New Monk bio in progress by Robin Kelley

[blajay]

Is there a difference between solfeggio and grunting?

Also, I didn't know that Herbie Nichols was a writer. Very cool.

[Brute]

I have been thoroughly enjoying this book but this thread, not so much.

[7/4]

I have been thoroughly enjoying this book but this thread, not so much.

:rsmile:

My copy showed up yesterday!

[AllenLowe]

"I have been thoroughly enjoying this book but this thread, not so much. "

sorry, we'll see if we can spiff it up for you -

re-Herbie Nichols, yes, I've read some of his pieces. Fascinating guy.

[seeline]

In the meantime, I'll listen to Monk's music and leave the behavior analyses to others.

I'm thinking pretty much the same thing, paul. (My copy *might* be here today, though...)

[AllenLowe]

you guys have convinced me - I'm burning the book -

Edited October 21, 2009 by AllenLowe

[blajay]

Is there a difference between solfeggio and grunting?

Can Larry or someone clear this up? Just curious because Kelley seems to use the term for any vocal noise that Monk produces while playing. The term seems funny to me, though. I imagine Monk singing "fa so la ti..." over his compositions.

[AllenLowe]

isn't solfeggio the formal singing of specific intervals?

I haven't taken a music lesson since 1968, so I'm not the best source -

[umum_cypher]

Is there a difference between solfeggio and grunting?

Can Larry or someone clear this up? Just curious because Kelley seems to use the term for any vocal noise that Monk produces while playing. The term seems funny to me, though. I imagine Monk singing "fa so la ti..." over his compositions.

That's exactly what it is (do re mi etc). Sounds like Kelley's being ironic, or rather serious-joking.

Edited October 22, 2009 by umum_cypher

[Larry Kart]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solfège

Allen is correct, with the additional fact that these specific intervals are linked to specific syllables -- e.g. do, re, fa, sol, la -- as a learning-teaching technique.

[blajay]

Is there a difference between solfeggio and grunting?

Can Larry or someone clear this up? Just curious because Kelley seems to use the term for any vocal noise that Monk produces while playing. The term seems funny to me, though. I imagine Monk singing "fa so la ti..." over his compositions.

That's exactly what it is (do re mi etc). Sounds like Kelley's being ironic, or rather serious-joking.

Yeah, that's what I thought, but I don't think he's being ironic in the context. A number of times he wrote, "Monk's solfeggio was particularly loud that day, indicating how good of a mood he was in," (I'm paraphrasing), but when I listen to the recording he refers to, I just hear grunting. Of course, loud grunting could say something about his state of mind, or at least his enthusiasm that day for his performance, but is that solfeggio?

I'm not trying to nitpick, and I LOVE this book, but I was just confused by this.

[AllenLowe]

unfortunately this does speak to the weakness in musical analysis that some non-musical academics have.

it's not really relevant, but I always think of Joe Venuti, who described his musical education as being heavy on solfeggio -

[umum_cypher]

Is there a difference between solfeggio and grunting?

Can Larry or someone clear this up? Just curious because Kelley seems to use the term for any vocal noise that Monk produces while playing. The term seems funny to me, though. I imagine Monk singing "fa so la ti..." over his compositions.

That's exactly what it is (do re mi etc). Sounds like Kelley's being ironic, or rather serious-joking.

Yeah, that's what I thought, but I don't think he's being ironic in the context. A number of times he wrote, "Monk's solfeggio was particularly loud that day, indicating how good of a mood he was in," (I'm paraphrasing), but when I listen to the recording he refers to, I just hear grunting. Of course, loud grunting could say something about his state of mind, or at least his enthusiasm that day for his performance, but is that solfeggio?

I'm not trying to nitpick, and I LOVE this book, but I was just confused by this.

I won't start reading this until the weekend, but I can't believe that Kelley would think that 'solfeggio' = 'any noise made with mouth in musical context'; your paraphrase above is the kind of thing I expected from you first post on the subject, namely that Kelley's talking about *Monk's* solfeggio, rather than solfeggio tout court, solfeggio as found in the classroom. Isn't the use of the word meant to create that kind of ironic distance between trad musical descriptors and Monk's practice (in an affectionate kind of way)? Maybe not.

[Larry Kart]

zanonesdelpueblo -- Could you cite a page number or two where Kelley uses "solfeggio" in that odd way? I have the book but am waiting to finish something else before I start. Consulted the index, but that didn't help (which may be my fault),

[Brute]

...it's not really relevant, but I always think of Joe Venuti, who described his musical education as being heavy on solfeggio -

and non skid manure.

[blajay]

About his Prestige side that included "Monk's Dream," "Bye-ya," "Little Rootie Tootie," and "Playhouse," Kelley describes Monk as feeling alive again: "All four songs were recorded in one take, and his solfeggio singing at times threatened to overwhelm the music. Monk expresses pure joy as he sings out his ideas.(Kelley, 160)."

It's true that he's singing out his ideas, and perhaps that's the essence of solfeggio. But it is so much more than what that term means, when I listen to these tunes, no?

[umum_cypher]

About his Prestige side that included "Monk's Dream," "Bye-ya," "Little Rootie Tootie," and "Playhouse," Kelley describes Monk as feeling alive again: "All four songs were recorded in one take, and his solfeggio singing at times threatened to overwhelm the music. Monk expresses pure joy as he sings out his ideas.(Kelley, 160)."

It's true that he's singing out his ideas, and perhaps that's the essence of solfeggio. But it is so much more than what that term means, when I listen to these tunes, no?

Hmm - you're right, that's a bit of a clunker. Looking forward to getting into the book tomorrow.

[jazzbo]

I finished the book yesterday. A very interesting experience, rotating through the recordings as well as i read along. Truly the best book about Monk yet. I learned a lot that I did not know, especially about the final, sad years. And there are a few recordings (unofficial) mentioned I'd like to hear!

[Lazaro Vega]

Too bad there was a sort of internecine war between Gillespie (Feather) and Monk as to who did the most conceptually to foster the music's stylistic evolution. Noticing in Shipton's "New History of Jazz" the idea, in his opinion, that more happened to foment change with working bands on the road than in jam sessions, which cuts Monk out of the genesis "debate." This book, to me, however, puts the "scene" as neighborhood into a realistic perspective, and Monk's centrality to that neighborhood's musical community and evolution into a more important relief than can be sloughed off with the "homemade" put down. That scene with Billy Taylor being pulled out of the club and taken to the piano session in the apartment speaks to the enduring relevance of passing it on, no matter how informally-- because in the end it was all traveling to the bandstand, whether you got paid for it or not.

[AllenLowe]

"Noticing in Shipton's "New History of Jazz" the idea, in his opinion, that more happened to foment change with working bands on the road than in jam sessions"

what does he base this on? I have some other problems with Shipton's book. I would question how he could possibly be sure of this, first of all -

[Lazaro Vega]

In the chapter "The Birth of Bebop." The advance proof that I have of the book lists page 337 for "Up until this point, there had been plenty of hints at how the front-line soloists would tackle the new jazz, not least in the recordings of Gillespie and Parker with their respective big bands that were made before the [recording] ban." He's talking about the Hines and Ecksintine bands, of course, in terms of the soloists, and McShann, and Calloway, Hite and Millinder in terms of "conventional" rhythm section. Shipton writes, "In my view, the main change to emerge from the after-hours clubs like Minton's and Monroe's Uptwon House is that they provided the opportunity for rhythm sections to work out how to accompany bebop." Then there's mention of Tadd Dameron with Harlan Leonard, McGhee with Kirk, Kenny Clarke with Teddy Hill. Later he says again, "Much as been written about the significance of the jam session in jazz, and in particular to the development of bebop." Then, "I remain skeptical about the degree to which the jamming at Minton's and Monroe's genuinely moved jazz forward, beyond consolidating the changes to the role of the rhythm section. Much more of the development that would subsequently become part of the universal vocabulary of jazz took place, it sems to me, in the regular wokring lineups of bands on 52nd street, beginning with Dizzy Gillespie's Quintet, which played at the Onyx from" October '43 to March '44.

Shipton spends a good amount of time on this. Kelly's book, it seems to me, doesn't separate the pianist from the band, and that Monk's informal tuition (which was acknowledged by Bird and Diz in print or interviews) played a major role in how they would develop ideas out in the world. Like I said, too, Kelly frequently sites Shipton's "Groovin' High," which I feel compelled to get now.

[Brute]

zanonesdelpueblo -- Could you cite a page number or two where Kelley uses "solfeggio" in that odd way? I have the book but am waiting to finish something else before I start. Consulted the index, but that didn't help (which may be my fault),

The first reference I saw was on page 72, paragraph 2. However, I am only about 100 pages in.

Edited October 24, 2009 by Brute

[AllenLowe]

I don't think Shipton has nearly proved his point - would have been better to have the direct testimony of he musician's themselves - he has an interesting point but his conclusions are much too speculative -

I never asked any of those guys the right questions myself (kicking myself now for this) but I do remember Dave Schildkraut telling me that when he got out of the army he went to Mintons and was bewildered by all the new stuff being played until Fats Navarro started telling him what each tune was based on ("Fats would tell me, 'that's Whispering.')" Now this was later, of course, but my point is that Shipton has far too little to go on to say this - think also of the Redcross recordings of Bird and Diz (from 1942?) - this was eomething at least largely being worked out in sessions AWAY from their working bands.

[Lazaro Vega]

Keep in mind, too, I haven't quoted him at length.

It seems to me that Monk was, as Trane would say later of Monk's gift, the Architect of the underlying changes in the music that the virtuoso stylists were innovating with or on. That seems to be what people were turning to him for in the Minton's days.

Then, with the publicity surrounding Bird and Diz and Monk feeling shorted, saying he's going to go in a different direction, and coming up with Introspection as Kelly lays it out, is pretty interesting and has me going back to whatever Minton's recordings I can get my hands on to see how, if at all in a major way, Monk's playing changed from then to his Blue Note contract.

Edited October 24, 2009 by Lazaro Vega

[JSngry]

...except that the Redcross recordings were made while Bird & Diz were both working nightly (more or less) in the Eckstine band, and by most accounts were brining the same thing to the gig that they were working on in the room, albeit in considerably more formalized settings.

Point being is that the band provided opportunity to continue developing and presenting and refining the ideas on the stand and off. The "problem" with the music today (and in many instances of the past) is that jam sessions and gigs too often become one and the same. Both are essential elements, but either one by themselves lead to dead ends - gigs to the institutionalized downsizing of ideas, jam sessions to the institutionalization of self-indulgence.

Seems to me that Shipton's point is valid in and of itself. Where he errs is saying that the bands were more important than the jam sessions. Both were factors, and the music would have not come out as it did minus the presence of either. Yet another example of either/or-ism, about the most useless intellectual conceit going.