Bilbo

I like drums and I like bass but I don't like Drum and Bass. Go figure.

I have never played a venue BIG enough to accommodate aband that size.

I am a Jazz musician and we never have to play the same thing once. I have used a music stand every gig and have done for the last 30 years. Never done me any 'arm. I also do covers gigs when there isn't any real work around and I use a music stand there to because I don't know any tunes. What makes oi larf is that on the two covers band gigs I do, the charts are so poor, I may as well not bother and end up jamming the whole thing

Jack DeJohnette would do a whole gig on just a music stand.....

I had heard AJ with Al DiMeola on 'Land Of The Midnight Sun' and 'Casino' but, for the me, the 'woah!!' moment came when I bought a sale LP (yes, vinyl) from HMV in Oxford St. of a band called 'French Toast'. The band included AJ, Michel Camilo, Stve Gadd/Dave Weckl, Lew Soloff (trumpet), Peter Gordon (french horn), Jerry Dodgion – alto sax, Sammy Figueroa – percussion and Gordon Gottlieb – percussion. For the uninitiated, that's one HELL of a band. The LP included the track 'Why Not' performed with horns and a tune I transcribed called Joe Cool. A massively tight band. I then got Camilo's Suntan trio recording and that was AJ at his best. Strangely, I recently got hold of a double live cd of Steve Khan, AJ and Dennis Chambers called The Suitcase which has some major AJ work including some rare solos. The best I think I ever heard from him, though, is a youtibe video of a young (27-28?) AJ with Sadao Watanabe Live at The Boudokan with a Dave Grusin led Jazz orchestra. The quality of the video is appalling but Jackson plays an absolute blinder. His solo starts at around 5.40 and you can see that AJ is really 'in the zone' and we are wondering what would have happened to the bass if he had been less reticent.

<p>From where I am standing,you're supersonic

There is also a lot to be said for new strings. I am not good at changing them on mine and hadn't changed strings for many years until fairly recently. When I did, I really noticed a massive difference in attack and complex passages seemed to leap out a lot more than the did on old, dead strings.

Here is my entry for December. No basses or guitars, just drums, percussion, vocalising (not singing) and my debut on soprano saxophone (don't get excited). Not a great recording and I have to admit it is rushed and some of it should have been redone (sax id poorly played and poorly recorded) but time and a sore lip militated against any more investment in this one!! Anyway, a bit of fun and some experimenting. https://soundcloud.com/robert-palmer-1/fire-works

Next year is shaping up well too. Christian Brewer, Simon Spillett, Kate Williams, Gareth Lockrane, Art Themen, Quentin Collins, Jim Mullen, Zoe Francis, Christine Tobin, Clark Tracey, Phil Robson, Sara Mitra, Tim Giles, Alan Barnes.. and more to come!!

I agree with the money argument. If you live off your playing, you are a professional. Although it should also be noted that you can be a professional composer, arranger, writer, teacher, producer, engineer etc etc. I think the broadest term would be professional musician which implies many but not all of the above. A physics teacher would not necessarily call themselves a Physicist. Or would they? The simple fact is that it actuall doesn't matter. You can have a pro attitude and not earn monty and have an amateurish attitude and earn shedloads. Definitions of this kind are generalisms and rarely bear close examination. I am not a pro.

Around this time of year, I like to look at the previous year's gigging and see where my 'career' (such as it is) is going (or not). I am down on last year's total of 60 and have only had 54 gigs this year (including one yet to happen on NYE). That's the bad news. The good news is that, during 2014, amongst the handful of journeyman gigs, I got to play with Lewis Wright (vibes), Art Themen (sax), Mark Lockheart (sax), Chris Ingham (piano), Osian Roberts (sax), Steve Waterman (tpt), Alan Barnes (sax/clarinet), Georgia Mancio (voc), Dave O'Higgins (sax - in a trio FFS), Josh Kemp (sax), Roger Beaujolais (vibes), Kelvin Christiane (sax), Pete King (alto), Andi Hopgood (voc), Pete Oxley (gtr), Byron Wallen (tpt), Brandon Allen (sax), Jason Robello (piano), Jim Mullen (gtr), Julian Siegel (sax), Matt Wates (sax), Anita Wardell (voc), Eddie Parker (fl), Ivo Neame (piano), Mick Hanson (gtr), Malcolm Miles (sax), Andy Watson (gtr), Martin Shaw (tpt), Kevin Flanagan (sax), Andrea Vicari (piano), Julian Nicholas (sax), Dave Gordon (piano) and Tommaso Starace (sax). I can live with the disappointment I guess that's what you get for running your own Jazz venue!! How was your year?

[quote name='visog' timestamp='1418672342' post='2632237'] Don't listen to any Steve Bailey whatever you do then. [/quote] I did. Once. I also had that Epidemics LP and agree it was weak.

Just keep going. 20m pianists can't all be geniuses!!

EW had a stroke a few years ago (2010?) and I heard that he no longer plays (that rumour may be out if date). ECM released a recent album where someone (not sure who) had orchestrated some of his historic solo bass work. I have to say that I never really liked his work and found it a bit 'noodly'. His sound doesn't work for me either and I always thought that he sounded like a poor fretless player rather than a decent upright. I have a lot of stuff with him on, including some of his own stuff, but never reach for it when I want to listen to something. I feel he doesn't inspire me but is not quite in the league of a deal breaker (there are a tiny number of musicians who, if they appear on a recording, I will not buy it). That ECM period people are referring to had some real diamonds in there but there were plenty of 'fillers' also. I have an emusic account and can download ECM albums at 42p a track (regardless of length - some cds are 84p) so have loads of stuff from all sorts of ECM artists but some of it is just bland and meanders pointlessly. Weber's work is one of those I approach with caution!!

I think the two finger thing matters more useful when you are soloing, playing 'funky' bass or playing more active lines. If you are walking, even fast, one finger seems to help everything stay focus (imaging a drummer playing a fast ride pattern using two hands instead of one). THe way the sound develops after you pluck is an important part of the timbre and, if your second finger is already in place, it is going to have an effect. I use one and two finger techniques depending on the line but, for a walking bassline, it is mostly one finger. Try playing a walking line around 100 bpm, one finger, straight quarter notes for half an hour. It's zen-like.

Last wedding I did a 40-something lady guest asked if she could sing Nutbush City Limits. She was absolutely brilliant. To be honest, I am not a Who fan but you cannot deny Daltrey's credentials. I would let him sit in as a mark of respect.

+1for the Green and Werner books. An example: I always want to play like a monster and waste hours cocking about up the dusty end. Recently, I spent half an hour playing straight quarter notes at about 120 pm. The difference it made in the way I connect to the bass was astonishing!!

Didn't get anywhere near this this month, guys. Sorry. Just really busy at the moment.

This is not that new a phenomenon. Pat Metheny was teaching at Berklee at 17 and touring with Gary Burton/Paul Bley at a similar age. Tony Williams was with Miles at 17, Paul Chambers was 20 etc. I guess it's the idea that 'schooled' musicians are finding a place in 'garage' bands that raises the eyebrows. But the simple fact is that learning our instruments is easier nowadays in that there are fewer barriers (living in a rural area used to prevent access to mainstream recordings, never mind live music) and more resources (dvds, internet etc). Good gear is cheaper, colleges covering popular are much more widely available, home recording and video is cheaper (you can do a video on your PHONE nowadays. In my era, you needed a camera that weighed about 40 pounds and even then the results were dubious). It's all good really but I think some of us old folk miss the 'folksy' element of it all, the fact that pop music came from the 'street' and not colleges. The fact is, all art forms start that way and end up as academic subjects of some sort. It's a multi-zillion dollar industry now. Why wouldn't it attract learners?

All of the above!!

Just try and relax. It is not that hard (am listening to it now). You know it's hard and, as a result, I suspect you are tensed up, gritting your teeth and holding the bass neck too tight. Step back from it and let it flow.

I did that Audio Masterclass on-line thing and found it useful for my purposes which were very general. I learned some stuff I could use and have a whole bunch of reference materials I can go back to etc but I do hold the view that the the best way to learn is to be doing and having up-to-date gear (software, vsts, decent microphones etc), working with that gear and keeping a watching brief on developments via the magazines and forums referred to above wiill cover a lot of bases. I guess the first question is what is it you actually want to do with the learning? If it's personal stuff, you can go the informal route. If it's professional ambitions that drive you,you may need to find something more formal.

Haden was a massive, massive talent. If you ever read through any transcriptions of his solos, his rhythmic sense is astonishingly sophisticated. He lacks the chops of the gunslingers but his musicality is unparalleled.

I spent an hour and a half on this yesterday and came up with absolutely nothing so practiced my reading instead.

Thematic development is a real art form and there are so many options available if you start to think about it and investigate it. My earliest substantial memory of music was hearing Ravel’s Bolero which is really only a very short theme re-orchestrated a couple of dozen ways as it builds (and it builds because it is orchestrated in several different ways). One of my recent Basschat composition challenge entries was a tunes called ‘Salome’ which was written with this kind of thematic development in mind: It sort of went: Theme One Theme One by new instrument plus first counterpoint by first instrument Theme by new instrument, first counterpoint by second instrument, second counterpoint by first instrument and so on (I think there is a fourth counterpoint as well but I think one of the others is dropped before it appears). Counterpoint is another area which I think is under utilised. It is marvellous what you can achieve when you invest time and thought into these areas of composition. The Jazz rhythm section and soloist approach is very limiting and a lot of popular music is only really a variation on that; drums, bass plays bass line, guitar/keyboards play chords/riffs, horns/voice on top. My biggest epiphany as a result of these composition challenges has been the recognition that ‘composition chops’, like playing chops, is improved with practice and that there is a LOT to be said for taking time to think and plan and work on your pieces in depth. A lot of the great classical composers took years to write their greatest pieces. We expect to sit down with a guitar and come up with something beautiful in a couple of hours. It can happen (I understand that ‘He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother’ was written that way) but, as the saying goes, it’s mostly 1% inspiration or 99% perspiration. I have a couple of friends who are professional composers and they talk about writing ‘7 minutes a day’. They call it factory work. It’s a skill like any other and improves with usage!!