[Dixielandjazz] Re: "Twinkle, Twinkle" the same as "Wonderful World"?

[Larry Walton Entertainment]

Laurence Swain wrote:
> Larry Walton wrote:
>
>   
>> I also don't agree at all that
>> Melodic jazz is a disparaging term akin to elevator music. An example
>> of this is Louis Armstrong's "What a wonderful World"  Very few
>> people, even musicians, recognize this as Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
>> until they are told that's what it is.  This is a perfect example of
>> hiding something in plain sight and converting a children's tune via
>> Jazz into something entirely different.
>>     
>
> This is a stretch, at best. 
>
> At worst, it's dead wrong. 
>
> There are 4 chords in Twinkle: C, C7 (not even sure this one is in Haydn's original, as the 
> tune sounds fine without it), F, G7.
>
> There are more, and some dramatically different, chords in Wonderful.
>   
Of course that's what jazz does, change things and expand chordal 
structures if it didn't we wouldn't have jazz.  you could have pointed 
out that the rhythm wasn't exactly the same either or that the bridge 
was added.  All elements of  composition.  If he kept it exactly the 
same we would have twinkle twinkle instead we get Wonderful world.  He 
seems to have borrowed the quote and used it in the opening bars.  It's 
done all the time.  I just think he was very clever about it.
> Even asserting that "jazzing up" Twinkle brings us Wonderful is a stretch on what 
> improvising is in OKOM.
>   
I didn't think I said he was improvising although composing and 
improvising are very similar.  I would agree that it might be a stretch 
because we don't know what he was actually thinking and as far as I know 
he didn't talk about it and could be as you assert a completely wrong 
assumption.
> Larry Swain 
> l.swain at comcast.net
>
>
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