'Arrangement' required

Subject: 'Arrangement' required
From: allanwill
Date: 06 May 02 - 11:56 AM

My little group has decided that the next song we want to learn is Wade in the Water, a la Eva Cassidy, but we have never tried to do a "jazzy" type song before.

My scant knowledge of jazz arrangements is that there a lots of 6ths and 9ths, but any suggestions?

Allan

Subject: RE: 'Arrangement' required
From: Sorcha
Date: 06 May 02 - 12:15 PM

Ivan B (IvanB?) can do arrangements, I think. Send him a PM........

Subject: RE: 'Arrangement' required
From: wysiwyg
Date: 06 May 02 - 12:15 PM

Just have FUN with it, you can figure this out!

~S~

Subject: RE: 'Arrangement' required
From: IvanB
Date: 06 May 02 - 12:30 PM

Sorcha, thanks for the vote of confidence, but, although I love jazz, I've never tried to perform it or arrange for it. I think Susan's advice is probably the best. I think if you try to play in the idiom, you'll find yourself instinctively knowing what works and what doesn't.

Subject: RE: 'Arrangement' required
From: Allan C.
Date: 06 May 02 - 12:39 PM

WYSIWYG is right about this, but if you need to get a "feel" for it, try listening to the Young Holt Trio : Wack Wack/On Stage version. You can find a sample on the CDNow pages.

Subject: RE: 'Arrangement' required
From: wysiwyg
Date: 06 May 02 - 01:05 PM

Maybe it would help top say how I arrived at that post. The "how-to" part of the encouragement.

What I was remembering when I posted was this-- we have a piece we have been playing for YEARS, "Little by Little." It's really pretty boring but people like it. One night we were rehearsing in a space we'd never played in before, for an ecumenical service the following night. I stepped away for a break and when I came back, the gang had left their places and were lounging about in the pews. No good place to set down guitars, so they had taken them along in their laps. Someone had started strumming idly, on that song, and someone else, not recognizing it, had started adding some very interesting sevenths and riffs. Then someone else started singing it, in the new mode so to speak, and now it was sounding all jazzy, soft, really cool.

They were just noodling around, and out popped this unique thing. Now we do it that way sometimes.

Doing that, accidentally, led us to the realization that it's easy to let the mind barriers slip sideways a bit and turn the brain cells loose on anything. We do it whenever we get bored with a piece. So now we have that one and several others we can fool around on, and one is a slow, sauntering blues wail of "Down to the Valley to Pray." Who'd expect THAT? We didn't!

They just COME. It's like a stream of music, from deep underground in your head, suddenly breaks loose from underground and runs through your repertoire. Try it! You will at least get some good laughs out of it!

~Susan

Subject: RE: 'Arrangement' required
From: allanwill
Date: 06 May 02 - 02:00 PM

Yeah, your right, of course, WYSIWYG. We do our own interpretations of most of the stuff we play. I think I just needed a bit of a push-start on this one cos', as I said, we've never tried anything jazzy before.

Thanks.

Allan

Subject: RE: 'Arrangement' required
From: wysiwyg
Date: 06 May 02 - 02:47 PM

Love to hear it! *G*

~S~

Subject: RE: 'Arrangement' required
From: Amos
Date: 06 May 02 - 11:46 PM

Well, I dunno the arrangement you're citing, but Wade in the Water goes fine with EM7, A7 and B7 -- that might not be jazzy enough for you though....

A.