This week I’ve begun classes towards a master’s degree in NYU’s Music Technology program. I’m going to be pretty overwhelmed with that for a couple of weeks, but then I expect I’ll be throwing a lot of course-related writing up soon. In the meantime, here’s a photo of Morton Subotnick’s Buchla synth. Can’t wait to try it out for myself.
Thelonious Monk’s beautiful ballad “Round Midnight” is said to be the most widely recorded and performed jazz tune — that is, a tune that was written specifically for jazz, not an adaptation of a showtune or pop song. It’s a testament to its popularity that it’s one of exactly two songs that Dave Chappelle knows how to play on the piano. There are a couple of scenes in Dave Chappelle’s Block Party that show him noodling around it. He talks in this clip about what Monk’s music means to him as a comedian — it’s all about timing.
Carmen McRae was a good friend of Monk’s, and for my tastes, she sings this song better than anyone. Her tart, unsentimental intellect matches Monk’s own approach to music perfectly. Here she is performing “Round Midnight” in 1962.
Rather than attempting the impossible task of explaining how everything in jazz works, I’m going to pick a specific, fairly mainstream tune and talk you through it: “Someday My Prince Will Come” by Miles Davis, off the 1961 album by the same name.
First of all, here’s the original version from Snow White.
Once you’ve got the tune in your head, listen to the Miles Davis recording.
The long intro uses a pedal point, which just means that bassist Paul Chambers plays the same note over and over, creating a feeling of floating suspense. Drummer Jimmy Cobb plays gentle waltz time with his brushes: one-and-two-and-three-and, one-and-two-and-three-and. (Most jazz tunes are in four-four time, so each bar would have four beats.) Pianist Wynton Kelly plays some improvised figures based mostly on arpeggios.
At 0:40, Miles Davis enters, playing the melody on muted trumpet. Even though he interprets the tune’s timing very loosely and adds some ornaments of his own, you should have no trouble singing the words along with him. This section is called the head, and as is the case with a lot of jazz tunes, it’s thirty-two bars long. In case you’re a music reader, here’s the chart.
The mind constantly works to find tonal centers in any music. The best atonal music is really just very complex tonal music, challenging our ability to get our harmonic bearings without totally overwhelming us. Music that strikes the right balance between predictable, functional harmony and randomness is the stuff that people find exciting; the unexpected combinations stimulate the imagination and create new emotional associations.
If the music resists all attempts at finding temporary key centers and harmonic relationships, then it’s just annoying. Serialism has always gotten on my nerves for that reason; it seems to be specifically designed to resist musical sense-making.
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For hip-hop, sampling and everything related:
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For the highbrow and avant-garde:
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Happy reading.
Auto-tune was already a well-established studio tool by the time “Believe” came out, though it was unknown outside the music industry.
A musical pitch is a blend of many different frequencies beside the fundamental. Here’s a visualization of the different vibrational modes of an ideal string. The string’s movements are the sum of all these different modes simultaneously.
Draw a lot.
Don’t be precious about materials. Don’t use fancy art board or moleskines. Get a big newsprint pad or a stack of cheap legal pads from Staples. You want to draw as much and as quickly as possible, without being worried about wasting expensive paper.
Draw fearlessly.
Use a pen or Sharpie. No erasers, no correcting fluid. Fill the page completely as fast as you can. Use loose scribbles and gestures. Don’t sweat details. Use The Force — let go your feelings, young Skywalker. Get it right the first time or start over. Try to push each drawing to completion, but if you’re really not happy with where it’s going, toss it in the recycling and move on. Also try drawing without looking at the page. Get ready to be pleasantly surprised by the result.