Michel Camilo on drummers ....

Yes, yes, yes. Love his remarks about expectations from a drummer being an equal partner in the music. There's talk on this forum about the drummer just taking a backseat and staying out of the way of the other musicians, but there's so much more to it than that.
 
Yes, yes, yes. Love his remarks about expectations from a drummer being an equal partner in the music. There's talk on this forum about the drummer just taking a backseat and staying out of the way of the other musicians, but there's so much more to it than that.
Agreed. I love how much he values interaction from all the players, including drummers. He says "it's jazz", and it is, so no argument there, but the same concept can be extended to many other genres as well as long as there's band buy-in.

I also really like his opinion that drummers need to be *performers*; that musicians play the notes (or keep the beats), but an artist has to move people. To do that, you really need to be willing to stick your neck out with the confidence that you can help move and shape the music for the better.

I think it's great to move the audience, but even better to move the other band members. When I feel the impulse to throw somethings out off-the-cuff that I've never tried before, and I try it and it works - and other band members respond with huge grins, or even laughter ... man, it really doesn't get any better than that! Even if it's just in the practice room.

Of course, things don't always work and flubs still happen ... BUT: nothing wagered, nothing earned; gotta break a few eggs to make an omelette; blah blah blah ... haha
 
That guy is so cool. What an inspiration!

It's funny because what he was talking about - all that music and musician/artist stuff - is almost in direct opposition to what I'd be out doing with the high school kids on their show choir journeys. It's a circus but none of what Michel talked about applies to what I'm asked to do. I've been told to overplay all the time, to rush when necessary, I'm playing with players that don't make me play any better, I've been told to drown things out......no wonder I never made it. I'm working on the exact OPPOSITES! It's amazing people call me at all.
 
and I don't expect anyone to agree with me .... but in my mind anyone who is experimenting , improvising in any way , or as you say "feel the impulse to throw somethings out off-the-cuff that I've never tried before"....is playing jazz .

I normally would wholeheartedly agree with you (Tony) and Mike - but aside from this statement, I don't.

I wouldn't think anyone would disagree with that definition of jazz, in general terms.. but i'd say that experimentation and improvisation are two different things, albeit their is a bit of grey area. For instance, when SRV improvises a solo on P&J, is he playing jazz? He may be playing in the spirit of jazz, maybe you could even say that was a great jazz musician in that moment, but I think he is still playing the blues..

But my main gripe is with this notion that you have to interject/experiment/improvise to move people. On that basis, I guess we can chuck Purdie and Gadd and Questlove as just musicians, but not artists, because they basically just play grooves and backbeats - just "the notes"... as if improvisations don't use "notes"...

I understand the sentiment: there is a profound difference between a moving performance and a mechanistic one. And it's this difference that separates the men from the boys - and possibly good art from bad art (if there ever could be such a distinction). But that distinction has nothing to do with whether or not the notes you play (or the art you make) are improvised or experimental.

Consider the analogy to canvas art or photography. Realism is equally as valuable and artistic as Picasso. Just because a photo or painting of a women reading a book would be banal/boring to view first hand doesn't make it any less moving to look at than the experimental/surreal nature of Picasso or Dali.
 
I think you a thinking way too into it and still thinking in genre

another problem musicians have

.... and Gadd is one of the great improvisers of our time

Seeing patterns and categorizing information is an important tool for learning and creating, and it shouldn't blindly cast away, because whether you like it or not, we all do it. In fact you are doing it with improvised versus nonimprovised music. You are cutting the pie, giving "musicians" one half, and "artists" the other.. you say "it goes beyond genre" but in the next breath you give improvised music the tastiest slices of pie, label that jazz, and presumably leave the burnt crust for all the pre-composed noise. lol.

But we can it both ways. We can recognize genres and categories and transcend them at the same time. If we are going to draw distinction, or cut the pie, it'll be between what's moves people and what doesn't.

By that same token, I'll draw the distinction between musicians by who moves me. It doesn't matter if they can or cannot improvise. I know that Gadd is an extraordinary improviser - I'm not trying to say otherwise. But by what Michel is proposing, he is an artist when he plays with Chick, but he left wallowing in mere musicianship when he plays with James Taylor or on any nonimprovised track of any genre. That is stupid. Steve moves me and I'll praise his artistry no matter how improvised or experimental or spontaneous he happens to be in that moment.
 
I never once said or even implied in any way that one style of playing was better , more affective, more interesting or even compared it in any way to another way of playing..... zero .... never happened

You're right. You didn't.

But I get the impression that Michel does think that, based on that video.

I simply said that in my opinion if you are interacting with fellow musicians via exchanging spontaneous ideas you are indeed in that moment a jazz musician
this has nothing to do with "jazz" vs. other music... this has to do with expressing ideas tastefully and contributing

Yes. Expressing ideas tastefully and contributing. The musicians that can do that are called good musicians. I'd think the same way about anyone playing any style tastefully and appropriately.

Whether you are playing a preconceived groove/fill tastefully or spontaneously composing, you are still required to listen, and play tastefully in pocket. It's all one in the same to me. I don't think you can have one without the other because they are mutually supportive.. so I guess I don't know why you are choosing to use the word "jazz" to describe these musicians (and I really don't know why Michel is choosing to call these people artists, as if musicians are fundamentally different somehow).

But I think we are more or less on the same page after all..
 
Of course, I can't take this in a jazz context, because I don't exist in a jazz context. That's completely fine, because everything he said applies to everything I do. Even the part about not repeating something. If I apply that to my world where repetitive structures pretty much rule, it still has application. A sense of journey can be implied via dynamics & other nuance but still within a repetitive structure, & that's what keeps the simple access stuff interesting for me. I need simple access, indeed I crave simple access, but once the music has let me in, I want to go on a journey, not sit in a corner.
 
man.... if 3:30 to 4:02 didn't pull emotion out of those people then I don't know what ever will .... and that was all Steve

I definitely got chills

absolutely perfect example of a drummer creating the most beautiful tension

brilliant !!

That Gadd guy is just brilliant. He said so much with less notes I've ever heard! And the crowd went with him.
 
Excellent. Thank you very much. I remember clearly the first time I heard Camilo. My brother gave me his Why Not record as a birthday present, 25 years ago maybe and I couldn't believe what I was hearing. My first comment was: "Who the hell is playing the drums?" "Some Dave Weckl guy", said my brother (Mr. Weckl wasn't that famous in those days). Ah... Incredible. Why Not, Island Stump... I didn´t even knew what the guy was playing, but I knew I was hearing something exceptional. Now, many many years later, I recognize what I heard then in Mr. Camilo's words. Thank you once again.

And here he is "having a conversation" with Horacio Hernández and Anthony Jackson. You are going to like it for shure.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLdKObM2OJ8
 
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But my main gripe is with this notion that you have to interject/experiment/improvise to move people. On that basis, I guess we can chuck Purdie and Gadd and Questlove as just musicians, but not artists, because they basically just play grooves and backbeats - just "the notes"... as if improvisations don't use "notes"...

Interesting examples. To me, those guys are all great musicians who add so much more than just meat and potato straight ahead drumming. I almost always feel like they are really listening and adding to the musical conversation. It doesn't have to be a huge noticeable thing, it just is.
 
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