Who's Your Mack Daddy

So, after countless sessions and missed sessions, hours of listening and tweaking, wrestling with a live performance, finding and stomping on bugs, trying to edit but being unable because of the close set-up inperformance, EQ-ing, you name it, we encounteredit, we are through mixing "The Re-(w)rite Of Spring". Could we spend more time? Sure. Would that make a difference? Certainly. Would it make it better. Maybe, maybe not. But for now, we have put a fork in the mixing.

Much, much credit and many, many thanks need to be given to Mack McLaughlin for his dedication to this project. He engineered the live show. He recorded the live show and did all the mixing hinself. Sure I was there most of the time and I had input. The kind an arranger might have. Like "I need a little more of that third voice in the chord. Boost that clarinet and muted trumpet just a bit". But it was really Mack's incredible ears and knowledge that made this recording come together. How loud should the solo be? How bright should this be? How much should the rhythm section be "present" in this tune? All those things Mack knew and handled with ease.

I've known Mack for a good while now. We put in a lot of miles together travelling all over the country in a van while serving in the Army and performing with the Army Jazz Ambassadors. Well, I was performing with them. Mack was mostly unnoticed. And that's a good thing, because he was running sound. If you notice the sound man it's probably because he's not doing a very good job. And people very seldom noticed Mack. And Mack has been at this a long,long time. Check out his Facebook page and see the pictures of him travelling and playing with the family band when he was a kid. He was gigging by age 6 or 7. Some of those home converted vans/tour buses and ancient pa/mixing equipment shots will really give you a chuckle. But man, he knows what he's doing. And he knows what to listen for in the process. Something I gained just a little insight into during the many hours in the studio.

For those that think mixing is easy, think otherwise. Heck, just listen to all the really bad home projects being put out these days by people who buy Cubase and a few mics and think they now know how to operate a studio. They record poorly. They mix poorly. They EQ poorly. (And it's usually bad music to start with.)There is a whole lot of crap out there. My project will not be one of those.

Also, a few more performances are in the making. It looks like The Bohemian Caverns Jazz Orchestra will be performing it at the Intersections Festival in DC in the early part of next year. And their is a chance The US Marine Band (The President's Own) may do it as well.

So, for now we are on to mastering. On Sunday, July 31 at 3:00 we will beging the process. The amazing Bill Wolfe in Arlington, VA will be doing that. So in a little more than 72 hours we will have a final project. Then it will be on to finding a label. Perhaps ARC with my friend Chris Burnett in Kansas City. Or perhaps someone else. Who knows. I'll certainly keep everyone up to date on that.

And who's your Mack Daddy? Why, Mack McLaughlin, of course.

Of Bob Mintzer

Calvin and Hobbes, my absolute favorite comic strip ever. Sometimes I have the wisdom and smarts of Hobbes. Other times I'm more the idiot wrecking ball that Calvin can be. Read on and you'll see.

So, I'm sitting in my hotel room in New Orleans. The JEN (Jazz Education Network) Conference here has just wrapped up. Three days of fantastic clinics, presentations and performances. This is the organization that has arisen out of the ashes of IAJE (International Association for Jazz Education).This is the 2nd conference the organization has put on and they are doing a great job. Kudos to them.

On Friday I went to hear a clinic/performance by Jeff Coffin and his Mutet. Great sounding band. And their bassist is Felix Pastorius, son of the legendary electric bassist Jaco. When I walked in the hotel meeting room there was a lot of people in there. But I decided to look for a seat up front. Lo and behold, there was a spot in the front row. And who do I sit right next to? Bob Mintzer. He was doing what most 20 somethings would be doing while waiting in a room for something to start, texting and checking e-mail on his phone. After a few minutes he looked and me and said do I know you?" I told him we had spoke for a little bit at last year's conference and that I was the one that had given him some rehearsal recordings of Rite Of Spring arranged for big band.

Now, when I gave that disc to him, I really didn't expect him to listen to it. I know that lots of people give recordings to people as well established in the business as Bob Mintzer hoping for some help or validation. I'm sure he never gets around to listening to most of them. But when I mentioned Rite he said "Oh yeah, that was some interesting stuff. That was a great idea." That felt really good. Then I thought about how I had dissed him in one of my earlier blogs. Then I wondered, what if he had actually checked out the blog? I think the materials I gave him might even have had the address for the blog. Oh man, I'm an idiot.

Bob Mintzer is one of the best tenor saxophonists in all of jazz. And he really is a very accomplished composer and arranger. Just listen to the tunes that he has written and recorded with The Yellowjackets. He has a great sense of melody, harmony and groove. And he has accomplished more than I could ever hope to do. And I just go and write all this highly opinionated and probably insulting blather. What a dweeb. So here is my conclusion:

I want to formally apologize to Bob Mintzer for saying such things. And though I will always have opinions on art of any kind, I will try to keep my personal tastes and opinions out of such public statements and offer artists like Bob Mintzer the respect they deserve.

As for the recording, we get to, and hopefully finish, the mixing this month. Hopefully mastering very soon after. Stay tuned.

Snow, Snow, Snow!!!!

So, here in Maryland we usually get a little snow a few times each winter. Every other year or so we might get a snowfall that's at least a bit significant, say, 7-12 inches. About every 5-7 years we get a good one. Maybe 20-30 inches. Well, this winter we have received the mother load. There have been several snowfalls in the 4-6 inch range. In addition we had 20 inches in December, 30 inches just this past weekend and today, only the following Tuesday, we have snow coming down with potential accumulation of another 20+ inches!! Aaaaggghhh!!!! Will spring ever get here?

Well, spring is on the calender and will arrive whether it seems like spring or not. And perhaps this snow will all be gone by then. But perhaps not. But I have arrived at "Spring Rounds", the fouth part of the first half of Rite of Spring, Adoration of the Earth. And it will warm you right up.

I think perhaps this is my favorite section of Stravinsky's work. It is possibly the only section where one might say it is beautiful in the traditional sense of that word as it applies to music. It reminds me a lot of tango music. Not the old stuff from the 30's or 40's that you might hear played at a ballroom dance, but more like the tango nuevo style along the lines of Astor Piazzolla. It has a very haunting, mysterioso feel to it and is probably the part that most easily lends itself to a modern jazz treatment. There was a lot of figures that sounded totally "correct" exactly as they were when a rhythm section groove was put under it. As a matter of fact, I would say this piece has the best natural groove of all the parts of Rite of Spring.

For the intro I gave the trill from the flutes to two clarinets. The Eb and Bb clarinet line, which is the melody here in the intro, is covered by a flute, two flugels and guitar. The original line is nearly all quarter notes with a few half notes. I keep the sequence of pitches intact but change rhythms to add some syncopation. I also wrote it in 4/4 instead of all the 5/4, 7/4, 6/4, 5/4, etc. that Stravinsky used for who knows what reason. The melody doesn't necessarily imply those subdivisions. When the groove starts I have the drums establishing the time and feel by using mallets on the toms. This creates a very seductive, tango-ish atmosphere. The two part, off-beat figure in the bass clarinets and low strings is perfect "as is" for this vibe and I give it to the bones, who are in bucket mutes, and the guitar. The on-beat, two note part in violin II is covered by two clarinets and two flugel horns. There is is a little "break" figure that appears twice. This is covered by flute and soprano sax. The note sequence is again intact with a slight rhythm change. Two of the descending eighth notes become grace notes and more of an effect within the melody than an actual part of it. A scoop is added to the top note as well giving it a more mournful feel and is in keeping with the jazz style.

The on-beat and off-beat figures continue as the "theme" is introduced. It is played verbatim by flugels and clarinets. The bones eventually relinquish their off beat part to the piano and guitar. The bones now fatten the melody being played by flugels and clarinets. A piccolo part is also played in it's exact form by flute and soprano. This combination is high in pitch but has more warmth than is usually found in that register in a jazz band. At what would be bar 25 in the orchestra score I break from the form a bit. Here I give the piano chord changes to comp and give the bones some chordal/rhythmic figures not found in the score, but ones that would be common to big band writing. The "break" figure appears two more times. This time I re-inforced it with a bass clarinet. The last time leads into a full band chord held out for two measures followed by two measures of the rhythm section vamping on Eb min11 as a release.

At this point the soprano sax begins an improvised solo. As it progresses I introduce background figures of my own creation. A lot of them are "warm" clusters mixing brass and reeds. There are also falls and rips into notes for greater emotion. These are countered by some low, two part lines played by tenor sax, bari sax and trombones 3 & 4. I have to admit that a lot of what I was trying to do here was to capture the type of sonic ambience that Maria Schneider so readily creates in her music. Eight bars before the end of the solo is the biggest figure where all the horns come together for some hard, stacatto hits ending with a big fall. There is just abit of a release here and the different horn sections then trade around a quarter note triplet idea while the soprano wraps up it's solo.

At this point I'm back to covering the basic idea of what happens with the orchestra. The theme returns but is developed a bit by Stravinsky with added beats. I again keep things in 4/4 and keep the groove going. I cover the same ideas. This time I make the theme ever so slightly syncopated in places instead of playing it exact. This helps to create a bit more tension and excitement. The orchestra arrangement gets quite loud here and I follow those dynamics. At this point the piccolo trumpet, C trumpets, french horns and trombones come in with parallel #9 chords that are nearly deafening. I don't have the manpower to cover so many things so I give this to the trombones and ask them to do their best. I never thought I would write something where I'm asking players to blast, but here it is.

All this leads up to a big fermatta. Following this is a faster section with embellishment type flourishes in the high woodwinds as well as a figure in the strings using an effect that I'm sure has some high-brow name that I'm unaware of. They would be sawing back and forth hard as the line goes up and down with two 16th notes on each pitch. There are also some punches here as well. I cover the basic idea of the flourishes but play them at half the speed make them a "melody" that can be more easily followed by the ear. This is played by alto sax, two tenors and bari as well as guitar and the piano, which plays it in two octaves. This is much stronger than the flutes and clarinets from the orchestra version. All the hits are done by the brass. The drums are given a snare part that is sort of like a telegraph/evening news figure and provides a lot of tension and forward motion. The bass drum accents all the hits. The soprano rejoins the band eventually as well. It is covering piccolo trills.

After the last hit in the orchestra part a trill holds through and the intro figure is played again. Here I have the soprano play an improvised cadenza instead of the trill. This buys times for some trumpets to go to flugels as well as the other trumpets and all the bones to put in mutes. Now I score the intro figure with a different twist. The first is actually the result of a mistake. I thought I was looking at the flute part but was actually looking at the alto flute part so I ended up writing this whole ending section in the wrong key. Second, I harmonized it with tight voicings and a lot of parallel motion. I also come to fermattas in three places in the line and give the soprano a short, improvised fill at each. The key may be wrong, but it worked out well to get me back to an Eb min11 chord on the last note. This is again a fermatta with the bass playing arco and the piano doing a tremolo on two low Eb's in octaves. Now the soprano freely play a written fill based on the main theme and bring the tune to a close.

So, it may be Feb 9th, but I've just made my "Spring Rounds". It was warm and sensuous and at times a bit heated. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to go shovel snow.

What do you wanna do with your life!?

There was a time, way back in the day, when MTV (Music Television) actually played music videos instead of constant re-runs of "The Real World", "Parental Control" or "MTV Cribs". Who cares about these pathetic people? Anyway, one of the classic videos was by a hair band named Twisted Sister. At the beginning of the video a boy of about 13 years of age is in his bedroom with his father spewing angry verbage at him, saliva flying everywhere. After mentioning something about carrying an M-16 in Vietnam the dad concludes his diatribe with the question "what do you wanna do with your life!?"

As I was in the early stages of this project I did a lot of listening to "Rite of Spring" and lots of following along with the score. Each part was quite different in melodic material, harmony, tempo, instrumentation and length. This would beg the question as to what I wanted to do with this part. Some parts are quite difficult to figure out what to do with in arranging it for a jazz band. Others a little more obviuos. Part two, "Dances Of The Young Girls" was painfully obvious. And the answer was the same as the one given by that 13 year old boy in the Twisted Sister video. "I wanna rock!!!!!"

Yeah, that's right, I wanna bang my head. The basses in the orchestra are sawing away, all powerful downstrokes, on these open fifths, the notes E and B, sounding much like an overdriven electric guitar slung down to the knees of some long haired, pimply face teenage boy rocking out in his parents basement. Well guess what? A jazz band has an electric guitar. And drums!! The French Horn punches get coverd by most of the horns like a second guitar punching in some crunchy power chords. A dancy little stacatto line by the English Horn is played by three saxes, playing it with more punch and some rhythmic variation making it more syncopated. The basic chord over the open fifths is an Eb 7(#9). Nice dissonance. The over that the bassons arpegiate a C major triad and an E minor triad. This is covered by tenor 2 and bari, again with a little rhythmic variation. The oboes play an almost fanfare type line. How much fanfare can an oboe produce. Enter 2 trumpets double by screaming guitar.

Now an eighth note part in the cellos in covered by trombone 3 & 4 and a triplet part in the violas is covered by trombone 1 & 2. The parts are typical string parts in that they play without break and the rhythm remains static. I not only syncopate the rhythm but I also turn it into a hemiola. Both parts play a three against four figure. The bass is covering the actual Stravinsky bass part and is also playing three against four. However, it doesn't really have anything to do with what the bones are doing. On top of that trumpets 1 and 2 cover an arpegiated line in the piccolos and A and Bb clarinets. The saxes are continuing the english horn part and this all stacks up into some serious rock and roll cacophony.

Now trumpets 1 & 2 play a high descending line and the whole band comes together for two punches and we are back to the intro vamp for four bars. And now ladies and gentlemen, the guitar solo. A screaming solo on Eb 7(#9)/E. Backgrounds used are figures from the piece. A bassoon line again for the saxes. And again the rhythm is changed. Little bleaps and blops in the piccolos are given to the trumpets and become more forceful. The solo climaxes with two fermattas on #9 chords. Then it's off into double time swing. A descending line is handed off through the sections as it descends further. The same english horn line from before appears and now the syncopation is changed slightly to make it a swing figure. The same strange bassoon arpegios are there two played by the tenors with a new alteration to include a change in placement using anticipation.

At this point in the score the first real melody of this part appears in the french horns. I give it at first to the trumpets. A swing version, but a singable melody. Finally. A few little odds and ends appear and the melody gets repeated. Here I give this line to the saxes 1-3. I do it in cannon form. The three parts stack well. Here another melody emerges in the C trumpets in two part harmony. This melody will appear again in part four. I score it for trumpets. Imagine that. Meanwhile, the bones are again playing a three over four type figure.

These melodies suddenly stop and the violas begin a tricky chromatic sixteenth note line. I'm in double time so the 16ths become 8ths. The line is too long without fro horns to play without a break so it gets handed back and forth between couplings of alto and tenor sax. Now the first "melody" gets screamed over a dominant pedal and we send the trombone off on a solo excursion. Typical background figures, sometimes relating to the piece, accent the last solo chorus. After this solo the band is in overdrive to the end. Couplings of saxes play a melody echoing back and forth. The bones play an E min 7 (b5) and D7 back and forth in swinging punches. These were french horn chords. The bari, piano and guitar cover a viola line, two different groups of four descending notes, which becomes very swinging. I just have to put in small breaks so the bari player can breathe. The oboes have a chromatic 16th note line that goes up and down over four beats, covering an interval of a minor sixth. This gets played and repeated by the trumpets. Trumpet 1 takes it up an octave every other time. The bass is playing a written line of quarter notes and the drums are swinging hard with a back beat at this point. The band is at a full romp.

This romping feel reminded me of a recording by The Either/Orchestra of a Henry Threadgill composition called "The Hard Blues". On their version they come to a tight, hard ending. It cuts quick and short. However, it's a false ending. They come back in with no prep and end it again. Then once more. Perhaps a tip of the hat to Basie's "April In Paris" without the "One more once". I decide this is a good idea for this chart and have three false endings with varying lengths of silence before the music returns. The fouth time is a charm. (The real ending)

So, Twisted Sister just might dig this part. And if I ever do a video of Rite of Spring for MTV perhaps I'll spoof their video and have a little talking head of Igor pop up and shout, "I wanna rock!" But I'm not about to wear spandex.

Of NYC, Maria Schneider and Don Sebesky

Yesterday I made a crazy trip to New York City. A friend and I hopped on a train at the Amtrack BWI station at 3:50 in the afternoon, travelled to New York, grabbed some food, saw a show at The Jazz Gallery, went to a later show at The Jazz Standard, ate a late night slice and hopped on the train home getting in at 6:24 am. I'm a bit tired but also quite inspired.



At the Jazz Gallery I ended up sitting right in front of someone I knew from my days as part of The BMI Jazz Composers Workshop. I particiapated from Sep 2003 to July 2005. Naturally the Stravisky project made it into the conversation. He instantly replied that that had always been a dream/goal of his to do. He had purchased a score many years ago, looked at it and put it off. And it is still off. He did say, as have others, "I believe Don Sebesky did a version of Rite of Spring." And that is true. However, neither myself nor anyone else that has mentioned it has actually heard it. It is something he did for Hubert Laws on a CTI record from the 70s. I have looked it up to find it is all Sebesky arrangements of classical pieces. The Rite of Spring piece is 9 minutes and 10 seconds long. Quite obviously not the whole work. I've sampled the track on itunes but the free 30 seconds doesn't tell me much. I can't purchase the individual track although the $4.99 for the whole album might be a good deal. Anyway, The Marcus Gillmore Quintet with Mark Turner sounded great at that venue.



At 11:30 I was in my seat waiting to hear a big band play the music of arguably today's greatest jazz composer, and my personal favorite, Maria Schneider. Her band holds forth every year during the Thanksgiving week. What a fantastic show. Two friends from college, Greg Gisbert and Donny McCaslin play in the band. Both played an amazing solo that set. And the music gave me goose bumps and moved me very nearly to tears on several occasions. She opened with Concert in the Garden. Ben Monder played another mind bending solo. She followed that with Gumba Blue. Gisbert, Steve Wilson and Ryan Keberle tore up some minor blues on that piece. The Rich's Piece featuring Rich Perry. She closed with Hang Gliding, an amazing musical excursion. Donny played his tail off as did Ingred Jensen. After the set he was apologizing to Maria for his poor playing. She didn't buy it, telling him that his worst nights would slay most other mortals. Great players never seemed to be satisfied with their playing.



After the set I was able to talk to Maria for a bit. I suppose it would be a stretch to say we are freinds. Perhaps acquaintance is the correct word. But I have had numerous opportunities to interact with her. I even shared a table at dinner one time. And she does give me a hug every time I see her. (I know, you're all jealous.) Anyway, last night I actually gave her an invite to the premier of Rite of Spring for jazz ensemble. (May 12, 2010, Baltimore's Contemporary Museum) One of the first things she mentioned was "Don Sebesky did a version of Rite of Spring." We ended up talking a bit about that. She told me that Bob Brookmeyer was on that date . He has told Maria that the first rehearsal was a disaster. But Don knew what he wanted, communicated it and drove on and got a good recording. Her point was to not be thrown off or discouraged by a poor initial reading. Sometimes that can freak a composer/arranger out and make them worry about what they wrote. Point taken.



Anyway, it was an inspring night in NYC. Some great food, great playing, great compositions, great conversations. This type of music is always a boost to my playing and my writing. It makes me want to keep at it. As a matter of fact, it is making me anxious to finish this project so that I can get to some original material for a change. And I'm not to worried about first readings of the music. (I get six more charts read on Tuesday and I'll probably post about that) I have enough new pieces read to not be bothered by what an intitial reading may sound like. But I may just pee my pants if Maria was to actually show up at the premier performance.

Rite of Spring as a work for Jazz Ensemble

So, I have been meaning to start this my first ever blog for quite a while now. I have however, procrastinated quite well. In fact, in much the same manner as I put off starting the project that I am now blogging about. And that is the daunting task of arranging and orchestrating Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring" for jazz ensemble. Or "big band" as these groups were called as they emerged as popular American performers in the 1930s. The genre has not disappeared although they have become a fringe group, at least as compared to rock & roll, country or hip-hop. But they continue to survive as jazz ensembles, jazz orchestras or even the good old word big band. I don't like big band so much as it has too strong of a tie to bands like Glenn Miller that were playing dance music and never digging in to really play some jazz. But, now I'm off on another tangent.



About November of 2008, Brian Sacawa, curator of the Mobtown Modern concert series in Baltimore approached me with an idea. Why not present Stravinsky's Rite of Spring as a jazz piece. Being an arranger and composer as well as a glutton for punishment I said, "hey that's a good idea." Well, nothing more was said until the following February or so when we more or less said the same things. "Let's do it." And off it went into the recesses of my mind.



Well, sometime around April or May I googled Stravinsky, rite, jazz, etc and what do you think I found. The website for Mobtown Modern with a performance date for Rite of Spring "as arranged by award winning composer/arranger Darryl Brenzel". Panic!!!!! Now there's a deadline. May 12, 2010 at the Contemporary Museum in Baltimore. A little more procrastinating and pen finally starts to go to paper in July. Well, actually, I start to input my first notes in the computer.



Anyway, I am currently about 2/3 of the way through the actual writing. I have heard a rehearsal of about 40% of that. My intention with this blog is not only to keep you posted on my progress and all it's inherent hurdles and rewards, but to backtrack through some of the process to let you in on what has happened along the way. And to perhaps even re-think things myself. My goal is to update at least two times a week. We'll see how that goes. Anyway, I hope Igor is not rolling in his grave. I kind of like to think that he would appreciate what I am doing. And I hope on May 12, 2010 that my audience does as well.