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Post by martin130161 on Feb 19, 2014 20:40:41 GMT
Hi All...
There's a moment on a John Shuttleworth CD where he mistakenly hits a randomly cacophonous sound on his keyboard, and quips: 'Blimey, it's like one of those moments when you accidentally tune in to Radio 3 late at night...'
I'm a huge fan of Radio 3, a long-time listener to Late Junction, I live and breathe jazz (though I don't pretend to understand a lot of it), some of my best friends are jazz musicians, and I pride myself on being open to pretty much every kind of music going.
But after turning on Jazz on 3 (BBC Radio 3) during a drive home from Manchester on Monday night (from a Newton Faulkner concert!), will someone PLEASE PLEASE explain to me what compels anyone to either play or enjoy what I tried my best to understand for over half an hour?
'Jez Nelson presents highlights from Adventures In Sound, an afternoon of improvisation at the 2013 London Jazz Festival curated by Jazz on 3. Featured sets include the bass-led Luc Ex Trio, where heavily improvised pieces build through the saxophone dialogues of Ab Baars and Ingrid Laubrock, while Ex's acoustic bass guitar growls and prompts emerging themes'.
There's challenging and there's challenging, and I know that if I said what was going through my head whilst listening to this, there are as many people in cyberspace who might have a similar opinion about some of the music I listen to/play.
So instead, I'd invite you to use the BBC Radio 3 'listen again' facility, give it a shot and let's have a properly-informed debate, musicians and non-musicians/listeners alike. All I will go out on a limb to say at this stage is that I applaud the different/daring/adventurous/innovative - but the comment as we pulled up at home was...expletive-laden, to say the least.
I'd really like this to be a proper discussion of what music means to us - emotionally, psychologically, socially etc. And just to fan the flames a little bit, here's a link (below) to a piece of footage I found during a similar debate on facebook yesterday...
The late Derek Bailey recorded with the likes of Pat Metheny a few years back - so, presumably, you can't get a much better recommendation/endorsement than that. But I really do need to understand what motivates anyone to open their guitar case every day of a long career and play like this.
Over to you lot...
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Post by michaelwatts on Feb 20, 2014 7:39:22 GMT
Atonal, non-conformist, confrontational music can be extremely refreshing! Derek Bailey has been an inspiration for many years as has my dear friend Amrit Sond who is one of the most skilled guitarists I know. I suspect the thing that gets these guys to "open the case" is the same thing that inspires you or I to do it. The music.
Here's Amrit's "A Broken Alphabet" to lead you in gently...
and this is the notorious "Rigid Geometry" taken from a live show we did last year. I'm V E RY wary of any "artistic statement" that needs justification before you experience it but I will say this: Rigid Geometry is not an improvisation. It is seemingly chaotic, unsettling, dark and very in your face. This is entirely intentional. Every sound and attack is considered. This is a composition that Amrit plays with incredible precision every time. That's quite scary.
It takes a huge amount of dedication to pursue any sort of musical idea. These visionaries stand on the borders and keep watch. I personally think that's very cool.
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leoroberts
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Post by leoroberts on Feb 20, 2014 8:48:33 GMT
I'd like to be in with the cool kids ... but it didn't work for me.
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Post by martin130161 on Feb 20, 2014 9:07:23 GMT
Thanks for getting the ball rolling, Michael - I was beginning to wonder whether anyone would 'bite'! I'm very familiar with Amrit's work, and (without wishing to patronise) really do love his playing/composing - particularly the two pieces you've highlighted. And, as he mentions before playing 'Rigid Geometry', 'people have a love-hate relationship with it...'. Pat Metheny - a player whose work I've followed and learned from over many years - made an 'artistic statement' some time ago called 'Zero Tolerance for Silence' which, set within the wider context of his career, certainly turned a few heads/ears and garnered some generally negative feedback (and I use THAT phrase intentionally, if you've ever heard the album) But that - as with Amrit's compositions - was just that: a statement, as opposed to a language, and of course, it is far easier to listen to/take in/assimilate/appreciate a statement than a whole other way of speaking/communicating. Britten's 'Nocturnal' makes huge demands of both player and listener; the music of Arvo Part similarly so, and I'm sure that between us we could come up with myriad other examples. What intrigues me about Derek Bailey is that here is a musician who learned to play and studied music in a conventional way (whatever definition we choose to put on 'conventional'), but then departed so radically from it to spend the rest of his life wringing tones, timbres and sounds from his instrument in a way that flew in the face of all that I suspect the majority of Soundboard members would regard as 'guitar playing'. I absolutely agree with you that 'atonal, non-conformist, confrontational music' can be refreshing - chords should not necessarily resolve in a way that is pleasing to our limited and prejudiced Western ears, for example; a melody doesn't have to be confined to something a milkman can whistle as he walks down your garden path... The discussion I'd like to elicit is not 'is this 'good guitar playing' - but rather, what is compelling about this music (regardless of the instrument being played) from a human perspective - psychologically, emotionally, intellectually, physically, even? Does it go right to the heart of what it is to be human? Does it tap into something primal within us? What makes one want to play it etc etc And to throw a mischievous few drops of kerosene onto the fire, Tony Hancock discovered in 'The Rebel' that it wasn't necessarily enough to simply 'dare to be different'...
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brianr2
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Post by brianr2 on Feb 20, 2014 9:33:58 GMT
Sorry but, for me, this is admirable playing but it does not move me. It only provokes frustration (which I suppose wis very much part of the human condition). My ears - and soul - are probably too attuned to more traditional melodic sounds. I would wish it otherwise, and I have tried, but I cannot love jazz. But each to their own, and it is this diversity that makes music so compelling.
Brian
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Post by martin130161 on Feb 20, 2014 10:28:46 GMT
Sorry but, for me, this is admirable playing but it does not move me. It only provokes frustration (which I suppose wis very much part of the human condition). My ears - and soul - are probably too attuned to more traditional melodic sounds. I would wish it otherwise, and I have tried, but I cannot love jazz. But each to their own, and it is this diversity that makes music so compelling. Brian I know posts have touched on this sort of territory before, Brian - but I honestly believe it's too much of a broad brush stroke to simply say 'I cannot love jazz/classical/pop/death metal (insert music of choice here)' and thereby dismiss a whole potential world of listening and playing. If I had only heard Derek Bailey or Evan Parker, or any of the other 'out there' musicians, for instance, my response would most likely be similar to yours. But what would you class this as, for example? 'It's jazz, Jim - but not as we know it'..? For sure, there are jazz harmonies, theory, improv techniques applied here, by a musician classed as a jazz artiste - so does it still not say anything to your ears and soul? I'm not an apologist for/defender of/lover of all kinds of jazz, by the way - I'm just alternately intrigued and fascinated what we're all, as individuals, affected by...!
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Post by michaelwatts on Feb 20, 2014 12:12:01 GMT
What intrigues me about Derek Bailey is that here is a musician who learned to play and studied music in a conventional way (whatever definition we choose to put on 'conventional'), but then departed so radically from it to spend the rest of his life wringing tones, timbres and sounds from his instrument in a way that flew in the face of all that I suspect the majority of Soundboard members would regard as 'guitar playing'. And it's up to him what he does with this training. Let's go slightly deeper... If we can agree that music (and more specifically, instrumental or non verbal music) is a language (having a semantic and syntactical basis regardless of parent culture) then perhaps we can also agree that music is unique in the fact that it is the only language that communicates entirely in emotion, not information. The cognitive dissonance experienced when confronted by a pensioner with an archtop guitar who steadfastly refuses to play tasteful extended harmonies to "Autumn Leaves" and instead bombards our senses with grinding, upsetting noises and an apparent disregard for the values that we as guitarists/musicians hold dear (sweet tone, clean attack, lyrical phrasing, clever tasty chord melody movement etc) is akin to being shouted at in Japanese by an elderly relative. (Adjust to Geordie if your elderly relatives are in fact Japanese). Hence an undeniable emotional response... We should also bear in mind that this clip is an introduction to a Derek Bailey performance, he's talking to the audience, setting the scene, perhaps even preparing them a little for what's to come. Not that what's to come is going to be any less "other"... There are some amazing techniques on display that I have stolen in the past (I love playing behind the bridge on an archtop and freely admit to snaffling this idea from Derek Bailey) but that's not at the heart of this performance. What is perhaps most admirable is that there's no coersion, no attempt to pander to taste/demographic/fashion. Derek Bailey sat down with the intention of giving a specific timbre of performance. He did that without compromise throughout his career. Hats off.
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Post by earwighoney on Feb 20, 2014 12:22:51 GMT
What intrigues me about Derek Bailey is that here is a musician who learned to play and studied music in a conventional way (whatever definition we choose to put on 'conventional'), but then departed so radically from it to spend the rest of his life wringing tones, timbres and sounds from his instrument in a way that flew in the face of all that I suspect the majority of Soundboard members would regard as 'guitar playing'. I absolutely agree with you that 'atonal, non-conformist, confrontational music' can be refreshing - chords should not necessarily resolve in a way that is pleasing to our limited and prejudiced Western ears, for example; a melody doesn't have to be confined to something a milkman can whistle as he walks down your garden path... The discussion I'd like to elicit is not 'is this 'good guitar playing' - but rather, what is compelling about this music (regardless of the instrument being played) from a human perspective - psychologically, emotionally, intellectually, physically, even? Does it go right to the heart of what it is to be human? Does it tap into something primal within us? What makes one want to play it etc etc One man's art is another man's garbage.... I personally can't understand how the whole nation of Ireland has gone crazy over Garth Brooks. The nation that gave the world B*Witched, Westlife and Boyzone going crazy over Garth Brooks makes even less sense than Derek Bailey's appreciation for melody!
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Phil Taylor
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Post by Phil Taylor on Feb 20, 2014 13:13:53 GMT
Hi All... The late Derek Bailey recorded with the likes of Pat Metheny a few years back - so, presumably, you can't get a much better recommendation/endorsement than that. But I really do need to understand what motivates anyone to open their guitar case every day of a long career and play like this. Over to you lot... Sorry, I haven't a clue certainly does not a jot for me. Phil
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Post by Phil Taylor on Feb 20, 2014 13:21:10 GMT
Atonal, non-conformist, confrontational music can be extremely refreshing! Derek Bailey has been an inspiration for many years as has my dear friend Amrit Sond who is one of the most skilled guitarists I know. I suspect the thing that gets these guys to "open the case" is the same thing that inspires you or I to do it. The music. Here's Amrit's "A Broken Alphabet" to lead you in gently... and this is the notorious "Rigid Geometry" taken from a live show we did last year. I'm V E RY wary of any "artistic statement" that needs justification before you experience it but I will say this: Rigid Geometry is not an improvisation. It is seemingly chaotic, unsettling, dark and very in your face. This is entirely intentional. Every sound and attack is considered. This is a composition that Amrit plays with incredible precision every time. That's quite scary. It takes a huge amount of dedication to pursue any sort of musical idea. These visionaries stand on the borders and keep watch. I personally think that's very cool. I certainly enjoyed the first one of these two videos. Thanks for posting Michael. Phil
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Post by ocarolan on Feb 20, 2014 14:57:04 GMT
Really enjoyed listening to Derek Bailey talking in that first video, but the guitar was an irritating distraction for me. Keith
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Post by missclarktree on Feb 20, 2014 19:57:02 GMT
For me it's a revelation to see that people genuinely see something in it, and good luck to 'em if they do. Without seeing that people can appreciate it, I might have dismissed it as 'emperor's new clothes'. But, is it music, or is it something else about it that they like, eg the fact that it is challenging and unconventional and puzzling.
To compare it with visual appreciation, on the one hand you've got the whole never-ending debate about what counts as art. But, on the other, you could say that people's unique life experiences make them open to appreciating absolutely anything, even some randomly blown litter or the sight of smashed windows. If you'd lost your sight and then regained it, you would probably appreciate everything visual.
So, is it about the fact that the diversity of individual experience and the ability of human beings to find meaning and value in absolutely anything, or is it about what counts as music?
My personal reaction was to wonder if Derek Bailey has had some kind of mini-stroke or mental condition causing him to focus on unusual sounds, just as one autistic lady on TV was obsessed by bricks and loved their texture. I don't mind it - just find it puzzling.
In conclusion, I don't know what to make of it.
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Post by vikingblues on Feb 21, 2014 8:22:06 GMT
Think my thoughts on the Amrit Sond videos are in alignment with Phil. I could find more to attract me to the first of the videos (Broken Alphabet). But as you said Michael "to lead you in gently". The Rigid Geometry piece is way more challenging. I've a feeling the sweeter tones from the guitar in the first one helped me, as did the more easily understandable rhythms.
But I understand that there are failings on my part in not understanding the music there. I'm thankful there are players who try to extend the boundaries.
A lot of people, me included, have difficulties when there's not enough conventional melody, harmony, or rhythm to cling on to. I recall wrestling for a good few years with music by the likes of Berio, Nono and Ligeti in my early twenties. But with no end success I'm afraid. And I would put "Rigid Geometry" ahead of most of their works in terms of a pleasurable listening experience.
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Post by leoroberts on Feb 21, 2014 8:30:21 GMT
But I understand that there are failings on my part in not understanding the music there. I'm thankful there are players who try to extend the boundaries. I don't think there are 'failings' at all ... michaelwatts' talks in one of his posts about the emotional response to music, and I guess we all have different responses to different interpretations. For me, my emotional response was one of being left cold and uninterested. The pieces did nothing for me. I don't think that is a failing on my part. I refuse to be chastised or feel diminished (and I know that nobody is suggesting I ought to) for not being 'clever' or 'cool' enough to 'understand it'. If others do 'get it' then good luck to 'em. If it inspires them to do something different; great. I'm going to stick to tunes, melodies and marginally amusing words thanks all the same
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Post by rodders on Feb 21, 2014 9:01:49 GMT
The human brain is not designed to naturally gain enjoyment from listening to this kind of music. The enjoyment stems from the conscious parts of the brain telling you that you are enjoying it.
Just because you like reading books doesn't mean you should have to enjoy reading the dictionary, and I get that kind of feeling from some (emphasis on some) styles of jazz.
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