When I worked as a professional pianist in the cruise industry, musical knowledge was slight. There was no lack of ego, and most of the young musicians who thought they could play jazz in essence were just just covering up that they couldn't. What is the big deal with jazz? You really want to know? Jazz - the quintessential American art form, but Bluegrass should be in there too. The thing about jazz is it takes a long time to amass the skills necessary to play it. Why? The reasons are specific. There is a lot to it, as there should be with any art form. Lots of things to study and understand. Can I be concise? I'll try.
1. You need a stellar sound concept. (you must be able to produce and sustain a beautiful, expressive, and in tune tone on your instrument) You can learn this with classical training, BUT - the variety of sounds found in jazz run the gamut. Sound concept is one exceptional and transformative element of jazz. Early Jazz circa 1920 transformed the sounds of traditional European instruments. These sounds got adapted to life in America, the New World. America was a very different place than Europe, and consequently America needed her own music with its own expression and identity. Jazz created and provided that.
2. You must be able to "Swing." What the "F" is swing? This remains unanswered today. No one knows, and those who don't or can't swing spend their lives covering this up. (like young cruise ship musicians) Swing most succinctly is a feeling, so if you can't produce an emotion or emote when you play, give up. It is necessary above all other things. If you have a crappy sound, you still can be part of an ensemble providing rhythmic feel. You play a "riff" maybe on one single note. There are different concepts of swing, and I am familiar with most of them. Listening to Dexter Gordon you will hear his concept of swing, and it requires playing in different parts of the beat. You can lay back or play behind the beat, and you can play ahead of the best. You can use swung 16th notes, 8th notes, or even triplets which are the easiest. The Count Basie band uses both at the same time. The rhythm section plays a tight shuffle feel and the horns play looser triplets on top of this beat. Duke Ellington plays a specific swing feel on the piano, and you can see it as he plays, because he accentuates his arm movements. Some of this was for sheer volume to be heard. If you were playing with a Big Band with an un-miked piano, good luck being heard. Glenn Miller had their own sense of swing as did Woody Herman and Stan Kenton. Swing rhythm is subjective, BUT you can't swing without playing good time. In short to swing you must be able to play time, in time, in many different tempos. The "feel" of a tune is the result of a groove, time, being played at a certain tempo. If you internalize that feeling, say a ballad and the emotion it conveys, it is easier to realize it. Producing this emotion magically creates the time. Discuss.
3. You must be able to improvise. All ready we have three things most musicians can't do. If you went to university and studied classical music, then maybe you can create a beautiful sound on your instrument. Maybe you can play good time. If you understand time and tempos, then you are ahead of the game. If you know how to phrase you are advancing up the ladder of musicality. That is not enough. To play jazz you must know tunes by heart, and that means knowing the melody (how it sounds) and the accompanying chord changes. Orchestral excerpts are not enough nor are studies. You must have a repertoire from the Great American Songbook. This is where most musicians fail. It takes conscientious work. You must go into the woodshed and "shed." Charlie Parker practiced over twelve hours a day. It is a bug you need to get. Even after you know the song and the appropriate chord changes, you are not a jazz musician. It may get you through a gig, and I would welcome anyone who could play the "heads" of a lot of songs. To be called a jazz musician, the most paramount thing is: You must be able to improvise a solo over the form of the tune. This is the way it all started. All of the Early Jazz, like the music of Jelly Roll Morton and Joe King Oliver sounds improvised. Surprise! It was all written down. It was not improvised. This blew my mind when I discovered this. John Phillip Sousa was one of the most popular recorded musical artists as was Enrico Caruso. Ragtime also was the popular music of the day. There were skilled and educated musicians in America, and they came from academia and classical training. A handful of them, including the Creoles from New Orleans, needed a new gig. When Jim Crow laws were passed in the American South, educated Creole musicians lost their classical and opera jobs. Many turned to jazz for income, and that is why Early Jazz was so virtuosic. Jazz musicians like Louis Armstrong played in ensembles playing arrangements of American popular songs. These arrangers, such as Paul Whiteman, Benny Moten, and Don Redman were instrumental in the birth of Early Jazz. It varied from geographical place to place in America, such as NOLA to St. Louis to Chicago. Before Bill Basie became the band leader of Benny Moten's band, their repertoire was rife with ragtime, novelty tunes, and blues. When Bix Beiderbecke and Satchmo took a chorus or improvised a second verse of an arrangement, this was the blueprint for improvised jazz to follow. They would play the first chorus straight or as notated, but their second improvised chorus swung more freely and took liberties with the limited rhythm of the time. They could bend notes, distort the time, and superimpose more complex lines over a simple song. In the Big Band music that followed, swing music for the times of war, the improvised solos became a part of the arrangement. The vocalists of swing, while they sowed their oats singing in time and harmony in a big band, later began to paraphrase the melody of a song. Louis Armstrong may have been the originator of this practice. It is a contentious issue to alter a composer's carefully printed notes, but in live performance on the road things evolved. Musicians such as Louis Armstrong quickly became self-contained composers singing and playing tunes and inventing things on the spot to fit the audience. This extemporaneous improvisation was exciting and entertaining and developed into what we know as jazz.
