Jazz for aficionados

@stuartk, @frogman, @tyray,

First, Lew Tabackin's flute sounded beautiful to my ear. Second, I think Andre Previn is in a very special class because he ended his career as a great conductor. I have just ordered a record of him conducting Debussy. He was also a bit of an enfant terrible, famously leaving his wife Dori (who wrote a song about him) for Mia Farrow. Although, a number of other jazz musicians are also classical musicians, Keith Jarrett, Benny Goodman, Wynton Marsalis, just to name a few.

Still I think there is a distinction. Classical musicians go through a rigorous review to be chosen for an orchestra, especially to be the lead musician. Every year they have to audition for their job, and I have seen much change over my years of watching the L.A. Phil. Jazz musicians pretty much just need to please an audience. How do I put it? They have jazz in their blood and they need enough technical precision to express that jazz. 

I know jazz musicians like Coltrane were perfectionists and studied all the time, and that was one of the reasons he was one of the greatest jazz saxaphonists. And perhaps today jazz musicians need to be technically better because so many of them come from schools like Berklee where they had to audition to get in. But for just purity's sake, I think classical musicians are chosen on that basis.

Also the nature of jazz and classical musicians are very different. Jazz musicians come into their own when they find a voice. I can tell Coltrane anywhere, even if he's playing a piece I haven't heard before. Classical musicians must play Beethoven one day and Philip Glass the next. They have to adapt to whatever the conductor says they should sound like. As a classical musician, they aren't allowed to have their own voice. Although, I admit there can be a kind of swagger when they are totally into Bartok or Brahms.

**** As a classical musician, they aren’t allowed to have their own voice. ****

@audio-b-dog , with respect, this could not be further from the truth.  In keeping with your comment about being able to “tell Coltrane anywhere”, it is, likewise, very easy to tell, for example, William Kincaid from, say, William Bennett.  Now, if one finds oneself running to Google to find out who those two gentlemen are/were this proves my point.  They are two of the greatest and most influential orchestral flute players (speaking of flute players) that ever lived and whose sounds and artistry can be identified immediately by any listener who has spent as much time listening to their artistry on recordings or live as that listener may have spent listening to Coltrane.  It is a matter of the amount of exposure to specific players regardless of genre among other factors.

It is true that orchestral Classical musicians have to express their artistry (swagger) within narrower parameters than do SOLO Jazz players.  To say that they have to sound “like the conductor wants them to” is an exaggeration. Yes, an orchestral conductor may have a certain “vision” for what the particular music being performed should sound like, but the players do have latitude when it comes to the expressivity, phrasing, tonal color (and more) of a solo or ensemble passage in a composition.  It is a matter of nuance within potentially narrower parameters since the player (and conductor) has to, ultimately, honor the written composition; the composer’s intent. In fact, there is sometimes tension between a player and the conductor when it comes to certain nuances of interpretation. When it comes to chamber music the players have even more latitude since the players, not a conductor, make all the artistic choices in the service of the particular composition.  In the case of solo artists, even more so.  Classical musicians need to have tremendous technical proficiency because that ultra high level of proficiency is required to execute that repertoire, especially modern works by composers who test the limits of what is possible technically on any given instrument.

The point of my diatribe is that the ability of Classical musicians to be expressive and/or soulful should not be underestimated.  Our own and personal musical preferences as listeners and level of “understanding” of those musics are formed for a lot of different reasons, not the least of which is simply amount of exposure to a particular genre,  Ask any one of the players that you mentioned as examples of players who are both Jazz and Classical players and they will tell you that at the end of the day (hate that expression 😊), from the players’ perspective, the similarities are greater than the differences.  Apology for rehashing this frequently quoted and very true adage:

”There are only two kinds of music.  Good music and the other kind” - Duke Ellington

BTW, a minor factoid that may interest you.  Orchestral players do not “have to audition every year”.  Yes, the audition process is very rigorous, as it should be given the demands of the music.  Once a player “wins” the audition process then there is typically a one year “trial” period to determine whether the player is a good “fit” artistically and personally within that particular group of musicians.  Then, if all goes well, the player is tenured.  There is actually relatively low turnover within most major orchestras.  

What are your thoughts about Mr. Dudamel leaving LA  for NY?

Regards.

https://youtu.be/0LjWmf4_kP4?si=XGuv6N10zWIEZNRz

https://youtu.be/VbfHzOvUxfg?si=VmudHZPohoMaZ8tS
 

'Flute Soufflé' album from 1957.

https://youtu.be/BKb9zDH_LRc?feature=shared

more of Bobby Jaspar

https://youtu.be/Te-3Q_OZPrM?feature=shared

The Ultimate Adventure 2007 Full Album.Chick Corea lideró este concierto sobre el escenario que recupera el espíritu flamenco del álbum "Touchtone", grabado en 1982 junto a Paco de Lucía. Éramos nuevos compañeros pero viejos conocidos; Yo, Jorge Pardo (flauta y saxo), Carles Benavent (bajo), Rubem Dantas (percusión) y Tom Brechtlein (batería)".

https://youtu.be/gA9arrShvSU?feature=shared

No Masculine, Feminine. Just great playing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYyaaEoM-SA