Compositional Techniques
As a jazz player focusing on improvisation for the first twenty years of my music, musical composition wasn’t my main interest. As jazz grew more compositional in nature and not so literal holding on to the form for soloing, I became intrigued with deeper harmonic possibilities and structures. I felt composing was another way to keep growing as a musician beyond playing over chord changes. I began listening to more orchestrated jazz such as Bill Evans’ “Symbiosis” written and arranged by Clause Ogerman and Herbie Hancock’s “Speak like a Child” as well as Impressionistic composers Debussy and Ravel. These and several other artists gave me the inspiration to compose.
The transition from being a fluid improviser, playing in the moment with no opportunity for revision, to a composer of “new” music with all the time I needed to revise, was a tricky one for me. I realize that “new” is a relative word but my inspiration demanded newness to me. For me, there was this built-in paradox of running away from myself in that my definition for composition was to create “new” music, while my musical vocabulary seemed too familiar to me to be considered “new” from playing jazz all the time. I thought the solution to this was to come up with a personal “music compositional system.” This means instead of looking inside myself, which would be drawing from my somewhat familiar vocabulary, my plan was to create musical experiments that would take me outside of myself based on musical theory, combined with common sense logic, and of course, my musical taste. After all, this was personal. Although things worked out differently later, this opened up a new world to me. A path to infinity would be more accurate. I learned how to think about musical possibilities and explore them with no blocks or barriers. Using logic, common sense, and my musical taste through listening, I opened up subjects like polytonality, diatonic and synthetic modality, metric modulation, non diatonic harmonic progression, as well as many other experiments; all generating material that was either usable or unusable to me based on my vocabulary at that time. Through the process of intense listening, comparing and developing usable material, I was being exposed to musical possibilities that went beyond my present musical vocabulary but not out of reach in that I could hear their potential. The manner in which I experimented with music was ordered and controlled. I wanted to uncover every stone to see all possibilities. For example with bi-tonality, I wanted a peek into some bi-tonal relationships so I simply combined the remaining eleven major triads with a constant major one separating them by register on piano. Although the musical manifestation of two (or more) key centers simultaneously involves a lot more complexity, such as rhythm, timber, and melodic character, the piano’s register separation revealed some obvious natural relationships instantly, such as Tritone, Major 7th, and Major 3rd, as well as difficult bi-tonal relationships such as minor2nd or perfect 4th. And this is only Major/Major. Simple deduction invited a listen to Major/minor, minor/Major, and minor/minor.
When composing, I use my voice with the guitar as my favorite technique. I realized that, even though I am not a vocalist, using my singing voice gives me a more emotional experience with harmonic exploration, much in the same as scat singing my guitar solos, which I often do. I also try to encourage my non-horn students to use their singing voice while playing.
My approach to composition is, and will always be, an open one. Sometimes I start out just tapping out a rhythm on a table; a figure, so to speak. Other times I play a chord and sing a melody and see where it takes me. Once in Europe, missing my son, I wanted to try to just write a swinging melody with no preset chord progression and continued it throughout, saving the harmonization process for a later time. This was a fun challenge and led me to places I wouldn’t have gotten to had I used harmony throughout the melodic process. Another approach for me is to use piano, simply because I can mess with its vast range and combinations. I never think of a preset form or even a particular style when I compose. I just see what comes out and try to go with it without judgments. Over the years I have learned to be patient with composition and not force the issue. Forcing something has only led me to tear it down later. Some compositions finish fast, others take longer. I try to finish a composition before I start another one, before I start judging it or even hating it.
Usually, my compositions are wide spread in time as I feel peaceful and satisfied after finishing. But lately I am experimenting with yet another technique; finish one and start another almost right away. This is creating a momentum and new diversity with my writing introducing some new elements. Since they are all sort of back to back, there is a subtle connection between them regardless of their obvious differences. I don’t know how long I can keep this up but like everything else in my life, I’ll just go with it. Since June 2003 I have completed 8 compositions. That’s a record, so to speak.
I intend to continue writing essays about music because I believe there is a need for more musical evolution today. I believe there has been too much focus on the preservation of our jazz heroes and not enough encouragement on self development. I believe that Wes, Coltrane, Evans, Miles, and many others reside inside of us, influencing and shaping our music indirectly. Let’s trust more in that and move on. Evolution is growth.
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