Title: "Backatown" Performer(s): Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue Culture/Origin: New Orleans, Louisiana, United States Orchestration: trombone, guitar, bass guitar, tenor saxophone, drum set Chapter 5 in the Wade text talks about improvisation in regards to structure. With Dr. Kang's permission, for this week's blog only, I have chosen jazz music, as improvisation is an important component to the structure of jazz. Although jazz originated in America, it is performed all over the world by different cultures. Improvisation allows the performer(s) the freedom to compose new melodies and rhythms on the spot within the given material, such as chord progressions. Often times, improvers will borrow bits and pieces of melodies and rhythms either from the current song itself, or other songs as an homage to other performers and composers. With the addition of improvisation to jazz music, it allows for individual creativity of the performer(s) (Wade, 2013). The typical structure of jazz music is that it begins with a chorus (or the head), which can be followed up with more choruses, and then an improvisation section (where either one or more performers will improv for any length of time), before closing out with a repeat of all or part of the head (Smith, 2008).
Trombone Shorty and his band Orleans Avenue have been making a name for themselves in the world of today's jazz music. The song "Backatown" is the title track of Trombone Shorty's 2010 album, and represents the culture and neighborhood of his hometown of New Orleans (Hansen, 2010). At about the 2:00 mark in the video, you can hear Trombone Shorty begin the improv section of "Backatown". Now I gave you where the improv section is, but can you pick out where the choruses are? If so, how many? I have actually gotten the privilege to have seen Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue perform live twice. The first was during my undergraduate studies in the spring of 2011 when they performed a concert at my university. A few of us even went out to dinner with the bassist in the video. The second time I saw them live was about a couple of years ago as part of our town's annual arts festival called Festivall. If you like jazz and Trombone Shorty is playing in your town, or close to, I highly recommend going and seeing him. We've talked a lot about access points for students into different musics. I believe Trombone Shorty is a great access point into jazz music. His music includes elements of music that students would listen to on the radio while still maintaining its roots as jazz music.
References: Hansen, L. (2010, May 1). Trombone Shorty: 'Backatown' New Orleans funk. Retrieved from http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=126443793 Smith, S. (2008). Jazz theory (4th Rev. ed.) [PDF document]. Retrieved from http://www.cs.uml.edu/~stu/JazzTheory.pdf Wade, B. C. (2013). Thinking musically: Experiencing music, expressing culture (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Title: "Swallowtail Jig" Performer: Katy Adelson Culture/Origin: Ireland Orchestration: fiddle (with added East West plugins for sound effects) Maybe it's the Irish in me, but I absolutely love Irish music, especially jigs. They make you want to get up and do a jig, and I'm not even a dancer or one who likes to dance in public. This particular jig is called "Swallowtail Jig" and it's a well-known fiddle tune that was composed in the nineteenth century during the Irish immigration to the United States. As jigs are, it is meant to be a dance, and this jig is sometimes called "The Dancing Master" (Barra, 2016).
Classification systems are useful as they help with easily identifying what type of music you are listening to, as well as what instruments are being used, in this case, a fiddle (which is also a style of playing a violin or other instruments in the violin family). A distinctive feature of Irish jigs are their subdivision of beats. Irish Jigs are in duple meter, but the beats are divided into three equal parts. During performance, the beats are stressed musically so that they can be easily felt (Wade, 2013, p. 79). References: Barra, M. (2016, February 25). Swallowtail jig. Retrieved from http://www.violinadventures.com/2016/02/25/swallowtail-jig/ Wade, B. C. (2013). Thinking musically: Experiencing music, expressing culture (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Title: "Sakura Sakura" Performer(s): Swinky (vocals), Kyoko Yoshioka (shamisen), and Matsuda-san (shamisen) Culture/Origin: Japan Orchestration: voice and two shamisens
In listening to "Sakura Sakura", which is a traditional Japanese folk song based on a poem, I could imagine myself peacefully sitting in a field or under a tree with cherry blossoms blowing in the wind. Translated, "Sakura Sakura" means cherry blossoms, and the song depicts the season of cherry blossoms: spring. The work features a voice accompanied by two shamisens, which is a traditional, three-stringed Japanese instrument. On their own, the shamisens can be a bit jarring, especially if you're not used to that type of tuning, but as accompaniment to the voice, it meshes well together. The study of ethnomusicology would inform us that the sung melody uses a scale called Hirajoshi (flutopedia), which is a tuning scale adapted from shamisen music (Harich-Schneider, 1973, p. 520). Further study would inform us that in the Japanese culture, this is a popular children's song that has been well-known for over a thousand years, and that the song belongs to a genre titled Min'yo, which means folk song (Gen'ichi). Translation: Romaji (romanization of Japanese) English translation sakura sakura Cherry blossoms, cherry blossoms, noyama mo sato mo In fields, mountains and villages mi-watasu kagiri As far as the eye can see. kasumi ka kumo ka It it mist, or clouds? asahi ni niou Fragrant in the morning sun. sakura sakura Cherry blossoms, cherry blossoms, hana zakari Flowers in full bloom. sakura sakura Cherry blossoms, cherry blossoms, yayoi no sora wa Across the spring sky, mi-watasu kagiri As far as the eye can see. kasumi ka kumo ka Is it mist, or clouds? nioi zo izuru Fragrant in the air. izaya izaya Come now, come now, mini yukan Let's go and see them!
References: Gen'ichi, T. (n.d.). Sakura. Retrieved from https://www.komuso.com/pieces/pieces.pl?piece=2106 Harich-Schneider, E. (1973). A history of Japanese music. London: Oxford University Press. n.a. (n.d.). Sakura Sakura - Sheet music for Native American flute. Retrieved from http://www.flutopedia.com/song_Sakura.htm
