[Monday Notes no.95] An experienced musician once advised me: “if while improvising you come up with a phrase you have already used, don’t play it. Rather take a rest, and think of something different.” This is a very radical position for a jazz musician, yet there is one saxophonist who sometimes seems to think in…Continue readingArt Pepper, Lost Life. A jazz piece with a Hispanic tinge
Category: Monday Notes
A music analysis column dedicated to the great classics of jazz and rock music: every Monday a song with technical notes and curiosities. To start the week on a good note… and learn more about music.
[Monday Notes no. 94] Jackie McLean is one of the most original and modern alto saxophonists, perhaps the one who most continued Charlie Parker‘s experiments. Hip Strut is an excellent example of his unique position between tradition and innovation. It is in fact a classic blues progression, which Jackie McLean nevertheless transforms in his own…Continue readingJackie McLean, Hip Strut. A very unusual blues
[Monday Notes no. 93] Love is one or the main subjects of great American song. There are several sub-genres: lost love, unrequited love, a secret love. Lover Man belongs to an even different category: the longing for a love that is yet to be. We listen and analyse Jay Jay Johnson’s performance on trombone.Continue readingJay Jay Johnson, Lover Man. Between blues and American song
[Monday Notes no. 92] Stevie Wonder is one of the most creative and innovative musicians in soul music and beyond. On the album Music Of My Mind Stevie Wonder plays all the instruments, so it is a ‘one man album’ like those recorded years later by Prince and Paul McCartney, to give other examples. Let’s…Continue readingStevie Wonder, Where Were You When I Needed You
[Monday Notes no. 91] Roberto Menescal was one of the leading figures in the invention of bossa nova. Guitarist, composer and producer, he wrote songs with Antonio Carlos Jobim and played on numerous records from the 1960s onwards. We analyse his interpretation of the Brazilian classic Garota de Ipanema.Continue readingRoberto Menescal, Garota de Ipanema. Between bossa nova and jazz
[Monday Note No. 90] Acknowledgement is the first track on the album A Love Supreme, a suite in four movements in which John Coltrane describes his religious conversion. A spiritual path that is also an original and innovative musical journey.Continue readingJohn Coltrane, Acknowledgement. A Love Supreme, Jazz and spirituality
[Note di lunedì n.89] That of Area is difficult music, not easy to listen to. Desecratory music, full of political content and revolutionary intentions, the product of a time that was complicated and full of conflicts. It is not easy to listen to Arbeit macht frei without thinking about the context in which it was…Continue readingArea, Arbeit macht frei. Music and revolution
[Monday Notes no.88] Abbey Lincoln is an inimitable singer, not only because of the timbre of her voice but also for her special ability to sing powerfully and deeply, delivering the words sometimes with gravity and sometimes with sharp sarcasm. Her performance of Laugh Clown, Laugh is beautiful and moving.Continue readingAbbey Lincoln, Laugh Clown Laugh. From Opera to Jazz
[Monday’s Note No. 43] Bing Crosby was an actor and singer, a great interpreter of the American Songbook. Taking advantage of technological advances such as more sensitive microphones and the radio, Bing Crosby was among the first to adopt a whispery, intimate and confidential singing style. We hear him here in his interpretation of a…Continue readingWhite Christmas, a classic song performed by Bing Crosby
[Monday Notes no. 40] Jimi Hendrix’s appearance at the 1967 Monterey festival has become legendary. While playing Hey Joe, the guitarist has a physical, almost carnal relationship with his instrument, playing with the guitar behind his head and even with his teeth.Continue readingJimi Hendrix, Hey Joe. Rock star excesses and great music