You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - What Makes a Good Vocalist?

Episode Date: September 2, 2019

On today's episode, Peter and Adam answer a listener's SpeakPipe on what qualities they look for in singers. Wanna send a SpeakPipe of your own? Sign up for You'll Hear It Premium to access our SpeakPipe hotline! Go to https://www.openstudiojazz.com/yhi for more info.Interested in jazz vocal lessons from Dianne Reeves? Buy her course from Open Studio here: https://www.openstudiojazz.com/define-your-voiceLike those You'll Hear It shirts Peter shows off on the podcast? Want some YHI swag of your own? Take a visit to our store! Just go to https://teespring.com/stores/open-studioLet us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel and leave a comment for this episode.Interested in more jazz advice? Go here to browse our catalog of jazz lessons and courses available for purchase.Follow us on Facebook, Twitter & Instagram at:https://www.facebook.com/heyopenstudiohttps://twitter.com/heyopenstudiohttps://www.instagram.com/heyopenstudio See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Hey, Adam. Yes. Do you know how to sing like Ray Charles? You know I do. Oh, let me hear a little bit. Nope. I'm Adam Manus. And I'm Peter Martin.

And you're listening to the You'll Hear Podcast. Daily jazz advice coming at you. You know the night. Oh, sorry. I was going to go right into it. I was going to go right. I was going to go ahead. I was going to say, why you were getting so shy you were singing before we went on.

You're busting out a little Ray Charles. Ray Charles gets me amped. Ray Charles was a master. I can't. Great pianist, keyboardist, as well. Excellent piano. There's a video we shared a couple years ago on, I forget, I think it was our Open Studio Facebook page of him playing a slow blues on a roads that is just like

laying it down. Dang. Yeah. So anyway, we're not talking about, well, we're not talking about Ray Charles. Well, we kind of are, because the subject today is what makes a good vocalist, although he would be a great voice. Did you name this good vocalist on purpose as opposed to great? Are you trying to say something?

Are you trying to say good, better, best? Are you trying to say average good and great? I wasn't really even thinking about it like that. You weren't thinking about it. Okay. Well, we're going to leave it the same. This is from Suzanne in Taiwan, a premium member. Hey, open studio.

Hello, Peter and Adam. This is Suzanne from Taiwan. First of all, thank you so much for this wonderful podcast. It's the only reason I use the podcast app on my phone. I was wondering if you could do one episode on vocalists in jazz. What skills do instrumentalists expect from a vocalist? What makes a singer fun to work with? and what are some things that might put vocalists on your black lists?

Also, I would be really thrilled if you would be so kind as to throw in a couple of stories about your best or worst experiences working with vocalists. Thank you so much in advance. And please, try to include Taiwan as part of your next Asia tours, so, you know, I can show you guys around and take it to all the best night markets on the island. Thank you again. and I'll be listening. Good stuff, Suzanne.

First of all, Suzanne, if you don't have your own podcast or do any kind of voiceover or radio work, you really should. Suzanne is likely a vocalist, likely a jazz vocalist, and likely very good diction, very radio-friendly voices, we used to say. As soon as she started speaking, I was like, she's got to be a vocalist. Her voice is too good to not be a fair. Either that or she did like 50 takes on as a speak pipe, you know,

and then she waited up. No, no, it sounds like she really nailed it. and interesting question. Thank you so much. And I just want to first give a shout out to Apple for their useless app. I love this. She's like, we're the only thing that she uses the app for the podcast app for.

That's awesome, though. Yeah. No, that's good. Have you played in Taiwan? I have played a couple times in Taiwan. And the last time, I'll give a quick,

just little story, because the last time I was supposed to go with Diane Reeves. No. Was it? Yeah, it was with Diane Reeves. This is the only time I've ever missed a gig in all these years. uh, due to airplane travel or weather related amazingly.

A delayed flight? That's the only time. The only time. I've never missed the gig because even with like traveling on the day of the gig and... That's impressive, man. Yeah. But there was a big typhoon coming into Taiwan and I was supposed to fly to, um... I remember I got to Chicago and I was supposed to fly from Chicago to Tokyo.

I'm about to get on the flight and they're like, your flight from Tokyo to Taiwan when you get in is canceled. And it's probably not going to be for like two days because there's a typhoon about to hit, even though it was like 20 hours before, about the time I was going to get there, it was already canceled. So I just ended up going home, and I couldn't get there. And everybody else was there already.

That was kind of bad. So they did do the gig, which was good. They did it like trio. Romero was playing, you know, guitar, piano bass. But the couple times I went before, I had a really good time. But I only been to Taipei. I haven't been all over the island

and had a lot of fun, some great food there. So, yeah, I'd love to go back. Maybe we'll do a little, you'll hear it live, Asia tour. That would be fun. That would be amazing. Tokyo. Hello. A little Bangkok,

Little Jakarta. Hanoi? Hanoi. Yeah. Let's do it. All right. Well, Suzanne, thanks for the question. Hey, if someone wanted to send us a question, before we get into Suzanne's question, how would they do that?

Well, I think you've got to be a premium member now. We hate to restrict it, but we were getting so many. Yep. And so, yeah, but you'll hear a premium super affordable. Sign up at you'll hear it.com. And then you can send a speak pipe. You get some other goodies, some swag discounts, the bonus episodes, and that kind of thing. We've been asked similar

things about vocalists before, about what makes a good vocalist, and we both have experienced supporting vocalists throughout our careers. You've supported some amazing, amazing vocalists. Yeah, as of you. As of you. I support some bad ones, too. As have you. Yes, as have we all. Okay, so, you know, the first thing on this, just to kind of frame the

discussion, and I like, she was asking about kind of what to expect with, what makes it fun to work with, best and worst experiences. In general, I don't really look at vocalists, all jokes aside as really any different than instrumentalists and other musicians. I think about vocalists first and foremost as musicians. The only thing that really makes it unique is that the vocalist has their instrument, is their body. Is the inside of their, you know, as part of their body? So other than that, I kind of look at the same. The other side of it, I guess, is that

oftentimes the vocalists are the leaders or making the most amount of money and the stars. Not that we're bitter about that? We're not? I do think there is a difference when I, when I stop and reflect on it, in the role. It's, I was Heather. Oh, you say these words too. Sorry. Yeah, they have, they have language. And that connects with people, I think, in a way that is, it's not better or more connective. It's just a different way to connect with people. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think they do serve a special role, which is why sometimes they can get away with maybe not being on the same level musically, you know what I mean? Okay. Even though all the good ones are.

Yeah, care for the big buddy. We all know the vocalists who's not, who maybe isn't up to the par with the rest of the band as far as like understanding what's happening in the music. But if they can sell a lyric, if they can, you know, if they have them. I think that's actually okay though. It's like specialization. I think it's fine too.

I was talking to Heather, she was asking me about what is a long snapper in the NFL? And I said it's a very specialized position of someone. He's got to be a big guy. He's got a lineman coming at him and he's got to be able to snap it about 15 yards, which is a long way, and it's got to be accurate every time. And it's a specialized position. Usually that's his only role, is the long snap.

Plus, he has to be able to sit on the bench for like 30 minutes at a time, doing nothing. And then come out and do the perfect snap. You're like the trumpet player in the orchestra, right? You go sit there for 30 minutes and they hit a high sea out of nowhere, right? Exactly, yeah. And so I think a vocalist is a little bit like that. And it's such a specialized position, and it's so different than anything else that, yes, they are musicians and should be held accountable for the music like anything else.

But it's not necessarily for them to know the same amount about harmony that we know. Well, and it's like, and really every instrument has its sort of idiosyncrasies and blinders spots like that. For sure. Even pianists, even though we always like to joke and be like, we're the most complete. And oftentimes we do kind of have the most sort of inside tennis understanding of what's going on. But if you think about it, like, look, most pianists do not actually know the lyrics as well as the vocalist. Of course not. And be able to interpret them.

And we don't really have to. Of course, it helps if we do. And it's an enhancement. And I like to really pride myself on knowing the song because if I'm in a company, but I can't do it like the vocalist. And it's not my job. That's his or her job to do that.

So we're working together. So I think we should go easy. That's what makes it fun to work with when people know their roles. When a vocalist comes to me with a chart of like awesome reharmonization that they did and understands like the inner workings of harmony, I'm like, oh, this is amazing. But that's not necessarily.

I don't think. Leave that to us. There's a little bit of that. A little bit, and that's not really essential to their job in the same way that, I mean, I really should know the story and the lyrics, but my ability to sell them with my own voice is not, you know what I mean? It's not as important as obviously theirs is. And even like, you know, Shirley Horn, I got a chance one time to play one tune with her. And she, you know, she's one of those vocals that they really understand me because she was such a great pianist. Yeah. She really understood. But she did not like go into, you know, because sometimes singers are really like trying to give you too much musical directions that they just don't need to know. know, or they don't need to tell you their thoughts on.

She didn't do that at all. She was just like, yeah, let's go. Yeah. And so I think everyone can kind of just take a breath and really, the more you understand your roles, understanding these other things enhances things. For sure. Just like if you're a pianist and you know, like, specific things about the drums and can even play a little bit. That's great, but you don't necessarily have to do that. I don't need to play like Elvin Jones, but I should understand the technical aspects of the drums and the role that they play. You should know how to play with, as opposed to playing. For sure.

And I think that's the thing with the vocalist, too, right? Yeah, and that's not to say that there shouldn't be any musical knowledge. I actually think there needs to be quite a high level from the vocalists as far as... There's a few things that they really have to know for me. They have to know about time signatures. They have to know about forms. Yeah. They have to know about things like their keys.

You know what I mean? You have to know that stuff. Yeah, that's the professionalism kind of side. For sure. But I think a lot of the things that we let kind of shift... down to not having the importance that they should. As part of musicianship, singers actually, good singers, are really good about knowing, like intonation.

I mean, like, how much more about music, time? Like, these things are so important, and great singers have the best sense of intonation. For sure. And the best control over that. So, I mean, a lot of times vocalists are put in a position. And shame on us as especially pianists for doing that, being know-at-alls and stuff,

and making vocalists feel like, oh, and they don't have an instrument to sit down or to interact with so it's like, oh, I don't know enough about this. But these things are just as important as understanding what you call a specific voicing or chord or whatever to be able to nail intonation, to be able to really nail the time,

to make those adjustments, to play without rushing. And, you know, like good musicianship, I think is something that good vocalists have the most natural feeling for because that's the original instrument, you know, that we all have. You know, if you can be a great musician as a singer, you can learn any instrument

and that musicianship can transfer there. That's so true, man. Yeah. And I think another basic skill a singer can have is understanding intervals that's just helpful about communicating to the other members of your band, understanding the difference between major chords,

minor chords, dominant chords, diminished chords, augmented chords. That's a very easy thing to pick up. Exactly. It just takes a little bit of time. But if you're a singer and you don't know that, if you're vocalist and you don't understand those concepts of a major seven chord

or a minor seven chord, you know, learn a little basic piano. Yeah, that's the easiest way. You'll be able, if anything, it just makes your life easier as far as communicating what you want from the band. And when the band tries to communicate with you, you'll know what they're talking about. Yeah, and you can pick up a lot of that sometimes just by asking.

I mean, I've had good singers that are just like, what was that chord you just played? And, like, they can hear it, but they want to know the name of it so they can communicate it at some particular time, you know? That's great advice. I mean, of course, if you can play stuff and sing stuff, and, you know, a lot of singers have really good ears,

the good ones. So, you know, if you can do stuff by ear, that's great. But yeah, you want to get into a thing where you can communicate it. But mainly, I think, as you're singing, just like a horn. That's what I'm saying. Like, so many, these are differences and unique things. But I always come back to, like, you notice the difference between singers and horn players or other musicians more when the level's lower, to tell you the truth. For sure.

When it's a really good vocalist, it's just like working with any other great musician. It's fun. You're playing. And, you know, to the thing of what? What makes it fun to work with for a singer? It's the same thing. They listen. Yeah.

You know, first of all, they sound good. They're a musician on stage. Yeah. Let's talk about this. Now, the instrument is important. More so than anything, because you can't go trade it out. You can't say, oh, they didn't have a good piano tonight or my saxophones in the shop, so I had to play this piece of crap. You have the instrument that you have, you obviously develop that to its fullest.

Not everybody has an elephant's gerald voice. I'm so disappointed. I don't have a Ray Charles instrument. No, but, but I mean, I also think that, like, the instrument, and I've been around some singers with great instruments, like what they do with it is still more than the actual instrument. Of course.

I mean, just like somebody who's like a long jumper. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Or like, but I mean, because it's their bodies, it's like, it's even more like, you can't just be rich and go buy a good vocal.

Sure. But it's like, you'll see, say like a marathon runner and what their physique is, it's very easy to be like, oh, look at him. Of course he's a great runner. He's built for this.

Right. And it's like, you know how many like, you know, five foot seven, skinny but muscular guys with no fat, they can't even run one mile. So it's not just, it's like, what do you do with it? Yeah, you have an advantage because you have a beautiful voice, a natural voice.

You know, just like Suzanne has the radio voice. But it's like, can you put together a coherent sentence of good ideas? If you can't do that, it doesn't matter what kind of great voice you have. Agreed. Let's talk about some things that we can learn from vocalists. I feel like because of the stigma of vocalists not being up to like a musician's standard or whatever, that we tend to enforce our will musically on it. But oftentimes it's not the problem.

best idea because there are things like phrasing that vocalists just naturally, good vocalists just naturally are masters of that we can learn a lot from with our plucking our fingers down at every eighth note we possibly can. And never stopping endless phrases with no breath. No, but like there's there's a way that a vocalist can turn a melody, a phrase a melody, or make a little melodic turn that I would never approach in my scale on chord, you know, kind of that is completely enlightening and will completely change the way you play. It's really awesome. No, I learned a bunch of,

I went to a period of, I mean, I learned several vocal solos and, you know, transcribe stuff and learned it by ear. That really helped me. Other things you can learn from vocalists, how to make more money than anybody else on stage. That's an important.

Kind of a financial skill. How to stay in better hotels than the band. I'll tell you what's something I learned. Big shout out to Ray Charles. Something I learned and I kind of put in practice occasionally is when we had Diane Reeves here for her awesome vocal course to find your voice, by the way,

available at openstudiojazz.com. Ding. she was talking about the importance of the lyrics and knowing the story and sort of relaying that story just by being able to say it and so sometimes when I'm soloing and I remember starting to kind of do this

around the time that I saw her say that and how effective it was when I'm soloing I'll think about the mood I'm trying to create and I'll actually think about trying to project it in a way like a vocalist would with a lyric you know what I mean where you're actually kind of acting out with your eyes with your emotions, with your body language.

You know what I mean? Like, I was trying to, like, really invoke what, whether that was, like, tension or whatever, I would kind of, like, add that with my physical presence in the same way a vocalist would, if they were talking about love or if it was joy, I was actually trying to think of what it's joyful look like on this piano right now.

You've been acting at your gigs, like, much more of a Thespian. I've noticed on stage, man. Thank you. You're welcome. But it really, really helped. First of all, I noticed that I got a lot more applause after my solos, which was interesting. Wow. This is how you get house.

Yeah, I think so. This is why they make more money than us. No, it was... Market economy. Somewhat, it was connecting with people, even if they didn't know what I was doing, or was... Some people were probably like, what the hell is that guy doing?

Well, no, but I think that vocalists, again, good vocalists have... Excuse me. Almost I would say an advantage in that, but it's a responsibility. Like, that they are, when they are singing, and Dian Rees has talked, I've talked with her about this. Like, when they sing, do a...

Like, we'll play a song, even if it has lyrics, and we don't really think about the lyrics, or maybe we do somewhat. But when they're singing it with their voice, they have like this responsibility. Because she'll talk about, like, I don't know if I want to do that song. And it's not, sometimes it's acting. It's not about what you're singing. You have to be experiencing at that time. But you have to connect with it somewhat.

And she's very particular about that. It's like, I don't know if I want to portray that, like, considering what I'm singing before that and after. Because I'll be like, oh, this will be a good tune to do in the set. And I'm thinking of like, the sound of the vibe. Yeah, yeah. She's like, she's like the story. The story. Emotion.

And based upon what. happened before that and after that. We could really use a shot of that. We could use a little shot of that. For sure, yeah. Wow, that's great. Yeah. Sorry, I felt like I stepped on you a little bit there. Sorry, no, no, that's good, sorry. I can feel we're getting towards, I can tell when someone's, we'll get into the natural flow of the end of the episode, you know? Oh, what about best or worst experiences? Suzanne asked about

that. I mean, I don't know if we can talk about those. Right, so best experiences. Yeah, we can actually... Oh, you're going to do a best and I'll do it worse. That'll be fair. Yeah, I'll just talk about what it's like, what it looks like to have a really great experience of the vocalist, and I think it's more towards what you were saying. First of all, when I have a really great experience of the vocalist, the vocalist is usually very clear about what they want.

Clear is kind, my friend. Clear is kind. So that they're very confident about like... Clear is kind? Clear as kind. Clear as kind to the person you're being clear to. Never heard that. It's an equivalency. Okay. Did you just make that up? No. You're hearing that a lot more. I'm afraid of that. No, but that clarity is actually

is so good for the confidence of the If they're like, where do I come in? Where do I? Right. You know, then you're like, here. You know what I mean? But if they're like, here. And that's the kind of thing.

When it's done right, you don't even notice it. It's just natural. When it's done wrong. Like, if it's overdone, oh, okay, so this is good. So I'll take it to the worst experience. It's not the worst. You know, the worst experience would be to be murdered by the vocalist on stage. Obviously, it doesn't get any worse than that, right?

So we're not going to go there. No, but, but we've been in, I've been in situations where the vocalist is like so, you know, so demonstrative about what they want you to do and like kind of feeling like they have to be the traffic cop at the front. Do this, do that. That it messes with the flow of the music. And luckily it hasn't happened a lot for me. And it's not that different or any different at all. When a hornplay, that's more about like they're standing in the front and feel like, okay, I have to have a certain authority and demonstrate it to the audience. When really the authority is like the flow that you have with everybody to the audience as a whole within the music. Like the music is controlling. You may be the least. leader in the one queuing things. But don't over cue it and make it about you. And that can be really hard to play with. I've only been there a couple times. I leave those kind of situation. I'm just like life's too short. There's too many good singers

to work with. Man, I had a my good experience. I'll throw on another one there of do you know this singer Deborah Brown? She's amazing. Deborah Brown out of Kansas City, she came to a trio gig last week at the Thurmans with me and Montez and Bob. And you know, she's hearing what we

do, which is like a lot of originals and like pop covers of, you know what I mean? Like modern pop songs, whatever. And she's kind of a straight ahead singer, so we called her up to sit in, and I thought she would call something. And she called like, she called James by Pat Mathini, and then she's like, or I can just sing over whatever

you guys want to do. I want to fit in with you. It's kind of like the vibe. And she didn't have to be that way, because she's like, she's terrific, and she could have commanded that, but she didn't. I thought it was like, that kind of like, but I think as a singer, like, that kind of openness to the other musicians to being, because I've heard you say this

about Diane, she doesn't say you're her backing band. No. She wants to be in the band. She wants to be in the band. She wants to have a band to be part of it. That's crucial. So one of my best experiences I'm just thinking, too, was a wonderful vocalist, Jermaine Basil in New Orleans, who was really one of my teachers coming up there. She had a group, I mean, we would work somewhat regularly, regularly. And it was actually where we really hone that original trio, Brian Blake, Chris Thomas, and myself, before we played with Josh Redmond. It was Jermaine Basil and Victor Gowin's saxophones. And she, Jermaine, was like I literally learned how to swing

just playing with her and she never told me do this, do that and I had worked with Betty Carter before. Well, that's another great that could be a whole other thing. I mean, I learned so much from her. Legend. But I mean, you know, really vocalists are really big leaders in this music, so I always

although I've had a few bad experiences here, there, I just associate these wonderful experiences from, you know, the blessing of being able to work with somebody like Betty Carter, Germain Basel, Diane Reeves, John Henrick's got to play with him. I mean, he was a master of Shirley Horn you know such such great leaders

musically for this music and then ambassadors truly to the crowd because they are the crowd favorites and they're the ones that can really connect in it in the most direct way love it. All right thank you Suzanne for the question that's a great question that was a great question we enjoy that we hope everybody's enjoying we're kind of turning the corner into

September 2020 yeah that's how we roll the kids are back in school oh man your kids are in school yeah some of mine one of mine's in school the other's about to me that's that time It's that time of the, no, it's not that time of the year, but it's this time of the year. The leaves are falling, not yet, but they will be. Right?

Soon. Soon. You're getting super poetic on us. This is a segue. Because we always say this until we say. Are you like an autumn kind of guy? I like autumn. I like autumn.

Spring is in the air. Fall is in the air. Something's in the air. Pump day. You'll hear it.