h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hallooooo...

Halloo?

Spiny?

You back yet?

No?

Well, when you get back, check out the article on All Things Scottish
http://www.h2g2.com/A198614
They're asking for Scottish contributors, and I think that's you.

blu
}:=8

Yeah SPINY, show yourself, please!!!

How was your trip? Filled with hang-overs, no doubt?

I've borrowed your tea-kettle for a few days, nice old thing it is too. Don't worry, I didn't scrub it or anything... only rinsed it with pure water before every use

Maybe you'd care to pay me a visit and check out my entries? I'm curious about your reaction

Oh, I forgot to tell you...I visited with Wonko briefly, and I did check out your Cartoon Physics page. Had reason to refer to it somewhere but cant remember where. Did anyone visit and leave comments????

So here's some nice Earl Grey for the pot. And while it's steeping, I want to ask more about jazz. Thought I would start here since the other thread is getting sorta long.

I am a little narrow in my own interests, like I said before. Tend more towards big band sounds of the 30s/40s like I said, but I do like blues, and sometimes dixieland. I know of Thelonius Monk and used to have a friend who liked Miles Davis and dragged me to a scruffy ole bar where he was playing. [guess they ALL play best in ole scruffy bars]
There is a place in Detroit called Baker's Keyboard Lounge which has been there forever. Lots of the 'classic' jazz musicians have played there and still 'make the rounds'.

I am curious about how well known the Montreaux/Detroit Jazz Festival is known? A friend of mine, Lanny Austin who was one half of the Austin/Moro Band. As I understand, their band was one of the groups who were instrumental [no pun] in getting the event off the ground many years ago. The band broke up a few years ago, but the Montreaux/Detroit Festival has grown quite large here, and seemingly quite prestigeous.

I used to kid Lanny about jazz, and ask him if he played 'good' jazz or 'bad' jazz. My definition of good jazz was jazz that I liked--mainly blues-y type stuff.

Hm, I'm not into jazz at all, I'm afraid. However, in Haarlem, where I was born, they have the Haarlem Jazz Festival every year (somewhere during summer), and though I didn't visit any of the Jazz-bars, I *did* like to listen to some of the small jazzy bands that roamed the streets. Just sitting on a terras, with a glass of beer or coke, and enjoying the early evening breeze. Quite enjoyable, really.

YOU'VE SEEN MILES DAVIS LIVE?! Let me kiss your feet! I'm a big fan of his cool period stuff, and if you don't have his "Kind of Blue" album, it's a great place to start. Gotta run, but I'll talk with you guys tomorrow...

Alright, got the computer to myself for a while! Well I can understand peoples' aversion to jazz if they like vocalists and good lyrics, since a lot of jazz is purely instrumental. Mind, you can say the same about most classical music, which is probably more popular than jazz these days. And jazz is often better heard live anyway, since so much of it is spur-of-the-moment improvisation. A lot of people don't actually get that concept, which is why they dismiss the music as endless ramblings, but like many things in this life, the rewards are greater the more work you put in.

The basic format is for the composer to write a tune, which is often known as the "head". This is usually arranged for the whole band to play so the number normally kicks off sounding very together. The head is usually played once through and then, while the rhythm section plays the backing chords, the soloists in the band will take turns to play solo, using the head tune as the basis for the improvisation. Sometimes a soloist will stick close to the original tune, but occasionally their flights of imagination will take them miles away, and it's at this stage that listeners will either follow what the player's doing if he's good enough and if they're able to concentrate on it, or lose interest and go to the bar. The soloist often quotes lines from other tunes in their improvisation, so as you listen to more jazz, you're more easily able to spot the references. When the first soloist has had enough, or after a set number of times through the tune, the band may play through the head once more, and then the next soloist will step up to the microphone. The process repeats until everybody who wants a solo has had one, then the head is played one last time, and the number ends, usually with the drummer going "fdlmm". And that's jazz! Though I wouldn't want to be so patronising as to suggest that people don't like it because they don't understand it or haven't listened to enough - they may genuinely not like it in the same way I genuinely don't like drum'n'bass.

As to the Montreaux/Detroit festival, blu, I personally am not aware of it, but I shall ask the guy who presents the radio programme I work on, who is a jazz buff so huge that he has co-written a three-inch thick guide to jazz on CD. If you want to know anything at all about jazz, he da man.

I'm also keen on blues, in fact, my band the Chilli Dogs plays a mixture of blues and country. But not jazz, because we're not good enough.

Right, who's next on the microphone?

scottish country?


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Ah, but what you have to remember is that a lot of country tunes came from the half-remembered folk tunes which Scottish immigrants sang and played in the USA. This is why country music is so popular in the north of Scotland, where many people were forcibly evicted during the Highland Clearances - it's like our own music coming back to us!

What I like about those little street-jazz-bands *is* their mostly instrumental nature. As soon as those "famous jazz giants" start to open their filthy beaks, I just feel like vomitting.. Just can't help that, sorry.

Just wondered what the definition of 'country' was in Scotland.

In the US it is tunes like "Dunno whether to shoot myself or go bowling", and "Muh wife left me an' the dawg is sick, so I guess I'll go huntin' an' have another drink"

[You may read between the lines to realize that I don't care much for country music at it's worst.]

However, it is really neat when you can hear melodies from ancient folk songs in Appalachian 'bluegrass'. Country fiddlin' mimics bagpipe music, too. So I know what you mean. It is REALLY your own music coming back to you.

Folk music, like folklore, and linguistics is fascinating in how it travels through time and space. Another thing that amazes me is how a "British" accent has translated into a southern drawl in the US. Some really isolated parts of the southern mountain states are most closely linked to the country and even local dialect of their origin. It's in their speech pattern, their vocabulary, folklore and music.

Wish I knew more really Scottish music. My late husband's [not the current one--I had another one who died] grandmother was very Scottish. She was a Breckenridge. Dunno where they are from, but she sure knew a buncha old tunes. I loved to listen to her.

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Know what you're saying about them jazz "singers", Fest. A whole generation brought up on Louis Armstrong seems to think that his drawl is fair game for plagiarising. Unfortunately, the original is usually best because it IS the original. Using Armstrong's drawl as an excuse for singing badly won't cut it.

"Country" in Scotland is probably the same as in the States, i.e. what you'd call C&W, blu. There are some awful songs in that genre, aren't there? Mostly the stuff out of Nashville that gets sung at the Grand Old Opry. Sadly, they're usually the ones that people like best, and when you're singing them on a stage as I have been wont to do when depping for missing bass-players, you find yourself really enjoying them when you see half the audience singing along! But once again, the more you listen to, the more you get into it, once you get past the rhinestone crud, that is. Took me a long time to realise what a giant Hank Williams was, for example. The simplicity of the lyrics and the strength of the melodies are unbeatable, and he's singing about ordinary things to ordinary people. But then you get stuff like "Drop kick me Jesus Through the Goalposts of Life", "Makin' Love to you is Just Like Eating Peanuts (Once I get Started I Can't Seem to Stop)", or even "I've got Tears in my Ears from Lying on my Back While Crying Over You". All genuine titles, I swear! Some of the newer guys get my vote - the band does stuff by Steve Earle and Lyle Lovett, for example, and John Hiatt's a good country/rock crossover, as is Mary Chapin Carpenter. Going back a bit, there's Woody Guthrie - the guy who inspired Bob Dylan - and Gram Parsons is another big influence.

People have taken to using the wider definition "Roots" music, which maybe encompasses more than "folk" does. I guess Scottish music has its roots in the fiddle and the bagpipe as well as the voice of course. Bagpipe music is still totally alive and kicking, not just in the form of pipe bands, but also in the Big Music - the Piobrachead (have to check the spelling - pronounced "pee - broch"), which is hard to get into as the tunes are nearly twenty minutes long and don't seen to do much except to pipers. Music for Scottish country dancing is big as well, two accordions and a fiddle with a piano/bass/drums accompaniment is the drill for that. Then there's a whole raft of young bands like the Tartan Amoebas, the Battlefield Band, Salsa Celtica (who mix Brazilian with Scots), Martyn Bennet, and Capercaillie who sing in Gaelic. I can give you a discography if you're interested, blu.

Breckenridge, eh? Have to check that. Sounds Scottish, but I'm not sure it is...

Right, going to have me a virtual bottle of Beck's at this point.

Great discussion of C&W!!! Thanks!
I left 'dropkick me jesus through the goalposts of life' out of my list but it came to mind. And 'I dont know whether to shoot myself or go bowling' IS for real, too. [But I must confess I made up the second one about the wife and dog]

I 'spose C&W is just like anything else. There's junk, and there's good stuff. [And sometimes the beauty is in the eye of the beholder] Remembering back, I have listened to Hank Williams, Kitty Wells, Earl Skruggs and the Foggy Mountain Boys [is that right?] back in the old days of the Opry, and there was something compelling about it. The problem comes with too many imitators doing too many of the same things over and over and over. gets tiresome [and whiney too].

Good C&W has it's roots in folkmusic. Woody Guthrie is a good example of 'real' folkmusic, IMHO. Now I am remembering the 60s and all the stuff before it [folkmusic] got commercialized. All the real protest stuff. [sigh]

Thanks for all the good scottish country info. Piping is alive and kicking here too. There are many Highland Games across the US each year. The oldest [in the US anyway] is the St. Andrews's Society Games held in the Detroit area. I go every year and listen to the pipe band competition. They also have a massed band at the opening and closing ceremony. Nothing like watching a field full of pipers and drummers marching to Scotland the Brave...unless it's sitting in a tent afterwords and listen to the informal piping. [with a wee drop of something, of course]

Breckenridge was DEFINITELY Scottish. All you had to do was listen to her to know it was. They were connected to a clan on account of 'services performed' [gods know what THAT might mean] and were allowed to wear the kilt, but cant remember which clan. Can't remember anything else. Would be curious if you did find anything out. Not a blood relative to me or my kids, but still interested.

Hey, just finishing up for the night, but will see what I can find on Breckenridge for ya. Night!