I Made The Right Move

Joseph is the piano player I mentioned last week. We got together and played for a little over an hour straight through. This is exactly the kind of situation I was looking for. With the exception of a brief period around 2011, I can’t remember the last time I was the one learning more than I was teaching. Here are some things I learned:

• My hand muscles are weak and puny.

• I don’t know as many songs as I thought I did

On the other hand

• Despite not having done it in an awfully long time, I can still sight-read pretty well. OMG we played so many tunes new to me

• I’m good enough to hang with someone who is better than me

• I have improvements to make on every front

Previously I talked about working on strength and intonation now, speed later. It’s clear to me that I can work on all three at once now. I’m strong enough to play hard for an hour straight and I’m fast enough and in tune enough to make it work with another good player, shaky though I may be. Go me.

There is this one tune Joseph called that has really captured my imagination, “Eighty One” by Ron Carter/Miles Davis (Miles was kinda famous for ripping off credit for songs written by people in his band, the Carter credit was added later.) I’d heard the tune maybe a couple of times long ago but the sheer WEIRDNESS of it never came across until I tried to play it. Here’s a photo of the paper copy of the lead sheet in bass clef:

At first glance it’s a pretty straightforward 12 bar blues in F. But look a little closer and note that every chord is shown as a 7sus4. Also note that while the tune is nominally in the key of F, the lead sheet is written in C. So given all these facts, when you dive in and actually try to play the thing it’s more or less simultaneously in the keys of F and Bb and maybe C also if you squint a little.

Now, since all the chords are 7sus4, that means the bass/piano are cooking along on an ostensibly normal blues but without ever playing any 3rds or maj7s for any chord (and then there is that Db/F outta nowhere but whatever).

And regardless of whether the key is F or not, no 3rds means no A notes and no D notes and that means no open strings on the bass and that is fucking TIRING. (I have some residual carpal tunnel issues from playing 30 years ago and these fingerless compression gloves turned out to be super helpful.)

Finally just look at the melody. Even if you don’t read music you can see those claustrophobic clusters of notes separated by uncomfortably long rests and whole notes. The whole song has an unsettled and unresolved feel to it that makes the listener either hope for it to go on forever or else hope for it to end somehow, some way.

My take here is more informed by this 1990 performance from Pat Metheny/Herbie Hancock/Jack DeJohnette/Dave Holland than Miles’. I love this band, and they really make the tune far more accessible and frankly enjoyable than Miles did, and they look like they’re having a good time. All of them except Metheny were veterans of Miles’ bands so they knew exactly what this tune was all about.

Anyway it’s a blast to play and it’s stretching the strength of both my rusty mental apparatus and also my puny left hand muscles in particular. Bring it on.