Next Level Bassist Musicality Issue

Bard College Conservatory of Music with the American Symphony Orchestra announces the
american symphony orchestra
Double Bass Scholarship
A full merit scholarship covering tuition, room and board at the Bard Conservatory.
Conservatory Double Bass Faculty
Leigh Mesh
Marji Danilow
845-758-7604 bard.edu/conservatory conservatoryadmission@bard.edu
What I want to hear is the different roles of the notes in different parts
of the bar. (See example) There are lots of elements to that seemingly
simple pattern. If you can’t create that sort of groove, you don’t have
musicality yet!
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4
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Call
Response Repeat Repeat
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j œ œ œ œ bœ
j œ
Once you have really crafted your internal rhythm, you can begin
thinking about all the styles of music out there where your rhythm
needs to be flexible. This can be classical music, or it can even be really
sophisticated forms of jazz. You’ll hear this called “rubato,” but I think
that can be misleading. This Italian word, meaning “robbing” time, can
lead a musician into thinking just stretching out your favorite musical
moments is enough, but of course you’ve got to make up for that time
somewhere else. What does that really mean, though?
Listen to any record of Pablo Casals or Oscar Shumsky playing Bach
- they have the rhythmic solidity of a drummer. The real markers,
the bar lines, are where the pulse is completely stable, but the music
between the bar lines can change all over the place. If you change
anything about rhythm, it’s important to remain grounded and come
back to that groove you worked so hard to develop. The next step that
you can research is what I call “playing over the top of the tempo,” and
it’s something you can easily hear in stride piano playing. A pianist can
have the left hand in time with the right hand stretched out over that.
There’s an even freer way of approaching time I experience all the time
in Wayne Shorter’s band - it’s the essence of breathing together and
feeling our way through the tempo as a group without a strict pulse at
all. We are creating music purely by listening and letting the harmonies
and the sounds guide when to change the music. This is a real sign
of trust, and I think you can only achieve this in groups where you
play together all the time. Wayne’s band has been together for 13 years,
and we can telepathically feel our way through stuff together in a way
that I can’t even explain in words! I think it’s a gift we can’t take credit
for - it’s a spiritual thing. Take a look at an example here.
Even the ability to play without a strict beat is only possible for people
who have an absolute, rock-solid inner pulse. That’s the level you need
to reach to be able to focus deeply on what others are doing around
you while you play. I think everyone should push themselves to
this level.
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bœ
j œ œ œ œ bœ
j œ
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Inspiration
I don’t think ignorance is bliss - I think knowledge is always power,
if you have some wisdom to back it up. It’s vital that you learn how
music is put together. I feel as though I’ve established deep relationships
with certain composers to the point where I felt
I understood what they may have been thinking when
they wrote the music. I’ve also felt deep emotional
reactions to music, to the point where at times I feel I
can see cinematic imagery in the music. This is true of
composers like Ravel and especially Bach, which for me
is so meditative and prayer-like. Wayne Shorter talks constantly about
imagery in music!
I like getting students on the piano just to practice voicings, and to
revel in the sound of the piano. It’s not about practicing scales and
arpeggios, or putting restrictions on the music someone needs to
learn. Show a musician some sounds and harmonies, let them put
notes together and experiment - this can really open one’s eyes. Coltrane
said he used to sit at the piano for hours just playing sounds
and chords to inspire him. I’ve always thought, “If that was good
enough for Trane, it’s what I’ll do!” I’ve spent a lot of time hearing
harmonies and responding to them on a personal level. It’s vital to
get to that area where music can paint pictures and take people to a
magical, other world.
I started out as a kid playing by ear, not reading any music. I’m so
grateful I had a teacher who made me learn music. I was so lucky for
that, because I suddenly had access to hundreds of years of music
I could look at and learn from. I was lucky in my childhood to be
exposed to a lot of different music, from pop and R&B to Latin and
world music. Having a wide range of influences gives you a world
of inspiration, and allows you to study how music is put together
throughout the world. All these different cultures have musical
structures that are fascinating. A lot of things I learned about music
were by intuition and from my ears early on. As I got deeply into jazz,
I had to train my ear to hear and respond to music that changes by
the millisecond, and that’s where musicianship comes in. In Wayne
Shorter’s band, there’s so much spontaneity and composition that goes
on the top of the pieces we’re playing! You have to be able to operate
within a harmonically complicated world, but have it sound intuitive
and visceral rather than cerebral.
A vital element to musicianship is singing - I grew up in a house where
we all sang. Early on, I studied with Charles Siani, Principal Bass of
NOV/DEC 2013 NEXT LEVEL BASSIST 15