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7. In the Studio and on Stage
- University of California Press
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155 The framings discussed in the previous chapters foreground the importance of attending to the details of a specific musical event via its nesting in successive frames—a scene, a blues aesthetic, ritual, space, time, tune, and form.1 They emphasize, as well, relating that single event to others and noting how each event is constituted by references and responses to others displaced in time and space. Building on those ideas, I shift the focus here to the ways that the work of different actors and institutions shapes musical events in recording studios or clubs. For recordings , I will indicate whether the released version of a tune comes from a single take or is a composite of two or more, and for both recordings and live performances, information from my field notes about other performances by the musicians or groups in question will inform the analysis, particularly when there are discernible patterns of interaction that recur from event to event. Moreover, I will analyze the statements made by the musicians about the performance contexts and their approaches to performance where available and relevant. In the process I will examine how performers manipulate “statistical parameters” of musical performance, those that Elliott (1987) argues are difficult to quantify and/or notate: timbre, dynamics, density, intensity, and feel. Density refers to both the number of sonic events occurring per unit of time and the number of discrete sonic elements present at a given moment. Intensity is a function of combinations of kinds of timbre, dynamics , register, density, the perceptibility of meter, and the manner in chapter 7 In the Studio and on Stage 156 | Blowin’ the Blues Away which those combinations produce expectation or ambiguity. A high level of intensity, then, might result from high density and dynamics, “noisy” instrumental timbres of indeterminate pitch content, and registrally extreme playing by a featured performer or group. Intense moments might likewise be the result of “metric dissonance” (Krebs 1987), disagreement between the established metric framework, on one hand, and the grouping of accents in the playing of one or more members of a group, on the other. Alternatively, intense playing can be characterized by opposite extremes, for example, low density and dynamics combined with metric regularity—particularly when contrasted with louder, denser passages. Those possibilities, of course, don’t foreclose other readings or perceptions of intensity. More specifically these analyses examine performers’ interactions and negotiation of forms, feels, and harmonic/modal and metric structures in the course of improvisation. Forms are harmonic and metric structures that provide raw materials for the rhythmic, melodic, and harmonic parameters of improvisation: the phrasing of improvised solos and accompaniment patterns alternately reinforces or obscures it. Strong cadences and phrasing whose peaks and accents agree with major structural points, for example, typically reinforce form, while the use of harmonically ambiguous progressions or substitute chords at cadences, for example, can obscure major structural points (Bastien and Hostager 1991). A feel is a distinct rhythmic, accentual, and/or textural pattern whose character arises from sedimented practices. In performance, different feels can be applied to entire compositions or specific sections within them, and each of the many named feels (for example, Latin, bossa, samba, ballad, twobeat , and swing) carries expectations about how rhythm section members (piano, bass, and drums, in particular) are supposed to interact. A feel is, as a result, not reducible to a characteristic rhythm; rather it is a composite emerging from the combination of a number of musical elements (Dudley 1996). Indeed, some feels are associated with prominent bandleaders or groups: one can therefore speak of a “Sam Jones–Louis Hayes feel”2 or “Art Blakey feel,” in the process indexing a number of sonic parameters. The harmonic or modal structure of a tune is the sequence of harmonies (chords) or modes (scales) that govern the pitch selections of improvising soloists and accompanying musicians. In the course of performance , individual musicians may stick to the prescribed harmonies or may replace them with a number of substitutes. Given a twelve-bar blues progression like the one in figure 3, one might either directly and literally [34.237.245.80] Project MUSE (2024-03-19 12:02 GMT) In the Studio and on Stage | 157 produce those harmonies, add tensions or extensions to them, or replace them with other harmonies. One might, for example, substitute a G♭7 chord for the G minor 7–C7 progression in measure twelve. Likewise, a recurrent, AABA modal structure—from Miles Davis’s “So What”—uses...