Dr Who?

Last summer, William Davenport and Jordan Picken brought me their composition entry for the BBC Dr. Who Proms competition. I was expecting to make a few suggestions as to how to improve it, but it was perfect already and I felt that it was a potential winner. But how could it possibly win when there were hundreds of entries? Well it did win. There were two classes and William and Jordan won the junior class.

We went to the BBC studios in London to work with Ben Foster, one of the composers of the music for Dr. Who, to prepare this piece to be performed by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales. This is the orchestra that is used to record all the Dr. Who music. 

The piece was performed at the Dr. Who Proms on the 13^th and 14^th of July, at the Royal Albert Hall in London. 

So I found myself at one of the greatest venues in the country, at the greatest music festival in the world, watching a performance of a composition from two of my students! Not a bad day!

There is an important lesson here: the best that we produce in this school is often equal to, and can be even better than, the best that anyone in the country can do.

A2 listening skills checklist

A2 Listening Skills

Use the right hand column to write explanations or examples

Cadences – perfect, imperfect, interrupted, plagal
Chords I, V, V7, V7d, IV
Inversions of chords: a b c
Cadential 6/4 Ic-V-I
Diminished 7th chord Bb+C#+E+G
Augmented 6th chord Ab+C+F# in key of C
Secondary 7th chord II#37 D7-G7-C
Sequence
Circle/cycle of 5ths
Pedal, tonic and dominant
imitation
canon
Ostinato
Riff
Hemiola
Augmentation/diminution
Appoggiatura (chromatic)
Passing note
Note of anticipation
Suspension
Dictation of melody/rhythm
Tonality
Modulation to dominant
Modulation to subdominant
Modulation to relative minor
Modulation to tonic minor
Modal tonality
Atonal tonality
Whole tone tonality
Bitonal tonality
Recognise instruments and techniques: pizzicato, arco, con sordino, double stopping, col legno
Homophonic/melody and accompaniment
Polyphonic
Unison
Playing in octaves
Monophonic
Ornamentation: trill, mordent, turn, portamento
Time signatures: 2/4, 3/4, 4/4, 6/8, 12/8, 5/4, 7/4
Intervals: 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, octave, minor, major, perfect, diminished, augmented

 

Art Exhibition

As usual, we will be providing the music for this event. It will mainly be a showcase for Y9 musicians. It's free. There may be food. Come along!

Y13 Jazz notes

Hello there! Click on the link below for the official AQA notes on jazz, you will probably need to zoom in to read things clearly. Use YouTube to listen to the songs they mention. Don't forget all the notes I've already done for you and let me know if you think any are missing
http://www.evernote.com/shard/s50/sh/28517698-fbdb-4997-a31b-4345ffa69d07/7c0fb0bf06dffd9bf4af94d3cc86ea68

Shostakovich essay ideas and notes

Shostakovich Essay Questions

My bets for the “write a critical commentary/informative account” style essay, where you write everything you can remember about that section are:

·         The exposition in the first movement, bars 1-119

·         The development section of the first movement, bars 119-243

Organise your notes around the basic features of each section:

·         Exposition – first subject (D minor, but with Ebs disrupting the tonality), bridge, second subject (Eb minor at first, but constantly changing key), codetta, if there is one at bar 100, moving from Eb major to B minor (bar 106), closing on a discord (bar 107) which hints at Bb minor.

·         Development – which motives are being developed? How? Into which keys? What devices are used to develop the material? 1c turned into a threatening semitone figure at 119, hinting at Bb minor, while the horns play an augmented version of 1d 122. Trumpets enter in canon 132. 140 woodwind enter with 1d and race into dotted rhythm idea at 142 (bridge theme, bars 32-33). 154 piano enters with dominant pedal (A minor), adds Fs to create dissonance (156). 157 second subject now developed, transformed almost into march theme, with rhythmic values shorter (diminution). 165 1a enters, imitation between bassoons/cellos/basses and horns. Starker combination of 1a and 2 at 172. 176 1d hammered out in, woodwind in canon with strings. 188 ironic march, 1d in horns, distorted F major. I-V thumped out by timpani, as they will at the end of the symphony. 202 woodwind bridge theme. 1a at 204. 208 1d and 1a combine, both using diminution to create terrifying dissonances. 217 furious version of 1a, rising in sequences to crank up the terror. 220 trombones and tuba add 2^nd subject. 239 note A finally reached, as “home” dominant of D minor. Dramatic unison signals the start of the recap.

Don’t forget that if you use our terms 1a, 1c etc you will need to explain them. 1=first subject, a=first idea as first seen in bar 1, cellos and basses.

You might also be asked about structure – see my sheet on the structure of the 2^nd movement. If it helps, try to do one yourself for the other movements. If you can’t, ask me and I’ll do one for you, but it helps you more if you do it yourselves!

You might be asked about melodies (and therefore motives) – see my sheet on melodies.

Rhythm is another possibility, so here are some ideas on rhythm:

I

The first subject has 2 strong rhythmic ideas. The first (1a) is double-dotted. This, combined with a wide leap, gives the theme an energetic, aggressive bite. The second idea (1c) – 2 quavers and a crotchet on one note – occurs throughout the symphony, sometimes acting as a fateful motto (following the examples of Beethoven and Tchaikovsky), sometimes helping to unify melodic material.

The second subject uses longer note values and is therefore much calmer, but underneath the accompaniment pattern gently beats the 1c rhythm. Much use is made in the development section of augmentation, eg 1d at bar 208.

II

The triple metre creates a dance-like feel to this movement. (a) is a descending figure, based on 1d from the first movement (bar 6, 1^st violins). Here, instead of being a legato folk-like melody in 4/4, it has become a crude, almost grotesque dance. The crotchet rest in the first bar adds to the clumsy, lurching quality and the rhythm 1c from the 1^st movement is ever present (eg bar 3). Shifting accents in bars 41-44, disturb the metre, created a 2/4 hemiola.(c) (bar 45) has a descending, dotted figure which makes some attempt at gracefulness before rushing upwards in a semiquaver scale. (d) at bar 55 has strong, on the beat rhythms, which, in spite of the ¾ metre, sound like a march. 1c is again present, as it is in the trio theme (e) at bar 86. The use of the single note E here emphasises the rhythmic motto of 1c. Upward glissandi hint at a playful, Viennese waltz quality.

III

The slow movement uses rhythms which add to the legato nature – a 3 crotchet anacrusis, followed by long notes in the bass, with nothing faster than quavers in the melody. These quavers again form the 1c motive and occur on different beats in the bar – 1^st in bar 3, 2^nd in bar 4. These shifting patterns, along with notes tied across the barlines, create the feeling of a Russian folksong, which often has changes of metre. The idea at bar 24 again has 3 crotchets as an anacrusis to another crotchet and then the 1c rhythm. This idea, because of the tenuto markings, has a hesitant quality, a bleak, lamenting cry. The quickening of note values at bars 117-8 helps to build towards the climax at bar 121, where tremolandi, first on the piano and then in the clarinets, are heard.

IV

The first subject of the finale consists of 3 ideas. x has an anacrusis, followed by 3 rising crotchets. y mainly consists of rising quavers and includes a dotted rhythm. Z contains a descending 5 note figure, reminiscent of 1d, followed by another reference to 1c. The Rossini-like idea at bar 12 is accompanied by a quaver motor rhythm. The first appearance of the 2^nd subject at bar 81 is almost masked by swirling semiquavers. A more unadorned version appears at bar 126, where the melody uses long notes values in the way that the 2^nd subject of the 1^st movement does, to create a more lyrical and tranquil atmosphere. Augmentation is again used to develop material, for instance the use of x at bars 196-8. The symphony closes with many bold rhythmic ideas – repeated quavers as a dominant pedal, solid crotchets in the timpani and, at bar 348, final iterations of 1c, augmented, blazing out D major, either defiantly or ironically, according to your point of view!

Shostakovich Themes

Here is a structural plan for the 2nd movement and a list of themes for the whole symphony. Happy revision!

How are you Mr. Windsor?

Hello everyone, hope you are all managing to get your work done without me. I will be back with you as soon as I can, doctors are advising me to start work straight after half term and that seems about right to me. I'm fine, only having a little bit of pain from the main wound. Two things are stopping me from coming back to work: I get tired very easily - after these last two posts I'll probably fall asleep again! This is partly because it takes a good while for the anaesthetic to clear from my system and also because my body needs time to get used to working with only one kidney. The other problem is that the main wound won't stop leaking. This means that I can't exercise much to speed up the healing process.
I can't wait to get back to work and see you all again, not to mention start sorting out coursework and preparing for exams.
My son, who received my kidney is doing very well. He no longer needs to have dialysis and will be able to lead a full, normal life from now on if everything carries on going well.
Hope to see you all soon,
Mr W

Y13 BTEC: How government policies affect music

The government recently announced that it had reduced the red tape for live music at small venues. Have a look at this and this.

What was the red tape?

Was it just red tape or did it protect people’s safety and income?

What will be the result of this reduction?

How will it affect musicians?


Pirate radio

What was it? Why?

Why was it illegal?

Why did it become popular?

How did it affect music?



Obscenity etc

LSD

Satisfaction

God save the Queen

Frankie relax

Prodigy

Rihanna

Pick one and discuss

Did banning it make it more popular, does banning work?

Y13 A2 Jazz Notes: West End Blues - Louis Armstrong

I've taken this from here, it's an example of a more "fanboy" style of writing, but with plenty of technical terms to keep examiners happy! If it discusses the music, it's fine. If it discusses the private lives of the musicians instead of analysing, it's not good. This is good!

West End Blues

Story 1
West End Blues is one of the most famous recordings in the history of jazz for the following reasons: 1) Armstrong's introduction showed how dazzling his skills as a trumpeter were; 2) he laid the groundwork for jazz soloists to be considered true artists, the same as musicians in other styles of music and; 3) the recording introduced Earl Hines as the first real jazz pianist, who was Armstrong's equal in creative musical thought.

Activity: Follow the outline below of West End Blues.

Trumpet introduction by Armstrong

Ensemble plays with Armstrong heard above all

Trombone solo

Call and response: clarinet solo alternates with Armstrong scat-singing

Piano solo by Earl Hines, playing with a trumpet-like attack

Armstrong solos: holds a high B-flat for almost four measures

Earl Hines' piano enters to join Armstrong for ending.

What did Pops do that was so different? He established the blues as a basic foundation for modern jazz. He elevated the role of the soloists, not just himself as a feature in front of an orchestra, but rather Pops created a band of individual soloists, which was a radical departure from the collective improvisation of traditional New Orleans music and also from the heavily orchestrated arrangements of dance bands. He established scat singing and created a new style for American vocalists emphasizing rhythmic inflections and melodic variation rather than straight, operatic-like singing. He introduced sophisticated harmonic improvisation with the soloist making on-the-spot variations. He established the trumpet as “the” major solo instrument in jazz and it would not be until the arrival of Charlie Parker that the trumpet’s reign would be challenged.

Pick up any major book on the history of jazz and you will read ecstatic paeans about “West End Blues” (from Complete Hot Five - Volume 3). The opening fanfare alone is enough to establish the song as a masterpiece, but check also how Pops reverses the tradition of horn obbligatos behind a lead vocalist. In this case, the saxophone plays the lead and Pops does wordless vocalizing behind the soloist. Armstrong’s accompaniment becomes so memorable that people regularly hum it and almost totally ignore the lead solo. Then there is a very, very modern piano solo, meaning that the pianist plays single note lines rather than chords. When Armstrong re-enters he uses a long, high, held note. Whereas "Heebie Jeebies" (from Complete Hot Five - Volume 1) has an old-fashioned 2/4 feel with a ragtime-like syncopation. When Pops does his second vocal chorus, dropping the wordless vocalizing, the song feels more modern than it does during the ensemble sections. Why is this? Because Pops had grasped where the music could go rather than merely rehashing where the music had been. This was the rhythm of the new era, a time period that would be dubbed the jazz age—fast, furious, forceful and full of fun, and Pops created a musical style that perfectly projected the zeitgeist of the Jazz Age.

For me personally, the “West End Blues” cadenza could have been issued as a record by itself, like the later Charlie Parker “Famous Alto Break.” It’s like listening to a song with all its different components and each time I hear it, something different knocks me out: the opening descending quarter notes that sound like an alarm clock; the dizzying arpeggios that build to the stirring high concert C; the history-of-jazz-encapsulated-in-one-bluesy-run descending blitz of notes that immediately follows the high C, foreshadowing where jazz is going, yet firmly rooted in where it’s been; and those scattered chromatic phrases, sounding so effortless in the hands (or chops) of an artist who is so completely in command of his horn. It’s 12 seconds of heaven. The rest of the record could have consisted of nothing but a yodeler warbling, “Stick out your can, here comes the garbage man,” and it would still be a classic just for that opening.

Fortunately, what follows is still pretty magical. Armstrong plays Oliver’s lead in harmony with Jimmy Strong’s clarinet as Fred Robinson’s trombone lends a foggy bottom to the proceedings. Armstrong maintains the dignified, somber feel of Oliver’s record, until he gets to bar seven, where his reading of the melody begins to grow more airy and ornate. At the 12-bar chorus, he spins another arpeggio up to a high concert Bb and then takes a breather, handing the ball over to Robinson to take a short solo. Robinson was no legend and on many of these 1928 sides, he doesn’t hold a candle to Armstrong, but even he seems inspired on this one, taking his time and moaning the essence of the blues on Oliver’s written second strain. He gets delicious backing by a Zutty Singleton shuffle beat with his hand cymbals and a steady, nearly 12-bar tremolo by Hines.

The feel of the record shifts in the third chorus, as Hines and banjoist Mancy Carr simply pound out the melody delicately over quarter notes behind clarinetist Strong’s chalumeau take on Oliver’s next strain. Every phrase Strong plays in answered by some of the most sober wordless vocalizing ever contributed by Armstrong. I hesitate to call it scatting because usually the word “scat” sounds happy and joyful and Armstrong is anything but that during “West End Blues.” There’s not a trace of gravel in his voice and he phrases up high, just like his trumpet, though it’s so relaxed, he sounds like he’s listening to the radio. There’s not a trace of a laugh or a grin; it’s just some very pretty singing.

On the Oliver record, the sober mood was broken by the ridiculous clarinet playing. On Armstrong’s version, the fragile nature of the Armstrong-Strong duet is temporary upset by Earl Hines’s dazzling piano solo. However, unlike the clarinet solo, this is not a bad thing. Hines was one of the most innovative pianists to ever sit behind a keyboard and his virtuosic display on “West End Blues” is one of the record’s most memorable features. Singleton and Carr drop out, leaving Hines all alone but he makes the most of it. His left hand is consistently shifting; part stride, part descending and ascending octaves and tenths, all mixed up the occasional jarring, off-the-beat accent. And that’s just the left hand! The right hand plays a lot of those “trumpet style” octaves, but there’s and a lot of single-note runs, too, leading to the solo being equal parts melodic and flashy. All of it is mesmerizing; just listen to the ascending chordal run he plays with both hands simultaneously for a second at the 2:28 mark for a short example of Hines’s brilliance.

With 51 seconds to go, there’s only enough room for one chorus and a coda. Again, this comes off so perfectly, I don’t think anyone could write it off as being completely spontaneous. Almost like an arrangement, Robinson and Strong harmonize, Strong holding one note while Robinson discreetly accents on the first beat of every bar, hitting a blue note in bar for. Meanwhile, Hines and Carr comp dramatically, surging together as the song begins to sweat. And on top of it all, the celestial being known as Louis Armstrong, holding the most dramatic, throbbing, high Bb in the history of recorded music. He holds it for four bars (12 seconds), with just the right amount of vibrato to send the hairs on one’s neck to rise to attention. It’s such a genius move, because he basically takes the original motif from Oliver’s melody, and inflates it into something much more bold and stunning than anything those original 12 bars suggest

But he’s not done yet! After four bars of the held note, Armstrong unleashes a furious series of descending runs off an Ab7 chord - Bb-Db-Gb-Eb, four notes repeated five times in five beats before Armstrong turns it inside out and hits a high C for a second. He continues onward, phrasing with a flair that does indeed suggest opera, especially with the upward, almost scalar, run he plays towards the very end of the chorus, as well as the little turn of a phrase that ends it.

Then it’s on to the coda, or the final resolution, to continue my movie analogy from earlier. I think if “West End Blues” had a cute little Lil Hardin ending, it might have taken some of the steam out of it. But instead, the actual ending, with Hines’s descending inversions and the final melancholy statement by the horns, delightfully maintains the mood of the entire record. In the noes to a Time-Life LP box set on Hines, the pianist remembered now the ending came about:

“Now how the ending was going to be we didn’t know. We got to the end of it and Louis looked at me and I thought of the first thing I could think of, a little bit of classic thing that I did a long time ago and I did it five times and after I finished that, I held the chord and Louis gave the downbeat with his head and everybody hit the chord at the end.”

Well, almost everybody. As everyone held their final chord, Zutty Singleton unleashed a somewhat strange “clop” from his cymbals. I’ve always liked this sound because, to me, it sounds like someone closing a time capsule on the amazing brilliance that just occurred in the previous 200 seconds. But Hines explained that Singleton had a little trouble with his simple duty: “Zutty had this little clop cymbal...and he clopped it wrong. So then we had to start all over again...We spent hours in there with the hot wax.” Thus, we can be fairly certain that “West End Blues” wasn’t a completely spontaneous performance. No alternate takes survive but I often do wonder that if they did, would each one of them contain the exact same cadenza?

The musicians were justifiably proud of their efforts, as Hines attested to. “When it first came out,” he said, “Louis and I stayed by that recording practically an hour and a half or two hours and we just knocked each other out because we had no idea it was gonna turn out as good as it did.” Armstrong would go on to list “West End Blues” as one of his favorite records, but he never seemed to speak or write too much about it. This is a shame, especially since Gunther Schuller published Early Jazz in 1967 when Armstrong was alive and well. Would it have hurt him or some other musicologist to actually ask the man himself about what was going through his head when he played that cadenza? Then again, to Armstrong it was probably just another session, a brief respite from his daily gig with the Dickerson band (though, of course, he had to know how special “West End Blues” was).

Armstrong’s song must have hit the jazz world like a meteor as other versions began popping up almost immediately. So for now, we’ll leave Pops and focus a little on some of these other recordings. First up, here’s Ethel Waters singing Clarence Williams’s new lyrics to the tune, recorded August 21, 1928, less than two months after Armstrong’s version.

Y13 A2 Jazz: essay plan

My notes, apart from the "Satin Doll" parts in the box, which came from All About Jazz

Plot the development of jazz formations from the five instrument combos to the big band. Refer to specific bands and pieces of music in your answer

·         New Orleans Jazz – King Oliver’s Creole Jazz Band, Louis Armstrong’s Hot Five – Alligator Hop, Sugar Foot Stomp, West End Blues

·         New York bands – Duke Ellington – Mood Indigo, Jungle Nights in Harlem

·         The Swing era of the 30s – Duke Ellington – Take the A Train, Satin Doll

·         The big bands of the 40s – Glenn Miller – Moonlight Serenade, In The Mood

 Development – 20s Dixieland/New Orleans - small groups with each player doing their own thing, often leading to complicated heterophonic textures...... West End Blues

New York – gradual change – more players, more arranged..... Jungle Nights

30s Swing – more players, complicated harmonies and rhythms, less scope for improvisation .... Satin Doll

40s Big Band – larger again, more sophisticated, popular arrangements.... In the Mood

Jungle Nights

Performed by Duke Ellington in the infamous Cotton Club – night club where black musicians played to white audiences. Jungle. Minor key depicts the Depression era.

Head – rasping trumpet solo with chromatic sliding unison saxes. Trumpet solo starts with trill again rasping and emphasising flat 5^th. Clarinet takes the next solo with rapid chromatic scales. Tenor sax has the next solo, followed by a repeat of the head. Ending has an organised ritardando, followed by all playing a final minor chord pp-f-pp swell.

Satin Doll

Duke Ellington – later swing style composition. Duke Ellington himself plays the opening piano intro and the solo which follows the head. Much more sophisticated arrangement

Intro – head – piano – tenor sax – head with added trumpet improvisations – quieter version of head – second piano solo, based on B section of head, making a lot of use of added note chords – head, fades to piano, drums and bass – head. Composition is longer through the repetition of the head section in different forms, rather like the baroque ritornello form

Musical analysis of “Satin Doll”
Original Key	C major with temporary false key changes to F major and G major during the bridge
Form	A – A – B – A
Tonality	Primarily major
Movement	Almost completely stepwise; only occasional skips
Comments     (assumed background)
The repetitive “A” section melody sounds suspiciously as if it began life as a “riff” or background figure that section players use as accompaniment to a soloist (similar to an ostinato). Section “B” is a bit more developed, based on a scale pattern that descends a fourth and then ascends back up a fourth. The chord progression of “A” is interesting because it starts out with a harmonic sequence often used as a “turnaround” at the end of a tune–ii7 – V7 – ii7 – VI7. The fifth and sixth measures of “A” almost defy analysis. If a composer following the classical rules of voice leading had written the harmonic progression here, it would have been II7 (or ii7) – V7(#9)– I (D7 or Dm7 – G7(#9) – Cma7 in the original). Instead, the chords used seem completely coloristic and yet disguise the voice-leading function definitely present when looked at closely. In the fifth measure, the first chord written is Am7(b5)/Eb (which could have been written as an Ebø7–and actually is), which proceeds to the D7 – the II7 we would expect to find there. The next chord, however, is Abm9, which resolves to Db9. Under normal circumstances, one would think of this as a ii7 – V7 – I in Gb, but really what has happened is that the Abm9 has been an embellishment of the “Neapolitan” chord (in the key of C, a Db7) which is nothing more than a tri-tone substitution for V7. Indeed, proper voice-leading technique is still present, albeit disguised almost beyond recognition. Section “B” is more orthodox sounding: ii7 – V7 – I in F and G major. Transition back to section “A” is accomplished by dropping the middle three voices of the G7 chord a half-step, creating a vii˚7/ii in the original tonic key of C major.

Conclusion

Bands got bigger

Arrangements became more complicated, less improvised haphazard

Solos stopped being a free for all and became part of an overall, controlled structure

Solos became the only place for improvisation

Gradual change to a more popular, sophisticated style as jazz became more acceptable

Y13 A2 Jazz Notes: Jelly Roll Blues - Jelly Roll Morton

This is an example of more technical, less fanboy writing about jazz from Richard Trythall. I've done, and will give you an annotated copy of the score


The following manuscript of Jelly Roll Morton's "Jelly Roll Blues" was transcribed from the Smithsonian Library recordings made in 1938 by Morton. The original recording is available commercially on Rounder Records' "Jelly Roll Morton, The Library of Congress Recordings, Volume 2, tracks #8 and #9". I completed this transcription (along with 16 others) in order to facilitate my own performance of Morton's piano music ("Jelly Roll Morton Piano Music", Richard Trythall, piano, Musicaimmagine, MR 10047). These transcriptions are, therefore, closely intertwined with performance practice. In them, I have attempted to indicate as exactly as possible not only the notes Morton played, but their effective duration and release - a vital element in determining the performing gesture. I have also given detailed attention to the nuance and accentuation with which they are performed and indicated unusual dynamic relations between the simultaneous lines. There are additional indications, in words, regarding "swing" (which I take as a term indicating both a rhythmic and dynamic inequality between the two 8th notes in a beat) and Morton's unique use of the thumb of the RH. All of these indications, and the following observations as well, are intended to help the pianist approximate Morton's own performance practice.
The formal plan for "Jelly Roll Blues" is simplicity itself - a set of variations over a 12 bar blues. Morton's piano realization, however, is anything but obvious. Conceived as if an arrangement for a jazz band of the epoch, he has created a fascinating textural mosaic which alternates florid solo "breaks" with rhythmic chordal responses while yet maintaining the original song's melodic line. (Morton also sings this blues on track #9 of the Library of Congress recording).
The concept of the imaginary jazz band is fundamental to the interpretation process since it clarifies the polyphonic nature of this music and suggests the importance of "orchestrating" every moment of the score. The score lives and breathes in countless little details which project the flux and flow of a group of individuals "conversing" - at times individually (see the solo "breaks" in bars 29-30, 35-36, 41-42, 47-48), at times in homophonic blocks (see the ritornello figure of bar 14-15, 26-27, 38-39, 50-51), as well as in a number of other homophonic textures (some straight forward, others with contrapuntal voices added) which carry out Morton's rich orchestral dialogue. Each of these situations requires a different pianistic touch and weighting - suggested essentially by the orchestration which the pianist imagines. Color and attacks need to be adjusted to suggest clarinet lines, trombone lines, tuba lines, etc. Similarly the homophonic tutti sections need to have a homogenous dynamic, attack and color suggesting performance by a single instrumental "section", while other moments (such as bars 9 - 10) require a variety of dynamic, attack and color in order to clarify the heterogeneous elements of the texture. Particularly important is the projection of the contrast of the tutti material with the solo material. The 3rd chorus of the blues (bar 29-40) provides a good example. Here staccato, tutti chords - dense, wide register sonorities performed by the full "band" - accompany the "clarinet's" solo. The pianist needs to convey both the weight and attack of the band's chords and the fragility of the soloist's trill figure. This contrast prepares the stage for the tutti's explosion on the second line of the blues which, in turn, sets up the contrast for the next clarinet solo (bars 35-36), and so on.
The fact that the roots of this music are found within the band tradition suggests a number of additional points regarding the "nitty gritty" of performance. The phrasing, for example, should be considered from the wind player's point of view, from the necessity to breathe, and from the natural attack and decay patterns of notes and phrases as performed on various wind instruments. Perhaps the clearest example of this has to do with the way Morton interconnects his phrases. Like a wind player, his hand frequently "bounces off" the last note in a phrase (cutting the phrase slightly short), takes a quick "breath" and alights firmly on the "goal" attack of the next phrase unit. Examples of this gesture are found throughout his music. In fact, he does it three times already in the four bar introduction of "Jelly Roll Blues": between the & of 4 /bar 1 and the & of 1/bar 2; between the 1/bar 3 and the & of 1/ bar 3; between the 1/bar 4, and the 3/bar 4. This sort of "bouncing" or "springing", from shortened release-over a rest-to solid attack, imparts an elastic, buoyant quality, a kinesthetic feeling of expectation and fulfillment allowing Morton to interlock his phrases in a particularly visceral way. Another telling example of this can be found in the RH between the & of 4/bar 20 and the & of 1/bar 21. Here both the "bounce" chord (on the & of 4/bar 20) and the "goal" chord (on the & of 1/bar 21) are accented. Additionally the arrival chord is longer, more dense and dissonant creating an explosive, syncopated "landing". What is particularly important in this gesture is the feeling of charged expectancy given to the space in between these points, the moment of "suspended free fall" which is then released by the following attack. For pianists, the breath is drawn with the finger and wrist "lift off". When a natural hand gesture is found, the phrasing and the proper feel come automatically.
Along the same lines, the flow of breath throughout a phrase should be traced in the dynamic shading assigned to each phrase. Like the voice, the sound of a wind instrument is in constant movement reflecting, principally, the amount of breath at disposition at any given time. Frequently (though certainly not always) the volume is slightly higher at the beginning of a phrase, when the player has just drawn a fresh breath, and slightly lower towards its end - as the player is running low on breath. (Examples which might use this shading include the phrases in bars 7, 8 and the ritornello figure of bars 14, 15) This is not so much perceived as a "decrescendo", but as shading and as a sign of the life cycle of the phrase itself. There are, of course, many other breath patterns as well. What is important is that the performer finds a vital, organic shading for each phrase, one that underscores the character of that particular phrase and that fits within the context of the larger "conversation" (phrase structure) which constitutes the entire composition.
A similar dynamic variety, attributable to tonguing and breath patterns natural to wind instruments, is also found within the phrase at the micro level, in the swing beat. In this pattern, the second eighth of the two eighth note swing beat (which places the second eighth of the figure very late in the beat - more or less on the third eighth of a triplet) is performed less loudly than the first note - meaning that the second eighth is both qualitatively and quantitatively weaker than the first. In the piano realization of these passages, Morton generally employs musical devices such as density, harmonic and/or registral stresses to underscore this strong-weak tendency. In bars 7 and 8, for example, the first two longer, "on the beat" notes of the pattern are non-chordal accessory tones which move to chordal tones on the weak portion of the swing beat; in the first 2 beats of bar 14, the longer portion is occupied by dissonant, 5 note chords which move to dyads on the weak portion of the unit. In passages such as these, little, if any, additional accentuation is required to project the swing unit since the stress pattern is suggested so clearly by the harmonic movement and by the hand position itself.
In his more vigorous scansions, however, Morton also uses heavy performance accents to reinforce these stresses. In these cases, the dynamic inequality between the two notes in the swing unit widens exponentially until the short-weak portion of the beat practically disappears in comparison to the long-strong (bars 9-10, 21-22, 33-34, etc.). Occasionally he may also reverse this pattern by placing a strong accent on the shorter part and de-emphasizing the longer part of the swing eighth unit (as in bar 32). This sort of "high relief" accentuation confers a jaunty, "gutsy" quality to these passages. Not surprisingly, it is precisely in these passages that Morton abandons his contrapuntal bass line and resorts to a rudimentary "oom pah" figure in the LH. By clearly marking the beat with this figure (its band origins are clarified by the name itself), he intensifies the feel of the underlying quarter pulse and reinforces the visceral presence of the "beat" against which the heavily swung melody is working.
Seen on a larger formal plane, such heavily accented, "beat intensive" swing passages serve as orientation points for the surrounding material. In this particular case, for example, the first line of each chorus of the blues (bar 5-8, 17-20, 29-32) has the feel of an extended upbeat to the downbeat provided by the vigorous opening of the second line in bar 9, bar 21, and bar 33 respectively. The "release" that the second line brings in each case is palpable. In the latter two choruses, this effect is even stronger since it comes following a solo break. Here the arrival of the swing beat is as much a change of mental attitude and spirit as it is of musical texture. The vital difference here is in the quality of the feeling communicated by the material which is "swung" and that which is not. In "Jelly Roll Blues", the solo breaks are not played with a swing beat. These solos are composed of rapid ornamental filling - trills, scales, arpeggios - made up of equal weighted notes performed in a smooth and regular fashion. The rhythmic regularity of such a material is not well adapted to expressing a strong beat, let alone expressing swing hence it falls in sharp contrast with the material which is performed with the swing beat.
This contrast between swing and non-swing material allows Morton remarkable possibilities for characterizing his musical material. By juxtaposing these opposites, he can achieve extremely dramatic effects locally and by controlling the amount of swing, he can also underscore a larger sense of form. Most of his pieces are constructed with an ever increasing sense of swing in mind - often concluding with a final "stomp" section. In "Jelly Roll Blues", for example, this heavy, swing scansion characterizes all of the variations of the second strain (in Eb Major). Essentially Morton "telescopes" his variation form so that each successive variation communicates greater rhythmic urgency. In turn this increasing excitement gives a sense of progression and ordered form to what easily might have been simply a succession of events.
It is, of course, ultimately up to the interpreter to find the proper manner to project Morton's irresistible energy and unerring sense of form. In my notation of his music and in these observations, I hope that I have supplied indications helpful in confronting both challenges. Morton's music is a demanding music - composed by a first class composer and a virtuoso pianist. It provides the definitive pianistic statement of a vital epoch in American popular music, but it goes beyond this as well. Like Scott Joplin's music, in fact, Morton's music transcends the vernacular "ghetto" and like Joplin's music, it is destined to become a vital part of the larger twentieth century piano repertoire.