number three, I have Chet Baker. You know, not known really for even a singer, but man, he's scatting. What's a remark about it, it sounds just like his trumpet playing. Yeah.

Like, it's very warm and earnest. Yeah. And just the sweetest language. Very personalized. Check out Chet Baker sings. I think there will never be another you. Oh, that's the scat solo that just kills me every single time.

Yep. And it's just so, like, the way he sings melodies, I mean, like all these great singers, but they're so seamless going into the improvisation. There's such a confidence. and an understanding of the musicality, the lyricism that they, you know, have such an advantage of, let's be honest, as singers, over improvisers. But then we get into an area of Scots singing where we think, ah, the horn players have an advantage. But when you get to this top level, not at all.

Okay, so number four, I'm going to go with Elephish Gerald. Who? Ella Fitzgerald. So, reference to earlier, you know, probably one of the most powerful improvisers as a singer, male or female, ever. Yeah. I mean, all these are powerful, but her authority and conviction and ability, and you think about all the great recordings, one in particular comes in mind, live in Rome with the Oscar Peterson Trio, where, you know, she really goes into some like scat, that kind that, that she forgets the lyrics and just goes into some incredible improvising and uses it kind of to her advantage. She was, of course, great at that, but just hard, hard swing, melodic, understanding, harmonic intricacies and just like right down. down the middle in the groove and then incredible voice on top of that.

Well, I mean, that's the thing, too, is everybody else is playing a ball one and she's got a faziole. Exactly, exactly. But it's not like, you know, some people sit out of the fasciola and the swing is in there. Oh, they can't do it. Yeah, she had it all. Yeah. Number five. Yep.

St. Louis's own Clark Terry. Yeah. Dude, underrated scat singer, this guy. Not even a real singer, but like, if you heard the mumbles blues? Of course, yeah. So swing in. just like he's playing again like groovy bluesy I'm seeing a pattern here

yeah just like they sing the melody or play the horn it's like you know yeah yeah so I saw Clark Terry when I was I remember when I was in high school we got to meet him when I was about 15 14 years old my dad took me down to the majestic hotel downtown St. Louis and he was such a warm like I went up and met him and he was so kind to me and like encouraging and he sang a lot that night

I remember it's kind of my first time seeing live scats singing yeah yeah yeah and I was like wow all right number one two three four five six Well, hold on, before we go off. Oh, sorry. If you haven't seen that movie on Netflix with Clark Terry, have you seen that? I haven't. What's great about that is the pianist.

I forget the pianist's a really good young pianist. But Clark Terry's basically just singing at him the whole time from his, like, hospital dead. Like, you know, like great jazz language. Yeah. Singing and the kid would repeat it. Effortland. It's really cool. Anyway, sorry.

One, two, three, four, five, six. We're number six. We're exceeding our allotment here. Gotcha, Charles. Gotcha, Charles. Betty Carter. You ever heard of her? Betty Carter.

So, you know, she's somebody that, I mean, look, a list of giants here, she really is a giant, may not be quite as well known or heard. I've been noticing, especially with the younger generation. That's crazy, right? So we need to lift up her name because, you know, Betty is right in there in the pantheon of incredible improvisers. I got a little chance to play with there in 1991 for about nine months. Such an education for me.

But hearing her, like, she was a true improviser because she always, she hated doing stuff the same way, but she liked doing the same. same repertoire. She had a big repertoire. So it was so exciting because she had these very specific arrangements, but then she wanted it to just be, I remember she would tell us before she came out like for the first tune. She's like, just play noise. And I was so terrified because I was like, what do you mean? She's like, just play. And like, you know, we'd try to do a groove. She's like, no, no, no, just play. Everybody on the whole tree. And then she'd come out and it forced us to kind build up something that we thought was sort of random. But we had to make some music. And then

she would like lift up her arm and it would come down. And then we were right into the group. like swinging like spam banged and but she understood like the drama of the music and it was the same way she would improvise and the same way she would scat it wasn't just i mean yeah she knew the changes and all that but it was like how do you create something she was always about creating something that's awesome man yeah all right yeah all right and this is the uh the father of all of it that's louis armstrong that's right yeah i mean you know uh can you separate i mean can you separate any of these great horn players from their scats singing, no, and especially not Louis Armstrong. And, I mean, I was just thinking, I'm like, I have to remember what was a singing solo and what was a trumpet solo. Like, they're all, I literally can't remember which is which. The same language, almost the same, well, not the same tone, because his voice was so gravelly, but you lose track.

It's so true. And then he was great at, like, singing melodies and scanning at the same time. You know, I mean, a lot of these people did that sometimes, but I mean, him, it was totally seamless. It was never like sing the melody and then go to the solo. It was all part of the same thing. Some of my favorite moments are on that Lewis and Ella record with Oscar Peterson trio. Yeah.

And just like Ella's singing the melody and he's coming in on these counter melodies underneath. Like a sax player. It's just perfect. Yeah. And Charles, we have a bonus. Oh, we're going bonus. We have a bonus for you. Who's the bonus?

George Benson. Oh, come on now. Now we covered him in players that sing because most of his scatting is done with the guitar. But he also just is a straight up great singer who can scat. Yeah, great improvisation. are great singer, a great guy, super funny, super kind. Did we just under promise over-deliver on this? We did.

We did. Well, it's Friday. It's hump day. So, you know, we got to do it like this. It's not like us. Is it hump day? Dude, hump day is Wednesday. Oh, I thought it was like the bridge between the week and the weekend.

Hop day. This guy's never had a real job in his life. It's not true. Next week we might talk about my days as a bus boy. It's at the pasta house company. Come on. What was it called pasta house? Yeah, pasta house.

So anyway, we are very proud. This is at the end of our first week of sponsorship from the Oxford American. Amazing. And it's been so great for us. And we're excited to have them on board. It's our charter sponsor. We've had a number of people, we don't like to brag about this. We had a number of people that wanted to sponsor the show, and we weren't going to do it.

And the reason when we were approached from Oxford American is because we love them so much. It was so easy. Free t-shirt helped as well. But I've been a reader. My family's been for years. and so I kind of grew up around it and even been to their venue. I was telling you about it, South on Maine in Little Rock.

Next time you're there or anybody's there, stopping their amazing restaurant, great venue, incredible programming in a very historic downtown right by the river in Little Rock there. So, I mean, Oxford American is like, they're into a lot of different things. The centerpiece of it is the magazine, and we'd encourage folks to go to

Oxfordamerican.org slash y-H-I for a very special offer for your first year of membership. you will not be disappointed. Reference back to Wednesdays, I'm not allowed to say it, but we have a personal guarantee that you will enjoy it, so check out Wednesday.

But the southern music issue of North Carolina is just, I mean, little tears came up from my reading some of this because there's so much just deep-spirited stuff that is right down our alley, and I think will be for a lot of ours. I mean, music doesn't exist in a vacuum

and to, like, get all the perspectives of the culture where this music comes from, is, I think, invaluable. Yeah. It's a great resource. Absolutely. So we look forward to a long, fruitful relationship with Oxford American, and we hope everybody has a wonderful weekend.

And until next week, let's get some lunch. Oh, you'll hear it.