Straight Ahead Jazz vs. GJ on the Banjo

Lango-Django

Ok, that video clip is a fine example of what I've been trying to express.

It's fun music. I like it. I've played the same tune with similar instrumentation in the past myself. The first banjo player was good, and the second one was outstanding.

But it's not gypsy jazz.

And even if those musicians had more virtuoistic technique, which is kind of hard to imagine, it still wouldn't be gypsy jazz.

Look, I've got nothing against bluegrass musicians playing jazz standards or gypsy jazz tunes. More power to them!

But their music will still sound like bluegrass musicians playing jazz standards or gypsy jazz.

NylonDave

I think the Banjo player on the right would be welcome anywhere. Unless the other players were insecure and had the prejudice and egotism that go along with it. In a good room if he was respectful, and he laid out a lot on the video, he would surely be a welcome addition.

Another thing this tune is American and being played by an American band. I do not think that they are even trying to sound like Gypsy Jazz. I don't know if any conclusion can be drawn from the fact that in a barn with a vaudeville Cellist playing western swing the Banjo didn't sound like authentic Gypsy Jazz when he wasn't trying to.

From my quick look Louis Armstrong had a hit with this track seven years before Django. Maybe the reality is that Django's wasn't New Orleans enough, or am I starting to get pathological here .....

D.

Jazzaferri

Having been a Bela Fleck fan for 15 years I must say I disagree with the concept that the banjo is not a single string instrument.

I think it has a unique tone and can be successfully used in a broad range of styles/genres.

When I first took my wife to a Bela Fleck and the Flecktones concert, when she found out he played banjo she was furious, until she heard him play. She loved it.

Russell Letson

Just a note about bluegrass/swing crossover: It's pretty common, with a lot of western-swing repertory showing up when bluegrassers get together. (In fact, Django and Stephane have always inspired plenty of western-swing guys.) At Augusta, the years that swing shared its week with bluegrass, the hotter BG pickers and fiddlers were always coming over to joing the swing jams. They were pretty good at it, too, and were not above jumping in on "Minor Swing." Well, who wouldn't.

Nevertheless, inserting the banjo into an otherwise orthodox GJ setting is not a project for the faint of heart, technically or aesthetically. (And how would it manage la pompe?)

NylonDave

Grappelli toured with Grissman and co. He seemed happy enough with their 'chop' on two and four.

I never had a problem from a gypsy from either northern or southern europe giving my playing a fair shake. It's the other guys who try and appropriate their presumed prejudice that get in the way.

I agree hartily with Jazzaferri about the five string banjo as a self accompanying instrument. What it lacks in range it more than makes up for in rhythmic interest. Doc Watson's version of Shady grove is just as driving and melodic and full as anyone could want. And this Clawhammer tradition of studying music through arranging by ear is a huge part of the aural tradition that too much bad teaching is in danger of extinguishing.
There is a great DVD by Mike Seeger where he explores the history of Clawhammer arranging from the inception of the recording industry.

Despite all my egalitarian protestation though I usually strongly dislike the Bluegrass jam versions of Minor Swing. Mainly because they are using the wrong scales (ie C pentatonic with a minor third which is often mislabeled the A blues scale and the six note hexatonic scale from Scottish and Irish folk songs, which is often mislabelled as dorian even though no sixth is ever heard in the wast majority of the tunes. The flat seventh in a minor tune only really makes sense when the harmony is bitonal (ie Shady Grove which in A would be Am and G (the six notes of which when added together great one of the two common hexatonic scales in north west european folk music)(with the option of C for Am to harmonise G and Em for G to incorporate the classic five flat seven one bass line so beloved in Scottish music)which is what Shady Grove so obviously is).

But what makes the famous original recording of Minor Swing really interesting to me is that I think it is actually an attempt at a minor blues in the American style and all that goes wrong actually became part of what characterises Django's style. Unless I'm not listening carefully enough.

Lets hope that styles continue to emerge and evolve through synthesis. Navel gazing though it has it own rewards is not all there is.

scot

"But their music will still sound like bluegrass musicians playing jazz standards or gypsy jazz." Exactly!

I play many styles of music, not just gypsy jazz. I've been around bluegrass since I was a kid because my dad played it (though I never played it; I always played old-timey style), and I'd say that nearly all committed bluegrass players always sound like bluegrass players, no matter what they play. Grisman, for example. Bluegrass players often have incredible technical skills and can play their own style as perfectly as you might wish, and many have repertoire outside the traditional one. But the overall musical culture tends to be pretty provincial. As it should be; this keeps the center strong. Not unlike gypsy jazz culture, eh? People made records of rock songs played in a GJ style, but who bought them?

I'm 61 and have played clawhammer banjo in the Round Peak style since I was in my 20s and l never heard anyone discuss "arranging" anything. People just play. Clawhammer style isn't that difficult.

People try all kinds of stuff with musical instruments. Guitarists have adapted clawhammer style to guitars. Musicians try to mix and meld styles all the time. Sometimes it works; more often it does not work. You try to mix two styles of music, normally you wind up not satisfying anyone in either camp. It takes a very special kind of musician to pull it off - like Django, whose style is a perfect melange of different styles. I once played "Round Midnight" and some other bebop tunes with a bowed dulcimer player/polymath named Ken Bloom. He could pull it off, too! But most jazz players would have hated it, I think.

For me, I agree with Will, you can't play play anything that sounds like jazz manouche on a 5 string banjo. You can certainly swing on a 4-string, though - check out any video by Eddie Peabody, an amazing musician by any measure. As Mr Natural once said, "Use the right tool for the job"...

NylonDave

Hey Scot. The OP asked about studying. If a student is too narrow in their studies then they won't have much perspective when they settle on a particular style for a time. If you follow the logic of being lead by the prejudices of listeners you should simply play whatever is in the top forty and pale versions of your own.

As for arranging, of you ain't playing the tune as sung and you make it idiomatic to your instrument you are arranging. If you find yourself exclusively in the company of people who are hostile to words that might be worth breaking out from now and then. Sure it is fashionable for men of a certain age, in the same was as poop jokes, mysogeny and casual racism are. It however will not fly in all venues.

We are mostly amateurs here, studying is it's own reward. If we limit ourselves by the trends of a single style then we are no better than sophomore rock guitarists. Not that I would go back and undo my time with my Destroyer.

Karl Marx famously made the point along the lines of (and here I maybe pushing from paraphrasing to apocryphalisation ). 'I am not sure what a Marxist is, all I know for certain is that I am not one.' I think Django would have feeling along the same lines for gypsy jazz. I seem to remember Angelo Debarre claiming that Django would be appalled by current Gypsy Jazz performance practice.

Authenticity is a weird thing. When Django wrote solo pieces in a Spanishy style they never sound like flamenco, they do however sound A LOT like Joaquin Turina who lived in Paris from 1905-14 and wrote impressionistic solo guitar pieces influenced by Spanish Nationalists (the musical movement not the politics) like Fe Falla and Albeniz.

Listen to Julian Bream and see what you think. It is neither Debussy nor a Ramon Montoya, I personally don't care.



Sounds like the time spent with your dulcimer player was really interesting. If you enjoyed and you learned then why regret it ? Maybe it never brought you commercial success ? Did other styles ?

Music is a big buffet and we have a lifetime. We know one thing for certain, all the greats visited more than one table.

And that gentleman is my excuse for free associating.

scot

Dave - Not at all. When this kind of thing works, I like nothing better. Even when it doesn't work, it's still a good idea, because as modern musicians, we already know what works. It is up to us to find out what else might work, and as amateurs, we have more opportunities than the pros, who have to earn a living doing what the audience expects. In my occasional GJ trio, we don't play the much of the standard repertoire. We always look for new tunes and have played a number of Monk, Mingus and Dolphy tunes, even Frank Zappa tunes, in the jazz manouche style. We play what we like. On this website, I have always championed those who are trying out new things, especially young composers like Antoine Boyer. See: http://www.djangobooks.com/forum/discussion/comment/79858/#Comment_79858

As musicians we also are familiar with failure, as (speaking for myself) all of my efforts come up far short of my aims. But I have always tried new things anyway. For example, I rearranged part of the fingerpicker's favorite "Buckdancer's Choice" using GJ chords, and I like the way it sounds but it doesn't sound much like "Buckdancer's Choice" anymore either. When I play a contradance, I stick to the kind of playing that the dancers expect. But there are plenty of contradance bands who do try new things, and if their audience likes it, great. Likewise, experimental bands like the Horseflies (old-timey), or Les Primitifs du Futur (France) or Les P'tits Belges, even Alma Sinti - these groups have created wonderful music by adding new elements to a solid base. And in fact these are among my favorite bands. But no one ever made a post here about Les P'tits Belges. People here are far more interested in straight GJ and might not even like P'tits Belges.

Playing with Ken Bloom is something I wish I could do every day, he's a guy who does not recognize any musical boundaries at all and can play anything. He wrote me a chart for "Round Midnight" in G from memory - on the spot! Playing those bebop tunes with him - we also played "I Remember Clifford" and a few more - was just unforgettable. I recently played with some elderly musicians in rural France, friends of the late Francis Moerman. It was a similar experience playing French popular songs, valses, and gypsy jazz tunes, anything anyone wanted to play or sing. But these weren't commercial ventures, just friends playing together. I am also an amateur and never had any interest in performing. I do it but it's not my raison d'etre. I agree with you, studying and playing music is it's own reward and I've always looked at it in just that way. I'm a mechanic by trade and I am a far better mechanic than I am a musician.

It's true that I have never had a conversation with another clawhammer banjo player about how to play a tune or learned a tune from tablature. Never had any need to, it's just not very difficult. I doubt if I ever played a tune the same way twice, either. Honestly, playing that kind of music just doesn't require a lot of words. You hear it all your life, you just kind of learn how to play it and you play it. It's the great thing about it.

I suppose all I'm saying in my long-winded way, is that in my experience, lots of people don't like mixing of styles. You can put a lot of work into something like this so be prepared for that. I've been around a lot of traditional musicians and audiences in the NC/VA area, and I know that a lot of them don't like it at all. Of course, most of 'em are around my age and among young people it might be a lot different.

BTW, great clip from Bream, IMO one of the 2 or 3 greatest musicians of the entire 20th century.

And if anyone can actually make a 5-string banjo sound like gypsy jazz, I will happily eat the whole plate of crow - or Will and I can share it...

NylonDave

Thanks for sharing your experiences Scot. I do appreciate it. And Ken does sound inspiring. It is great to have people around we can look up to. I have been working on my idea of Clawhammer textures for nylon stings, might never play them on a gig but boy is it fun. And Jerry Reid had some success with this, a few classics for the country boys to showboat at conventions, even Lenny Breau recorded one, as well as the odd Sabicas solo.

Good talk !

D.

Matteo

Not related to the five string banjo, I believe, but back in 1928, at least one banjoist knew how to take a single string solo on a jazz tune and make it sound interesting and good. I know that Johnny St. Cyr, who was on other Hot Five/Hot Seven recordings, played a six string banjo. Is this also a six string?