From harunobut@sbcglobal.net Fri Jul 15 12:34:20 2011
Subject:Re: Hammond & Leslie and SK1 & Ventilator ..

In Japan, many of them don't know the concept which Jimmy Smith and other
legendary organ players invented. Why? I know that kid and most of jazz organ
players here since I moved to Japan from the US. Many of them don't use the
appropriate drawbar settings for jazz (especially C/V). Plus, they don't get the
concept of "Groove".

I learned with Tony Monaco and Chris Foreman fortunately, so they taught me the
right concept, but in Japan, I know most of the jazz organ players, and they
don't have the right concept. Well, the right concept could be subjective, but
it's the way of most jazz organists do. They do imitate, but they don't usually
imitate the depth of playing. I mean, they only imitate superficial stuff. Also,
like somebody else pointed out, they are not good at creating their own style.
However, they are disciplined.

Hal
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiiOv25d-q8

________________________________
From: Daniel Forró
To: CloneWheel@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Sat, July 16, 2011 2:14:57 AM
Subject: Re: [CWSG] Re: Hammond & Leslie and SK1 & Ventilator ..


General problem with musicians in Japan is they are diligent but not
too creative. This is true for both teachers and their students.
Confucianism is still deeply imprinted in Japanese mentality, so
teacher is a god, even when not so good. Mechanical drill and copying
teacher or anything what's recorded is the main way of study.
Japanese are also bad in improvisation, I didn't meet much musicians
here able to improvise even simple things. They are afraid of it, in
art as well in real life (it's very rare here that a train has delay,
so when there would be just one minute delay, Japanese would start to
panic... that's also reason why so many mistakes happened in
Fukushima atomic plant problem solution).

Even jazz musicians learn choruses and improvisations just from
scores, note by note. Same with classical music. So in the end they
just play only notes, not music, without deeper understanding the
musical context and structure. Each note is played perfectly, but I'm
sorry - series of perfectly performed individual notes are far from
making music.

It's rather closed world, and many really talented musicians go study
abroad, and unfortunately don't return to Japan to improve situation.
The reason is also they will have not so much opportunities to
perform here. One reason is that amateur scene is very strong here,
and lot of opportunity is stolen by amateur volunteers who are happy
to show their art even for small payment or without any payment.
Nothing against them - level and knowledge of some of them is really
astonishing, quite comparable to pro level of Western musicians.

I also have never met in my life so many performers on so many
unusual instruments like during my last 8 years here in Japan - be it
ocarina, Theremin (even that funny type looking like Russian doll
matryoshka - I've seen quite bizarre ladies orchestra!), Ondes
Martenot, harmonica, traditional Japanese and Asian instruments,
taishokoto, ethnic instruments from world, even pipe organ, reed
organ, toy piano, mouth drum...

Children study music since very early age (thanks to their careful
and ambitious mothers), and are forced to work really hard, so lack
of talent is balanced by diligence. But result can't be quite good,
of course. Children have also school brass bands, choirs, and even
symphonic orchestras.

But after junior high school they must concentrate on the other
subjects and art and music education usually stops...

Never mind, not everybody can become professional musician. Anyway
music study has good effect to brain, and people with such background
will love music even later. Don't forget karaoke is also Japanese
invention :-) (this word combines Japanese "kara" = empty and
Japplish shortage "oke" = okesutora = orchestra) - they like this
entertainment and everybody can sing at least.

Daniel Forro

On Jul 16, 2011, at 1:23 AM, Lou C wrote: