Many great players, still a doubt

redblues

Basically you are describing Encyclopedia Britannica, or more recently,Wikipedia.

U mad Elliot? I have found people can't read properly when they're mad or angry

Michael Bauer

I love this forum! I don't know of any other guitar forum anywhere where a real argument about Richard Feynman could take off in a thread.

Redblues, I have only read The Meaning of It All but I found Feynman, like many really brilliant people, to be strangely humble. I won't say he was never egomaniacal (sp?), just that I never came across it.

My pal Ben Wood is a pretty smart guy, and I found his advice earlier in this post to be really good. Wrembel has said about the same thing: when you are learning a Django solo, for instance, play the recording over and over again until you KNOW it and can sing every nuance perfectly. Then, when you teach it to your fingers, the real learning has already been done. The rest is translation.

So why don't I ever follow such sage advice?

bbwood_98

Jkaz,
one quick comment that I am finding more and more- the old jazz cats (ie. bebop players here in NYC) that I am around every so often at workshops and stuff can all do this, even with the fast runes . . . I recently asked on of them if they practice singing the fast stuff, and the answer was, yes of course. When I asked why the answer was the same as singing the slow stuff (you don't own it if you cant sing it). The fast runs and arpeggios are well worth trying to sing . . .
B.

Jim Kaznosky

bbwood_98 wrote:

Jkaz,
one quick comment that I am finding more and more- the old jazz cats (ie. bebop players here in NYC) that I am around every so often at workshops and stuff can all do this, even with the fast runes . . . I recently asked on of them if they practice singing the fast stuff, and the answer was, yes of course. When I asked why the answer was the same as singing the slow stuff (you don't own it if you cant sing it). The fast runs and arpeggios are well worth trying to sing . . .
B.

I agree with being able to sing everything. A few players have started to show up to our weekly gig who are pretty awesome players. One guy in particular plays some pretty outrageous bop lines and sings almost everything, including the fast runs. When I wrote that I don't hear the fast runs, I mean that I'm not at the point where I'm hearing fast lines yet. What appeals to me is a player who can mix the technically challenging lines with the melodic lines. Hopefully, with some practice, I'll be able to own some of this. More playing with more musicians and more transcription should help.

There's a lifetime of work in this material.

Lango-Django

Wow! How cool to find out there are so many Feynman fans--- and non-fans--- lurking out there!

I was afraid i'd killed this thread, instead it seems I started a flame war... for those of you who who are not initiated into the Feynman fraternity, let's just say that if you read his book "Surely you're joking..." you'll love it, but it might piss off your girlfriend... and having read the Gleick bio "Genius" referred to above, it seems likely to me that Feynman was a more serious womanizer than Django!

And, yes, the anecdote about Feynman's filing cabinet is taken directly from "Genius" p.316.... I believe that Django probably had a similar mental filing cabinet of licks... because his illiteracy probably meant that he had to have a prodigious memory, because he couldn't write anything down, just like my late friend Toronto guitarist Jeff Healey, who was blind from birth but had the most amazing memory I've ever encountered.

Now, I like all the comments above about singing... I'm going to try that too... Before, I'd always thought "If I can't HEAR it, I can't play it"... now it's humbling to learn I have to not only HEAR it but SING it, too!

I haven't been around here for awhile because I've been busy recording some stuff--- which I plan to share here a little later today, just to give everyone a laugh ;-)

But, additionally, I have been trying to develop my chops just in that one basic position I mentioned above, and have found a few sounds that are now becoming "new reliable" licks for me, some swiped directly from Django and others I don't know where they came from--- they may be stuff I've remembered from others, or they may be original, I just don't know.

I'll just close by saying that is always inspiring to come here and be part of a community that likes to talk about stuff like this... fellow spirits like you are rare, indeed! Thank you!

Will

Jazzaferri

One way to end up with your own personal statement is to learn the short phrases that really sp;eak to you. Sometimes a few notes, sometimes a few bars. Learning whole solo's perfectly in the end takes one down the road of "classical" music.

If you learn those short statements that really speak to the point of effortless mastery (like using a fork) then you will start to use them in your solos.

Feynman was a brillliant guy. I have read all his books particularly his lectures. Even though by book 3 the math was above my head I could still understand enough of what was written to understand that he really did understand physics.

Lango-Django

Short phrases--- yeah, good advice, Jazzaferri. I've got to learn to think that way.

When I'm listening to Django, I'm starting to realize that he tells his story in sentences; each progressing logically from beginning to end.

Often he'll end a phrase with an exclamation point! Instead of a period.

And frequently there is a tiny pause between sentences to give them extra drama. But when Django chooses to speak in longer sentences, often by means of a riff that repeats over and over different chord changes, that becomes even more dramatic.

And most of all, when Django ends his solo, he finishes with a flourish or punchline---voila! There you have it! Top that!

How I'd love to get this sense of drama in my own playing!

Now, I've actually had a chance to try singing along while soloing, and found that it actually isn't very hard to do--- weirdly enough. It just kind of happens all by itself, like skipping or something, I can't really analyze how I'm doing it.

Also I'm still working on knowing exactly where to instinctively find every note I want from inside that basic "box", and I've been paying special attention to phrases using the flat five, which seem to go well with this style of music.

That's it for now---

Will

Elliot

Lango-Django wrote:

And, yes, the anecdote about Feynman's filing cabinet is taken directly from "Genius" p.316.... I believe that Django probably had a similar mental filing cabinet of licks..

Thanks, Will.

Maybe next time when someone makes a statement and somebody else has the nerve to say "there is so much wrong in this anecdote, i cannot let it pass. Every word, (drawer, general theory, derived) is wrong", (as if I made up the entire thing) they'll keep their hole shut when they have nothing to back it up... 'nuff said.

And no, I'm not mad.