lydianchromaticconcept.com

motherlode mentioned an idea - quite a while ago - which he called "hearing absolute". he said at the time, that beboppers used to speak about the idea of "hearing absolute".

after his post, i asked my oldest jazz friend benny powell if he'd heard of this, while he was playing on the bebop scene in new york during the forties. i still find this idea compelling. it seems like this is what people did - who had the confidence to do so. and i'm attempting to open up our discussion to the idea that "not knowing" is more important than "knowing" - a statement that cage and einstein both made in different ways. and which was also made by anything charlie parker, ornette coleman, or charles mingus ever played.

and it seems to me that so much of george russell's music falls into this category as well. listening to the recent re-issue of the band from newport 1964 with john gilmore, it's really striking that no matter what concept drives the musical structure it never loses its freedom and its ability to soar in any direction at any time. and to anyone interested in how music developed after charlie parker, i can only recommend listening to this and hearing the astonishing variety of sounds - a language with it's own unique unspoken meaning.

b

great post... especially with a car like that in the driveway.

this is truly great subect matter... and at least we made a start on it.

thanks.

b

ML One of my friends just played a gig with Moody and said his enthusiasm for learning was like that of a youngster. He was woodshedding lines and trying to get the younger cats to show them the stuff they were working on.

my interest in “hearing absoluteâ€

I am in debt to the brilliant souls in this forum for such enlightening posts!
-I truthfully enjoyed this article more than any other

Any-who, my reason for posting was that I have a book recommendation.
-Have any of you guys read it?

"Hearing Chaos" by Judy Lochhead.

That looks interesting. I'll try and get one through the library. She teaches at SUNY I think.

It's on jstor. I just downloaded it. Will report back later.

b

thanks to dds1234!

i'm now doing a grad project on the judy lochhead piece. she creates a very interesting argument for placing music alongside art theory, literature, and science as a leading contributor to the development of chaos theories.

it's beautifully researched. and as an example of what one can do to create greater understanding and make a difference in the future of musicians inclined to the evolution of vocabularies - it's a testimony!

she stretches from schoenberg through cage and aacm to the grateful dead - weaving through time and across subjects.

highly recommended: judy lochhead "hearing chaos"