Topic: Jazz - Title
Cool jazz musicians in the 1950s minimized the role of rhythm. [1] The next generation rebelled by incorporating Latin meters, usually Cuban or Brazilian. [2] Tino Derado’s six-and-a-half-minute version of "Kumbaya," mentioned in the post for 18 March 2018, opened with a minute long drum solo. When he recorded it with his own group in 2000 he labeled the album "Latin Jazz." [3]
The album’s notes listed two drummers, but did not indicate if they played together or on separate tracks. Neither fit the mold of someone inspired by Gene Krupa. Jamey Haddad wanted a drum after he heard Arabic ones at Lebanese gatherings in Cleveland. [4] Satoshi Takeishi played in a brass band when he was in junior high in Japan. [5]
Derado didn’t use a vocalist like Rigmor Gustafsson. By 2016, when he was playing "Kumbaya" in a Berlin jazz club, he had dispensed with the saxophone as well. Instead, Robby Geerken played the opening drum solo on congas. After forty-five seconds, the string bass joined him. Derado begin playing a few notes on the piano thirty seconds later, but did not start the saxophone theme until another thirty seconds had passed. During the remainder of the performance, the congas took over the role of the piano as the sustaining instrument for the piano, bass and drum set.
Some might take Derado’s use of drums as the reason he called the piece "Kumbaya." However, that would assume all drums were the same, when in fact congas were not African. They developed in the poor settlements that grew around the cities of western Cuba after the abolition of slavery in 1886. Olavo Alén Rodriguez argued the shapes on some early ones suggested African models, but also said congas served the same function as indigenous wooden sound boxes called cajones. [6] The tall barrel-shaped drums appeared in clubs in this country during Prohibition when Havana casinos were defining the taste of American tourists. [7] Dizzy Gillespie introduced congas into jazz in 1947 as Latin instruments. [8]
Performers
2000
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: Billy Drewes, saxophone
Instrumental Accompaniment: Tino Derado, piano; Ben Street, acoustic bass
Rhythm Accompaniment: Satoshi Takeishi, Jamey Haddad, drums
2016
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: Robby Geerken, congas
Instrumental Accompaniment: Tino Derado piano; Andreas Lang, string bass
Rhythm Accompaniment: Diego Pinera, drums
Credits
Composer: Tino Derado
Notes on Lyrics
There were none
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: Tino Derado
Tempo: fast
Basic Structure: homophony with solo congas accompanied by rhythm instruments
Notes on Performance
2016
Occasion: 2 September 2016
Location: A-Trane club, Berlin
Microphones: floor mikes for the congas; the video camera did not pick up the other instruments as well
Clothing: the men wore black for dark gray long-sleeved shirts or jackets
Notes on Movement
2016
The conga player moved his head when he was playing, often rotating it, and sometimes throwing it back. The bass player also moved his head as he played, especially when his right hand was particularly active. Derado and the drummer’s heads move up and down toward the end. Derado stood a couple times to adjust his position, while the drummer remained still while he played.
Notes on Performers
The conga player, Robby Geerken, was born in Berlin where he started to play the instrument when he was eleven-years-old. He apprenticed with José Luis Quintana Fuerte, then entered the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler in Berlin. [9]
Derado’s father was a particle physicist from the Croatian city of Split. [10] His mother was a biochemist. [11] They married in the United States in 1965, and returned to Munich in western Germany [12] where Derado was born in 1970. [13] Although he studied classical piano as a child, he believed his family’s mixed cultures made him open to other forms of music. [14]
After his years at Berkee College and the New School, mention in the post for 18 March 2018, he worked as a sideman in New York. [15] He returned to Germay in 2009 to lecture at the Universität der Künste in Berlin. In 2014 he became a professor at the Musikhochschule für Musik, Theater und Medien in Hanover. [16] He called his 2016 band Somnambulist.
Availability
Album: Aguacero. Perun Records. 2000.
YouTube: uploaded by Ralasan o123 on 15 February 2016.
End Notes
1. Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Style Sheet. "Cool." Jazz in America website.
2. Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Style Sheet. "The Breakthrough Year into the Contemporary Period: 1959." Jazz in America website.
3. "Aguacero by Tino Derado." CD Baby website.
4. Joanna Connors. "Acclaimed Percussionist Jamey Haddad Shows Us His Basement Studio in Oberlin, Full of 1,000 Drums and Other Instruments." The [Cleveland] Plain Dealer website. 9 December 2012.
5. Nuno Loureiro. "Satoshi Takeishi Interview." Clean Feed website. 10 December 2008.
6. Olavo Alén Rodriguez. "History of the Congas." AfroCuba website. November 2002.
7. Wikipedia. "Havana."
8. Alén.
9. "Stephan Geerken." Global Music Academy website.
10. German Wikipedia. "Ivan Derado."
11. German Wikipedia. "Thea Derado."
12. Wikipedia, Ivan Derado.
13. German Wikipedia. "Tino Derado."
14. "Bio." Tino Derado website.
15. Tino Derado website.
16. Wikipedia, Tino Derado.
Showing posts with label ~ Jazz. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ~ Jazz. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 20, 2018
Sunday, March 18, 2018
Rigmor Gustafsson Quintet - Kumbaya
Topic: Jazz - Title
Tino Derado created a version of "Kumbaya" that made no reference to the original song when he was working with the Rigmor Gustafsson Quintet in 1998. Instead, he used the relentlessly fast pace and instrumentation of Bebop with a piano, string bass, and drums. Gustafsson vocalized with the saxophone.
His version had more thematic unity than most jazz compositions that allowed each instrumentalist to improvise in his or her own style. [1] Derado created two recurring motifs. One was the rhythmic one he played on the piano to signal the beginning of each of the solos. The other was the melodic one, which, because it required Gustafsson and Gabriel Coburger to move in unison, imposed a discipline on both.
Derado’s work entered the jazz repertoire as a virtuoso piece for young vocalists. Karolina Zibkute posted a short segment that featured only the vocal duet with the saxophone in 2015. Her Lithuanian group used an electric keyboard and bass, and supplemented the regular drummer with two small snare drums played with sticks.
Manon Pellicorio performed her own version in a Dublin club in 2016. Her pace was slower, and she did less unison work with the saxophone player. Instead, she treated parts of Gustafsson’s duets as solos. Both women had just completed conservatory training programs.
Performers
Gustafsson [2]
Vocal Soloist: Rigmor Gustafsson
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: Gabriel Coburger, saxophone
Instrumental Accompaniment: Tino Derado, piano; Hans Glawischnig, bass
Rhythm Accompaniment: Roland Schneider, drums
Zibkute
Vocal Soloist: Karolina Zibkute
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: saxophone
Instrumental Accompaniment: keyboard, electric bass
Rhythm Accompaniment: drum set plus two small snare drums
Pellicorio [3]
Vocal Soloist: Manon Pellicorio
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: Nick Roth, tenor saxophone
Instrumental Accompaniment: Cormac Kenny, piano; Barry Rycraft, string bass
Rhythm Accompaniment: Brendan Doherty, drums
Credits
Gustafsson
"Composer: Tino Derado." [4]
Zibkute
None given
Pellicorio
"written by Tino Derado (Rigmor Gustafsson)" [5]
Notes on Lyrics
There were none
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: Tino Derado
Tempo: fast
Basic Structure: recurring motifs
Singing Style: Gustafsson, Zibkute, and Pellicorio scatted alone or in unison with the saxophones
Notes on Performance
Gustafsson [6]
Occasion: recording session, September 1998.
Location: Systems Two, New York
Zibkute
Location: theater stage
Microphones: Zibkute had a hand-held mike
Clothing: Zibkute had straight blond hair cut in the style of Mary Travers of Peter, Paul and Mary. She wore a yellow dress and matching coat. The men were in the shadows in the video.
Pellicorio [7]
Occasion: 10 June 2016
Location: Dublin, Ireland, club
Microphones: Pellicorio had a hand-held mike; the rest had floor mikes.
Clothing: Pellicorio wore a dress with black tights; the men wore dark long-sleeved shirts and slacks.
Notes on Movement
Zibkute
When she was not singing she stepped from one diagonal to another and let the arm that was not holding the microphone swing freely. When she sang, she bent her knees to keep time and bent her left arm at the elbow. During the staccato section she used that hand to mark the beats.
Pellicorio
The grand piano was between the pianist and Pellicorio, creating a barrier between it and the other musicians who were widely spaced. She kept time with her hands.
Notes on Performers
Gustafsson was raised in Grums, Sweden, where she learned to play guitar in public school when she was eight-years-old. [8] After she moved to New York in 1993 to study at the New School for Jazz, she formed a quintet that played local clubs. [9] The group toured for several years after she graduated in 1995. [10]
Two of the musicians on the "Kumbaya" recording, Derado and Coburger, also had been at the New School in those years. Coburger’s post-school quartet included Gustaffson’s drummer, Roland Schneider. [11] The bass player, Hans Glawischnig, was at the Berkee School when they were at the New School, but moved to New York where he studied at the Manhattan School of Music. [12]
Zibkute’s vocal talent was discovered early, and she was sent to schools that specialized in the arts. While a student at the conservatory in Klaipedos, [13] she placed fourth in the Baltic voice contest. [14] After graduation she moved to Vilnius to continue study at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre. In 2017, her Facebook page indicated she had used the name Carolyn Lu when she was in Chicago. [15] Her musicians in 2015 were Leonardas Beksa, Augustas Genutis, Kasparas Petkus, Vilhelmas Rudys, and Paulius Stonkus. [16]
Pellicorio was raised in Zürich, Switzerland, where her father "encouraged me very early to sing songs with him, which he then accompanied on the guitar." [17] She studied at the Musikschule Konservatorium Zürich and the Hochschule für Kunst, Design und Populäre Musik in Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany, before going to Dublin where she earned a degree in jazz performance from the Newpark Music Centre in 2016. [18]
Availability
Rigmor Gustafsson Quintet
Album: Plan #46. Prophone Records PCD 044. 1998.
YouTube: uploaded by NAXOS of America on 13 February 2015.
Karolina Zibkute
YouTube: uploaded by infokarolina on 6 June 2015.
Manon Debora (Pellicorio)
YouTube: uploaded by Manon Debora on 30 November 2016.
End Notes
1. John Wesley Work described this jazz style in the post for 26 February 2018.
2. Gustafsson personnel list from "Rigmor Gustafsson Quintet - Plan #46." Discogs website.
3. Pellicorio personnel list from YouTube.
4. Gustafsson credit from YouTube.
5. Pellicorio credit from YouTube.
6. Gustafsson recording information from Discogs.
7. Pellicorio performance information from YouTube.
8. Wikipedia. "Rigmor Gustafsson."
9. Rigmor Gustafsson website.
10. Wikipedia, Gustafsson.
11. German Wikipedia. "Gabriel Coburger."
12. German Wikipedia. "Hans Glawischnig."
13. "Carolina Lu (Karolina Zibkute)." Facebook.
14. "Baltic Voice 2014 4-th Place/ Karolina Zibkute." Uploaded to YouTube by infokarolina on 14 July 2014.
15. Facebook, Zibkute.
16. Zibkute personnel list from YouTube.
17. Manon Pellicorio. Quoted by Instrumentor website.
18. "Manon Pellicorio." Take Jazz website.
Tino Derado created a version of "Kumbaya" that made no reference to the original song when he was working with the Rigmor Gustafsson Quintet in 1998. Instead, he used the relentlessly fast pace and instrumentation of Bebop with a piano, string bass, and drums. Gustafsson vocalized with the saxophone.
His version had more thematic unity than most jazz compositions that allowed each instrumentalist to improvise in his or her own style. [1] Derado created two recurring motifs. One was the rhythmic one he played on the piano to signal the beginning of each of the solos. The other was the melodic one, which, because it required Gustafsson and Gabriel Coburger to move in unison, imposed a discipline on both.
Derado’s work entered the jazz repertoire as a virtuoso piece for young vocalists. Karolina Zibkute posted a short segment that featured only the vocal duet with the saxophone in 2015. Her Lithuanian group used an electric keyboard and bass, and supplemented the regular drummer with two small snare drums played with sticks.
Manon Pellicorio performed her own version in a Dublin club in 2016. Her pace was slower, and she did less unison work with the saxophone player. Instead, she treated parts of Gustafsson’s duets as solos. Both women had just completed conservatory training programs.
Performers
Gustafsson [2]
Vocal Soloist: Rigmor Gustafsson
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: Gabriel Coburger, saxophone
Instrumental Accompaniment: Tino Derado, piano; Hans Glawischnig, bass
Rhythm Accompaniment: Roland Schneider, drums
Zibkute
Vocal Soloist: Karolina Zibkute
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: saxophone
Instrumental Accompaniment: keyboard, electric bass
Rhythm Accompaniment: drum set plus two small snare drums
Pellicorio [3]
Vocal Soloist: Manon Pellicorio
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: Nick Roth, tenor saxophone
Instrumental Accompaniment: Cormac Kenny, piano; Barry Rycraft, string bass
Rhythm Accompaniment: Brendan Doherty, drums
Credits
Gustafsson
"Composer: Tino Derado." [4]
Zibkute
None given
Pellicorio
"written by Tino Derado (Rigmor Gustafsson)" [5]
Notes on Lyrics
There were none
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: Tino Derado
Tempo: fast
Basic Structure: recurring motifs
Singing Style: Gustafsson, Zibkute, and Pellicorio scatted alone or in unison with the saxophones
Notes on Performance
Gustafsson [6]
Occasion: recording session, September 1998.
Location: Systems Two, New York
Zibkute
Location: theater stage
Microphones: Zibkute had a hand-held mike
Clothing: Zibkute had straight blond hair cut in the style of Mary Travers of Peter, Paul and Mary. She wore a yellow dress and matching coat. The men were in the shadows in the video.
Pellicorio [7]
Occasion: 10 June 2016
Location: Dublin, Ireland, club
Microphones: Pellicorio had a hand-held mike; the rest had floor mikes.
Clothing: Pellicorio wore a dress with black tights; the men wore dark long-sleeved shirts and slacks.
Notes on Movement
Zibkute
When she was not singing she stepped from one diagonal to another and let the arm that was not holding the microphone swing freely. When she sang, she bent her knees to keep time and bent her left arm at the elbow. During the staccato section she used that hand to mark the beats.
Pellicorio
The grand piano was between the pianist and Pellicorio, creating a barrier between it and the other musicians who were widely spaced. She kept time with her hands.
Notes on Performers
Gustafsson was raised in Grums, Sweden, where she learned to play guitar in public school when she was eight-years-old. [8] After she moved to New York in 1993 to study at the New School for Jazz, she formed a quintet that played local clubs. [9] The group toured for several years after she graduated in 1995. [10]
Two of the musicians on the "Kumbaya" recording, Derado and Coburger, also had been at the New School in those years. Coburger’s post-school quartet included Gustaffson’s drummer, Roland Schneider. [11] The bass player, Hans Glawischnig, was at the Berkee School when they were at the New School, but moved to New York where he studied at the Manhattan School of Music. [12]
Zibkute’s vocal talent was discovered early, and she was sent to schools that specialized in the arts. While a student at the conservatory in Klaipedos, [13] she placed fourth in the Baltic voice contest. [14] After graduation she moved to Vilnius to continue study at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre. In 2017, her Facebook page indicated she had used the name Carolyn Lu when she was in Chicago. [15] Her musicians in 2015 were Leonardas Beksa, Augustas Genutis, Kasparas Petkus, Vilhelmas Rudys, and Paulius Stonkus. [16]
Pellicorio was raised in Zürich, Switzerland, where her father "encouraged me very early to sing songs with him, which he then accompanied on the guitar." [17] She studied at the Musikschule Konservatorium Zürich and the Hochschule für Kunst, Design und Populäre Musik in Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany, before going to Dublin where she earned a degree in jazz performance from the Newpark Music Centre in 2016. [18]
Availability
Rigmor Gustafsson Quintet
Album: Plan #46. Prophone Records PCD 044. 1998.
YouTube: uploaded by NAXOS of America on 13 February 2015.
Karolina Zibkute
YouTube: uploaded by infokarolina on 6 June 2015.
Manon Debora (Pellicorio)
YouTube: uploaded by Manon Debora on 30 November 2016.
End Notes
1. John Wesley Work described this jazz style in the post for 26 February 2018.
2. Gustafsson personnel list from "Rigmor Gustafsson Quintet - Plan #46." Discogs website.
3. Pellicorio personnel list from YouTube.
4. Gustafsson credit from YouTube.
5. Pellicorio credit from YouTube.
6. Gustafsson recording information from Discogs.
7. Pellicorio performance information from YouTube.
8. Wikipedia. "Rigmor Gustafsson."
9. Rigmor Gustafsson website.
10. Wikipedia, Gustafsson.
11. German Wikipedia. "Gabriel Coburger."
12. German Wikipedia. "Hans Glawischnig."
13. "Carolina Lu (Karolina Zibkute)." Facebook.
14. "Baltic Voice 2014 4-th Place/ Karolina Zibkute." Uploaded to YouTube by infokarolina on 14 July 2014.
15. Facebook, Zibkute.
16. Zibkute personnel list from YouTube.
17. Manon Pellicorio. Quoted by Instrumentor website.
18. "Manon Pellicorio." Take Jazz website.
Friday, March 16, 2018
Ekah Hyunjoong Kim - Kumba Kumbaya
Topic: Jazz - Title
Some jazz musicians have recorded versions of "Kumbaya" that didn’t include even a token reference to the original song. They left their reasons for the use of the word as a title for a jazz performance to their listeners to intuit. Like Carmen Lundy’s juxtaposition of "Kumbaya" with a reference to the esoteric and exoteric codes for Black behavior in Code Noir, it was easy to over-intellectualize their thinking. [1]
Ekah Kim recorded "Kumba Kumbaya" in 2010 with fellow students from the Berkee College of Music. The drummer had formed a quartet in 2009 with Junya Fukumoto on piano and Keisuke Higashino on bass. [2] His preferred instrumental soloist was a saxophonist: on "Kumba Kumbaya" it was an Israeli-born musician, Jonathan Greenstein.
For the MP3 album he produced his senior year, Kim wanted to explore Brazilian jazz. [3] He added a conga player and a Brazilian-born singer. "Kumba Kumbaya" opened and closed with a verse by Tais Alvarenga that made no reference to the original in text or tune. Between her solos, the group reverted to the usual modern jazz format: virtuoso solos by the saxophone and piano over a smooth continuo of piano and congas that replaced the string bass in this role.
Performers
Vocal Soloist: Tais Alvarenga
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloists: Jonathan Greenstein, tenor saxophone; Junya Fukumoto, piano
Instrumental Accompaniment: Keisuke Higashino, bass
Rhythm Accompaniment: Ekah Hyunjoong Kim, drums; Jorge Pérez González, congas [4]
Credits
(C) 2010 Ekah Hyunjoong Kim
Notes on Lyrics
Language: Portuguese [assumed]
Verses: own
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: own
Tempo: upbeat
Basic Structure: medley of instrumental solos, framed by a vocal solo
Singing Style: one syllable to one note
Notes on Performers
Kim was born in Seoul, Korea, and lived in various parts of Southeast Asia. He said he began playing drums after a UN Day festival at his school in Singapore. He also learned classical guitar. [5]
After graduation from Berkee, he produced another album of Latin jazz, Ekahsonic, with many of the same musicians. Liutauras Janusaitis played the sax. [6] Kim and Janusaitis continued to work with Junya Fukumoto and Keisuke Higashino as the Boylston Jazz Quartet in Korea, Japan, and Lithuania. Fukumoto had graduated from the Senzoku Gakuen College of Music in Tokyo before he went to Boston, while Higashino graduated from the Osaka University of Arts. [7]
Alvarenga was from Rio Janeiro where she began singing in church when she was seven-years-old. She since returned to Brazil and had a contract with Sony. [8]
The conga player, Jorge Pérez González, was born in Boston and raised in Madrid. Since graduating he remained in Boston where he performed with Patax, a fusion band. [9]
Greenstein was trained in Tel Aviv [10] He recently moved from Brooklyn to Madison, Wisconsin, where he was pursuing a doctorate in music from the University of Wisconsin. [11] He had released a number of albums in the interim, and was working as a sideman and appearing with his own trio.
Availability
MP3: Treasure Hunt. 1 March 2010.
YouTube: uploaded by CDBaby on 19 July 2015.
End Notes
1. Carmen Lundy was discussed in the post for 12 March 2018.
2. "Boylston Jazz." Facebook.
3. "Treasure Hunt by Ekah Hyunjoong Kim." CD Baby website.
4. List of performers from CD Baby, Treasure Hunt.
5. "Bio." Ekah Kim website. Translated by Google Translate.
6. "Ekahsonic by Ekah Hyunjoong Kim." CD baby website.
7. "Ekah Kim Latin Jazz Quintet." Korean All That Jazz website.
8. "About Tais Alvarenga." Facebook.
9. "About Jorge Perez Gonzalez." Facebook.
10. "Jonathan Greenstein." Smalls Live website.
11. "DMA Recital: Jonathan Greenstein, Saxophone." University of Wisconsin press release for an event scheduled for 7 December 2017.
Some jazz musicians have recorded versions of "Kumbaya" that didn’t include even a token reference to the original song. They left their reasons for the use of the word as a title for a jazz performance to their listeners to intuit. Like Carmen Lundy’s juxtaposition of "Kumbaya" with a reference to the esoteric and exoteric codes for Black behavior in Code Noir, it was easy to over-intellectualize their thinking. [1]
Ekah Kim recorded "Kumba Kumbaya" in 2010 with fellow students from the Berkee College of Music. The drummer had formed a quartet in 2009 with Junya Fukumoto on piano and Keisuke Higashino on bass. [2] His preferred instrumental soloist was a saxophonist: on "Kumba Kumbaya" it was an Israeli-born musician, Jonathan Greenstein.
For the MP3 album he produced his senior year, Kim wanted to explore Brazilian jazz. [3] He added a conga player and a Brazilian-born singer. "Kumba Kumbaya" opened and closed with a verse by Tais Alvarenga that made no reference to the original in text or tune. Between her solos, the group reverted to the usual modern jazz format: virtuoso solos by the saxophone and piano over a smooth continuo of piano and congas that replaced the string bass in this role.
Performers
Vocal Soloist: Tais Alvarenga
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloists: Jonathan Greenstein, tenor saxophone; Junya Fukumoto, piano
Instrumental Accompaniment: Keisuke Higashino, bass
Rhythm Accompaniment: Ekah Hyunjoong Kim, drums; Jorge Pérez González, congas [4]
Credits
(C) 2010 Ekah Hyunjoong Kim
Notes on Lyrics
Language: Portuguese [assumed]
Verses: own
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: own
Tempo: upbeat
Basic Structure: medley of instrumental solos, framed by a vocal solo
Singing Style: one syllable to one note
Notes on Performers
Kim was born in Seoul, Korea, and lived in various parts of Southeast Asia. He said he began playing drums after a UN Day festival at his school in Singapore. He also learned classical guitar. [5]
After graduation from Berkee, he produced another album of Latin jazz, Ekahsonic, with many of the same musicians. Liutauras Janusaitis played the sax. [6] Kim and Janusaitis continued to work with Junya Fukumoto and Keisuke Higashino as the Boylston Jazz Quartet in Korea, Japan, and Lithuania. Fukumoto had graduated from the Senzoku Gakuen College of Music in Tokyo before he went to Boston, while Higashino graduated from the Osaka University of Arts. [7]
Alvarenga was from Rio Janeiro where she began singing in church when she was seven-years-old. She since returned to Brazil and had a contract with Sony. [8]
The conga player, Jorge Pérez González, was born in Boston and raised in Madrid. Since graduating he remained in Boston where he performed with Patax, a fusion band. [9]
Greenstein was trained in Tel Aviv [10] He recently moved from Brooklyn to Madison, Wisconsin, where he was pursuing a doctorate in music from the University of Wisconsin. [11] He had released a number of albums in the interim, and was working as a sideman and appearing with his own trio.
Availability
MP3: Treasure Hunt. 1 March 2010.
YouTube: uploaded by CDBaby on 19 July 2015.
End Notes
1. Carmen Lundy was discussed in the post for 12 March 2018.
2. "Boylston Jazz." Facebook.
3. "Treasure Hunt by Ekah Hyunjoong Kim." CD Baby website.
4. List of performers from CD Baby, Treasure Hunt.
5. "Bio." Ekah Kim website. Translated by Google Translate.
6. "Ekahsonic by Ekah Hyunjoong Kim." CD baby website.
7. "Ekah Kim Latin Jazz Quintet." Korean All That Jazz website.
8. "About Tais Alvarenga." Facebook.
9. "About Jorge Perez Gonzalez." Facebook.
10. "Jonathan Greenstein." Smalls Live website.
11. "DMA Recital: Jonathan Greenstein, Saxophone." University of Wisconsin press release for an event scheduled for 7 December 2017.
Wednesday, March 14, 2018
DaPaul - Kumbaya
Topic: Jazz - Word
DaPaul’s version of "Kumbaya" overlaid a jazz-influenced instrumental background with an American soul singing style. The lead performer, David Philips, said he first thought about doing the song after hearing the Escoffery Sisters sing it with their pianist, Paul Gladstone-Reid. [1] Their father was a Seventh-day Adventist who had migrated from Jamaica to London in 1959. [2] He trained them to sing harmony. [3] One sister remembered when they began
"‘We were more expressive vocally and musically than most groups like us from an Adventist background,’ explains Marcia. ‘They wouldn’t normally have a full band and we don’t use drums in our church like the Pentecostals, so to Adventists we were probably quite radical. Yet in the eyes of the Pentecostals we were conservative! Gradually, as we mixed more with people from other backgrounds we got less restrained’." [4]
They were signed by Atlantic Records as jazz artists in 1990, [5] and were credited with introducing modern Black gospel music from the United States into England. [6]
Philips converted "Come by Here" from a song steeped in Biblical references to a lyrical expression of need. Many versions of "Come by Here," including those of Inez Andrews [7] and Doc MacKenzie, [8] drew on an image of Christ as a healer and asked him for something specific, a healing or a blessing. [9] DaPaul’s version was more like Evelyn Turrentine-Agee. [10] He used a generic "it’s broken" that allowed listeners to apply it to their own problems.
Philips’ also did not make his version a narrative of sin and repentance. His protagonist admitted he had done this before, and, like before, needed help. One is left to assume, it, whatever it referred to, would happen again. There was no expectation or demand that he reform. The only constants were the human condition and Christ’s love, and that human condition did not follow from Eve eating an apple.
Philips came from a background like the Escofferys. He said his stage name, DaPaul, came from his "father’s French Guyanese roots." [11] He spent his childhood in a Caribbean church in South London absorbing its aesthetic, then, as a teenager, listened to popular music. [12] He heard everything with naive ears that were unencumbered by the cultural connotations that have developed around specific songs and sounds.
He drew upon the musical vocabulary of Cool jazz, but used a harmonica rather than a horn or saxophone for the solo instrument. More important, he replaced the piano continuo with a vocal one. The background singers sang "la la la" three times, followed by "come by here." Then they sang "la la la" two times, again followed by "come by here." This was used in the introduction, in the transition when he asked God to fix what has been broken, and more often when he recommended others also turn to Him.
Although DaPaul titled its version "Kumbaya," the word was heard only once, in a deep voice, at the end of the transitional "la la la." The melody was entirely his own. What came from "Kumbaya" was the short-shorter-long rhythm of the "la la la." The repetition pattern also matched the basic meter of "Kumbaya": two "la la la" for line one, one "la la la" and "come by here" for line two, two "la la la" for line three, and "come by here" for line four. Phillips usually sang the "come by here" phrase.
Performers
Vocal Soloist: David Philips, tenor
Vocal Group: unidentified
Instrumental Accompaniment: Clive Mellor, harmonica; [13] guitar, keyboard
Rhythm Accompaniment: drum, cymbal
Credits
"‘Kumbaya’ or ‘Come By Here’ is a folk song from Africa/America which the southern slaves used to sing and has been handed down over generations." [14]
Notes on Lyrics
Language: English
Pronunciation: short-shorter-long for "la la la"
Vocabulary
Pronoun: I
Term for Deity: you, Lord, God
Special Terms: reference to "His Eye Is on the Sparrow," gospel song by Civilla D. Martin and Charles H. Gabriel that was popularized by Mahalia Jackson. [15]
Basic Form: rhymed couplets
Line length: most were 8 syllables, but some were 9 or 10
Line Meter: followed the spoken word
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: own
Tempo: slow
Basic Structure: little variation in melody or instrumentation once the pattern was set
Singing Style: used melisma and sustained tones
Notes on Performance
Philips produced the record with Michael Collins using Pro Tools, a music-editing software package. [16] They worked on the project for two years. It’s more than likely Collins played the guitar on "Kumbaya" [17] and Philips the keyboard. A drum pattern probably was borrowed from one of the music libraries. More than likely Philips sang the background part. The software probably was used to multiply the effect of his voice in places.
Audience Perceptions
Bill Buckley asked Philips about "Kumbaya" because "everyone’s intrigued by that –thinking it might be the old folk song." He also believed the harmonica part was inspired by Stevie Wonder. [18]
Notes on Performers
Philips said his mother began teaching him to read music and play piano when he was six-years-old, and sang in church. He noted:
"the music that really caught my ear and engaged me was the folk songs from our Caribbean culture. These songs like ‘I’m gonna lay down my burdens’ or ‘Jesus on the mainline’, ‘Glory Glory Hallelujah’ were all handed down aurally to each generation and the musicians who played them at church played by ear and improvised. I found this intriguing and also started to play piano by ear." [19]
When he was older he began
"going to youth clubs and music community projects like Lewisham Music Academy in Deptford and The Basement Music Project in Covent Garden (near to Pineapple Studios). The musical atmosphere then was like a Fame School because there were many opportunities to join groups, bands and to perform." [20]
Once he made his record with Collins, he went from store to store in London trying to get one to carry it. One owner reviewed it on his store website, and that led others to listen. [21] Once one prominent disk jockey made another song his "Track of the Week" in July 20013 DaPaul’s reputation grew. [22] He found a manager [23] who booked him to Qatar and China, and since has produced a second album, London Town. [24]
The Escoffery Sisters made only one album, Opinions. It did not include "Kumbaya" or "Come by Here." [25] So far as I know, no record exists of their version.
Availability
CD: Soulful Spirit. 30 April 2013.
YouTube: uploaded by CDBaby on 7 August 2015.
End Notes
1. David Philips. Cited by Bill Buckley. "Soul Spirit ... DaPaul Speaks." Soul and Jazz and Funk website. 29 October 2013.
2. "George Stephenson Escoffery – d. 15 March 2010." Messenger [Journal of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in the United Kingdom and Ireland]. 28 May 2010. 15.
3. James Attlee. "The Escofferys: British Gospel’s Escoffery Sisters Re-emerge as R&B’s Escofferys." Cross Rhythms website. 1 February 1992.
4. Marcia Escoffery. Quoted by Attlee.
5. Marcia Escoffery. Cited by Attlee.
6. Attlee.
7. See entry dated 27 August 2017 for discussion of Inez Andrews’ version.
8. See entry dated 12 December 2017 for discussion of Doc McKenzie’s version.
9. This was behind Carmen Lundy’s use of the line "people are suffering" mentioned in the post for 12 March 2018.
10. See entry dated 6 August 2017 for discussion of Evelyn Turrentine-Agee’s version.
11. Philips. Quoted by Buckley.
12. "About DaPaul." DaPaul Music website.
13. Philips. Quoted by Buckley.
14. Philips. Quoted by Buckley.
15. Wikipedia. "His Eye Is on the Sparrow."
16. Mike Collins. Pro Tools 11: Music Production, Recording, Editing, and Mixing. Waltham, Massachusetts: Focal Press, 2013. ix.
17. Collins. He mentioned he played guitar on some tracks. ix.
18. Buckley. He asked: "there’s also a Stevie Wonder style harmonica going on... are you a big fan?"
19. Philips. Quoted by Buckley.
20. Philips. Quoted by Buckley.
21. Buckley.
22. DaPaul Music. The DJ was Peter Young, and the song was "She’s So Entertaining."
23. The manager was Gary Parks. ("DaPaul LONDON." Star Now website.)
24. "DaPaul." Rocket Fuel HQ website.
25. The Escoffery’s. Opinions. Atlantic. 7 September 1991. Track list on Amazon listing for CD.
DaPaul’s version of "Kumbaya" overlaid a jazz-influenced instrumental background with an American soul singing style. The lead performer, David Philips, said he first thought about doing the song after hearing the Escoffery Sisters sing it with their pianist, Paul Gladstone-Reid. [1] Their father was a Seventh-day Adventist who had migrated from Jamaica to London in 1959. [2] He trained them to sing harmony. [3] One sister remembered when they began
"‘We were more expressive vocally and musically than most groups like us from an Adventist background,’ explains Marcia. ‘They wouldn’t normally have a full band and we don’t use drums in our church like the Pentecostals, so to Adventists we were probably quite radical. Yet in the eyes of the Pentecostals we were conservative! Gradually, as we mixed more with people from other backgrounds we got less restrained’." [4]
They were signed by Atlantic Records as jazz artists in 1990, [5] and were credited with introducing modern Black gospel music from the United States into England. [6]
Philips converted "Come by Here" from a song steeped in Biblical references to a lyrical expression of need. Many versions of "Come by Here," including those of Inez Andrews [7] and Doc MacKenzie, [8] drew on an image of Christ as a healer and asked him for something specific, a healing or a blessing. [9] DaPaul’s version was more like Evelyn Turrentine-Agee. [10] He used a generic "it’s broken" that allowed listeners to apply it to their own problems.
Philips’ also did not make his version a narrative of sin and repentance. His protagonist admitted he had done this before, and, like before, needed help. One is left to assume, it, whatever it referred to, would happen again. There was no expectation or demand that he reform. The only constants were the human condition and Christ’s love, and that human condition did not follow from Eve eating an apple.
Philips came from a background like the Escofferys. He said his stage name, DaPaul, came from his "father’s French Guyanese roots." [11] He spent his childhood in a Caribbean church in South London absorbing its aesthetic, then, as a teenager, listened to popular music. [12] He heard everything with naive ears that were unencumbered by the cultural connotations that have developed around specific songs and sounds.
He drew upon the musical vocabulary of Cool jazz, but used a harmonica rather than a horn or saxophone for the solo instrument. More important, he replaced the piano continuo with a vocal one. The background singers sang "la la la" three times, followed by "come by here." Then they sang "la la la" two times, again followed by "come by here." This was used in the introduction, in the transition when he asked God to fix what has been broken, and more often when he recommended others also turn to Him.
Although DaPaul titled its version "Kumbaya," the word was heard only once, in a deep voice, at the end of the transitional "la la la." The melody was entirely his own. What came from "Kumbaya" was the short-shorter-long rhythm of the "la la la." The repetition pattern also matched the basic meter of "Kumbaya": two "la la la" for line one, one "la la la" and "come by here" for line two, two "la la la" for line three, and "come by here" for line four. Phillips usually sang the "come by here" phrase.
Performers
Vocal Soloist: David Philips, tenor
Vocal Group: unidentified
Instrumental Accompaniment: Clive Mellor, harmonica; [13] guitar, keyboard
Rhythm Accompaniment: drum, cymbal
Credits
"‘Kumbaya’ or ‘Come By Here’ is a folk song from Africa/America which the southern slaves used to sing and has been handed down over generations." [14]
Notes on Lyrics
Language: English
Pronunciation: short-shorter-long for "la la la"
Vocabulary
Pronoun: I
Term for Deity: you, Lord, God
Special Terms: reference to "His Eye Is on the Sparrow," gospel song by Civilla D. Martin and Charles H. Gabriel that was popularized by Mahalia Jackson. [15]
Basic Form: rhymed couplets
Line length: most were 8 syllables, but some were 9 or 10
Line Meter: followed the spoken word
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: own
Tempo: slow
Basic Structure: little variation in melody or instrumentation once the pattern was set
Singing Style: used melisma and sustained tones
Notes on Performance
Philips produced the record with Michael Collins using Pro Tools, a music-editing software package. [16] They worked on the project for two years. It’s more than likely Collins played the guitar on "Kumbaya" [17] and Philips the keyboard. A drum pattern probably was borrowed from one of the music libraries. More than likely Philips sang the background part. The software probably was used to multiply the effect of his voice in places.
Audience Perceptions
Bill Buckley asked Philips about "Kumbaya" because "everyone’s intrigued by that –thinking it might be the old folk song." He also believed the harmonica part was inspired by Stevie Wonder. [18]
Notes on Performers
Philips said his mother began teaching him to read music and play piano when he was six-years-old, and sang in church. He noted:
"the music that really caught my ear and engaged me was the folk songs from our Caribbean culture. These songs like ‘I’m gonna lay down my burdens’ or ‘Jesus on the mainline’, ‘Glory Glory Hallelujah’ were all handed down aurally to each generation and the musicians who played them at church played by ear and improvised. I found this intriguing and also started to play piano by ear." [19]
When he was older he began
"going to youth clubs and music community projects like Lewisham Music Academy in Deptford and The Basement Music Project in Covent Garden (near to Pineapple Studios). The musical atmosphere then was like a Fame School because there were many opportunities to join groups, bands and to perform." [20]
Once he made his record with Collins, he went from store to store in London trying to get one to carry it. One owner reviewed it on his store website, and that led others to listen. [21] Once one prominent disk jockey made another song his "Track of the Week" in July 20013 DaPaul’s reputation grew. [22] He found a manager [23] who booked him to Qatar and China, and since has produced a second album, London Town. [24]
The Escoffery Sisters made only one album, Opinions. It did not include "Kumbaya" or "Come by Here." [25] So far as I know, no record exists of their version.
Availability
CD: Soulful Spirit. 30 April 2013.
YouTube: uploaded by CDBaby on 7 August 2015.
End Notes
1. David Philips. Cited by Bill Buckley. "Soul Spirit ... DaPaul Speaks." Soul and Jazz and Funk website. 29 October 2013.
2. "George Stephenson Escoffery – d. 15 March 2010." Messenger [Journal of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in the United Kingdom and Ireland]. 28 May 2010. 15.
3. James Attlee. "The Escofferys: British Gospel’s Escoffery Sisters Re-emerge as R&B’s Escofferys." Cross Rhythms website. 1 February 1992.
4. Marcia Escoffery. Quoted by Attlee.
5. Marcia Escoffery. Cited by Attlee.
6. Attlee.
7. See entry dated 27 August 2017 for discussion of Inez Andrews’ version.
8. See entry dated 12 December 2017 for discussion of Doc McKenzie’s version.
9. This was behind Carmen Lundy’s use of the line "people are suffering" mentioned in the post for 12 March 2018.
10. See entry dated 6 August 2017 for discussion of Evelyn Turrentine-Agee’s version.
11. Philips. Quoted by Buckley.
12. "About DaPaul." DaPaul Music website.
13. Philips. Quoted by Buckley.
14. Philips. Quoted by Buckley.
15. Wikipedia. "His Eye Is on the Sparrow."
16. Mike Collins. Pro Tools 11: Music Production, Recording, Editing, and Mixing. Waltham, Massachusetts: Focal Press, 2013. ix.
17. Collins. He mentioned he played guitar on some tracks. ix.
18. Buckley. He asked: "there’s also a Stevie Wonder style harmonica going on... are you a big fan?"
19. Philips. Quoted by Buckley.
20. Philips. Quoted by Buckley.
21. Buckley.
22. DaPaul Music. The DJ was Peter Young, and the song was "She’s So Entertaining."
23. The manager was Gary Parks. ("DaPaul LONDON." Star Now website.)
24. "DaPaul." Rocket Fuel HQ website.
25. The Escoffery’s. Opinions. Atlantic. 7 September 1991. Track list on Amazon listing for CD.
Monday, March 12, 2018
Carmen Lundy - Kumbaya!
Topic: Jazz - Word
Jazz musicians who used the word "kumbaya" in other songs often did so in recurring choruses. Carmen Lundy’s basic quatrain began "Mother kumbaya" and continued with substitutions of other family members known by a child. One repetition used "come by here" and the family members important to a single mother.
Lundy’s lyric structure was more complex than most. The kumbaya verse usually was followed by backup voices singing a chorus that included allusions to Ecclesiastes with a "time to heal." Lundy repeated the verse-chorus five times.
The lyric iterations were divided into three sections by another melodic line that introduced a narrative element drawn from the original "Come by Here." In the first Lundy sang "people are suffering and need some understanding." The second time she added an injunction for action that included "yes we can make a better life."
After the second imperative, she shortened the verse by combining lines into "Oh mother, father come by here." Her singing style became melismatic. Before she usually had devoted one tone to each syllable, although she did scat the end of "kumbaya" in the final line of the first repetition.
The third imperative repeated a line from many versions of "Come by Here" that directly asked the Lord for help: "I don’t know if I can make it without you." She sang the second-section verse one more time, then began singing "my my my" and scatted to the end.
These segments were dramatized in the video she uploaded to YouTube. It began by showing stylized black stick-figures against white squares framed by black borders with the lyrics flashed across the screen. For the second imperative, it changed to footage of a dark-skinned drummer playing an African goblet drum with a hand drum at his or her side.
The video returned to the stick figures until she began the jazzier "mother, father" lines. Then it changed to footage from a concert. The video began and ended with a spinning circle of striped colors dominated by red that was formed like the bottom of a round basket. This motif also appeared during the third imperative.
She used the basic modern jazz ensemble of a piano, drums, and electric bass. An electric guitar played some solo lines in the introduction and added occasional accents thereafter. The melody used a single note for "mother" and went up slightly on "ba."
Performers
Vocal Soloist: Carmen Lundy, contralto
Vocal Group: Elisabeth Oei, background vocals
Instrumental Accompaniment: Patrice Rushen, piano; Ben Williams, electric bass; Jeff Parker, electric guitar; Carmen Lundy, acoustic guitar [1]
Rhythm Accompaniment: Kendrick Scott, drums
Credits
Written and arranged by Carmen Lundy
Copyright: (C) 2017 Afrasia Productions
"‘Kumbaya,’ originally spoken as ‘Come By Here’ in the south, ‘perhaps in the Gullah language of slaves from Angola brought to the Carolinas, to my understanding,’ says Carmen" on her website. [2]
Notes on Lyrics
Language: English
Pronunciation: koom-bah-yah. "Here" sometimes had a broader vowel sound.
Vocabulary
Pronoun: I, names for family members
Term for Deity: You
Special Terms: suffering, healing
Basic Form: "kumbaya" used in a repeated quatrain with other text
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: her own
Tempo: moderate
Basic Structure: simple repetition with little variation
Singing Style: scat in places
Vocal-Accompaniment Dynamics: the voice was dominant. R. J. Frometa wrote:
"The album’s finale ‘Kumbaya’ brings out some real musical firepower but uses the same relaxed approach that’s characterized so many of these songs. It opens with a bright sheen of keyboards and incorporates guitar in generous doses. The backing vocals are understated and underscore Lundy’s own." [3]
Notes on Performance
Occasion: concert
Location: indoor platform
Microphones: floor mikes for the musicians; Lundy used a corded hand mike.
Clothing: Lundy wore white slacks with wide black stripes and a sheer black jacket. Her hair was cropped. The men were dressed in long-sleeved black shirts and slacks. The pianist wore a yellow dress with her hair loose to the waist.
Notes on Movement
Lundy stepped around as she sang, but stayed within a small circle. Her knees were bent, so her feet barely left the ground, and her body was tilted forward from the waist. She used her left hand to gesture and occasionally stood erect, before leaning forward again.
Audience Perceptions
The album titled Code Noir was released soon after Trump was inaugurated in 2017. Lundy said her selection of songs "also encompass the many emotions that are prevalent in this country right now. We are going through tough times with a country that is sorely divided and many of these tracks reflect the feelings that we as human beings are going through on an individual level." She added "Kumbaya" was "a song to my family. A plea to humanity." [4]
Many critics used those words in their own comments on "Kumbaya." Frometa wrote:
"The song might have a wide social scope, but it is quite personal in some ways – Lundy is clearly singing from the heart." [5]
In Jazz Weekly, George Harris wrote:
"Even her own ‘Kumbaya’ mixes the red African earth with a third world grove, taking the title of the tune back to its equatorial home." [6]
Notes on Performers
Lundy’s grandfather started a gospel group, which her mother was continuing when she was a child in the 1950s. Her brother Curtis [7] remembered their mother "was a powerful, beautiful singer." [8] Lundy herself recalled the rehearsals in their home and
"how the singers worked out harmonies and how they were transported to ‘a whole new dimension’ when they performed." [9]
She majored in music at the University of Miami. It had had a conservatory since its founding, but had only desegregated in 1961 [10] and was still incorporating African-American music forms. One of Lundy’s friends from high school, David Roitstein, [11] enticed her to join his jazz group that was playing at the Eden Roc hotel. She remembered
"We would come out of the classroom and take those ideas to our gigs. And I think that’s where I really began to hone a sense of whatever it was to do jazz singing." [12]
She moved to New York after she had created a demonstration record for Columbia. When it was turned down, she sent it to Herbert Wong who released it in 1985. [13] Lundy later moved to California and formed her own production company with Elisabeth Oei [14] in 2005. [15]
When she made an album released before Code Noir, Lundy played and recorded all the parts in her home studio "to get a working ‘feel’ for how the music might sound." [16] When she was ready to make the final recording, the musicians had to learn their parts by ear, rather than by readying sheet music.
Availability
CD: Code Noir. 17 February 2017.
YouTube: uploaded by Carmen Lundy on 17 July 2017.
End Notes
1. On the video, Andrew Renfroe played guitar and James Genus played bass.
2. "Code Noir" tab. Carmen Lundy website.
3. R. J. Frometa. "Code Noir by Carmen Lundy." Vents Magazine website. 2 March 2017.
4. Carmen Lundy, Code Noir.
5. Frometa.
6. George Harris. "CODE NOIR, the New Album from Vocalist/Composer CARMEN LUNDY." Jazz Weekly website. "Grove" probably was "groove" in the original.
7. Curtis Lundy played string bass in jazz groups. He was a year younger. (Wikipedia. "Curtis Lundy.")
8. Curtis Lundy. Quoted by Christopher Loudon. "Carmen Lundy: Freedom in Music Personified." Jazz Times website. 25 September 2012.
9. Carmen Lundy. Quoted by Bob Weinberg. "Jazz Great Carmen Lundy Reflects on Her Miami Roots." [Deerfield Beach, Florida] Sun-Sentinel. 13 April 2008.
10. Wikipedia. "University of Miami" and "Frost School of Music."
11. David Roitstein became chairman of the Jazz Program at the Herb Alpert School of Music at California Institute of the Arts. He played piano. (School website.)
12. Carmen Lundy. Quoted by Weinberg.
13. Loudon.
14. Elisabeth Oei graduated from high school in Rye, New York, in 1974 and studied voice at the SUNY Fredonia. In 1989 she became the U. S. agent for Sonoton, a German library of music available for use by films and other media. (Her Facebook page).
15. Wikipedia. "Carmen Lundy."
16. "Carmen Lundy." Kuumbwa Jazz Center website. Announcement for concert scheduled on 9 October 2014.
Jazz musicians who used the word "kumbaya" in other songs often did so in recurring choruses. Carmen Lundy’s basic quatrain began "Mother kumbaya" and continued with substitutions of other family members known by a child. One repetition used "come by here" and the family members important to a single mother.
Lundy’s lyric structure was more complex than most. The kumbaya verse usually was followed by backup voices singing a chorus that included allusions to Ecclesiastes with a "time to heal." Lundy repeated the verse-chorus five times.
The lyric iterations were divided into three sections by another melodic line that introduced a narrative element drawn from the original "Come by Here." In the first Lundy sang "people are suffering and need some understanding." The second time she added an injunction for action that included "yes we can make a better life."
After the second imperative, she shortened the verse by combining lines into "Oh mother, father come by here." Her singing style became melismatic. Before she usually had devoted one tone to each syllable, although she did scat the end of "kumbaya" in the final line of the first repetition.
The third imperative repeated a line from many versions of "Come by Here" that directly asked the Lord for help: "I don’t know if I can make it without you." She sang the second-section verse one more time, then began singing "my my my" and scatted to the end.
These segments were dramatized in the video she uploaded to YouTube. It began by showing stylized black stick-figures against white squares framed by black borders with the lyrics flashed across the screen. For the second imperative, it changed to footage of a dark-skinned drummer playing an African goblet drum with a hand drum at his or her side.
The video returned to the stick figures until she began the jazzier "mother, father" lines. Then it changed to footage from a concert. The video began and ended with a spinning circle of striped colors dominated by red that was formed like the bottom of a round basket. This motif also appeared during the third imperative.
She used the basic modern jazz ensemble of a piano, drums, and electric bass. An electric guitar played some solo lines in the introduction and added occasional accents thereafter. The melody used a single note for "mother" and went up slightly on "ba."
Performers
Vocal Soloist: Carmen Lundy, contralto
Vocal Group: Elisabeth Oei, background vocals
Instrumental Accompaniment: Patrice Rushen, piano; Ben Williams, electric bass; Jeff Parker, electric guitar; Carmen Lundy, acoustic guitar [1]
Rhythm Accompaniment: Kendrick Scott, drums
Credits
Written and arranged by Carmen Lundy
Copyright: (C) 2017 Afrasia Productions
"‘Kumbaya,’ originally spoken as ‘Come By Here’ in the south, ‘perhaps in the Gullah language of slaves from Angola brought to the Carolinas, to my understanding,’ says Carmen" on her website. [2]
Notes on Lyrics
Language: English
Pronunciation: koom-bah-yah. "Here" sometimes had a broader vowel sound.
Vocabulary
Pronoun: I, names for family members
Term for Deity: You
Special Terms: suffering, healing
Basic Form: "kumbaya" used in a repeated quatrain with other text
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: her own
Tempo: moderate
Basic Structure: simple repetition with little variation
Singing Style: scat in places
Vocal-Accompaniment Dynamics: the voice was dominant. R. J. Frometa wrote:
"The album’s finale ‘Kumbaya’ brings out some real musical firepower but uses the same relaxed approach that’s characterized so many of these songs. It opens with a bright sheen of keyboards and incorporates guitar in generous doses. The backing vocals are understated and underscore Lundy’s own." [3]
Notes on Performance
Occasion: concert
Location: indoor platform
Microphones: floor mikes for the musicians; Lundy used a corded hand mike.
Clothing: Lundy wore white slacks with wide black stripes and a sheer black jacket. Her hair was cropped. The men were dressed in long-sleeved black shirts and slacks. The pianist wore a yellow dress with her hair loose to the waist.
Notes on Movement
Lundy stepped around as she sang, but stayed within a small circle. Her knees were bent, so her feet barely left the ground, and her body was tilted forward from the waist. She used her left hand to gesture and occasionally stood erect, before leaning forward again.
Audience Perceptions
The album titled Code Noir was released soon after Trump was inaugurated in 2017. Lundy said her selection of songs "also encompass the many emotions that are prevalent in this country right now. We are going through tough times with a country that is sorely divided and many of these tracks reflect the feelings that we as human beings are going through on an individual level." She added "Kumbaya" was "a song to my family. A plea to humanity." [4]
Many critics used those words in their own comments on "Kumbaya." Frometa wrote:
"The song might have a wide social scope, but it is quite personal in some ways – Lundy is clearly singing from the heart." [5]
In Jazz Weekly, George Harris wrote:
"Even her own ‘Kumbaya’ mixes the red African earth with a third world grove, taking the title of the tune back to its equatorial home." [6]
Notes on Performers
Lundy’s grandfather started a gospel group, which her mother was continuing when she was a child in the 1950s. Her brother Curtis [7] remembered their mother "was a powerful, beautiful singer." [8] Lundy herself recalled the rehearsals in their home and
"how the singers worked out harmonies and how they were transported to ‘a whole new dimension’ when they performed." [9]
She majored in music at the University of Miami. It had had a conservatory since its founding, but had only desegregated in 1961 [10] and was still incorporating African-American music forms. One of Lundy’s friends from high school, David Roitstein, [11] enticed her to join his jazz group that was playing at the Eden Roc hotel. She remembered
"We would come out of the classroom and take those ideas to our gigs. And I think that’s where I really began to hone a sense of whatever it was to do jazz singing." [12]
She moved to New York after she had created a demonstration record for Columbia. When it was turned down, she sent it to Herbert Wong who released it in 1985. [13] Lundy later moved to California and formed her own production company with Elisabeth Oei [14] in 2005. [15]
When she made an album released before Code Noir, Lundy played and recorded all the parts in her home studio "to get a working ‘feel’ for how the music might sound." [16] When she was ready to make the final recording, the musicians had to learn their parts by ear, rather than by readying sheet music.
Availability
CD: Code Noir. 17 February 2017.
YouTube: uploaded by Carmen Lundy on 17 July 2017.
End Notes
1. On the video, Andrew Renfroe played guitar and James Genus played bass.
2. "Code Noir" tab. Carmen Lundy website.
3. R. J. Frometa. "Code Noir by Carmen Lundy." Vents Magazine website. 2 March 2017.
4. Carmen Lundy, Code Noir.
5. Frometa.
6. George Harris. "CODE NOIR, the New Album from Vocalist/Composer CARMEN LUNDY." Jazz Weekly website. "Grove" probably was "groove" in the original.
7. Curtis Lundy played string bass in jazz groups. He was a year younger. (Wikipedia. "Curtis Lundy.")
8. Curtis Lundy. Quoted by Christopher Loudon. "Carmen Lundy: Freedom in Music Personified." Jazz Times website. 25 September 2012.
9. Carmen Lundy. Quoted by Bob Weinberg. "Jazz Great Carmen Lundy Reflects on Her Miami Roots." [Deerfield Beach, Florida] Sun-Sentinel. 13 April 2008.
10. Wikipedia. "University of Miami" and "Frost School of Music."
11. David Roitstein became chairman of the Jazz Program at the Herb Alpert School of Music at California Institute of the Arts. He played piano. (School website.)
12. Carmen Lundy. Quoted by Weinberg.
13. Loudon.
14. Elisabeth Oei graduated from high school in Rye, New York, in 1974 and studied voice at the SUNY Fredonia. In 1989 she became the U. S. agent for Sonoton, a German library of music available for use by films and other media. (Her Facebook page).
15. Wikipedia. "Carmen Lundy."
16. "Carmen Lundy." Kuumbwa Jazz Center website. Announcement for concert scheduled on 9 October 2014.
Saturday, March 10, 2018
Eva Vea - Kumbaya
Topic: Jazz - Word
The vocal analog to jazz musicians who use "Kumbaya" as the pretext for a display of musical skill are the singers who use the word "kumbaya" with different tunes and lyrics. Eva Vea changed the pronoun to "I" and ended with supplications to "Oh Lord" in her 2014 version.
Vea had begun singing in choirs in Stavanger, Norway, when she was 15, [1] and had begun offering her services for meetings, weddings and other events. She said she sang "everything from jazz / fusion to soul / gospel and hymns" and played piano. [2]
She met Sammy Sylvester "on one of her choir’s tours." [3] He was a free-lance producer from Trinidad who, apparently, promoted his services to the more talented individuals he saw in gospel music concerts. Stephen John said he made his album in 2011 "only after I met producer Sammy Sylvester who was impressed with my vocals he heard on my previous album." [4]
Isaac Agyeman listed Sylvester in the credits for his I’m on My Way album. Sylvester played keys, guitar, bass, and drums; programmed the drum machine, and hired others to play other instruments and sing backup vocals. In addition, Sylvester rented time in recording studios in Nashville, Tennessee, and paid someone to do the mixing. [5]
Vea said "she decided to do songs she knew from Sunday school and make them into songs for all ages, because of the song’s great lyrics and meaning beyond childhood." [6] She was probably a second soprano. Her melody for "Kumbaya" had the characteristics of that part, sometimes going high on a word.
She preferred singing slowly; none of the videos she uploaded to YouTube had a quick beat. Sylvester took her tempo and added instrumentation pioneered by Cool jazz musicians in the 1950s. He used the basic piano and minimalist drums, with a wailing trumpet soloist who played in the interludes between verses.
After Vea had sung the three verses of "Kumbaya" she began repeating "Oh Lord" or humming while a background voice or voices sang "kumbaya my lord" very softly. Sylvester may have dubbed her voice into the support part. The equipment available for rent in Nashville would have been the most sophisticated available. [7]
Performers
Vocal Soloist: Eva Vea
Vocal Group: may be Eva Vea
Instrumental Accompaniment: piano, horn
Rhythm Accompaniment: block, drum set
Credits
Copyright: 2015 Eva Vea [8]
Notes on Lyrics
Language: English
Pronunciation: first two syllables of "kumbaya" very short, and last extended, but without any emphasis
Verses: kumbaya, praying, crying, own; references to singing
Vocabulary
Pronoun: I
Term for Deity: Lord
Special Terms: none
Basic Form: four-verse song with extended ending and partial recapitulation
Verse Repetition Pattern: none
Ending: repeated "oh Lord" many times, with "kumbaya," "I’m singing," and "I’m praying" as isolated phrases
Unique Features: none
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Tempo: slow
Basic Structure: AB with A using strophic alternation of verse and instrument.
Singing Style: one syllable to one note
Instrumental Style: Cool jazz
Notes on Performance
Occasion: summer 2014 [9]
Location: Nashville [10]
Notes on Performers
Stavanger’s prosperity during Vea’s childhood came from the North Sea oil industry. [11] After she returned from Nashville, she posted videos of herself playing a keyboard, rather than piano. [12] She often used the name Eva Irene Vea.
Sylvester moved to the United States in 1992. [13] On LinkedIn he indicated he began Leumas Music in 1995. Most recently it suggested he specialized in production, artist development, and concert organization. [14]
Stephen John said he discovered "his gift of music when he won the" Full Gospel Song festival in 1998. After making his record his Sylvester, he released other singles in Trinidad. [15]
Isaac Agyeman earned a master’s degree in music from California State University Long Beach, but also studied law at Pepperdine. The African American practiced law, and played "saxophone and keyboards for a local church" in San Diego. [16]
Availability
MP3: Angels. 12 September 2014.
YouTube: uploaded by Eva Irene Vea on 3 December 2014.
End Notes
1. "Eva Vea." Presskit website.
2. "Eva Vea - Sanger og låtskriver." Facebook.
3. "Eva Vea." KlickTrack website.
4. Bobie-lee Dixon. "Gospel Singer Ready To Soar." Trinidad and Tobago Guardian website. 7 May 2011.
5. "Agyeman, Isaac." Indie-Pool website.
6. KlickTrack.
7. Agyeman’s record was recorded in the Bonus Room of the Sound Stage Studios in Nashville. (Indie-Pool)
8. Amazon listing for Vea’s Angels.
9. Notes for YouTube video of "Kumbaya."
10. YouTube, Kumbaya.
11. Wikipedia. "Stavanger."
12. "Medley Jul Eva Vea." Medley of Christmas songs uploaded by Eva Irene Vea to YouTube on 29 November 2015.
13. "Soming ’bout Me." Sammy Sylvester website.
14. "Sammy Sylvester." LinkedIn.
15. "Biography" Stephen John Music website.
16. "Bio." Isaac Agyeman Music website.
The vocal analog to jazz musicians who use "Kumbaya" as the pretext for a display of musical skill are the singers who use the word "kumbaya" with different tunes and lyrics. Eva Vea changed the pronoun to "I" and ended with supplications to "Oh Lord" in her 2014 version.
Vea had begun singing in choirs in Stavanger, Norway, when she was 15, [1] and had begun offering her services for meetings, weddings and other events. She said she sang "everything from jazz / fusion to soul / gospel and hymns" and played piano. [2]
She met Sammy Sylvester "on one of her choir’s tours." [3] He was a free-lance producer from Trinidad who, apparently, promoted his services to the more talented individuals he saw in gospel music concerts. Stephen John said he made his album in 2011 "only after I met producer Sammy Sylvester who was impressed with my vocals he heard on my previous album." [4]
Isaac Agyeman listed Sylvester in the credits for his I’m on My Way album. Sylvester played keys, guitar, bass, and drums; programmed the drum machine, and hired others to play other instruments and sing backup vocals. In addition, Sylvester rented time in recording studios in Nashville, Tennessee, and paid someone to do the mixing. [5]
Vea said "she decided to do songs she knew from Sunday school and make them into songs for all ages, because of the song’s great lyrics and meaning beyond childhood." [6] She was probably a second soprano. Her melody for "Kumbaya" had the characteristics of that part, sometimes going high on a word.
She preferred singing slowly; none of the videos she uploaded to YouTube had a quick beat. Sylvester took her tempo and added instrumentation pioneered by Cool jazz musicians in the 1950s. He used the basic piano and minimalist drums, with a wailing trumpet soloist who played in the interludes between verses.
After Vea had sung the three verses of "Kumbaya" she began repeating "Oh Lord" or humming while a background voice or voices sang "kumbaya my lord" very softly. Sylvester may have dubbed her voice into the support part. The equipment available for rent in Nashville would have been the most sophisticated available. [7]
Performers
Vocal Soloist: Eva Vea
Vocal Group: may be Eva Vea
Instrumental Accompaniment: piano, horn
Rhythm Accompaniment: block, drum set
Credits
Copyright: 2015 Eva Vea [8]
Notes on Lyrics
Language: English
Pronunciation: first two syllables of "kumbaya" very short, and last extended, but without any emphasis
Verses: kumbaya, praying, crying, own; references to singing
Vocabulary
Pronoun: I
Term for Deity: Lord
Special Terms: none
Basic Form: four-verse song with extended ending and partial recapitulation
Verse Repetition Pattern: none
Ending: repeated "oh Lord" many times, with "kumbaya," "I’m singing," and "I’m praying" as isolated phrases
Unique Features: none
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Tempo: slow
Basic Structure: AB with A using strophic alternation of verse and instrument.
Singing Style: one syllable to one note
Instrumental Style: Cool jazz
Notes on Performance
Occasion: summer 2014 [9]
Location: Nashville [10]
Notes on Performers
Stavanger’s prosperity during Vea’s childhood came from the North Sea oil industry. [11] After she returned from Nashville, she posted videos of herself playing a keyboard, rather than piano. [12] She often used the name Eva Irene Vea.
Sylvester moved to the United States in 1992. [13] On LinkedIn he indicated he began Leumas Music in 1995. Most recently it suggested he specialized in production, artist development, and concert organization. [14]
Stephen John said he discovered "his gift of music when he won the" Full Gospel Song festival in 1998. After making his record his Sylvester, he released other singles in Trinidad. [15]
Isaac Agyeman earned a master’s degree in music from California State University Long Beach, but also studied law at Pepperdine. The African American practiced law, and played "saxophone and keyboards for a local church" in San Diego. [16]
Availability
MP3: Angels. 12 September 2014.
YouTube: uploaded by Eva Irene Vea on 3 December 2014.
End Notes
1. "Eva Vea." Presskit website.
2. "Eva Vea - Sanger og låtskriver." Facebook.
3. "Eva Vea." KlickTrack website.
4. Bobie-lee Dixon. "Gospel Singer Ready To Soar." Trinidad and Tobago Guardian website. 7 May 2011.
5. "Agyeman, Isaac." Indie-Pool website.
6. KlickTrack.
7. Agyeman’s record was recorded in the Bonus Room of the Sound Stage Studios in Nashville. (Indie-Pool)
8. Amazon listing for Vea’s Angels.
9. Notes for YouTube video of "Kumbaya."
10. YouTube, Kumbaya.
11. Wikipedia. "Stavanger."
12. "Medley Jul Eva Vea." Medley of Christmas songs uploaded by Eva Irene Vea to YouTube on 29 November 2015.
13. "Soming ’bout Me." Sammy Sylvester website.
14. "Sammy Sylvester." LinkedIn.
15. "Biography" Stephen John Music website.
16. "Bio." Isaac Agyeman Music website.
Thursday, March 8, 2018
DaJubilus - Kum Ba Yah
Topic: Jazz - Modern
Music is more than virtuosity. Repertoire and technique can be taught, but the aesthetic that allows an individual to perpetuate a tradition - be it jazz, Southern gospel, or girls’ camp songs - is absorbed through exposure and participation. The post for 26 February 2018 suggested how colleges were providing the rudiments for musicians like those who played with Terell Stafford; if they attracted a talented group of students, the youthful interactions replicated the sort of music sessions at Minton’s Playhouse that gave birth to Bebop in the 1940s. [1] But, as Derrick Lewis discovered, absent that peer group one could graduate and still not be fully initiated. [2]
Carlos Alexis Caraballo was exposed to a musical instrument when he was eight-years-old in Puerto Rico, [3] and "grew up listening and playing music among his friends and family." [4] He said he wanted formal training, but "life and parents brought me through a totally different path and professional career not related to music." He finally got some training as an adult at Miami Dade College in south Florida. [5]
When an interviewer asked Caraballo what songs first influenced him, his list didn’t include the founders of Bebop and other forms of modern jazz. Instead, he said they were:
"The version of ‘A Night in Tunisia’ the musical composition written by Dizzy Gillespie and Frank Paparelli in 1942, performed by Papo Lucca and La Sonora Poncena [6] and ‘Watermelon Man’ by Mongo Santamaria a 1962 arrangement [7] of Herbie Hancock’s 1961 original composition of the same name." [8]
Caraballo had heard enough music to recognize his own limitations. He remembered the time he had spent in Miami Dade’s Commercial Music Ensemble had "built confidence in me, self-assurance during on stage performance and musical projection." However, instead of making a record of his own playing, he used his entrepreneurial instincts to apply the classes that taught the skills needed to produce a recording with modern equipment [9] to hire more skilled musicians to realize his vision.
He took some songs from David Arivett’s Jazz in Church series to Puerto Rico. He didn’t say if the men in DaJubilus read the sheet music or listened to the tape that came with the score. What was clear was they Hispanicized Arivett’s "Latin jazz arrangement" of "Kum Ba Yah."
Arivett’s arrangement was rooted in the modern jazz tradition that employed a piano as the backbone instrument and saxophones as soloists. Instead of the usual drum and string bass, Arivett used percussion instruments associated with Latin music, and augmented the piano with a low drone played by the electric bass. Among the exotic instruments he suggested was the Puerto Rican güiro, a ridged gourd rubbed by a stick. [10]
Like Lucca and Santamaria, Caraballo found the common areas in the African-American jazz style and his own taste, and modified the rest. [11] Arivett’s piano had the timbre of ragtime, but the Puerto Rican keyboard had a more piercing sound like that of a harpsichord. DaJubilus made the rhythm obvious with a steadily beaten cymbal. Caraballo used drums in the instrumental interlude, then added a whistle in the final iterations.
Like Lewis, Averitt devoted more time to iterations of the basic "Kumbaya" melody than to pure instrumental music in his arrangement than did Stafford. This may be one of the compromises artists make who try to perform jazz for conservative religious audiences. His main variations were giving little time to "my" and extending "yah" in the first three lines with staccato tonguing of "by" each time. In the final line, he used a turn on "kum."
While Dancing in the Spirit was described as "Christian" on Amazon, [12] Caraballo said the record of gospel songs was intended to honor his parents and "it encompassed a number of songs from his childhood." [13]
Performers
Averitt
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: alto and tenor saxophones
Instrumental Accompaniment: piano
Rhythm Accompaniment: electric bass guitar, drum set, side stick, guiro, congas, timbales, cowbells, shakere
DaJubilus
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: two saxophones
Instrumental Accompaniment: primarily keyboard; accents by trumpet, whistle
Rhythm Accompaniment: primarily cymbals
Credits
Arivett
Negro spiritual
Arranged by David Arivett
© Copyright 2009 Songs Of David Music
DaJubilus
(C) 2011 DaJubilus Latin Ensemble
"Music composed and arranged by the David Arivett" [14]
Notes on Lyrics
There were none
Notes on Music
Arivett
Time Signature: 3/4
Tempo: Latin beat, quarter note = 75 beats per minute
DaJubilus
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Tempo: fast
Basic Structure: ABA, with A the melody
Notes on Performance
Location: Puerto Rico
Notes on Performers
Arivett was raised in Ontario, California, [15] where he began playing violin and viola. He started mastering the piano as a teenager, [16] then majored in music at California State University-Fresno. [17] After graduation, he directed church choirs and bands, eventually becoming a clinician. [18]
He said he was first exposed to jazz in church, [19] and has written: "My main goal is to celebrate the miracle of existence as well as savor and enjoy the beautiful gift of music...Celebrate today!" [20]
Caraballo rarely used his full name, preferring his given names. However, his production company was his name spelled backwards, OllabaraC.
Availability
Arivett
Sheet Music: "Kum Ba Yah." Songs of David website. The PDF came with an MP3 file. The website included a sample from it.
DaJubilus
Album: Dancing in the Spirit. MP3. 6 October 2011.
YouTube: DaJubilus version uploaded by CDBaby on 23 August 2015.
End Notes
1. Wikipedia. "Thelonious Monk."
2. Derrick Lewis was discussed in the post for 4 March 2018.
3. "Dajubilus." Radio Swiss Jazz website.
4. "DaJubilus Latin Ensemble." Facebook.
5. Radio Swiss Jazz.
6. Sonora Ponceña. New Heights. Inca Records JMIS 1074. 1980. (Discogs entry for album).
7. Mongo Santamaria and His Orchestra. Watermelon Man. Battle BM 6120. 1963. (Discogs entry for album).
8. Radio Swiss Jazz.
9. Radio Swiss Jazz.
10. Wikipedia. "Güiro."
11. In an interview, Hancock said he had created the rhythm for "Watermelon Man" from the sound of horse-drawn wagon wheels on cobblestones in Chicago. He added, when he first played it for Sanatamaria, the Cuban-born Congo player said "that’s a Guajira." ("Herbie Hancock - Watermelon Man." Unidentified tape of televised concert with British interviewer uploaded to YouTube by path0610 on 7 January 2012.)
12. Amazon page for Dancing in the Spirit.
13. Facebook, DaJubilus.
14. Facebook, DaJubilus.
15. "About David Arivett." Facebook.
16. "Bio." Songs of David website.
17. "David Arivett." LinkedIn.
18. Songs of David.
19. Songs of David.
20. LinkedIn.
Music is more than virtuosity. Repertoire and technique can be taught, but the aesthetic that allows an individual to perpetuate a tradition - be it jazz, Southern gospel, or girls’ camp songs - is absorbed through exposure and participation. The post for 26 February 2018 suggested how colleges were providing the rudiments for musicians like those who played with Terell Stafford; if they attracted a talented group of students, the youthful interactions replicated the sort of music sessions at Minton’s Playhouse that gave birth to Bebop in the 1940s. [1] But, as Derrick Lewis discovered, absent that peer group one could graduate and still not be fully initiated. [2]
Carlos Alexis Caraballo was exposed to a musical instrument when he was eight-years-old in Puerto Rico, [3] and "grew up listening and playing music among his friends and family." [4] He said he wanted formal training, but "life and parents brought me through a totally different path and professional career not related to music." He finally got some training as an adult at Miami Dade College in south Florida. [5]
When an interviewer asked Caraballo what songs first influenced him, his list didn’t include the founders of Bebop and other forms of modern jazz. Instead, he said they were:
"The version of ‘A Night in Tunisia’ the musical composition written by Dizzy Gillespie and Frank Paparelli in 1942, performed by Papo Lucca and La Sonora Poncena [6] and ‘Watermelon Man’ by Mongo Santamaria a 1962 arrangement [7] of Herbie Hancock’s 1961 original composition of the same name." [8]
Caraballo had heard enough music to recognize his own limitations. He remembered the time he had spent in Miami Dade’s Commercial Music Ensemble had "built confidence in me, self-assurance during on stage performance and musical projection." However, instead of making a record of his own playing, he used his entrepreneurial instincts to apply the classes that taught the skills needed to produce a recording with modern equipment [9] to hire more skilled musicians to realize his vision.
He took some songs from David Arivett’s Jazz in Church series to Puerto Rico. He didn’t say if the men in DaJubilus read the sheet music or listened to the tape that came with the score. What was clear was they Hispanicized Arivett’s "Latin jazz arrangement" of "Kum Ba Yah."
Arivett’s arrangement was rooted in the modern jazz tradition that employed a piano as the backbone instrument and saxophones as soloists. Instead of the usual drum and string bass, Arivett used percussion instruments associated with Latin music, and augmented the piano with a low drone played by the electric bass. Among the exotic instruments he suggested was the Puerto Rican güiro, a ridged gourd rubbed by a stick. [10]
Like Lucca and Santamaria, Caraballo found the common areas in the African-American jazz style and his own taste, and modified the rest. [11] Arivett’s piano had the timbre of ragtime, but the Puerto Rican keyboard had a more piercing sound like that of a harpsichord. DaJubilus made the rhythm obvious with a steadily beaten cymbal. Caraballo used drums in the instrumental interlude, then added a whistle in the final iterations.
Like Lewis, Averitt devoted more time to iterations of the basic "Kumbaya" melody than to pure instrumental music in his arrangement than did Stafford. This may be one of the compromises artists make who try to perform jazz for conservative religious audiences. His main variations were giving little time to "my" and extending "yah" in the first three lines with staccato tonguing of "by" each time. In the final line, he used a turn on "kum."
While Dancing in the Spirit was described as "Christian" on Amazon, [12] Caraballo said the record of gospel songs was intended to honor his parents and "it encompassed a number of songs from his childhood." [13]
Performers
Averitt
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: alto and tenor saxophones
Instrumental Accompaniment: piano
Rhythm Accompaniment: electric bass guitar, drum set, side stick, guiro, congas, timbales, cowbells, shakere
DaJubilus
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: two saxophones
Instrumental Accompaniment: primarily keyboard; accents by trumpet, whistle
Rhythm Accompaniment: primarily cymbals
Credits
Arivett
Negro spiritual
Arranged by David Arivett
© Copyright 2009 Songs Of David Music
DaJubilus
(C) 2011 DaJubilus Latin Ensemble
"Music composed and arranged by the David Arivett" [14]
Notes on Lyrics
There were none
Notes on Music
Arivett
Time Signature: 3/4
Tempo: Latin beat, quarter note = 75 beats per minute
DaJubilus
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Tempo: fast
Basic Structure: ABA, with A the melody
Notes on Performance
Location: Puerto Rico
Notes on Performers
Arivett was raised in Ontario, California, [15] where he began playing violin and viola. He started mastering the piano as a teenager, [16] then majored in music at California State University-Fresno. [17] After graduation, he directed church choirs and bands, eventually becoming a clinician. [18]
He said he was first exposed to jazz in church, [19] and has written: "My main goal is to celebrate the miracle of existence as well as savor and enjoy the beautiful gift of music...Celebrate today!" [20]
Caraballo rarely used his full name, preferring his given names. However, his production company was his name spelled backwards, OllabaraC.
Availability
Arivett
Sheet Music: "Kum Ba Yah." Songs of David website. The PDF came with an MP3 file. The website included a sample from it.
DaJubilus
Album: Dancing in the Spirit. MP3. 6 October 2011.
YouTube: DaJubilus version uploaded by CDBaby on 23 August 2015.
End Notes
1. Wikipedia. "Thelonious Monk."
2. Derrick Lewis was discussed in the post for 4 March 2018.
3. "Dajubilus." Radio Swiss Jazz website.
4. "DaJubilus Latin Ensemble." Facebook.
5. Radio Swiss Jazz.
6. Sonora Ponceña. New Heights. Inca Records JMIS 1074. 1980. (Discogs entry for album).
7. Mongo Santamaria and His Orchestra. Watermelon Man. Battle BM 6120. 1963. (Discogs entry for album).
8. Radio Swiss Jazz.
9. Radio Swiss Jazz.
10. Wikipedia. "Güiro."
11. In an interview, Hancock said he had created the rhythm for "Watermelon Man" from the sound of horse-drawn wagon wheels on cobblestones in Chicago. He added, when he first played it for Sanatamaria, the Cuban-born Congo player said "that’s a Guajira." ("Herbie Hancock - Watermelon Man." Unidentified tape of televised concert with British interviewer uploaded to YouTube by path0610 on 7 January 2012.)
12. Amazon page for Dancing in the Spirit.
13. Facebook, DaJubilus.
14. Facebook, DaJubilus.
15. "About David Arivett." Facebook.
16. "Bio." Songs of David website.
17. "David Arivett." LinkedIn.
18. Songs of David.
19. Songs of David.
20. LinkedIn.
Tuesday, March 6, 2018
Nicolas Vatomanga et Tony Rabeson - Kumbaya
Topic: Jazz - Modern
Often, with the serial solo jazz form described by John Wesley Work in the post for 26 February 2018, the melody was only a pretext for what followed. Partly this was inherent in the form, and partly it was a reaction to the restrictions imposed by copyright laws. The Thelonious Monk Institute said improvisation became important to Bebop musicians during ASCAP’s ban on the use of its music while the organization negotiated a new contract with the radio networks in 1941. [1]
The olio format was ideal for a French concert in 2017 that brought together two accomplished musicians from Madagascar [2] and students from a local conservatory. The Association la Feuille Noire sponsored master classes by the older men in the morning, some workshops with students, and then the concert. The ensemble’s practice time together was limited, and their performance depended on shared conventions. [3]
Nicolas Vatomanga played the melody for "Kumbaya" through once on tenor saxophone, and didn’t vary the tune thereafter so the student alto saxophone player could play with him. He syncopated it by making the "my" very short. He extended the second "yah" in the second line with melisma, and simplified the last line by playing "Lord" on one tone and giving "kumbaya" only two beats on the same note.
After the repetition with the alto saxophone, each of the musicians played a solo that made no reference to the melody. The keyboard player, Edison Knight, played chords that provided continuity along with the drums and electric stringed instruments.
After the last solo, Vatomanga played the "Kumbaya" melody again. After he and the group repeated the last line two times, he played one final solo that exploited the lowest register of his instrument as John Coltrane had done in "Alabama." [4]
Performers
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Accompaniment: Nicolas Vatomanga, tenor saxophone; Edison Knight, keyboard; Robin Nitram, electric guitar; Maxime Degeuser, alto saxophone [5]
Rhythm Accompaniment: Tony Rabeson, drums; Grégoire Vo, electric bass [6]
Credits
None given
Notes on Lyrics
There were none
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Tempo: moderate
Basic Structure: medley in the form of a theme and improvisations
Notes on Performance
Occasion: concert following master classes, 27 May 2017; sponsored by Association la Feuille Noire
Location: auditorium, Conservatoire de Musique, Lagny-sur-Marne, France
Microphones: floor mikes for saxophones; the other instruments were directly connected to amplifiers.
Clothing: jeans and shirts
Notes on Movement
Vatomanga kept time with his right leg; all one could see behind the amplifier at the front of the stage was his right knee move up and down. He occasionally bent backwards when he was playing. The French musicians did not mark time, but the saxophone player bent his body backward and forward, while the electric guitar player moved his head in an arc.
Notes on Audience
Audience was seated on plastic chairs; it applauded each solo and at end.
Notes on Performers
Vatomanga started learning to play flute in Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar, when he was four. He discovered jazz when he attended a concert by Talib Kibwe. The fourteen-year-old first reproduced everything he had heard on flute, and then started to learn the sax. At this point, he started listening to the important modern American jazz players, including Charley Parker, Sonny Rollins, and Stan Getz. John Coltrane had the greatest influence, according to Wikipedia. [7]
After graduating from college, he moved to France to study mathematics at Aix-Marseille Université in 1993. The next year, he entered the Conservatoire Darius-Milhaud d’Aix-en-Provence and soon after began working with a cousin of Tony Rabeson. [8]
Rabeson’s father was a Madagascar jazz pianist, Jeanot Rabeson; he learned the fundamentals at his father’s knee. He moved to France when he was 20 and began working as a sideman. Around 2001 he played in Eric Le Lann’s trio that included Vatomanga. [9]
Vatomanga returned to Madagascar in 2004, where he formed his own groups. [10] His MadaJazz group played much more dynamic music than the Langy-sur-Marne concert. He had two drummers, one with a drum set and one with a group of African drums. "Soimanga" featured the latter with keyboards. He played duets with the trumpet player. [11]
In the French concert, neither he nor Rabeson showed all their skills. Both recognized they were there as mentors, and did what they could to make the students sound good, and play the kind of jazz the predominately white audience was expecting. Lagny-sur-Marne was in the region of the Disneyland Paris park. [12]
Availability
YouTube: uploaded by jazzakely on 27 May 2017
End Notes
1. Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Style Sheet. "Bebop." Jazz in America website.
2. Madagascar lies off the coast of east Africa in the Indian ocean. The French invaded in 1883, and held it as a colony until 1960. The population was a mix of Malagasy who came from Borneo centuries before, and later migrants from China, India and Comoros island to the north. The Malagasy had intermarried with local Africans, and, in 2010, were divided into 18 subgroups. (Wikipedia. "Madagascar.")
3. Association la feuille noire. Facebook post for 3 May 2017.
4. Coltrane’s version of "Alabama" was discussed in the post for 2 March 2018.
5. Association la feuille noire.
6. Association la feuille noire.
7. Wikipedia. "Nicolas Vatomanga."
8. Wikipedia, Vatomanga.
9. French Wikipedia. "Tony Rabeson."
10. Wikipedia, Vatomanga.
11. "Le groupe MadaJazz (Mad a Jazz) Soimanga - Madagascar." Uploaded to YouTube by madajazz on 22 September 2012. The performance was from February 2012.
12. Wikipedia. "Marne-la-Vallée."
Often, with the serial solo jazz form described by John Wesley Work in the post for 26 February 2018, the melody was only a pretext for what followed. Partly this was inherent in the form, and partly it was a reaction to the restrictions imposed by copyright laws. The Thelonious Monk Institute said improvisation became important to Bebop musicians during ASCAP’s ban on the use of its music while the organization negotiated a new contract with the radio networks in 1941. [1]
The olio format was ideal for a French concert in 2017 that brought together two accomplished musicians from Madagascar [2] and students from a local conservatory. The Association la Feuille Noire sponsored master classes by the older men in the morning, some workshops with students, and then the concert. The ensemble’s practice time together was limited, and their performance depended on shared conventions. [3]
Nicolas Vatomanga played the melody for "Kumbaya" through once on tenor saxophone, and didn’t vary the tune thereafter so the student alto saxophone player could play with him. He syncopated it by making the "my" very short. He extended the second "yah" in the second line with melisma, and simplified the last line by playing "Lord" on one tone and giving "kumbaya" only two beats on the same note.
After the repetition with the alto saxophone, each of the musicians played a solo that made no reference to the melody. The keyboard player, Edison Knight, played chords that provided continuity along with the drums and electric stringed instruments.
After the last solo, Vatomanga played the "Kumbaya" melody again. After he and the group repeated the last line two times, he played one final solo that exploited the lowest register of his instrument as John Coltrane had done in "Alabama." [4]
Performers
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Accompaniment: Nicolas Vatomanga, tenor saxophone; Edison Knight, keyboard; Robin Nitram, electric guitar; Maxime Degeuser, alto saxophone [5]
Rhythm Accompaniment: Tony Rabeson, drums; Grégoire Vo, electric bass [6]
Credits
None given
Notes on Lyrics
There were none
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Tempo: moderate
Basic Structure: medley in the form of a theme and improvisations
Notes on Performance
Occasion: concert following master classes, 27 May 2017; sponsored by Association la Feuille Noire
Location: auditorium, Conservatoire de Musique, Lagny-sur-Marne, France
Microphones: floor mikes for saxophones; the other instruments were directly connected to amplifiers.
Clothing: jeans and shirts
Notes on Movement
Vatomanga kept time with his right leg; all one could see behind the amplifier at the front of the stage was his right knee move up and down. He occasionally bent backwards when he was playing. The French musicians did not mark time, but the saxophone player bent his body backward and forward, while the electric guitar player moved his head in an arc.
Notes on Audience
Audience was seated on plastic chairs; it applauded each solo and at end.
Notes on Performers
Vatomanga started learning to play flute in Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar, when he was four. He discovered jazz when he attended a concert by Talib Kibwe. The fourteen-year-old first reproduced everything he had heard on flute, and then started to learn the sax. At this point, he started listening to the important modern American jazz players, including Charley Parker, Sonny Rollins, and Stan Getz. John Coltrane had the greatest influence, according to Wikipedia. [7]
After graduating from college, he moved to France to study mathematics at Aix-Marseille Université in 1993. The next year, he entered the Conservatoire Darius-Milhaud d’Aix-en-Provence and soon after began working with a cousin of Tony Rabeson. [8]
Rabeson’s father was a Madagascar jazz pianist, Jeanot Rabeson; he learned the fundamentals at his father’s knee. He moved to France when he was 20 and began working as a sideman. Around 2001 he played in Eric Le Lann’s trio that included Vatomanga. [9]
Vatomanga returned to Madagascar in 2004, where he formed his own groups. [10] His MadaJazz group played much more dynamic music than the Langy-sur-Marne concert. He had two drummers, one with a drum set and one with a group of African drums. "Soimanga" featured the latter with keyboards. He played duets with the trumpet player. [11]
In the French concert, neither he nor Rabeson showed all their skills. Both recognized they were there as mentors, and did what they could to make the students sound good, and play the kind of jazz the predominately white audience was expecting. Lagny-sur-Marne was in the region of the Disneyland Paris park. [12]
Availability
YouTube: uploaded by jazzakely on 27 May 2017
End Notes
1. Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Style Sheet. "Bebop." Jazz in America website.
2. Madagascar lies off the coast of east Africa in the Indian ocean. The French invaded in 1883, and held it as a colony until 1960. The population was a mix of Malagasy who came from Borneo centuries before, and later migrants from China, India and Comoros island to the north. The Malagasy had intermarried with local Africans, and, in 2010, were divided into 18 subgroups. (Wikipedia. "Madagascar.")
3. Association la feuille noire. Facebook post for 3 May 2017.
4. Coltrane’s version of "Alabama" was discussed in the post for 2 March 2018.
5. Association la feuille noire.
6. Association la feuille noire.
7. Wikipedia. "Nicolas Vatomanga."
8. Wikipedia, Vatomanga.
9. French Wikipedia. "Tony Rabeson."
10. Wikipedia, Vatomanga.
11. "Le groupe MadaJazz (Mad a Jazz) Soimanga - Madagascar." Uploaded to YouTube by madajazz on 22 September 2012. The performance was from February 2012.
12. Wikipedia. "Marne-la-Vallée."
Sunday, March 4, 2018
Derrick Tony Lewis - Kum Ba Yah
Topic: Jazz - Modern
Few of the modern jazz versions of "Kumbaya" uploaded to YouTube used voices. The religious associations may have prevented some from making recordings. Derrick Lewis told an interviewer:
"My devoutly religious grandmother, who lived in South Carolina, might roll over in her grave at the sound of contemporary gospel music. And in North Carolina, Lewis says, his saxophone accompaniment with one gospel group made a few churchgoers uneasy." [1]
His own version was divided into two parts. In the first he played the melody three times with few variations. In the second, a woman sang three verses. She ended singing "Say Jesus" and Lewis completed the phrase and played his own improvisations. He used the standard 1-3-5 melody, but she tended to use the more traditional 1-5.
Lewis kept the accompaniment simple: instead of a piano, string bass, and drums, he used a synthesizer, drums, and shaker. Even when he played variations, the synthesizer maintained the melody with parallel chords.
Performers
Vocal Soloist: woman
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: Derrick Lewis, soprano saxophone
Instrumental Accompaniment: synthesizer
Rhythm Accompaniment: drums, shaker
Credits
Copyright: (C) 2008 Uplifting Sax Production
Notes on Lyrics
Language: English
Pronunciation: she took audible breaths at the ends of lines on the first verse
Verses: come by here, needs you, praying
Vocabulary
Pronoun: somebody
Term for Deity: Lord, Jesus
Special Terms: none
Basic Form: three-verse song
Verse Repetition Pattern: none
Ending: none
Unique Features: all verses were from "Come by Here."
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: Lewis used 1-3-5, the vocalist used 1-5
Tempo: moderate
Basic Structure: strophic repetition followed by one improvised chorus.
Singing Style: melismatic
Instrumental Style: few displays of virtuosity
Solo-Accompaniment Dynamics: the instruments maintained the beat when the soloists were singing the melody, and played the melody when they were varying it.
Notes on Performance
Location: Nefretiti Makenta said Lewis had his own studio in his mother’s home. [2] It’s very likely he played the synthesizer and then added the saxophone part to the recording. The vocalist on the recording was not identified.
Notes on Performers
Lewis’s father, Robert Hughes, performed as Bobby Sax. Lewis remembered his group, the Housekeepers, "became a purveyor of the Motown sound. ‘He was the killer in the ’70s,’ says Lewis. ‘They were at one point the top group in this area.’ His father toured with Gaye, the Floaters, and the Jackson 5." [3]
However, Lewis told Makenta, his father wouldn’t let him play sax because he knew the dangers of a musician’s life. Instead, he had him learn the flute and piano. He didn’t have a sax until he entered Dunbar High School. [4] It had once the premier academic Black school in Washington, but Thomas Sowell said desegregation converted it into a neighborhood school. [5]
Lewis attended the historically Black Saint Augustine College in Raleigh, North Carolina, at a time when such schools were having a difficult time competing with integrated state schools. [6] He said when he returned to Washington he discovered "his technique was unrefined." [7]
He took a volunteer job with the National Park Service working backstage as a factotum for musicians appearing at jazz events. Some of them were willing to take a little time to help him. For instance, "Grover Washington Jr. schooled Lewis in breathing techniques and ways to improve his sound." [8]
He continued taking classes, this time at the University of the District of Columbia. [9] He usually lists himself as Derrick (Tony) Lewis to distinguish himself from others with the same name.
Availability
CD: Walking by Faith. 15 February 2009.
YouTube: uploaded by CDbaby on 21 July 2015.
End Notes
1. Nefretiti Makenta. "Saxophonal Healing." Washington City Paper website. 31 May 2000.
2. Makenta.
3. Makenta.
4. Makenta.
5. Thomas Sowell. "Dunbar High School After 100 Years." Town Hall website. 4 October 2016. Cited by Wikipedia. "Dunbar High School (Washington, D.C.)."
6. Wikipedia. "St. Augustine’s University (Raleigh, North Carolina)."
7. Makenta.
8. Makenta.
9. Makenta.
Few of the modern jazz versions of "Kumbaya" uploaded to YouTube used voices. The religious associations may have prevented some from making recordings. Derrick Lewis told an interviewer:
"My devoutly religious grandmother, who lived in South Carolina, might roll over in her grave at the sound of contemporary gospel music. And in North Carolina, Lewis says, his saxophone accompaniment with one gospel group made a few churchgoers uneasy." [1]
His own version was divided into two parts. In the first he played the melody three times with few variations. In the second, a woman sang three verses. She ended singing "Say Jesus" and Lewis completed the phrase and played his own improvisations. He used the standard 1-3-5 melody, but she tended to use the more traditional 1-5.
Lewis kept the accompaniment simple: instead of a piano, string bass, and drums, he used a synthesizer, drums, and shaker. Even when he played variations, the synthesizer maintained the melody with parallel chords.
Performers
Vocal Soloist: woman
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: Derrick Lewis, soprano saxophone
Instrumental Accompaniment: synthesizer
Rhythm Accompaniment: drums, shaker
Credits
Copyright: (C) 2008 Uplifting Sax Production
Notes on Lyrics
Language: English
Pronunciation: she took audible breaths at the ends of lines on the first verse
Verses: come by here, needs you, praying
Vocabulary
Pronoun: somebody
Term for Deity: Lord, Jesus
Special Terms: none
Basic Form: three-verse song
Verse Repetition Pattern: none
Ending: none
Unique Features: all verses were from "Come by Here."
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: Lewis used 1-3-5, the vocalist used 1-5
Tempo: moderate
Basic Structure: strophic repetition followed by one improvised chorus.
Singing Style: melismatic
Instrumental Style: few displays of virtuosity
Solo-Accompaniment Dynamics: the instruments maintained the beat when the soloists were singing the melody, and played the melody when they were varying it.
Notes on Performance
Location: Nefretiti Makenta said Lewis had his own studio in his mother’s home. [2] It’s very likely he played the synthesizer and then added the saxophone part to the recording. The vocalist on the recording was not identified.
Notes on Performers
Lewis’s father, Robert Hughes, performed as Bobby Sax. Lewis remembered his group, the Housekeepers, "became a purveyor of the Motown sound. ‘He was the killer in the ’70s,’ says Lewis. ‘They were at one point the top group in this area.’ His father toured with Gaye, the Floaters, and the Jackson 5." [3]
However, Lewis told Makenta, his father wouldn’t let him play sax because he knew the dangers of a musician’s life. Instead, he had him learn the flute and piano. He didn’t have a sax until he entered Dunbar High School. [4] It had once the premier academic Black school in Washington, but Thomas Sowell said desegregation converted it into a neighborhood school. [5]
Lewis attended the historically Black Saint Augustine College in Raleigh, North Carolina, at a time when such schools were having a difficult time competing with integrated state schools. [6] He said when he returned to Washington he discovered "his technique was unrefined." [7]
He took a volunteer job with the National Park Service working backstage as a factotum for musicians appearing at jazz events. Some of them were willing to take a little time to help him. For instance, "Grover Washington Jr. schooled Lewis in breathing techniques and ways to improve his sound." [8]
He continued taking classes, this time at the University of the District of Columbia. [9] He usually lists himself as Derrick (Tony) Lewis to distinguish himself from others with the same name.
Availability
CD: Walking by Faith. 15 February 2009.
YouTube: uploaded by CDbaby on 21 July 2015.
End Notes
1. Nefretiti Makenta. "Saxophonal Healing." Washington City Paper website. 31 May 2000.
2. Makenta.
3. Makenta.
4. Makenta.
5. Thomas Sowell. "Dunbar High School After 100 Years." Town Hall website. 4 October 2016. Cited by Wikipedia. "Dunbar High School (Washington, D.C.)."
6. Wikipedia. "St. Augustine’s University (Raleigh, North Carolina)."
7. Makenta.
8. Makenta.
9. Makenta.
Friday, March 2, 2018
Frank Macchia - Kumbaya
Topic: Jazz - Modern
Modern jazz musicians have been exposed to recordings by all their great predecessors, and have learned to play many styles, partly as a hedge against the vagaries of the job market. With that said, Bebop’s piano-drum set-string bass combinations seem to have been most important for men who uploaded recordings of "Kumbaya" to YouTube like Terell Stafford and the Human Voice Quartet. [1]
Thelonious Monk was one of the prime piano innovators of the Bebop style. His most famous performances were done with a bass, drums, and John Coltrane in 1957. [2] The saxophone is second only to the piano as the preferred instruments in jazz versions of "Kumbaya." Frank Macchia wrote:
"I wanted to portray it as a kind of tribute to Coltrane tunes like ‘Alabama’, [3] which I find to be very moving. I play the tenor sax solo and the band did a great job on a very ‘loose’ arrangement!" [4]
Bebop’s small groups encouraged individuals to improvise solos. [5] White instrumentalists who had spent their journeymen years in big bands, tried to restore a more orderly form with their Cool jazz associated with artists like Dave Brubeck. They used larger groups and included more instruments from symphonic bands. [6]
Maccia began playing clarinet in the mid-1960s in San Francisco, when Cool jazz was still important on the West Coast. [7] When he recorded his "modern big band album," [8] Folk Songs for Jazzers, he wrote:
"I rejected the traditional big band section of 4 trumpets, 4 trombones and 5 saxes because I wanted a more intimate setting. Instead I chose 4 multi-woodwind players, 1 trumpet, 3 trombones (doubling on euphoniums and tubas) and the standard rhythm section, enhanced with vibes on several numbers." [9]
Coltrane recorded "Alabama" in November 1963 in response to the bombing of a Birmingham church in September by members of the Ku Klux Klan. [10] He began with McCoy Tyner playing a rapid series of low notes on the piano. Macchia assigned that part to the trombones, but instead of rapid tone changes that required extraordinarily good tonguing, he had each instrument play a different tone simultaneously. At the slow tempo, it created a drone.
Bebop had reveled in its freedom from playing for dancing couples by using faster tempos. [11] The Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz said the Cool jazzmen played slower, but reduced rhythm to a passive element. [12] Following the pattern of Martin Luther King’s remarks on the murder of four young girls, [13] Coltrane adopted more melodic phrasing with more obvious drums and piano chords in the midsection of "Alabama," before ending with the drums and low, rumbling piano.
Macchia’s version of "Kumbaya" fell into two parts: four repetitions of the melody and an extended solo. Maccia set the melodic pattern in the opening solo, when he played the long notes of the melody as expected and treated the short ones with vibrato. The other soloists, a horn and a sax, repeated his melody against a progressively more dissonant accompaniment by Macchia. His final solo, like any jazz solo, gave him an opportunity to demonstrate his mastery of the saxophone over its entire tonal range. He ended in the lower register.
It’s hard to know if there was any significance in using a jazz idea spawned by violence in the South for "Kumbaya." One reviewer noted:
"‘Kumbaya’ opens with Macchia’s hearty tenor solo and a loose-limbed, rumbling, brass-heavy accompaniment. It seems like an unusual choice for a jazz treatment, but Macchia and the band give it grit, and a foreboding feeling of oncoming calamity. This heard around the camp fire would conjure images of dangerous things lurking out there in the dark." [14]
Performers
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: Frank Maccia, tenor saxophone; Wayne Bergeron, trumpet; another sax
Instrumental Accompaniment: low brass dominant
Rhythm Accompaniment: Peter Erskine, cymbals
Credits
Arranged by Frank Macchia
Copyright: 2010 Frank Macchia
Macchia wrote: "Kumbaya seems to have come into being in the early 1920’s. The spiritual ‘Come By Yuh’ was sung in a creole dialect spoken by the former slaves living on the sea islands of South Carolina and Georgia. It translates to ‘come by here, my lord’." [15]
Notes on Lyrics
There were none
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Tempo: slow
Basic Structure: four iterations of the melody by different instrumentalists, followed by an extended sax solo that made no reference to the tune. The four repetitions were Macchia on sax, horn, horn and a different sax, and brass ensemble.
Instrumental Style: used vibrato
Solo-Group Dynamics: soloists dominant; parts of Maccia’s last solo were a capella. In the first repetitions, brass instruments played low, sustained tones. Later, Maccia added a counter-melody on saxophone. There were occasional sounds that mimicked the wind and a whimpering dog.
Group-Rhythm Dynamics: cymbals rarely heard until Maccia’s final solo.
Notes on Performance
Location: Entourage Studios, Sherman Oaks, California
Notes on Performers
Maccia was raised in San Francisco where he began playing clarinet when he was ten. By the time he was in high school, he had learned other reed instruments and was studying composition. He graduated from the Berkee College of Music in Boston, then returned to San Francisco where he worked as a sideman. After a German tour with a musical comedy troup, he moved to Los Angeles in 1992 where he began providing scores for films and television programs. [16]
Availability
CD: Folk Songs For Jazzers. Cacophony FMC516. 12 January 2010.
YouTube: uploaded by CDBaby on 20 July 2015.
End Notes
1. Terell Stafford was discussed in the post for 26 February 2018; the Human Voice Quartet was discussed in the entry for 28 February 2018.
2. Wikipedia. "Thelonious Monk."
3. John Coltrane. "Alabama." Live at Birdland. Impulse A-50. January 1964. (Discogs entry for album).
4. Frank Maccia. Liner notes. Reprinted by CD Baby website for his Folksongs for Jazzers.
5. Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Style Sheet. "Bebop." Jazz in America website.
6. Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Style Sheet. "Cool." Jazz in America website.
7. "Biography." Frank Macchia website.
8. CD Baby website for his Folksongs for Jazzers.
9. Macchia, liner notes.
10. "Alabama, by John Coltrane." Music Afficianado website. 14 April 2016.
11. Monk Institute, Bebop.
12. Monk Institute, Cool.
13. Music Afficianado and others have commented on the parallels in development between King’s speech and Coltrane’s "Alabama."
14. Dan McClenaghan. "Frank Macchia: Folk Songs for Jazzers." All About Jazz website. 25 February 2010.
15. Macchia, liner notes.
16. Macchia, biography.
Modern jazz musicians have been exposed to recordings by all their great predecessors, and have learned to play many styles, partly as a hedge against the vagaries of the job market. With that said, Bebop’s piano-drum set-string bass combinations seem to have been most important for men who uploaded recordings of "Kumbaya" to YouTube like Terell Stafford and the Human Voice Quartet. [1]
Thelonious Monk was one of the prime piano innovators of the Bebop style. His most famous performances were done with a bass, drums, and John Coltrane in 1957. [2] The saxophone is second only to the piano as the preferred instruments in jazz versions of "Kumbaya." Frank Macchia wrote:
"I wanted to portray it as a kind of tribute to Coltrane tunes like ‘Alabama’, [3] which I find to be very moving. I play the tenor sax solo and the band did a great job on a very ‘loose’ arrangement!" [4]
Bebop’s small groups encouraged individuals to improvise solos. [5] White instrumentalists who had spent their journeymen years in big bands, tried to restore a more orderly form with their Cool jazz associated with artists like Dave Brubeck. They used larger groups and included more instruments from symphonic bands. [6]
Maccia began playing clarinet in the mid-1960s in San Francisco, when Cool jazz was still important on the West Coast. [7] When he recorded his "modern big band album," [8] Folk Songs for Jazzers, he wrote:
"I rejected the traditional big band section of 4 trumpets, 4 trombones and 5 saxes because I wanted a more intimate setting. Instead I chose 4 multi-woodwind players, 1 trumpet, 3 trombones (doubling on euphoniums and tubas) and the standard rhythm section, enhanced with vibes on several numbers." [9]
Coltrane recorded "Alabama" in November 1963 in response to the bombing of a Birmingham church in September by members of the Ku Klux Klan. [10] He began with McCoy Tyner playing a rapid series of low notes on the piano. Macchia assigned that part to the trombones, but instead of rapid tone changes that required extraordinarily good tonguing, he had each instrument play a different tone simultaneously. At the slow tempo, it created a drone.
Bebop had reveled in its freedom from playing for dancing couples by using faster tempos. [11] The Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz said the Cool jazzmen played slower, but reduced rhythm to a passive element. [12] Following the pattern of Martin Luther King’s remarks on the murder of four young girls, [13] Coltrane adopted more melodic phrasing with more obvious drums and piano chords in the midsection of "Alabama," before ending with the drums and low, rumbling piano.
Macchia’s version of "Kumbaya" fell into two parts: four repetitions of the melody and an extended solo. Maccia set the melodic pattern in the opening solo, when he played the long notes of the melody as expected and treated the short ones with vibrato. The other soloists, a horn and a sax, repeated his melody against a progressively more dissonant accompaniment by Macchia. His final solo, like any jazz solo, gave him an opportunity to demonstrate his mastery of the saxophone over its entire tonal range. He ended in the lower register.
It’s hard to know if there was any significance in using a jazz idea spawned by violence in the South for "Kumbaya." One reviewer noted:
"‘Kumbaya’ opens with Macchia’s hearty tenor solo and a loose-limbed, rumbling, brass-heavy accompaniment. It seems like an unusual choice for a jazz treatment, but Macchia and the band give it grit, and a foreboding feeling of oncoming calamity. This heard around the camp fire would conjure images of dangerous things lurking out there in the dark." [14]
Performers
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Soloist: Frank Maccia, tenor saxophone; Wayne Bergeron, trumpet; another sax
Instrumental Accompaniment: low brass dominant
Rhythm Accompaniment: Peter Erskine, cymbals
Credits
Arranged by Frank Macchia
Copyright: 2010 Frank Macchia
Macchia wrote: "Kumbaya seems to have come into being in the early 1920’s. The spiritual ‘Come By Yuh’ was sung in a creole dialect spoken by the former slaves living on the sea islands of South Carolina and Georgia. It translates to ‘come by here, my lord’." [15]
Notes on Lyrics
There were none
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Tempo: slow
Basic Structure: four iterations of the melody by different instrumentalists, followed by an extended sax solo that made no reference to the tune. The four repetitions were Macchia on sax, horn, horn and a different sax, and brass ensemble.
Instrumental Style: used vibrato
Solo-Group Dynamics: soloists dominant; parts of Maccia’s last solo were a capella. In the first repetitions, brass instruments played low, sustained tones. Later, Maccia added a counter-melody on saxophone. There were occasional sounds that mimicked the wind and a whimpering dog.
Group-Rhythm Dynamics: cymbals rarely heard until Maccia’s final solo.
Notes on Performance
Location: Entourage Studios, Sherman Oaks, California
Notes on Performers
Maccia was raised in San Francisco where he began playing clarinet when he was ten. By the time he was in high school, he had learned other reed instruments and was studying composition. He graduated from the Berkee College of Music in Boston, then returned to San Francisco where he worked as a sideman. After a German tour with a musical comedy troup, he moved to Los Angeles in 1992 where he began providing scores for films and television programs. [16]
Availability
CD: Folk Songs For Jazzers. Cacophony FMC516. 12 January 2010.
YouTube: uploaded by CDBaby on 20 July 2015.
End Notes
2. Wikipedia. "Thelonious Monk."
3. John Coltrane. "Alabama." Live at Birdland. Impulse A-50. January 1964. (Discogs entry for album).
4. Frank Maccia. Liner notes. Reprinted by CD Baby website for his Folksongs for Jazzers.
5. Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Style Sheet. "Bebop." Jazz in America website.
6. Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Style Sheet. "Cool." Jazz in America website.
7. "Biography." Frank Macchia website.
8. CD Baby website for his Folksongs for Jazzers.
9. Macchia, liner notes.
10. "Alabama, by John Coltrane." Music Afficianado website. 14 April 2016.
11. Monk Institute, Bebop.
12. Monk Institute, Cool.
13. Music Afficianado and others have commented on the parallels in development between King’s speech and Coltrane’s "Alabama."
14. Dan McClenaghan. "Frank Macchia: Folk Songs for Jazzers." All About Jazz website. 25 February 2010.
15. Macchia, liner notes.
16. Macchia, biography.
Wednesday, February 28, 2018
Human Voice Quartet - Kumbaya
Topic: Jazz - Modern
Jazz is primarily instrumental music. Vocalists like Frank Sinatra appeared with big bands, but they were parts of complete variety programs, not members of the bands. Ella Fitzgerald became an important jazz singer when she abandoned traditional concepts of song and turned her voice into a musical instrument with scat. [1]
A Caribbean-French group merged different jazz styles when they recorded "Kumbaya" in 2015. Two of the members, Alain Deshagette and Léo Rafaël, had been part of a group that specialized in Cole Porter songs. [2] Another, Didier Quérin, had appeared with Ray Charles. [3] They dedicated their album to the Golden Gate Quartet. [4]
Their instrumental accompaniment, a piano with a muted drum, was a simplified version of the bebop style introduced by men like Thelonious Monk. They sang three verses in close harmony that remained true to the primary melody, then the arrangement turned to variations that had little to do with the tune or text.
The group began the lines of the first two iterations together then diverged to parallel thirds. They sang slowly and stayed in harmony when they varied the tones on words. The difference between the two verses was only the piano accompanied them on "kumbaya," while the drums, block, and cymbal were added for "come by here."
The third verse was a solo by one of the tenors that again was melismatic. He altered the wording from "someone praying" to "I hear someone praying."
The style changed on the fourth verses, which was in French. This time the group repeated a single phrase over and over while the soloist varied the melody. It had little to do with "Kumbaya," although the reference to "seigneur" in the last line may have been an allusion to the song’s usual last line.
The transition to pure jazz was completed in the fifth iteration, which was played by the piano and drums. If it was playing the original melody, it was not recognizable. However, the group sang "Oh Lord, cum by yar" twice in close harmony toward the end.
Finally, a soloist began scatting against the piano, again using his own melody. The group concluded by repeating "Oh Lord, cum by yar" five times slowly. They broadened the harmony on the third repetition and continued their melismatic changes.
Performers
Vocal Soloist: tenor
Vocal Group: Alain Deshagette, first tenor; Léo Rafaël, second tenor; Didier Quérin, baritone; Miguel Dalu, bass [5]
Instrumental Accompaniment: piano
Rhythm Accompaniment: drums/block/cymbal
Credits
Composer: RR
Copyright: Jimmy’s Production
Music Publisher: D.R
Notes on Lyrics
Language: English and French
Pronunciation: may have used Creole pronunciation on "cum by yar."
Verses: kumbaya, come by here, praying, own
Vocabulary
Pronoun: someone
Term for Deity: Lord
Special Terms: none
Basic Form: song
Verse Repetition Pattern: none
Ending: repeated "Oh Lord, cum by yar" five times
Unique Features: French verse; substituted "I hear someone" for "someone" in one line
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Tempo: slow
Basic Structure: began with iterations of main melody, then changed to improvisations.
Singing Style: parallel harmony with melisma; scat
Solo-Group Dynamics: soloist varied melody while group repeated a single phrase, much like the denouement section of prelude-denouement versions of "Come by Here." However, the tempo remained slow.
Vocal-Orchestral Dynamics: muted, even when playing alone.
Audience Perceptions
Africultures said the Human Voice Quartet presented "a mix of Negro Spirituality, gospel and Caribbean jazz [. . .] very nuanced, which makes each of their performances an unforgettable moment." It also indicated the group had won the Louis Armstrong Performance Award at the Paris Gospel Festival in 1999. [6]
Notes on Performers
The nucleus of the group may have been Accord, who recorded for Frémeaux et Associés. The company website indicated Accord’s origins lay in Guadeloupe, a French overseas region in the Lesser Antilles. The tenor, Alain Deshagette, and baritone, Didier Quérin, were members. [7]
Quérin had spent two years in the United States before moving to France in 1996. [8] He became director of the choral group, Gospel Hearts, which he took to Guadeloupe. [9]
Meantime, Deshagette worked with Jean-Paul Elysée and Léo Rafaël on the Cole Porter project. [10] Elysée and Rafaël later were members of Baylavwa that specialized in Carribean jazz. [11]
Availability
Album: Human Voice Quartet. MP3. 16 October 2015.
YouTube: uploaded by Believe A on 14 April 2016.
End Notes
1. At its simplest scat involved singing vocables in imitation of a musical instrument.
2. "Vocal Porter." Gospel Agency website.
3. Gospel Hearts website.
4. The Golden Gate Quartet was an African-American group from Virginia that featured tenor and bass solos. They began recording in 1937 with "Born Ten Thousand Years Ago." They performed many gospel songs that entered the camp repertoire, including "Dese Bones Gonna Rise Agin," "Noah and the Ark," and "Wade in the Water." They moved to Paris in 1959. (Wikipedia. "Golden Gate Quartet.")
5. "Human Voice Quartet." Africultures website.
6. Africultures. Google translate from French.
7. "Accord Singers. Down by the Riverside. Frémeaux et Associés website.
8. "Master Class Gospel à Saint-Malo." Agendaou website. Class was scheduled for 28 February 2016.
9. Gospel Hearts.
10. "Vocal Porter."
11. "Baylavwa." Facebook.
Jazz is primarily instrumental music. Vocalists like Frank Sinatra appeared with big bands, but they were parts of complete variety programs, not members of the bands. Ella Fitzgerald became an important jazz singer when she abandoned traditional concepts of song and turned her voice into a musical instrument with scat. [1]
A Caribbean-French group merged different jazz styles when they recorded "Kumbaya" in 2015. Two of the members, Alain Deshagette and Léo Rafaël, had been part of a group that specialized in Cole Porter songs. [2] Another, Didier Quérin, had appeared with Ray Charles. [3] They dedicated their album to the Golden Gate Quartet. [4]
Their instrumental accompaniment, a piano with a muted drum, was a simplified version of the bebop style introduced by men like Thelonious Monk. They sang three verses in close harmony that remained true to the primary melody, then the arrangement turned to variations that had little to do with the tune or text.
The group began the lines of the first two iterations together then diverged to parallel thirds. They sang slowly and stayed in harmony when they varied the tones on words. The difference between the two verses was only the piano accompanied them on "kumbaya," while the drums, block, and cymbal were added for "come by here."
The third verse was a solo by one of the tenors that again was melismatic. He altered the wording from "someone praying" to "I hear someone praying."
The style changed on the fourth verses, which was in French. This time the group repeated a single phrase over and over while the soloist varied the melody. It had little to do with "Kumbaya," although the reference to "seigneur" in the last line may have been an allusion to the song’s usual last line.
The transition to pure jazz was completed in the fifth iteration, which was played by the piano and drums. If it was playing the original melody, it was not recognizable. However, the group sang "Oh Lord, cum by yar" twice in close harmony toward the end.
Finally, a soloist began scatting against the piano, again using his own melody. The group concluded by repeating "Oh Lord, cum by yar" five times slowly. They broadened the harmony on the third repetition and continued their melismatic changes.
Performers
Vocal Soloist: tenor
Vocal Group: Alain Deshagette, first tenor; Léo Rafaël, second tenor; Didier Quérin, baritone; Miguel Dalu, bass [5]
Instrumental Accompaniment: piano
Rhythm Accompaniment: drums/block/cymbal
Credits
Composer: RR
Copyright: Jimmy’s Production
Music Publisher: D.R
Notes on Lyrics
Language: English and French
Pronunciation: may have used Creole pronunciation on "cum by yar."
Verses: kumbaya, come by here, praying, own
Vocabulary
Pronoun: someone
Term for Deity: Lord
Special Terms: none
Basic Form: song
Verse Repetition Pattern: none
Ending: repeated "Oh Lord, cum by yar" five times
Unique Features: French verse; substituted "I hear someone" for "someone" in one line
Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Tempo: slow
Basic Structure: began with iterations of main melody, then changed to improvisations.
Singing Style: parallel harmony with melisma; scat
Solo-Group Dynamics: soloist varied melody while group repeated a single phrase, much like the denouement section of prelude-denouement versions of "Come by Here." However, the tempo remained slow.
Vocal-Orchestral Dynamics: muted, even when playing alone.
Audience Perceptions
Africultures said the Human Voice Quartet presented "a mix of Negro Spirituality, gospel and Caribbean jazz [. . .] very nuanced, which makes each of their performances an unforgettable moment." It also indicated the group had won the Louis Armstrong Performance Award at the Paris Gospel Festival in 1999. [6]
Notes on Performers
The nucleus of the group may have been Accord, who recorded for Frémeaux et Associés. The company website indicated Accord’s origins lay in Guadeloupe, a French overseas region in the Lesser Antilles. The tenor, Alain Deshagette, and baritone, Didier Quérin, were members. [7]
Quérin had spent two years in the United States before moving to France in 1996. [8] He became director of the choral group, Gospel Hearts, which he took to Guadeloupe. [9]
Meantime, Deshagette worked with Jean-Paul Elysée and Léo Rafaël on the Cole Porter project. [10] Elysée and Rafaël later were members of Baylavwa that specialized in Carribean jazz. [11]
Availability
Album: Human Voice Quartet. MP3. 16 October 2015.
YouTube: uploaded by Believe A on 14 April 2016.
End Notes
1. At its simplest scat involved singing vocables in imitation of a musical instrument.
2. "Vocal Porter." Gospel Agency website.
3. Gospel Hearts website.
4. The Golden Gate Quartet was an African-American group from Virginia that featured tenor and bass solos. They began recording in 1937 with "Born Ten Thousand Years Ago." They performed many gospel songs that entered the camp repertoire, including "Dese Bones Gonna Rise Agin," "Noah and the Ark," and "Wade in the Water." They moved to Paris in 1959. (Wikipedia. "Golden Gate Quartet.")
5. "Human Voice Quartet." Africultures website.
6. Africultures. Google translate from French.
7. "Accord Singers. Down by the Riverside. Frémeaux et Associés website.
8. "Master Class Gospel à Saint-Malo." Agendaou website. Class was scheduled for 28 February 2016.
9. Gospel Hearts.
10. "Vocal Porter."
11. "Baylavwa." Facebook.
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