Good times! So glad to be back with my JazzLab! Last rehearsal was cancelled because I was almost dead.
This brother on guitar is one of my dear brothers, and actually the Army Band liaison who put me in the Army Band. He came out to help today. This dude is one of the best guitarists I have ever played with—and a great guy. It was such a treat for JazzLab students to get to play with him.
It was so great to get back at it with JazzLab this week! Our last class/rehearsal time together was canceled unfortunately due the fact that I was almost dead. A lot of people in a situation like mine (recovering from a motorcycle accident with multiple spinal fractures, right arm and hand fractures, and right knee fractures and consequent surgery) might be just taking it easy and chilling out at home! I could do that in that I am the boss, and I could have simply given myself all this time off.
On the other hand, though, I absolutely despise just sitting around. As a matter of fact, one of the first things that I thought of when I got home from the hospital was what can I do while I am still physically recovering enough to be able to get back to work. One of the beautiful things about writing and arranging music is that you don’t have to be real physically mobile to do it. So one of the first things that I did was pick up my laptop and start writing a couple of new arrangements for my JazzLab.
One of the coolest things about music is that when students learn well how to read music, how to listen, and they know their instruments well, is that they can learn new music really well. Yesterday we ran through one of those new arrangements once. Well it wasn’t perfect yet of course, and definitely has some things we’re going to work on, it was beautiful to hear it come to life. The students read it, they listened, and they made music! That’s what it’s all about.
The students also had an opportunity to get their feet wet with a brand new jazz standard yesterday as well. This class is called JazzLab for a reason. It’s not just a group or a band or an ensemble yes it’s all those things, but it’s a class intended to challenge students to experiment, grow, and learn together as they dive into new material. We explored Maiden Voyage which is a classic piece which really does use some very different concepts when it comes to Jazz music. It’s based on straight 8ths, more of a jazz rock kind of a feel, it’s modal and spends the majority of the time on just a few chords which are actually quite ambiguous and neither major nor minor, which offers a unique opportunity for the rhythm section and the soloists. The students did a great job exploring that as well! Of course we also worked on some material they’ve been playing together for a while, and I’ll have an opportunity to play that music live next week at Arts Walk and we can’t wait!
One of the things I think is amazing from an educational standpoint and growth of these musicians, is that many of these songs have countless chords changing rapidly from one key to the next, requiring students know not just every key, but various different tonalities utilizing mixolydian, dorian, locrian, as well as of course major, natural minor (aeolian) and harmonic minor as well. While it is possible that some musicians could learn tunes like this, most of them would likely take hours of listening and practicing and learning these things by ear. On the other hand, a musician that knows these tonalities, knows how to read these chords, knows how to understand chord scale theory, can experiment and play over such chord changes on the spot. That’s what we’re here for! To teach people how to do that! Among other things.
