What do you Country Guys think of Jazz?

Post by **Dave Mudgett** » 15 Jul 2006 12:16 pm

With some of the jazz that I've listened to,I can't hear a specific melody. all I can hear are chord changes.That's why I don't like it.

Some practitioners in many styles of music get so far away from a melody that it's practically nonexistent. But the best jazz, IMO, is about restating melodies in a different harmonic and/or rhythmic context. Good improvisation is about making melodic and rhythmic variations. Bill's suggested listening is good - also try listening to people like Kenny Burrell, Barney Kessel, Wes Montgomery, Johnny Smith, Joe Pass, and Hank Garland on guitar, Jimmy Smith on B-3 organ, sax players like Ben Webster, Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, and Stan Getz, and singers like Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughn. Melody, melody, melody.

I've always been a little surprised at how much interest in jazz there is among country pickers. To me they are at opposite ends of the musical spectrum in so many ways.

I don't see classic country and classic jazz at all on opposite sides of the spectrum. Sure, more modern and atonal jazz is hard to get used to, but I still argue that both classic country and the classic jazz I mentioned earlier are different but closely related. The great classic jazz players were masters at reinterpreting old standards - great melodies with new harmonization. I see the great classic country - people like Ray Price, Patsy Cline, Merle Haggard, and others - as being highly melodic, and interestingly so. Not to mention the very strong connection to shuffles and western swing - which are strongly related to blues and traditional jazz.

Really, how would jazz and blues inflected singers like Ray Charles and Dean Martin be able to reinterpret great country songs if the styles were on different planets? Country singers like Marty Robbins, Patsy Cline, and Faron Young might just as easily have been jazzy pop or jazz singers, to my ears. What they all share in common is the ability to strongly interpret melodies.

But discussing what jazz is, and what is good and bad jazz is getting off topic.

Well, I don't know about that. Some country-only players have come on and said things like "Jazz has no melody, that's why I don't like it." I think those of us who love both and have found great melody to be the common connector should say something. Jazz is not just one idiom - like most styles, it is a complex amalgamation. If country was just Dr. Humphrey Bates and the Possum Hunters or the Fruit Jar Drinkers, or Gid Tanner and the Skillet Lickers, I might agree, but the classic country that a lot of steel players love has been very strongly influenced by jazz, IMO.

Really, we're just trying to set the context by getting a handle on what we mean by "jazz". The same thing comes up when people say "I don't like country music - it's off-key, whiney, overly simplistic, and barren of interesting melodic and harmonic content." And that is true of some country music. But the brush shouldn't be applied that broadly. Of course, this is all my opinion, nothing more.

Rick Schmidt · Post by **Rick Schmidt** » 15 Jul 2006 2:43 pm

Yogi Berra Explains Jazz:

Interviewer: Yogi, can you explain jazz?

Yogi: I can't, but I will.... 90% of all jazz is half improvisation. The other half is the part people play while others are playing something they never played with anyone who played that part. So if you play the wrong part, its right. If you play the right part, it might be right if you play it wrong enough. But if you play it too right, it's wrong.

Interviewer: I don't understand.

Yogi: Anyone who understands jazz knows that you can't understand it. It's too complicated. That's what's so simple about it.

Interviewer: Do you understand it?

Yogi: No. That's why I can explain it. If I understood it, I wouldn't know anything about it.

Interviewer: Are there any great jazz players alive today?

Yogi: No. All the great jazz players alive today are dead. Except for the ones that are still alive. But so many of them are dead, that the ones that are still alive are dying to be like the ones that are dead.

Interviewer: What is syncopation?

Yogi: That's when the note that you should hear now happens either before or after you hear it. In jazz, you don't hear notes when they happen because that would be some other type of music. Other types of music can be jazz, but only if they're the same as something different from those other kinds.

Interviewer: Now I really don't understand.

Yogi: I haven't taught you enough for you to not understand jazz that well.

David Doggett · Post by **David Doggett** » 15 Jul 2006 2:46 pm

Influence can connect any point on the musical spectrum, even the extremes. But in terms of opposite extremes, I'll play the devil's advocate and state the obvious (considering jazz and country in the last half century): country is not merely based on, but retains traditional melodies, harmonies and rythms/jazz (although based on blues and American pop) is virtually defined as a departure from tradition; country is rural and small town/jazz is big city; with rare exceptions, country is anglo-American/jazz is African-American; country is intentionally unpretentious, provencial and unsophisticated/jazz is intentionally pretentious, cosmopolitan and sophisticated; country treats simplicity as a virtue, and complexity is shunned/jazz strains for complexity; in country, straying far from the melody is considered bad form/in jazz staying too close to the melody is considered bad form. One could go on and on. Of course there are exceptions to everything above, but the fact that they are exceptions proves the rules. I mean no criticism in any of the above. I love country and jazz, exactly because they are what I said above.

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Student of the Steel: Zum uni, Fender tube amps, squareneck and roundneck resos, tenor sax, keyboards

[This message was edited by David Doggett on 15 July 2006 at 03:50 PM.]

Post by **Dave Mudgett** » 15 Jul 2006 8:49 pm

I agree that the sociology of modern jazz is different than country. But they have similarities even there. Both classic modern country and classic modern jazz emanated from the South. Jazz represented an evolution of blues and gospel styles as well as influencing and being influenced by current popular music. Overall, jazz was strongly influenced by European harmony from the church. On the other hand, what we now consider "classic" country evolved from the mixing of string band "hillbilly" music, blues, gospel, western swing, and other styles of jazz and current popular music. Sure, country tended to be the province of rural white people, and jazz tended to be the province of urban people, both black and white. But I see these as different parallel developments of similar ideas.

So, of course I agree that jazz and country are very different music styles. But I think that classic mainstream jazz and classic "pop" music are closer to classic mainstream country than other popular music forms, save possibly bluegrass, which I consider to be a form of country music itself. Let's consider some of the more common styles:

1. Rock - There are obviously different schools of rock, but most rock is not melody-based, but riff-based. Hard emphasis on pentatonics, away from typical scales and flowing melody. Rhythm is typically 4/4, but heavy-handed. Some heavy metal has a strong melodic classical music influence, but again is radically different from classic country. In all of these, distorted grinding guitar tends to dominate and churn out riffs or patterns and a high decibel level. So-called "modern country" is basically rock, as the "classic country guys" repeatedly lament.

2. Blues - Rock, jazz, soul, funk, and R&B have strong blues roots, and blues wields some influence in classic country and bluegrass. But like rock, it does not typically emphasize melody - it is more often riff-based with strong use of shouting and repetitive phrases. This is true in most blues styles, from early Delta blues to modern urban blues. One thing in common with classic country is the shuffle rhythm, which is used heavily in both.

3. Soul/Funk/RnB - Ballads are sometimes more melodic and have more straight rhythms, but the core of classic soul, funk, and RnB is typically very riff-based and rarely use straight rhythms.

4. Reggae - Again, very different, more riff-based with lots of repetitive phrasing and different rhythms.

5. Hip-hop and rap - The logical extension of the soul/funk/RnB/reggae approach, leading to almost complete dominance of strong rhythm over melody and harmony.

5. Pop and Jazz - Admittedly, these two styles are too big a catch-all, but classic country of the type I'm talking about used many of the devices of pop music of the 40s, 50s, and 60s - but I believe most of these were borrowed from jazz. More sophisticated melody and chord progressions, harmonization, and smooth sounds. I don't think it's any accident at all that the kind of guitar amps that appeal to jazz guitar players also appeal to country guitar players. The reason is that this classic country style demanded clarity so players could complement the vocalist's melody lines with interesting lines of their own. Similarly with steel players. Further, there is a direct pipeline from western swing (which is a form of jazz) to classic country.

Of course, jazz is not country. But how did Willie Nelson do the "Stardust" album and still have it come out sounding not-so-far-away-from country? I don't know one jazzer that considers it jazz, but they're definitely jazz tunes. I already gave the Ray Charles example in the other direction - country tunes done jazzy RnB. It's easy to find differences, but I think there are lots of similarities. Not all jazz is about radically altering melody - some just plays around with it. Some jazz is all about constructing mind-boggling and complex melodic patterns over complex and rapidly-changing chord progressions, but some is about playing soulfully and melodically over a standard like "Moonlight in Vermont". How is this so different than Hank Garland weaving nice lines over "Crazy"?

So my point is that classic jazz/pop and country are two styles that focus heavily on relatively sophisticated melody and harmony, unlike the vast majority of other modern popular music styles, which have turned more and more to mind-numbing and grinding distortion, riffs, root-five power chords, total dominance of heavy-handed rhythm, and a near complete departure away from flowing melody. Yes, jazz melody and harmony are typically more complex than typical country melody and harmony, but both these classic styles emphatically retained a focus on both melody and harmony. Do you still really believe classic modern country and classic modern jazz are at the opposite ends of the musical spectrum? All my opinions, of course.

David L. Donald · Post by **David L. Donald** » 16 Jul 2006 2:40 am

Two of the greats of country guitar,
Jimmy Bryant and Hank Garland,
though nemisses in the country scene,
were both very into jazz.

Bryant would go out and play west coast bop
all night after his country gigs.

Garland, a distant relative of mine,
played with some jazz giants of his day.

It seems those needing a continuous learning curve in music,
no matter their roots, eventually go into jazz as part of that growth.

It is adding something to what you have.
Do it slowly and it grows on you.
Try to just jump in and do it all at once,
then it can seem over whelming.

Bobby Lee · Post by **Bobby Lee** » 16 Jul 2006 7:13 am

Isn't "classic modern" an oxymoron?

Hank Williams' "Lovesick Blues" has a "Dixieland jazz" chord progression. At some point in the 1940's (or earlier?) it became acceptable to stray from the I IV V7 in country music. Where did this notion come from? I think it was from jazz.

In the 1970's we started hearing a lot of ii to V changes in country. From pop? In the 1980's we started hearing a lot of bVII in country. From rock?

In the meantime jazz evolves. Today there's stuff called "smooth jazz" that vamps a sax line over a funky rhythm. No outside notes at all, and no improvisation in the drums.

The lines have been totally blurred. Today, the difference between "styles" of music is all in the mix and the packaging. The country guys improvise more and the jazz guys improvise less.

I think that the Grateful Dead were the world's most popular jazz band ever.

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<img align=right src="http://b0b.com/b0b2005.gif" width="78 height="78">Bobby Lee (a.k.a. b0b) - email: quasar@b0b.com - gigs - CDs, Open Hearts
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Earnest Bovine · Post by **Earnest Bovine** » 16 Jul 2006 7:24 am

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Lovesick Blues" is a show tune written by Cliff Friend and Irving Mills, which has become a popular country song and pop standard. Published through Tin Pan Alley in 1922, the song was first recorded by Emmett Miller. Four years later, the song was a minor hit for blues singer Bertha "Chippie" Hill. The song's most recognizable version did not come until 1948, with Hank Williams' hit rendition.

Steve Hinson · Post by **Steve Hinson** » 16 Jul 2006 9:24 am

As the story goes,Hank"bought"the song from Rex Griffin,a country singer who wrote"The Last Letter"...only after Hank cut the song and it became a hit was it discovered that Rex didn't write it...there may have been alcohol involved...

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http://home.comcast.net/~steves_garage

Post by **Dave Mudgett** » 16 Jul 2006 10:11 am

Isn't "classic modern" an oxymoron?

Yeah, I suppose in a certain sense, but I wanted to distinguish the pop and jazz-influenced country of the late 50s and 60s from the Carter Family, Skillet Lickers, and Possum Hunters brand of "classic" country music. I view 60s country - Ray Price, Patsy Cline, and so on - as pretty sophisticated, but still different from what most people call "modern country". I guess I should have just said that, but it gets wordy.

Hey, I'm an academician - imprecise associations based on loosely-defined concepts bug me. I probably should have had a definitional section, but this ain't an academic paper:

"classic" country - music of early string bands like the Carter Family, Uncle Dave Macon, and the Skillet Lickers.

"classic modern" country - country music of the late 50s and onward, showing increasing sophistication from the influence of jazz and popular music, represented by artists like Ray Price and Patsy Cline in the early 60s.

"countrypolitan" country - country music showing strong influences of easy listening and popular music, often using orchestrated strings in place of country fiddle and steel guitar, pioneered in the later work of Ray Price.

"modern" country - country music showing strong influence of rock and blues, beginning in the 80s and becoming dominant during the 90s and onward.

and so on .... One can do the same for jazz. The semantics can get mind-boggling. That's part of the problem here - you're right, anything goes these days, and people have so many different ideas about what "jazz" or "country" are. IMO, whether you think country and jazz are remotely related depends entirely on what you think they are. To me, they are not worlds apart at all, but I understand that they are to many people.

Myself, I am much more interested in seeing the commonality in music than the differences. I think there are more than enough style-fascists pushing that point of view, I'm pushing in the other direction.

It is my view that most styles of popular music have heavily intermingled since the 50s, and these labels and "brand-loyalty" do more damage than good - but at least if we're going to talk about labels, let's agree on what we mean first. IMO, as always.

David L. Donald · Post by **David L. Donald** » 16 Jul 2006 10:18 am

b0b, jazz & country mixed goes farther back than that.

Jimmy Rogers recorded with Louis Armstong
on at least 1 cut in the late 20's or early 30's.

I heard it, Jimmy had a country song
that fit perfectly with Satchmo's New Orleans jazz, and the grouping worked.

Ain't no one I know will disput
Jimmy Rogers country credentials.
If he liked jazz, why shouldn't
country pickers also.

Bobby Lee · Post by **Bobby Lee** » 17 Jul 2006 7:16 am

Jimmy Rogers' "Waiting For a Train" has that classic Dixieland circle of fifths thing going on. So here we have jazz mixing with country very early on. I doubt that many of the country steel players of the era objected.[This message was edited by Bobby Lee on 17 July 2006 at 08:20 AM.]

David L. Donald · Post by **David L. Donald** » 17 Jul 2006 7:46 am

Especially with the hollywoodized jazz
in the Hawaiian steel they were hearing all the time.

And with those IV to III drops it really is quite Dixiland influeneced.
I played a lot of Jimmy,
and also did to recurring Dixieland acts,
and you could have thrown in many of
Jimmy's tunes and it would have worked.

I think country got back to it's folkie roots
shortly after, and never looked back.

The only ones getting close to jazz licks and tonalities
was the steelers and sometimes guitarists.
But most chord patterns went real americana simple.
Then many people just got used to that.[This message was edited by David L. Donald on 17 July 2006 at 08:50 AM.]

Gene Jones · Post by **Gene Jones** » 17 Jul 2006 8:16 am

[This message was edited by Gene Jones on 18 July 2006 at 04:11 AM.]

David Doggett · Post by **David Doggett** » 17 Jul 2006 8:20 am

Well, I'll still play the devil's advocate here. A little jazz influence in country now and then is one thing. And there was a time way back in the '30s when all American genres were closer together and crossbred quite a bit. But since then, jazz and country have mostly gone in opposite directions. For the last 50 years they have been further apart than any other two American genres. In many ways they are polar opposites, and I think 90% of the players and listeners of both genres would agree with that, and would like to keep it that way.

That's why it has always been interesting to me that some top country pickers like to branch out into jazz. It does make a little sense. From bebop on, a lot of the most experimental jazz came to be "musicians music," and ceased any pretense of being popular music. It's jam music for the musicians to get wild and freaky, and damn the listener. When you are a working musician tethered tightly to the narrow music the public wants to hear, it is fun to get with other musicians and jam away on something completely different and completely unconfining. When you get sick of the sweet harmonies and tame tempos, there is nothing like modern jazz for hunting down every form of dissonance and unpredictable rhythm. There are of course forms and structure (that the inexperienced listener can't fathom), but they leave miles of room for innovation and freedom. I think it is notable also that, more than any other genre, jazz is instrumental music. And naturally that appeals to any instrumentalist. So in a way it is not surprising that some top country sidemen and studio pickers gravitate to jazz as a sideline. Having said that, there is the lounge singer type of country jazz vocal style that stretches from big band/Western swing through Patsy Cline and the later Ray Price stuff, and Willie's Stardust; and it has lately surfaced in some of Nora Jones stuff. But a lot of country players and fans consider that a long way from hard core country, and a lot of jazzers don't consider it real jazz, certainly not modern jazz. Not saying they are right, just saying.

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Student of the Steel: Zum uni, Fender tube amps, squareneck and roundneck resos, tenor sax, keyboards

Post by **Dave Mudgett** » 17 Jul 2006 9:00 am

Of course, style mixing has been going on forever in all styles of music. But I think the pace of modern communication since the 50s has accelerated this a lot. So much so that I think many of these labels are so amorphous to be largely meaningless in 2006. If you take jazz, blues, country, rock, and so on, one can find significant schools of thought within each that fit perfectly well in any of the other categories. Think about it.

For the last 50 years they have been further apart than any other two American genres ...

Of course, I still disagree for the reasons outlined earlier. Naturally, YMMV.

... and I think 90% of the players and listeners of both genres would agree with that, and would like to keep it that way.

I think that is more sociological than musical. It's about being a member of an exclusive club. To blazes with the facts, I want to hate {insert musical style here}, because my style is superior, and so am I, in its reflected superiority.

I heard this idea quoted by Chas Smith a while back in a different thread, and I agree: for many, music is about their identity, not the music.

David L. Donald · Post by **David L. Donald** » 18 Jul 2006 12:16 am

Yeah, there IS way to much of that stylistic parochailism.
I cross genres with out thinking about it much.
But many I meet in each genre suffer from
this unneccesary affliction.

Hey dude, chill out, it's JUST MUSIC!

Andy Greatrix · Post by **Andy Greatrix** » 18 Jul 2006 1:26 am

I improvise over chord changes.
Call it whatever you like.

David Doggett · Post by **David Doggett** » 18 Jul 2006 5:40 am

All jazz involves improvisation. But not all improvisation is jazz. There is certainly improvisation in folk, country, bluegrass and rock. But unless the improvisation involves jazz scales, harmonies and rhythms, it's not jazz. This is not a criticism or meant to imply that jazz improve is better, I'm just trying to keep the concepts straight.

Understand, I don't think the distance between country and jazz is never breeched or should never be breeched. I'm just trying to keep to reality and point out that the overlaps are slight, and the influence of the two genres on each other is pretty small. Of all the American genres, I can't think of any other two that are further apart.

Myself, I play and listen to all the genres. Sometimes I like to mix them together; somtimes I like to keep them pure. Some of the mixtures I've heard seem like the worst of both, rather than the best. Mixtures can end up horrible sometimes. Think of the mixture of bad rock and country that has taken over current commercial country, or the bad rock and jazz that was sometimes called fusion in the '70s, or the bad jazz and easy listening music that has become smooth jazz. All mixtures are not created equal.

Sometimes purity is a blessing.

[This message was edited by David Doggett on 18 July 2006 at 06:42 AM.]

Post by **Dave Mudgett** » 18 Jul 2006 6:53 am

All jazz involves improvisation. But not all improvisation is jazz.

Sure, I agree.

But unless the improvisation involves jazz scales, harmonies and rhythms, it's not jazz.

I don't want to push this too far, but just what is a "jazz scale"? Seriously, jazz owns no scales, chords, or rhythms. IMO, most of the altered scales scales, extended chords, new rhythms, and so on, were used much earlier in classical music or world folk music - which don't own these ideas either. It's the way these elements are used that make it (in ones mind) jazz or not.

It's sorta like the supreme court's comment, "I don't have a clear definition for {it}, but I know {it} when I see/hear {it}". The label is purely for marketing anymore - they market "identity", not music.

Of all the American genres, I can't think of any other two that are further apart.

Older country and hip-hop/rap. Melodically, rhythmically, harmonically, lyrically - almost nothing in common, to my ears.

Bobby Lee · Post by **Bobby Lee** » 18 Jul 2006 7:04 am

Jazz scale. That's sort of the opposite of the double scale that the A Team makes, isn't it?

Seriously, I never heard of a jazz scale before. What is it?

Bill McCloskey · Post by **Bill McCloskey** » 18 Jul 2006 7:20 am

Well, there is a bebop scale.

David Doggett · Post by **David Doggett** » 18 Jul 2006 7:48 am

Geez, you guys are so literal. I didn't mean anything technical when I said jazz scales (note the plural). It's the pentatonic blues scale mixed with other modes as needs be. Of course, they are the same notes used in other music, but as Dave M. says - in different ways. In what ways? In jazz ways.

There was rap in country long ago - think of Hot Rod Lincoln and any other song with spoken lyrics. And the sound effects - anybody remember "Efaning" and the hambone on the Grand Ole Opry, Porter Wagoner Show, etc.? Violence, crime, sex and substance abuse are no strangers to country lyrics. To my ear, Hip-hop rhythms are rather conventional, and not as far from country as some jazz rhythms. In essence hip-hop is a fairly narrowly defined commercial popular music form closely derived from the pop tradions of blues and R&B. Likewise, country has always been a fairly narrowly defined commercial popular music form closely derived from folk and blues. Jazz long ago abandoned narrow popular commercial constraints for the freedom to pursue cult and elitist interests and obscure unpopular sounds. That's not to say there hasn't been pop commercial jazz from time to time, but a very substantial part of jazz, some would say the essence, is consciously not popular and commercial.

The difference in what I'm saying and what those holding out for the commonalities of country and jazz are saying is that they are straining at knats on the periphery, and I'm describing with broad brush strokes the mainstreams of the two genres. They are polar opposites, in spite of a little cross breeding here and there from time to time.[This message was edited by David Doggett on 18 July 2006 at 09:52 AM.]

David L. Donald · Post by **David L. Donald** » 18 Jul 2006 9:20 am

When I try out my scale in the morning...
all I get is JAZZ!

bebopty bebopty beboppity bop

Post by **Dave Mudgett** » 18 Jul 2006 9:57 am

What one perceives about any style of music comes from what one views as the important defining qualities of that music. If one holds that the point of view that

1. Jazz is essentially an intellectual excursion to fit complex scale patterns and fragments over the most complex possible sequences of chord changes with complex rhythms at warp speed.

2. Country is essentially a regressive style of music where ultimate rural simplicity rules and complexity is completely eschewed.

then I guess they are polar opposites. That is emphatically not my view of either. I know people who feel this way, but I couldn't disagree more. I sharply differ with people who argue that jazz is pure intellectualization. This is probably why I tended to get off the jazz boat after the 60s.

My jazz guitar mentor - a really fine old-school mainstream modern jazz guitarist - has a favorite saying when people ask him about modes: "The only mode I know is pie a-la-mode." This is not to say that there are not modal influences in his playing - but he would never play a modal scale for the sake of playing a modal scale. It's about picking the correct {edited to say - a "good"} choice of notes for the song at hand. It's the same in country music. How can one even begin to compare any of this to rap? The concepts of notes and melody barely exist.

So, I disagree on the comparison between Hot Rod Lincoln and modern hip-hop and rap. There is some spoken word in most any style of music, that doesn't make it what we now call rap.

Of course, dark topics abound in many styles of music. It's the way it's presented musically that is so radically different, IMO.

BTW - in one sense, I am a country guy - I listen to and play a lot of country music. Just not exclusively. And the fact that I love that approach to music probably colors what I think about jazz.

As usual, YMMV, no problem.

[This message was edited by Dave Mudgett on 18 July 2006 at 10:59 AM.]

David L. Donald · Post by **David L. Donald** » 19 Jul 2006 9:12 pm

Here's jazz and country crossing over,
way back in the day.

Jimmy Bryant and Speedy West ; Flyin' High
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vzt1iA2D_Kg&search=jimmy%20bryant
Case closed.