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We asked respected Australian musician/
composer/teacher,
Greg Foster
to answer the following question... |
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February 2010
The Question:
Can any musician learn to play jazz? |
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Response
by Greg Foster |
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I don't come from a particularly musical family but even as a young
child I quickly found my way around a piano and worked out melodies,
harmonies and chords instinctively. I was given a mouth organ and in no
time could play any song from the popular repertoire of my contemporary
Australian 8 year old peers. I took an interest in the blues music
records my older brother was listening to and was fascinated by what
Sonny Terry could get out of the humble mouth organ. I always felt the
need to know how things work so I listened intently and worked out what
he was doing to produce the notes and bends and trills, etc., and so
taught myself to play blues harp.
When I was a teenager going out and listening to jazz bands playing in
pubs I would be watching the musicians, watching their hands and their
faces, and listening to each individual performer, working out the role
of each instrument and admiring the ability of each player, and sensing
the musical form of each song.
One day it struck me that not everyone in the audience listening to the
band could hear what I was hearing, notice what I noticed or connect the
way I did. The whole audience burst into applause at one point because
they thought the song had finished. It was obvious to me that there was
no finality in the chords just played. What were they hearing? How were
they being affected? It seemed to me they were connecting to the music
on an entirely different level. They felt the beat, were drawn in by the
mood and excited by the driving pulse but few felt the balance
of the song's structure, related to its tonality, or understood how the
soloist's improvised pattern of notes related to the chord structure. If
you asked almost anyone of them "How many musicians are in the band…What
instruments are playing?…Who played a solo during the last song?...Was
the last song in a major or minor key?" I doubt that the response
from most would
be much more than a blank stare.
That was a revelation to me because until then I guess I just assumed
that everyone thought the way I did. I suppose there are many musicians
who could tell a similar story. So how then should a band of musicians
"sell" their music to an audience? They could either play the music that
is most satisfying to their own creative thirst in the hope that the joy
or self-satisfaction exudes from the stage and connects with the
audience, or they could, making a conscious commercial decision, try to
appeal to "the lowest common denominator", in other words, work on the
elements which will most likely excite and satisfy the average listener.
But the interesting question to me in all of this is why doesn't
everyone perceive music in a similar way? It doesn't seem to be
contingent on musical education. I doubt that my own set of
circumstances would be rare. Does this mean that only some are born
with the "music gene" – providing a capacity to instinctively understand
musical concepts? or at least a predisposition to a musically
investigative capacity? My opinion is that there is some truth in this.
Let's now take this a step further. There are of course lots of young
musicians who would be similarly observant and manage to connect to the
intricacies of the music when listening to a live jazz band performing.
Does this mean that they could all potentially play jazz? I think not.
There is another dimension, another level of connection involved in jazz
performance that is not present in many other types of music. Classical
music requires a great deal of skill, musical aptitude, a high level of
musical knowledge, sensitivity and dedication but this does not mean
that any classical musician necessarily possesses the wherewithal to
become a successful jazz performer and this applies to even the finest classical
players. However I believe that the finest jazz players, generally
speaking, do have the
necessary attributes to be classical musicians if so inclined. In fact many would have
been classically trained before going into jazz. There are of course
many musicians who successfully play in both genres and perhaps even
play rock or other types of music. Many of the best rock bands in the
world are at least partially made up of musicians with a jazz playing
background.
It is also important to note that popular musical styles including
Rock, Folk, Country, Bluegrass, Blues and others frequently incorporate
a similar improvisatory element to jazz although to a lesser degree. In
jazz it is the principal defining element.
So apart from the "music gene" there also seems to be a "jazz gene" that
is required as well.
You may well ask "Where was this 'jazz gene' before jazz came into being
in the early 20th Century?" In my opinion "jazz" does not just refer to
the style of American music labeled "jazz". I go along with the pianist Bill Evans who said jazz is
more a process of spontaneity than a style. I believe that this
improvisatory process of spontaneity was always present and that there
were always "jazz" musicians. In earlier forms of music – early
classical, baroque, and renaissance, etc., musicians were often required
to improvise and some even became renowned virtuosos in the art of
improvising impressive cadenzas and other solo passages. These and
perhaps countless folk musicians and singers from many cultures and
countries over the centuries probably possessed the "jazz gene".
So my answer to the question, "Can any musician learn to play jazz?" is
no. I believe the genetic predisposition must be present to some degree,
or at least an innate inclination to the necessary musical improvisatory
approach.
This is only my humble opinion and I'm sure I will attract vigorous
dissent. The contrary view may be that given the right circumstances,
being in an atmosphere immersed in jazz, that any young musician's
capacity to improvise effectively may be activated and nurtured.
I would love to hear the opinions of others so please don't
hesitate to leave your comments below.
(See a previous article on a related
topic)
Greg Foster
© 2010 Greg Foster
Scroll down to the bottom of the page to post your comments.
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| Comments |
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Hi Greg,
I know what you mean about people who seem to get it straight away, and others who struggle with it. But I imagine most of these school kids have had little exposure to jazz in a real way. Imagine if these kids' parents listened to jazz all day and their peers swapped jazz cards instead of footy cards. I imagine there must have been communities in America's past something like this - where Benny Goodman, Nat King Cole, Ellington etc were revered and the influence of their music was everywhere and kids picked up this music naturally as part of their environment. I think it's truly exceptional that anyone in Australia today would get into it at all given our culture. I guess I do think all people can become poets and authors too. I believe to some extent we all are - we have to construct narratives to communicate - withhold the punchline, hurry through the boring bits to keep people at a party listening, we want describe the film we just saw etc. The really committed ones like Jane Austen or John Cleese take their craft very seriously and work at it while most of us muddle along. I know in primary school us kids would make up plays, write stories, make up games with little scenarios and funny voices and then somewhere along the way most people stop creating things - peer pressure, self-consciousness, lack of encouragement lack of positive role-models, other priorities take over. I think any utopian vision of a creatively active general populace is unlikely to be realised any time soon - especially in the west. But I know in some communities in Africa many people participate seriously in making music as part of ordinary life. What really got me into creating music was going to a John Morrison-run Jazz camp as a school kid, just on a whim, where I saw people my age playing really well, saw professionals play, and learnt and got inspired in a week-long celebration of listening, playing and generally having fun in a context where I didn't have to apologise or feel like I was an outsider because I had a beginning interest in a couple of Miles Davis albums. I think without that experience I might have been a casual jazz fan who played a bit of classical piano. But I met friends during that week who are still my musical buddies, and set my life on a different course. For me - several consecutive days of positive exposure was enough to give me the bug. You might say I was the rare kid who got it. I don't know - it didn't feel like that. I would however say I was someone who didn't blindly follow the herd and I don''t know where that trait comes from. To be into jazz in Australia today i think you need a bit of that...
Posted by Matt McMahon on Saturday 6 February 2010
Hi Matt, I must say I do have a problem with your analogy. Just because most people can use language successfully does that mean that they could all be successful poets or authors? Your analogy implies that jazz is just an ordinary skill. I guess it does come down to what we perceive jazz to be. I see it as an extension of the musical intellect of an already accomplished musician. As a teacher I encourage young players to try playing jazz and hopefully to enjoy their attempts but, as you say, to an extent anyone can do anything they want to, but do they really "get it"? Is it really “jazz”? I’ve conducted numerous school jazz workshops and every now and then one of the kids who are brave enough to try a solo stands out and exhibits that spark that let’s you know they do get it and that they possess that potential jazz x-factor. The others have great fun as they would trying to play tennis but usually show no sign of being able to take improvisation to the level required for a true jazz performer. I guess we are once again getting bogged down in the disagreement about that elusive definition of jazz…
Posted by Greg Foster on Friday 5 February 2010
Hi Greg,
I agree with all your points. At the fringes are savants and geniuses on one end and people with severe disability at the other, and the rest of the population in between. Some people seem to take to things much quicker than others - whatever the reasons are. But even Mozart was taught seriously about music from a very young age. Returning to my speaking and writing analogy I think that there are people who display great aptitude with words, or learn several languages etc. and there are others who have less ability. But most people learn to use language to some level of success. I think most people could learn to play tennis too - not enough to make a living at it but to achieve basic competency. I think that in certain circumstances a large majority of a population could learn to play jazz. Not all would exhibit exceptional improvising skills but they could take a solo on a simple song. I guess we come again to "what is jazz?" and at what level would we say "After several years of studying now this person can play jazz". In my experience playing "jazz" is actively discouraged all the way through our culture (in many cases any art is viewed suspiciously). Parents don't understand it, many teachers are threatened by it, friends can hate it, ignorant journalists ridicule it, TV stations generally won't broadcast it, arts bureaucrats don't like to fund it. Most people are indifferent or hostile to it. But I'm sure there could be a scenario where, like tennis, there existed masters, professionals, and many many enthusiastic recreational players who play just well enough to amuse themselves and have some fun.
Posted by Matt McMahon on Friday 5 February 2010
The fact that some people cannot sing in tune and are often unaware of this, and some seem devoid of rhythmic perception and yet others with no training sing in tune and sense rhythm instinctively, indicates that we are not all the same. Where I teach I know two severely autistic boys with limited social and cognitive skills, who have minimal communication skills and therefore serious learning limitations. One sings and whistles perfectly in tune whilst the other seems to have no perception of pitch and sings in a monotone. This tells me that we are all possibly equipped differently from birth. It is known that anomalies in the brain or specific injuries to the brain can have striking effects on a range of personal characteristics and abilities. Oliver Sacks in his book, Musicophilia, writes about a surgeon with no previous interest in music who is struck by lightning and immediately becomes obsessed with Chopin and begins playing the piano. He also writes about a condition called amusia which is the inability or inhibited ability of the brain to process music. There are two autistic savants, Rex Lewis-Clack and Derek Paravicini who are both blind and severely intellectually impaired but have incredible musical talent and can play back the most demanding musical piece on the piano after hearing it only once. Neither of them can tie his shoelaces nor take care of his most basic self-care needs. As the mysteries of the human brain are unraveled by scientific research a plethora of new questions arise. You may be thinking that I have strayed from the topic at hand but what I am trying to point out is that perhaps some are born with the prerequisites of musicianship, some are not, and perhaps some are born with the capacity to develop exceptional musical improvisation skills. I don't think we can reject this proposition out of hand.
Posted by Greg Foster on Thursday 4 February 2010
Very interesting. I think that learning to talk and being able to read and write are amazing skills, comparable to improvising in music. A large proportion of the human race manage to do these things and I suspect the learning of these abilities is driven by need and desire - "Give me food" , "I don't want to go to sleep!". It's definitely in an individual's interest to learn these things. For a lot of us in Western countries , especially these days, an interest in jazz (or many other forms of creative expression) has questionable social benefits. Only a certain kind of person who is prepared to go against the herd will stick at it - as listener or player. In other cultures and eras participating in music, even sophisticated improvising music, has occupied a more central place in daily life. The norm is or has been to participate. I can imagine a culture where many more people played and learnt about jazz or any kind of creative music.
In the Sydney scene I've seen the result of a high school having just one motivated teacher and the impact that this can have on a whole music community. I'm thinking of people like Steve Williams, Saul Richardson or Anthony Gullick, Eric Dunan - teachers responsible for creating a culture of excitement for music and introducing many current professional musicians to jazz. Not all people who play jazz will become masters but many can take a chorus on a blues or Autumn Leaves and give pleasure to themselves, their collaborators and listeners.
I think the real issue is "do I have a strong need/desire to play jazz?" which for most people, it seems, the answer is no. Many people underestimate what is involved in learning any kind of discipline and give up, discouraged before they've made a serious attempt. But in certain circles and situations, and for certain individuals the answer is yes. If people are exposed in an enthusiastic way then the desire may be kindled. I wonder what would happen if the government or James Packer introduced financial incentives (or extra donuts) to primary school students who could solo on Autumn Leaves - unlikely and ethically problematic but I think there would be some results. This is the kind of incentive which attracts young people to sport beyond their intrinsic interest- money, fame, respect, attention. In the West Indies cricket now has to compete with the attractions of basketball and the lure of other American sports from across the water where it was once the uniting factor amongst the separate countries of the Caribbean. The dominance of cricket by the West Indies has declined over the last couple of decades because of a changing social context. In a similar way I think the perceived importance of any kind of instrumental music has declined during the last century in the west. For many people "music" means "five minute songs". In this climate only a relatively small proportion of people have an interest in jazz. My knowledge of science is hazy. I'm not sure about genes but maybe the neurons just aren't firing...
Posted by Matt McMahon on Thursday 4 February 2010
My personal observations of musicians across the spectrum of musical genres is that not just any one can learn to be a jazz musician. Sure, if musicians who want to learn how to play jazz, just listen to jazz for long enough they will get the idea but that still doesn't mean that they can play jazz as only the true follower is touched by the magic and the others learn the twenty most popular standards and claim to be jazz players. I know individuals who have music collections of pure music and yet cant themselves play any musical insruments. But their love of the jazz makes them more like jazz musicians than some players who claim to be jazz musicians and yet to my perception, can't even keep simple time.
No, not every musician can become a jazz musician.
Posted by Ian Beddows on Wednesday 3 February 2010
No other special skills are required to play jazz except determination and the ability to listen well.
Posted by John Harkins on Wednesday 3 February 2010
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