[Dixielandjazz] stride vs. comp

[John Farrell]

The Sheik said :

" In OKOM, there's a basic hierarchy: Horns are at the top, piano, then
banjo/guitar in the middle, bass below them, and drums at the bottom. Rhythm
players have to understand that they are there to support the horns"

The trumpet/leader of quite a well known band in which I occupied the piano
chair subscribed to this reasoning too, so I left after three months. He
wanted me to be a ghostly figure in the background knocking out chords four
to the bar with no embellishments, it was something like playing a very
large banjo. On the rare occasions when a one-chorus piano solo came up the
bass player would grumble at me for playing stride, saying that my left hand
interfered with his classic jazz bass line (my suggestion that he dropped
out during piano solos fell on deaf, hostile ears). Eventually it became
clear to me that the bandleader regarded the front line as the only good
reason for the rest of us being there.

In a band consisting of accomplished musicians the top of the hierarchical
tree is not the horns - it is the music itself. Each band member is a
crucial subscriber to the collective sound, no individual is subservient to
another, they are equals. Rhythm players are not there to support the horns,
they are there to provide rhythm and harmony - the horns are there to
provide melody. Each depends on the other for the music to work as it
should.

John Farrell
stridepiano at tesco.net
http://homepages.tesco.net/~stridepiano/midifiles.htm