Home : Plato's Words : December 2006

December 2006

Here in Vancouver we broke new records with the amount of precipitation that we had in November. That precipitation included lots of snow. So much snow fell that our parks and our city streets were quickly transformed into a type of Winter Wonderland. Branches everywhere were heavily laden with sparkling clean white snow. Unfortunately in some cases the snow had fallen so quickly and in such abundance that many branches and in fact entire trees broke under the weight of it all. There is a jazz lesson there as well in my opinion. Too much of a good thing can wreak havoc and cause damage it seems and the proof of that was in all of those fallen branches scattered about the city. In jazz while soloing, too many notes or a gratuitous number of ideas and lines can begin to affect the beauty or the purity of the piece. That is subjective of course but I will explain what I mean. In the past few years I have been delving further and further into the land of improvising; scatting solos over the changes. This is something that I really hadn’t explored in any serious way for a long time, as I hadn’t really thought it was something I was seriously interested in. I was content to improvise within the context of the lyric; altering the melody in an improvising fashion but still maintaining the lyrics of the song. Still I was intrigued with the idea of becoming more instrumental and realized soloing is a huge part of playing jazz and thus I began to work on creating solos over the changes to some of the tunes that I sing. This of course requires some knowledge of what you are singing over theoretically speaking and also requires some skill in negotiating the chord’s harmonic structure, roots and movement. What I have found as I have become more comfortable in hearing the changes is that I get more and more excited to sing spontaneous lines and ideas but that doesn’t necessarily translate into an interesting or satisfying solo. Sometimes I call it “wanking” because it is like a run on sentence. Perhaps I am even guilty of that within this entry of words today? I realize I need to learn to sum up some of my musical ideas and try to build or sculpt a solo so that it is not merely a string of notes that happens to fit over the chord structure but a new melody that has an arc, a shape if you will, that hopefully makes the listener feel satisfied to hear it in its entirety. I think it has to have a beginning, middle and an end; kind of like telling a story only that story is being told with sounds instead of with words. Perhaps it is like a short story that takes you somewhere and surprises you along the way. It may move you, shake you up a bit or excite you. That would be ideal and happens to be just the kind of solo that I enjoy listening to. That being said there is a feeling of satisfaction as well in simply singing everything that comes to your mind as you are improving. If you allow every idea to flow without editing or limiting the ideas it can be very cathartic somehow. Now I will just have to learn to be more artistic and intelligent in my note choices. I don’t think a listener wants to necessarily hear my cathartic experience. The listener wants to hear an inspired solo. So….that is one of the things that I will continue to work on in my ever-evolving life as a jazz singer.

On the singing front this month I am looking forward to singing with my two friends Jennifer Scott and Kate Hammett-Vaughan as we embark on our annual Christmas jazz gig singing 3 part harmony seasonal material that has been arranged a jazz style. We have so much fun together. Often the music is very difficult for me because I am not accustomed to be singing in harmony with other singers. I need to work carefully in order to learn my parts accurately. Each year I vow I will spend more time working on harmony singing but so far I have not put in the time I should to improve those skills. There really is so much to learn and explore in music and I suppose I will continue to work on improving my musicianship skills throughout my lifetime. I suppose I can think of far worse things to be doing! Typically if I am working on music I am happy. There are some difficult things that require patience and hard work and at times I am a lazy student but I know what I must to do to improve and so will eventually get to the necessary list of “should knows” and “must knows”.

Once again I will be performing with my group for the annual Christmas Jazz Vespers. This year it lands right on Christmas Eve so that is very timely and will make it all the more exciting because on that day in particular people are either already in the spirit of Christmas or they are waiting to be lifted into that special place. Hopefully our music will help everyone get into their Christmas groove. It is a beautiful but stressful time of year for many reasons but I always love Christmas. I love the social aspect and I do enjoy going to dinner parties with friends. I love the candles, the music, the decorations and I love giving presents to people as well. I love the scents of Christmas and the tastes of all the special food that is served at that time as well. This year I will be thankful for the good health of my family and friends. I know that many people around the world will be suffering will illness and with sorrow, poverty and violence in their lives. I am far removed from the world of war and thus far illness has stayed away from those I love so I will count my blessings at this time of year. Peace on Earth seems like an impossible thing once again as 2006 draws to a close and yet this is a time of year when we seem to hope for that more than ever. Perhaps there will be a day when that dream of peace may come true.

Here are Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s words written in 1863 that were set to music in the song “I Heard The Bells On Christmas Day” to end my December 2006 words. It appears that even then there was no peace on earth but there was hope and we have that today as well. Our collective hope of peace one day may one day come true.

I HEARD THE BELLS ON CHRISTMAS DAY

I heard the bells on Christmas Day,
Their old familiar carols play
And wild and sweet the words repeat of
PEACE ON EARTH GOOD WILL TO MEN.
I thought how as the day had come
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along the unbroken song of
PEACE ON EARTH GOOD WILL TO MEN.
And in despair I bowed my head:
 “There is no peace on earth” I said,
“For hate is strong and mocks the song of
PEACE ON EARTH GOOD WILL TO MEN”
Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead nor doth he sleep.
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail, with
PEACE ON EARTH GOOD WILL TO MEN.”
Till ringing singing on its way
The world revolved from night to day
A voice, a chime, a chant sublime of
 PEACE ON EARTH GOOD WILL TO MEN…