Thinking in Jazz

by Berliner, Paul F.

  Harris’s admonition stems from his understanding that the same theoretical rules that account for the multitude of aesthetically pleasing possibilities for invention within the jazz tradition can also generate phrases that fall outside the field’s idiomatic bounds and its dictates of good taste. Therefore, the learner must devote years to studying the breadth of jazz literature and to participating in the music’s performance practices before it is possible to develop an appropriate, informed perspective for evaluating personal musical creations. Improvised melodies that fail to display the basic stylistic conventions of jazz commonly stand accused of “lacking roots or lacking history.” In one instance, an advanced performer criticized the solos of a former classical musician as “corny” because he articulated pitches uniformly, failing to imbue them with the nuances of attack, inflection, and color associated with jazz. In another instance, an elderly musician advised a young soloist: “I like your feeling, but you need to listen more and learn more of this music’s vocabulary.”

  Beyond providing models for melodic shape and phrasing, the absorption of conventional vocabulary patterns establishes the basis for the relationship between aspiring performers and their tradition. If Arthur Rhames “uses a particular motive the way that Bird would use it, it’s only,” he insists, “to let the listeners know of my awareness of what Bird did with this. That’s the mark of a novice going into the intermediate stage of music, where he’s actually aware of what he’s saying. He’s aware of his place in the music and his predecessors.” According to Jimmy Robinson,

  Whenever those licks really fit in with the story you were telling, you’d stick them in your solo. Then, other people could tell by listening to you that you were influenced by Diz or Fats or whoever. Most players held Diz and Fats and those fellows in high esteem, and you could tell whether other musicians were also working on those things. There wasn’t anybody else coming along with anything as good or anything better, so you had to listen to them. And if players weren’t working on those things, well then, they weren’t trying to be artists in a true sense.

  The evidence of respect for the melodic substance of musical ideas found in pretty notes and exemplary phrases, knowledgeably rendered, is reflective of jazz’s great stylists. Clearly, it is a significant mark of being a jazz artist in the “true sense.”

  Judging Harmonic Content

  Performers are also sensitive to the relationship between the constituent elements of phrases and their harmonic backgrounds. On the one hand, Benny Bailey praises Miles Davis for emphasizing chord tones in his melodies, making “beautiful choices so deeply into the harmony. It’s much harder to play that way,” he explains, “than to playa lot of notes.” On the other hand, Herbie Hancock remembers an evening in which his performance “had gotten into a rut,” and Davis advised him to avoid the “butter notes” in this instance. Hancock interpreted the butter notes as being the “fat notes, the obvious notes that tell tale what you’re doing,” notes such as the third and the seventh. Reasoning that leaving them out might lead him “in another direction.” Hancock implemented the strategy and enjoyed renewed success in his solos, eliciting the most enthusiastic response of the week from the audience.7

  For the most part, it is the relative mixture of pitches inside and outside of the harmony that creates interesting melodies. “Playing inside the changes means playing enough of the important notes of the chord progression at important times.” Chuck Israels says. “A good solo might be very free, but every once in a while it loops or hooks into an essential note that describes the harmonic change. . . [playing a chord tone in] one of the two or three basic lines of the harmony. Artistically successful jazz players go in and out of that in their solos.” Kenny Barron extends this point. “The more your level of hearing gets better, the more you can hear complicated kinds of ideas, and assuming that you are technically proficient enough, you can execute those ideas. By more complicated ideas, I mean ideas that would be both longer in length and make use of notes that might be considered outside the chord. Being able to play complicated ideas means being able to position those notes in such a way that they flow back and forth between the notes that are in the chord.”

  To be critically appreciative of such features of solos and to manage them in performance, students must develop an ear for the vertical aspects of music and “for the tone center of every chord” (LD). One learner recalls an early lesson in which he finally improvised a solo with credible melodic shape, only to have his teacher, Charlie Mariano, simply inform him that he had played “too many wrong notes.” That he had not even perceived the clashes between harmony and melody that troubled Mariano was a sobering revelation for the student.

  At issue here are the precise harmonic relationships defined as dissonant and the judgments applied to an artist’s treatment of them. 8Experienced improvisers can “play anything in relation to chords as long as you resolve it right.” Josh Schneider asserts. This means developing the control to return to “the key center at the time you want to,” resolving the mounting tension of “the curve” of a solo line by ending it inside the chord, that is, on a chord tone. “Unresolved dissonances are the true mark of an amateur,” Alan Swain says. One musician expressed his irritation that a younger player did not, in particular, “resolve major seventh pitches over seventh chords.” Another artist faced criticism for not resolving flatted ninths and using them indiscriminately. After the player perfected the use of flatted ninths in his own improvisations, he noticed comparable problems in solos of other performers and found them objectionable himself.

  Non-chord tones, as implied above, present different liabilities, depending on their placement within melodies and their relationship to underlying chords. Within a vocabulary pattern that spans chord tones, the passing motion of intermittent dissonant pitches can add interesting harmonic color to the solo. Even a stretch of dissonant pitches can serve as a dramatic tension-building device before resolving to a chord tone. If the same pitches are redistributed within a figure, however—with non-chord tones assuming prominent positions of emphasis without resolution—they can create the displeasing effect of wrong notes. In this regard, theoretical models of scales can be problematic for improvisers unless they learn to weight their pitches variably in melodic invention, treating non-chord tones with special sensitivity. To free students from such concerns, some teachers initially restrict student solos on simple blues progressions to limited pitch collections they regard as “working harmonically” with underlying chords, either matching the tones or displaying a harmonic neutrality that avoids or minimizes conflicts (JMc).

  Comparable challenges arise when soloists experiment with applying a vocabulary pattern within the settings of different chords in which the pattern’s pitches assume new relationships to the root, exchanging identities as chord and non-chord tones. One of Barry Harris’s theoretical drills addresses this issue by cultivating in students a relative sense of the role of individual pitches in relation to a piece’s quickly changing harmony. In increasingly rapid exchanges with the class, Harris calls out the name of a pitch and a succession of chords, to which students respond by instantly calling back the pitch’s recalculated position with respect to each chord change. (The pitch C, for example, is “the second” of a B7 chord, “the sixth” of an E7 chord, “the seventh” of a DM7 chord, and so on.) Such drills prepare students for the challenges of applying their models flexibly in performance.

  With experience, students become increasingly sensitive to the effects produced by their patterns’ applications. “Using a phrase with a certain chord in a certain part of a tune gives it greater meaning and allows it to make a stronger statement than it would in another part of the tune,” Harold Ousley states, “where it would be kind of lost.” Because of the interdependence between the effectiveness of patterns and their larger musical settings, learners are sometimes surprised when an exciting figure copied from an album turns out to be “only a basic construction material li
ke a chord or a scale fragment” (RuR). Such figures commonly lose their luster when removed from their musical surroundings. It is when a great player like Ron Carter performs a simple scale fragment in relation, perhaps, to an imaginative, tastefully dissonant chord of Herbie Hancock’s, Rufus Reid explains, “that it sounds really slick!” Similarly, without their original timbral colorations and inflections, quoted material from expert soloists may become bland and lifeless to disappointed novices.

  In working out the most effective applications of their phrases, artists’ theoretical positions on issues like dissonance can, at times, run counter to their own aural imaginations. One renowned pianist indignantly rejected another person’s transcription of one of his solos because it contained pitches that the pianist insisted were, from the standpoint of theory, “wrong notes” that he “couldn’t have played.” In point of fact, the transcription was accurate. Patterns that had been acceptable to the pianist’s ear in performance deviated from his theoretical concept of correct practice. To the improviser concerned as much with the consistency of theoretical method as with the validity of aural imagination, these distressing discrepancies require the accommodation of one to the other. Such dilemmas are sometimes compounded by the conflicting perspectives of different music cultures. Doc Cheatham cites the case of a great clarinetist in Fletcher Henderson’s band who allegedly lost his improvising abilities after studying music theory at college. In part, he could never overcome his confusion regarding incompatible features of the harmonic principles of Western art music and those of jazz.

  Within the jazz community’s intellectual life, the relationship between theoretical notions and practice remains a source of lively debate. Miles Davis recalls his argument with Charlie Parker, who maintained that players could “do anything with chords. I disagreed, told him that you couldn’t play D in the fifth bar of a B blues. He said you could. One night later at Birdland, I heard Lester Young do it, but he bent the note. Bird. . . just looked over at me with that ‘I told you so’ look.”9

  Because of the potentially daunting nature of the dilemmas described above, some improvisers are ambivalent toward theoretical approaches to improvisation. Their concern is that the approaches might inhibit them, leaving them preoccupied with following rules, undermining their ability to think creatively. Whatever the forms of representation, jazz players appreciate the vertical aspects of music, and, whatever the pitch relationships players choose to define as dissonant within the bounds of their jazz idiom or personal style, they regard the artful handling of dissonance as an indication of mature artistry.

  Originality and Taste

  In constructing phrases, considerations of originality and taste intersect judgments about proper practice. Benny Bailey still laughs with appreciation when he considers the sheer innovative qualities of Dizzy Gillespie’s forties solos with their unpredictable phrasing, intricate chromaticism, and fresh harmonic concepts. “If you speak to Dizzy, ask him something for me that I wanted to ask him all those years I played in his band. How in the world did he ever think up ideas like that?” Such questions apply to the most subtle gestures of improvisers. Paul Wertico praises older master drummers like Jo Jones for the “insightful little details” in their playing, such as the ways in which Jones “would draw little rim shots out in the middle of a phrase. They’re clever. He’s like a sly fox, and it makes you laugh. You can feel the mind and the soul behind what he’s doing.”

  Don Pate similarly appreciates innovation. “What’s intense about a solo is when somebody does something and it makes one think, ‘What’s THAT he’s playing?’ or ‘WHERE is that coming from?’ or ‘HOW did he ever do that?’” With playful language, Pate coins the term otherwhere to describe the destination of soloists’ explorations—conceptual operations that David Sudnow illumines with his neologism melodying. 10Taken together, the terms are as succinct a definition of the goals and activities of improvisation as any: improvisation is “melodying” to “otherwhere.”

  Artists’ undertakings are not uniformly successful, however. Their travels do not always take them very far. “Someone may play something very obvious and predictable, and you know right away what he’s doing,” Pate says. Indeed, another improviser describes one bass player’s solos colorfully as being “so simple-minded, they’re embarrassing to listen to. They find all the common tones and one blue note and drive that into the ground.” He continues:

  If you played one of his solos on the trombone, people would say, “Jesus, who is this corny trombone player?” It’s like listening to someone read a Dick and Jane book rather than poetry. His phrases sound like “See Spot run.” Not everybody has to play the same way or have the same degree of complexity. There are things that Miles and Lester Young did which had classic simplicity and were pristinely beautiful. But this player pitches his solos to the lowest common denominator.

  A famous pianist once expressed surprise at the variable quality of ideas in the performance of another highly regarded artist, attributing the discrepancies, in part, to the capricious nature of improvisation. When he followed his friend’s performances from phrase to phrase, he was at some moments “bowled over, thinking, ‘That’s incredible! I could never come up with anything like that,’” whereas at other moments he thought, “Oh, no! What he’s doing now is so corny.”

  One common basis for such criticism is the overuse of conventional jazz vocabulary, the very opposite condition to lacking roots. In rehearsal, a band leader once stopped a newcomer’s solo at its outset, scolding, “Everyone plays phrases like that on a Spanish tune. If you can’t think of anything else to play, let’s play a different tune.” Some patterns, however, reveal a soloist’s comprehensive knowledge of jazz literature. “You can always tell cats who have the whole body of the music down by the licks that they play, because there are certain licks that are phrased a certain way that you just won’t know unless you’ve listened to a lot of music” (BR).

  At the same time, musicians sometimes differ strongly over the precise influences others absorb from the literature. To infuse pitches with a high content of air like Miles Davis may be “fun to do and nice to do for about eight bars or every once in a while,” says John McNeil, “but it stamps you as not being very original.” Wynton Marsalis questions not only the propriety of borrowing material but also the taste governing its selection when he observes that “some people copy the worst licks of second-rate players.” Illustrating yet another consideration, Keith Copeland maintains that there are “certain things that are sacred—that you don’t copy—like Art Blakey’s press roll.” Asserting this value backstage one night after graciously receiving a young singer and listening to a recording that she had brought for appraisal, Betty Carter remarked, “Why are you using scat syllables like ‘shoo-bee-doo-bee?’ Those belong to Sarah [Vaughan], and they belong to the fifties. What you have to do is to find your own syllables.”11 Other performers raise practical rather than ethical considerations. “You don’t try to duplicate certain things that other cats do,” Marsalis asserts, “because you could never do it as well as they do. Nobody can get on that tenor saxophone and play like Trane, because he’s the only one who can spell out chords and sound good when he does it.”

  Sensitivity to conventions associated with repertory is as important as the soloist’s prudent application of material learned from idols. One renowned pianist objected to a trumpet player’s superimposition of a complex chord substitution over a simple blues progression because it created harmonic tension “inappropriate for that kind of tune.”12 In a similar spirit, Barry Harris criticizes performers who constantly pepper improvisations within the framework of “pretty ballads” with blue notes. “It’s like the old people used to tell us when we were growing up, ‘People who curse the most are generally people who have the fewest words at their command.’” Older musicians also complain about younger performers who routinely “double time” their renditions of ballads, “playing all their licks fast like they
do on every other tune,” thereby avoiding the challenges of phrasing a beautiful melody at a slow tempo.

  From this perspective, improvised performances that fail to preserve the style of their vehicles are “shallow,” not bringing out the individuality or depth of pieces, or making understandable “how much there really is to them.” As a band leader, Max Roach periodically calls these things to the attention of a musician after a concert, cautioning, “Every piece has its own character. You went outside the character of the piece tonight.” Roach does not tell artists exactly what they should play, but allows them to figure out “how to improve their performances along these lines.” Similarly, when improvisations by a well-known trumpeter once strayed too far from the appropriate feeling of a ballad, Art Blakey shouted across on the bandstand, “Think of the lyrics; think of the lyrics.”13 These experiences exemplify the balance between discretion and originality that jazz musicians demand from themselves—and from each other.

  Emotional Substance

  In the preschool classroom where Harold Ousley is music director, a large tapestry looms with the message “I Feel Therefore I Am.” The words might well be an anthem for emotional substance, another important component of the improviser’s art. Part and parcel of originality and taste is a performance’s “soul,” its “spirituality,” its “integrity of expression.” Musicians refer to the emotional content of improvisations in part by alluding yet again to the metaphor of storytelling. “When you solo, you attack the tune, shading the notes, creating the expression, and getting the idea of how you feel about that tune across to the person who’s listening. If they can feel that, then you’ve told your story” (JR). Similarly, Chuck Israels describes the emotion in Miles Davis’s performance (with Cannonball Adderley) of “Autumn Leaves” as “extraordinary; what concentration—what commitment to the feeling of that piece! That’s my idea of how to be a performer. When you give it all to the piece.”