"Hey, how about we listen to some jazz?" A playlist by Sheldon Person - Houston Symphony (2023)

Classical musicians are often asked, "What do you listen to in your spare time?"sheldon's person, viola, share this playlist with some of your jazz favorites.

Like all of us lately, I found myself working from my home office more than usual. This time has given me the opportunity to expend some energy on an old interest of mine, jazz, both as an inspiration for my own creative work and to refresh my mental and acoustic ears. These are some of my favorite songs from my home library, so here's my 11-song jazz playlist (also available on Spotify).

This is a hobby for me, and I'mnoan expert, but I wrote some notes on each track. i really believe in itreally paying attentionBecause music is where you'll find the magic, and that's where these notes are designed to point you. Think of it this way: I can go to the Grand Canyon, take a photo, maybe put it online and go, and that's fine, there's nothing wrong with it. But what if I put my phone down and pay attention to where I am, just for ten minutes? What happens in that space?

The musicians and performances in this playlist are from some of the greatest musicians of all time, in the top 0.01%. Listening to this song is like seeing the world from Everest. There's nothing wrong with turning it on and listening in the background, I do that too. But if you can spend even ten minutesreally listening, that's where you'll find gold. If you have an interesting interaction with the music in return, that's your gift to me. Thanks in advance.

1. “Blues del West End” de Louis Armstrong & His Hot Five (1928)

This track seems like the best place to start. Louis Armstrong was an innovator and a jazz giant. This track is early New Orleans style in a nutshell. The first 13 second trumpet solo is legendary, what an opening statement! Note the duet at 1:23 of this track: Louis is singing "scat." Remember that, we'll come back to that later. This duet with the clarinet is a “call and response”. Think: Southern churches and African American spirituals. Armstrong did not invent "call and response"; he just uses it poetically in a jazz setting. This is jazz: a mix from the heart.

2. “Oh, Lady Be Good” de Count Basie & the Kansas City Seven (1962)

Kansas City isn't just barbecue: It was one of the major early centers of jazz when it first emerged in New Orleans. This track is so light and easy - whisper "great". I love how Basie (piano) uses silence to create drama for the first two minutes of this song. He can play very fast, and occasionally he does, but it's the pauses where the magic is. The part that always makes me smile is 1:22–1:26. Theit isplaying the music here (originally composed by George Gershwin), but he's not doing much of anything at the same time. light, abstract andreally modern🇧🇷 Now go back and listen to the first 9 seconds: see what he's doing? He is playing with this 2 note idea of ​​the intro and puts this idea back (1:22) in the first theme or "head". Jazz musicians play and improvise in real time, and that means they also compose in real time. Here we have a composer working in real time. Nice.

3. “Evening in Paris” by Stéphane Grappelli (1971)

String players are atypical in jazz, but it had to include one. And there is one jazz string player who rises above them all: violinist Stéphane Grappelli. Grappelli rose to prominence in Paris in the 1920s and 1930s. Although jazz evolved around him throughout the 20th century, the newer styles were never his thing, and good for him: his was completely unique and authentic. As you can hear in this song, even though he can play so fast and virtuously, he always sounds effortless, smooth, a bit French, and most of all, fun. There is never a dark cloud in the sky when he plays. I love that music. It's an incredibly singable song that I find myself singing over and over without realizing it...

4. “Confirmation” by the Charlie Parker Quartet (1953)

Here's a famous song by another jazz giant, Charlie Parker. It's impossible to overstate Parker's influence on jazz: there were before and after him. As you can hear, we're in a different world than the first three songs. Called "bebop," this style was something of a start to modern jazz. We're in "Lisa Simpson" territory now.

I love Charlie Parker's performance. He lived extremely hard and suffered a lot, and his music has a strong drive and swing quality. Listen to this song: there's nothing light or laid-back about it. But although it is rigid, I find it paradoxically elegant. There are some musicians who can play faster than I can think of, and he is one of them.

On a more advanced note, listen to Parker's phrasing from 0:44 to 2:00, during his first two impromptu choruses. Like Basie, she too often uses silence to punctuate his thoughts. But he's also phrasing over bar lines and even harmonic sections. For example, at 1:50, the harmony returns to section A, but Parker is still finishing the last phrase of section B. This is just one example: he does it everywhere. It's not easy to do, and he's amazing at it. His nickname was “Bird” and his in-game image is flying. He is imaginative, flawless and impressive.

5. “Celia” de Bud Powell (1949)

Another tortured soul of jazz, Bud Powell was a lifelong pianist. In a similar style to the one we just heard, Powell was a kind of Charlie Parker on the piano. Check out the solo break at 1:09–1:13. In addition to his virtuosity, whichInterestingbanknote collection - fresh and beautiful.

There are other pianists from this era who are perhaps more household names, but I chose this track because of all the songs I love on this playlist, this is my favorite. Powell was apparently released from the hospital psych ward to record this session, with the promise that he would be back by dinner, which is unrealistic. This song is named after Powell's daughter, Celia. What I love about this song is that it's charming but never cute and cuddly without being sentimental. It's a magical gem of a song I've been singing to myself all day. I can't get it out of my head.

6. “Bloomdido” de Charlie Parker y Dizzy Gillespie (1950)

Here's another incredibly catchy song that's been following me from room to room this week. Composed by Charlie Parker, this time drawing on his Kansas City roots with the 12-bar blues. He was joined here by jazz legends Dizzy Gillespie and Thelonious Monk. Compare this song to "West End Blues," which is also a 12-bar blues. In 22 short years, this art form is now on a completely different planet. For one thing, the tempo is almost three times faster than Armstrong's blues. Parker and Gillespie also repeat the 12-bar form almost three times as often as Armstrong on basically the same length of track: more speed, more notes, more harmonies, more content,just more🇧🇷 Side note: the album cover (shown in this YouTube video) is brilliant - it's Dizzy in front of us on trumpet and Bird in profile on sax.

7. “It Means Nothing” by Stan Getz and Dizzy Gillespie (1953)

They are joined in this famous “pattern” by Dizzy Stan Getz (best known as the velvet-toned saxophonist on “The Girl from Ipanema”) and Oscar Peterson. I like this track because it gives a little glimpse of the accidental magic of live performance. Jazz is an improvised art form; the players are improvising solos over a defined harmonic sequence, or "changes". But they're not composing every note on the entire canvas; think more about speaking a language and having a conversation. Theysoncompose, but compose within an established framework.

The shape is easy to understand in the visual realm. But music also has form, it's just harder to understand because it's invisible and also exists in time. Like the visual (and mechanical!) form, the musical form is made up of components. The music may seem like “good sounds that start and end”, but there is actually a script, aFormat, which takes us from start to finish. I know, you're thinking, "The next thing you're going to tell me is that magicians in Vegas don't do magic." Exactly.

On this track, listen to the first 20 seconds. This is the introduction. Hear that circular part played over and over again? Remember this. Now, at 0:21-0:43, we have the melody, "It doesn't mean anything..." After that, the musicians take turns playing improvised solos. Spoiler alert: there are 32 bars each (I knowsomeonereading this you will find this joke hilarious).

Now something cool happens at the end. Jazz standards usually end as they begin, with the theme, or "head." That's what Getz expects. Listen at 6:07, Getz starts playing from 0:21. But then Dizzy gets a different idea, he's playing the circular part of the intro. Just by playing this, Dizzy is saying to Getz, "Let's finish with the intro instead of the head." And Getz is listening (insert "Getz" pun here), and he jumps on board with Dizzy right away. Who knows why Dizzy wanted to end the song like that, maybe he just wanted to get it over with, or maybe he thought it would be something cooler to do. No idea, but it seems Getz didn't know either. It is thiseverything happensbetween 6:07 a.m. and 6:12 a.m. This is chamber music conversation and writing, happening in real time, and all this confusion is resolved in five beautiful accidental seconds. Who knows what jazz "is", but whatever it is, you can hear it right there.

8. “Mack the Knife” de Ella Fitzgerald (1960)

Houston Symphony Principal POPS Conductor Steven Reineke mentioned this song at a POPS concert recently, and I've included this track as a kind of PSA. It absolutely deserves to be heard. She was performing in West Berlin and decided that she wanted to sing this song. Originally by German composer Kurt Weill, "Mack the Knife" was popular at the time due to the success of Bobby Darin. She says herself before the song starts at 0:14: "We hope we remember every word."

There are legends about Ella's lack of discipline in learning the lyrics, and maybe that's exactly what's going on here—let's take her word for it. At 1:40 am the magic begins. What Ella does from here, in this moment, in this performance, is better than any lyrics anyone could have written for her. This performance earned him two Grammy Awards. Hear what she says at 2:56–3:02, hilarious self-awareness. And do you remember in "West End Blues" I said to pay attention to the scat singing at 1:23? Well, look at 3:03–3:31. Not a bad impression, right? Creative, improvised, magical. What a musician and what an interpretation.

9. “Flamenco Sketches” by Miles Davis (1959)

Compared to "Confirmation" six years earlier, we are again on a different planet. The world is speeding up, as is the evolution of jazz. This song is from the Miles Davis album.kind of blue, perhaps the most famous jazz album in history. Everything here is about simplicity, brevity and tone, even just thebasic sound of the instrument itself🇧🇷 This is my favorite song on this album. Listen to the first two notes of this track on the double bass. Now watch as Miles walks in at 0:18: listen to how he, too, plays just two notes and stops. I can't imagine it being a coincidence. Those two notes become the framework for your entire solo. Simple and beautiful.

Listen to the song before and after 1:09 and again at 2:50. Hear what it's like to cross those boundaries. Do you hear how when you go through this moment and enter a new section, it doesn't just feel like we're in a different place, but almost a different country?flamingo sketches, take it? An incredibly intimate and beautiful performance - legendary.

10. "My Man's Gone Now" de Bill Evans Trio (1961)

Bill Evans was also the pianist for "Flamenco Sketches". Compare your playing to Bud Powell's: completely different, right? Also note the plates from :00 to 0:29. Go back to the beginning of “Bloomdido”: see how this is different? Jazz drumming went from keeping the beat to adding a layer of color and intimacy. Side note, this is the only song on this playlist that is on 3 and not 4. Bill Evans loved to waltz.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8HEl093bAE

11. “Theme from 52nd Street” by the Oscar Peterson Trio (1956)

If Bill Evans is Debussy, then Oscar Peterson is Liszt. Like Charlie Parker, Oscar is another musician who plays faster than I can imagine. Peterson is from Montreal, and to me, growing up in Canada, he was always considered one of our great Canadians. He was something of the Wayne Gretzky of jazz piano, playing completely in his own league. Peterson learned the piano because he had tuberculosis as a child; he couldn't keep playing the trumpet, so he played the piano like Dizzy Gillespie.

The story of how it was discovered strikes me as hilariously Canadian. After World War II, jazz impresario Norman Granz heard Oscar on the radio while riding in a Montreal cab and arranged to meet him. When he offered to take Oscar to Carnegie Hall, Oscar basically said that he wouldn't because he wasn't good enough yet and he had to go home and practice. Granz would not take "no" for an answer, and thus a legend was born. History now is funny: there are so many great and unique voices in jazz, legends in their own right, but who couldforeverplay the pianoBetterwhat Oscar Peterson?

Jazz evolved around Oscar during the 20th century, but like Grappelli, Oscar continued to play in his own style. It makes sense to me: why experiment with synths or electronic music when you can play the piano like that?

I chose this track for its speed and virtuosity. He's playing with two guys who can keep up and they're all flying. Do you remember "Call and Response" from "West End Blues"? Listen to 0:15–0:18 and 3:25–3:30. Same thing, just evolved and at the speed of light. And I'm sure it's Oscar singing along to this song. Incredible. what a legend

You can also listen to the full playlistits spotify. Cherish!