You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Why So Serious?

Episode Date: August 26, 2022

Peter and Adam discuss why the culture surrounding Jazz is sometimes interpreted as tense or serious.Have a question for us? Leave us a SpeakPipeCheckout courses from Adam, Peter and more at Open StudioLet us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel.Follow us on Twitter | Instagram

Hey, what's up, Adam? Peter. Yo. This is very, very serious business today. Okay. What are we talking about? Jazz. Oh.

It's a serious subject. Is it? It won't be made fun of. Why are you so hostile? I don't know. I'm out of menace. And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to the You'll Hear It podcast.

Jazz Splane. Jazz. We're going to jazz spain today. We're going to mansplain. We're going to jazz playing. What did you? No, no, no man's playing. Okay.

What is that thing you taught me? I was so embarrassed. I didn't know. It was like, um, you called it, talking about spraining, planing. Oh,

this is a Brian Fielding. Shout out to Brian Fielding. Oh, okay, so that's not like a worldwide phenomenon. Well, it is, but,

and you do it. But it's just, it's a name. I hadn't heard before we started hanging out with Brian, but it's basically where you take, you know, like if you have C minor, right?

And with your left hand, you do these fourth voice things, planing them across the diatonic scale, right? You could splain some planing on an episode. We can, we can, when you said,

when you said, planning, I was thinking. I was thinking about how my Saturday was spent. Big shout out to Delta Airlines for the three-hour delay. Instead of planing, I was more like terminaling. We just play the right note. Delta.

Yeah, that's what I wanted Delta to do. Anyway, cool, but we're not talking about planning today. What are we talking about? Today, we are talking about how serious some people perceive jazz. Well, that was an awkward segue there, wasn't it? I know. Well, so we got a voicemail here from Cliff. By the way, you could leave us your message by going to you'll hear.com.

leave us to speak pipe. Which is the same as a voice message. It's the same as a voice message. That's what we've been doing here. It's also the same as a voice memo. It could be. No one says voice memo. No, voice memo goes into your phone.

It's like Tuesday, 4.10 p.m. Oh, what's the thing? Big shout out to Brian Owens, great vocalist. What's the thing he's always sending us? Brian Owens will not text with text. It's a voice memo. It's always a voice memo. It always disappears 10 seconds later.

It's ephemeral. It is a femoral. Okay. So we've got a voice memo from Cliff, but just before we do that, shout out to our new YouTube channel. If you haven't checked out the new, you'll hear it YouTube channel, go there, subscribe. If you're on the YouTube channel now, watching as we're uploading every episode to YouTube now. Again, like we used to back in the day. Subscribe.

Yep. Put the bell on. We're going live here all the time. Like and subscribe. Let's do it. So this is from Cliff. Hey, Peter and Adam, you guys are awesome. You know, just more of an intermediate jazz player and I play in a lot of rock bands, but everyone's someone.

while I do a wedding and we want a nice little standard. And you guys are funny and you compliment each other, your styles and your personality, really entertaining. And it's a real boost. I really look forward to maybe once or twice a month. I tune in and pick up a couple of cool ideas to add to my repertoire. Come on, Cliff.

I really appreciate all you do. Awesome. And thanks for the sense of humor. Jazz sometimes is all real serious. Santa. You guys bring a lot of humor to the table. So really appreciate it. You guys have a good one. Bye. Okay. Thanks, Cliff. But I thought you said it was a question. It was just more of a comment, right? That was a great comment, though. Yeah, it was kind of a backhanded compliment. I mean, we'll take it. Thank you, Cliff. Well, he's very complimentary, but then he said he only tunes in once or twice a month. We're on three times a week last time. Maybe he goes and he just catches up. Maybe our charm. Like, so he said we're funny. We're complimentary. By the way, beautiful jacket you have on to tell.

And we're entertaining. Maybe only, as long as you only listen to us once or twice a month, that's we are all those things. I think that's about the limit. Yeah, that's the threshold. But, you know, he did mention, like, the seriousness that jazz is often perceived. We're able to extract the question. But it's so funny.

From our dear listeners. Yeah. It is an interesting point that Cliff makes that, like, it could seem so serious and heavy at certain times. And, you know, there's, of course, it can be. Right. Like anything that's as lush and rich as this. art form is, it has many faces and many facets.

Right. But I will say, I've never been on a gig, serious or not. I've been on some serious gigs. I've been on some very lighthearted gigs. Musicians in general are fairly lighthearted. Even people who play serious music are some of the funniest people I know. Right. You know what I mean?

So why? So is this a mask that we're putting on when we try to be serious jazz musicians? I do think. It's a little inaccurate. Well, but no, there are serious people. people play in the music and it can be a serious art well let me okay let's try this yeah if i say i want you to name the first person that comes to mine yeah if i say serious tradition jazz musician leader who comes to mine serious serious winton well yeah yeah exactly that's

i was just i mean i think is right you put in tradition in there just to this tradition yeah but i mean like respected tradition serious jazz but i would also put you know cecil taylor as serious. Yeah. Ornett Coleman as serious. Right. You know what I mean? Because the music feels very, very heavy.

Wait shorter, perhaps. But you know, like, people like Buddy Rich, who is an entertainer. Right. Was a serious dude. Right. Seriously mean from what I hear, right? We could, I'm sure he had a great, actually, great sense. He seems like a kind of guy would be a fun hang at the right circumstance.

As long as you're not the butt of it. Yeah, exactly. Right, right. But no, Cliff makes a good, I think people, especially people who maybe not are in, on green room hangs or tour bus hangs or airport hangs or after gig restaurant hangs or bar hangs. But is it like we can only hang and not be serious amongst jazz musicians? Because like he's saying, you know, he's primarily playing rock.

Yeah. And then he comes into jazz. It's kind of like, why is everybody so serious? I think that we think we're so precious. We're so skilled because we are. Well, that could be it too. Because we do it. We actually do.

So like, sorry, go ahead. No, I think a lot of jazz musicians naturally take the music very, very seriously. even if you're playing like, you know, I mean, if you're Ray Brown and you're playing with Oscar Peterson, that's a very lighthearted style, right? But they're taking it very seriously. So maybe that idea of like, you can't come in here fake in the funk. You can't come in here. That's very much a part of our tradition. It's actually can be a little bit part of, there's some gatekeeping is what I'm saying. There's a lot of gatekeeping. Traditionism. Maybe that's what could be perceived as a seriousness. But where is the line between, you know, being serious, taking something seriously, being highly

skilled respecting it. Yeah. And then it becoming pretentious, ostentatious, you know, elitist, right? Because, I mean, that's part of the seriousness does kind of push over into elitism, I think, a little bit with some people that listen to jazz, play jazz, and part of just sort of the jazz aesthetic, right? Oh, you don't know such and such? Like, that's kind of rare.

Maybe you see that in the classical world where people are like, oh, you haven't heard this record? Yeah. We don't do that around here. We don't do that around here. I mean, this is not our, we're also, we're Midwestern guys. You know what I mean? We're just like, we're here for.

But I think there's too much of that in jazz. I'm going to call it out right now. Well, there's certainly. I'm feeling a little bit. Okay, I think we're really uncovering this, Cliff. This is actually your softball question, quote unquote, is it. No, there definitely is a corner in let's say like, we'll just say New York jazz journalism. Yeah.

That feels very elitist. Yeah. Feels very downtown. We're making things that should be hard and difficult. You know what I mean? to do homework to come to the gigs. That's what I'm not a fan of. That's tough.

Because there's been a number, and this is not particular to any of the different vines that have come off of the jazz world, the different streams. But I think that any time you go into this thing of like, don't come here unless you've done your homework, you have to know, you have to listen in a certain way. Like what happened to like you're coming to be entertained? You're coming to be uplifted. You're coming to, yeah, certainly a serious attitude of listening, but also like a huge human element of dance and tapping your foot on all these things.

Can't that be serious? Can't we have a seriously good time? You know what I mean? Like, when do we lose? And I'm not saying we have lost it, but we haven't lost that in the music, I don't think. But there's certain parts and components of different kind of subgenres that seem to be pushing that away when I think that that's such a primal and important part of the jazz tradition. It's what it was born from.

You listen to a Lewis Armstrong. I mean, you doesn't get any more traditional than that. go back to Ken Oliver and this stuff that there was a reason it's still around and people are still listening to it. It was joyful. It was not, I don't think serious. I mean, it's seriously badass music. Yeah, but I don't think like serious like, oh, you know, burrow your frau in this music is the first thing that comes to mind when you listen to this stuff. And I just, I feel like that, you know, when we try to portray it as too serious and too precious, I mean, let the historians and the theorists look and call something genius or serious or whatever.

that's fine to analyze it is that and the brilliance of this music of course but i think to the listeners it shouldn't be serious it should be joyful right so i'm i'm going to refer here peter or defer yeah to our hit video on youtube shout out youtube uh on our shout to the algorithm this is one of the very first you'll hear at episodes that's up on our old open studio channel okay i feel like i don't want to retire the old open studio channel at all but no uh this is where you'll hear it's used to go oh you're going to play some No, I'm not going to play anything. I'm going to refer to just the first few comments here.

Oh, okay. I'm kind of answering why people think this. Dirk says the problem with a lot of jazz is where the musicians' chops and knowledge of music theory have reached such a level that they feel compelled to showcase it at every opportunity. It can be exhilarating to watch live, but on record it sounds ironically a bit one note. Yes. So again. And then Eric says, I'm an amateur jazz musician. I often think jazz is like an inside game for the musicians to have a blast together playing, but that is really difficult for most listeners to find a way.

way into as listeners. Yeah. And then Benjamin says, four minutes into this podcast and my point is proven with a long-winded explanation to an easy answer. Jazz musicians just love to hear themselves talk. And on that note, Benjamin, I think we've... Just play the right notes. Not the other one.

On that note. Peter, this is fun, though. I love talking about this kind of stuff because I feel like people do, you know, you would paint some of these cultures as a monoculture. And it's really not, man. There's so much variety in this. There's, but I will say, I just reiterate again, like, most of the musicians I know are super chill. Yeah.

Of course, there's some serious people and very, like, demure people, very stoic personalities. But in general, most musicians I know are chill and funny. Yeah, yeah. And lighthearted. Well, I'm trying to think who from our generation would folks think about as, like, the most serious musician? Brad Meldow. Brad Meldow. Okay.

So Chris Davis. Chris Davis, right. Okay, so Brad, I don't know Chris as well, but Brad is like a very funny guy. Yeah. And fun. I had hung with him or seen him for a while. I mean, obviously during the pandemic, I saw him in Europe earlier this year. And he sat in on the gig, which was, oh, that's fun to play someone.

And then Christian McBride saying, oh, now we're going to bring up Brad Meldon. Bramford is considered pretty serious, I think. Okay, I'll tell the rest of my story another time. Sorry, go. No, I'm kidding. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Brantford's a great example, too. Bramford is very serious. No, Brantford's very serious. but he's got a really free, joyous side to him that is mostly coming out in his music, I think. I agree. I totally agree. Totally agree. Yeah. Well, thank you, Cliff. Again, if you want to leave us a voice message, go to you'll hearat.com. Don't forget to subscribe to the new You'll Hear It YouTube channel.

Where would they find that? They can find that at YouTube.com slash you'll hear it. There you go. And yeah, thanks, Peter. It's super fun, man. That's right. Until next time, you'll hear it.