You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Actual Proof

Episode Date: July 1, 2022

Adam goes in depth to explain one of the slickest, grooviest, and most revered tunes of Herbie Hancock - "Actual Proof".Have a question for us? Leave us a SpeakPipeCheckout courses from Adam, Peter and more at Open StudioLet us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel.Follow us on Twitter | Instagram

What's up? You'll Hear at listeners, Adam here. Peter's over in Europe, but don't worry, you're in safe hands. We're going to have a very good time today. And if you want proof, here it is. My name's Adam Aniston. You're listening to the You'll Hear at podcast. Jazz explained. Today, we are going to have a little bit of an appreciation, a little bit of an analysis of Herbie Hancock and Bernie Maupin's amazing actual proof. It's from his 1974 album Thrust, and it's one of the most iconic tunes from that era, from Herbie, or from anyone, really. And the tune itself has a bit of lore around it in Herbie's autobiography.

He talks about this tune, actual proof, and about the groove specifically and about how the record label really wanted something more commercial. and he and his rhythm section of Paul Jackson on the bass and Mike Clark on the drums had had come up with this amazing pocket and it certainly doesn't fit into any commercial box whatsoever but it has a very, very magical and special feel. So Herbie fought for it and the record label rep said, okay, if you can do it in one take, you know, we'll use it. And they did. They did one take of it and this magical groove. Thank goodness. It's stayed. with us here and we get to just bask in its glory. But I'm not really here to talk about the groove today. I'm here to talk about Herbie's solo and about how in a tune like this that has a form full of

landmarks, we're going to listen to one of the great musicians of his generation or any generation, use the tune to help play his solo. What does that mean? So he's using the big movements, the big landmarks in the song to help guide him through his improvised solo. He's not playing over it. He's not bowling through it. He actually plays some of the landmark hits and changes that are in this, and figures actually and licks that are in the melody itself every time through his solo, which is incredible. So what I want to do here, there's, we're going to link below. There's a copy of our version of the lead sheet where you can see and follow along. if you like, but we're just going to listen to the head right coming, right before getting into

Herbie's solo. And I'm just going to flag all of the major landmarks. And you can follow along on the lead sheet as well, because the hits are on there as well. But the hits are super important. And Herbie proves it. So let's just listen to the tune and I'm going to flag. You do not, by the way, have to use the lead sheet. If you want to use your ears, it's even better so you can flag the form. But I will sort of mark what's going on. And then once we get in the Herbie's, solo, you're going to hear how Herbie uses these important landmarks to define his solo. It's amazing. It's a true lesson from a master.

Let's listen to actual proof. Already, that super loose, magical groove happening. All right, the tune starts on a chord change, two bars. Tune starts now. There's our first landmark. This eight-thuss thing. Ah, and a four again. Dot in a stop.

Another big landmark. That's another big landmark. We're back at the top of the form. We're going to play it again. A7. A7 Suss. Another and a four. Gotta get that in there.

Got to get that in. Okay. I'm going to let it simmer for a minute here before we get into the road. So, just real quick. Those are, those are the big landmarks, right? So if we're following along here, the tune itself, it starts with two bars of just C, minor, right? There's nothing, and Herbie's doing doing that thing there on the clav. And then the tune starts with that, that, and then there's this hit, right?

This chord that happens on the, on the end of four, right? Then there's another four bars, this this G-flat, major seven over B-flat, and then to this A-7 altered thing, and then this A-7-altered thing, and then this A-sust. And then another hit on the end of four in that E flat, minus seven, flat five. And then we have this figure of all of these like, right, on these sort of like dotted eighth note rhythm. Another landmark. And then another two bars. And then, right?

Like a stop time thing, no chord. And then this figure, everybody plays together, including Paul Jackson, the bassist. Right? Everybody's playing that. It's kind of a crush note. but it's not a, it's more of like this little A-flat wiggle that happens, right? So those one, two, three, four, five landmarks, right? The first hit on the end of four, the second hit on the end of four, four bars later,

the little dotted eighth note thing of the, the old, that thing, that's the third landmark. And then the stop time thing is the fourth. And then our figure here, five landmarks why are we talking so much about these landmarks why are they important let's listen to herbie's solo and i want you to notice what happens what a great road that right there's our first one and a four second of and four is coming up here a seven sucks here all right herbie's going to start hitting landmarks here and a four herbie hits it that left hand there that left hand all right he's he's now in the groove with that he hit those dotted eight

let's keep going what okay so now he hit that right he hit that with with Paul jacks he kind of plays through it on the second time man mark the end of four he hit it big hit there playing really playing with that those those those dotted ath there he you know he really did some 16th in groups of three to highlight that let's keep going there it is again that's part of that's head and then he's between the landmarks and the four four bars later he's going to do it again oh let's it breathe there on that one with those dotted a's he did this like like these slide down i can't even do it these sliding downs on dotted eighths again using the tune right letting the tune help you play it's it's so important because there are a lot of modern compositions that are

written like this, right, with these hits, with rhythmic figures, with melodic figures. And so often I hear players try to play through them or play over them or ignore them. And you can just use the information that's given to you. Listen to her. Mark number one. And he's built up to that. Dottaday. Again, using what's given to you.

Again, hinting it back again, in his solo. And then everything that's happening is true. Got a date's landmark, right? Hitting that again, making sure we know where we are. You're the four? Listen to that. So that first landmark, the and of four, the babo da-da-bo-dab-a-dab-ba.

He hits it. He leads up to it just perfectly. And it happens every time. It happens every time. There it is again. It could start to be jik. Stop time. Again, he's coming back in with that.

Such a great solo. So what you're getting here is that to form these hits, right, these major events that happened. And there he didn't play all of those dotted Naples, but these major events that happened throughout the tune that are part of the form. Herbie's not barreling through them, right? That first chorus, he did kind of play through it, and it's cool. And you don't have to hit every one, for sure. But you can hear him chorus after chorus after chorus using what's given to him to great effect. It really takes a lot of the composition out of it.

Composition is there. It's there to give you ideas. And when I'm saying and a four, sometimes it's the eighth note and, sometimes it's the 16th note and, like that last one. But yeah, so it goes on here for another three minutes.

And it's, if you don't know this track, it's just one of the most iconic track of the 70s, one of the Herbie's most iconic tracks, one of the greatest tunes ever. And I was listening to it this morning and I was thinking like, it's just,

it's such a great letter. in using what is given to you. I mean, this is his own composition, so he wrote this for himself to play. But, you know, this can be anything. If there's something that is in the form that's marked and it's there, don't shy away from it. Don't barrel through it. Don't just play changes or two five ones over it.

You know, use what is given to you to great effect. And you can then play around with it and let that, those big events give you ideas. Like, how many times did we just hear Herbie play like, you know what I mean? that dotted eighth note thing that's happening there in the head itself or the you know that that thing he does that almost every single time in some way or another and then the times he doesn't do it it becomes an event in and of itself where he kind of plays through it but more often than not he's letting the tune uh guide his improvisation and he's he's really playing the tune and letting the tune do the work do the heavy lifting you know and that way your audience also is with you

the whole time. They know where you are. They trust where you are. And it's, it's, you know, always, it's always a bit of conserving how much brain power you're using as far as like, you don't have to compose every single bar of every single tune, right? Like, you can use the pre-written information, the song itself to great effect, not only for ideas and for improvisation, but to just help ground the tune in something real that's not just changes and not just, you know, you blowing over something. I hope you found that as interesting as I did when I was listening to that and noticing how much Herbie used the landmarks to mark where he was. I just thought it was fascinating and inspiring and something that I plan on working more into my own plane. That's it for today.

Before we go, how about a word from our sponsor? There you go, folks. We're, of course, always brought to you by Open Studio. I will be back on Monday for another solo episode. Until then, you'll hear it.