Hey Cass, some people will look at Picasso's Guernica and think it's weird. That doesn't mean it's not good, it just means they don't get it. That's not a putdown, but depending on your exposure, your taste, and especially your musical sensibilities, some will hear tasteful, well-thought-out, melodic explorations, and others will hear uh, scales. Jazz is definitely not for everybody, but for those who have taken the time to study it, to learn it, to understand it; it's a beautiful thing.

For the record, I've never heard anyone say that they didn't like jazz who could actually play jazz. Must be some kind of connection there.

chas

[This message has been edited by cgiles (edited 11-19-2008).]

Cass, jazz is an acquired taste. There's no foul saying that someone doesn't get it. And those who do (the players) often dig in so far that they play themselves out of a job.

The most unhappy of the lot have to choose between starving on the pay a "journeyman" jazz player makes or "selling out" and playing something else, which, to many hardliners, is unacceptable.

A year before he died, Ray Brown asked me what I made as a communications manager at a Fortune 100 company. Turns out it was a little more than his average annual salary, and he was a guy at the very top of his game and pay scale. There are 100's; maby thousands of people who have my skill-set in the communications business.

The saddest people I've known are jazz players who live and breath jazz 18 hours a day. They blame the public for not accepting what they do and become bitter, withdrawn and
often dependent on alcohol and/or drugs. They don't realize that the general public just isn't that involved in the art form.

In many forms of music, adequate players can find work. In jazz, only the "cream of the crop" has any chance of success. I know lots of people who are just shy of the ability to succeed in jazz, but can't commit to anything else.

A sad reality for me is that I'm a "sell-out". That extends to more than music. As it is in music, in art and photography, the money is in corporate projects, not fine art. That level of work pays around $1800.00-2000.00 per day.

As a producer of collateral materials (brochures, packaging, etc.), the compensation is in the $200.00 plus range per hour when you work for large organizations. Producing a publicity release runs $750.00 per page. Adding a mark-up to the printed pieces increases the gross. One on-going job is a 40 page catalog for an Italian company. Lowes goes through several hundred thousand a month. Mark-up on the printing is 15%, or over $13,000 a month in income.

I'd like to be a fine artist/photographer and only do creative work. I'd like to be a top jazz player. I'm not. Instead, I've located a place where I get to work in the fields I sincerely love.

And I'm always grateful I get to do that.

Russ

Points well taken, Russ. I certainly am not knocking jazz. I'm not a student of the art, but I can appreciate all the hard work, desire and dedication it takes to play and understand good jazz.

As our good friend chas said, "some people will look at Picasso's Guernica and think it's weird." Well, I can't even picture it in my head, let alone critique. I guess I must be more of a realist (is that even an art term?).

People see and interpret things in millions of different ways. I'll just return to my original statement - It's not for me.

God bless all. Peace!

I hear you loud and clear, guys... Point one, OF COURSE it's better to play with a great who is sober than jacked up... but I'll still take one of those over a lump that can't play sober or not

And point two... Nothing wrong with being a sellout... as long as you realize it All to often we get sellouts that won't even acknowledge it, then it's all kinds of excuses to justify it. Own up to it (I do mine!) and recognize it as it happens, and you are a LOT better prepared for it's consequences, good OR bad...

But, all in all, as per my original post, I just worry about how much self-justification goes on here by belittling those some of us may have played with in the past... Without any acknowledgment of PERHAPS we are not the saints we would like to make out. Either in our playing skills OR our personal and professional habits. Oh for the forum where we could go and listen to these guys talk about US!

I'd be surprised if it was anywhere NEAR as good as we bill ourselves...

Really fine rendition of "Blackbird". You can do so much with tunes like this. The guy uses some really nice chord inversions.


Russ

http://www.artnewsblog.com/famous-paintings/guernica/index.htm

chas

I understand that COMPLETELY !!! ... but then, I HAVE been taking art lessons ...

t.

Ever hear Joe Cocker's version?