Essentially Ellington 2019: Q&A with WYNTON MARSALIS

[Applause] the festival that we want you to look at this is much more festival than the competition but it is a competition so we want you to compete and we want you to be up on top of it and feel the joy and the pressure and the disappointment of a competition because that's a part of life but we also want you to meet people you don't know be collegial be friendly root for other people be a part of a general learning experience that will take you into your mature adulthood and it's what you make it the feeling of this festival is very much based on the spirit that you come to this experience with and we here we're resources all of us you'll see us around and the band we come with a amounts of love and experience we have all participated in competitions we were in high school with many of us have parents that were in in the music and we're educators and one of us Carlos Enriquez was in the very first essentially Ellington so at we we normally just start I say a few little words which I've said and then we open it up for questions because we want to get to things that we know you may want to know you don't just have to ask questions to me we are available as a resource it's more productive if you want to know about things that will help you in your experience here with your band you want to know something out the rhythm section how to play certain grooves how to lead a section kind of technical things we're here but we're willing to answer any type of question as long as there's something that could be printed in the paper or put on media without any problem so let's start with the first brave person that will come up and ask a question and then I'm sure other people will come on okay you're looking at your phone you see I was looking at you but you had your phone now I like your tie I like your whole vine blue was nice oh man Wow that's a great start I'm going to turn that over to one of our listening captains probably we've got some people who this is our historian historian he has a library full of knowledge and when we have questions in the band we generally ask him mr. Vincent Gardner it's perfect to answer that [Music] we can't listen with non-musicians ears and listen with the ears that are tuned from all of your experiences and all the the investment that you put in so when you listen to whatever the music is you shouldn't be listening superficially you should be listening for things that relate to how well you desire to play how well you desire to write if that's one of your ambitions you should be listening to intricate details of tone and articulation I'm not sure what instrument you play but I play a tenor saxophone tenor saxophone okay so they do they do apply to that so you should be listening to intimate details when you listen to great masters play of tone articulation breath control or support all the things that you heard about but you can now hear master exempt exhibiting all of those things so you should be listening with very detailed ears and that's going to help to increase the depth of how how much you're involved with what you listen to you should always pick things out that you've never heard before when you listen back to something Sherman and I were just listening to kind of - so what the other day we were in Charlotte and somebody played so work for us and we thought and we've heard so what a million times probably everybody in your hands and he's I hope so and we heard a wrong note that cannonball or Coltrane played and so what for the first time three three days ago listening to him and we'd never heard that before you know they played a wrong note in the second and the second half of the tune when they were going out just one time so you know you're always listening always trying to increase the depth of how you listen but you got to listen with those types of intentions thank you with the recent attention that's been brought to it on social media and other outlets what is your opinion on jazz being labeled as black American music black American music okay I've spoke I've spoken on this many times and I'm happy to speak on this I do I don't believe in putting race a race term that's inaccurate like black or white or red or yellow on music because of the the prevalence of racism in our country as part of our identity we look at everything as a color music is so porous and so many things influence our music this music is American music it is in the from the perspective of therefore America but I've never called our music black music because I don't want somebody else to tell me something is white music the polarity and the way we look at things affects our understanding but I'm gonna say that we know now that we've discovered the DNA strain that race is a matter of climate and the DNA tells us how well interrelated but if you've lived in the climate of racism and you live in that climate and all of your experiences have been shaped by that racism how can you undo your experiences to address the scientific facts of your humanity jazz deals with all of these issues and it's very complicated if you look around our room and you look at just from from the standpoint of the race of who's in here that speaks more to the resources in our country than it does to anything racial but it's very important for us to address these issues as musicians and to be real for us to heal ourselves and it get better if we act like we don't see it or we don't talk about it there's always going to be a problem there are many musicians that have played jazz who have been great not only of different races in America but at this point all over the world to reduce a music to our term of racism that applies to a country that holds those values so dear if I don't I don't I don't think that that has a history if I went a guy called me I'm just give you an example because this is a relatively complex but very simple question because on the one hand I don't want to disrespect the afro-american tradition because it is the world's bringing a source of where jazz comes from however what degree of black does a person have to be to become black what degree of whiteness I might have to be to be white well if you from the South you could be a segregation it's clear but at this point let's go out of our culture and think of if you learn Beethoven's music and you say well let's just some white music is Beethoven's music if you learn tango music's well it's just some white music if you learn Brazilian music and it's more serious on so you say this is black music these terms become very not just not just offensive they're inaccurate I always ask people questions Americans a question I say what color do you think Iranians are and you'll say oh you know dark little people are whiter than you well why are we fighting now that's the next thought not to question why we really I didn't know that these are very difficult but simple subjects so for me personally I don't refer to music in racial terms they can be a nation attached to American they can be afro-american music in terms of the tradition of the Blues the tradition of songs it but let's not forget the root of Afro American music is anglo-celtic music the African ization of music exists all across the Diaspora it's so much music all through the world Middle Eastern music music from Spain everywhere African Diaspora music every time you hear six rhythm in a 12 verse African music but in our obsession for racism to define things racially we have to know what exactly who invented is the DNA told you we come from Africa so we all Africans so we can all call it just African music there you go hello hello my name is Andrew Stein and I'm a baritone saxophonist from Middleton high school and obviously Joe temperately is one of my greatest role models and so my question is how do you think Joe temperately status as an immigrant to American culture affects affected his ability to play music that was rooted in immigrant people I like that question I'm eternal just answer over - Markus primo he said how did Joe temple he status and the reason I'm turning it over to him is because we having a conversation about your temple the years ago I don't know if you remember he said man okay we're talking he said man there's something how Joe is not even from here and he's playing our music but level of seriousness that we're not playing it with do you remember that yeah okay he doesn't remember so you feel comfortable because Marcus really loved Joe with a certain type of intensity as we all did writing a composition for him for a commission we did and you know I was trying to think of what to write and I tried to write some some melodies of my own and then Joe spirit came in to it's like like a month after he died he was print up just sing something and play it and pretend I'm soloing on it so I wrote some chord changes out and I imagine what he would play with the chord changes and so the song was born from that and I can't tell you too many stories about Joe cuz some of them are he was a character he Joe kept us laughing he would tell limericks which is how do you describe a limerick is like a Scottish something that we won't say now exactly but he was just soulful I mean he just loved our culture he loved the culture of the United States and we miss him very much and his sound just says it all so just listen to him and your answer will be given to you just by a sound that's all I can say about Joe yeah I wanna I'm gonna make the point also with what Marcus was saying that we love Jill temporally from a personal standpoint is very deep this music is very personal now talk to Jill right before he passed away i sat down with him on his couch we talked for two hours and he was so sick and then I got up to go to the door and just him trying to get up out of his couch man it was so heavy just to look at him and he got down in there and he stood up he walked over to me he hugged me I heard there and we looked at each other and it is something in our music it's very deep and it's very profound that's intensely human and it's not a joke Joe temple gave his life to that and he was so for real about it it was in his sound and every note he played and I was telling y'all that many of the roots of afro-american music and of American music are anglo-celtic they come from all over the world everything comes from Africa music jewel temperately understood that and he embodied the music Joe will call before we hit some real part he said I went in send me my part I want to make sure that I'm ready don't tell anybody my idea I can tell everybody Joe will practice and work and she had on his part and you know we we love them and in in speaking of Joe his spirit is always with us we talked about Ryan and I used to joke about Joel's changes when you're playing a certain song a Joe will play some type of melodic phrase or something and we're going through whatever the change is what he say Jones changes and I want to also recognize Paul net seller who came in a very difficult position in the band as a young person plays with a tremendous amount of integrity and style and feel has his way of playing and he's continued in that tradition and he's continued with the spirit of joke embracing joke playing his own way and I always have been the ultimate respect reverence without making that reference and all this necessary to be respectful overwhelm his own style and sound and ambitions so I know we going on long and about that but Joe temple it was something he was absolutely for real on so many levels I wish I could get deeper than that but we love this man yes I played alto sax in the Monster High School Jazz one and I have a question about improvisation I was gonna ask what your opinion on scale or skill or improvisation versus playing the changes and how that relates to horizontal and vertical nests of your solo whoo let's see who could answer that who wants to answer that tittle Vic okay you want answer that okay I think I heard of it I think I heard everything you said improvisation is amazing it's an amazing opportunity for us to really explore who we are in different ways but just as a technical thing scales chords you know harmony it's such a it's such a big part of of our tools of what we use to express something to create something to create melodies basically if we remind ourselves we're not just playing notes that work with using the scales in the chords - to create melodies basically if you listen to Coltrane even the most complicated solos you always come back to blues and melody and it's playing and I kind of like to break it down in a couple of ways there's a global way and there's a local way to approach it like a global ways where you create melodies we talked about Joe's changes kind of like where you almost ignore the chords you know and default to playing melodies and phrases that are bigger and more global and take into account something broader than just the chords and the scales and the cadences and the implications of the cadences but the local way is where we address the individual chords for what they are and all the implications they have five 1 1 2 4 sharp 11 things like that those kind of technical things so really basically when you're practicing and you're working on this music you should go back and forth between a more technical and harmonic approach of a local way of looking at it looking what the chords are the function of the chords why they're there really analyze it and then also forget about all that and just try to make melodies that fit over the top of everything too so if you practice both those things you'll develop an instinct for having both the complicated and depth and depth to your solos but plus having melody and blues in it that's how I would approach it I hope I didn't hear all of your question but I think that was a lot of it right yes that's great unjust understand all the perspectives like I like ours use of the word global to like that there's something beyond the technical aspect it's a spiritual thing and then also there's so that way you're not inept because you may have the Technic you may have a very great understanding of a global feeling but you may be technically inept and not want to spend the time it takes or you may be very focused on but you may not want to hear so yes hello I was wondering how we as jazz musicians can continue to evolve jazz music without turning into a different genre and where do you determine the difference between an evolution of jazz music and the creation of a new type of music it's a good question very advanced ok this this goes to a question of meaning now what makes it difficult is that meaning is arbitrary so there's some things that is not arbitrary like you need to drink water that's not arbitrary but they're not many things like that so let's say the first time you really disrespect your parents you're not gonna be struck by lightning the next day you're gonna wake up and do whatever and if they tolerated I'll cool with it you're gonna go on living the first time you don't do stuff you're not supposed to do you're not gonna die then you start to think wow you know ok this really doesn't mean anything this means this that's like what goes on in our political system it means one thing one day the next day it means another whole thing depending on who's defining it if you look at two different news channels you get two totally different News's so you start to think well you know everything is arbitrary meaning is arbitrary in the tragic thing and the great thing about it is it is so you determine what your symbolism is and if that symbolism is some thing that serves your group your nation and you personally you're successful and if that symbolism is not you end up with a monarchy that has all kids that have defects because of interbreeding the world has many examples of symbols that do not serve the people in terms of jazz great part of your question was how can we evolve our music while keeping it itself yeah that's a good question you do that by identifying what are the fundamentals of this music now you have to realize another thing about jazz it goes back to that racial question what if I don't want you to be yourself what if I would look at you and say man the problem with you is you're white you'd be like wow that's a problem yeah let me make about 4,000 movies to show you that is a problem and in each one of those images I'm gonna make sure that you're suppressed in a fool and I'm gonna be the hero and you say but wait a second man I can't get to be the hero sometimes I say and I tell you no man and I do I like you though come here let me rub your head do you have a grill you can put in what kind of stereotype can you be for me why it starts from one thought you're less than me this music is for real like Joe temple it was for real and it deals with real issues we have an identity crisis in our country it affects all our younger people because it's real we want to laugh it away and you know but it's affecting people's lives you all are young y'all are artists step into the meaning of our country of what is what of the most heroic of our achievements of what does it mean to be who we are see your oneness with other people and perceive things in your gonna get you gonna pull out of your pocket instead of some dollar bills you're gonna pull fire out of it yeah boy when you pull that fire out you better be ready for what comes with it cause everybody's not smiling when you do this they say I don't like him we got to open eyes how old music has fundamentals what are those fundamentals think of all the greatest records in the history of our music and ask yourself what do all of these things have in common that tells you what those fundamentals are address those fundamentals and if you if you see deeply enough into those fundamentals you start to see new things new patterns new ways or go away from all of those fundamentals and you can create another form of music see meaning is it's not it's not a right or wrong I like to talk about 360 degree experience and what you just follow me about I talk to one person two people in the family I talk to one they say man my family life was so dysfunctional I determined it when I left home I would be I would get a family I would be faithful I would not drink or whatever the dysfunction was I was gonna be perfect and I'm sticking to this path the the brother or the brother said man my family left was so dysfunctional I couldn't wait to get out and be dysfunctional they both came from the same family 360 degrees so experience is open but it's not you have to be able to hold in your mind to thoughts it's like what democracy is yes you have personal freedom like us in this band everybody can play people spend hours years learning how to play I sit next to a guy who can play any kind of thing on the trumpet most of nice he's not even playing and it's not one or two years it's 20 years hey man you want playing this now man you know I don't listen let somebody else um I was complete Elliott might solo at the end of the night we were talking me and him yesterday when he stole those our night ends we played a whole gig and he starts playing and we say oh yeah him he playing all kind of stuff you never heard on his horn but he sat that a whole night what is the negotiation of me in us we have to hold those two to thoughts y'all asking us some real serious questions so I'm trying to I'm trying to get in there with you but can you follow kind of what I'm saying so the last thing I believed you it is when there's a tremendous investment in you not being yourself for the so-called security of the nation you better defend being yourself and be ready for what it's gonna cost you [Applause] my name is Jeffrey Ocampo trumpet I'm a trumpet player that attends Dilek Center for the Arts my question the story to you what really influenced you to pursue jazz instead of pursuing classical music my daddy and all the musicians I knew I loved classical music - I mean I loved the music but I was raised by a jazz musician and they were struggling so I always saw them struggle but I saw I like they hug each other the way they talk to each other you know him not paralyse there's a certain group of people it was sophisticated they knew about stuff they they were kind of hard-edged about it they política play but they were broke but they could do all those things so I was always kind of hanging around them and I mean I liked them I love my daddy of course he was always so cool my dad was one of them just cool it's not judgmental mess with people he was always just yeah man you know he's always they need people alone man it's hard enough out here and just the way they would like they see dizzy they would hug him or they see you don't want it on and on and many of us have a similar experience if we have it in our family if not we pick the music up some other way you asked me so I'm answering did that did that help I mean I still love classical music I don't have to choose against jazz but jazz I mean I grew up in that tradition so and I love what I learned growing up I loved the musicians they played it in a vibe of it I love it more told I get the more I love it the more in question there's actually the deep of my commitment to it is and you know I believe in it more than I ever believed in it and I believed in when I was Joey but I believe in it now I'm ready to go down with it I'm happy about I love the music you know music is unbelievable it's so great how just keep talking by the man thank you yes I suppose I'm wondering when you're writing new music how you incorporate like international like folk or world sounds with the traditions of jazz without sounding like you're just mashing them together or contrived first time I was approached to write gosh trombones was a piece I did back in 2012 and I remember I was in Cuba actually when went and asked me to do it is 2010 like October so there's a lot of time that I had to I know I had to because I wasn't I was familiar with it but I really had to delve into what it was so like you said I wouldn't you know make a a caricature if you will of of what it is that I was trying to do so one thing that I've learned over the years of being in the orchestra of just being a musician alone is embrace culture embrace culture that you that you run into there's one thing one you may not run into it ever again that might be your only time you ever see a Fiesta that lasts for hours and hours after I give or we're going to you know going to a country and seeing one of the seven wonders of the world I just seeing something to chew first of all never even imagined that you would be there and then second of all you know just taking it all in just cuz that might be that one time you might see it again so in making making gosh trombones I had some really really study I really had to read read a lot and tried to get inside of what changed well and Johnson was coming from and luckily for me that was it was pretty easy because I grew up in that tradition I grew up in church I grew up listening to sermons I grew up listening different preachers and different deacons and different you know members of the clergy and my dad is a gospel quartet singer so I grew up around different groups and they had different ways to sing in different ways to play in different ways that this that and the third so embrace whatever it is that you're trying to work on and really try to find out things that make that make that different make that culture make that whatever it is that you're working on different from anything else and then study rhythm all the time steady rhythm study time study melodies and and different things inside that that what you tried to what you're trying to do so you can make the best out of your version of what it is that you're trying to do it makes sense yes okay I also I want Carlos that I'm sorry to cut cut off del applause I want Carlos to answer that question also because he did a fantastic record Ruben blades he did all of the arrangements we want a plane one time we're studying this book with all this flamenco music man we're studying it like crazy man what about this this trailer when the peoples when we start playing that book didn't help you so Carlos said you see man it's not books so another thing additional Christmas talk might if I have something I'm trying to work on now to understand I call Carlos Carlos what is this what is this rhythm can you write this cell out for me and he'll say man I wrote that cell out for you ten years ago but he can give you a clue to because he writes good arrangements of how different a diversity of cultures can come together so just checking along what Chris said you do a lot of reading and you check out different cultures and in my case for those who don't know I grew up in a afro-latin community and with music I mean to be honest with you my first jazz gig was working with wind so I was I was lucky before that it was just primarily working with Tito Puente Eddie Palmieri Frank Reiser uh Francisco reso and some of the and all the other pop stars in the Latin era with Mark Antony in lane yeah I did a lot of research when I started writing for this band when gave me the opportunity to do some writing and my first arrangement was Brahms Lullaby and at the time I was checking out chico farrell for those who don't know chico fairways check him out he's one of the baddest orchestrating arranges in the world he wrote for my Cheeto and for his own group and there are many orchestrations for jazz bands and i started studying the music and what I did was which what you should do is try to figure out and analyze the similarities in sound and in culture right and try to figure out why this works out and then you figure out the history rhythmically understand where those rhythms come from at the end of the day you're gonna start understanding that we've all been together rhythmically from the start and once you figure that out it becomes easier when you start arranging and you start putting things together so once I started doing that and when I got to the point with doing the the Ruben blades project that was that was fun because Ruben blades music was all over my house as a kid I used to play frisbee with his 45s and in LPS with my brother so I mean I knew his sound very well the thing was I could I could take that music and also hear American jazz music and understand what like Fletcher Henderson was doing and understand what cats were doing then and try to understand the similarities rhythmically so you know you take music and you try to dissect it in different ways like when it says 360 you look at it in many different ways since I'm a bass player I'm always analyzing the rhythmic part of it because the rhythm is unbelievable once you start understanding where it comes from you know I talked with written about the habanero boom boom boom from this rhythm has been everywhere in the world and everyone wants to claim that it's theirs but at some point you're gonna find out that everybody plays it and there's an airy style of music that we love even to if they get thong that's been popularized now so once you start understanding these little details and these cells you could slowly start enhancing the way you write music and you personalize it but at the same time you use the historical factors with it which also it makes it better you know because then you could actually know where things are coming from hi my name is Coleman javi I play piano in the Fox Roy school jazz ensemble my question is um as musicians what do you think is the most powerful and effective way to use jazz music or music in general to impact our cultures in our society and bring everybody together I'm gonna stand up cuz I can't see y'all with this in front of me your question is very big but it's a good good question I believe every time you put your instrument to your mouth or if you sing anytime you sing you are ambassador of the world you are sharing something that is very special music that has transcended time that has been a voice for people of many many colors and also has history and when you play you carry that you're part of that history are continuing that so you could kind of see yourself as an ambassador of that music you're studying that music you're continuing it and you're sharing it with the world and you're also sharing it with parts of the world that probably have never heard that music before I was fortunate last year to go on a tour with the State Department and we went to Africa and some of the places in Africa that we went to it was the first time they've ever probably even seen or heard a jazz concert and what was really moving was even though we didn't speak the same language the music was so powerful that it touched two people and made them want to dance and made them want to sing it made them want to shout it almost felt like we were at a game and it was really cool to see how even though we didn't speak the same language the music itself connected us and I would say to answer your question use the music that's the key it's going to connect us it's connect you it's gonna open up the minds and ears of other people and be an inspiration to them but also get them as excited and energized about to learn more and share it with their friends mr. Marsalis I read an interview that you gave were you quoted yourself is saying Thelonious Monk being your favorite musician or one of your favorite musicians so I was just wondering if you could touch on maybe the connection between Duke and monk I mean they have angular styles and similar approach to harmony I was just wondering maybe why you you think those two musicians are really important just to jazz in general the only advanced a bit here okay well monk love Duke Ben Riley's great drummer to play with monk he told me that monk would not get it was very hard to make monk angry but if you disrespected Duke monk will get angry and then he said that month was big man you didn't want make him mad I think I like the global nature of the way they come both conflict there are they are a band the same piano has a confident of middle register those short choppy rhythms that interfere with the snare drum monk is way at the top in the bottom of the piano do it monk said of Duke he said Duke knows all the courts nothing has the intelligence of their voicing monk voicings man he just knows how to space cars to make the chords Bend and then I would say over the overwhelming thing is the global intelligence just there accounting for everything then there's none the soloist the time that's what that's what I think I think I might ask dad if he wants to say something about their playing monk and Duke yeah that's why I love them but I mean then knows their two styles better than I know everything that we do the same they're both iconic musicians in their own right and composers also their compositions were very important and their piano styles are very unique from anyone that you overhear and the use of space like what Wynton was saying use of registers and just the way they attack the piano that the clarity and you know just that the sounds that got out of the instrument itself you can't never be recreated again hello my name is Ethan Salgado and I play tenor saxophone in Dillard Center for the Arts and my question is for you what was the intention behind John Coltrane's post 1960s recordings such as ascension and transition and why is it as important as per se Duke Ellington or dizzy colep C's Music Man that's okay you told my post in 1965 music who was good to answer that it's interesting I was this in the interstellar space last night I don't ask me why I put it on I was just checking it out I think that what I what I learned being a jazz and echo Santa was that when some music is written out a lot of people can play it when music depends on the soloist depending on the size of that solace if you don't have that soloist you don't have music good example is if you ever try to play the originals Gil Evans did for Miles Davis you can do it but at a certain point you know you're saying where's miles you try to play Louis Armstrong's 1930s music you're like you know you need pops now Duke Ellington there's no island suite we can all play that no problem some music is easy to play without the person who plays it some music is very difficult that music is almost wholly improvised off of cells and is wholly about Coltrane's group and wholly about him so it's very hard to present that I was gonna play it who can play it even who understands it then who wants to listen to it because you don't have a lot of people who want to listen to something doesn't mean it should not be played but if you have a Hall of a certain size mm-hmm you have to make certain decisions about what you're going to program if you had an unlimited amount of capital it just programmed at your whim and you had no constraints man you could just program whatever you feel like doing when you don't when you start to have constraints you have things you have to consider for me of Coltrane's music that is not my favorite music I still listen to it I still return to it and I still think that there are many lessons in it and it's not very little of that music if I have a program because I don't think it would be successful in a performance but I could be wrong we have program when they're cold most music we've called people to play their own music many times they've done an excellent job with all different styles of music that lay Coltrane music is very very difficult and I put that in a category with any the kind of iconic it's kind of like the Miles Davis 1960s quintet music great to listen to you want to say something about it Chris got well I think that the Coltrane in the sixties I remember might have been on the road just recently on the tour I remember somebody would somebody was telling the story about how Jackie McLain was in the club one night 1954 and Coltrane was playing just out of his mind and in Jackie McLean said I heard the future there's that and that one and that one night and like the next day he the Coltrane went back to 1954 Coltrane at the time if you can if you know what that whatever he wasn't the train that we know yet but I think that in the 1960s you know before then he was just always associated with somebody who was cold training miles it was cold train it is it was cold training benny golson it was cold training uh telonium uncle you know he was always associated with someone but during all at that time he was still working on himself and he was still getting better and getting better in his net proposition than he so so much so that you would hear little little nuggets of info like kind of blue like you hear all my all blues you hear like a little snippet of the Coltrane changes inside of his plate and also when he was on tour with Miles even though he would always play stuff that you would hear later on like in 1962 or 1963 is next he was already working on that stuff and so by the time 1962 came he would already be working on things that were you know coming up in the future so I think that's why a lot of those recordings like you said ascension and transition to be that's that's one of those ones yeah that's what that's one of those ones where you hear I like both directions at once like you definitely hear what he was doing in the past and what was coming up in the future so I think that's part of why his music in that instance is so important is because it gave everyone else and absent another avenue to to go to as you know as to as time you know presented itself and if you listen to that first practice you listen to Mars on interstellar space you can actually be able to hear the kind of debate or day or day he's running that kind of his concept of how to play harmonies in the context of all that sound and another thing about Coltrane and the delayed post ascension because transition is important to record thick crisp a great that great long form sweet on transition I don't know what the name of it is most of times somebody wonders in the transition but they won't listen to that sweet if he doesn't long form sweet then Coltrane went elven and them started to kind of receive from the banner right sheeting him started to play it was interested in his concept we're trying to put the two bands together one that was playing more like a kind of chaos sound and the other band kind of playing Street if you think back to the question we had earlier about vertical and horizontal imma try to tell y'all something this is complicated to explain but it's about polarity and it exists it exists in a male and female attitude it exists in hot and cold night and day yin and yang Shakespeare anything you read it was greater now just as always music is sweet thunder under sweet house and they're gonna be sweet you can go down the line of artists what the blues is a major and a minor mode now if you look at how we look at things it's Democrat versus Republican man versus woman black versus white that's the opposite of the conception he's working on horizontal versus vertical but we live in a world that is horizontal and vertical we live we live in a world which all these things exist they existed long before we started to fight over them and the question is more of what Ted was saying how do you see the integration it goes to what Chris says with Tom on how do you how do you get together with other cultures see how you're integrated with them now instead of bringing a fist your hand is like now they might have a fist you gotta be like it also exists in our culture most perniciously between age old versus young how you gonna be versed yourself when you're old man you gotta be foolish but all of this answers to what cuz Coltrane was an honest seeker like he was trying to find something so when you listen to that late music check out the level of relaxation in his plan that's always been the most fascinating put that in a Steller's bass on and so far that's programming it man I might give it to Chris he might race it could Ted you know we got certain we try to work on the music all the time we did a show on our net which has nothing to do with how train was planned but we did he wrote one long arrangement they have Marcus plan a real long melody what was that song was that of our Nets of the song what was the name of that song we can tweak we get near sit near sixty years old it's hard posture but he did a fantastic job of arranging it so that we could get the kind of feeling and the freedom and with a large ensemble you know you got always understand the more people you add the more the more you better have some kind of organization I was answering a question about classroom you said what about a simple Symphony Orchestra improvise I see you're gonna have 70 people sit on the stage and just give them slashes okay good luck tell me how it works out to be ready so okay we could go on and on but just I hope that helped to kind of answer someone what you were saying yes thank you hi my name is John Murray and I played the bass and um I was wondering like you hear all these guys like the jazz legends that we look up to today and whose music we play like they play one note and you hear like oh that's Myles so that's Bill Evans that's bird and I was wondering how you go about developing your own unique sound alright developing your own sound I mean a couple of things need to happen first you have to listen to a lot of other people play you have to understand what's out there and then you have to be you have to work on that and then you'll find the elements of what you like within those things that you hear and try to listen to a lot of different things a lot different players play I also fluence by many different musicians over the years playing gospel music instrumental R&B jazz country even rock you know influenced by all of that and I find elements of everything that I liked and I start put it into my own plane but I have to study first I have to really listen I study and figure those things out and there's going to be a point when you know you can be exploring like blah you know I hope I can get my own sound you may be 80 years old at that point because you know you can never really determine it all in your mind if you really are honest with yourself you're still growing and growing and someone else will tell you thank you got your own sound me I'm still on that journey I can't say okay I got my own sound knows that I'm trying to get there so trying to be able to voice what I need okay you have your own sound I know Sherman sound I should say back in the 80s people say they can't tell younger musicians in the 80s and I could tell right hawkgirl's playing anyway I heard wheat was 17 16 or something I could tell you he's playing I could hear Kaiser play when he was young I know it's him marques print up I know it's him I could just hear individual song immediately no question I was print up playing that a lot of times you know your own sound and your ability to hear this can you hear do you listen to them play I will be doing interviews because known young people have their own selves they his own song say well I don't recognize I said but do you listen to him that's why you don't recognize it your sound you got to mean your sound I mean this and the more you mean that the more you gonna have your own sound I mean this he definitely had his own sound approach everything sometimes Sherm enough he's right and I asked German to send me some transcript of his writing of saxophone section may I start studying I said yeah man how do you hear this he say man I sing each part individually we all arrange we have different approaches so you have your sound you just got to be for real about it another good thing I don't know if everybody agrees if you disagreed in please to give them the counter is to tape record yourself and write down or think about the things you like about your playing and then magnify those things and the things you don't like diminish those right that's the point I was just beginning to get to whenever you practice you have to have an unrelenting discipline in in listening to yourself you have to be the doctor and the patient so like you're playing you're the patient and as you're playing and listening and recording yourself is a good tool because at first that's sort of hard to do when you're concentrating so much on what you can't always hear everything that you're doing but then you're the doctor you hear some little how come the way I'm playing this phrase it's not really coming out like Wes Montgomery on the record or whomever or Paul Chambers ah maybe cuz and you start to figure it out that away so it's it's it's really being able to listen with an unrelenting discipline it being honest bingo [Music] we're gonna continue but I want us to play a little player no music before so I want to recognize a piece that we ran over yesterday yes the student composition and I just want to talk about just the kind of pride we have with our younger people right music coming up playing and when we see you all the kind of desire that we want for your creativity and for the things you're gonna come up with a lot of things we would never think of but for we want you two to know it's important to play Duke Ellington's music and all these touch tones are important but it's also important to use these things as springboards for your own creativity have your ideas work on stuff work on your craft so we're gonna get to all the questions I don't want y'all but I want to get the winner of the student arranging and Composition contest to come up mr. miles Linux he did so many good things in his arrangement you got you're gonna I'm I just he did so many good things in his arranged and I want you to listen for the two themes he introduces in the beginning his in lewd material how he turns those themes around though he has background material his use of colors of the orchestra where the solo spaces are the way he builds up a shout chorus near the end and just a lot of things that reflect the kind of intelligence a level of engagement and creativity and craftsmanship that we are very proud of seeing and you all as we know we're gonna hear so many great things from y'all over these next days point I want to make before Myles leads us in his composition I just probably say a little song about it it's just to know that this is all a cycle in wind it's a cycle and we are honored you know as we talk about Joe we love having y'all come up and we love seeing him and what he's done in the type of work he puts in and his playing and all of that and we love to celebrate it and we like to talk good about y'all so you believe when we sit down and we're judging if it's Jeff Jeff Hamilton and I generally sit together it's one of the highlights of my year is just the cracks that he's he's so funny when he's talking but we're always speaking with love like we talked about people in our family and when we start to argue about people's playing it's always with love and respect for what you have to go through to be here so miles are going to introduce this tune and then we will play you know it's so to give you an example of what happens just how I'm just to say the things that happened on the past and so I'm talking I'm looking around I have my contact lenses in which are to read music so I can't really see y'all I'm looking out there so I don't when you can't see people you don't know how they're reacting to what you're saying I'm sitting down we're talking and I'm looking at the setlist because we played two or three songs and I'm looking at Chris Chris is pointing out Tunes he has his music and I said we should we play and Chris has already crossed off the things that we've played which I don't know what all of them are so he's making it much easier for me to know what it is so he points at his page and I look at it and I say I don't know and then Carlos draws an arrow on his page to open windows so I looked over at that arrow you know as I said Jay and I looked at him and he said so that's we do we were gonna play it and also Chris said hey Karla is here so we have to do the we're gonna do a vocal number also but I just did the kind of collegiality of all of what we're doing and then I forgot to name James as a soloist so when I looked at Victor he went okay and all of that is a part of what our music is notice how everybody came down when miles started to play the piano solo we started trying to find out how the brass section is trying to find Ryan we this is the third time we've actually gone over this song the different adjustments that we make one of the things I told miles when he was conducting us miles we're gonna get a lot better each time we play it so when you rehearse it you don't have to over versus cuz people want to play the music and they want to do a great job and you'll notice all the adjustments he made we were on top of doing those things because we want to do it and that's another part that's an important part of the democracy you have to want other people to have something to be in this system if you want everything for yourself it's not gonna work okay which side were we on yes ma'am my question is what have you learned from your struggles and how are they shaped who you are today okay what have you learned from your from your struggles well you get to our age we don't have enough time mister I have to find one of our younger members to discuss that what have you learned from your struggles Taylor okay this is this is a member someone who participated in in EE in 1999 I remember at least that one year he might have been in others because you know some great trumpet playing went on that year and he was one of them to get renewed my whole faith and hope just and playing from the strength of his playing he's up here with us now mr. Tatum Greenblatt um I'm actually wearing my badge from 1999 I just moved talk about a struggle moving is a struggle but I found my badge from 20 years ago and reminded me how old I am so that's great you know I think the thing that like everything that you can deal with in life can be a struggle or an opportunity to learn from it personally I have a one-year-old kid that's a struggle a lot of ways it's even more of a struggle for my wife just because he's won and he wants her all the time you know that's a struggle but it's also a beautiful opportunity to learn about everything else in my life from a whole new perspective being in this section is a struggle having to sit next to this cat is a struggle for your own sense of self-worth sometimes you know but it's an opportunity to learn you know and I think that as you know we can't help but age and the older that we get the more that we either look at am I going to look the struggles are going to present themselves no matter what you do you have no control over that whether it's a math test or a solo on is fun or whatever you know the the thing you can control is your reaction to it right and the I can say that the thing that I had the thing that I admire in the people that I admire is the way that they react to those struggles tends to be similar which is looking for ways to learn from those struggles and looking for ways to embedder themselves somehow you know I remember actually getting the chance to practice and Winton's apartment when you were getting over your lip surgery like a while back I was seeing this gentleman go through that struggle was one of the most important experiences of my life and most teaching moments in my life to see him come back from something where he had to put three months off from the horn he was starting back from zero I didn't know how to practice until I saw that reaction to a challenge that taught me more about practicing the trumpet about learning music than anything else I had ever dealt with and I got to have both Scott Brown and Clarence a Cox's band directors in my life but seeing him you know I mean I've but I saw one of my heroes struggling at a fundamental level in the way that he was dealing with it made me realize oh that's how you deal with the Clark exercise you know and at that point I've been playing trumpet twenty years and it was like that was day one how did he deal with that challenge and I think that if you look at the people that you admire and you see how they respond to struggle if they're looking for every one of them is gonna look for what can I learn from this how can I make myself better through this challenge and I think if you approach life that way you're gonna be on the more advantageous end of those struggles more often than not you know sometimes you can't do anything about it math tests or math tests you know but in general if you're trying to get better from those challenges you're gonna find yourself being a better person as you get older and that's about all you can do really you know you know to go over tato he says sometimes you don't come back from stuff I got what we played for years I was sitting next to Ryan and he understood how much I was pregnant so he was here like I will struggle on my parts that's four or five years of really struggling and sometimes he would look at me like man you are right and I was just telling him another day it was it was maybe last week or something sometimes if we have a real hard show I'll start playing some of his Parts I said man I want you to know this out every time I play a lead part I'm gonna miss something and I went years I was very accurate on my own I was proud of my accuracy but I said you'll notice when I get him of G's aids B flats it's very hard for me to play a passage and not miss at least one note it's gonna happen somewhere because my set is just not the same as it was it's just not and he said he stood the bigger but he said yeah but you know sometimes you just have a struggle like and we all have things I was saying I thought used to think Clark Terry and them didn't want to play with us when I would ask him hey can you do this gig or can you play what does he say well I need my music blown up so we would blow the music up and then eventually he said no I don't want to do it and I thought he just doesn't want to play with us but now that I'm dealing with my own eyes know he was tough my man I can't see this music and when you're younger you don't understand that these things are gonna happen to you like and what is it is something you don't know in terms of your own personal not to mention personal tragedies that are gonna hit you or that have hit you life is a struggle at anytime we have members that are dealing with all kinds of things death of a loved one death of a child personal disappointments unbelievable pain is what life is and the to go over Tatum was saying we have a saying whenever we miss apart we will you missed that part let's go just where we going but you know you're not gonna escape this you got to embrace that razor edge because that's what life has in store for you and it's a certain Beauty to it yes there's a over there I love that said yes yes so as you guys have advanced in your musical careers how or what did you do to associate yourself with the people to help cultivate your career to be at the point where you are today there was a great Los Angeles record producer named bones how and he said you never say no to a gig until you're too busy to say yes that's the short answer you can learn from any kind of job when I first came to town they had a lot of companies would hire Dixieland bands Dixieland called traditional but that's where I got to learn all those great tunes that Louis played and all those guys and you know it great gig you get to play some good tunes with some good musicians you learn so play anything and everything you can that's a simple answer I guess for me you got what you should do is put yourself in a situation you want to be in so quick story when I was attending high school I had a friend named Steven Oquendo who's a trumpet player and Steven say hey I just met Wynton and he's invited me to his rehearsals oh my god let's go let's go hang out so I remember going to one the first rehearsal I went to I think they were doing something with Alvin Ailey and I hung God I was like man this is hip I like this right so that what I started doing which I don't recommend I started cutting class and coming to rehearsals a hanger wind but dig this but check this out so I wanted it when I first went to that rehearsal I wanted to be in that band when I first met write original villain Rodney Whitaker's like I want to do this I was already playing with Eddie Palmieri and Tito Puente so I would see some of the subsets on double bills and jazz festivals but I knew when I was in high school I said well I did right across the street so I'm gonna go hang and just check out the music and what would happen is eventually Ronnie Whittaker had to go to the bathroom or something and I would be like I just pick up the bass and play the next you know whatever five minutes till he got back and then they would realize man kid is playing the part and then I was just hanging and you know something leads to another and then oh he can't make the gig here you want to do it bingo I'm already in but you got to put yourself I mean you got to put yourself in that situation he's telling the truth he's telling the truth but he's what he's not saying is he could all he could pick a play I'm the first time I read an Plastic Man is the guys in the afro-latin tradition plays they can I flee with this count of four and another thing that how much he brought to the to the band and to all of our understanding of music and for respect for different styles of music like how much he's taught me personally about all the styles of afro Latin music which I loved and always loved and respected his people thought I was Puerto Rican when I first came to New York and I play gigs I never said a word because I didn't want them that I didn't want to polish myself my Africa kind of past IBC could not see us and uh this is true I'm not you know but when he came to hang with the band he was a part he hung he was a part of it so so much so that now all these years later okay you gotta imagine we played with each other all the time it's been years of it I saw man I don't know if David Robinson is here okay there he is we finish the tour he's been I saw Matt since 1980 what 1989 we just on a tour we're playing every night we plan on Australia we're playing and he looks at many goes man do you hear all the bass that Carlos his plan every night this man is coming to swing Ted and I are talking and tackles man calls the plan so good and it's just we work with each other all the time and we have our little spats and our things that we don't but in terms of the depth of the man's professionalism and his seriousness and the love and respect we have and for me he fit in with us but he gave me another whole way of understanding music I had some music we were working with an African group from Ghana I wrote some music all on the on the wrong side of the beat on the end of two so I had just given up on planet i sat down with Carlos one day he was still a kid at that time I said man doesn't exist man why is this music so sad that I wrote it's there it's all written on the wrong people and if you just go from there to all the times we've talked and the seriousness he has I'm just saying it because he's talking about the music he will call me at night before a concert hey papa we not ready for this huh I don't know about this said this you just gave us I think we should concentrate on this but he has that type of seriousness and dedication to play and that affects the ensemble and and we could go from chair to chair when we have that you start to have a band full of people who have that kind of seriousness about what each other is doing then you start to get to that kind of feeling so the people you need to know are people who know what you want to know and you have always distinguished a point I make that in my entire career playing music I was never in a position where people who were making music products ever asked me to do more ever there was always less can you write shorter can you not be serious can you come up with something that's not with trumpet on it can you figure out how to not be yourself I used to go to TV shows in the 1980s and 90s when we were still playing on TV and it would say well do you have a singer can you play something slow can you play something fast because that might did with anything as we play something slow it might be sweet if you play something fast it might be over quick I was always a question my answer would then become we could just stand and not play at all if you want us to we're here so understanding when you're serious about something and it's not something that everyone is serious about it's not gonna be like in a movie everybody smiles at the end you're gonna be like fighting for that seriousness all the time and if not you put that mask on pull the grill out here we go start shuffling because that's what that's what it's about okay it's a good question thank you yes I'm up a trombone as a trombonist how would you go from being a good trombonist to being a great musician play bass well I'll just say that you know being being a great musician is being being a great musician as being a great musician on any instrument you know it all comes to the same amount of seriousness and dedication and study and and desire to want to be great and that comes out on whatever instrument you play but it's the same basis of desire and determination and all of that so if you are if you have the desire you know to be the best on your instrument if you're if you're listening to the greatest sounds the greatest trombone tones that there are and you're listening very critically and trying to take things and fill in gaps in your own musicality in your own playing through listening to the masters and this new people play live and people that you admire if you're doing all of that and that showcases that desire that shows that that's there all of that is part of it and it gives you momentum man I've worked on this for so long and now I'm finally starting to get it you know it starts to feel like that I remember when I couldn't do this and now I've worked on it methodically and now I can I'm starting to kind of get it now it gives you pride and momentum in what you're doing and it makes you want to get even better at it so you have to go about I think it's I think it comes from that I think that your preparation and your desire and all of that it feeds yourself and it makes you become the better musician that you want to be a network that comes out in whatever it's the same process for everyone and I think that comes out in whatever you whatever instrument you play okay great good question Carly would you like to say sometimes singers okay I did want to just talk I especially like doing this essentially Ellington because by far my favorite composer I think one of the challenges listening to especially a lot of vocalists today is some of the artistic freedom when a lot of people are taking in the melody and Ellington and Strayhorn too for that matter wrote so precisely so you know every note was crafted this music is way older than everybody on this stage and it's lasted this long and been inspiring for all of these years for a reason so it's really important to honor and not just Ellington but you know the American Songbook it's really important to honor the melody that the composer wrote it's beautiful when you bring your own thing to the music but you got to learn the original melody first it's I'd like to say learn blue and red before you get to purple that's that's the simpler way to put that also I would like to some of this music has really mature themes and maybe someone 1718 doesn't necessarily relate to it as it is written now it's really important after you've learned the melody and you've learned the words sit down with the lyric for a few minutes sit down and literally mull over what this whole thing means not just the title but the whole thing and it should help you with your interpretation how you how are you planning to tell this story and also connect with the players even though everybody up here has a different function the rhythm section has their function the vocalist obviously with lyrics has a function as well but but the singer is not in a bubble I'm I'm singing but I'm also listening to them time and sometimes I'm consciously or unconsciously picking up some things that are informing the way I deliver the music to the audience so that's my big news and he singers anybody up a question for call a singer yes hi my name is MIA Geneva and I just want to know how exactly do you really present yourself and what you want to give to the audience to the audience you know like stage presence wise oh I think it's important that everyone deliver develop their own stage presence when I was really young well when I was in elementary school I wanted to be Nancy Wilson I had like a pink see-through hair brush and I would you know I'd stand there and do what I thought she was you know then I you know a few years later when I went through a big Sarah Vaughan stage I would always see her in a gown well that turns out that's not who I am I think your personal personality and the music that you present well the more you do this you'll find yourself you'll find your comfort level and literally it's one of those things that the more you do it the better you get at it and you get your your sea legs so to speak and you'll find your place you will find your own place there thank you thank you for thank you very much thank you so much okay now we're gonna very quickly answer everybody's questions we're gonna play Cottontail and then we're gonna wrap it up Cottontail is three minutes and 33 seconds long okay so would you excuse us but we're gonna get right to our answers where we will be yes hello mr. Marsalis I wanted to ask you about your experience with the flamenco guitar player Paco de Lucia I'm generally like new to jazz and I'm trying to you know get into it and you know so far I've loved every part of it I wanted to ask your experience with him and and the combination between like cultures and and I know how you can relate jazz to flamenco you know how I love so he was he was a shaman too so he understood he T one of his sentences I always remember he said we had a dinner with everybody you know it's always a lot of people and family around he said the the soul he said the the mind the mind cries for innovation but the soul yearns for tradition so there we go again with those opposites both and he was both I won't tell you a question I asked him once I said man would you think my chance I've ever really planned good on flamenco he said define good he said I mean or you go play something somebody wants to learn he said what you think my chance is all playing like a blues guitar player I said madness you know he said this is hard even for me so I think that there's a common ground in terms of rhythm and Sensibility but it's very difficult to be on a certain level and he was always talking about us coming here and putting together he remembered a big thing he wanted to put together with gospel saying as he talked about when he first came to United States and the 60s we're gonna put together a big show whenever gospel singers in flamenco and afro Latin music and everything Sherman he actor Minh actually went did you go play with Paco you won't tell him a little something I know he's supposed to be being brief but Paco Paco called and said man we cannot call Sherman to do a gig so uh well he was something else you know what I loved about him he was inclusive you know it's like okay I love your spirit so I want to play with you didn't matter what style of music that you normally play you come in you fit in it was we didn't talk about the music you say I'm just gonna play this tune you come in and fit in this is a space for you to play play your fan who's warm so full but quiet didn't have much to say just so you just sit around you sit next to him you smile you kind of feel the vibe when I got on the stage it was just like I was part of a family you didn't have to save much he just played and afterwards everybody hug each other and say hey man it's great you know being around each other it was a great experience yeah yes that's right it's like family when we all get together man peed on you playing cajon soul food just like beat you in New Orleans somewhere just yes thank you thank you hello my question is about after that part of your career your musical career where you decide I'll be a performer educator director or whatever you decide to be what the what do you think is the thing or the drive you get when you come and do what you would like to do for music like this is who I am who we are this is what we do like what is that in in your career you know I don't I don't I don't look at it as a career right it's a way of life for me my daddy did it and I love it and I know for most of us we work so hard we practice we study we I mean I'm so driven to do it I'm more fired up not and I ever was and I was fired up as a kid I remember Victor coming in my house I was trying to learn a countdown when I was 15 on the sea trumpet but a little bitty bitty bitty bitty bitty bitty bitty bitty bit about the everybody check this out via the video VW we still up here we went to kindergarten together we up here right now so I don't look at it as a career you know it's just not I say it's a way of life and overtime you do stuff the same way I once asked the great sweets Edison how did he get his playing to wear when he just picked up his trumpet he'll take me five courses to play one idea it was good he start off playing like that see man how do you play like this way you just pick y'all up he's a tangy but one way to play baby boy dang but one way to play and I just feel like for me it's a blessing to talk to you it's a blessing they have young people come here in our home we built this hall we should walk around here nothing was here to work with your people I've worked with in my organization the people who were not musicians will come around the idea of our music of American music of international music then we sitting up in here now or call us all of us it's a phenomena Duke Ellington's music is being played all the original members are dead they played in our Orchestra they were members of Duke Ellington's Orchestra we still up here planted and y'all are up here and one day we're not gonna be here and we hope that we give you enough spirit and feeling about this did you keep it going without watering it down and just make it disrespecting it so for me man I'm so blessed and I'm so dedicated like what can I say about I am dedicated and I could speak for we're on the tour everybody got the computers out writing arrangements and stuff and we taught my music and we called each other that way for real about it and you want you to put together 40 of some years of it that's basically what you are yeah thank you before you leave I'd like to add one thing to that because it's funny he referenced that at me prior to that day we were both playing in different elementary band orchestras all state orchestras playing in the classical music tradition and all of that and I played my high school jazz band but that day was the first time I heard Jack Coltrane and I do remember that day when he took out the sea trumpet and say check this out and I do remember that day how that experience with him impacted me to be where I'm at today so the point is you never know how you're gonna impact the person sitting to your left or right or so are you going to interact with today or a year from today but you will have that experience yeah first of all it's just I'm like sound to be here it's nice to see you guys I'm inspired my question my name is Chris face and I go to Tarpon Springs High School and my question kind of goes hand-in-hand with that so as jazz is broad and consume lay into like mini-sub like John genres how do you channel your individual path as an individual in the field meaning as it like a performer verse educator verse like outreach because it seems like in your organization it's brought very well and just I guess how do you how did you find your place in your path to push it forward it depends on what you what you love and you don't necessarily push it forward you're going in a circle it's a cycle you think of everything is a cycle you're born you're gonna live and guess what's gonna happen to Dan and now you're a certain age you and all your friends talk about one thing you know when you - my age what you talk about so as a grandkid somebody's parents dying somebody's dementia somebody losing their crib like you you get to a certain age you start to realize hey I'm getting older with all these older people now when you're young when I was met Victor was that thinking about that think about that think about members play calm down let's go to the gig and play with our fault band we're all apart I could talk to Ryan Kaiser he's from Iowa I'm from Louisiana and he'll tell me about going to gigs throughout that state with his father his father was teaching jazz his father had a series so we've been sitting next to each other 20-something years 30 I don't even know how many use it is this a long time so you know what you're drawn to is what you like doing I like doing all of it I saw my daddy do it I like to teach I'm not necessarily the best teacher but I like to do it and we all teach sometimes we teach together I said well Carlos Louis's a Victor knows that Chris victim probably has more experience than the rest of us in terms of teaching so we rely on him to do this but different of us teaching know different things so when you get the verses out of your mind if you can just think about how can I get rid of verses take that verses out and instead of saying verses say with what is it for me to teach them my nothing I just say hey man check check this out look at this exercise up we believe in trying to be natural like Victor called me a couple of nights ago with a kid I was just look we just try to be natural about what you're doing it's not about bossing you are my clothes my movie whiplash what I might be rating people and all of that man you can't that's not gone that's that's kind of productive as you get older you really understand it when you're younger you may not understand when you get old and you start it's German as man you know when I was young I was rough as I got all that you understand he's not versus so you teach you play you advocate you talk about things you love it's like I go in the kitchen and you like to make a certain type of did you say man you ever check this out man look at this or when I was growing up and be the new dance tune everybody be in a room man you gotta listen to Stevie's new record man that's right Ian listen right there people are enthusiastic about it I think if we could be about that our political process and things of a certain type of value it's not like you can candy then you start to that make sense thank you and I want you also to check out the way our our orchestras playing it's the middle of the day for us they sitting up I want you to check out the attention to detail just implant arrangements we play once or twice for years we've been doing this I told the August recess today and I'm standing a front triangle be critical and find things to say but a couple of range we played so well I just that's years of us working on it and being serious all I could say was yeah you know okay let's go to the next tune and it's it's that dedication and passion and it feels good you don't have to always be have a video gaming and our device to have a good time you know you can have a good time with people and and that's that's the thing so you know what I'm saying no versus yes my name is Tate Satterlee I play tenor trombone for mounts I and my question for anyone in the band is that clearly everyone here loves music this should be a given and so I was wondering if I have you Oliver come to a personal crossroads of sorts where you have to ask yourself why am i playing music why do I want to be here and then what did you answer yourself and to keep yourself through that time where you're confused and in turmoil to get to where you are now yeah hey what's up I've been through that a couple times in my life where I've come close to quitting gone through some very difficult personal times lost the passion for playing for whatever reason and the thing that always brings me back the playing is actually through teaching and working with students when I work with you guys when I work with students around the world around around the country around the world I start to see mirrors of myself and they you guys remind me why I started playing in the first place you know so it's through teaching for myself that I'm brought back to the reason I started to play in the first place somebody mentioned about going through struggles before every one of us goes through struggles and we could cite them you know but each one of us has and through those struggles if we find the positivity in the struggle we learn from it turn it into a lesson because each one of us has gotten through those struggles and learned from and grown from it and don't let those bring you down let them bring you back to the joy of playing that we all started with you know and I've gone through times when I was just playing commercial music and really didn't have any love for what I was doing but it was through through students and teaching that brought me back to the place where it reminded me why I started to play in the first place it's fun it makes a difference in people's lives to play for them and to teach you know when we teach music it's not just teaching someone how to play an instrument it's teaching them awareness and raising their awareness of people around them and it's improving us as people through learning these instruments a profound discipline you know and it takes us to another level as a person we grow as people and it is through that process that you know I've been reminded time and time again why I started playing it's fun first a for most and it makes a difference in the world we want to make a difference a positive difference and that's really what it's about for me yep okay thank you for your question okay we're gonna play Cottontail and then we're gonna do uh i'ma reiterate again that the thanks that we have into congratulations to everybody and to just before we plan to add one thing to what Kenny was saying he's talking about teaching but another thing that all of us do is it the importance of listening me Ryan got together one night on the road we just listened to Kady I said may I play your favorite Kady he was putting it on Vincent Sherman Dan I called them sometimes man are you checking out what should we check out Carlos give me some stuff to check out okay you know I had to come up with a list of the best fifties things in jazz in one morning I was on a train coming from North Carolina I only listened to stuff that I considered to be the best and it was like taking a bath I got to wonder what's the greatest example of just flat-footed people could improvise and play so I put on Louis Armstrong playing second cornet dick King Oliver I just listened to it I just listened to Louis Armstrong's part and tried to isolate it I think damn this guy was 21 plan with this kind of sophistication and drive then I put on a record of Stan gets focused the first thing they just gave him string parts and say play on this and listening just how inventive all that improvisation was his unbelievable plan just improvise so I think that when I got finished with that train ride it was like five or six hours or something like I had taken a bath for six hours I was so clean from here in all those great musicians across time all the different styles so remember as musicians the greatest legacy we have is our ability to listen to music one thing I think my father all the time is my ability to actually hear classical music and not wish it was something else you know it is very important to understand you can listen to a Shostakovich symphony and say Shostakovich last night after I was listening the interstellar space I put on the first moment of Bartok music for spring percussion in chalice and listen to that few key wrote five voice whew I was just shaking my head like I was back in the 11th grade it's greater than it was then so the more you connect with things with those type of values they don't grow old and they also don't make you feel nostalgic I didn't listen to that music 4 string percussion she liked to say I remember when I was in the 11th grade I said man I missed a whole lot of this when I was in 11th grade so we want to thank y'all congratulate you till you flow around this this hall and make it like it's your home we built it for people to come in and be a part of it make yourself be a part of this legacy in this tradition and make your tradition be what you want it to be meet people in our other bands you're gonna be some people you'll know your entire life meet them be khaleja with them and when you get up on this stage play your little heart out as a pleasure it's gonna be an honor for us to listen to you and serve just great music and we hope you enjoy your time here and when we finished playing cottontail we're just gonna get up and we're gonna when I go go through a lot of ceremony we already have had y'all for a long time we hope you enjoy this cottontail jazz Lincoln Center orchestra [Applause]

Channel: Jazz at Lincoln Center's JAZZ ACADEMY

Views: 16,032

Rating: 4.9380803 out of 5

Keywords: jazz, jazz education, essentially ellington

Id: PrM0UmrOB6E

Length: 90min 53sec (5453 seconds)

Published: Fri May 24 2019