Jazz Improv

This is short jazz solo I recorded at my producer friend's house. It got us warmed up to recording that day. I try to play bebop with a lot of modernism and some outside free jazz sort of stylings. 

https://soundcloud.com/orlando-figueroa-17/jazz-improv-1

Mass plays Spirits of the Dead

My band recorded an original tune of mine recently called Spirits of the Dead, a tune I wrote on Halloween morning in 2017. Features my friend Martin Arevalo on drums and myself on guitar and vocals with Dmitri on bass. Dmitri also recorded it. Rock and roll!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfdbEKI_y7g

Out Front

Out Front is a jazz record from March 1961 by Booker Little and his quartet featuring Max Roach (drums). Also on the album are Eric Dolphy (alto sax, bass clarinet, flute) Art Davis (bass), Ron Carter (bass), Don Friedman (piano), and Julian Preister (trombone). I wanted to write about this album because its a terrific record, very polished for 1961. I was curious to hear it because it featured Eric Dolphy (everyone knows the live Dolphy record with Booker Little at the Five Spot) and Max Roach on the same album, something I had not heard before. And it was totally worth it.

Booker Little was only 23 and died later that year in 1961. These seven tunes are worthy enough to be replayed and preserved by a modern jazz group, that's how good it is. Eric Dolphy's playing isn't as free as it usually is here. In fact, most of what you hear here sounds like arrangements complete with piano, bass, trumpet, trombone, alto sax, flute, bass clarinet, and drums. Its quite a full sound. Not quite big band but not quite quartet either. It reminds me of something Mingus would record although not as technical. In fact, I would say that although this music is challenging for the soloists, the music is much more emotive than technical. There's humanity to this jazz, quite a lot of it. This element is sorely missing in today's modern straight ahead and sometimes free-jazz scenes. Its blues even though there's complicated arrangements.

The music has room to breathe. There's a sense of blues to all the pieces although a lot of the heads sound like bebop riffs from the 50's. I want to say it sounds orchestral as well. They are definitely playing to well organized charts and doing a spectacular job laying down the groove and getting the right tones. 

With song titles like We Speak, Strength and Sanity, Quiet Please, Moods in Free Time, Man of Words, Hazy Hues, and A New Day you would think this is either a free jazz album or some kind of progressive jazz record. It is quite a progressive jazz album but not free jazz. However, it was definitely new and innovative in 1961, that's for sure.

The solos here are spectacular. Dolphy's style is recognizable as always. Instead of going too far outside the changes, instead here he plays to the song's tonality, meaning he doesn't go off into the realms of the netherworld like on some of his own records. There's a feeling of respectability to the composer and he stuck to the song. The solos aren't long but are rewarding. This is about tunes, not so much about blowing, like the 50's bebop records. Although there is definitely a bebop influence here in the playing, especially the drums, I would say that Booker Little is also trying to find his own sound, style, vernacular if you will. I would say he achieves this with his sounds.

I found this CD on the library servers and ordered it. It was so good I downloaded it onto my computer. Its a shame Booker Little died so young, he would've gone on to have a great career in jazz. In a lot of ways I see how this sort of music inspired the modern jazz crowd of today. In fact, a lot of modern straight ahead jazz today sounds much like this music. There's detailed, written out arrangements, soloists, and they try to put as much humanity into the music as possible, no matter how technical the music is.

Its damn good!

Antman and The Wasp

Yesterday was another scorcher in the Valley so my friends and I decided to cool off at the movies. We saw Antman and Wasp, the new Marvel superhero movie. Paul Rudd (Antman) and Evangeline Lily (Wasp) save the world by telling jokes and saving a family member from a super teeny tiny space-universe. It pays the bills.

The movie isn't really about anything per se but if there is a plot it is this: Wasp and her father are trying to save their mother, who's trapped in a tiny universe. They need Antman's help because Wasp's mother used some kind of telepathic ability to have Antman explain how they can find her. What the what? It makes no sense, and if it did it would still be grade school level speculative fiction. But that's not what makes this movie good. What makes this movie good is that its fun.

The movie is only about an hour long, which is about as long as I can take when it comes to superhero movies these days. After Infinity War this movie is right in the pocket. Evangeline Lily looks great in her Wasp suit, Paul Rudd tells jokes that aren't as corny as Ryan Reynolds' Deadpool character, and the action scenes although cliche, they bring a wallop to the cinematography.

There's sketches of character development in this movie that is sorely missing in other Marvel movies. Antman is a great dad that loves his daughter. Wasp loves her mother and Antman.

The villain of the movie is sort of unclear. We have a villain-esque type character that reminds me of the character Sombra from Overwatch, the video game. Her body is in a lot of pain because her body isn't stable, its shifting through space and time, she is and isn't there physically. Needless to say she can whoop Antman and Wasp's ass, that's why they have to tag team her to beat her down. Great character, it'll be great to see if she joins their squad of superheroes.

This isn't a memorable film and I've already forgotten most of the one liners. However, its a blast of a summer film. Marvel won't surprise me with anything truly great or remarkable anymore. At the very least, I can still have fun.

The Wagner Connection

I've been listening to a lot of classical music. I've found myself listening to more and more classical music after my vacation to Chicago last year, where I saw a quartet (from DePaul University) perform Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time (check out my review for that performance here). That changed my attitude towards classical music and expanded my musical horizons. Messiaen is much different composer, albeit just as amazing as Richard Wagner. However, it has been Wagner's music that really strikes a chord with me.

Where do I start? I first heard various parts of the Ring Cycle in college, around 2011, however I didn't listen to it seriously until recently. I'm partial to favoring the instrumentals-the Overtures, Preludes, but the actual opera itself is quite a masterpiece. I plan on listening to the entire opera (many hours long) soon when I have enough time away from work, which proves to be extremely difficult this summer. 

Anyways, Wagner's music opened new doors. I've been reading the score for Tristan and Isolde, trying to decipher it, figure out how he gets the Tristan chord sound, how he arranges, how the melodies intertwine with the bass and the melodies. Serious stuff you know. I'll never look at heavy metal the same way again. Wagner's music sounds like heavy metal to me, that's what initially got me interested in college. The music is heavy but there's beauty in the melody, sometimes dark and other times tugging at the heartstrings, not just crushing chords. 

Because Frank Abbinanti, a new music composer that has been mentoring me from Chicago has sent me some pretty difficult scores for me to work on and play, I've been able to read music much better to the point where I can read and understand Wagner's score, albeit in a much less refined way than a classical musician or composer. I think about the chord voicings, how it would sound on guitar, piano, try to imagine the sound in my head as I read the notes. One of my goals is to one day be able to look at a score and know what it sounds like without hearing it on record or playing the notes on an instrument. I may never get there. But its a goal.

Wagner's music has much emotion. I tried to explain Wagner's music to my co-worker when he saw me reading the score on my break. He asked, "What does Wagner's music sound like?" I thought for a long time and explained as best as I could. I said that the music has a heavy feeling to it, like a lot in your head, but melodies that make you see the beauty in that which you didn't know exist. I told him to listen to the Tannhauser Overture and that he would know what I mean. 

I've gone down a very untypical path for a guitarist that first learned to play by playing the Ramones and Black Sabbath. My tastes have evolved eclectically and I'm all the better and smarter for it. My interest in jazz is still strong but now I have the entire classical canon to refer back to, a gift that I didn't know I had access to until recently. 

Most of the music my friends and associates listen to is not classical, nor jazz, or classic rock even. None of the stuff I'm into. Like regular young adults, they listen to whats popular, new, current and "hip", for lack of a better term here I use the word hip rather loosely because for me what's popular will never be hip in my traditional jazz musician's sensibility. I've realized that music for most people is just background noise. Co-workers listen to rap on earbuds while they work. My friend listens to death metal when he's driving fast down the freeway. My other friend listens to indie rock as he drives casually down the boulevard. I've realized that music for me is much greater, and more profound. Music for me is art, nothing to snicker or sneer at, and definitely not background music. In fact, I only listen to music on my computer when I'm sitting down, either reading , or just listening doing nothing else. 

I've found out that to be a musician is a hard life. I can't even get a band of guys together that are willing to meet once every week, let a lone a jazz group. I had a death metal band a while ago but when we didn't make money within three months the singer and bassist called it quits. As Frank Zappa used to say, "Strictly commercial." Most music these days is cheap (hence why the singles thing has become the new medium), just like our culture. We want things fast, hard, and easy. This is what I've come to find out. Life isn't easy, and making money with your art is even harder. 

Even if I never fulfill my childhood dream of becoming a famous hotshot guitar player or make a ton of money playing music I will be happy knowing that the music served it purpose, it opened the path for great artistic achievement and endeavors. And for that I am entirely indebted.