#how to play piano montuno

[ajrdileva]

How To Play A Piano Montuno on Any Song

Playing piano montunos can transform any song, giving it that infectious Latin groove that makes everyone want to move. Today, we’ll take a jazz standard like “Satin Doll” and turn it into a piano montuno. By the end of this lesson, you’ll know how to create a montuno pattern from any chord progression and apply these concepts to any montuno pattern you want. Step 1: Choose Your Montuno…

[addictionstories]

13

Naomi had been frustrated with her public defender and felt she needed a “real lawyer” to deal with her mounting charges. A friend she did psychedelics with recommended an attorney who had gotten him out of a legal jam, who he claimed to have paid “in weed,” at least partially. 

Simon the lawyer met us at Salina Town Court before Naomi’s first appearance. He was elegantly dressed, with a tweed jacket and vest and he spoke with a British accent. A $700 retainer got us started. 300 of it was due that evening. I agreed to pay for the lawyer and would take the 700 out when we got her bail money back, which was in my name. I handed Simon the cash and we walked in.

The courthouse, if you could even call it that, was in an old school.  We went through a metal detector and walked into a big room that had been a gymnasium. We took seats. Simon walked to an area on the side where the other lawyers were. 

When it was your turn you walked up to a podium with a microphone. The judge sat above you, looking down. The whole conversation came through a PA system with speakers on the walls. 

I watched as people were called up, many looking beaten down by life. It was a steady stream of petty charges and traffic violations.  Like a benevolent father, the judge seemed proud of some, flashing them a warm and approving smile as they explained how they fulfilling their legal obligations. 

“My client is currently employed, supporting his family,” an attorney said.

“Don’t worry, It’s not my intention to put your client in jail,” the judge said.

When Naomi’s case was called, Simon went up and uttered a few words and got the whole thing deferred for two weeks. 

That was easy enough. But pointless I thought. So much of the legal system was kicking the can down the road, I was learning. But so what? I was ready to get out of there. 

A few nights later I was driving to a recording session in Rochester when I got a phone call from a trumpet player I’d worked with a few times in the past, who heads the jazz department at a prestigious college. He asked me about doing a winter concert with the faculty. The current piano teacher was going to be leaving the following semester to take a gig up north, he explained. And he inquired about my interest in the position, explaining it was basically mine if I wanted it. It was just the thing I needed at that moment as my so called career was languishing. I hadn’t been afraid or had a new musical challenge in a long time so I welcomed the opportunity.

Later that week I got the music in the mail. The majority of the work I’d been doing involved playing standards, the same couple dozen tunes we’ve been playing since we were kids. You can do those gigs in your sleep. It’s easy to get lazy. This was mostly original music, composed by the faculty. Nothing I couldn’t handle with preparation, but it was challenging.  

There was an Afro Cuban piece with a section where the piano plays alone, a montuno they call it. I spent hours practicing that as well as the other tunes.

The concert was a success. So many of my gigs were in bars in undignified situations. Being in a regal concert hall at an ivy league institution with a suit and tie felt great. I shook a few hands and talked to some people after the show. But I was chomping at the bit to get out of there and back to Naomi. I made a beeline back to Syracuse, stopping at the pharmacy and McDonald’s before pulling up to the Econo Lodge. 

When Ashley opened the door I walked in and sat down on the bed, putting the bag of food next to me. I reached in and took out two cheeseburgers for me. Two doubles for Naomi, no pickle, no onion. And two for Ashley with Big Mac sauce. I grabbed the bag of needles from my pocket and shook it to get Naomi’s attention, flashing her a big smile. She smiled back, pleased as I got up and handed her the syringes.

When you’re doing hardcore IV drugs, you’re on a different timeline, I was learning. So much of our hanging out involved sitting around, literally for hours on end, either waiting for drugs, or waiting for Naomi to be able to inject herself with the drugs.  Nothing ever happened fast. The hands of time moved through molasses when we were together. You learned to get used to it. 

We watched tv for a while and chatted. Then Ashley got up and started muttering quietly to herself. She began to walk around the room, floating like a drug addled phantasm, with zombie eyes and a far away stare. 

“What the hell,” Naomi yelled.  “Did you do it all? 

She didn’t answer. 

“Jesus Christ!” Naomi screamed.

I felt like I was in a scene from Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas as Naomi screamed wildly.

“I paid for that.  I’ve been paying for everything for the last two days.”

“I know. I know. I am going to make it up to you. I got you when I see Jones again,” Ashley muttered, her words running together in a long slur.

They argued for a few more minutes before things calmed down.

Naomi and Ashley were back at Rich’s house a few days later. As far as I knew Rich wasn’t a drug dealer and I couldn’t quite figure out his connection to them. Whatever it was I didn’t want to think about it. I thought about what Ashley had said. How Rich “just likes helping people.” Helping people, I thought. Was he running a Ronald McDonald house for the opiate crowd?  Something tells me it wasn’t pure benevolence behind his actions. 

Naomi would go on benders that would last days where she was there. Communication with get spotty. I’d get a text message from her saying she wanted me to pick her up in an hour and and then I wouldn’t hear back from her until the next day. Sometimes I’d get fragmented texts that wouldn’t make sense at all.

I picked her up at Rich’s and drove her to her parent’s house to pick up some clothes. I enjoyed taking her home and always hoped she’s just stay there when we visited. Her parents were always gracious to me. I worried they might have thought our relationship was unusual considering that I was significantly older. But they knew I didn’t do drugs and that I had Naomi’s best interest at heart and they trusted me. 

We walked in and talked with her parents in the kitchen for a few minutes. Then Naomi and I went up to her room. Her room was small, with stacks of clothes neatly folded on the bed and on top of her dresser. She began to sort thought them. I took at seat on the bed and looked through a small stack of books, picking up one about addiction and trauma. I made conversation but Naomi seemed laser focused on what she was doing. After about twenty minutes I went back downstairs for a glass of water. 

Naomi’s father was in the kitchen. 

“The depression. The sleeping all the time. I think it’s because she has Lyme disease,” he father said.

I looked at him, curious, interested.

“I got it when I was bitten by a tick. I think she has it too.” 

He explained his decade-long battle with the disease, which included seeing multiple doctors and spending thousands of dollars on treatments in Pennsylvania. He told me about herbs he was taking and some that he had recommended for Naomi like Charlotte’s Web.

My aunt had gotten Lyme disease in the eighties. But apart from that I really didn’t know too much about it. I knew it could wreak havoc on you mentally and physically if left untreated. 

When I went back upstairs I found Naomi standing by her closet looking terrified and gasping for breath. 

“On my God. Are you okay?” I asked.

“I’m having a panic attack!”

“Why? What happened? What did you take?

She didn’t answer.

Her father came up a minute later, taking one look at her and becoming alarmed. He asked her what she took.

“Nothing dad. Nothing.”

He looked at me and asked. I shook my head and said I didn’t know. 

Naomi started to walk out of the room and motioned to me that she wanted to leave. 

“Keep her here,” her father quietly mouthed to me under his breath.

We sat back down on the bed and talked. Ten minutes later I heard sirens. Then the doorbell rang. She quickly gathered the clothes she had picked out and headed for the kitchen. I followed her. When we got to the stairs a fireman, two EMTs and a village cop were walking up. We met halfway down. I just stood there, semi frozen, not sure about what to say or do. Naomi’s father was standing at the bottom of the stairs by the front door. Naomi explained how she was having a panic attack. The EMT took her pulse, recommending that they take her to the hospital but she refused. They asked several times and each time she declined. 

The cop knew about Naomi’s drug history and wanted to hold her but he couldn’t. He asked repeatedly if she had any thoughts about hurting herself or anyone else. She answered no each time. After about ten minutes the EMTs started to pack up and leave. But the cop lingered. He seemed angry, frustrated. At this point Naomi had started to come out of it. Eventually the cop gave up. He walked to the front door, talked quietly with her father for a moment and then left. I sat down on the couch with Naomi. Her father walked over. We chatted for a bit. Then Naomi hugged her father, said goodbye and we headed out.

Naomi’s birthday was February 15th. I bought a card at the grocery store along with a four pack of Stewart’s Cream soda and two small heart shaped balloons on sticks, a combination birthday-Valentine’s Day gift. I picked Naomi up at Grant Village. The plan was to go to her mom’s house for dinner. Naomi was relaxed, lucid, upbeat and I was looking forward to the evening. It was a clear cold winter night. A perfect evening for driving.

We arrived and sat down in the kitchen. Her mom poured me a glass of red wine and one for herself. She was serving a baked chicken dish with potato leek soup.  

“I made you your favorite dinner last year on your birthday too, Naomi,” her mom said. 

“Oh yeah. I remember,” Naomi said, distracted as she looked through her mail on the counter.

Her mom and I chatted some more and then Naomi excused herself, saying that she had to run upstairs for a minute. 

A few minutes later her mom put the salads out and called up to Naomi. Naomi said she’s be down in a minute. I ran up to check on her. She was sitting on the bed with a syringe in her hand pressed up against her arm. Good Lord, I thought. 

“Hey. What are you doing? We’re about to eat,” I said.

“I know.  I just have to finish this first.”

I waited for a minute then walked back downstairs.

“Is she coming down?” her mom asked.

“Yeah, I think so. She’s just sorting through some old clothes.”

Her mom called up to her again. “Naomi! Dinner!”

Her mom started on her salad. I started on mine. After we finished the salad she brought out the soup. 

The mean was excellent. “I’d love to get the recipe for the soup for my mother,” I explained.

We each had another glass of wine as we ate. Naomi missed the whole meal.  I went back upstairs after we finished and found her sitting in the same spot on her bed, still trying to inject herself.

Good god, I thought. I laid down on the other side of the bed and fell asleep. When I woke up early the next morning Naomi was sitting on the floor still digging in her arm with the needle. Exhausted and bleary-eyed, I gave her a hug and headed home where I went back to bed until noon. 

[jazzviewswithcjshearn]

Chris Trinidad Y Con Todo (Iridium Records, 2019)

Chris Trinidad: bass guitar; Christian Tumalan: piano; Carlos Caro: congas, bongo, guiro; chekere; Colin Douglas: timbal kit, clave, bells; Bill Ortiz: trumpet (1, 4, 6, 7, 8) Jeff Cressman: trombone (1, 6, 7, 8) Jamie Dubberly: (2, 3, 4, 5) Tony Peebles: tenor saxophone (3, 6) Anthony Blea: violin (2, 3, 5) Tod Dickow: flute (2, 3, 4, 5) Juan Luis Perez: voice (1, 5, 8) Christelle Durandy: voice (1, 5, 8)

Vancouverite and now Bay area bassist Chris Trinidad has always had a multitude of musical interests.  He truly sees the commonalities in music.  This equanimous approach, allows for players from varying musical backgrounds, but complement each other perfectly with harmonious, selfless playing.  Coming off Chant Triptych II , a jazz interpretation of liturgical melodies, the electric bassist returns with Con Todo a searing 12 piece group including Grammy winning pianist Christian Tumalan, Carlos Caro on congas, bongo, guiro and chekere, Tod Dickow on flute. Tony Peebles on tenor saxophone, former Santana members trumpeter Bill Ortiz, and trombonist Jeff Cressman, trombonist Jamie Dubberly on trombone, violinist Anthony Blea, rounded out by Juan Luis Perez, and Christelle Durandy on vocals.

Trinidad was first introduced to Afro Cuban music through percussionist Jack Duncan whom taught a masterclass at his high school.  Naturally, the bassist skipped his math class to begin to immerse himself in this visceral new world that instantly grabbed him by the lapels and began to learn as much as he could. ��Fast forward to his jazz studies at Capillano College, he enriched his understandings of Latin jazz, salsa dura by playing with many Vancouver area musicians like Marlin Ramazzini's Orquesta, John Korsrud's Johnny Montuno Jazz Quartet, among many others.  After graduating college, Trinidad took to playing cruise ship gigs, often playing Latin music and becoming even more proficient in the grammar, and upon returning to land, got a gig with Jack Duncan's Shango Ashe a decade after that first masterclass.

Con Todo is a diametric opposite to Chant Triptych II, but that's part of what makes Trinidad's projects so endearing-- the omnivorous attitude.  He grew up listening to the pop music in the 90's but as a teenager, he was drawn to see the vast musical vistas, sought out prog rock, and eventually was led to jazz.  With the present album, the 12 player ensemble is so tuned in to a unified vision.  With the first track, “Luna Nueva En Mi Mente” (New Moon In Mind) composed on the Explorer of The Seas, Jeff Cressman and Bill Ortiz solo with a beautiful heightened intensity on the timba and funk spiced track.  Cressman's lines seem to float horizontally against Tumalan's relentless montuno, and Trinidad's lockstep bass in tandem with Colin Douglas' percussion.  For Ojos Abiertos (Eyes Open) Tumalan created an arrangement dispensing the odd meter bassline on the bridge that Trinidad had originally designed, and the rhythm section positively smokes as Christelle Durandy and Juan Luis Perez take the vocals in the timba section.  Durandy's lead and Perez' choro really move things forward.  Tony Peebles' tenor solo  with his Sonny Rollins and Michael Brecker inspired tone on “Tigres Blancos y Elefante Grises”  (White Elephants and Grey Elephants) is humorous with bebop references underpinned by the classic bembe rhythm, and Trinidad's unyielding bass.  The bassist takes his only solo on “Llegando A La Raison” (Arrive to Reason), a sparkling, lyrical bolero ballad, a model of economy, with beautiful motivic development.  Bill Ortiz's Harmon muted trumpet not only helps carry the melody, but his solo drives right to the core of the tune. Christian Tumalan's cha cha arrangement of “Principios De La Causalidad” (The Principles of Causality) showcases his driving McCoy Tyner esque solo, the booming quartal harmony really providing the impetus for some searing right hand phrases.  On the closing Puerto Rican plena and  Cuban son of the Richard Bona influenced “Espiritu Del Antiguo Sol” (Old Sun In Spirit), Juan Luis' vocals are passionate behind the choro of he and Durandy, and Trinidad's plodding half and quarter note bass lines really galvanize the joyous rhythmic flavor.

Sound

Con Todo's sound is quite alive thanks to the excellent engineering from Jeremy Goody and additional engineering from Akiyoshi Ehara.  Trinidad has a strong idea of how his music should sound, and it's presented with a very realistic approach in the sound stage, horns on the left and center, piano center and percussion right channel.  The dry quality of the recording really brings out the live, realistic quality. Trinidad's passion for sound shows in this and every release. Something critically important in the era of streaming and poor music reproduction by mobile phone.

Closing Thoughts

Con Todo, with it's varied panorama of Afro-Cuban styles prove once again Chris Trinidad is one of the best musicians and composers that should be recognized on a grander scale.  His absolute sensitivity as  a bassist and knack for pairing the right musicians and catchy tunes, is what makes the album a treat and real sleeper.   In addition, as far as indie releases go, the presentation is superb, a great cover from artist PJ Martin, and with rich liner notes and session photos Chris Trinidad Y Con Todo should not be missed.

Music rating: 9.5/10

Sound rating: 9/10

[mastcomm]

A Composer Puts Her Life in Music, Beyond Labels

She was supposed to end up in Paris.

When the composer Tania León was 9, her piano teacher, traveling in France, sent a postcard back to Cuba with a picture of the Eiffel Tower. “I don’t know what happened to me when I saw the card,” Ms. León, now 76, said recently. “I went to my family, and I said, ‘This is where I’m going to live.’ And I became obsessed.”

A few years earlier, her intrepid grandmother had marched her to the local music conservatory in Havana and demanded that she be enrolled. They didn’t usually take students so young, but Ms. León already showed promise: Even at 4, she would press against the radio at home, dancing to salsa and singing along, with perfect pitch, to the classical station.

Following rigorous, European-style conservatory training, and inspired by her teacher’s postcard, the young pianist set her sights on France, intent on becoming a touring virtuoso and helping lift her family out of poverty. After years of waiting, she landed a free flight to the United States through a resettlement program. In 1967, at 24, Ms. León left for Miami, intending to travel on to Europe.

But right before boarding the plane she learned that she would not be permitted to return to Cuba, and upon entering the United States, she discovered that she would have to stay at least five years before she could apply for citizenship. She was trapped, a citizen of nowhere.

“That’s how I arrived: already traumatized,” Ms. León recalled.

But she soon reached New York, where she began carving out an unusually varied artistic path and resisting, even at a time of increasing focus on multiculturalism, the identity-based labels — “black composer,” “female conductor” — that others sought to attach to her.

She eventually served as the New York Philharmonic’s new-music adviser in the mid-1990s. Although she curated the Philharmonic’s American Eccentrics series and conducted educational concerts, the orchestra, which had a weak record with composers of color at that time, stymied some of her projects and never actually played her music.

But this week she finally arrives at the Philharmonic, with the premiere of her work “Stride,” to be performed on Feb. 13, 15 and 18, under Jaap van Zweden. The premiere is part of Project 19, a multiseason initiative in honor of the centenary of the 19th Amendment, that has commissioned works by 19 female composers. Deborah Borda, the Philharmonic’s executive director in the ’90s, returned as president and chief executive in 2017, and was eager to finally program Ms. León’s music.

“Here we are,” Ms. Borda said in an interview, “coming back to an important artist and enfranchising her, over 20 years later.”

Ms. León’s trajectory in America, from displaced pianist-in-training to compositional force, began with upheaval. Not long after she arrived, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Senator Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated; Ms. León barely spoke English, but found herself shouting slogans at antiwar protests. She was overwhelmed with stress, and her hair began to fall out.

But propelled by talent, tenacity and a bit of luck, she began to reverse her fortunes. She played her way into a scholarship at the New York College of Music. Substituting for a friend as an accompanist to dance classes, she was spotted by the famed New York City Ballet dancer Arthur Mitchell. He was starting a new venture, the Dance Theater of Harlem, and recruited Ms. León as music director.

Soon, Jerome Robbins and George Balanchine were teaching Ms. León their repertoire. “What freaked me out the most,” she recalled with a laugh in an interview in the Philharmonic’s archives, poring over old program booklets and photographs, was “when I found out that Stravinsky was alive, and that Stravinsky had written three or four ballets for Arthur Mitchell.”

At Mitchell’s behest, she began conducting, improvising and, increasingly, composing. Her tendency was to say yes to every opportunity, and not fret too much about what it might entail. “People that I respect a lot, they tell me something seriously and I think about it, but I don’t become negative,” she said. “He told me, ‘Write a piece.’ And I said, ‘Wow.’ So I wrote the piece.”

She honed her voice in large-scale, percussive dance works that dabbled in the serial techniques in vogue in the 1970s. The Dance Theater became an international sensation, and its tours even took her, finally, to Paris.

At last she was able to return home, through a Cuban government family reunification program. Visiting Havana in 1979, she went first to the cemetery to see her formidable grandmother, who had died while she was abroad. She played recordings of her new compositions for her father, who remained skeptical.

“He told me, ‘Where are you in your music?’” she recalled. “He knew something about me that I was not addressing in my sound.”

“When you come from one land into another, one culture into another, you want to be assimilated,” she added. “You want to learn the traditions, you want to learn the gestures.”

To remind her of her roots, her father took her to a Santería ceremony, where she heard the polyrhythmic music that she had absorbed growing up, but which had remained absent from her early professional work.

She returned to the United States, and soon after, her father suffered a stroke and died. Visa issues kept Ms. León from attending his funeral. She began having nightmares in which she heard pounding drums. She was working on a piece for solo cello, and started to sketch out a movement based on her father’s rhythmic gait, in the style of a syncopated montuno. The grand mixture that is Cuban music — its intricate grooves, melodic inflections, arrays of drums — began flowing into her compositions.

A series of probing works followed through the 1980s and ’90s: “Batá,” with its eerie evocations of Yoruba rituals; “A la Par,” a piano-percussion duo that moves from murmuring chromaticism to a coolly contained guaguancó rumba; and “Indígena,” in which trumpet fanfares herald riotous explosions of orchestral color.

“I was searching myself, trying to address something,” she recalled of those years, describing it as a period of “trying to understand my own culture.” The music’s central impulse is a forceful, bustling modernism, with angular and pointillistic gestures undergirded by kinetic, perpetual motion.

She also became an outspoken advocate for cultural diversity. Alongside her pathbreaking career as a conductor, Ms. León spearheaded a pioneering outreach program at the Brooklyn Philharmonic and led community concerts across that borough. She oversaw major festivals of Latin American music with the American Composers Orchestra, served as music director of the Broadway production of “The Wiz,” and testified at city hearings about the integration of pit orchestras. Today, she directs the wide-ranging festival Composers Now, which is going on across New York through February.

But as her career unfolded, Ms. León bristled at attempts to define her. Her background is mixed — she has family roots in Spain, France, Africa and China — and the seemingly binary categories of race and gender circumscribed her individuality.

“I am tired of all our labels,” she said in 1986. “I am nothing that the people want to call me. They do not know who I am. The fact that I am using this physical costume does not describe my energy, does not describe my entity. My chosen purpose in life is to be a musician, a composer, a conductor. This is the way I am making my contribution to mankind.”

She saw herself as a global citizen, a cosmopolitan figure boxed in by categories that had confined people of color for hundreds of years. The scholar Alejandro Madrid, who is writing a biography of Ms. León, observed recently that this ethos was grounded in her arrival in the United States in the late ’60s, toward the end of the civil rights movement.

“Identity politics are very strong,” he said of that period, “and she never felt very comfortable with it.” He added, “The ambivalences she has about blackness come out of the specific experience of her being in New York at this time, and being always labeled something that she didn’t believe she really was.”

Ms. León’s position is largely the same today: She praised the Philharmonic’s Project 19 as a “reparations gesture” but also argued that “any label limits the person.”

“I honor all my ancestors in my skin, and in my character, and my presence,” she said. “But I don’t go around saying I’m Cuban-Italian, or I’m Cuban-French, or I’m Cuban-this and Cuban-that.”

Nearly two decades ago she moved to Nyack, a village on the Hudson River north of Manhattan, seeking more space. “I always lived in places where, every time I looked out the window, I was looking at someone else,” she said.

Today, Ms. León remains a bit astonished by the trajectory of her life and career. “I consider what happened to me to be a miracle,” she said. She attributes some of her success to mystical forces, adding: “I still talk to the spirits of my ancestors.”

Her music is still infused with a vigorous pluralism, although it is a bit more relaxed — less harsh, less busy — than her earlier efforts. (Little of her recent work has been commercially recorded.) The Philharmonic will present a Nightcap concert on Feb. 15 that explores her myriad influences, with guests including the jazz harpist Edmar Castaneda.

“Stride,” her new work for the orchestra, is inspired by two women: the suffragist Susan B. Anthony and the grandmother who was a major presence in Ms. León’s life — a progressive who embraced socialism as soon as it reached Cuba. “Stride,” unfolding in a series of fitful episodes — thickets of glassy strings, declamatory brass and contrapuntal juxtapositions that evoke Charles Ives — is both solemn and celebratory.

It is also aware of the racialized limits on the enfranchisement that women won a century ago. Its final moment offers a note of prophetic dissent: As two percussionists symbolically ring 19 tubular bells, a third plays a rhythmic pattern based on a clave from West Africa.

“That is the symbol of the people of color,” Ms. León said. “It’s like, this is next.”

“It’s the 100th anniversary,” she added. “A lot of things have changed, a lot of things need to change, and that is my very personal comment. That we’re celebrating something that was handicapped, and something that is still handicapped.”

from WordPress https://mastcomm.com/a-composer-puts-her-life-in-music-beyond-labels/

[thepracticeofpractice]

 How To Play a Piano Montuno over any chord 

I’m not a piano player, but I do play the piano. You should, too. It’s one of the best tools for understanding theory.

So, I’m always looking for something to play on piano that’s easy and fun (and useful, I hope). A band mate suggested I learn montunos, so that’s what I’m doing. Here are some of the better videos I’ve found. Take your time, go slowly.

First one has one of the simplest…

[jazzworldquest-blog]

USA: John Beasley · MONK'estra, Volume 2 on Mack Avenue Records: Release Date: September 1, 2017

       Looking to the past for inspiration brings the music into the future for MONK'estra, Vol. 2, which masterfully applies a rich orchestral palette across an array of modern infectious rhythms, while discovering new dimensions of the classic compositions that emerge directly from 

their deepest jazz roots.

Release Date - September 1, 2017

Photograph by Rob Shanahan

  Learn More and Listen at Mack Avenue

Looking to the past for inspiration brings the music into the future for MONK'estra, Vol. 2, which masterfully applies a rich orchestral palette across an array of modern infectious rhythms, while discovering new dimensions of the classic compositions that emerge directly from their deepest jazz roots. John Beasley expands on the inspiration that earned him two GRAMMY® Award nominations, plus widespread critical and popular acclaim, for MONK'estra, Vol. 1. Beyond just adapting the indelible themes of Thelonious Sphere Monk (subject of many centennial celebrations this year) for a 16-member big band plus incomparable guest artists, these 10 songs explode into new musical experiences due to the collective unit embracing a new strain of jazz, which features diverse sounds and a broad base of influences from the entire black music canon.  

Consider: trumpeter Dontae Winslow breaks out a fierce rap, appropriate for these modern times, between his horn solos on "Brake's Sake." Regina Carter bows in the soulful vein of Ray Nance on Beasley's homage-to-Ellington treatment of "Crepuscule for Nellie." Tenor saxophonist Kamasi Washington wails at full throttle, à la Pharoah Sanders, on the first half of "Evidence," followed by Conrad Herwig's "I want to be happy!" trombone history-of-techniques lesson. Dianne Reeves enacts "Dear Ruby" with lyrics written by Sally Swisher, originally recorded by the great Carmen McRae. Pedrito Martinez infuses "Criss Cross" with an Afro-Cuban beat. With his multi-faceted talents being recognized on the largest scale, Beasley has been invited to conduct global jazz orchestras playing the music of MONK'estra. 

Live performances have given him a deeper understanding of the genius and wit of Monk and how he gave space for musicians to interpret freely. "We did a lot of concerts prior to recording Volume 2," Beasley says, "which allowed me to 'feel out' our band's personality and tweak arrangements so we would not sound like a wind chamber ensemble - which can be kind of stuffy - but instead like a juicy, funky, street big band - you know, jazzy. Witnessing audiences reacting to this sound, made me write more of this feeling into Volume 2." 

The "juicy, funky, street" elements are evident from the get-go - Winslow's rap about racial and economic justice also bears throwback resonance. "While this is a Monk tribute record, it expresses ideas about the human experience at his time and at our time - how we live and what we value with a poignant point that the equality issues that his generation of black musicians faced are still present today," comments Beasley. "I mean, yes, we've come a long way, but have we really?" 

As such themes from Monk's life and his music endure, Beasley's interpretations are informed by the music of his generation: "Our time, which I think of as a fair amount of funk, rhythm and blues, Afro-Cuban influence, hip-hop, all of that. For me," he continues, "arrangements start with a rhythmic groove. I'm not trying to recreate the great earlier versions, because they've already been done. I'm trying to put my own personality into the mix. I orchestrate and write at the same time, thinking 'How about this counter-line? What color would be cool underneath it?'" So hear handclaps and finger snaps beneath Regina Carter. Terreon Gully's drums and Ben Shepherd's bass punctuate the freely improvised group section of "Evidence" (Beasley says he was thinking of Coltrane's "Ascension"). 

Low and muted brass and high reeds usher in a lush trombone on "Ugly Beauty," then whisk it into "Pannonica." New Orleans syncopation launches "I Mean You," with funk riffs lending body. Beasley's organ swirls under the ultra-romantic harmonization of "Light Blue." Irresistible clave drives "Criss Cross," coming to a head in staggered parts of call-and-response after passages of montuno and barrelhouse piano. "Work" has a mysterious, cinematic, narrative complexity. 

John Beasley is the director, grandly re-envisioning stories born from the genius of Thelonious Monk on MONK'estra, Vol. 2.

John Beasley

                                                     Mack Avenue Records

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[spookytrashlight-blog]

Blog Post #3

I finished coming up with parts in this session. I was listening to the song “Quimbara” by salsa legend Celia Cruz and I have straight up copied the piano part from the Montuno section. I had to learn how to play it first; a long and arduous project seeing as I haven’t played piano in months (I actually had to slow down the tempo of the song to keep up… It’s bloody fast!). But I think that it made a nice part. It also changes the mood entirely. The song starts off more relaxed, and like a Montuno section in a salsa piece, it became a little more excited and driving, but in this case the mood darkens a little bit. A little bit more spicy.

Once this was done, the rest of the session was spent looking for loops and samples for the electronic break from bar -- to --.I found something called a “Red Line Bass” that strongly contrasted the man made latin sounds of the rest of the song. It may be too different, but I was running out of time so I stuck with it. Because it appears  that my sounds came from South America (Not all, from the Middle East too), I thought another vocal hook from the same geographical region would work nicely. The “Water For Life” comes from a sample pack called “Ras Kitchen”; a set of sound slices from a Rastafarian Cooking Channel on YouTube. The “Yah” samples also came from here. These reminded me of the Jamaican “Toasting” genre of vocal improvisation so I stuck them in over my electronic break to generate a little bit of excitement.

In “The Gun”, I think the strongest part of this middle section is the intensity of anticipation it generates. With this in mind, I chopped up a string section sample entitled “The Fight” or something like that, to include only the ominous first two notes from the recording. With a little bit of trial and error, I concluded it sounded best on the fourth beat of the bar.

I sort of fell in love with the track by Nino and so I’ve copied many of the artist’s ideas. For example, the bi-tonal rising effect of the bass line and the rewind “swipe” effect at the end of the electronic middle break. I think that The Gun is still a much more effective dance piece than mine, specifically because of the light major pentatonic melodies give it a very happy mood. Considering the drug culture of the 90s rave scene in Europe and the UK, this would have mirrored the euphoric mental state of the audience.

Some finishing touches were made to the balance of the mix before I did a master track. Because the guitar part was a solo recording, it still had heaps of the bass frequencies in it, which sounded very strange in the first section, so I balanced these out. Other than that it was mainly re-listening to the piece multiple times to see if it needed anything brought forward or set back. Listening to the mp3 now, the electronic middle section needs to be brought up, but I have to stop at some point.