[Dixielandjazz] Mopo's belated response to "How Bass Solos Ruined Jazz"

[Donald Mopsick]

You may be interested in my response to "How Bass Solos Ruined Jazz"

http://www.jazz.com/jazz-blog/2008/5/19/how-bass-solos-ruined-jazz

a blog posted LAST YEAR by an Alan Kurtz on jazz.com. You can read my
response there or with the paragraphs intact here.

My understanding is that Kurtz is a non-musician and apparently has
not listened to much jazz in the prewar style. As the I Ching says,
"no blame." It's amazing how much the blog stirred up the bass
players, which says more about them than about the author.

Here is my response FWIW. I (and Dick Hyman in Keyboard magazine) have
written previously about how bass AMPS have also ruined jazz.

I come at this subject from a point of view not seen in any of the
comments so far. By way of introduction, I have been holding down the
bass chair of the Jim Cullum Jazz Band in San Antonio since 1991 and
have appeared with them on the Riverwalk Jazz public radio series
(www.riverwalkjazz.org) since then. We're heard nationwide on over 150
stations by about a million people weekly, with a listener base age
ranging from pre-teens to Greatest Generation.

I play an old German double bass strung with gut strings and high
action in the pre-amplified manner. I don't get to solo very often,
and that's just fine with me.

Kurtz is correct in pointing out that the role of the bass in jazz
changed after LaFaro, just as all the great innovators on their
instruments, by definition, moved the goal-posts higher (or lower for
Kurtz). You may be surprised to know that I very much enjoy those
startlingly creative sessions. I love most kinds of well-crafted and
thoughtful music, but for the moment I choose to play in an ancient (I
call it Jurassic) style most of you would find quite unfamiliar.

I was fortunate to have taught bass at the Stanford summer jazz camp
along with the great modern NY bassist Greg Ryan, who said to the
students, "We are in a service industry. We spend our professional
lives making others look good." In my own teaching, I put a heavy
emphasis on the importance of supplying the rest of the band with
evenly-played, definite, swinging, quarter notes as job #1.

I was also fortunate to have worked with the late drummer Mousey
Alexander. To his ear, the highly developed, technically "awesome"
post-LaFaro low-action bassists play the instrument with a guitar, not
a bass, conception.

Which, again, in the right hands can be really enjoyable to listen to,
but then who's minding the store? "Bass," an abbreviation of the
Italian "basso," has the same meaning as the English "base," as in
"basement" or foundation. The reason that I play in this foundation
style is precisely because of this "mission creep" morphing of the
role of the bass into co-equal soloist, most importantly--at the
expense of the foundation, the erosion of which causes the collapse of
the entire edifice. This is why the great Milt Hinton compared his
role as bassist to the Greek deity Atlas, the world resting on his
shoulders. Hinton, along with George Duvivier, Pops Foster, Wellman
Braud, and countless others which most of you have never heard, were
to me the great Atlases.

The saxophonist Bob Wilber once heard my impression of Slam Stewart, a
style in which the soloist sings an octave above the bowed bass solo.
He encouraged me to keep it in the act, saying that it was the best
way the audience could hear what a bass solo was supposed to be about.
By the way, when Slam wasn't zinging his solos, he played very strong,
excellent foundation bass behind everyone.

The post-LaFaro style dominates jazz, and yes, the notes are hard to
hear in the low register. That's why bass players are interested in
the solos but everyone else may not find them as riveting. But please
be aware that there is an entire world out there--of players, fans,
festivals, parties, and recordings, and one radio show--for whom bass
solos don't suck--because there just aren't that many of them as
you're used to.

Don Mopsick