You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - The Ultimate Deep Dive into Standards

Episode Date: June 3, 2021

Put on your scuba gear and jump into the sea of jazz as Peter and Adam take an in-depth look at 5 well-known standards.Links from this episode:Get the free PDF for this episode right hereListen to all of the tunes played in this episode with this Spotify playlistHave a question? Leave us a SpeakPipeWatch Live: YHI LIVE Mondays at 4pm ET on YouTubeWant more of Adam and Peter? Check out Open Studio Pro hereSupport the pod by spreading the word with the link youllhearit.com 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

Hey Peter. Hey, what's up, Adam? Are you certified in scuba? You know what? I actually am a certified scuba novice. Good, because we're about to go on a deep dive. Well, a medium-sized dive. Oh, medium-sized. I'm certified for that. I'm Adam Annis. And I'm Peter Martin.

And you're listening to the You'll Hear a podcast. Music advice, inspiration, ideas, and vernacular. Come in all up in your earwaves. You always add like one or two more things with each week. It's a little flourish. It's a little verbal flourish for the, for the, for the, folks. I'm so glad to hear you noodling around a bit as

yeah, keep noodling buddy. I'm a nudeler. We're going to go back to a little bit of the roots here of the most recent incarnation of the you'll hear of podcast, which is when the root the roots of the noodling started. Yeah. The Peter Noodles Martin over here. Poodle.

Poodle. Poodles. Poodles. You don't want to give yourself poodle, the nickname poodles. But you might have just done it. But I mean, there's a difference between noodling, which I mean, I'm gonna definitely be right on the line of this. He said there's a difference between noodling.

Well, I didn't fit it. I'm trying to demo what I'm actually doing. Okay, there's a difference between noodling and just playing background music. Like, talk a little bit. I'll show you background music. I mean, background like like pads. Okay, so first of all, you're not allowed to give yourself your own nickname. Second of all, Poodles is a fantastic nickname.

So I'm gonna allow it. Keep talking about. Yeah, this is background. This actually makes me feel. Yeah, now I'm noodling. I'm using, yeah, this is too much. This is too much. Man, do you follow...

This is straight smack Raymond right here. We're going to start the episode here in a little bit. No, we are started. Do you follow just a little bit of Instagram catching up? Do you follow Chris Dave on Instagram? No, Chris Daddy Dave. Yeah, he's got an amazing post. He mostly posts like church music, like memes and stuff like that.

But he's been posting these like church musician memes. They're hilarious. He's been posting these like the audio from the in-eer like, PA between the musicians at the churches, it's really funny to hear like, don't do that. That's not the time for that. Like, them yelling at each other, getting mad. They haven't passed the collection plate yet. As, like, church is happening, they're like, this isn't what this is for.

It's amazing, man. That's great. He's a great follow him. Okay. Noodles. I'm going to noodle a little church music behind you. Hi, poodles. Oh, man, this is amazing.

Okay. So today, what we're talking about today absolutely does not fit with what old noodles McGee here is doing, right now. Noodles Malone. So we've been doing these episodes on the real book. Really, I mean, they're framed as the real book. And by the way, there's a hell of a lot more real book defenders out there than I thought there would be.

I know. We thought we were bringing in allies. Oh, my gosh. We pulled all of the real book OG like salesman, perhaps even. Maybe even the writers. Maybe that was like Steve Swallow and his whole crew. He's like sent his people on his. His minions.

Yeah. His real book minions. Anyway, so just to set. this up. So we're going to do another episode here where we're going to talk about some commonly played tunes and just to frame this. We're not really bashing the real book. What I think we do... Yes, we are. Well, we will be. I'm sure at some point. Offhandedly, but only because it's wrong. Directly. No, no, no. Seriously, though. But what we want to do with these, what's really interesting, I think, to us, to both of us, is that when you kind of like go on deep dives as a listener of the tunes,

right, you actually learn a lot about, you know, if you can go back as far as you want to the origins of the song, you can learn some interesting things that not only are very helpful and maybe can give you some ideas about how to arrange it or how to play it, but then you actually get to see the moves of the famous versions. And that's what we like to point out. Like, it's not, it's not that Miles Davis was wrong for how he played Stella. It's just interesting to see, you know, the version that he probably was listening to or that was popular at the time. And then he took and made his own thing out of. Knowing both of those makes it for kind of an interesting experience. It kind of enhances the Miles version. And then you're like, oh, and that's kind of what the

original changes probably we're close to. It's really interesting conversations and enlightening discussions we can have around it. So it's not, no one is wrong here is what I'm saying. It's like there's no, there's no wrong way to do any of this stuff. It's just interesting to go a little bit deeper than what the real book has or maybe what you've learned at the jam session. Well, and I wonder if it's the kind of situation, even if we could, we could look at some technicalities and say that Miles was wrong. the way he played Stella or anything else around midnight. And, you know, that's more of an issue that I have with that because, but maybe it's one of those situations where if Miles is wrong,

then I don't want to be right. Well, it is a fascinating situation because if Miles does something, and obviously if Miles is doing it, it's going to become, you know, very famous. Right. And then a bunch of people are going to copy that. But then you get into a lot of defending, like, you're not doing it the right way, the way that Miles did it.

Right. Right. Which isn't the way the monk did it, of course, right? And I think we did that one on our last real book, thing where we did more jazz standards and jazz compositions. Yeah. So today I wanted to go back to three very famous jam session tunes. We're going to cover Autumn Leaves.

Ever heard of it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Autumn Leaves, what is this thing called love? Yes. And I fall in love too easily. So Autumn leaves, Joseph Cosma, was a French poem and with music added in 1945. A chantal leaves. I've got a French version.

Jean-Ga-Haw-Haw-Hie. What is this thing called Love, Cole Porter, of course? Peir Pele, pele, I'm noodling vocally, by the way. From the musical, Wake Up and Dream. And then I fall in love to easily music by Jules Stein, beautiful music by Jules Stein, from the film, 1944 film anchors away,

starring Frank Sinatra. And so we have, what we're going to do is we're going to listen to the original, not the original versions first. We're going to listen to sort of what I think are kind of the most well-known versions. You can have your own versions of these, but these are what I think of. Okay.

And then we're going to kind of go on a little bit deeper of a dive of what's going on and kind of talk about some of the differences. The theme of this week's standards deep dive is really going to be two fives. And there was this whole era, right? Yeah, this whole era, really in music, I was going to say jazz, but it's not really even that. Where people were just throwing two fives everywhere. It was just two five crazy. Two five one.

Yeah. Yeah. Two five one going crazy. Yeah. Nothing wrong with two five ones, but maybe there's other options. And I think if we can go back a little further and see some of the original harmony for this, it kind of gives us a bigger picture of what could happen.

Okay. Sound good? Sounds good. So let's start with Autumn Leaves. Commence, O Festival. Autumn leaves the quintessential jam session standard. Autumn leaves written in 1945. How about a little Bill Evans' portrait in jazz?

Okay. You know this. You know what I mean? Keep down. So this Bill Evans' Trio version, awesome. It's good to bass solo. Definitely one of the first ones I think of along with Cannonball's version, of course.

Yeah. Naturally, those two, I kind of think, are right around the same time that I think about it. Yeah. But there's a couple of things that are a little different than the original. So let's listen to the first, like, recorded hit of this was in 1950 in France by Yves Montaunt. Oh, I know. Yves, Enfant. Eve Mondein.

At Paris, at the club of jazz, Holt. But interestingly, I think music publishers and record companies knew what they had

with Autumn Lees because it's such a good song. You know what I mean? And so English version came out the same year, lyrics by Johnny Mercer and recorded first by Joe Stafford. I think we've had Joe Stafford

on the show before singing something. I want to say. But not live. No, no. I don't think she's been live for a while. But she's got a... Man, such a rich voice. And this is the first English version of autumn leaves on a label.

Check it out. Wow. Striff by the window. The autumn leaves are red and gold. I see your lips, the summer kisses. The sunburn hands I used to hold. Since you went away. Check out the bridge here we have on screen.

And soon I'll hear. But I'm... When all... A little half step in there that has been abandoned. Oh, the string arranging. Oh, man, the string arranging in the 30s, 40s and 50s. Just incredible. It makes me think of, like, the synchronized swimmers in the Cassie.

No, definitely. Like, this is... Is this as hip as the Bill Evans version of the Cannibal version? Certainly not. But it does give us some insight. So there's one thing that I want to highlight here, and that's the second half of the tune. So interestingly, if we go to the real book version back here, and so we're here in the second half of the two, right?

And actually, the real book version is in the key of G, but that Bill Evans version and the Cannibal version is B flat. So we're just going to do a B flat. So there's a 251, a minor two, five one that everybody plays. Now, in Joe Stafford's version, and I've transposed it here to the real book, it goes right to the five. Right to the five. Now, she doesn't do the five on the A section. On the A section, it's all the twos, fives, ones. I think it's just really interesting that then on that second half,

they really become, the tune gets simpler. Yeah. You know, it becomes just 5-1-5-1. Was there maybe, did I maybe hear? There was a, there was, but it was over the five. Over the five. And so this is just kind of the theme of the day is you don't always have to do it. You can just five it sometimes.

And in fact, knowing that, and also the original French recording of this is, the same thing. Two fives in the first half, five ones in the second half, which is, it kind of adds a layer of like, oh, that's interesting. You know, it doesn't mean that it's right or wrong, but it just is kind of an interesting way to think about it, that the first people that were playing this were thinking that. Now, Joe Stafford here, the arrangement that she's playing, I'm not sure who did the arrangement, but that last four bars there, that's a nice little change there. I love that half step there. You hear a couple of different early versions of this. So the real book has

That's another two-fiver, right? Well, the real book, yeah, well, it's a flat six-five, right? And it has major seven the real book, which I never heard anywhere else. Bill Evans doesn't do that, Cannonball doesn't do that. Yeah, I don't know what that's about. I don't like that. I don't like that. But this, very nice.

Yeah. Can you play that? It's just a little bit richer. It's just not so. And it's just got more of a counter melody in the bass line versus Absolutely. Isn't that nice? So again, it's like the real book way, the Bill Evans way,

not wrong to put twos in the two-fives, but kind of cool to find out that the original versions didn't really do that. There was a lot more 5-1 happening. And in fact, it kind of frees you up as an improviser. If you wanted to go more modern with it, I'm going to go with that. You know what I mean? The 2-5s, to me, put me straight in the straight-ahead jazz. category. You know what I'm saying?

Well, it's interesting because I think you played, I think that hers was more like real triad. We both went to that kind of, yeah, which is just one extra note with that ninth or second, but gives it that. See what I'm saying? That's so nice. It just gives you some good ideas here. So he's taking, he can't help it with the Rhodes sound.

He can't help it. Rhodes noodles. Roads noodles. Okay, next up, if we can take the next up, if we can take the next. notation off for a second. Yes, sir. So next up is what is this thing called love? Of course, jam session standard.

Everybody knows it, right? Is this? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm always confused that with... There is no greater love. They're both about love. We'll do that on the next episode. One is more questioning.

One is more demonstrative. What is this thing called love? I always think of Clifford Brown, Max Roach, Sonny Rollins. Check it out. Simple career. What a gutsy, like, one and a half minute intro there. It's the best, man.

It's the best. Max Roach. He's the best. Bam. Bam. I mean, is that swinging, though? Yes. Next week's episode.

Is that swinging? Yes. We just listen to Max Roach to say, is that swinging? Yes. Of course, what is this thing called love? You know it, you love it. You probably played it. Come on.

Stop it. Stop it. We're not going to be able to finish the episode. Probably played it a billion times, yeah? Not like that you haven't. Not like that you haven't. So there's a... There's another version.

Okay. This is, oh, this is so corny. This is Libby Holman, actress, singer, 1930 was when this was... Chantus. This was the earliest recorded version. Now, I know we have a lot of, like, sheet music heads out there,

so please send me your versions. If you have older versions, original copies, I am not a sheet music head, so I don't actually have a ton of experience researching sheet music. But we do ask, dust them off. They might be a little old and dusty.

Are you implying that they're dusty? No, I mean, literally dusty. Like, please clean them. Nobody said it a bunch of dirty paper up in here. You know what I'm saying? But again, even with some corn dogness that is all respect. Corn dogness? All respect to Libby Holman.

You should really, this is one of the funs about going on deep dives of this is you learn about interesting people. Libby Holman was, she was on fire. She had an interesting life. Did she? Was she ahead of her time? Well, she was ahead of the earth in some ways. Wow.

Okay. Anyway, yeah, Libby Holman was really interesting. Not really with her work. This was recorded in 1930. One year after Cole Porter wrote the song. 1930? Is that what you said? Dang. I know.

That's a long time ago. Check it out. This is Libby Holman. What is this thing called love? This is weird. I wish you could see your picture. I was a humdrum person leading a life of car. When love blew in through my window wide

and wakened my humdrum heart. Love blew in. It's kind of hip, is that a tuba instead of a bass? It's a tuba and banjo instead of a bass and piano. I've made the shift, yeah, had that? It's 1930. Oh, umpala. Check it out.

Classic Pelot. A boy. Oh my god. She's in the key of G here. There's a G through that whole first A. C minor over G. Now they'll go. Why should it make a G major?

You know what I mean? That's not bad. That's pretty hip, right? Libby's not messing around, actually. Libby's living her life here in 1930. Libby was, might have been liberated, huh? Libby was liberal. She was.

And literal with her intonation. Again, check out that pedal. So Peter, can you put on the sheet music, please? music activated I wish I had that kind of of vibrato that just you do

you do okay so what is this thing called Love Cole Porter So why do people start going to the minor to end it

didn't they No no no everybody still goes to the major But what people do here in the real book And what we heard Clifford Brown do I mean as jazz musicians

Are what to do Right Libby was in G so we're down a fifth Or up a fourth And C Just two 2.5 in it, right? Minor

2.5A. Instead, that recording that we just heard from 1930 keeps everything in that first A over a C pedal. And it's... It's very dirged-esque, too, because it is. It is very dirged-est. It's like, just keeping it going.

And something very mysterious about it. Then on the second A, same kind of thing. That should go to the tonic there. It's bad copy pasta. But you get the idea. The harmony there is different. Now, I've also, I don't have it here, but check out James P. Johnson's version. He does a similar thing. Okay.

Yeah, James P. Johnson does a similar thing in 1930 or 31, I think, of staying on that pedal throughout the whole A. To me, these little details totally changed the dynamic of how I am going to approach this from now on. I think that's super hip. I think so, too. And like, the way we would normally think about if we were going to throw a pedal on this, it would be like, it would be pedal on the five, and then it would be to go to the

five of the actual five there as opposed to staying on it, right? Yeah, yeah. Well, that's what she does in the second eight, but the first day she just stays on the five. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But even that little detail is kind of hip, man. It's kind of a hip change. So it's just, but again, it's just like instead of, and we have people in the chat asking, like, why, if you're still doing devices that are similar to a two, like when you suss out

in autumn leaves, why even worry about it? But it is the options of not just automatically insert two five, right? that there's actually like 10, 20 different things you can do to achieve a similar but, but varied effect. So that it's not just all Dorian, Mixilidian tonic. You know what I mean? It's different ways to do it. So it's pretty cool. Especially that G, what is that G7 over?

So we got the first. That G7 over C is hip, yeah. Let's hear that again. Especially with the flat nine because you got that. Let's hear young troubled Libby Holman. Trouble. Trouble. Hot, a polka-esque vibe there.

Just all on that tonic pedal. That piano player's noodling, you hear that? He's a noodler. It's noodling. So here's the second A. Again, on the one, now they'll go to the five. Now even on the bridge instead of two five, just five. Instead of two, normally you would go two five there,

but it's just five there. It's great. So again, the whole theme of today's episode is that if you kind of go back before that straight ahead era, you're going to get less two fives, more varied versions of five, which is why I think people like, you know, people in the chat are saying like,

this is Barry Harris talks about this, Ethan Iverson talks about this, but it is, it just is a kind of an interesting way to frame things. It's not wrong to learn things as two fives, but there's just a whole other world out there that we can. It is fun to see where it comes from. For sure, for sure. And what it replaced.

All right, we got one more. You ready? You want to take that notation off one more time? Okay, here's, I love this tune so much. This has been on the podcast before. I played it once, and I played it, you're gonna freak out, Peter, because it's so unlike me.

But I played the melody. Frike out! I played a wrong note on the melody. Heard about it from our listeners, as they're want to do, and I'm, want to. Really? I don't remember this at all. Doesn't seem like them.

But, no, learned a lot, actually, from our listeners. I actually learned a lot. Learn quite a bit. I fall in love too easily. I think of Chad Baker, I think of Miles Davis. Seven Step 7. Victor Feldman, perhaps. Perhaps.

Herbie's on this record, though, isn't he? Yeah, he's on half of it. This is absolutely beautiful. Yeah. It just doesn't get better than that. That's as good as a ballot can get. Frazing. Fraising, everything.

And the changes, everything. I mean, just beautiful, harmony, rich melody, the sound, the playing, all good. So I've all in love too easily. lyrics by Sammy Con, music by Joel Stein, written in 1944, for the film Anchors Away, which I've not seen, but starred

a young Frank Sinatra. Now, I don't know, Peter, if you know young Frank Sinatra. Of course I know. But damn. Good looking dude. I mean. I mean, but also even middle-aged or not, yeah, middle-aged acting Frank Sinatra, of course the voice, the golden voice,

the beautiful voice. But as an actor, have you seen, and I diverge a little bit here, the Manchurian candidate, the original version. It's been back in college, I watched a lot of those old classics, but I haven't seen it in five years. I haven't seen it five years. That's when I was in college. Yeah, that was right.

That was online college. Yeah. It was online college. But no, the exciting thing about that movie, well, an interesting thing was it was banned for many years. I think actually right after it was released, they banned it because it hit a little too close to home with some Vietnam, no, Korean War stuff or whatever.

Wow. But it was re-reliable. least when I was like maybe I don't know a teenager or something because I remember I went to the high point theater so my dad but great actor but yeah young frank Sinatra for sure well let's get the notation oh by the way we have a PDF here it's linked in the description of the podcast yeah and okay of course here check it out in the description uh on youtube check out the PDF that's yours to take where you can see these examples Peter can you put the notation back up on screen for our YouTube folks so for this last one uh we're going to

to focus in here on just the last cadence of the tune. Now, I don't, if you've not heard the original from Anchors Way, this was actually what the, the recording they used in the film just with Frank Sinatra singing and playing piano on the film. Quick question, though. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is this anchors away? This sounds like it might have been one of those from that genre of, um, their sailors,

they're going to New York. It's a little bit swashbuckling. Like, no, there's a little bit of another connotation on the high seas, you know, swashbuckling. No, they're out to get, they're out to get dame. It's on leave, I think, is the... Okay. Obstensibly.

Yeah. Ostensibly. Yeah. Oh, do you know how this is... How this is... Okay, maybe I'm going to throw this up here. You know how it's spelled? I have it right there, man. Where?

Oh, yeah. So it's a little bit of a... Away! Yeah. It's a little bit of a... A little pun there. Yeah, yeah. Okay.

So if you haven't heard this original version, I didn't know this original version. I grew up on the Miles version. I grew up on Chet Baker singing it. Yeah. This... I mean, talk about getting out of the two-fives and finding the juicy bits of the harmony. This is what actually inspired.

Look at that. Look at that. Gene Kelly, Catherine Grayson. Right. There's a threesome there for you. There's a threesome for you. Oh, my gosh. Look at this guy.

Not bad. Not bad. Dean Stockwell. Wasn't he a quantum leap? Really. Ageless. Holy smokes. Ageing yet ageless.

Okay, here's Frank Sinatra's I fall in love too easily from anchors away. Just stunning. Yeah. Fall in love. I fall in love. Too terribly hard. For love to ever lie. Heart should be hell school.

Because I've been food in the past. Check out this final cadence here. And still I fall. Did you hear that? So pretty. So this is, this is why. it's fun to get out of out of this the two five zone and check out what's going on here so we're going to put it to the real book key so in the real book here these last four bars

so it's just the two and then you know the the five of the two yeah uh sorry uh flat six uh sorry flat seven five two five two five two one but what is in the original so for even just out the gate here in the original it does this this this crazy like G7 to E flat 7 suss to the 4. And that keeps going up to the a little B flat 7 or B flat 7 suss. Yeah. And then to the 1. And that gives you that even though that A flat is kind of function as a temperate 1, but they gives you that 4, 5 to 1 as opposed to 2.5. Exactly.

And then landing, instead of landing on the flat 7, it lands on the 1, which is so much more gratifying. And then just a little walk down to the 6. And then the two. Oh, I like this one here. That's the flat six. It's like a G7 flat nine over B to the one over five. So it's like two.

And that's just we were talking about before like kind of entry points to putting some kind of modern hip substitutions. I mean, it's right there for you. Like if you wanted to go modern, it's there in the original. Like that sort of that. that sort of that corral bass movement. That's not, you know what I mean? A lot of, like just as strong of a melodic movement with the root as there is coming off the melody.

I was one of the greatest classes I ever had at the new school was with an amazing ear training teacher named Armand De Nielion. It's one of the greatest ear training teachers ever. And he talked about that, that your baselines as you craft reharmonizations as you craft arrangements need to be as strong melodically as the melody.

They can't just jump all over the place. place because you got to hit this or whatever. Like you can craft. If you know how to do what's happening here, you can craft melodic baselines, which is done beautifully here. And if you think about it, you know, a 251 on its own in terms of the root movement is not the most melodic thing or it can be because it can be, but it's actually like moving up like that. That's not really a melodic movement.

Whereas can be kind of a stronger thing. Yeah. Or how about like? yeah mm-hmm you know and even so much more so than just yeah

you know what I mean yeah because that's honoring the melodic movie of the actual root even here just getting into the four from the two you know instead of doing just a five and then back to the two

which is what you do like I don't even know where this G7 flat nine is really coming from or going to but there's something about it that just adds yeah

all this sets up that four Let's just hear this Frank Sinatra version one more time from the... I have been food in the bad and still I fall. Beautiful. Yeah. Five. Gorgeous. I think he's in the key of C here. I have this, I have the chart in the real book key of E flat.

So good. Well, and check this out. You had a question about, or you were trying... I could see you... I could see your Noggin turning. Dean Stockwell, how is this? That is a very young Dean Stockwell. No way, it's him from Quantum Leap.

See, that's because you were like, you were doing the math and you couldn't. Well, I was like, okay, so that was Gene Stockwell, is it Stockwell? Gene Stockwell. Dean Stockwell. Dean Stockwell. I was like, that's the same guy, the name from Quantum Leap. It was an 89, 90, 91 that was that show? He was an older gentleman, but not that much older.

I was like, was he a teenager? Turns out he was a little kid. He's a little kid. Man, that dude's a pro act here, man. Oh, man. He was great. He was great on that show. What was Al?

His name was Al. He was like the computer. I love that show. Well, full circle, man. Going back in time. It's a quantum leap. That should have been the title of this friggin episode. Well, we're going to retitle it after this.

The next one. The next one. Totally. It's amazing. It's amazing. All right. Thanks, thanks everybody for listening.

Let us know what you want to hear next. We already have some suggestions. Because we are out of ideas. No, not at all. Actually, we could do this. There's so, I was, I had to whittle this down. There's so many, what do you know about what'll I do, man? Have you ever heard the original version of what will I do?

Oh, what'll I do? Not the Chris Bodie version, which I know is your favorite. No, that is. But, but there's the original Irving Berlin sheet music is like. That's a great, that's a great lyric too. Yeah, yeah. Awesome. Thanks, everybody.

Thanks, everybody. Peace. Until next. The time. Until next time. You'll hear it. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Nice one, Pete.