Paul Motian: Time is There All the Time

Posted on March 5, 2016 by Scott K Fish

SKF NOTE: My first awareness of Paul Motian — which might be different from when I first heard Paul Motian — was the opening song, Victoria, on his 1974 album Tribute. This haunting, beautiful song written by Paul Motian, is played by guitarists Sam Brown and Paul Metzke, bassist Charlie Haden, and Carlos Ward on alto sax.

This was a period in my life when I was first thinking a jazz drummer’s ding-dinga-ding ride cymbal and two-and-four hi-hats were outdated and unnecessarily constricting. I thought it would be great to play drumset with the fluidity of a tenor sax player.

One Amazon.com reviewer of Tribute writes, “Mr. Motian plays the most stretching, elastic, breathing drumming I have ever heard in my life…” That was my reaction on first hearing this album. Motian was one drummer who found a way out of the shackles of ding-dinga-ding and the two-and-four hi-hat.

Then I listened to Keith Jarrett‘s Byablue album with Paul Motian on drums. The one song I liked — and I loved the melody – was the title track, composed by Mr. Motian. Today I think the definitive version of Byablue is from the Paul Motian Quintet’s Misterioso album with guitarist Bill Frisell.

So when I interviewed Paul Motian for Modern Drummer I was a freelance writer, devouring every jazz book and magazine article I could find. Certainly I was aware of the innovative role of the Bill Evans Trio with Evans on piano, Scott LaFaro on bass, and on drums, Paul Motian. But I’m not sure — at that time I interviewed Mr. Motian — I had heard much of that trio’s records. My stronger point of reference was Motian’s own albums and his work with Keith Jarrett and Carla Bley’s Liberation Music Orchestra.

This exchange took place at Paul Motian’s New York City apartment circa 1979 or 1980. If you have the original Modern Drummer with this interview, I think it includes one photo I took of Motian on his drumset which, along with his acoustic piano, took up 75-percent of the room we were in.

This is where I ask Paul Motian about what seemed to be the point at which he figured out how to keep time while breaking free from ding-dinga-ding and the two-and-four hi-hat.

Scott K Fish: How did you get that gig [with the Bill Evans Trio]?

Paul Motian: That was kind of accidental too. Well, I had played with Bill alot. We played with Tony Scott together and a couple of other people. A clarinet player named Jerry Wald — years ago.

And so then, Bill — we played alot. We use to play gigs together and I use to live in the same building as Bill. And we played together a lot.

And then one day he had his trio. It was after he had been with Miles Davis, and I think he had a drummer who was Kenny Dennis. And he had a bass player too at the time.

He was playing in Midtown at a place called, I think, Basin Street [East]. Kenny Dennis couldn’t do it one night, so Bill called me.

Scott LaFaro was playng around the corner with somebody else, and he use to come by. He liked Bill a lot and he came by and sat in. It seemed like that was it, y’know? Bill liked it alot, and from there we just kept it together. We played together about two years.

MUSIC_020_Paul-Motian_JohnAbbottSKF: Somebody said that you and Scott LaFaro were responsible for freeing up Bill Evans.

PM: Yeah, I think it might have been mutual. I think it was just a thing. I mean, nobody was playing bass like that [Scott LaFaro] before. It was a freeing up too. I guess bass player played roots of chords all time, and this was the first time the bass player was playing with the pianist, and wasn’t playing that kind of bass, and I guess that freed him.

[With] myself sort of playing what I hear and fitting in with that.

SKF: It was keeping time but not in a strict sense.

PM: Yeah. I’ve really gotten away from that now. (laughs) I think that the time thing is there all the time. I don’t mean a particular pulse, but the time itself. Maybe if you took eight measures of music, and each measure was in a different pulse. Like one fast, another one is slow, and another one a ballad in each measure — but it’s all there somehow. I think that can be played without being played. All different ways.

It’s like a huge thing that says TIME, and it’s up there [gestures as if pointing to an eye chart on the wall before him] and it’s printed TIME. I mean, that’s there and you can play all around that.

SKF: Was the Bill Evans Trio the first time you played like that?

PM: I guess it was a sort of freeing up for me too.

SKF: Was it a conscious thing?

PM: No, I don’t think so. I think it was something that just happened. I’ve never thought of playing that way. I’ve never pre-thought something. It seems like it’s always been something that’s happened through the involvement in the music and the musicians.

Photo of Paul Motian by John Abbott

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Vinnie Ruggiero’s Drum Method Book Available

Posted on March 4, 2016 by Scott K Fish

SKF NOTE: Jon McCaslin posted some wonderful news recently on his Four On The Floor blog. Vinnie Ruggiero’s handwritten jazz drumming method book is now available thanks to Vinnie’s son.

Since the early 1980’s I have personally heard stories about Vinnie Ruggiero from Joe English and, most recently, Roy McCurdy. And now, thanks to YouTube, those of us who missed seeing Vinnie when he was alive, can at least see him on video.

Good for Vinnie’s son for keeping his father’s work alive.

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American Revolution: Wet Drumheads Saved Lives

Posted on March 3, 2016 by Scott K Fish

SKF NOTE: An interesting news report. I learned new information and concepts on the use of drums during the American Revolution. The idea of “hearing” history, of drums as communications technology, and of wet calfskin drumheads saving lives.

Drums of history sound off at Fort Meigs presentation
By EMILY GORDON, Sentinel Staff Writer | Posted: Tuesday, March 1, 2016 9:32 am

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Mark Logsdon and 1824 Drum

PERRYSBURG — History buffs read extensively about their favorite aspects of the past, but…don’t often get to actually hear them.

…Mark Logsdon…talked to local history fans about the importance of music in battle….

During his presentation, entitled “Music in the Military: The Story of Fifes and Drums,” Logsdon, director of the 1st Michigan Colonial Fife and Drum Corps, explained how musical instruments were used as disciplinary tools as well as ways to relay commands on and off the battlefield.

With a reproduction rope tension drum hooked onto the drumstick carrier slung over his shoulder, Logsdon described the thrill of hearing what soldiers and citizens would have heard in the late 18th century.

“Musically, sonically, what you’re about to hear are the kinds of things you would have heard over two centuries ago on the technology of the time period,” he said.

The loud, rapid sounds signalling soldiers around the time of the American Revolution were so loud, they could be heard…five miles away.

“Fifes and drums became so important as communication devices that some towns levied taxes on the colonists so they could be purchased,” he said.

Logsdon played songs and signals soldiers would have heard throughout the day from fifes…and drums, such as a call to wake, dress and stand at attention, a call to go to church and a call to dinner.

“Paul Revere never said ‘the British were coming.’ It wouldn’t have made any sense. We were British. What he did say was, ‘The regulation is coming.’ It was a scary time,” he said, referring not only to the looming presence of soldiers marching through a village on their way to war, but also the intimidating sounds of their drums.

Although historians have questioned whether drums were used during the battles themselves, Logsdon is confident they were, citing numerous anecdotes in diaries, letters, memoirs and pension applications.

He also relayed a story about how General Mad Anthony Wayne wanted to move out earlier than planned before the Battle of Fallen Timbers…but…the drummers’ calfskin drum heads were wet from the night before.

“He had to wait for them to dry out. There were campaigns that didn’t happen because drums were wet,” Logsdon said. “The drums were the voice of the battle.”

Drum and fife signals told soldiers which way to turn and how to get in formation.

…Logsdon played a restored Brown Family drum circa 1824, an almost entirely original solid shell drum made of tiger stripe maple and ash that was found in a garbage pile in Baltimore, Maryland, held together by its tack pattern.

Logsdon sent it to the Smithsonian, where it was “saved from having its voice silenced,” he said.

“You can be old and still have something to say. It’s a privilege to be able to hear history,” he said,

“Because of the Grand Army of the Republic, thanks to old veterans, drummer boys from both the Union and Confederate sides getting together to play, the tradition has carried on,” he said. “We speak for the dead. We honor the veterans we cannot thank in person. In playing these drums, we hope we make those ghosts happy,” Logsdon said.

Full Story and Photos

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Max Roach: A Favorite Photo of a Favorite Drummer

Posted on March 2, 2016 by Scott K Fish

SKF NOTE: A favorite photo of a favorite drummer, Max Roach, from the March 22, 1979 Down Beat. Max looks so c-o-o-l in this shot. That said, I never quite understood Ludwig‘s “At last! Matching heads” campaign.

792203_roach_max_groovers_db

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Fred Gruber on Dave Tough: ‘I Have a Great Love for this Man’

Posted on March 2, 2016 by Scott K Fish
Freddie-Gruber3

Freddie Gruber

SKF NOTE: Excerpted from my interview with Freddie Gruber in late 1983 or early 1984. This is an instance where I recommended a drummer have a feature interview and the rest of the Modern Drummer editorial staff outvoted me. That means much of this interview was never published, while some of it was published as an MD Focus on Teachers interview. 

This exchange took place at Buddy Rich‘s kitchen table in Buddy’s New York City apartment. Buddy was not present. In this part of the interview Freddie and I were talking about drummers he met during his lifetime. Freddie had just finished talking about Big Sid Catlett. I asked Freddie next about Dave Tough. Freddie’s whole demeanor changed. He became very reflective.

Dave Tough had a major impact on Freddie. Part of me was wishing Freddie would share specifics of his time with Dave Tough. Maybe what Mr. Tough said could help others. But the greater part of me respected Freddie enough not to pry.

Still, this Gruber/Tough exchange is one moment from all of my drummer interviews I have thought about many times since.

Scott K Fish: How about Dave Tough?

Freddie Gruber: Extraordinary! Extraordinary with a band. His feel. His ability to be sympathetic to the arrangements, to play with a band.

I mean, as a teacher, what is it you can say about Dave Tough that’s not really good? He exemplifies what you should really do with a band. And I’m sure if you took the time to interview all the great big band drummers of toay, I can’t imagine in my right mind any one of them not saying how really marvelous the magic – the magic – of Dave Tough was.

He was only unsung to a degree. Not within the confines of the business or any conscious drummer. But, unsung to the public because Gene Krupa brought the attention and focus….

SKF: Because [Dave Tough] wasn’t a soloist?

FG: It isn’t just that. Gene had such an ability to bring attention to himself. In fact, he did that for drummers.

I did an interview recently, somewhat of a documentary of Gene, and I’ll say exactly what I said at that time: Gene Krupa alone was solely responsible for bringing attention to the drummer and his role within the orchestra to the world at large! He alone did that. More than anything, Gene brought focus and attention to the drummer. Not to take away from his validity as a drummer and what he did as a drummer.

SKF: Did Dave Tough ever speak to you about his own approach to the drumset?

tough_dave

Dave Tough

FG: This is, more or less, personal. I did get to meet Dave on more than a casual level during the very last years of his life. In fact, almost down to the last moments.

I found him to be, throughout a lifetime of knowing drummers, probably — possibly — the most sensitive; certainly one of the more intellectual, as a man, of all the drummers I ever knew. And it was displayed in his sympathetic playing with an orchestra.

But, when I speak of him I really have real strong feelings because I was privileged enough for him — in a special situation which I’d rather not elaborate on — for him to say some things to me at a very young age…. He may or may not have spotted some things in my personality. And he was trying to tell me something, at a very young age, as to some of the pitfalls of the business and the industry. And [telling me] to look out for certain things.

He really said some petinent things to me which I think I was to young to hear in perspective. I did hear what he was saying. But not in perspective. I was in my teens. I wish he could have stenciled them into my head.

But, for him to have said some of the things that he said to me showed, in general, the kind of man he was and how concerned a person — that’s it! — He was a concerned man in general. Sensitive.

I could go on for another hour about how I feel during the short period of time that I was privileged enough to get close enough to have some conversations with [Dave Tough] at that last period of his life. His concern.

And I don’t think I was that special. I think he would have been that way with almost anyone. He said some nice things to me. He said if I handled things correctly, maybe some nice things would happen.

Now, in retrospect, I see that I have a great love for this man. I think the keynote word for a man like Dave is: special. Not just from the standpoint of another accomplished drummer in the industry who makes [an] impact by virtue of the amounts of money he’s earned, by the amount of notoriety he receives, by all the applause he gets from the fans he has, and from all the other things that go along with th ends of the business that you already know about.

I’m talking again about something that goes with that word special that has nothing to do with — you have to pardon my expression — bullshit. Everything was real.

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