Why I'm Not A Music Critic, per se...
A lot of people ask me my opinion of different artists. There was a time I was very opinionated about who I like, and who I didn't like, but, well now that I'm doing it instead of just talking about it I've learned to keep my mouth shut, especially having realized that even my own opinions change. My philosophy is this: If there's an artist I like and dig, of course I'm going to hip other people to that particular artist. And if there's an artist I don't dig... well, why belittle the guy ? Look, it takes no genius to find cow shit in a barn... and when you're dealing with a very subjective area why stand over the pile and argue anyway? ...now, finding needles in hay stacks, now that's another story. So if there's someone who takes delight in finding bad stuff and writing about it with authority and elegance, fine be impressed... I'd much rather some dude in bad half broken English hip me to a GREAT LISTENING experience than listen to some snob complain about one louzy album after another...
Today, I'm a professional Jazz organist. But actually, when I first started listening to Jazz (thanks to the music of Eddie Jefferson) it took me a long time to get into the Jazz organ sound. To be honest, I found it kinda cheezy and old fashioned (even Groove Holmes who's playing would come to have a major influence on my style didn't hit me so much at first.) - - My idea of what the organ should sound like had initially come from those old James Brown albums (on SMASH), a record album called "Yo' Mamma Don't Dance" by Charles Kynard) and those early WESTBOUND Ohio Players albums as well as another WESTBOUND release by a group called THE COUNTS called ITS WHAT'S UP FRONT THAT COUNTS. To me, Jazz was Jazz, and soul was soul, and the Hammond organ was a soul, not Jazz instrument...
But things began to change for me as I began to expand my listening horizons.
Charles Earland's MIGHTY BURNER album really helped.
I got it, figuring that maybe there was atleast one other "funky" Jazz organist like Charles Kynard. I also had a number of Funk Inc. albums in my collection... During my first stay in Japan I started to hear some of those BLUE NOTE sessions from the vaults that were totally out of print in the US, in particular, Freddie Roach (who's GOOD MOVE album is one of my all time favorites) and some cat named Big John Patton. Reuben Wilson's BLUE MODE was also a very important recording for me. I was able to identify with these recordings, because even though they were REAL JAZZ recordings, they also had an unbelievably groovy feel, some even more soulful than the ample number of soul albums in my record collection.
Anyway, eventually I'd return to the States and Big John would actually become my friend and mentor. I started hanging out at a Jazz Bar in Harlem called SHOWMAN'S CAFE and I learned the true meaning of feel of live swinging Jazz in the sense of going for FEEL over complexity. I also started seeing and hearing Jazz that people were actually dancing too, something you'd never see at those ritzy expensive uptown Jazz clubs. Through my tutelage with Big John Patton I really came to worship the depth and true meaning of the blues. - - In no time at all, my entire concept towards Jazz began to evolve... Instead of looking for the most modern and far out stuff I could find, I began looking for the deepest and most soulful stuff I could get - - stuff that gave me my kicks. In fact, even when I first started listening to James Brown (after discovering Jazz) what really attracted me to him was that his music was really Jazz, but a type that emphasized the groove over the solos... If you listen to what his horns are playing a lot of times, they ain't nothin' but bebop riffs, only instead of flying all over the place, they find the groove, keep it and vamp on it. To me, that was MUSIC... and as I began to appreciate the Hammond organ sound more (which to a large extent is really about that pocket and simplicity), I began to stop judging artists on modernity, technicality and ability to re-invent the wheel, and more on the effect they had on me. Soon, it wasn't solos I began listening to but RHYTHM SECTIONS,melodies... then overall arrangements. - - It was through Count Basie's music that I learned that a tune isn't a bunch of solos but an overall story with not only begining, middles and endings, but also peaks, climaxes and an overall sense of going and getting somewhere. And so my overall perspective and what makes music good or bad changed. Words like "Old fashioned" or even "modern" no longer meant anything to me... This is a commercial concept. Jazz can be commercial - - there's nothing wrong with it, but real Jazz should never be purely commercial on purpose.
So who's good and who's not ?
Today, if you ask me what I think of an artist, my honest opinion is I'm not interested in individuals so much as I am in FEELS and how a particular tune FEELS to me and what it says to me.... if I get my hands on an album and its cooking... that's great... The only time I'll critisize a musician is when they're on*my* bandstand... and if they're playing on yours you have a right to too ! My biggest sore points are when musicians don't play with appropriate dynamic (volume especially), when they play without tapping their feet and it shows, when they're are too wishy washy on the melodies and changes, or when they play with a "know it all" attitude and never strive to evolve (such musicians always never fail to impress the first time, then can eventually bore the living daylights out of any crowd as they become more and more perfect and predictable.) In such situations, if I'm the leader, I feel I have a right to be critical since its my bandstand... but when its a situation where I'm not in charge, or I'm just a listener, I usually won't give an opinion unless the artist himself solicits it from me. In that case, I try to be as positive yet honest as I can... but as a general rule dread when people send me CDs and say, "What do you think of my music...?" The answer I've started to give is simple, "Its not a matter of what I think of your music... its what the people who you are playing for a YOU think of it... I can only comment from the perspective of my own STYLE and PHILOSOPHY of music... no teacher or profession can really serve as an absolute judge. If that was true, it would have to mean that Jazz is dead and the entire book plus all the rules have been written... I would rather sacrifice a criteria of perfection for a belief that the music is still alive and growing anytime !" Sure, if someone sends me a FREE JAZZ CD (free Jazz in the sense of avant garde, not the cost) and asks me my honest opinion and forces me to give it, sure there's a high chance I'll have to say something the person who sent it isn't going to want to hear (*in fact, I did recentlly and the person got quite upset!), but then again, if someone comes to my club expecting a night of FREE JAZZ, MEDESKI MARTIN & WOOD style jams and TONY WILLIAMS LIFETIME type stuff, I'm sure they'll same of me... and you know what I'll say, "Just because aproctologist and a cardiologist are different types of doctors doesn't mean one's better from the other." The person who goes to the proctologist expecting aheart exam is the idiot... not the doctor ! --The sign is on my front door... WE SWING... take it or leave it - - and I think that's what makes me interesting as a live player. I may not be technically perfect, but many people who come to my club have only heard certain types of organists, so when they hear my sound, it sounds very new, energetic and refreshing to them. Much to my surprise, most of our customers seem to like it. I've yet to encounter the famous Jazz Police... (!)
So all in all, what do I think of this or that guy...? Please don't ask... Who do I dig personally ? Well, as a listener and player my tastes are a bit different. That's to say that there's lot's of music I listen to and enjoy as a fan, not really a player. (I'm a big fan of EL CHICANO and FELA KUTI for example, but you don't hear much of their stuff in my music, atleast currently.) In terms of my style of performance as an organist, if you ask me and catch me off guard, I might name a few albums (WILD BILL DAVIS's sound on albums like LIVE AT BIRDLAND, LIVE AT COUNT BASIE'S and LIVE AT CLUB HARLEM have impacted my playing majorly) but really I think my playing reflects a wide variety of styles, and in that fact, I think any good musician should have a lot of different influences... if you're hip to philosophy, the concept is known as a Hegelian Dialectic whereby all progress comes through a struggle of opposite forces... thesis + anti-thesis + synthesis = progress, and I dig it strongly - - you create new things by mixing old things together (always keeping an eye on the future of course."
So keep swinging groovy people, and go here to find out what music I've been listening to lately...
Eddie (2006)
Today, I'm a professional Jazz organist. But actually, when I first started listening to Jazz (thanks to the music of Eddie Jefferson) it took me a long time to get into the Jazz organ sound. To be honest, I found it kinda cheezy and old fashioned (even Groove Holmes who's playing would come to have a major influence on my style didn't hit me so much at first.) - - My idea of what the organ should sound like had initially come from those old James Brown albums (on SMASH), a record album called "Yo' Mamma Don't Dance" by Charles Kynard) and those early WESTBOUND Ohio Players albums as well as another WESTBOUND release by a group called THE COUNTS called ITS WHAT'S UP FRONT THAT COUNTS. To me, Jazz was Jazz, and soul was soul, and the Hammond organ was a soul, not Jazz instrument...
But things began to change for me as I began to expand my listening horizons.
Charles Earland's MIGHTY BURNER album really helped.
I got it, figuring that maybe there was atleast one other "funky" Jazz organist like Charles Kynard. I also had a number of Funk Inc. albums in my collection... During my first stay in Japan I started to hear some of those BLUE NOTE sessions from the vaults that were totally out of print in the US, in particular, Freddie Roach (who's GOOD MOVE album is one of my all time favorites) and some cat named Big John Patton. Reuben Wilson's BLUE MODE was also a very important recording for me. I was able to identify with these recordings, because even though they were REAL JAZZ recordings, they also had an unbelievably groovy feel, some even more soulful than the ample number of soul albums in my record collection.
Anyway, eventually I'd return to the States and Big John would actually become my friend and mentor. I started hanging out at a Jazz Bar in Harlem called SHOWMAN'S CAFE and I learned the true meaning of feel of live swinging Jazz in the sense of going for FEEL over complexity. I also started seeing and hearing Jazz that people were actually dancing too, something you'd never see at those ritzy expensive uptown Jazz clubs. Through my tutelage with Big John Patton I really came to worship the depth and true meaning of the blues. - - In no time at all, my entire concept towards Jazz began to evolve... Instead of looking for the most modern and far out stuff I could find, I began looking for the deepest and most soulful stuff I could get - - stuff that gave me my kicks. In fact, even when I first started listening to James Brown (after discovering Jazz) what really attracted me to him was that his music was really Jazz, but a type that emphasized the groove over the solos... If you listen to what his horns are playing a lot of times, they ain't nothin' but bebop riffs, only instead of flying all over the place, they find the groove, keep it and vamp on it. To me, that was MUSIC... and as I began to appreciate the Hammond organ sound more (which to a large extent is really about that pocket and simplicity), I began to stop judging artists on modernity, technicality and ability to re-invent the wheel, and more on the effect they had on me. Soon, it wasn't solos I began listening to but RHYTHM SECTIONS,melodies... then overall arrangements. - - It was through Count Basie's music that I learned that a tune isn't a bunch of solos but an overall story with not only begining, middles and endings, but also peaks, climaxes and an overall sense of going and getting somewhere. And so my overall perspective and what makes music good or bad changed. Words like "Old fashioned" or even "modern" no longer meant anything to me... This is a commercial concept. Jazz can be commercial - - there's nothing wrong with it, but real Jazz should never be purely commercial on purpose.
So who's good and who's not ?
Today, if you ask me what I think of an artist, my honest opinion is I'm not interested in individuals so much as I am in FEELS and how a particular tune FEELS to me and what it says to me.... if I get my hands on an album and its cooking... that's great... The only time I'll critisize a musician is when they're on*my* bandstand... and if they're playing on yours you have a right to too ! My biggest sore points are when musicians don't play with appropriate dynamic (volume especially), when they play without tapping their feet and it shows, when they're are too wishy washy on the melodies and changes, or when they play with a "know it all" attitude and never strive to evolve (such musicians always never fail to impress the first time, then can eventually bore the living daylights out of any crowd as they become more and more perfect and predictable.) In such situations, if I'm the leader, I feel I have a right to be critical since its my bandstand... but when its a situation where I'm not in charge, or I'm just a listener, I usually won't give an opinion unless the artist himself solicits it from me. In that case, I try to be as positive yet honest as I can... but as a general rule dread when people send me CDs and say, "What do you think of my music...?" The answer I've started to give is simple, "Its not a matter of what I think of your music... its what the people who you are playing for a YOU think of it... I can only comment from the perspective of my own STYLE and PHILOSOPHY of music... no teacher or profession can really serve as an absolute judge. If that was true, it would have to mean that Jazz is dead and the entire book plus all the rules have been written... I would rather sacrifice a criteria of perfection for a belief that the music is still alive and growing anytime !" Sure, if someone sends me a FREE JAZZ CD (free Jazz in the sense of avant garde, not the cost) and asks me my honest opinion and forces me to give it, sure there's a high chance I'll have to say something the person who sent it isn't going to want to hear (*in fact, I did recentlly and the person got quite upset!), but then again, if someone comes to my club expecting a night of FREE JAZZ, MEDESKI MARTIN & WOOD style jams and TONY WILLIAMS LIFETIME type stuff, I'm sure they'll same of me... and you know what I'll say, "Just because aproctologist and a cardiologist are different types of doctors doesn't mean one's better from the other." The person who goes to the proctologist expecting aheart exam is the idiot... not the doctor ! --The sign is on my front door... WE SWING... take it or leave it - - and I think that's what makes me interesting as a live player. I may not be technically perfect, but many people who come to my club have only heard certain types of organists, so when they hear my sound, it sounds very new, energetic and refreshing to them. Much to my surprise, most of our customers seem to like it. I've yet to encounter the famous Jazz Police... (!)
So all in all, what do I think of this or that guy...? Please don't ask... Who do I dig personally ? Well, as a listener and player my tastes are a bit different. That's to say that there's lot's of music I listen to and enjoy as a fan, not really a player. (I'm a big fan of EL CHICANO and FELA KUTI for example, but you don't hear much of their stuff in my music, atleast currently.) In terms of my style of performance as an organist, if you ask me and catch me off guard, I might name a few albums (WILD BILL DAVIS's sound on albums like LIVE AT BIRDLAND, LIVE AT COUNT BASIE'S and LIVE AT CLUB HARLEM have impacted my playing majorly) but really I think my playing reflects a wide variety of styles, and in that fact, I think any good musician should have a lot of different influences... if you're hip to philosophy, the concept is known as a Hegelian Dialectic whereby all progress comes through a struggle of opposite forces... thesis + anti-thesis + synthesis = progress, and I dig it strongly - - you create new things by mixing old things together (always keeping an eye on the future of course."
So keep swinging groovy people, and go here to find out what music I've been listening to lately...
Eddie (2006)
