You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Two Jazz Pianists React to Bill Evans

Episode Date: August 7, 2020

It's solo analysis time as Peter and Adam break down Bill Evans' solo on "Autumn Leaves."Links From This Episode:For a comprehensive collection of piano lessons, save money by purchasing the Piano Access Pass - every piano course past, present, and future from Open Studio.Today's Open Studio Live Events (All times in EDT):1:00 PM - Adam's Daily Guided Practice Session (for Members Only)3:00 PM - Live Guided Practice Session with Adam Maness on YouTube8:00 PM - Peter Martin's Shelter in Place Live #21 - Solo Piano Concert on YouTubeFor the rest of this week's calendar, follow this linkInterested 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, don't you need bigger glasses for this episode? Perhaps, perhaps. I'm Adam Manus. And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to the You'll Hear podcast. Advice and inspiration for music and life. You leaned into it.

You leaned into the inspiration. What are you checking your message up? We're doing a podcast here, buddy. You know, I got to, you know, we did podcasts on why not to have your phone open as you're doing important things. And I'm disresulated that. That's okay. Our own rule, Peter. It's all good.

We're having fun here. Hope everybody's doing well. We're coming at you old school with the audio podcast. Well, that's what podcasts are. Aren't podcasts great? Aren't they the best? They are the best. And they're the worst sometimes too.

Not today. People. They're the best. The worst. Well, we're here in our new pod suite. This is like Pod Suite v3 here. Man, this is like, this is pandemic version of the pod, pod suite. Yeah, we got a Plexiglass.

sheet between us, which is really, I think, just for the placebo effect. No, dude, it's real plexiglass and it's a barrier. I mean, on the other hand, I guess we could be in just different rooms at this point. But, you know, we're here. We're having fun. Yeah, no, it's fun. Yeah. So we are, yeah, I mean, thank you guys for listening.

We're always having a good time here. We are sponsored by Open Studio. That's right. Go to Open Studio Jazz for, oh, yes. I've never done that. He's on board. He's on board. He bought in.

We've got so many great things happening, not the least of which is a wonderful new course. Well, it's relatively new, the magic voicing system that we discussed two weeks ago here on the podcast. Yeah. Which folks are kind of going crazy. And it's a course, it's your brainchild. And it's based upon one simple concept, one magical concept. But folks are really loving that because it seems to be unlocking some knowledge for folks on, you know, a kind of tricky area. Like how do you conceptualize voicing?

How do you play better voicings? How do you approach jazz chords at the piano? So that's been a nice thing, and you can check out the piano access pass. Yeah. Get in on that. And what are we talking about today? Well, today we're talking about Bill Evans. You know, we've played some Bill Levens.

Bill Levin. He's my accountant from East Rutherford, New Jersey. No, Bill Evans, you know, the great pianist. The master. We've played him on the show before, but only in the context, I think, with Miles Davis. Yeah. And, you know, we played him. I think we have played him before too.

But not enough. Not enough. And I thought we would do. We haven't done, it's been a long time since we've done a two jazz pianist reacts. This isn't even a YouTube video, but it feels like. But it's supposed to be like two jazz pianists reacts to Britney Spears. You all can imagine the thumbnail. It's like Peter double pointing at me and I'm like, whoa!

Yeah. And so that's what we're going to do today. We're going to listen to Bill Evans, Autumn Leaves from Portrait and Jazz, which is one of his iconic records. Scott LaFaro. Who? Scott LaFarro ever heard of him? A young Scott LaFarro, I believe. Young?

Well, he was always young because, unfortunately, yeah. And then a young, but a very young Paul Motion. Yep. And this is just one of Bill's great solos. So it starts with the melody, which you heard there with that little intro, the don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't. That little, like, three over four thing that they do as a trio. And then there's the bass solo, and there's some really good interaction with that.

But we're going to skip all that, because we're going to go straight to the piano solo. what really matters here. Yeah. I think I transcribed the solo as a young teen. It's been often transcribed for a good reason. I mean, this is a good one. In fact, you might even say on two fronts, if you're only going to transcribe Bill Evans,

one Bill Evans solo, but why would you? But or a first one, although this is not the easiest solo to transcribe. But it could be a good entry point. If you're at the level, you can handle it, right? Bill Evans solos are a little bit like, they're a little bit like Keith Jarrett solos or even like someone like,

Bud Powell solo is like, you think they're going to be easy, right? You think they sound easy because they make it sound so easy. That's the great trick there. And then you get in there and you're like, oh, snap, this is actually fairly difficult. But this is a great solo. So let's check it out and we'll share our thoughts once the solo is over. Go back and forth trading and take the head out. I like how you kind of kept you going.

It's like we're just going to listen to piano. But the bass solo's got a little piano solo. Yeah, the bass solo's kind of killing too, actually. It is great. And this is something that Bill Evans, we hear him do in different situations, I believe on this record, too, where he,

it's almost like a, like a New Orleans cacophony of voices happening at the same time. Yeah. You know, I don't know if that was a thing of like from miles that he got or just,

he was hearing, I mean, basically, I think it's really cool because he finishes his solo, obviously, and the bass solo starts as you normally would think,

and then we have some drop down from the drums and different things, but it's not like, bam, And it's not a square kind of way. He basically keeps solo on top of the bass. Well, and it's like that section that happens before the piano solo is kind of the same thing where the bass and the piano are trading like that.

And I think that's a fairly strong characteristic of, especially with Scott LaFarro in this trio. Yeah. But actually all of Bill Evans' trios, Paul Motion too, man. Oh, killing. I got a fun story about meeting him, but we'll get to that. So this, and I was just looking this up, this was the Bill Evans. I mean, this is, of course, the classic Bill Evans trio. Yep.

This was their first recording together. Oh, yeah, I didn't realize that. And it was there. If my inside sources are correct, big shout out to Wikipedia. How you doing? But it was recorded eight months after Kind of Blue. So give you a little bit of a reference point there. Yeah.

So I was just thinking like his Bill Evans, I think he's such, I mean, it's so much to unpack here. There's a lot of Evansisms. There's a lot of Evanisms. Yeah. And like this period and, you know, I was thinking of like everybody did Bill Evans, which wasn't that much before this, but that was, you know, I think that was with Sam Jones and Philly Joe Jones.

Exactly. Or PC in Philly. I think it was Sam Jones. But they, like, once he started moving here, like you're still hearing some very strong red garland influences, like everybody, like I think every past. Went and Kelly for sure. But you've got those evidences in there.

And like he's definitely, it's the beginning of this trio concept specific, I think, to Paul Motion and Scott LaFaro. Yep. but we have the historical context of hearing, you know, at the Vanguard and the later, you know, the short-lived, but those great recordings and of this great trio and where it developed. But you're really hearing that happen, I would say, already. Yeah, and exactly right. And I love that you mentioned the Red Garland thing because he does one of his Billy, Billy, Billy, you know, Billy Evans Evans.

Billy Evans. He does one of his Bill Evansy things where he does, which I think is directly related to Red Garland. where he does something like... Yeah. He does the chords with the single line. Now, Red might do... With the octaves or spread voicing. Yeah.

But the fact that he's doing this melodic... It's a tough little thing, too. The way he does it is not easy. Yeah. It's not easy. And then what I love about this solo, too, is, you know, the... That kind of...

I don't think that was the exact theme, but that theme at the beginning... Yeah. You know, that sort of... turn with a wide interval at the top. A little riff, a little riff. Is the theme that keeps coming back. And then another evinisms that he does is that whole like,

triplet on triplet, right? Ah, yeah. Da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. So if you're here, you know, two, three, four. Dot-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. On the piano, on the piano, it's something we don't think about that much of like,

and he can put it all. over the bar. You know, that kind of thing. Yeah. That was not clean the way I just did that. No, no, no, but it's definitely got the, it's got the flare and the feeling. I think, too, you know, if you look at this solo and really the way he plays a lot during this period, it's fairly thick.

Like, you know, we talk about, like, leave spacing and stuff. And, like, if you don't really clue into hearing where he's coming from and how he's setting off the architecture of his phrases as the solo unfolds, you might think, wow, he's just playing continuously, but Bill Evans is the master on the soul, the master of the very brief spacing and pause, but very well timed.

You know what I mean? So there's actually, I think, not a huge amount, but the correct type of breathing room between those phrases. And it's a fun thing that kind of, you know,

we talk about deep listening and going back and kind of analyzing, learning some techniques about how you can incorporate that into your playing, no matter what style or tune you're playing over. Because it's a great thing to have. Yeah, It's easy to set up your phrases to have space when you leave a lot of space around them.

And that's important sometimes. But what about when it needs to be denser? You know, you talk about Bill Evans. You talk about John Coltrane, the master of that as well. Different ways to do it. But that's, I think, a great thing that kind of jumps out. Well, and he had his own signature space. He would have his own like this.

And he does it a lot in this one where he breathes on the one. Yes. Which is something that is counter. Like we kind of teach sometimes against. comes in on the Anna one. Right. He's always like, one, two, three, four.

Yeah. And then when he hits on one, it's actually pretty powerful. Yes. You know what I mean? We always talk about like the syncopation, like letting it delay, letting it delay,

and then bam, because it's a, it's a calling response with yourself rhythmically, but it's also like setting up the drama and setting up the, the rhythmic resolution in a way that's a little bit elongated.

Yeah. That's great, man. Yeah. Well, thank you, Bill Evans, for the beautiful track. I do recommend transcribing at least the first chorus of this. You'll get a lot of really solid jazz theory on a tune that you probably should know anyway. And it's a great solo to start with. I think this would be challenging for beginner.

I think even for an intermediate player to do all like, I don't know, 10 choruses or whatever he does. It's a long solo. But that first chorus is fairly easy to hear and you're going to get a lot of great information. Absolutely. And I was just looking up. Everybody digs. Bill Evans totally recommend that record. I know a lot of people have heard it.

Sam Jones? Yeah, Sam Jones. I mean, that's, and it's such a, like, to hear the way Bill Evans plays with that trio versus this trio, it's still Bill Evans. You know, a lot of people like, wow, he's playing, he's not playing differently. I mean, he's playing, it's a different recording that, what is this, like a year? Because this was his first record, I think, on Riverside. Yeah, it's like a year, a year and a half or so, maybe two years. But, you know, he had, Bill Evans had such big years, you know, especially for, from a rhythm section standpoint, from, I mean, from everything.

but from like a trio standpoint, the rhythm section, the bass and the drums and like he could hear how they, you know, Sam Jones and Philly Joe Jones played Scala Faro, Paul Motion, and he could fit in there in a way that was so just authentic and organic

and beautiful, you know, master trio player and beyond. Good stuff. Oh, I should tell my Paul Motion story real quick? Yeah, go for. Are you begging me? No, you got it? Oh, no, no, no.

Okay, you got it. Really? You want to hear? Okay, cool. So I met Paul Motion maybe like 93, 94, 1993, 94. I was playing with Roy Hargrove, and he's touring around Europe.

Of course, I knew Paul Motion, but he was so like understated. I was like, wow, that's him. I met him. Hey, how are you doing? And he was famous around that time because he was like 15 years ahead of the curve on the, you know, about one bag travel?

You taught me about one bag travel. One bag, travel, baby. Yeah. I mean, I didn't know about it. Back then, I had one huge duffel bag, and I was, you know, bringing all sorts of stuff. But Paul Motion had, he didn't travel with drums, which of course nobody does now.

But even he was ahead of the curve with that. He's like, you know, they'll provide drums wherever. And he was touring heavy in Europe. And I mean, everybody loved him. And he had one bag. He had like three kind of days worth of clothes, he said. And he would wash stuff in the hotel or send it out. And we were like, oh, my God.

You know, we had like eight suits on the road. We were young lions and whatever. We were like, man, this guy is legend, but he's kind of crazy. But it took me, you know, 15 years later or so that I started adopting that. I don't want to say I'm the Paul Motion of modern one bag jazz musicians traveling, but I kind of am. I've mastered it. I've imperfected it, but Paul Motion was my original because I was like, wow, that seems like so much freedom. I didn't get it because I literally used to bring like 100 CDs on the road in these like folders and stuff.

I mean, I had so much stuff. And Brian Blade was not to sell by the way. That's to listen to. That's to listen to. Yeah, exactly. And then Brian Blade, who I was traveling with, I guess that was a couple of, maybe. No, yeah, it was like 94, 95. He used to bring record player and LPs in his big bag to have in his room.

He probably did that like six months ago. What am I talking about? Hipster Brian Blade, man, bringing to LP? That's what he was doing. So I mean, like, we were more, you know, like in a kind of a different place with him. But Paul Motion, I always kind of had that in my mind. I was like, that would be so cool. But I just couldn't conceptualize it fully.

I remember the first time I flew with you, Peter, I came to the gate and you were there and you just had a backpack. And I was like, you'd chuck your bags. You're like, no. Oh, man, I hadn't checked the bag since the 90s, bro. No, maybe early 2000s. Yeah. I'm serious. I probably haven't checked a bag in 15 years.

Are you serious? Yes. Why? Because you know what? Waiting at the thing is the worst. It's the worst. Having them lose your bags is the worst. It is the worst.

Yeah. It is. Yeah. All right. Until next time. Go here.