June 2004 Archives

We had our first rehearsal, last night, with the folks from Denver. These young people have come over, with the help of Jazz Aspen, to play with and teach our valley's jazz learners. We had a great time together, and played Blue Bossa (Kenny Dorham), Fe-Fi-Fo-Fum (Wayne Shorter), Katrina Ballerina (Woody Shaw), Now's the Time (Charlie Parker), and a free tune using the Promethean* scale, and written by Danny, the tenor player. From our workshop, Conner O'Meara, Mike Gorman, and Ashton Taufer participated. Marc Bruell was also in attendance, listening and helping to make copies.

We're looking forward to rehearsing today and tomorrow, and to performing Saturday and Sunday, at the Jazz Aspen June festival.

*Danny related that the name for this scale/chord was one assossiated with Alexander Scriabin. The scale is basically a Lydian Dominant scale leaving out the 5th. (e.g. C-D-E-F#-A-Bb-C).

In this session, we talked about upcoming Jazz Performances in the Valley, and last night's performance by Bud Shank at Two Rivers park in Glenwood Springs. We then reviewed the cycle exercises and played through them in several different ways. We studied how the cycle would sound using 7th chord harmonies and ii-V progressions. We spent time looking at the 7-b7-6-1 cycle and how the melody of that pattern defines the 7th (of the dominant chord) to the 3rd (of the tonic chord) voice leading, and just how important the 7th to 3rd movement is.

We made some summer goals, which include:

• Play all the cycle exercises we've been working on, and the bebop scales at 118 beats/min.
• Buy 4 jazz CD's from the Historical Recordings list, and wear them out!
• Learn at least 2 tunes in every key:
• Beginning group
• Summertime
• Blue Bossa
• Advanced Group
• Stella By Starlight
• Just Friends

Next time, those interested will rehearse with the Denver group for the Jazz Aspen festival performance.

Regarding all the naming and labeling we do (e.g. "Cycle of 5ths", "Post Bop", "Traditional Jazz", "Bbsus7b9"), I read an interesting quote in Philip Toshio Sudo's "Zen Computer":

"Name what can be named: align yourself with that which can't."

This suggested, to me, that in the course of studying music (or computers, or climbing, or whatever), it helps to name and label stuff. But, all the intellectual work should be aimed at the goal of recognizing, living, and playing in a spiritual place.

Just a couple of my pennies...