You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Our 5 Favorite "Simple" Solos

Episode Date: February 14, 2020

These solos might be "simple," but that doesn't make them any less killin'. Peter and Adam list their favorite understated solos. You can hear them all on our Spotify playlist here.5 Favorite "Simple" SolosMiles Davis - "So What"Keith Jarrett - "Never Let Me Go"Ahmad Jamal - "But Not for Me"Herbie Hancock - "Solitude"Sonny Rollins - "Blue 7"BONUSCheck out Geoffrey Keezer's new course from Open Studio: Elements of Solo Piano. He'll show you the strategies and techniques you need to know to become a better solo pianist. For a free sample, take a look at Keezer's excellent transcribed performance of "The Nearness of You" right here.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.Let 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.

Hey Peter. Hey Adam. Have you ever heard this record before? Um, it sounds vaguely familiar, like from a dream. It's a little known album released in the late 50s. Kind of green? Close. Some kind of blue? Closer.

Is that Bob Evans on piano? I'm Adam Manus. And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to The You'll Hear It Podcast. Daily music advice and beautiful tones coming to you. All right, Pete. we're going to get right into our number one of our five favorite simple solos

you know what I'm saying? Yes Do you like a simple solo or do you like a complex solo? Because we're going to do both We're going to do our five favorite busy solos tomorrow Oh we are, okay I like simple I mean complex has its place

Agreed Yeah But don't you think Variety is the spice of life Variety is the spice of life As Bob Evans once said But it's not I think the point I want to make

Is that because a solo is simple Doesn't mean it's any easier To compose or play Or to execute correctly Yeah, it can be much harder. Let's make something complex sound simple. Yeah. Well, you know what one of my favorite simple solos is?

What? Miles Davis. So what? I mean, do we even have to play the rest of it? You all have heard it a million times, right? Yeah, it's so fun to talk over it anyway. Yeah, I mean, simplicity of it's fine. It's come on.

It really is. You kind of gave me a little snicker when you saw this one on the list. But how can you leave it off, man? Yeah, how are you going to let... It sets the tone. It's the whole album. It's the whole album. It's the whole album.

I know we've talked about this at liberty and at length, but it's not just a simple Miles Davis solo. It's a simple composition. It's a simply but magnificently crafted album and story. That's what it is. It's a story. And then it's like these little simple, but so effective. Like it's so hard to be simple because you can come off simplistic.

If you don't have the skills with a Z, maybe even two Zs. So it's like, how do you pull? that off. And I mean, obviously for Miles, it's kind of like, you might think it's just natural and effortless, but there was a lot of crafting that went into, I think, by design, his approach to music. And on this album, I think the reason we celebrated so much and it's so beloved is not just because of the wonderful compositions, the beautiful playing, but the sound of it. It's a very simple and cohesive sound to it, a true audiophile's delight. It's absolutely gorgeous. It's gorgeous, yeah. Well, you know what? Something I'm noticing about all of the artists,

on our list of simple solos is that they're all like giants of this music. They're all simpletons. Well, no, no, definitely not. I mean, these are all the heavy, heavy, heavy hitters. Yeah, and all of them... This is the you'll hear of podcasts. We don't come.

We bring the fire! Yeah, I'm just saying, so if you're... What? If you're listening to this, like, maybe you just got out of the practice room and you're like, oh, I'll never burn like Michael Brecker. That's okay. Right.

Not everybody burned like Michael Brecker, you know? Now, let's listen to number two. Michael Brecker. Yeah, number two, Michael... No, he could play a great simple solo, but you know what I mean. I feel like he might show up tomorrow. He's going to show up tomorrow on our favorite busy solos, for sure. Yeah.

But number two of our favorite simple solos, this was your first pick. And this is Keith Jarrett from, what's the record? Standards volume 2. He recorded this a couple times on the live stuff, but this is, I love this recording. Never let me go. Man, just got me already, Keith. Come on, Keith. That's awesome.

Yeah, incredible. It's just so beautiful. Yeah, obviously, this is just the interpretation of the melody, the soul. The whole thing is just a cohesive, nuanced masterpiece by Monsieur Jarrett. Check it out. We will have a playlist. Alex, I'm going to send you this playlist right now so you can put it in the description. Wow, that's so meta.

The inner workings of the finely oiled machine here. And you can hear all these on our Spotify playlist. Our next selection is also from a master of jazz, known for his simplicity and real artist at this. And this is Amajimal, but not for me. You ever heard this track, too? I think so. As if he's carrying weight. Okay, do you get any more simple than not playing?

That's what I'm talking about. I live as far as the mind. He's doing so much with so little. You know what I mean? He's saying so much. This is the left-hand comping. Talk about dynamics. The dynamic between the left and right-hand are astounding.

And the balance. I mean, this is really about just the simplicity and effectiveness of the entire trio, really. You know? Clean balance. on the piano. When you play like this, like your approach to time has to be so precise. There's nothing covering anything else. It doesn't feel tighter anymore. No. A lot of humanity to the approach to the syncopation and the time of the swing.

Now here's the solo. I'm just gonna hit this one phrase for a while. How'd you know? What did I introduce in just a little simple left hand? Not much. Huh. I'm gonna drop the two there. He's probably

dropped it too. That's Amad Jamal from Live with Pershing but not for me the title track it is unbelievable and even though

it's getting thicker here obviously with the block chords it's still simple though because the approach that he started

with he doesn't abandon that the rhythmic approach the nuance the dynamics simple doesn't necessarily mean sparse now

it just means a simple approach like a melodic approach to it that's definitely been the theme so far

I mean even that that that continuous line that he starts to solo with, that's actually very thick. Even though it's single line, it's up high, but I mean, that's a long phrase. That phrase is hashtag long AF.

Yeah, we don't have time for you to do the whole. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Keeps going, keeps going. So our next cut. Love you, Amat. This is one you picked. This is from Herbie Hancock's River, the Joni letters, right?

Is that it? Yes. And this is Solitude. We've played this on the show before. Solitude. I'm pretty sure we've done this solo before. Yeah, should we jump to the solo? Yeah.

It's kind of in the middle, right? or kind of after. Oh, no, let's start at the beginning. Let's start at the beginning. All right, here we go. Space. What a sound, too? Yeah.

What year was this? This is like seven, eight years ago, maybe nine, ten. 2008 or something? Yeah. 2010? Yeah. I don't know how we can, I hate to talk over this, but I love how we can, like, go down to the month of 1959 in what was recorded, what?

We were like, this Herbie record. We said eight, ten, twelve, fourteen years ago? 2007. So there's a lot going on in this. But it's laid out, you know, architecturally in terms of how he's arranged the melody. And then when he gets into solo, in a very simple way. It truly is beautiful. And a lot of space.

But there's a lot going on, you know. Like when you really look at you, like, whoa, if you're looking at the transcription of this, you'd be like, that's not simple. But it's the performance that brings out, I think, the simplicity. That's so great. Yeah. That's Herbie Hancock's solitude from the Joni letters, River. And I think it's a great example for all of us. You know, there's so much to take from any of these recordings and approaches to soloing and arranging it.

On this one, on that Herbie, I would say, you know, he did an amazing job of a number of things, but particularly really getting inside of the form and the flow of the song. You know, this is, of course, Duke Gallington's solitude. And taking this arrangement, it's fairly esoteric, but he linked it up so well with the direction of the story of the original, composition, that it flows in a very simplistic way. When we talk about, like, kind of fighting against the form and doing something that's against the natural bones of a tune, it can end up sounding convoluted and complicated. If you're going for that, that's fine. But this is a way where he was able to put some very advanced harmonic and melodic ideas

coming in a lot of different directions in a way that's super cohesive and calming and just fits with the song. Beautiful. Our number five, we do have a bonus, but here's our number of five. We'll get to the bonus. but first our final of our five favorite simple solos this is a solo that I often point people to

when they ask about like you talk about I'm doing my... I love that voice. You talk about a soloing with the melody. How do you do that? And I always say, just listen to this. And this is Sonny Rollins from Saxophone Colossus. This is Blue 7.

And what I mean solo off the melody is he starts with a melody and he weaves his solo from it so effortlessly. You can't even tell where one stops. He's so inside the melody though. I mean, he's all up in it. all upon it.

Doug Watkins. Max Roach. What a sound too. Again, it's not that it's super sparse or he's not playing a lot of notes. It's where he's putting them. It's how he relates them to the melody that makes it just a simple idea

taken to a beautiful, beautiful place. And it keeps going like that for like three or four minutes. Yeah. So let's just talk a little bit about how maybe folks could get into this concept of playing. a simple solo because it's not necessarily something that you know every tune every you know

kind of tune and every night on every gig you want to be like okay i want to play a simple solo it's got to be a little bit of a mentality that just sort of starts to come out at the appropriate time yeah because it's not i mean i think yes it's possible to make something very busy sounds simple but that's a lot more advanced in a way but to play a very simple and perhaps sparse solo um there's different approaches to it and i and i would just say that this last the sunny ronald on solo, this would fall under the style of super logical, the way that it's constructed, right? For sure. You know, I mean, all of these have it to a certain point, but there's like different

techniques, and I think you can really get that away from the solo. And if you learn the solo, and these, look, these simple solos that we're highlighting today and a number of other ones we could come up with are great solos to transcribe and learn. Oh, for sure. Simple solos are generally easy. They're not necessarily easy to play just like the performer did, but to get the notes and the rhythms and stuff, they're a little bit on the easier. All right, I'll take the, so what?

You take the solitude. Okay, yeah, right. The solitude's got a little, got some more stuff. But even that, I mean, in terms of, like, from other Herbie Hancock solos, even on that record, it's a little bit more accessible. For sure, for sure. But I would just say that, like, as you learn, or even if you don't learn this Sunny Rolls solo, but you just, like, study it and say, well, what's my takeaway? Not just, oh, it sounds great. I love it.

What can I take from that to apply to my playing? And I would just say, on that kind of solo, think about the inner logic of the solo. And so you're going to want to take, how does he? he delineate his phrases, you know, be, boo, boo, do, boo de, ho, with that sharp 11. Like, how does he use that and make it so clear, the clarity of it? And then the resolution of the logic that he sets up as he goes through, I mean, this is on a blues form.

So you have the expectation and the harmonic form that's already built in to set up your solo in a way that the architecture works in a logical manner. But how does he specifically do that? Because that's the more interesting stuff, I think, to take from a great solo that you can apply to your playing than just the exact phrases. Well, you can hear he's staying in like the context of the blues. Like he, that first really, um, notey line that he plays is, it's no mistake that's on the last four bars. That that's on, that's on the cadence of it, right? Like he's, he's stated the theme twice and then he does this massive variation like off the bat. Right. And then he

goes back to the theme. Right. You know, and I mean, to me, like, this is a master who, who, even though he's playing this, um, you know, very melodic, thoughtful, simple solo, he still understands, this is the blues I'm playing. Right. Can we play that first phrase? I want to do a little pop quiz with the listeners. Y'all ready? We've got to go to school, A-C-T-S-A-T.

Like to kind of where his very first phrase he plays. I think it's get the head here. He rode on the head. Yeah. Oh, that's the head? Oh, yeah, that's right. His solo is so cohesive. No, it just weaves right into it.

So you've got the direction of it and then like the rhythmic resolution, because you've already set up the harmony and the feel of the blues. and like on the head it's really about that you know that sharp 11 kind of you know and then so that's kind of a thing and so then when he goes you know up to there that's like what you're hearing actually and when you do it's so beautifully and simple I mean look the rhythm and all that's killing but you got that even though it's that it's not that C try it over and then Tommy Flanagan yeah he hears that

that's some expert level comping right there's the next level for sure well those are our five favorite simple solos. Be sure to go to openstudiojazz.com to check out all of our jazz lessons, simple or otherwise. And we have a bonus. Bonus. This is from Kenny Garrett. This is before it's time to say goodbye.

But this is not... From songbird. From songbird. It's not Kenny Garrett's solo. No. It's Kenny Kirkland's solo. Yeah. Kenny Kirkland's tune as well.

We're going to go out on this. So until next time, you'll hear it.