NationStates Jolt Archive

What would you get - a fantastic style or just an aural dog's breakfast?

Carlos Santana has been doing that for almost three decades, it's worked for him.

Carlos Santana has been doing that for almost three decades, it's worked for him.

Santana's also a guitar god, guitar gods can do anything... that is cept overdose and live (WE LOVE YOU JIMI!!!!!!!!!)

Well, if anyone OTHER than Santana tried it, they'd make a huge jumble of nasty sounding noise and fail pretty badly. I'd feel bad for them.

Santana's also a guitar god, guitar gods can do anything... that is cept overdose and live (WE LOVE YOU JIMI!!!!!!!!!)

Well, if anyone OTHER than Santana tried it, they'd make a huge jumble of nasty sounding noise and fail pretty badly. I'd feel bad for them.

Cough... Mahavishnu Orchestra... cough...

Well, I think it is physically imposible. I also believe that everything is possible. Therefore, if anyone can do it, they'd make millions!


But let's break down each style:

Rock: Usually using a I-IV-V repetative progression. Common instrumentation includes drums, bass, guitar, keyboards and vocals. Common topics include love, drugs, political protest and death.

Classical: Usually uses complex chord progressions and voicings. Usually uses a string, brass, woodwind and percussion section, or any combination and number thereof, as well as piano and solo instruments. Almost all classical is done with accoustic instruments. Topics include Greek/Roman Influence, Odes to Lady's and Lords, and Classic Stories.

Jazz: Uses varying chord progressions. Some influence from blues progressions, or heavy use of stacked chords (G9, A7#5, B13/D) or loosly connected progressions (swing). The Dominant 7 chord is the most commonly used chord, whether in a blues progression or a swing chart. This style also includes be-bop, and many other's that I can't think of right now. Instrumentation varies from Big Band to Combo styles. Bigband can include a trumpet, trombone, saxophone and a rhythm section. Combo can be made up of any or all of these. Topic's include love, drugs, and music/dance. Vocal's can also be used.

Avante: I am unfamiliar with this style of music. Is it similar to Electronica?

World Music: I am asuming that this mean's ethnic music. This style(s) of music is far more varied than any of the other sections. There actually is no way to categorize it. Vocal's tend to be important in all ethnic music, no matter where its from. Drums are also associated with this style. Chord progression's and phrasing tend's to be rather loose, as the music is made not by musicians, but by common people to pass the time. Topic's include everything in a common person's life, and varies from culture to culture.


So there you go...BRIEF overviews of each style. Clearly they conflict, and there is no easy way to blend them all. Some bands, like the 12 Girl Band seem to blend some of this nicely...same with Bond. But for the most part, it's impossible!!!

Its been done. Its called Industrial.

Its been done. Its called Industrial.

Not even.


Try "Jazz Fusion".

See:

Herbie Hancock.
Miles Davis.
Al Dimeola.
Chick Koriya.(sp?)

A band called "Chicago" did a pretty good job in their early days with that.

For Progressive Music, you wanna be trying bands like King Crimson, After Crying, Van Der Graaf, Porcupine Tree, Djam Karet etc.

I think that would be a nice sound to play in a retirement home for rockstars... ^_^ It all depends on tempo and how good they are. ^_^ Ooh... an old home for retired rockstars. Scary! ^_^

It would depend on how good the band who's doing it is, that could make it suck or kick ass.

Go back to the 60's.

Listen to a later-year Beatles album.

Note carefully the use of orchestral movements, sitars and other elements Indian music, blues rifs, jazz progressions, and various other elements from other genres.

I'm not a big fan of the Beatles, but they certainly pioneered exactly what you are describing. Other bands have certainly also brought in diverse influences with varying degrees of success. Carlos has been mentioned. Pink Floyd should also get a nod.

What you are describing is nothing new. As always, it is up to the skill of the musicians and the quality of the composing.

World Music: ...Chord progression's and phrasing tend's to be rather loose, as the music is made not by musicians, but by common people to pass the time.

Most laughable sentence I have read all day (excluding all those made in connection with the worldwide Jewish conspiracy).

So musicians != common people, and nobody that plays world music is a musician? I think you might want to start again from first principles.

(Having issued my earlier caveat concerning the racist posting going on in other threads, I will just note that such an attitude as Valderixia expressed is not without its own blatant racist overtones.)

So musicians != common people, and nobody that plays world music is a musician? I think you might want to start again from first principles.

maybe musician = white musician on the payroll of a major corporation (or the aristocracy for older ones).

maybe musician = white musician on the payroll of a major corporation (or the aristocracy for older ones).

Ah, so when Peter Gabriel or Paul Simon play world music they are musicians, but when Ravi Shankar or Fela Kuti play it they are just 'common people'. Thanks, Valderixia, for clearing up my foolish misconception that being a musician had something to do with actually playing music.

Ah, so when Peter Gabriel or Paul Simon plays world music he is a musician, but when Ravi Shankar or Fela Kuti play it they are just 'common people'. Thanks, Valderixia, for clearing up my foolish misconception that being a musician had something to do with actually playing music.

which leaves just one question - does irish music count as world music? it sounds awfully 'ethnic', but the irish all so damn pasty.

Generally, a song thats attempting to be classical, jazz and world music (etc) all at once is going to just fail. Jack of all trades, master of none kind of thing. Pick a style and be that!

However, most musicians (most real musicians :P ) are brought up with at least somewhat classical knowledge and that probably influences their music... in that classical really came first it probably underlies a lot of music today.

...in that classical really came first it probably underlies a lot of music today.

Really? and at what point did folk music around the world evolve out of classical music?

What you are describing is nothing new.

I know that, but I think there might be a lot of young 'uns who haven't heard of Progressive Music. Also, a lot of people have the mistaken idea that Progressive died out during the 70s or that the style's heyday is strictly from back then. Progressive Music is very much alive today.

Progressive is my favourite style of music so I'm always trying to introduce people to it. Especially because radio and other media completely ignores it except occasionally to state wrong information about it.

At the same time folk musicians ever started playing classical. Or starting out from a classical music culture. Anyway, I never said all music evolved from classical, just most of what we hear today.

Cough... Mahavishnu Orchestra... cough...
lol, yeah I was about to suggest them. Santana hasn't really been blending all those styles for decades, but he dabbled with it in the early 1970s collaborations with John McLaughlin.

Most laughable sentence I have read all day (excluding all those made in connection with the worldwide Jewish conspiracy).

So musicians != common people, and nobody that plays world music is a musician? I think you might want to start again from first principles.

I agree, a lot of world folk music depends on the virtuosity of the musicians, particularly Spanish flamenco.

As regards Ravi Shankar, he is not a folk musician, he's a classical musician. Indian classical music is not the same as Indian folk music.

lol, yeah I was about to suggest them. Santana hasn't really been blending all those styles for decades, but he dabbled with it in the early 1970s collaborations with John McLaughlin.

Their LP 'Apocalypse' recorded with their second line up (no Jan Hammer) and the London Symphony Orchestra is probably the best answer to the original question "What If A Band Blended Rock Music With Classical, Jazz, Avante and World Musics?"

Naw, it would never work.

No band can be everything to everyone; music is too diverse for that to work. They would end up sounding like they didn't know who they were.

At the same time folk musicians ever started playing classical. Or starting out from a classical music culture. Anyway, I never said all music evolved from classical, just most of what we hear today.

Just this once, in view of the anti-Jewish wars going on in the Forum right now I will curb my pedantic tendencies...

Generally, a song thats attempting to be classical, jazz and world music (etc) all at once is going to just fail.
That's why Progressive music seldom uses short "songs" but instead uses the classical frameworks of "Suites" and "Movements" so that a piece can evolve over a longer time period. Lots of Progressive "songs" are 20 minutes long or more.
Pick a style and be that!
Why limit yourself if you don't want to?

As regards Ravi Shankar, he is not a folk musician, he's a classical musician. Indian classical music is not the same as Indian folk music.

Agreed, but it is still marketted and viewed in the west as 'World' music, and according to Valderixia that makes practitioners of the art 'common people' instead of 'musicians'.

Their LP 'Apocalypse' recorded with their second line up (no Jan Hammer) and the London Symphony Orchestra is probably the best answer to the original question "What If A Band Blended Rock Music With Classical, Jazz, Avante and World Musics?"

Wow - I never heard of this album but it sounds like it might be really interesting! Is it very good?

Why bother? Damn the anti-Jewish threads, I want pedantry.

Although in that case I meant more than "classical" by "classical," and in fact its really unfair, generally, for everyone to divide popular song forms into thousands of sub-genres while lumping anything written before the mid 20th century as 'classical...'

Why limit yourself if you don't want to?

True, not everyone wants a distinct style.

Pick a style and be that!

Yeah: damn right. Imagine if some idiot had tried to fuse the coloured blues/gospel tradition with white hillbilly/country music in the 1950s - just imagine where we would be now...

Yeah: damn right. Imagine if some idiot had tried to fuse the coloured blues/gospel tradition with white hillbilly/country music in the 1950s - just imagine where we would be now...

Damn straight, we'd have rock dominating all culture and conforming to the general public's inability to concentrate on music unless it was ultra simple and tonally inoffensive! Rock sucks. Unless you meant jazz, and well a lot of jazz sucks as well, though not as much as rock.
;)

Wow - I never heard of this album but it sounds like it might be really interesting! Is it very good?

If you like the Mahavishnu Orchestra's other stuff, then you'll like it. It is not as hard to get into as John McLaughlin's later solo stuff or work he did with other fusion bands. If you haven't heard anything by him, then the Miles Davis 'Bitches Brew' stuff or the McLaughlin/Santana LP might be good starting points.

I looked the album up on rateyourmusic.com and it's quite favourably reviewed. Some fans of early Mahavishnu didn't find the music as fast/intense as they like, but most others enjoyed it.

I'm soon to be getting a copy of Herbie Hancock's "Sextant" album; I think it will be a bit similar in feel to Mahavishnu minus the guitar gymnastics.

The only artist to really pull off a blend of many music types and do it successfully was the late, great, Frank Zappa. Just listen to all of his music. He mixed rock, funk, jazz, rap, classical, world music into something rather unique.

Insert a jazz note here!

The only artist to really pull off a blend of many music types and do it successfully was the late, great, Frank Zappa. Just listen to all of his music. He mixed rock, funk, jazz, rap, classical, world music into something rather unique.

Indeed: although with Frank Zappa one always has to bear in mind that sometimes quantity won out over quality.

John Zorn probably deserves a mention as another fusion orientated artist: NY based sax player that takes most of his style from Ornette Coleman, but mixes in all manner of weird influences and personnel. The Naked City - Torture Garden LP is probably the best place to start - there are a couple of MP3s of them available here:

http://www.earache.com/bands/naked_city/naked_city.html

The first song (Osaka Bondage) mixes 60s cocktail jazz with Coleman styled arbitrary notes, British/Japanese 80s hardcore and a trace of prog-rock keyboard playing in the style of Keith Emerson. The second (The Prestigitator) takes some lessons from the No Wave movement, throws in some surf guitar, before swinging into a latin styled outro, all aided with more peculiar sax playing.

Recommended.

What If A Band Blended Rock Music With Classical, Jazz, Avante and World Musics?

They'd be eligible for a fat grant from Heritage Canada, funded by me and you!

If you like the Mahavishnu Orchestra's other stuff, then you'll like it. It is not as hard to get into as John McLaughlin's later solo stuff or work he did with other fusion bands. If you haven't heard anything by him, then the Miles Davis 'Bitches Brew' stuff or the McLaughlin/Santana LP might be good starting points.
I have the first two Mahavishnu albums, but my favourite McLaughlin project is Shakti.

The only artist to really pull off a blend of many music types and do it successfully was the late, great, Frank Zappa. Just listen to all of his music. He mixed rock, funk, jazz, rap, classical, world music into something rather unique.

Insert a jazz note here!
I agree, I love Freak Out! and Hot Rats. And he was a liberal! (OK sorry)

I agree, I love Freak Out! and Hot Rats. And he was a liberal! (OK sorry)

A social liberal certainly, but I'm pretty sure FZ was an economic conservative. He also had a strong Libertarian streak in him. Zappa loved to skewer hippies and had little use for those who didn't have the same kind of mega work ethic that he did.

A social liberal certainly, but I'm pretty sure FZ was an economic conservative. He also had a strong Libertarian streak in him.

Judging by his autobiography his main economic concern seemed to be the amount of tax that was being collected from him once he started to make it big. He drones on and on about this at length for most of the second half of the book.

I have the first two Mahavishnu albums, but my favourite McLaughlin project is Shakti.

The only Shakti I have heard is off a 1980 'Best of John McLaughlin' compilation. I wasn't vastly impressed with the tracks on their.

What is a great post-Mahavishnu album though is the Live Jeff Beck/Jan Hammer Band one from 1977. Fantastic stuff.

Anybody had a listen to the John Zorn/Naked City stuff yet?

I've not heard any Zorn, but I always imagined his stuff might be really intense/difficult avante stuff lacking any melodies or hooks. Am I wrong about that?

I've not heard any Zorn, but I always imagined his stuff might be really intense/difficult avante stuff lacking any melodies or hooks. Am I wrong about that?

Judge for yourself:

http://www.earache.com/bands/naked_city/mp3/The_Prestigitator.mp3
http://www.earache.com/bands/naked_city/mp3/Osaka_Bondage.mp3


The first file is 750k, the second 1,250k.

Thanks.

BTW way are there many people here who are familiar with some of the *branches* of Progressive Music such as Space, Krautrock/Kosmische, Canterbury, Fusion etc?