You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - From the Vault: 7 Great Standards You Don't Know

Episode Date: December 18, 2020

Today, we dust off an old episode from the archives - all the way back from May 18, 2018, here's an episode where Peter and Adam discuss some standards you might not be familiar with.Interested in more music advice? Go here to browse our catalog of jazz lessons and courses available for purchase. And be sure to check out our All Access Pass - every course from Open Studio on every instrument.Friday's Open Studio Live Events (All Times EST):1:00 PM - Adam's Daily Guided Practice Session (for Members Only)3:00 PM - Piano Guided Practice Session with Adam on YouTube8:00 PM - Holiday Special | Shelter in Place solo piano concert with Peter on YouTubeFor the rest of this week's calendar, follow this linkLet us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel.Follow us on Facebook | Twitter | Instagram See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

I'm Adam Menace and I'm Peter Martin and you're listening to the You'll Hear It Podcast. Today we're going to give you seven great standards you don't know. Now you don't know me. How do you know I don't know these? That's for the audience. Oh, for the audience. Well, we don't know you. So if you know these, sorry. We're both so accusatory and apologetic at the same time. We can cocky on this podcast. That's right. Okay, so these are, well, if you do know them, good for you. But if you don't know them, shame on you.

I think the idea is these are less jam sessiony standards. These are more like, I mean, good jazz musicians probably know all of these. That's true. And have played them at least. So these are definitely some of like the next level standards that you may want to get in your repertoire. Yeah. And actually, now that I'm looking, there's at least one on here. Not only do I not know I've never heard of.

Really? Yeah, I think so. Let's start out with I cover the waterfront. It's a great tune. Great tune going way back. You know, a lot of times where, I mean, definitely a standard. I always think about when I first heard Lewis Armstrong and got into some kind of older stuff, I was lucky because this trumpet player in New Orleans kind of hit me to a bunch of, like,

I'd heard Lewis Arns, I was like, oh, he's corny, you know, what a wonderful world or whatever. I was young and dumb. And he's like, you need to check these. You need to go back further and check these. I was like, go back further. Oh, hell's not. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But he, like, gave me a bunch of tracks like Dinah and I covered the waterfront.

I got a right to sing the blues. and you know like I really just it just drew me into Lewis Armstrong and then I started thinking about man this is like 1932 1928 you know the hot fives the hot sevens that stuff and like really listening to the soloing and the phrasing of what he was doing now everything around him was pretty corny sometimes or dated I shouldn't say corny yeah yeah but I mean you know how that's when I really heard how ahead of his time was and just got into his voice and his phrasing and started to really understand and how much he laid out everything that we did in terms of jazz, taking standard tunes and making them jazzy, quote, unquote.

I feel like I've heard this tune recently. Now, where would I have heard this? Well, it was on my mind because I played it. Yeah, I did it. It's funny. I just did a gig, and I hadn't played it in like 25 years or something. I recorded it years ago. It's a cool arrangement you have, though, with the trio.

Yeah, and it was kind of, you know, Oscar Peterson, Oscar Peterson, Oscar Peterson, you know, inspired arrangement and stuff. So that's a fun one. That's cool. So my first one, this is number two. This is the great Sam Rivers tune, Beatrice. Oh, wonderful. Super fun tune.

It's a short form. But the changes are really, really fun to play on. And it's definitely become a standard in the circles that I run with. But I find that sometimes a lot of young players don't know this one. But check out. No, and that's one of those tunes, I think we could even have a list sometimes of like tunes that make you sound better than you are. It's true. If you just play the tune and kind of honor the tune and then, you know, meander around the melody and stuff.

You're going to sound above your pay grade, which is nice. It's a well-written tune for sure. Sam River is a great jazz standard because we just said standards, and sometimes people think it has to be old Broadway tunes. American Songbook, yeah, yeah, yeah. American Songbook, but then jazz standards and then even like pop standards, they all go into the jazz standard oeuvre, I would say. Totally, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay, number three, I'm going to go with the great Benny Golson classic. The great. The great. I remember Clifford. Awesome tune. Yeah, that's an awesome tune. Now, I learned this tune. Shame on me.

I didn't know this until I was, I can tell you exactly, I was 24 years old. And the very first gig I did with Roy Hargrove when I got in his band, I had learned like all of Roy's music and some other tunes. Like, I was prepared. I felt like I was prepared. And we did like a sound check and just played a few things. And I was like, what else are going to play? And he's like, oh, you know, you seem like you got it. And then he kind of sat at the piano.

He's like, we might do this. I've been kind of thinking about, I remember Clifford. I was like, whoa, I don't really know that. And he's like, I'll show it to you. And he just, like, sat at the piano and taught it to me. Awesome. And, like, I remember that tune. There's nothing like being taught a tune, like, when you know you have to play it later that night.

But that's when I learned it and, you know, the melody and the changes and everything. So I've always loved that tune. I mean, if we're talking about jazz standards here, Benny Golston's whole songbook is just an amazing collection of jazz standards. They really, you know, talk about, like, getting you to play to sound good as a jazz musician. if you learn, you know, all of his hits even, which some aren't even played that much, but they're all so good. Well, I think that this, you know what it is?

This list, I just realized what we made. This could almost be like, these are tunes you can't just call in a gig and assume that even good players are going to know them. That's what this basically is. It's true. Yep. Well, that takes me to number four, and that is the great ballad. We're doing a lot of greats.

The great. The great. No, this is by a really quirky songwriter named Matt. Dennis. And this is a ballad called Everything Happens to Me. I played this for years with a particular singer that I used to play with and she just killed this song. And it's a real, it's one of these

lyrics that you can only really go through the lyrics one time because there's a bit of a punchline at the end of it, you know? But he, he wrote some really interesting stuff. Junior and Julie is another one that's really interesting. So Matt Dennis, check it out. He actually has a really quirky

album that he did of his own stuff. as a weird dude, but a decent piano player and a really great composer and songwriter. Check it out. Everything happens to me. Didn't Miles record this on like one of the work in steaming, relaxing? I think he did. Or something. Yeah, I vaguely remember.

I don't know that one. I mean, I've heard it. I've never played it. It's beautiful tune. Nice. All right. Next, I'm going to go with, what is this? Number five, this masquerade is over.

Cool. And this is there, I believe there's two versions of this tune. I always be confused about this because, you know, I grew up. up hearing a lot of like George Benson because he had some really big hits like when I was in high school and middle school like pop hits. You know, and then on Broadway and stuff. Or Broadway, rather, not on Broadway. And he has this, this masquerade is over. Oh no, that's the one I'm talking about now. See, I'm getting so confused. I just confused myself. Seven Great Standards. Peter doesn't even know. This one. I know this might not come through, but this is the one I'm talking about.

It's beautiful. Nancy Wilson. This is actually Joe Zavidol, I believe, on piano. This is the Cannibal Nancy Wilson. But that, this masquerade is over. That's what it is. George Benson's this. That's okay.

Now it's all coming back to me. They're both great tunes. But, oh, man, now I'm thinking about that Benson intro when he's singing along. Don't confuse it. Oh, sorry. They're both good, man. They're both good. All right.

The masquerade is over. I don't even know who this is by. Now I forgot. But anyway, check it out on the Nancy Wilson Canterball Classic recording. That's awesome. That takes us to number six. And this is really not, this might not be a standard at all. It's not a great American songbook.

I guess it kind of is. This is somewhere from the musical West Side Story by Leonard Bernstein. It's got to be Great American Songbook. It is, right? West Side Story counts. Is that a legal term? So what's weird is, I've started playing this in the last two or three years, and you don't hear any jazz musicians play this one.

I think Keith Jared has done it. But I don't hear a lot of, I couldn't find a lot of, I couldn't find a lot of recordings of jazz musicians playing it, but it's amazing. It's so much fun to play. Look it up. I mean, you know the tune. The song, beautiful, beautiful lyrics.

Somewhere over the rain. No, not that, man, not that. No, but the form is a little funky. It's like an ABC form with different lengths on each section. I love my ABCs. Learned years ago. Learned them. But if you can incorporate this, I've noticed that,

we'll call them people who may not be jazz fans know this tune and love this tune and it's it's incredibly popular and well known and it really it works in a jazz repertoire really well nice tomorrow we're going to do seven people that may not be jazz fans and call them out by name looking at you mom okay well that brings us to number seven and um i'm gonna call a little bit of an audible here just because billy strayhorn's on my mind from from yesterday's episode and go with UMMG. Nice. And this is Upper Manhattan Medical Group, which is kind of a...

Healthcare scenario, right? A health care scenario. And apparently he wrote this, I'm just thinking about from in the book. Like, he was very ill at the end of his life. But he was such a consummate artist and creator and creative force. He was writing, you know, he was in the hospital, you know, very ill and was still writing and stuff. So he kind of used some names.

And you would think this is a really dark... He also had a song called Blood Count, and that's like a very pensive, poignant ballad. But this UMMG is actually, you know, like just a great kind of blowing tune. That's a swinger, right? It's a swinger kind of A, A, A, B, B, B, B, B, do, D, D, D, D. A really fun tune to play. And there was a time in the kind of mid, mid or the early 90s in New Orleans where this was, like, actually a standard that you had to know on a gig. Victor Goan's kind of started the thing. And it was cool, and we all kind of learned it.

I was going to fit. Isn't it funny how, like, certain players will be like, we're all playing this? And then a whole community, like my first one, Beatrice, that's like a Willie Aiken's, who's like legendary St. Louis, tenor saxophonist, who everybody's played with. Yeah. He loved that tune. So I feel like we all know it. We all know it in this town.

But sometimes, yeah. Yeah, around the time, it was some kind of lesser known ones that I realized when I left New Orleans, I would call these tunes and people like, I don't know, the UMMG, what is that? It's great. Regional standards. Regional standards. It's dope. Seven regional standards.

You don't know unless you're from there. Yeah. Cool. So, all right, well, that's good. If you don't know them, you should know them, and you don't know them. So, you'll hear it. Thanks for listening to this episode of the You'll Hear It podcast. You can go to you'll hear it.com to get more information, submit a question, or just say hello.

Wait, you can do that. Absolutely. All right. And if you like what you heard, please leave a review and a rating below. Thanks.