Forward

I'm currently writing a book geared towards guitarists playing in their high school jazz band:


One of the most difficult and confusing positions in high school is not student council president, quarterback, chess club president, cheerleading captain, or even teacher’s pet. The amount of knowledge, understanding, talent, and training in order to simply “play your part” correctly in a high school jazz band as a guitarist is intense. The trumpets, saxophones, and trombones unless asked to improvise can basically get through their rehearsals and performances with a limited understanding of the notes on the page, their instrument, and rhythm reading. A guitarist is asked to be steeped in the language of chord symbol nomenclature and not only understand what it means to read it, but to be able to translate it to their instrument. No other instrument is asked to make this “leap of knowledge”. Most bass parts at the high school level are written out and don’t require the player to construct their own lines based on the chord symbols. Even the piano parts have written out chords. Maybe it goes back to the old joke, “how do you get a guitarist to shut up? Put a piece of music in front of them.”
This joke, however cruel, has (as most jokes do) some truth to it. Strange to think that as guitarists, we would prefer learning a GMaj7#11 chord and all the theory/nomenclature that goes along with it rather than reading those individual notes on a staff. It seems that the latter would be the easier approach, wouldn’t it? I like to think that it’s our thirst for knowledge that makes us learn the hard way…..who am I kidding, anything that would resemble traditional music notation freaks most guitarists out. The nature of our instrument (especially in the 20th century) is associated more with a folkier, self-taught, instrument "for the people" kind of thing rather than a formal, disciplined, conventional approach to learning. Most of us have related more with Jimi Hendrix playing with his teeth than Andres Segovia playing with proper hand technique and sitting position.
Most of you reading this book are probably trying to make some sense out of this jazz stuff and are probably not quite sure how you feel about it yet. I’m assuming that most of you are probably pretty good rock guitarists that got put into the jazz band because it’s the closest thing to playing guitar in school and getting credit for it. Chances are you probably even get to do a few solos. That’s one thing that you have on the horn players in the band; if you’ve done any amount of jamming with your friends, you’re probably pretty comfortable with the blues scale, the pentatonic scale, and improvising. That alone, has made your playing jazz way more advanced than understanding all the notes on the page. If not, we’ll be getting to all of that so don’t worry if you haven’t done any improvising.
This book is intended to strip away some of the mystery of those elusive charts that you’re supposed to understand. I’m not going to lie to you. This is not all fun. It will take a lot of dedication and commitment, especially if you’re using this book on your own without a teacher.
Jazz ability cannot be measured. It is a subjective art form. In other words, if Tiger Woods hits a 300 yard drive, I think golf fan or not, everyone can admit that that is impressive. Conversely, just because Charlie Parker can play a great idea using the half whole diminished scale doesn’t necessarily mean that everyone will find that impressive. In fact, Charlie Parker probably wouldn’t think that impressive. The joy of jazz doesn’t come from executing what you’ve practiced; the joy comes from the practice itself or more specifically, the process. I know who’s the astute student by when I point out a few things that they can work on that they will instead of being frustrated, smile as if to thank me for discovering a weakness.
You’ll often hear musicians talk about “shedding”. A phrase associated with practicing. It comes from the idea of going out to the woodshed and building your craft. A great drummer friend of mine, Randall Stoll, had a better take on “shedding”. He equated it to a snake, shedding its skin. Still the same snake, but with a new (and better) outer layer.
Shedding your musical skin can be a frustrating and difficult process, but the difference between the good musician and the great musician lies within the attitude of shedding. The good musician will see practicing as a necessary evil whereas the great musician will view practicing as one of the most exciting and satisfying parts of music.
Big Las Vegas casinos will often pay cheats to go in and see if they can fool their dealers. When the cheat does “rip-off” the dealer the casino thanks them for exposing a problem that they can now solve by re-training their oblivious dealer. Instead of ignoring the problem, the casino investigated and took action; heck, they even paid the cheat for discovering their incompetence!!!! Within music, in order to progress, you must adopt the same attitude. Be proud of your accomplishments, but understand that you must be humble enough to be accept criticism and work on your weaknesses.
The skills that you will learn in jazz can serve you in all forms of music; I guess that’s why some people call jazz "multi-directional music". Learning extended chord qualities (Maj7, min7, 9th, #9th, etc), reading, comping, chord-scale relationships, diatonic harmony, slash chords, substitution and reharmonization, motific playing, etc. are not jazz exclusive concepts; they’re found in all styles of music from rock to country to classical to metal. Jazz musicians are inherently great imitators. Most session and back up musicians or “hired guns” have had training in jazz. Jazz tends to set the bar quite high so that when asked to play another style, jazz musicians tend to feel completely comfortable playing just about whatever style.
A great musician once said to me, “Rock player can play rock, country player can play country, and classical player can play classical, but none of them can play jazz. One doesn’t dabble in jazz. The jazz musician can play jazz AND all of their styles too.” Not to take away from any of those other great styles and there are certainly exceptions to the rule, but it’s true that most jazz musicians are well equipped to handle most musical idioms.
Jazz is an amazing music. It’s exciting and can move your soul. The thing that first attracted me to jazz was the musicianship. It should come as no surprise that jazz is very demanding. It will require every musical skill that you ever have and will ever learn in some way. It requires a “complete” musician. If you see this as an exciting proposition then this music is made for you.
Jazz doesn’t only exist in your classroom either. Imagine someone’s idea of rock was listening to a few 8th graders trying to jam on Smells Like Teen Spirit. Not a very good representation of the music is it? Same goes for jazz. I’m always blown away to hear students at high school competitons telling me that they’ve never listened to jazz and that their only experience with the music is their jazz band rehearsals at school. You mean, you’re competing in a festival playing music that you have never even heard????
I also hear from some students that jazz is boring. I think you should listen to whatever turns your crank, but make sure that you always give a certain music a chance before writing off the entire genre. Maybe you’re not listening to the right stuff. For some people, jazz is John Coltrane. For others it’s Kenny G. For some it’s Nora Jones. For others it’s John McLaughlin. For some it’s Ornette Coleman. For others it’s Lester Young. These are all quite different and diverse artists that all have very different and unique styles. To listen to and like one doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll like some of the others.” Jazz is a very diverse music and there (like all music) is something for everyone. I have yet to play a couple great Wes Montgomery tracks for some of my most musically stubborn students and not have a look of curiosity about who this virtuoso is. I then tell them that he was playing with his thumb; it’s at that point that I help them pick their jaw up off of the floor.
For me, jazz sounded like "elevator music" until I saw it live at age 13. I went to see my teacher, Oliver Gannon play and I up till that point felt pretty content with my guitar playing. Hell, I could play almost everything Stevie Ray Vaughan and Jimmy Page had done at that point. When I left the concert, I was so excited; I realized I had a LOT of work to do. I didn’t translate how amazing jazz was until I saw someone do it live. Almost 20 years later I still feel like I’ve got a LOT of work to do and that's one of the greatest feelings in the world!