Jan 152009
OK, now you guys tell me there’s a lack of clarity on the term jamming. Some of you feel that the more it’s planned out the less it’s jamming. I’m not so sure that I agree. I think, in part, the term refers to a communal activity among musicians that involves the stance of jamming. As a group, let’s define what we mean when we talk about jamming.
It should at least feel improvised, if it is not actually improvised.
I agree, Oats. For that reason I support those who say the instrumental break in “My Sharona” is NOT a jam, but I do NOT support those who say the same about “Freebird.” The latter clearly requires the jamming stance.
I think that it has something to do with not having everything planned out so that the participants have room to stretch out a bit.
It may or may not have a defined structure at the beginning and the end, but at the very least, the middle should be somewhat improvisational.
So, I would say that My Sharona is more of a jam than Free Bird. My Sharona sounds like the guy had a certain number of bars to play whatever rock riff he wanted and then after 32 bars (or, or a nod from Doug Fieger, or whatever), he had to come back in with a defined riff. On the other hand, Free Bird is all defined riff as evidenced by the fact that there are two guitars are playing the exact same thing.
To sum up: Green Grass and High Tides by the Outlaws and Get Ready by Rare Earth? Jams!
Close to the Edge by Yes and Suppers Ready by Genesis? No!
I think a jam should have some freedom for all the players to develop, usually in some non-defined time frame. My Sharona, guitar solo, NOT A JAM. A jam can have planned occurrences such as signature moments where something pre-planned involving multiple interlocking parts might occur based on some cue. Free Bird, maybe a jam. Too much planning though, and it stops being jamming!
The Bob Marley song Jamming has confused many people who don’t know what improvisation is. Back home there was a time when people always used the expression “they be so jammin'” to mean “the band is great.”
Even in rock songs most people would call tightly structured the instruments are not expected to play exact notes the same exact way to the extent that classical musicians are required to. Ringo’s fills weren’t written out and would vary from take to take, even if the basic rhythm stayed the same.
So I guess the line between songs and jams can be drawn differently by each listener, but I think for our purposes My Sharona should stay on the song side of the line. Guitar solos are usually not composed note-for-note, and a little freedom in a guitar solo of a specified length is this side of a jam I think.
Can you plan out jams? It sounds like huddle a pre-sex huddle to plot a game plan (“it’s manual/oral/intercourse – break!”). It should be about live communication between musicians not some Broadway routine. It’s interesting that musicians do everything they can to make sure nothing unexpected happens on stage yet when something does it is unfailingly the most interesting part of the gig.
Then again, some musicians charged that Miles would sit in his hotel room after the gig and practice the solos he was going to play at the next night’s show.
Can a jam be planned? Maybe the contour, maybe sections, but the critical thing is the overall flexibility of the overarching structure. A jam might involve spots where the band plays a composed developed head, even in some specific arrangement, but there should be room to stretch and wander between such segments. I also try to differentiate a jam from the typical old jazz structure of having a repeated head that separates various solos. I think a jam has to leave room for other individuals to organically assume the solo spot spontaneously.
I’m sticking with my concept of the jamming stance until I can no longer see it as making sense. A tightly structured, long jam like “Marquee Moon” or “Freebird” may not have a lot of variety night to night, but because the musicians have assumed the jamming stance, the force of working within that long, tight structure can cause different vibrations from night to night, sound system to sound system, audience to audience. And most importantly, unlike a long rock composition that’s not assuming the jamming stance (eg, “Starship Trooper” or “Supper’s Ready”), the tightly structured, well-planned rock jam aims to APE the whole point of the more loosely improvided jam, which does not always result in an orgasmic crescendo. To me, that desired end result is as important as the effort to reach the result. If you know how to get there and you and your fellow musicians can gear up and assume the stance, then you also get the communal aspect that is part of a jam. I’m telling you, as someone who’s done almost nothing but planned jams, they’re still jams of some merit. It’s about the stance as much as anything. On the other side of the coin, who among us hasn’t sat among a group of stoned Deadheads purportedly “jamming” on “Feelin’ All Right?” It’s such an apathetic scene that it’s not a jam; there’s no stance in play.
Mod supposes: “If you know how to get there and you and your fellow musicians can gear up and assume the stance, then you also get the communal aspect that is part of a jam.”
When you get to that part, do you yell out something like, “Alright boys, now this time with ‘brio’!”?
Holy shit.
I wrote that “planned vs. jamming” thing yesterday, popped back in to see how THAT thread is progressing, and “now all this has to happen.”
My whole point was that there’s lots of fluidity and exchange between the spontaneity of jamming and some of the more composed aspects of some of the long form stuff you guys are bringing up.
the difference between jamming and planning an instrumental section out is directly proportional to the collective confidence of the unknown of the members of the band, which is divisible by their trust in their own ability to hold it together while going into uncharted territory, as well as their trust in that ability in the players around them.
the syntax in that formula is dreadful, but you get the picture.
the rest is gravy.
and for the record, i’m with geo: it has to allow *everyone* some freedom to invent in order for it to be a ‘jam.’
and so no, ‘sharona’ isn’t a jam. my point was only that it’s not as planned as some of you were making it out to be. cdm is right: give the pot smoking ex-hippie a chance to stretch out and then bring it on home.
btw, if memory serves from watching a dvd about the knack, that track was cut live. there are no overdubs except for lead and backing vocals, and the had never played the section over which we debated yesterday for that many bars. that still doesn’t make it a jam, maaaaaan.
I like this from dbus: “It’s interesting that musicians do everything they can to make sure nothing unexpected happens on stage yet when something does it is unfailingly the most interesting part of the gig.”
I would add that those musicians who “do everything they can” to stave off disaster are also the FIRST to brag about those unexpected moments.
see zeppelin comma led, whose interviews featured all kinds of “dancing on the edge of a precipice” / “tight but loose” rhetoric for years, but whose bootlegs reveal them doing the same “spontaneous” maneuvers night after night.
Sat, we grew up believing Zeppelin’s jamming cred because they took such a strong jamming stance. Same goes for Skynyrd. Same probably went for a lot of the titans of jazz. Their stance inspired others to learn how to jam, to learn how to assume the position. Some would go on to jam more spontaneously than others. I would argue that the influence of planned jamming bands like Zeppelin is as profound as the influence of unplanned jamming bands, like the Dead. Do not deny the stance. While you’re respecting the stance, please comment on the jamming credentials of the Deadheads “jamming” on “Feelin’ All Right.”
I think there’s a big difference between jamming and long songs. I think a real jam is when everyone in the band has the opportunity to solo for approximately equal time, at least in a live setting. The lone exception is that the drummer should take no more than one solo, and if he’s a cool person, he won’t take that. Any drummer subjecting the audience to more than one drum solo is being a dick.
From what I’ve heard of Phish, they’re really a sound bed for Trey Anesthesia to jam. Most of today’s jam bands seem to exist primarily for a guitar player to take solo’s. In theory that sounds like Great Rock, but in practice I think it’s dull because it just develops into the same stuff over and over. Jamming on one or two songs is one thing, but I found an entire night of The Dead doing whatever that was almost unbearable.