Can Vijay bop?

 

Until cutting-edge pianist Vijay Iyer shows mastery of the tradition, guest blogger Brandon Mezzelo remains a skeptic about him and contemporary “egghead” jazz.

Brandon Mezzelo

About Brandon Mezzelo: After graduating from Parkview High School in Springfield, Mo., Mezzelo served in a U.S. Army band in Germany and Hungary for eight years in the 1990’s. He returned to Springfield, then set off for Hungary about three years ago, where he immersed himself in the Budapest scene, and came back last year. His group, the Triptet, plays an energetic version of mainstream jazz that he calls “soulbop.” The band consists of some of the more accomplished musicians in the region.

Guest post: I have asked Brandon to contribute a piece to this blog in hope of broadening its perspective. Because I am a listener, not a player, I enjoy partaking broadly from the jazz buffet, and I enjoy most of what I consume. Players, having invested a lifetime pursuing a personal vision of the music, often have a much more passionate and defined point of view. [I have addressed Vijay Iyer and this video in a previous post.]

Brandon’s post follows —

Vijay Iyer is arguably the most successful and well-respected jazz musician currently on the scene. Downbeat loves him — he won five awards in the magazine’s 2012 critic’s poll, and he’s on nearly every cover that Esperanza Spalding isn’t.

But as I listened to this recent clip (above) of the next great innovator, I was left feeling quite mystified and unfulfilled. I am not an expert, I wouldn’t claim to have the same level of chops, and I may not have paid my full share of musical dues (which in the modern era refers to numbers of degrees in music and performance you accumulate, not actually paying your dues in a life of playing).

However, the trend of this generation is confusing to me to say the least. In my humble mind, this is not even remotely a solid representation of jazz/swing/bop or any of the things that for me made New York City the great mothership of jazz and soul. I respect this new music for what it is, but I don't see any real genius in it at all. I hear more genius in guys playing much less esoteric music but with far more passion and devotion.

I remember a story from when I was at the Army School of Music. I had to take my final audition to graduate from the program. I was really nervous and not sure what piece to perform. My instructor suggested I go to the library and find a piece that is not often played. This made sense to me. If the judges didn’t know the piece that well, how could they judge it too harshly? They would listen for tone and basic technique, but really it would be over so fast they wouldn't be able to nit-pick me to death over the mistakes.

So I played the piece and took all the liberties that I could come up with, lots of tempo changes (to help me through the hard parts) and lots of physical emotion and gyrating to help sell the performance.

In the end what did I get? A mediocre score for a job half well done.

It’s not that the piece was bad or that my playing was terrible, but with all that messing around, I didn’t show that I had mastered the essentials of the program.

In the same way, I think these “advanced” players would be wise and more interesting if they played some music that we all know and pass their tests in that realm before jumping off the cliff to immortal self-indulged stardom. Can Vijay bop? Can he play a ballad? Isn't that also pretty important in our business of making the jazz?

This cerebral egghead music is cool, for the sake that it is cool. Nobody is up there rehashing “All Blues” or “Blue Bossa” (both excellent tunes by the way). But I will have a lot more respect for these guys when they come out and pay tribute to this great art form in genuine dues-paying style.

Burn it up, play some damn changes that make some sense. Get out “Giant Steps” and “Body and Soul” and show me and the world that you really deserve to be on every damn cover of Downbeat. Until then I remain skeptical that your legacy is really relevant.

I'm modern, but I'm also a moldy fig

All jazz is modern, Wynton Marsalis says. That's true in the sense that everyone paying jazz now is working in this moment, which must be modern.

In contrast, it's also true that jazz that was once modern is now old — unless it's resuscitated by musicians playing it now, in the moment, which must be modern.

But how should we respond to stuff that would have been tired even when it was modern, but is now being played now? For example, this recent performance by the Nasheet Waits group with Vijay Iyer.

Sad to say, there's nothing happening here (even though Waits is a great drummer). Well, at least there's a pulse for a while after 2:30, and some intermittent runs and clusters from Iyer around 4:00-5:00. I listened to part 1 of this piece, which I found a little more engaging, but still dull. Four decades ago, the free jazz I heard had lots of muscle and sonic extremes. As a high school kid with a new driver's license, I drove with my friends to downtown Chicago and heard Ornette Coleman with Dewey Redman, Charlie Haden and Ed Blackwell. I also had albums by Coltrane, Albert Ayler, Pharoah Sanders and the Art Ensemble of Chicago. Lots of screeching and blatting and general commotion, plus periods of abstraction kind of like these videos — but never boring. Fun while it lasted, but I moved out of that phase, like many others.

The Art Ensemble from the 1970s sounds more modern than this stuff that was performed a few weeks ago.

All of this adds up to the grim fact that after nearly half a century of listening to jazz and being open to new sounds, I have become a moldy fig. I never thought it was possible. But, having encountered such dreary music that owns a place in the vanguard, I must accept my lot.

However, many musicians are making challenging music WITH A LIVELY PULSE.

Such as Tom Harrell, who has produced nearly one great album every year for the past half-decade. His current work, "Number Five," has him paying in duos and solo formats, really taking risks. There's hope for modernity after all.