How do you reply to a Jazz guitarist who states that there is no "Structure" to Irish music. I don't especially know the meaning of the question, and I guess I feel offended on one hand, embarassed on the other, that I can't technically respond to what I take as a criticism.
Anyone care to tackle this with a serious reply?
Gosh... Not being an expert, I am not exactly sure what your friend means, but I'll take a stab at it:
By "Jazz Structure", (s)he may be referring to the fact that a jazz piece is usually built upon a particular chord progression. And that progression stays the same. So the band may play an intro, and play the melody a couple of times, before going into a more improvisational mode, but that chord progression will remain throughout (which is how the other players can back up the others doing their "take" of the melody).
As a guitarist, (s)he may have tried to play in an Irish session once and gotten confused, because (s)he didn't understand what was going on.
Irish music has a lot of inherent structure in a lot of different ways. But it is very different than jazz.
The first thing you might try to explain to your friend is that Irish music is the opposite of Jazz. Jazz is built from the bottom up. There's the chord progression and the rhythm at the base, and the melodies are built upon that, and must fit into that structure. Irish music is built from the top down. The *melody* is king. The rhythm is somewhat inherent in the melody, and the melody stands on its own. The backing (string accompaniment, percussion, etc) is built upon the melody, instead of the other way around. It is there to complement and support the melody, but it should never "drive" the melody.
A jazz guitarist can go into basically any jazz session, hear a tune, and pick up the chord progression and work with it. In an Irish setting, it is much more important to actually know the tune to be able to accompany it well. (Or at least be intimately familiar with the way Irish music works, so that you can make intelligent and proper choices in your backing).
Anyway, don't know if that's what your friend is referring to, but it might help
No, let's not be too hasty--it's an opportunity to educate somebody who needs it badly. I'll leave it to Dow or llig or some other musically educated sesh.orger... all I could say is the usual "Irish and Scottish music begat American hillbilly music, which begat bluegrass and blues, which begat jazz."
Any so-called jazz musician who doesn't know that needs to go back to school.
If Louis Armstrong had heard Michael Coleman play, do you think Satchmo would have said Coleman's music "lacked structure"? Or vice versa? No way to know for sure, but I don't think so.
I have my own hypothesis regarding the development of structure in the music that Africans introduced to America. I have a recording of Nigerian rebob music and it has melodies that are "thousands of years old." To me they sound like unstructured pentatonic scales with blue notes. The early Irish immigrants lived in close proximity to the African slaves and there was likely a cross-cultural exchange where these scales and melodies were introduced to 8 and 16 bar structures. The result might have led to what we now call “New Orleans” or "Dixieland" jazz." This occurred to me after watching the Ken Burns documentary on jazz and hearing a Dixieland rendition of the Irish reel, Sally Gardens. So it might actually be ironic that your jazz playing friend would fail to see the structure in Irish music.
Irish music, meaning dance music, jigs reels etc. has a very definate stucture as it has to fit the dances,most tunes are structured in 8 bar repeated phrases,of which there will be at least two, so most tunes are 32 bars long, but some are longer, 48 bars or more, but still in multiples of 8. Certain set dances, which have to fit a particular solo dance of unusual length have a different structure i.e. could be an 8 bar phrase repeated, followed by a 12 bar phrase, these dances have to therefore be performed to their own tunes.
Irish music is so structured that a lot of people find it very boring. Actually a lot of people think it is the same tune thats being played all the time , ha ha ha
Major structured!!! it's how backers can back things on the fly they never heard before, and melody players can pick it up and play it often by the second time through.
There are many repeated "riffs" to use a word your jazz friend may understand, yet to those of us who play, it is never boring, little variations can always be used, but the basic structure is the same much of the time. This could be why non-players think things sound all the same, yet players can play the most overplayed session tunes over and over and always find something new in them. A little twist or turn, or the dynamics differing groups of players bring to a tune from one session to the next that make the music so exciting, even playing the same old tune. Someone not immersed in ITM doesn't get it. They may "like" the music, but it's not inside them, they don't feel it like a player does, they don't feel the excitement and the vibrations coming off the instrument, so naturally many think it's all the same.
PS.... I don't really mean ALL non players don't get it and feel it... I know many that do, and love it, but I do believe it's a different experience from the playing end of things. I was referring more to the general public. We have many who come to the sessions who listen and really seem to be changed by the music, almost need it the way we do!
Because with Irish music "melody is king" anyone inclined to be a bit tone deaf may not be able to distinguish between the tunes and find it boring! However, while there are structures, which I think have been well described by Cathy, the magic of the Irish tradition is that it's not constrained by any "set-in-stone" rules. Just compare the differences between the high energy reel playing in Donegal with the laid back East Clare style not to mention the exhuberance of Sliabh Luachra polkas and slides, all of them equal and essential components of the tradition.
My feeling is that the jazz guitarist who offered the original criticism needs to get out there and listen to some trad !
Windybaer - perhapps what your jazz friend was referring to was 'macrostructure' rather than 'microstructure'. The internal structure in Irish traditional tunes - airs as well as dance tunes - should be obvious to anyone who takes the time to listen to *a tune*, rather than to the overall sound. What is not so prevalent in Irish music is a larger-scale developmental structure - statement, development and recapitulation of themes, and variation in mood and intensity. This may be present in some band arrangements, but not necessarily in a session - in general, tunes are played, one after another, without a great deal of consideration for how they work together as part of a larger structure, beyond the practicalities of moving from one tune to the next. In a good solo performance, however, that structure is there, by way of the choice of tunes in a set and variations within a tune (which may not be obvious to the unititiated, or to the jazz-primed listener, who expects to hear extensive improvisation). Of course, the same kind of structure is inherent, on a much smaller scale, within the tunes themselves, even without taking into consideration variations between successive executions.
I'll take a stab at this- anyone who cut their teeth in the rock/pop/jazz world would have been weaned on the 32 bar formula (chorus/chorus/bridge/chorus), as well as the 12 bar blues.
Many of the tunes we play are shorter by comparison (two phrases of 8 bars each) but certainly a structure exists. To me, that structure is not as obvious, and Bannerman is right when he says the guitarist needs to listen to quite a bit of trad and try not to view it through his jazz background.
This reminds me of the Jazz violinist who used to come to listen to our sessions a few years ago. We were talking during a break one day and he said - and I'm not making this up: "How come you never play any whole-tone scales?"
As a fan of both jazz and trad, I can say I've talked to lots of folks who don't know jazz and think it's completely unstructured and sounds like noise. Its very common too for listeners unfamiliar with a musical tradition, whatever it is, to think all of its songs or tunes sound just the same. As stated above by others, it just takes some listening of the music to develope an appreciation. Pat
I think the Reverend and his successors nailed it right.
This guy is so into his own field that anything outside of it lacks the framework he has come to rely on, and is therefore structureless.
If he was an all-round musician, then he'd recognize the structure.
Reverend and Spoon have said it all.
"Structure"? My wife still hasn't forgiven me for taking her to hear the New York Saxophone Quartet some years ago. Hordes of serious jazz fans left at intermission, or sooner. I had to focus with determination to feel where they were going, and not very successfully.
My point is this: If you understand that a musical genre has some genuine history, you should not question it, but try to understand it. Or just walk away.
I once was asked, "Where the improvisation in Irish music," and I have to admit I was at a loss on how to answer such a question. I tried to say that the melody is very important, and at session people are trying to preserve a tradition. But good players can do variations on the basic tunes and be staying with the tradition (in terms of chord structure, rhythm, etc.). I suppose that is as close as we can get to improvisation (in the jazz sense). The person who asked me this was not a musician, as far as I knew, but I think a really good musician who respected their own style would respect other styles.
Strange a jazz person mentioning structure, which is famous for improvisation. Hence the expression when tuning by ear "close enough for jazz".
I admired Clannad for bringing a "bit of jazz" to Irish tunes and songs, whereby there would be a flute "solo", then bass, then the harp, before everyone came together again.
no improvisation? how come then we have so many different styles? its what makes one musician different from the next. its what you can put around the notes thats so great about the music.. a jazz musician should know that
You can find structure in anything, it's the discipline of science.
Some musics are built from structure upwards, for example, Irish dance music. Others are built to tease structure, for example, how great diddley music expands what was once purely dance music. And there is that strange genre of "free jazz" that so deliberately eschews structure that its only rule is that one mustn't ever play anything that one has ever played before.
The tired old analogy of flesh and bones comes to mind and an interesting expansion on this could be to look at insects and vertebrates. What music has its skeleton on the outside and the flesh on the inside, or vice-versa?
But structure is not a thing that musicians in this tradition should be interested in. Examining structure can help when learning the basics, but the sooner a formal analysis of structure is set aside, the sooner a deeper level of intuitive, holistic understanding can take over.
And the best way to hasten that setting aside of formal analysis is to listen to ITM 'til you're blue in the face. Don't bother unless you love it. Structure will then lurk buried in your subconscious, where it ought to be, and you won't be worrying about it. The odd 3-part jig or that flippin' Johnny Cope may momentarily take you by surprise on first hearing but all that listening you've done will render you totally unfazed. Structure sounds like a mechanical word to me.
Thanks for all the constructive comments and really honest replys. I have forwarded a link to my guitarist and his reply came rather swiftly, and setting a positive attitude from which we can communicate. So this forum has proved its value again. I appreciate it and am myself enlightened.
Phil
Steve Shaw.... so true, I don't think anyone totally immersed in this music actually THINKS about structure while playing, it does need to get buried in your subconscious and the only way is immersion for a good long while. I don't know any great players who stop and think about what letter note comes next or what chords are coming...it's just there.
One person very involved in the music I know theorizes that it may actually get encoded in your DNA and can get passed to your kids...thus musical families, but that also must be fostered in them while growing up. So who knows if true and if so, how much of which contributes to their playing. Some kids seem to be born musicians though, sometimes multiple kids in a family. If they are born with this in the DNA, subconscious or whatever, great for them!
This is very interesting...! I love that this discussion is on here!
I am a professional jazz pianist living in Chicago. I also play trad on the piano box. Most of my peers in the jazz scene here have no idea why I'm so into trad. The answers are many, of course - I grew up hearing the Bothys and lots of old Claddagh and Gael Linn records from my dad's collection, but didn't start playing trad seriously until a few years ago. Many jazz musicians can't get into trad because of the lack of HARMONIC change. Jazz harmony is extremely sophisticated, with sometimes very simple melodies - i.e., many/most standards from the "Great American Songbook".
Traditional Irish music, on the other hand, has very sophisticated melodies - and relatively simple harmonies. It's the melody that holds it together!
This is very interesting to me, particularly as I am about to submit a research proposal, in hopes of obtaining a grant to study Improvisation in traditional Irish music! Perhaps the improvisational aspect is a subject for another discussion...but please feel free to contribute to this again, after two years of it being dormant!
A lot of jazzers fail to spot the enormous amount of improvisation in traditional Irish music merely because it is on a different scale to theirs. Big does not mean more.
Jazz Improvisation is done on grand sweeping landscapes. They construct rolling hills of endless meadows. But Irish music is concerned with the detail of individual meadows, the individual blades of grass, the thousands of exquisite tiny flowers.
Jazz musicians think their improvisation is more than an Irish musician's because they stand on a hill and study the shape of the landscape. But they are wrong. They need to get on their knees and humble themselves to the complex beauty of the minutia, rather than simply hearing it as a bland sea of green.
You may want to point the questioning jazz professional to Niall Keegan's "Don't Touch The Elk" CD. He plays on the very outside edge of trad with a considerable amount of authority.
Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
How do you reply to a Jazz guitarist who states that there is no "Structure" to Irish music. I don't especially know the meaning of the question, and I guess I feel offended on one hand, embarassed on the other, that I can't technically respond to what I take as a criticism.
Anyone care to tackle this with a serious reply?
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by wvwhistler
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Gosh... Not being an expert, I am not exactly sure what your friend means, but I'll take a stab at it:
By "Jazz Structure", (s)he may be referring to the fact that a jazz piece is usually built upon a particular chord progression. And that progression stays the same. So the band may play an intro, and play the melody a couple of times, before going into a more improvisational mode, but that chord progression will remain throughout (which is how the other players can back up the others doing their "take" of the melody).
As a guitarist, (s)he may have tried to play in an Irish session once and gotten confused, because (s)he didn't understand what was going on.
Irish music has a lot of inherent structure in a lot of different ways. But it is very different than jazz.
The first thing you might try to explain to your friend is that Irish music is the opposite of Jazz. Jazz is built from the bottom up. There's the chord progression and the rhythm at the base, and the melodies are built upon that, and must fit into that structure. Irish music is built from the top down. The *melody* is king. The rhythm is somewhat inherent in the melody, and the melody stands on its own. The backing (string accompaniment, percussion, etc) is built upon the melody, instead of the other way around. It is there to complement and support the melody, but it should never "drive" the melody.
A jazz guitarist can go into basically any jazz session, hear a tune, and pick up the chord progression and work with it. In an Irish setting, it is much more important to actually know the tune to be able to accompany it well. (Or at least be intimately familiar with the way Irish music works, so that you can make intelligent and proper choices in your backing).
Anyway, don't know if that's what your friend is referring to, but it might help
Pete
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by Reverend
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
It doesn't deserve a serious reply.
No, let's not be too hasty--it's an opportunity to educate somebody who needs it badly. I'll leave it to Dow or llig or some other musically educated sesh.orger... all I could say is the usual "Irish and Scottish music begat American hillbilly music, which begat bluegrass and blues, which begat jazz."
Any so-called jazz musician who doesn't know that needs to go back to school.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by John Galt
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Or--
If Louis Armstrong had heard Michael Coleman play, do you think Satchmo would have said Coleman's music "lacked structure"? Or vice versa? No way to know for sure, but I don't think so.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by John Galt
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
I have my own hypothesis regarding the development of structure in the music that Africans introduced to America. I have a recording of Nigerian rebob music and it has melodies that are "thousands of years old." To me they sound like unstructured pentatonic scales with blue notes. The early Irish immigrants lived in close proximity to the African slaves and there was likely a cross-cultural exchange where these scales and melodies were introduced to 8 and 16 bar structures. The result might have led to what we now call “New Orleans” or "Dixieland" jazz." This occurred to me after watching the Ken Burns documentary on jazz and hearing a Dixieland rendition of the Irish reel, Sally Gardens. So it might actually be ironic that your jazz playing friend would fail to see the structure in Irish music.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by Phantom Button
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
"Anyone care to tackle this with a serious reply?"
You seem to be applying an unfair condition there, Windybaer, if you don't mind me saying so! (wink).
By the way, how did you get that name?
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by de Selby
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Irish music, meaning dance music, jigs reels etc. has a very definate stucture as it has to fit the dances,most tunes are structured in 8 bar repeated phrases,of which there will be at least two, so most tunes are 32 bars long, but some are longer, 48 bars or more, but still in multiples of 8. Certain set dances, which have to fit a particular solo dance of unusual length have a different structure i.e. could be an 8 bar phrase repeated, followed by a 12 bar phrase, these dances have to therefore be performed to their own tunes.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by cathycook
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Irish music is so structured that a lot of people find it very boring. Actually a lot of people think it is the same tune thats being played all the time , ha ha ha
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by houlberg
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Pete (reverend) I think totally nailed it.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by reenactor
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Major structured!!! it's how backers can back things on the fly they never heard before, and melody players can pick it up and play it often by the second time through.
There are many repeated "riffs" to use a word your jazz friend may understand, yet to those of us who play, it is never boring, little variations can always be used, but the basic structure is the same much of the time. This could be why non-players think things sound all the same, yet players can play the most overplayed session tunes over and over and always find something new in them. A little twist or turn, or the dynamics differing groups of players bring to a tune from one session to the next that make the music so exciting, even playing the same old tune. Someone not immersed in ITM doesn't get it. They may "like" the music, but it's not inside them, they don't feel it like a player does, they don't feel the excitement and the vibrations coming off the instrument, so naturally many think it's all the same.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by irisnevins
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
PS.... I don't really mean ALL non players don't get it and feel it... I know many that do, and love it, but I do believe it's a different experience from the playing end of things. I was referring more to the general public. We have many who come to the sessions who listen and really seem to be changed by the music, almost need it the way we do!
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by irisnevins
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Because with Irish music "melody is king" anyone inclined to be a bit tone deaf may not be able to distinguish between the tunes and find it boring! However, while there are structures, which I think have been well described by Cathy, the magic of the Irish tradition is that it's not constrained by any "set-in-stone" rules. Just compare the differences between the high energy reel playing in Donegal with the laid back East Clare style not to mention the exhuberance of Sliabh Luachra polkas and slides, all of them equal and essential components of the tradition.
My feeling is that the jazz guitarist who offered the original criticism needs to get out there and listen to some trad !
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by Bannerman
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Windybaer - perhapps what your jazz friend was referring to was 'macrostructure' rather than 'microstructure'. The internal structure in Irish traditional tunes - airs as well as dance tunes - should be obvious to anyone who takes the time to listen to *a tune*, rather than to the overall sound. What is not so prevalent in Irish music is a larger-scale developmental structure - statement, development and recapitulation of themes, and variation in mood and intensity. This may be present in some band arrangements, but not necessarily in a session - in general, tunes are played, one after another, without a great deal of consideration for how they work together as part of a larger structure, beyond the practicalities of moving from one tune to the next. In a good solo performance, however, that structure is there, by way of the choice of tunes in a set and variations within a tune (which may not be obvious to the unititiated, or to the jazz-primed listener, who expects to hear extensive improvisation). Of course, the same kind of structure is inherent, on a much smaller scale, within the tunes themselves, even without taking into consideration variations between successive executions.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by CreadurMawnOrganig
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
I'll take a stab at this- anyone who cut their teeth in the rock/pop/jazz world would have been weaned on the 32 bar formula (chorus/chorus/bridge/chorus), as well as the 12 bar blues.
Many of the tunes we play are shorter by comparison (two phrases of 8 bars each) but certainly a structure exists. To me, that structure is not as obvious, and Bannerman is right when he says the guitarist needs to listen to quite a bit of trad and try not to view it through his jazz background.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by Greg the Piano Tuner
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
This reminds me of the Jazz violinist who used to come to listen to our sessions a few years ago. We were talking during a break one day and he said - and I'm not making this up: "How come you never play any whole-tone scales?"
Just smile and wave boys. Smile and wave.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by Gzeg
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Gzeg, you shouldn't have said that. There are one or two well-known members here who may well take up the challenge and compose a whole-tone reel
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
As a fan of both jazz and trad, I can say I've talked to lots of folks who don't know jazz and think it's completely unstructured and sounds like noise. Its very common too for listeners unfamiliar with a musical tradition, whatever it is, to think all of its songs or tunes sound just the same. As stated above by others, it just takes some listening of the music to develope an appreciation. Pat
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by PatrickJWK
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Oi... as a recovering jazz guitarist of over three decades, I detect a distinct whiff of wind-up in the cyber air...
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by drone
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
I think the Reverend and his successors nailed it right.
This guy is so into his own field that anything outside of it lacks the framework he has come to rely on, and is therefore structureless.
If he was an all-round musician, then he'd recognize the structure.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by Guernsey Pete
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
if he needs to ask the question he won't understand the answer.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by millionyears_bc
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Reverend and Spoon have said it all.
"Structure"? My wife still hasn't forgiven me for taking her to hear the New York Saxophone Quartet some years ago. Hordes of serious jazz fans left at intermission, or sooner. I had to focus with determination to feel where they were going, and not very successfully.
My point is this: If you understand that a musical genre has some genuine history, you should not question it, but try to understand it. Or just walk away.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by oldstrings
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Which, I guess, is what PatrickJWK said.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by oldstrings
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
I once was asked, "Where the improvisation in Irish music," and I have to admit I was at a loss on how to answer such a question. I tried to say that the melody is very important, and at session people are trying to preserve a tradition. But good players can do variations on the basic tunes and be staying with the tradition (in terms of chord structure, rhythm, etc.). I suppose that is as close as we can get to improvisation (in the jazz sense). The person who asked me this was not a musician, as far as I knew, but I think a really good musician who respected their own style would respect other styles.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by NorthEagle
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
In clearly defined roles for tuning and backing.
Strange a jazz person mentioning structure, which is famous for improvisation. Hence the expression when tuning by ear "close enough for jazz".
I admired Clannad for bringing a "bit of jazz" to Irish tunes and songs, whereby there would be a flute "solo", then bass, then the harp, before everyone came together again.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by bodhran bliss
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
no improvisation? how come then we have so many different styles? its what makes one musician different from the next. its what you can put around the notes thats so great about the music.. a jazz musician should know that
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by trad!
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
You can find structure in anything, it's the discipline of science.
Some musics are built from structure upwards, for example, Irish dance music. Others are built to tease structure, for example, how great diddley music expands what was once purely dance music. And there is that strange genre of "free jazz" that so deliberately eschews structure that its only rule is that one mustn't ever play anything that one has ever played before.
The tired old analogy of flesh and bones comes to mind and an interesting expansion on this could be to look at insects and vertebrates. What music has its skeleton on the outside and the flesh on the inside, or vice-versa?
But structure is not a thing that musicians in this tradition should be interested in. Examining structure can help when learning the basics, but the sooner a formal analysis of structure is set aside, the sooner a deeper level of intuitive, holistic understanding can take over.
# Posted on April 28th 2007 by llig leahcim
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
And the best way to hasten that setting aside of formal analysis is to listen to ITM 'til you're blue in the face. Don't bother unless you love it. Structure will then lurk buried in your subconscious, where it ought to be, and you won't be worrying about it. The odd 3-part jig or that flippin' Johnny Cope may momentarily take you by surprise on first hearing but all that listening you've done will render you totally unfazed. Structure sounds like a mechanical word to me.
# Posted on April 29th 2007 by Steve Shaw
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Thanks for all the constructive comments and really honest replys. I have forwarded a link to my guitarist and his reply came rather swiftly, and setting a positive attitude from which we can communicate. So this forum has proved its value again. I appreciate it and am myself enlightened.
Phil
# Posted on April 29th 2007 by wvwhistler
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
Steve Shaw.... so true, I don't think anyone totally immersed in this music actually THINKS about structure while playing, it does need to get buried in your subconscious and the only way is immersion for a good long while. I don't know any great players who stop and think about what letter note comes next or what chords are coming...it's just there.
One person very involved in the music I know theorizes that it may actually get encoded in your DNA and can get passed to your kids...thus musical families, but that also must be fostered in them while growing up. So who knows if true and if so, how much of which contributes to their playing. Some kids seem to be born musicians though, sometimes multiple kids in a family. If they are born with this in the DNA, subconscious or whatever, great for them!
# Posted on April 30th 2007 by irisnevins
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
This is very interesting...!
I love that this discussion is on here!
I am a professional jazz pianist living in Chicago. I also play trad on the piano box. Most of my peers in the jazz scene here have no idea why I'm so into trad. The answers are many, of course - I grew up hearing the Bothys and lots of old Claddagh and Gael Linn records from my dad's collection, but didn't start playing trad seriously until a few years ago. Many jazz musicians can't get into trad because of the lack of HARMONIC change. Jazz harmony is extremely sophisticated, with sometimes very simple melodies - i.e., many/most standards from the "Great American Songbook".
Traditional Irish music, on the other hand, has very sophisticated melodies - and relatively simple harmonies. It's the melody that holds it together!
This is very interesting to me, particularly as I am about to submit a research proposal, in hopes of obtaining a grant to study Improvisation in traditional Irish music! Perhaps the improvisational aspect is a subject for another discussion...but please feel free to contribute to this again, after two years of it being dormant!
# Posted on June 12th 2009 by smacclutch
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
A lot of jazzers fail to spot the enormous amount of improvisation in traditional Irish music merely because it is on a different scale to theirs. Big does not mean more.
Jazz Improvisation is done on grand sweeping landscapes. They construct rolling hills of endless meadows. But Irish music is concerned with the detail of individual meadows, the individual blades of grass, the thousands of exquisite tiny flowers.
Jazz musicians think their improvisation is more than an Irish musician's because they stand on a hill and study the shape of the landscape. But they are wrong. They need to get on their knees and humble themselves to the complex beauty of the minutia, rather than simply hearing it as a bland sea of green.
The devil, as they say, is in the detail.
# Posted on June 12th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
You may want to point the questioning jazz professional to Niall Keegan's "Don't Touch The Elk" CD. He plays on the very outside edge of trad with a considerable amount of authority.
# Posted on June 12th 2009 by Toppish
Re: Where's the "Structure"? in Irish Music
If someone wants to study traditional Irish music, I'm not sure that "the very outside edge" of it, would be the best place to point them.
# Posted on June 12th 2009 by llig leahcim