Bob Mintzer interview, Man of Several Musical Lives

 

Bob Mintzer

 

 

Interview with Bob Mintzer ~

a Man of Several Musical Lives

 

Bob Mintzer is professor of Jazz Studies at the USC Thornton School of Music as well as an accomplished saxophone player, band leader and composer. He is a twenty-year member of the Grammy award-winning Yellowjackets, who also leads a Grammy award-winning Big Band, travels with his own Quartet, and plays with numerous bands globally.

A respected educator, Bob is the recipient of the Buzz McCoy endowed chair of jazz Los Angeles, Bob continues to conduct clinics and workshops worldwide. He has also written nearly twenty books which are an important part of the curriculum of Jazz education worldwide.

 

Bob writes for orchestra, concert band and big band, with over two hundred charts to his credit. His big band music is performed by groups all over the planet. Bob honed his big band writing and playing skills in the bands of Tito Puente, Buddy Rich and Thad Jones-Mel Lewis.

His recent master classes with the SFJAZZ All-Star Jazz Orchestra and SFJAZZ All-Star Combo left me feeling more grounded than usual.  So much of this type of education can seem esoteric, but Bob's feedback and suggestions were practical, usable.  Many visiting educators will bring their instrument, but play very little if at all.  Bob played with the group quite a lot, especially with the combo. He sat in with the combo the following day to illustrate certain Big Band concepts for the SFJAZZ Discover Jazz Workshop (expertly curated by SFJAZZ Education Director, Rebeca Mauleon). It was such a growth experience for these young players, reminiscent of the proverb which ends, "...involve me and I will understand."  Asked about his influences for jazz composition, he began by naming several classical composers including Stravinsky and Mozart, to my surprise and delight.  His website (www.bobmintzer.com) is a treasure trove of information including many teaching videos, one thus described: "I've always loved Classical Music and in my new video, I discuss, with examples, how Jazz improvisers can best utilize classical music."

Given that he relates to and creates all these different music genres, it shouldn’t be a surprise that he also relates to students and their struggle. Our friends at USC love him, they all want to be in his Big Band class. A couple years ago, my son Logan visited USC as a HS sophomore, college-shopping. Though he was young, Bob welcomed him heartily, asked him to sit in with the band and even included me in gathering around a computer to watch a special video. That kind of willingness to disrupt your day and add to a student’s experience was so special, we’ll never forget it.  That was plainly evident in the master class as well; it can be nerve-wracking for young players to sit in with the master, but he makes them feel comfortable. Even when delivering necessary criticism, he has an easy way about him that I find pretty often in the jazz community, but not out in the world. It speaks to a larger world view; he is in the eye of the storm in the center of several musical lives of his own making, and the many he supports.

Educator Questions

1.  How do you find a balance between imposing your own ideas over the student's creativity?

 

I preface most teaching with the fact that music is subjective, and opinions vary greatly on what works and doesn't work. That said, I feel there are certain fundamental principles that are common to well-conceived music that an experienced musician and  teacher usually has a good grasp of, and can hopefully impart to students in a way where it doesn’t impede creativity. I relied (still do, actually) heavily on both teachers and colleagues as a young musician to pull my coat when a specific area of my musicianship needed consideration. I feel it enhanced my creativity if anything.

 

 

2. Practice + Parent Support = Musical Achievement

A recent publication, Guitar Zero, was written by a neurologist about his 2-year journey learning to play the guitar.  The author claims that the single-most important quality, after practice, that indicated musical success, is parent support.  Assuming parent support includes lessons or school classes, do you see this statement as accurate?

 

Parent support is critical in whatever passions and interests a young person may have. This can include helping a student find good forums for study and collaborating with other like-minded young people. However, I think another critical parental activity may be staying out of the way, and letting the young musician blossom on their own, find their own way, if you will.

 

If a young person is truly passionate about music, they will immerse themselves in the business of learning the language, and inevitably wind up being steered in the direction of nurturing musical activity, either by school music teachers, or peers. The music scene is a small club, and if a young musician can really play, word travels fast. Generally playing and learning situations will present themselves. At least they did for me when I was younger.

 

In my case, it was a combination of the two elements. My folks took me to an after school jazz improv class at an early age, as well as steered me in the direction of going to Interlochen Arts Academy. They also let me find my own way into the world of music study on my own terms, which ultimately helped me to find my voice and specific calling in the music scene.

 

 

3.  What is your approach to teaching a student a process as intangible and personal as improvisation?

 

The study of improvisation is not terribly intangible to me. There are tangible elements to being a good soloist that can be taught and learned.  The art of improvisation in jazz is a language, and must be learned like any other language, through repeated exposure, study of grammar, and the act of immersion into speaking the language with others. Repertoire plays a big role in shaping a jazz improviser’s vocabulary in a similar way that Shakespeare would be an integral part of any aspiring creative writer's study.

 

Studying all the detail of the music is critical. Those who are most thorough in this endeavor generally are the most articulate and creative improvisers.

 

Creative musicians are generally shaped by their environment. Those who have the most expansive recording collections, or perhaps had the opportunity to be around live musical performance on a regular basis generally have a broader vocabulary. Bottom line: the more you know about the subject matter, the more you have to say.

 

 

4. What qualities have you seen in students that seem to predict future success in music?

 

Those students who seem to thrive in music are not afraid to work harder than everyone else. They also manage to see the big picture, which goes well beyond just playing an instrument. They usually get involved with composition, arranging, recording, video, instigating playing situations vis-à-vis putting bands together to play original music. The most successful musicians are instigators. They envision an environment in which it would be inspiring to play, and they follow through to make it happen. 

 

www.bobmintzer.com

 

 

SFJAZZ All-Stars at 'Jazz in the Basement'

~ Jazz in the Basement ~

“Talking about music is like dancing about architecture.”  ~ Thelonius Monk

Despite Monk’s quote, I will talk about an extraordinary musical event that took place on Saturday night, March 1, 2014.  My son, Logan, and the SFJAZZ All-Star Combo (expertly directed by Dann Zinn) were the guests selected to perform at this month’s Jazz in the Basement, a serious, old-school jazz salon that has taken place every month for more than five years at the beautiful, classic San Francisco home of Michele and Jesse Foster.  Taking place in the detached, first-story music room off the garden of the Foster abode, there is an intimate theater set-up (drum set, bass amp, lighted music stands, theater and mood-lighting, framed photographs of jazz luminaries and classic-show bills on a freshly-painted, lovely ground of periwinkle blue) with seats for about 40 regular guests and guests of artists. There is an adjacent room where wine is poured and Michele’s chicken and snacks are served.  There is even a dedicated “green room” used by the band to take breaks between their two 45-minute sets.  The atmosphere is very friendly, most of the regular guests (including a 6-month-old baby girl named after Ry Cooter), are like family.   We are warmly welcomed and questioned about our life in the jazz lane.  This is the first time the SFJAZZ All-Stars have been invited and the first time they are hosting student musicians. 

Though Jesse Foster is a jazz singer, percussionist and educator himself (performing at Café Soliel, 2nd and 4th Saturdays, 6:30 – 9:30pm), Michele is responsible for the line-up.  She proudly says that Jesse gets “his own night” on the schedule.  They are both very open and willing to speak to The Lead Sheet SF about their unique event.  They have been able to attract some leading names in jazz, including Mads Tolling, Kenny Washington, Alvon Johnson, Mike Zilber, Peter Horvath, Dave Mcnab, Anton Schwartz, Wayne Wallace, Howard Wiley, Lady Memphis, Will Blades, Raz Kennedy, and Marcus Shelby, to name just a few, so special and attractive is their salon.  Nestled among the spread, is a basket labeled “$20” for guests to donate to the artists’ compensation.  By providing a venue and sharing the cost, I think it is notable how this group of music-lovers enjoys a private concert and in the process, supports the arts.

On this night, as is the group’s signature, the All-Stars perform nearly all original music, composed by the band members.  The introductory offering is an upbeat tune, entitled “Bebop,” by the band’s percussionist, Benjamin Ring.  Enthusiastically received, this is followed by two tunes by string bassist, Logan Kane, including the forceful “Doors Lead to Ceilings” and the odd-meter "Birdsong’s the Thoughts of a Wood.”  Included in the set list was “Supermoon” by pianist, Patrick Hogan and “Tune for Dann” by saxophonist, Matt Richards, ending with the rollicking “Grapes” by trumpeter, Edward Evans.  The audience is surprised and impressed by their self-compositions, receiving enduring applause and promises to be invited to return and perform again.  We hear comfort expressed about the future of jazz in the hands of these young giants.  I feel very fortunate to have attended, met the Fosters and friends, and am sure this will become a regular stop for the All-Stars.

Jesse has kindly agreed to be interviewed as an educator, so look for his upcoming article.

Stradivarius Violins at upcoming "Strad Fest"

Stradivarius Violins at upcoming "Strad Fest"

The Holy Grail among string players and owners is the famed Stradivari.  The world-renowned sound of violins created by Cremona, Italy, luthier, Antonio Stradivari, are so unique and beautiful, it is said that his hands were guided by God.  Few on earth have ever heard such sound, so an upcoming event is truly a ‘chance of a lifetime.’  For four days in March (the 26^th through the 29^th), the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra will showcase eight of these violins, worth more than $25 million collectively, at an event called the “Strad Fest.”  These masterpiece instruments will be showcased, played and displayed.  Most of these have been owned by collectors, so precious are they, most musicians cannot afford such a luxury.  Fortunately, these collectors know that the instruments must be played to maintain the sound.  Foundering in a museum would ruin them.  Thus, they are heavily insured, and then loaned to professional musicians.

Each of them has a story unto itself, many of world travel and intrigue.  Following is a brief history of four, which will then add Strad Fest to their lengthy resumes.

The Serdet Stradivarius, 1666:

The earliest known Stradivarius violin still bears its original label with the year 1666.  Its name is derived from the Paris shop of violin dealer, Paul Serdet, who sold it in 1900.  Last summer, it was featured at the first significant exhibit honoring Antonio Stradivari at the famed Ashmolean Museum at Oxford University in Oxford, England.

The Titian Stradivarius, 1715:

The orange-red color of this reminded one French violin dealer of the paintings of Titian, and it was thus named.  It is known the instrument traveled to the United States and was in Boston in 1872.  The famed Rudolph Wurlitzer Company of Cincinnati, Ohio, owned it from 1924 to 1926.  Currently, it is owned by Cho-Liang Lin who played it in residence with the Shanghai Symphony.

The Milstein Stradivarius, 1716:

An Olympic sailor from Viborg, Finland, by the name of Harry Wahl owned this violin until his death in 1940. Soon after, virtuoso, Nathan Milstein, played this violin in London and other European cities for more than 40 years.  Its current home is in Pasadena, California, owned by philanthropist couple, Jerry and Terri Kohl, who lend it to various fortunate concertmasters in Los Angeles.

The Red Mendelssohn Stradivarius, 1720:

The 1999 Academy award-winning film, The Red Violin, was inspired by the story of the Red Mendelssohn Stradivarius.  Soon after it was crafted, this violin disappeared for Elizabeth Pitcairn, played it for the premier of a Swedish concerto in Helsingborn, Sweden, in 2005.

I can’t resist throwing in a quick book review.  There is a new crime novel called The Tooth Tattoo – a Peter Diamond Investigation, that deals with the classical musical community and speaks about the nature of these priceless, collectable instruments and their loan to masters.

“Peter Diamond, head of the Criminal Investigation Division in scenic Bath, England, is investigating the murder of a young woman whose body has been found in the canal, the only clue to her identity a tattoo of a music note on one of her teeth. For Diamond, who wouldn’t know a Stradivarius from a French horn, the investigation is his most demanding ever.

Meanwhile, jobbing violist, Mel Farran, finds himself scouted by a very elite classical quartet with a cushy residency at Bath Spa University -- one whose previous violist disappeared without a trace.  As the story unfolds in fugue-like counterpoint, Peter and Mel both learn frightening secrets about fandom and about what it takes to survive in the cutthroat world of professional musicians.”

Detwiler, Jacqueline.  “The World on a String.”  Hemispheres.  March 2014.

Lovesey, Peter.  The Tooth Tattoo – a Peter Diamond Investigation (Peter Diamond #13).  New York: Soho Press, 2013. 

Duende

“Music, of all the liberal arts, has the greatest influence over the passions, and it is that to which the  

 legislator ought to give the greatest encouragement.”   ~Napoleon Bonaparte

There is a great club in Oakland, California called Duende, "an innovative restaurant that brings the Bay Area a new way to experience food, drink, art and live music."  Downstairs is a feast for the eyes; the food, Spanish in nature, is a feast.  There is a second floor entirely devoted to up-and-coming music.

My social media efforts required me to talk with the club manager and I asked about the business name, Duende.  He said it was a suggestion from his son, but when I learned about the meaning of this word, I couldn't believe I hadn't heard it used before, in terms of musical expression.   Taking over the full second story, it was my pleasure to watch another of the college-break bands my son had joined.  That night in particular, one special guest attended, Dann Zinn.  After the performance, we took a picture with Dann and all the musicians he has supported and educated, something like 20, who happened to be there that night.  Zinn may not speak of Duende, but as he "works the steps" with the up-and-comers, especially in performance, he practices it.

Duende ~ loosely means 'having soul', a heightened state of emotion, expression and authenticity*

The Wikipedia article, "Duende (art)," does a great job of addressing this word in its myriad current and past usage.  I decided to reproduce the article with deletion-edits to suit my purposes: music and the brain.  The added commentary of Nick Cave (of Birthday Party fame) at the end, gives a modern perspective which finds duende largely missing from contemporary rock music, the component of 'true sadness' unfound.  Except, in Dylan, summoned in Waits... 

"El duende is the spirit of evocation. It comes from inside as a physical/emotional response to art. It is what gives you chills, makes you smile or cry as a bodily reaction to an artistic performance that is particularly expressive. Folk music in general, especially flamenco, tends to embody an authenticity that comes from a people whose culture is enriched by diaspora and hardship; vox populi, the human condition of joys and sorrows. Drawing on popular usage and Spanish folklore, Federico García Lorca first developed the aesthetics of Duende in a lecture he gave in Buenos Aires in 1933, 'Juego y Teoria del Duende' (Play and Theory of the Duende)."

"According to Christopher Maurer, editor of 'In Search of Duende,' at least four elements can be isolated in Lorca's vision of duende: irrationality, earthiness, a heightened awareness of death, and a dash of the diabolical. The duende is an earth spirit who helps the artist see the limitations of intelligence, reminding them that 'ants could eat him or that a great arsenic lobster could fall suddenly on his head'; who brings the artist face-to-face with death, and who helps them create and communicate memorable, spine-chilling art." 

"The duende is seen, in Lorca's lecture, as an alternative to style, to mere virtuosity, to God-given grace and charm (what Spaniards call 'angel'), and to the classical, artistic norms dictated by the muse. Not that the artist simply surrenders to the duende; they have to battle it skillfully, 'on the rim of the well,' in 'hand-to-hand combat.'  To a higher degree than the muse or the angel, the duende seizes not only the performer but also the audience, creating conditions where art can be understood spontaneously with little, if any, conscious effort. It is, in Lorca's words, 'a sort of corkscrew that can get art into the sensibility of an audience...the very dearest thing that life can offer the intellectual.'  The critic, Brook Zern, has written of a performance of someone with duende, 'it dilates the mind's eye, so that the intensity becomes almost unendurable...  There is a quality of first-timeness, of reality so heightened and exaggerated that it becomes unreal...'

"Lorca writes: 'The duende, then, is a power, not a work. It is a struggle, not a thought. I have heard an old maestro of the guitar say, "The duende is not in the throat; the duende climbs up inside you, from the soles of the feet."  Meaning this: it is not a question of ability, but of true, living style, of blood, of the most ancient culture, of spontaneous creation.  He suggests, 'everything that has black sounds in it, has duende [i.e. emotional 'darkness'].'  This 'mysterious power which everyone senses and no philosopher explains' is, in sum, the spirit of the earth, the same duende that scorched the heart of Nietzsche, who searched in vain for its external forms on the Rialto Bridge and in the music of Bizet, without knowing that the duende he was pursuing had leaped straight from the Greek mysteries to the dancers of Cadiz or the beheaded, Dionysian scream of Silverio's siguiriya.  'The duende's arrival always means a radical change in forms. It brings to old planes unknown feelings of freshness, with the quality of something newly created, like a miracle, and it produces an almost religious enthusiasm.'

"All arts are capable of duende, but where it finds greatest range, naturally, is in music, dance, and spoken poetry, for these arts require a living body to interpret them, being forms that are born, die, and open their contours against an exact present." 

In March 2005, Jan Zwicky (University of Victoria) used the notion of duende in the context of contemporary music at a symposium organised by Continuum Contemporary Music & the Institute for Contemporary Culture at the Royal Ontario Museum.

"[The second way music can be new is] when it possesses duende: 'black sounds,' as Lorca called them, the dark counterpoise to Apollo's light, music in which we hear death sing.... Duende lives in blue notes, in the break in a singer's voice, in the scrape of resined horsehair hitting sheep gut We are more accustomed to its presence in jazz and the blues, and it is typically a feature of music in performance, or music in which performance and composition are not separate acts. But it is also audible in the work of classically oriented composers who are interested in the physical dimensions of sound, or in sound as a physical property of the world. Even if it is structurally amorphous or naïvely traditional, music whose newness lies in its duende will arrest our attention because of its insistence on honouring the death required to make the song: we sense the gleam of the knife, we smell the blood.... In reflecting on the key images of Western music's two-part invention – the duende of the tortoise and the radiance of Apollonian emotional geometry – we are reminded that originality is truly radical, that it comes from the root, from the mythic origins of the art."
(Note: in Greek mythology, Hermes killed a tortoise to create the first lyre, which he traded to Apollo who was enamored by its music.).

Australian music artist Nick Cave discussed his interpretation of duende in his lecture pertaining to the nature of the love song (Vienna, 1999):

"In his brilliant lecture entitled 'The Theory and Function of Duende,' Federico García Lorca attempts to shed some light on the eerie and inexplicable sadness that lives in the heart of certain works of art. 'All that has dark sound has duende,' he says, 'that mysterious power that everyone feels but no philosopher can explain.' In contemporary rock music, the area in which I operate, music seems less inclined to have its soul, restless and quivering, the sadness that Lorca talks about. Excitement, often; anger, sometimes: but true sadness, rarely.  Bob Dylan has always had it.  Leonard Cohen deals specifically in it.  It pursues Van Morrison like a black dog and though he tries to he cannot escape it.  Tom Waits and Neil Young can summon it. It haunts Polly Harvey. My friends the Dirty Three have it by the bucket load. The band Spiritualized are excited by it. Tindersticks desperately want it, but all in all it would appear that duende is too fragile to survive the brutality of technology and the ever increasing acceleration of the music industry. Perhaps there is just no money in sadness, no dollars in duende. Sadness or duende needs space to breathe. Melancholy hates haste and floats in silence. It must be handled with care.

"All love songs must contain duende. For the love song is never truly happy. It must first embrace the potential for pain. Those songs that speak of love without having within in their lines an ache or a sigh are not love songs at all but rather Hate Songs disguised as love songs, and are not to be trusted. These songs deny us our humanness and our God-given right to be sad and the air-waves are littered with them. The love song must resonate with the susurration of sorrow, the tintinnabulation of grief. The writer who refuses to explore the darker regions of the heart will never be able to write convincingly about the wonder, the magic and the joy of love for just as goodness cannot be trusted unless it has breathed the same air as evil - the enduring metaphor of Christ crucified between two criminals comes to mind here - so within the fabric of the love song, within its melody, its lyric, one must sense an acknowledgement of its capacity for suffering."

* Duende is often connected with flamenco, the artistic & especially musical term was derived from the 'duende,' a fairy or goblin-like creature in Spanish mythology

"Duende (art)."  Wikipedia, December 29, 2013.  February 18, 2014 <http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duende_(art)>.

Duende Restaurant website:  http://duendeoakland.com/

Jam of the Week

A new Facebook page called Jam of the Week just popped up and has gained such widespread popularity in the jazz community, that in order to handle the traffic, it has announced its plans to upgrade to a full website platform after just two weeks!  The idea comes from Portland resident and trumpet-player, Farnell Newton, who has been touring internationally with Bootsy Collins and Jill Scott.  Newton posts a tune each week and invites musicians to post a brief, improvised solo and chorus over chord changes.  Videos tend to be around one minute and unaccompanied.  Members are then invited to comment and in Facebook parlance, 'like' a performance.  Week 2, my high-school son, a string bassist, was 2nd on the list of likes at time of post (1st was a professional musician; I was excited about the unexpected attention given to a young student).  But, we realized with the heavy activity, the way Facebook categorizes posts by popularity, accounting for views, 'likes,' 'comments,' and recency, the rating system was changing the result on each connection.  It gives a whole new meaning to Warhol's "15 Minutes of Fame."  The idea of popularity-rating isn't in the spirit of Jam of the Week* anyway, though the most-viewed, well-liked videos will naturally be highlighted as supreme examples.  In its third week, Jam of the Week was already taking longer and longer to load and categorize: the huge amount of video memory required for downloading hundreds of submitted videos and the constantly changing associated data, flooded with 'likes' and 'comments' is stressing the system to its limits.  Facebook wasn't built for this type of data-sharing and will be but a stepping stone on the way to dot com sitedom.   

Even with the caveat of members needing to be invited by an existing member, the page has grown exponentially.  This means visitors to the page are musicians, vetted by the system.  And, it is attracting all kinds; in addition to students, well-known performers and working professionals are making appearances (our private teacher gamely asked to be invited).  Most of the videos are recorded close-up and personal.  Students must feel this is invaluable; not only can they share their work, but they can see the work of their peers and professionals, each week, like a huge, communal lesson.  Recording unaccompanied, there is no hiding intonation, technique or time issues.  People will be inspired and strive to produce that great cut, their personal best.  It is a unique tool and as with all things technological, it either fills a specific need, will morph as needed, or die off.  In this case, the latter seems unlikely, but time will tell. 

High-level adjudication can be hard to find in certain locales, especially out of school, but not on Jam of the Week.  While most comments are along the lines of, "super killin' man!" there are thoughtful and specific comments as well, informal micro-lessons, if you will.  In addition to precious feedback, finding like-minded practitioners across the world and sometimes surprisingly, in their own backyards is reason enough to follow.  An amazing bonus, members are already reporting finding gigs and paying work on this page. 

I am so fascinated by the jazz community.  Unlike pop, where guest-artist features are often done to drive album sales, and artists' mutual-admiration in public sometimes seems superficial (though this may be thanks to media presentation), the jazz community is fueled by true cooperation.  Jazz musicians seem to genuinely LOVE listening to other jazz musicians and sharing their finds.  They are truly in the business of inspiration-sharing and with the advent of social media, this vast, widespread community is drawn closer still, and I think that may be the key to Jam of the Week's immediate success.  Members become friends across the world, linked in time by recorded solo performances and the feelings they elicit.  Certainly, there has been a recent "Jazz Expansion" in my own home, and hometown area (with the January 2013 opening of the SFJAZZ Center in San Francisco, CA and the recent accreditation of the Jazzschool in Berkeley, CA), but I'm wondering if it isn't a microcosm of what is happening in the world.    

The first week the selected tune was blues, the second week, "Just Friends."  This week's (2.8.14) Jam of the Week is,  "All the Things You Are" (also one of USC's required college-entrance audition tunes).  Check it out at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/jamoftheweekgroup/members/

*Jam of the Week's modus operandi:

Every Week a Blues, Favorite Lick, Progression, Song or Jam will be announced for everyone to record and post here. 

This Group IS NOT for promoting your gigs, or cool youtubes....etc. "You will be Kicked Out"

This Group is for the sole purpose of posting and commenting on weekly submission.  

This Group is not to see who has the greatest chops, who can play the highest, etc. It is a place to have fun, learn some new licks, network with fellow musicians and to promote the simple fact that we are all learning and striving to be better. 

With all that said.....Thank you all for joining and have FUN.