Tim Hagans on the artist's role in society

I've always loved the way Tim Hagans played. His highly developed chromatic concept gives him a sound that is very modern, yet still highly melodic. Swedish saxophonist Thomas Trulsson wrote me today and mentioned that he recently attended a Tim Hagans clinic. Tim's chromatic concept seemed to be very similar to Rich Perry's concept. Here's what Thomas had to say about Tim's workshop:

"Two weeks ago I attended a clinic with Tim Hagans were he talked about his concept in improv. For him there is only one chord scale, the chromatic scale. Through the years he practised only playing a note and then listen in his head what note he would like to play next. Which for him was a way to get into his quirks, or style of playing. He also talked about practising playing and listening to what every note sounds and feels like for every chord. Very interesting indeed. He is a wonderful improviser."


The following was taken from Tim Hagan's own website.
He has some great music streaming on his page also.

• Tim Hagans::THE ARTIST'S ROLE IN SOCIETY

Every successful dictator/control freak/power monger knows that the masses can be controlled if the catalysts of freethinking are removed. That is why in any repressive movement it is the artists, regardless of their race, ethnicity or religious affiliation, that are neutralized first…either by physical or mental imprisonment. Without the artistic community and their works, urging society to remain open minded and examine all issues from all points of view, the controlling powers can easily sell their ideas with little resistance.

Artists are scary. They celebrate individualism. They portray the nuances and emotions of life in abstract terms. Music is the most abstract art form and improvised music creates the intangible in the moment. An artist’s mission is not to entertain although entertainment can be a desired by-product. Their mission is to give the receiver of the artistic statement emotions and impressions to reflect upon. Whether the receiver likes or dislikes the statement is secondary.

This is an enormous point of confusion. Often an artistic statement’s worth is judged by its marketing ability and selling power. Unfortunately, the lower the quality, the higher the sales. (for a great dissertation on the subject of quality please read Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance). Although there are some incredible artists in the pop music (the Beatles, James Taylor, Steely Dan, Moby, the Police), they are in the minority. And, in the era of formula bands, the same franchise business groupings every five miles and the lowest quality food being offered, society is loosing its taste and appreciation for diversity and quality.

A major reason for this is the stressful everyday with little time available for contemplation and reflection. Listening to Coltrane at the Village Vanguard or a Bruckner Symphony is rewarding and enriching in the long term, but it’s easier and more comforting to play something familiar that one can sing along with. And again, there is nothing wrong with entertainment statements, but the balance is way out of proportion.

The artist’s role in society is to remedy that balance by making statements that demand attention. Statements that inspire the receiver to examine a subject from all angles, that encourage confidence in one’s own interpretation and that encourage flexibility and allow change in those interpretations. Otherwise, a society will base its group decisions on 10 second sound-bites, half-truths and fear-based initiatives. The loudest voice will be assumed truthful and, most tragic of all, beauty, the underlying common denominator in all art, will go unappreciated.

At a workshop in Reno, Nevada a few years back, a gentleman asked me what the point of Re:Animation Live was…..a Blue Note recording that I can best describe as free electronica. He said he had listened to the recording several times and still could not figure out what was going on. He said that he didn’t even know if he liked it and had to come to the workshop to ask me for an explanation. I replied that he had given me (and Bob Belden) the greatest compliment. Better than great reviews, this is the desired reaction….a musical statement that requires repeated listenings. In fact, I replied that I had no idea what the recording was about either. It was a musical description of how six musicians interpreted their collective life experiences leading to and including that exact moment. Improvised abstract emotional statements that influence the thought process. No wonder artists are so feared.

For students sitting in practice rooms wondering what the point is, for music teachers discouraged that their message may not be valued, for performers who are tired of the hustle and the travel…please remember…..any thing as feared and uncontrollable as art must be an incredibly important force and a vital ingredient for a healthy society and cool place to live.

George Garzone and Kenny Brooks with Ratdog

Garzone sitting in with KB and playing the music of Jerry Garcia?!?!

Jerry must be proud, first his own ice cream flavor and now George Garzone is playing his music. Thanks Pat Tucker.

KB & Garzone w/ Rat Dog video on YouTube

More Garzone Videos of YouTube!!!

Jazz Dispute

Thank you to Jakub Dolezal for this link to a great YouTube video. I've heard people talk about this for a while. It's sure to become a classic. You have to see it, I won't even attempt to explain it.

Jazz Dispute

Dexter Gordon & Woody Shaw on the web

You can never get too much Dexter and Woody as far as I'm concerned. The official Dexter Gordon website and the official Woody Shaw website were recently launched by ShawNetDesign. You'll find a FREE Lead Sheet of an original Dexter Gordon composition when you sign up on the mailing list, an iTunes Exclusive Album INVITATION: Dexter Gordon and Woody Shaw - Live and Unreleased!, links to official MySpace pages, audio interviews, newsletters, transcriptions, composition catalogues, streaming audio and video, photo galleries.

Coming Soon: More Live, Unreleased Recordings,Audio and Video Streams, Podcasts and RSS Feeds, Round Midnight page - Dedicated to Dexter Gordon's Oscar-Nominated performance.

www.woodyshaw.com
www.dextergordon.com

Mouthpiece Room

I've got to say that I'm not the only mouthpiece nuts on the internet. I must admit that I did recently overextended my finances with some eBay buys (an early Babbit HR alto piece, a slant Link tenor piece and an old HR alto Dukoff). There are guys far worse than me, and I can prove it! A friend of mine recently hipped me to a site by a Japanese saxophonist who takes the cake.
On his site Eji has sound clips of himself playing about every mouthpiece ever made. He isn't the greatest player, so it's kind of hard to get a clear idea about the sound of a particular mouthpiece. He also clearly favors metal over hard rubber. None of the mouthpieces are for sale either!

How can one person have so many pieces?
Is he an eccentric billionaire?
Does he work at a huge music store?
How many does he keep at one time?

I don't read Japanese and his site may answers these questions, but I'll never know the whole story.
Saxophone Mouthpiece Room

Steve Neff, who I went to school with, also has a site that has clips of him playing different pieces. Steve is a much better player than Eji so it easier to tell what the mouthpieces are actually like. He also has a very interesting selection of pieces, a bit more to my liking. He even has a clip of an alto piece that I sold him (I still miss that piece).

Steve Neff's clips
Steve Neff's clip archives

Autumn Nocturne session

Sorry about not following up on questions and comments. I've been engrossed with a new CD project that I just recorded last week. A few weeks ago I heard that Alan Jones,one of my favorite drummers, was coming back from Bavaria for some gigs in Portland. Even though my last CD project 'Oasis' hadn't even pressed yet, I didn't want to miss the opportunity to record with Alan because there is no one else in the area at his level. We recorded with pianist Randy Porter and a 17 year old tyro named Jeff Picker on bass.
Before the session I went through about a hundred boxes of reeds to find something playable. Luckily the Rigotti Golds came through and I found a couple of decent reeds. I don't know about you, but I've never been much of a morning person and the session started at 10a.m. When you start to record in the morning you don't even have time to warm up before you start tracking. It took two hours to get set up so we only had four hours to record and entire CD. It usually takes me at least a couple hours of playing to warm up, so by the last hour hour I was actually warm and feeling loose. We got through nine tunes, not too shabby. With 54 minutes of music it was about enough for a CD. I even considered the possibility of recording a duo tune with Randy at a later time to add a couple more minutes. This session was also the first time I would ever bring my tenor into the studio on one of my own projects.

I have already mixed about four tunes my Sean Flora, the engineer who recorded and mixed my last project. Like a flash the new tracks are already on my MySpace page for the world to hear. Take a listen and let my know what you think.

Hans Groiner: The Music of Thelonius Monk

Here is an incredibly funny YouTube clip of Larry Goldings in a blond wig playing Austrian pianist Hans Groiner. Hans has made the music of Monk more accessible by making every tune totally diatonic. He has done what "Monk meant to do". We're anxiously awaiting episode 2 Hans.

Harder reeds?

This was a question in response to the last post on reeds. It deserved it's own post.

Q:
"Hey David - This brings up the question regarding how one moves from one reed strength to the next. I usually play 2 or 2.5 and am always astounded that people playing my same size mouthpiece are sometimes playing 3, 3.5 or even 4. I've read that the harder the reed, generally the better the sound and the longer the reed life. But if forcing yourself to play on a harder reed is not recommended, what is the process that a player goes through that allows them to one day play on a harder reeder? I've tried working out on harder reeds, and you're right, it really does not make practicing fun. And you're not the first person that I've heard of that suggests it's not like lifting weights - that forcing the issue with brute force is not necessarily the way to go. Can you offer any more insight on this process? Thanks, Roman."

A: Roman,
Great question. I usually forget that a reed that feels perfect for me is probably a little too hard for my students. I'm generally against starting students out on really soft reeds. I don't think that it is very helpful because it trains you to play with a much different embouchure than a professional would use. There is some amount of muscle and air-stream control that needs to be developed over time, but it's not like you need to become iron-lips in order to have a good sound. I was talking to Ralph Morgan, the master mouthpiece maker and former head engineer during Selmer's Mark VI production, and he was saying how he thought that no one should ever play anything harder than a 2 1/2 or 3 reed on a 5 tip opening mouthpiece.
He didn't think there was any way to have enough control pieces like 8s and 9s with hard reeds. In fact he was thought that there was no way I could possibly have control over my Slant 6 Otto Link and my 3 1/2 reeds. Of course I disagree with his assessment of my set-up, and I even think I could move to a 6*. He does have a point in general though. So many of the Jazz greats used softer reeds and smaller tip openings then many players today and they sounded amazing. Cannonball played on a 5 tip opening with a 2 1/2 or 3 reed, so did Phil Woods and many other great players.

You must remember that the strength of the reed varies from brand to brand and always must be considered in relation to the mouthpiece. A smaller tip opening, shorter lay, smaller chamber or larger baffle will make a harder reed easier to play. Also an stuffy immature 3 reed may feel harder than a 4 reed from really good cane. Dead and stuffy can't always be fixed be sanding or shaving. If the reed looks green after you soak it then it most likely will play like a much harder reed.

Personally I don't recommend extreme set-ups, like a 9 or 10 tip opening, which is what George Garzone sounds so great playing. He runs 10 miles every day to keep up that king of air-stream. I think student should start out on a strength or reed that is close to what a seasoned professional would play, unless of course the student is a little kid. I wouldn't suggest that anyone play anything more open than around a 7 tip opening, and that's even kind of extreme for alto. I was playing on an Early Babbit 7 alto piece for a while last year and it felt like I could put about twice as much air through it. My sound was MASSIVE! I ended up selling it after a few months because it was just a little to hard to control. I could have gone down to a softer reed, but I didn't want the extra buzz that would have added to my sound.

If I were your teacher Roman, I would probably move you up to a hard reed (3 or 3 1/2) and if you really couldn't cope I would have you get a mouthpiece with a smaller tip opening. I also like the warm dark sound of a large chamber piece, and dislike the overly buzzy sound of a high baffle. I recommend a 5-6* tip opening on alto and a 6-7* tip opening on tenor, with
2 1/2 to 3 1/2 strength reeds. This will get you a sound closer to Zoot Sims than Lenny Picket, and closer to Cannonball than Sanborn. If the reed is not hard enough then you won't have enough resistance to control it as as well, unless of course it a 4 reed. There needs be be enough resistance from the reed in order to be able to make subtle timbre changes.

If you are still having real problems playing harder reeds, even though you have a reasonable mouthpiece, then you need to get into the woodshed and spend some time doing overtone exercises. Overtone exercises are the fastest way to develop air-stream, embouchure, and upper oral tract control. There is no quicker way to a gain control of of your set-up. Here are the exercises that Joe Viola gave me to practice overtones-
OVERTONE EXERCISES from the Bb fundamental. Continue them from Bb up to low C#.

More reed problems

Q: "I play on Vandoren Java's. My M.O. is to go through a box of reeds and find the good one's; maybe practice/play on a good reed for a short while after it manifests; then mark an "x" on it's plastic holder and put it back in a box with the other 'good ones' as arsenal for my upcoming gigs. The "bad" (more stiff, difficult, cumbersome) reeds I save to practice on - sort of like baseball player swinging 2 bats in the warm-up area before going up to the plate. This of course makes my practicing less enjoyable. My question is: is this a bad philosophy? Reeds aren't cheap. I'm mainly doing this to make sure I have good reeds to play gigs on without buying boxes and boxes of reeds each week with money I don't have. But I'm also wondering if it makes sense, if it is constructive, to practice on more difficult reeds."
Thanks
- Adam

A: First of all, sorry I haven't written much lately. I've had the flu, it kicked my butt.

Ah, the constant reed struggle, the bane of all reed players. Now that you have a baby, I'm sure that reeds are even less a priority than before.

Your tactic is to practice on the shitty reeds and save the good ones for gigs. Bummer, who wants to really practice on a bad reed? It seems like if you always practice on bad reeds, then your chops will be unprepared to play on a good reed. I could be way off here. Personally, I can't even practice on a really bad reed. It's no fun.

I don't think that it is helpful to 'work your chops out' by using a reed that is too hard. If you do this regularly you may get used to putting too much bottom pressure on the reed. Contrary to some opinions, the saxophone embouchure should be very relaxed and almost loose. How can you practice relaxing properly on a stiff reed? My answer to your question then is to adjust your reeds to where they are no longer too stiff. These reeds may still not be concert worthy, but they won't force your chops into any unnecessary contortions.

When I first play reeds I categorize them with two factors in mind, hard or soft and good or bad cane. If a reed is too hard or too soft but the cane feels and sounds good to me, then it has the possibility of being playable. If the cane is immature and feels dead or chirpy then no amount of adjusting will make it good. I'll first pull the playable reeds out of the box and put them in a reed holder. Then I'll ditch the really bad ones back in the box, which goes to the bone yard in case a day of pure desperation arrives. Then I'll separate the reeds that have potential, except for the strength. If I were you Adam, I would be practicing on these reeds. Once your reed adjusting skills are honed, these reeds will even make it to gigs. The next time I practice I will soak these questionable reeds again and see if they're any better the second go 'round. Remember the thing that breaks down hard reeds the most is going from wet to dry. Each time you dry out a wet reed you really break down the Xylem and Floem (the fibers in the reed that carry water up and down the plant).

Break out your reed tools! You should never really need to play on a reed that is too stiff or too soft. A reed clipper, fine water proof sandpaper, a reed knife, reed rush and a piece of glass is everything that you will need to work on reeds. I also recommend Vandoren's reed resurfacing glass also. This is simply a piece of glass with sandpaper on both sides. They also have a model with rough glass instead of sandpaper.There is a strip of glass at the top that has no sandpaper on it. This is so that when you resurface your reed your can leave the tip as it is. The re-surfacer is a great way to make the entire reed softer and also to flatten out any warping on the bottom of the reed. Many times it is a safer bet it take a little off the bottom of the reed than to sand down or shave the top of the reed. Make sure you also have a reed clipper that fits the tip of your mouthpiece, or at least the reeds you like to play. For example if you always play Javas then buy a Vandoren reed clipper. Remember only to clip the tiniest sliver at a time off the tip of your reed!

Always check to see if the rails are equally hard. To do this turn your mouthpiece at at 30 degree angle and blow normally so that only one side of the mouthpiece is really touching your bottom jaw. Then do the same thing on the other side. You should be able to tell which rail is harder, then make adjustments with a knife or sandpaper. If a reed is shitty, then what do you have to lose by experimenting on it? Go town, carve the f%&# out of it! There have been many very strange things done to reeds for the sake of good tone. People have methodically split the tips of reeds with razor blades, carved circular divots out of the tops of reeds, cut channels into the tops and bottoms of reeds, and reeds have been treated with everything from Hydrogen Peroxide to highly refined Pig oil. Bacon flavored reeds aren't really my thing, but I'm willing to try just about anything else in order to get a reed to play.

Here is a very helpful reed adjustment chart to help get you started.

Remember these things abut reed adjustment:

A little at a time, not a lot.
Keep trying, you'll never run out of bad reeds to practice adjusting.

Terrible cane will always sound terrible.
Die Vandoren, evil scumbags! You'll burn in hell for all the suffering you've caused!

One more thing Adam, do yourself a favor and switch to Rigotti reeds.
Order them from Roberto's or WWBW. You'll never go back to Vandorens, I promise.

The Live at the Lighthouse Omnibook!!

Kenny Brooks, one of my oldest friends and most significant musical co-conspirator, came through town today with Rat Dog, a Grateful Dead spin-off band. The band was playing a one night show in Portland on their way up the west coast. I met KB on the band's tour bus in the afternoon and we talked shop for a while. He showed me his latest mint Balanced Action tenor and I let him play my new Mark VI acquisition. The usual gear geek stuff. He told me that he was now playing a Japanese brand of saxophone reeds that uses Rigotti cane (we both agree that Rigotti cane is the best on the market right now). The name of these reeds escapes me at the moment but Kenny thinks they're even better than standard Rigotti reeds. He had a friend who speaks Japanese call and order him 100 reeds, totalling $270.

Kenny told me he had brought a present for me and we went up to his hotel room to get it. After rummaging around in his bags a while Kenny pulled out a bound book that looked like a small fake book. I was in shock as I leafed through the perfectly notated manuscript paper. It was the Live at the Lighthouse Omnibook. "You're kidding", I gasped. "Oh, yes", said KB with nodding his head with eyebrows raised. It was the entire Live at the Lighthouse album transcribed in beautiful clear computer notation. "This is insane", I whispered. Kenny explained how a Spanish bass player living in San Francisco had contacted him on his MySpace page and gave him a copy. The transcriptions were done a Petter Wettre, a Norwegian saxophonist and includes all the heads, changes, harmony parts and Dave Liebman and Steve Grossman's solos . There are ten tunes and the book is over 110 pages long. Anyone who is a serious Liebman or Grossman fan has by now shit their pants in excitement while reading this. Petter even has plans for a Play-a-long to go with the book and there is now a DVD available that features Petter playing some of the solos while the transcription scrolls by. This is an epic accomplishment.

Main Lighthouse Omnibook web page
WHY?
LIEB'S NOTES
SAMPLE
BUY NOW

Crack Spider

I try to keep everything on this blog at least tangentially related to music. This is very funny video and one could argue that it does have some relevance to music. Thank you Damien for this one.

The Crack Cocaine Spider

Spiders On Drugs

Scientists at the United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) have turned their attention from the mysteries of the cosmos to a more esoteric area of research: what happens when you get a spider stoned. Their experiments have shown that common house spiders spin their webs in different ways according to the psychotropic drug they have been given. Nasa scientists believe the research demonstrates that web-spinning spiders can be used to test drugs because the more toxic the chemical, the more deformed was the web.

* Spiders on marijuana made a reasonable stab at spinning webs but appeared to lose concentration about half-way through.

* Those on Benzedrine - "speed" - spin their webs "with great gusto, but apparently without much planning leaving large holes", according to New Scientist magazine.

* Caffeine, one of the most common drugs consumed in soft drinks, tea and coffee, makes spiders incapable of spinning anything better than a few threads strung together at random.

* On chloral hydrat, an ingredient of sleeping pills, spiders "drop off before they even get started".

Namyo-ho-renge-kyo

Rob Scheps forwarded me this from Jeff Pittson who knew Brecker from an NSA Buddhist temple in New York. This particular form of Buddhism that Brecker was involved in at the end of his life practices a very intense form of chanting, while concentrating on a Japanese scroll called a Gohonzon. Most of you have probably have heard of "Namyo-ho-renge-kyo". Many Jazz musicians have been proponents of this method of spiritual attainment, including Chick Corea, Harold Land, Herbie Hancock, and Wayne Shorter. The rhythmic emphasis of this chant seems to have a special call for musicians.


A little story; Mike told us, the last time he was able to come to a meeting. "I just wanted all of you to know that despite what's happened to me over the last 2 years, I fell happier now than I did before I started chanting. My life has been very chaotic and lately many mysterious things have been falling into place. I can definitely attribute this to my chanting." When he went to do the recording, he had been chanting for about 3-4 weeks and, of the recording session and being weak from bouts with chemo, he said "I can't believe I'm doing this! " and later he confided to me that he felt that he felt that he limped his way through the recording. We should all limp so well!! But later when I asked him, the last time I saw him, " Hey Mike, how the record going?" He replied" You know, I'm thrilled with this record and I'm never thrilled with a record." Actual proof from a man who was heard to say on at least one occasion ,"I have 11 Grammys (now 12) and I think my music sucks! Well, we all know differently, but we also know that Mike was hypercritical of his own playing and I think as he brought out his own Buddha-nature. He started to appreciate himself more and more and be more gentle with himself, and I also think that he definitely attained Buddhahood. He practiced with us exactly 6 months to the day...He received Gohonzon on August 14th and passed on Jan 13th. Pleases convey this to all the members that you know and non-members alike. Sam himself is chanting daily and says that when he does he feels his Dad's presence, as indeed we all do, and always will.
JP

The Serious Jazz Practice Book- seriously

Chuck Sher has continually put out some of the best Jazz Fake Books and Jazz educational books on the market. I remember when he first started publishing. He would takes his fakes books to the high-school and college Jazz festivals and sit at his little table wearing headphones while practicing his electric bass. Now he's catching up to Jamey.

I just got the 'Serious Jazz Practice Book' by Barry Finnerty last week. I was kind of skeptical because I've ordered so many practice books that turned out to be quite lame. It turned out to be a really great book. Here are a few endorsements that I think described the book very well:

• "The book I've been waiting for! Barry quite logically leads you through hundreds of wonderful studies with easy to understand text relating to how each study/pattern is set up and how it relates harmonically to chords and scales. This book will keep you busy for many years and is a compelling method with the overall goal of expanding your Jazz vocabulary. It is a great book!"

Randy Brecker

• "This is an exhaustive, yet compact guide to the fundamental of scale vocabulary, written by an accomplished musician. The section on diminished scales is outstanding."

Dave Liebman

Barry has done a fantastic job of organizing this book. He starts simple diatonic exercises in chapter one, and moves on to pentatonic and arpeggio studies in chapters two and three. The last arpeggio patterns are cool sounding diminished and augmented arpeggios. In chapters four and five Barry introduces whole-tone and diminished patterns. There is a wealth of great ideas here. The closest book I can think of to this book is Slonimski's 'Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns'. In Slonimski's book you need to really dig to find usable patterns and then figure out how to apply them to changes yourself. In the 'Serious Jazz Practice Book' everything is laid out for you, it is very clear about how to apply the patterns to improvisation.
Here is an except from the diminished chapter:

• "But the great thing about the diminished scale is that it contains so many other kinds of triads, including major, minor and certain quartal triads. And these can all be moved around melodically in minor thirds. In fact, ANY combination of notes made from the diminished scale will transpose cleanly in increments of minor thirds. OR Tritones. The modern Jazz soloist will make good use of this convenient fact. Remember: all diminished triads can be the 3rd, 5th and the 7th of B7, D7, F7, and Ab7. And those are the tonal centers to be aware of within this particular scale. You can see them very easily in our first diminished scale exercise:"

There is also a CD included with the book that illustrates how some of the patterns sound over chord changes. The thing about the patterns in this book is that they all sound great, without being cliche.

I think that this book will be a great addition to my personal practice routine and I would highly recommend it to any musician wishing to develop a modern Jazz vocabulary.

Here are some samples from the CD:

• Patterns over 'Inner Urge'
• Patterns 'Impressions'

Sample Page: Page 1

The Serious Jazz Practice Book for All Instruments: Melodic Materials for the Modern Jazz Soloist (Book & CD)

Jack Reilly's Jazz blog- the Ornette Coleman debate

I've mentioned Jack Reilly's Jazz blog here before, but it's so good that I had to plug it again. He's got a great article on there right now called 'Shaping Jazz – an Ornette Coleman debate'.

Heavyweights weigh in about Brecker

Sammy sent me the question below about Brecker's harmonic concept. I thought it would be interesting to forward it to some of today's top saxophonists and get their answers. As more replies come in I'll update this post.

"Hey David, This one is not for the blog...yet. I am phrasing my question off the cuff, and it might be unintelligible if published verbatim...

Q: How do you go about analyzing Brecker lines? They are often quite disjunct, but always sound hip when you hear the recording. (Michael Brecker, may he rest in peace, was an incredible innovator.) I've yet to see a good analysis of one of his "in and out" type of solos. Some folks claim the style comes from Coltrane...but they never point to WHICH Coltrane solos were influential. (The only Coltrane I've found that even comes close is a small section of Night Has a 1000 Eyes, an interim portion between choruses. And I haven't seen that analyzed either.) I've heard that he uses the augmented scale, but can't seem to make an analysis using augmented scales. Await your thoughtful reply.. Sammy"
__________________________________________________________________
Bob Mover-
In response to that question re: Mike, I can respond by saying that probably the best sources to talk to concerning Michael's intervallic approach would be Dave Liebman, who was an influence on Mike in the years that we were sessioning a lot together in the late '60's and early
'70's. As for the augmented scale, a fellow named Gary Campbell, an excellent saxophonist who teaches at the University of Miami, turned us all on to possibilities of that scale around that time. Mike and I spent a lot of time jamming and listening and talking music together
during that period. I remember our listening to Sonny Rollins play "Four" on his RCA recording and the way he extended that augmented scale through a whole section of the tune, was something that knocked both Mike and I out, and we copped it off the record together. Another interesting thing concerning the "inside/outside" aspects of Michael's playing that I know had an influence on him was Paul Bley's solo on "All the things you are" on the "Sonny Meets Hawk" record, as well as Sonny's playing on that record which is definitely inside/outside. We went through Bley's solo many times listening and playing along trying to figure out what on earth he was doing. Then we would go to sessions together and try to apply these concepts. Later on when Mike was with Horace and I was with Mingus, we actually would get together two or three times a month and actually study from each other. We would each give each other an hour. Mike showed me how he was working on how to artfully use pentatonics and patterns around chord changes. I showed him some of my harmonic things, such as, some of the cyclic matrices I was working on. Mike was influenced by lots of music. At the end of his life, he was studying and trying to play Serbian and Balkan folk music. Years before, Mike had turned me on to practicing Irish/Scottish reels and transposing them into different keys. As Mike got busier, and sometimes I was busy too, we would practice on the telephone together. Mike and I also did this with several other people, especially, Tom Harrell.

Mike was a wonderful guy, warm, with a great sense of humor. A generous, thoughtful, meaningful friend and a brilliant musician. I wish that he'd had more time. - Bob
____________________________________________________________________

John Gross-
I do not have an answer. I do not, with few exceptions, analyze anyone else's solo. However I feel compelled to say that M.B. was, in my opinion, one of the most important Tenor Sax players in the history of the instrument. Besides being passionate and emotional in his manner of playing he also had a huge musical intelligence which he used to it's fullest. He, along with all the other important Tenor players, was a student and fan of the music. God bless him and all the other Giants.

P.S. My personal list of the most important tenor players: Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, Stan Getz, Dexter Gordon, Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane, Wayne Shorter, Joe Henderson, Albert Ayler and Mike Brecker. Of course there are countless more great players but I believe these particular player had the greatest influence.
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Pat Tucker-
I've only transcribed 2 or 3 Brecker Solos. But I do know one influence of his which is Steve Grossman. If you listen to a late 70's Hal Galper album called: "Speak with a Single Voice", there is a modal tune on there in D minor concert where Brecker was pretty much playing all of Grossman's Lines verbatum, but cleaner (Grossman solos to compare this to are on: Elvin Jones "Live at the Lighthouse", Grossman "Born at the Same Time" and all Stone Alliance albums). Even in later Brecker's solos after that you hear him playing Grossman stuff, Steve Grossman was definitely influenced by John Coltrane. David Liebman talks about the "Loft Days" where he lived in a Loft in Manhattan in the early 70's where he, Grossman, Bob Berg and Michael Brecker would have Jam Sessions and they would all try to play like Coltrane and as fast as they could. As far as the "in and out" playing that your reader asked about, when I transcribed Gossip off of Mike Stern's "Time and Place" Album; the solo starts off in C minor, but Michael is outlining the key of Db major for the first 14 bars, I think this works because of how sparse the bass part is. Then he goes through some Giant Step type changes bars 14 to 16. Then in bars 22 to 24 he goes right down the Augmented scale. Then towards the end of the solo (bars 33 to 41) he plays this diminished lick motive to build up to the end of the solo, which is influenced by many late Coltrane solos like "Transition" etc, so that may be a solo for your reader to check out. Later, Pat
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