A thread to politely discuss the merits of jazz

Jazz musicians can grab a single note by the scruff of the neck and rip its head off, use it to sooth the savage beast, slur it, overblow, add too much breath, hold back, attack it hard - the choices for a single note tend to be wider and more reactive. Jazz players sometimes paint is broad brush strokes, where the notes matter less than the effect (Evan Parker is a great example, as was Coltrane. Noone will ever approach Coltrane and say 'you missed that Eb in the fourth bar of your 27th chorus' )

This line of thought is exactly what I mean when I say that there isn't enough analysis in jazz, too much of it gets caught up in "magic" and "soul" - not enough taking a look and realizing that, yeah, he blew that Eb.

But he does make a great point in that Jazz cannot be looked at as a classical piece, just as a Romantic piece cannot be looked at the same way as folk(indigenous European) music

Originally Posted by oboeducky

Ok. This is simply not true. And any good classical player can improvise. Likewise, any good jazz pianist can sit down and play a piano concerto.

I need to meet the classical players you're referring to because a majority of the ones I know (many of whom have PhD and are professional players) cannot improvise in the manner a jazz professional can. This is not because of any lack of talent or intelligence on the part of the classical player. The two are just drastically different- and arguing which one is or isn't more complex or important is frankly.... retarded. They are both important and complex in their own rights. They are both very, very different, so why compare? It's like holding an intense debate on which animal is better: a giraffe or a penguin. Is there a point? They're both important to our eco-system and they're both very different animals with pros and cons. I digress, on to your statement: Improvising in the sense of a jazz solo setting just isn't something found that often in classical music settings. Sure you have some sections are the improvisation but they're often shorter than what you can find in a typical jazz combo setting. Improvising for 32 choruses (or even as short as 8, 12 choruses) is a exercise in pacing and development on the spot.

I do know some musicians that are equally great at both jazz and classical- but I've seen far too many classical-only players fail when asked to improvise 16 bars. I cannot accept your comment. Other points you've made are more up for question and debate, but from my experience, this one isn't. This statement also assumes that any jazz pianist will have the same technical reading ability that a classical pianist will have. Being both- I can tell you this is incredibly off the mark. Some great jazz pianist I know cannot read classical piano music and some classical pianist I know cannot voice chords effectively while comping. Your statement seems to be assuming a great deal on both the jazz and classical fronts.

Originally Posted by Nathan Madsen

I need to meet the classical players you're referring to

I need to meet some classical players that can't improvise! Improvisation is a HUGE part of most serious classical musicians' study.

I guess I wasn't taught by serious classical musicians then in both my undergraduate and graduate degrees. Both degrees forced saxophonists to study both classical and jazz rep and take private lessons and all of the profs I studied under had PhDs or DMAs in music and were highly accomplished musicians as well as teachers. Aside from the occasional cadenza that would feature improvisation, most of my classical work was written out for me. Of course I had a say in musical interpretation and performance, but not much straight improv.

Where do some of these classical players you're referring to study and perform? I'm questioning you- I'm interested because I think more classical studies should feature more improv. From what I've seen in the three states that I've lived, performed and studied in (Colorado, Texas and Oklahoma) most classical musicians cannot improvise on the same level as a jazz musician.

Its a different kind of improvisation; you're also in states that have short jazz lineages.

When you deal with jazz improv (for the most part), its a stylistic to bebop or one of the kissing cousins of it. The world of "classical" improv is significantly more variant, especially across styles.

Originally Posted by Voce

I need to meet some classical players that can't improvise! Improvisation is a HUGE part of most serious classical musicians' study.

No it's not. Improv outside of Jazz has only caught on in the last half-century. Last I checked, Beethoven, Tchaik, Wagner, Mahler, had no improv in them. I do not need to know how to improvise be a classical musician.

And those unwritten cadenzas? A normal musicain would plan ahead and write one out before coming to the concert to play it.

Originally Posted by Ferkungamabooboo

Its a different kind of improvisation; you're also in states that have short jazz lineages.

This sentence doesn't support your stance though- I had a stronger jazz education with regards to improv than my classical studies. So if the states that I studied in have short jazz lineages- then how does this affect that I had more study and exposure to improv when working with jazz? Do those states with longer lineages have even more exposure? Hard to get more exposure when every jazz lesson I had worked around and on improv. So, this statement is confusing.

It's a different kind of improvisation? Sure, it is. You don't often read chord symbols in classical or have a rhythm section improvising the comping to back you up.

Originally Posted by Ferkungamabooboo

When you deal with jazz improv (for the most part), its a stylistic to bebop or one of the kissing cousins of it. The world of "classical" improv is significantly more variant, especially across styles.

But you only listed one kind of jazz improve- bebop. There are many other different styles of jazz improv: Bossa Nova, Swing, Traditional Latin, Ballad, Big Band, Cool Jazz, etc. Each has its own style and rules. If classical improve is so much more variant across styles, then why not list them? Again, I've found parts of improv or other parts in modern scores that allow a player to select one motif from a group of pre-written ones and play them in any order. This is more random chance music than improvisation, I would think.

Originally Posted by Justin Tokke

No it's not. Improv outside of Jazz has only caught on in the last half-century. Last I checked, Beethoven, Tchaik, Wagner, Mahler, had no improv in them. I do not need to know how to improvise be a classical musician.

And those unwritten cadenzas? A normal musicain would plan ahead and write one out before coming to the concert to play it.

Okay expert.... look at that era before classical.. cough.

Fair enough, but for simplicity's sake, I feel we can group them all in Modern Jazz (as opposed to Trad or Contemporary) and they all have the same basic tenants, something like how all Romantic music follows the same basic tenets. 99% of jazz played is bop-based; its just that it's the easiest to classify, doesn't sound too dated, and has been "gentrified" only so much.

At any rate, I'd argue that the fundamental internal processes are the same across all improvisation, so it can be treated the same.

Corbin- I think Justin's point (and I don't mean to speak for him) is that today's modern classical performers do not look at cadenzas the same way as they did back when cadenzas were mostly improvised. Sure- some performers today do still improvise their cadenzas but I still don't think that equates to the same about of volume and frequency improv in jazz occurs (particularly in the jazz combo realm).