the ae CHAPTER 3 A Matter of Trust Five Classic Rhythm Sections ECEMBER 23, 1965: IT’S A FREEZING NIGHT IN CHICAGO, but the Plugged Nickel is warm and smoky, packed with bodies waiting to hear the hottest group on the jazz scene, The word on the street says the quintet i kilin: If the previous night of live recording was any indication, tonight's music should be groundbreaking Ron Carter takes the stand and picks up his Jazck acoustic. There are microphones for the recording, but no bass amps and no monitors, These musicians don't need elec- tronic technology. They control their music with their hearts, souls, ears, and fingers. That is all they need. ‘Tony Williams takes his seat behind the drums. The 20-year-old looks young and slight. At 28, Ron isthe oldest rhythmn-section member, tall and mature-looking, They are {all of the youthful confidence that comes with being the best at what they do. They have created a new sound that will often be imitated but rarely matched in years to come, Miles Davis takes center-stage and counts off “If I Were a Bell.” Ron plays in two for the melody chorus; Tony starts on brushes. At the end of the first chorus, the rhythm sec tion explodes into four as Ron begins walking and ‘Tony switches to sticks, The tempo is 300 quarter-notes per minute, and it fels like a glider ride over the mountains: thrilling, dangerous, and wide awake, ‘After a few choruses, the rhythm section abandons the tune’s changes and begins repeating a four-bar tumaround, Pianist Herbie Hancock is on top of every note from Miles, harmonizing and leading the solo further into the stratosphere. Ron is the anchor. ‘Tony is the wild man pouring gasoline on the fire. ‘Wayne Shorter, the quintet’ fifth member, plays a tenor solo after Miles, stretching and bending with the rhythm section to create a tapestry of time and color. Wayne had already logged five years with drummer Art Blakey. The rhythm team of Blakey and bassist Jymie Merritt was the epitome of hard bop, but the rhythmic and harmonic gymnastics of Williams and Carter added another dimension to the music. Herbie’s solo starts, The bass and drums shift to a half-time walking feel. There was no planning for this, only musical inspiration and trust, Miles jumps in to finish Herbie's solo, and the rhythm section gradually slows to a medium walk, then double-time, then a brief melodic reference, nd the tune is over. Thirteen-and-one-half minutes of brilliance. You can ‘experience it yourself with Miles's The Complete Live at the Plugged Nickel 1965 [Columbia], ‘What was it that made this rhythm section so incredible? Was it the playing style they pioneered? Yes and no. Ron Carter and the late Tony Williams ate famous not only for theit temporal innovations and interactive accompaniment but because they share common traits with all ofthe great rhythm sections: a good feel for time, the ability to listen to every thing at once, and the willingness to cooperate musically for the good of the whole band. Ron Carter recalls, “The hookup with Tony happened right away, from the first time wwe played. When we started developing the music shythmically and harmonically, I trust- ced my judgment, If I said this was the top of the tune, that’s where they took it tobe, I just THE JAZZ BASS BOOKtrusted that it was going to go where it was going to go. I was one person they would trust to play the top of the form or show where the top of the tune was. That’s something I could always do, whatever was going on. They trusted that when I played one, if that wasnt their ‘ome, they would get to it on the next time around.” How important is trust? Carter repeatedly says the trust between these musicians was the element thet allowed them to experiment. But musical trust is a delicate thing. The development begins when somebody gives something musically, and it's completed when another person supports that idea. When great musicians do this unconditionally, night after night, the environment is ripe for the kind of musical brilliance documented on Live at the Plugged Nickel. Master drummer Eliot Zigmund, whose intuitive playing has graced the work of such pianists as Bill Evans and Michel Petrucciani, describes the process this way: “Playing day after day with the same group gives the music a strength and ease of execution that doesn't happen otherwise. Many players don't really have a concept of hooking up. It’s more like, ‘Wel, Pm going to do my thing and you'll do your thing, and hopefully it will work? That makes it harder to achieve the very subtle state that marks the difference between effortless swing and four hours of manual labor.” Says Carter of his work with Williams, “You can always hear the bass on those records, and that comes from the way Tony played the drums. A lot of guys think he just played Joud—they miss the point altogether. He didn’t play loud, he played with intensity, and he balanced what was going on in the music” Bassist Todd Coolman, Professor of Jazz Studies at $.U.N.Y. Purchase, completed his doctorate in jazz studies with a dissertation on the Miles Davis band with Carter and Williams. “Tony referred to Ron Carter as Checkpoint Charlie? Coolman says, “because he is the bedrock—probably the greatest bassist of all time within a rhythm section. He always uses the greatest choice of notes and rhythmic variants; he has a rock-solid time feel, a definitive sound, and big, big ears” Miles Davis always had the wisdom to bring together the best rhythm sections. His first great rhythm section was Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones. Philly Joe and PC. (as he is sometimes called) worked with Miles from 1955 through ’58 and laid down solid +thythm-section performianices on Cookin’, Workin’, Relaxin’, and Stearn’ [OJC], which are all classic jazz recordings, Philly Joe Jones is probably the biggest influence on drummers learning the bebop tradition. “Paul Chambets'time feel was a big part ofthe forward motion of that band,” recalls Zigmund of P.C., who died in 1969 at age 34. “It was a swinging rhythm section that was very sophisticated harmonically and rhythmically. Chambers played great functional bass lines—he probably lived a past life in the baroque era—and swung like crazy. He was a ‘team player, as were his rhythm section mates” Jimmy Cobb took over the Davis drum chair after Philly Joe left. Chambers and ‘Cobb developed the bebop time-playing style into an art form, laying down a feeling and pulse that were as solid as a big chunk of Mother Earth. The 1961 Miles Davis recording In Person: Saturday Night at the Blackhawk, San Francisco [Columbia] captures the pair smokin’ in a traditional hard-bop vein, while 1959s landmark Kind of Blue [Columbia] showcases Chambers and Cobb in a mid-tempo collection of modal tunes. Their laid-back yet present groove on this date set the standard for modal rhythm-section playing. ‘The rhythm sections anchored by Chambers and Carter shared some of the secret THE JAZZ BASS BOOK a matter of trust uv18 ingredients of great section playing: team spirit, harmonic and rhythmic sophistication, and buoyancy—the magical ability to give the tempo forward motion without speeding up. ‘Swing, pulse forward motion, and good time all mean the same as buoyancy: The tempos have a “feel-good” edge to them. ‘While Chambers and then Carter were anchoring epochal Miles rhythm sections, Ray Brown was making his own musical statements with the Oscar Peterson trio. Ray’s musical partnership with Peterson stretched from 1949 to '92, but some of his most memorable play- ing came in the '60s with drummer Ed Thigpen. Ray and Ed were a team that “laid it down.” ‘What does “laying it down” mean® Listen to Peterson's Night Train [Verve] and dig Brown and Thigpen's straightforward strength and elegance and strong yet supple sound. If Tony Williams is the guy pouring gasoline on the fire, Ed Thigpen is the cook putting spice in the stew. Brown, meanwhile, has the biggest beat you will ever hear. He can lift a whole band ‘and make them play better than they have ever played before. And he can do it tune after tune, night ater night. “He's the epitome of what anyone would want of a bassist” Peterson told Bass Player. “He has all the components in equal proportions: time, sound, intuition, He ‘pte-psyches’ where a soloist is going—his musical perception is that sharp—so he arrives there with you.” Ed Thigpen once told me “the groove is like your heartbeat.” Okay, set down your cof- fee (ot herbal tea), lay two fingers on the inside of your wrist, and count your groove—er, pulse, Your heart beats in a triplet: bu-dub-rest, bu-duh-rest, bu-duh-rest, Ed’s point? The {groove is an organic thing: you are a living, breathing example of a groove. Get some hhumans together to play music, and you have many different pulses, heartbeats, and grooves mixed together. To make a successful musical statement, the musicians must rely on trust and support Ray and Ed played simple quarter-notes in a way that made them creep under your skin and infect your soul with swing, They did more with less. But is that a realistic approach in this age of technical virtuosity? Aren't “modern” bassists required to play intri- cate lines and complicated solos over confusing harmonies at super-fast tempos? Not nec- essary, Consider Scott LaFaro: He displayed tons of chops, but he also supported his band- ‘mates. The groundbreaking piano trio of LaFaro, Bll Evans, and drummer Paul Motian is 1 perfect example of three musicians playing with total trust and support. LaFaro had a strong bebop background and was completely grounded in walking bass fundamentals. On his earliest recordings with Victor Feldman, his sound recalls Paul ‘Chambers. When he joined the trio with Evans and Motian—after the pianist had gone through several bass players—the two musicians’ trust and support let LaFaro open up his playing. In turn, Scott was the missing ingredient that helped Bill and Paul turn in some of their best performances. On their first recording, Portrait in Jezz [OJC], they make “Autumn Leaves” sound like three musical Buddhas engaging in the hippest, most inteli- gent conversation you've ever heard, with musical mastery, instrumental prowess, and complete trust and support. Joe LaBarbera, the last drummer to play with Evans, recalls the dynamic between Evans, LaFaro, and Motian. “Paul was playing the time, and T think that was exactly what Bill needed. The real interaction was happening between Bill and Scott. | admired the way Bill and Scott worked togethers I felt the drummer's chair in Bill's trio was wide open, but ‘every bass player who went into that gi fet the stigma of Scott LaFato.” THE JAZZ BASS BOOKEddie Gomez, who played behind Evans from °66 to "77, ecalls the impact of the trio's landmark 1961 Village Vanguard recordings (Sunday Night at the Village Vanguard and Waltz for Debby, OJC). “I listened to those albums a lot” Eddie told Bass Player. T was «big Paul Chambers fan and then a Ray Brown fan, but like every other bassist from that period, I got totally whisked away by Scott LaBaro.” With playing that became the standard for an open, intuitive, cooperative chythm- section sound, LaFaro left an enormous impression on all jazz bassist, “We reached such a peak with Scott, such freedom,” Motian recalls. “It seemed everything was becoming pos sible LaFaro died in a car wreck ten days after the Vanguard sessions at age 25, Evans did not play in public for six months after LaParo’s death, ‘Trust, strength, team spirit, buoyancy, and groove—all contribute to a great rhythm- section sound, and all are qualities these rhythm sections had in abundance. To this day bbandleaders tell their rhythm sections, “Get that P.C.-Philly Joe thing” Or, “It's like a Tony- and-Ron groove, you dig?” Or, “Leave it open—create that LaFaro-Motian vibe” But the rhythm sections documented here are only a few of the greats. Listen and learn from all of ‘the masters. And don’t forget to keep your fingers on your pulse. It Takes Guts: Playing Acoustic Acoustically Bill Evans once told Joe LaBarbera that when Scott LaFaro had a solo, he would pick up the bass and move forward to the upstage microphone, and when he was finished he ‘would pick up the bass and move back, LaFaro played with gut strings and no amplifier, as did the other bassists in the great rhythm sections profiled in this chapter. The sound of unamplified bass and piano and the sensitivity of the drummers contributed greatly to these sections’ interaction, But when the bass, piano, and drums are amplified via direct ‘boxes and microphones, musicians lose control of their sounds, and many subtleties get lost. While classical players started using metal strings in the °50s and carly ’60s, most jazz players didn’t go metal until the late ’60s. In Bass Player magazine, Ray Brown recalled the challenges of playing acoustically: “It was a lot tougher, You had to put the strings up high, and those gut strings broke a lot when. it got hot or if you had acid in your perspiration. But somehow we got it done. I listen to some of the records we made before we had amplifiers, and it sounds pretty damn good.” For proof of Ray’s technical prowess with gut strings, check out his 1955 “How High the “Moon” solo in Chapter 20 Amplified rhythm sections can play with a high level of listening, trust, and musical- ity, and amplification can produce better overall sound quality. However, sound quality and ‘musical quality are separate issues. Amplification can obscure true musicality, and over- amplification can kill the rhythm section’s human element. The players in a great section ‘must be able to hear one another and react spontaneously to the slightest nuance. Does your rhythm section have the guts to go acoustic? THE JAZZ BASS BOOK a matter of trust