a case study in replication

[bighonkintuba]

The fairly well-respected 'jazz' outfit, Mostly Other People Do the Killing, has released a note-for-note replication of Miles Davis' Kind of Blue.

Here's a 'review' (as if there is anything to review... to which the 'reviewer' attests...):
http://www.freejazzblog.org/2014/10/mos ... -blue.html" target="_blank

Jazz?
Music?
Joke?
Pointless?

Sigh...

Disclaimer:
I admit to attending the 40th anniversary of Kind of Blue concert at Town Hall (I think) which featured Jimmy Cobb as the only musician (I think) from the studio session. It wasn't note-for-note replication and was a good show (particularly Vincent Herring), but I did ask myself at the time - what's the point?

[bighonkintuba]

put the needle on the record

[bighonkintuba]

Press play, rewind and repeat. That would have saved the Killers a lot of time, energy and 'production' costs.

[bighonkintuba]

Of course I can't replicate Kind of Blue. I'll never have that level of technical proficiency.

Playing Kind of Blue absolutely requires enviable mastery of a difficult skill set that might be useful in developing one's own creativity and direction, but I don't see that publishing a note-for-note replication of a previously recorded work (particularly one based largely on improvisation) accomplishes anything. If a musician wants to tear a work apart, reinterpret it and make it their own, I have a lot of respect for that even if the outcome isn't my cup of tea. That's a form of creativity.

I can really easily criticize others' efforts...but I try to catch myself (whether I "like" what someone accomplishes or not) and first evaluate whether or not I can actually *do* what those others did.

i.e. Before starting a thread criticizing someone else replicating some music (again, in the very same way that symphony orchestras replicate Bach, Brahms, and Beethoven) I might ask myself if I could actually do it myself.

[bighonkintuba]

I believe I've been to more than one tuba recital where this was transcribed note-for-note.

What tune? My browser doesn't have the necessary plug-in.

[Donn]

I suspect you are fortunate there, but I'm not going to listen to it to verify, I would just guess that it's a disparaging comment on those recitals.

Similar angle on the replication issue when you hear that someone playing in a classic jazz style "plays the scratches", i.e. maybe more faithful than necessary to the old recordings. Classic jazz and classical music are different, one of them celebrates spontaneity and improvisation and the other doesn't so much.

[bighonkintuba]

celebrates spontaneity and improvisation

That's what I want to hear. It should be an element required of every tuba recital.

[Donn]

There is for sure no real guarantee that you're going to hear any improvisation in a jazz performance, but for me anyway it's part of the idiom and in some sense there ought to be some improvisation even if we understand there isn't going to be. A note for note copy explicitly commits you to doing no improvisation, though, so I suppose some would argue it isn't jazz - even if it's indistinguishable from the original.

[Donn]

Of course it's notably difficult to draw a line around it, where everything inside is jazz and outside is not. Improvisation sure isn't the key to that distinction - I'm no musicologist, but I imagine that musical traditions that don't include improvisation are comparatively rare, at any rate it isn't unique to jazz. On the other hand, there are performers that use the term jazz, but aren't really greatly respected in the jazz world, and I suppose the only reason no one argues is because it isn't worth the trouble.

Reading the review of the recording ...

but it is a piece made for discussion and for raising some fine existential questions about what is jazz and where does it go from here.

As simple tuba players who aren't in New York city, we probably don't understand how important that is.

[bighonkintuba]

As simple tuba players who aren't in New York city, we probably don't understand how important that is.

Simple tuba players in New York City don't understand it either...

I think the term 'jazz' is long overused and overworked to the point that it's irrelevant.

For me, improvisation is the most interesting thing about music. Much of 'modern jazz' (mid-40s onward?) improvisation occurs along an underlying structure of some sort (e.g., following the changes). For 'free' improvisors, structure has withered to the point that it's difficult for the listener to identify. Trying to wrap my head around it is a challenge that I happen to appreciate. To each their own. Whether or not it's 'jazz' is beside the point.

[bighonkintuba]

The concluding paragraph from The New York Jazz Record (a monthly paper with reviews, articles and concert listings etc. that's also available in a handy, hold-in-your-hands paper version):

"Perhaps what made Kind of Blue so appealing was its very hesitation, its sense of deliberation, its players’ negotiation of a new land making each gesture seem composed. Perhaps it has always invited this double, this utterly secure reading. Rather than compromising its original, Blue may be heard as an act of sacrifice. In creating a perfectly reified Kind of Blue, Elliott and MOPDtK have freed the original to live and breathe again. For those who own only one jazz recording, Blue should be the second."

(Link to the .pdf version of the paper: http://www.nycjazzrecord.com/" target="_blank)

[Donn]

For those who own only one jazz recording, Blue should be the second.

I like this, and of course there's no reason it should stop there. A new musical idiom is born: copies of "Kind of Blue."