My friend and former trumpet for Seven Jazz West, Gary Trosclair, is putting on a combination semniar and jazz concert on Friday June 3 at the Carl Jung Center in Manhattan. You might know CJ Jung from his writings on the collective unconscious, or his influence on Sting’s songwriting in the Synchronicity era. I didn’t know he had a center named after him here in town, but I had a feeling.
Gary’s day job is a psychologist, author and lecturer, and expert on Jung, so you see it all makes sense. Gary had to leave 7JW about a year ago – had some dental problems – but now he’s playing trumpet again and put together a group for this event called The Archetypal Jazz Quintet, mainly players from the Haven Street Quintet, some of whom were also in 7JW and are some of the best players I know. It should be a really fun and interesting time. I’ve never really thought about jazz from a Jungian perspective, although doing so for just a minute or two lights up some interesting lines of thought. So I’m really keen on hearing what he has to say.
We’ve been hard at work, learning another batch of new tunes, this time some classics by The Beatles, The Band, some funky and abstract Bowie, and some Al Green (not an artist whose name begins with a B, I know). Lots of good stuff. Hope to see you there!
LEFT HOOK
Music with a punch!
Westchester’s classic rock Funk & soul party band
Saturday May 14, 8:30 PM
Fisherman’s Net
129 6th St. Pelham
Lots going on these days. Last night LEFT HOOK played at Victor’s in Hawthorne. I bought one new piece of gear for this show: a lightweight collapsible handtruck to help schlep the PA from the car to the hall. It really came in handy cuz Victors is up on a hill so you have to go up a big ramp and thru two or three rooms to get to the place where the band is playing.
I played Victors a couple years ago in my old band with Gus, and we didn’t have much of a turnout because there was an unexpected November snowstorm. Well last night we didn’t have much of a turnout either, a couple of friends of Jeannie and Gus, and whoever was there at the bar anyway. But band sounded great, and the people who were there really dug it, and the bar paid us well. Ken got a new 4×10 cabinet which has alot of presence. As fate would have it, on the way home there was an unexpected storm of hail and sleet, and this morning my car was covered in ice.
We didn’t add any new songs for this show, but this week we’ve got a bunch lined up to work in for the next gig. I’ll be singing some Bowie. Psyched about that.
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You may have noticed that, recent hailstorms notwithstanding, winter is over and spring has arrived. Daylight and sunshine again. I’ve been kinda sick the last few weeks and have only just been feeling better again, so I haven’t had a chance to much yardwork yet. Today I was gonna do the first round of raking and trimming, but it was too cold and windy. I did get some grass seed down a few days ago before it started raining, in the spot where the stump used to be, so hopefully that’ll take.
Easter came early this year. Last weekend Martin’s came down on Saturday and we went to Jeannie’s parents on Sunday. The kids have been off from school all week. Nice to have a little family time. I gave Lizzy another driving lesson today. She drove to her old elementary school and back. Learning to deal with real streets, stop signs, turn signals, other cars, and pulling in and out of parking spots. So far doing very well, but still hasn’t gone above 20 mph.
I got my Mustang on the road a couple times. This spring it started right up, no need to charge the battery. I took it in for an oil change and a safety inspection, and my mechanic told me it’s got some leaks in the underside including the differential, so hopefully there’ll be a nice day net week where I can get that taken care of.
Here’s another jazz demo in what I hope will become an ongoing series:
The group liked my last song, Dark Skies, but they really love this one. Your Dancing shoes was originally written as song with lyrics, and I recorded it for the Buzzy Tonic album Elixr. But since my rock band is not really open to doing originals and my jazz band is, I thought I’d try a jazz arrangement of it. It has a funk-boogie feel, in the same zone as songs like Red Clay and Mercy Mercy Mercy, and it’s great fun to play. They bass player Jay was particular enthusiastic after having just read the sheet music, and our drummer Mike wants to do the song in the Wednesday jazz group.
As an aside, our piano player Rich recently sold his business and retired and is going back to school to study jazz piano. He’s a really good piano player already even though he told me really only started playing and studying when was 50 years old. He’s 60 or so now. You really gotta admire that. (He’s also one of those guys who works out, so like my brother Martin he appears alot younger than his age in both looks and energy level.) He’s been encouraging me with my composing, and I’ve been encouraging him to write some stuff to bring to the group too.
Gary has been continuing to record our rehearsal, so hopefully sometime soon we’ll capture a good performance of these new originals. Meanwhile I’m gonna go ahead with my next jazz demo, a thing I’m calling Buzzy Blue.
Here’s some video from our recent gig at Burke’s, cut up into a bench of easily digestible medleys. You can also here the full songs. Enjoy! And while you’re at it check out the update LEFT HOOK home page.
I’m happy to say that the show at Michelle’s school was a smashing success. The theme this year was Give My Regards to Broadway, and it was basically a revue of show tunes. There were alot of talented kids in this year’s graduating class. Some years there’s just one or two eighth graders, but this year there were more than thirty, including a good handful of soloists. They did the same Phantom/Les Mis medley that we did in the Cabaret show a few years ago, and I’d say they did a better job. This is the fifth year or so I played in the band in its various permutations, maybe the seventh show. It gets easier and more fun every year as I’ve gotten to feel familiar with this group of musicians, and at this point I’ve played with everyone in the group. My playing is at a level now where I can read thru the songs once and pretty much be good. I only learned Friend Like Me when we were setting up for the first show.
Another highlight: Michelle had a ukulele solo in We Are Made of Stars. We practiced that one together a few times. She nailed it.
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Today I gave Lizzy her first lesson in driving a car. I gave her a basic safety primer then took her to an empty parking lot and had her practice driving around slowly, doing circuits of the lot, mainly just lifting her foot off the brake and letting the car roll. Once she got comfortable with starting and stopping and steering and shifting between park and drive, I let her give it a bit of gas. She got up to 11 mph (17kph) one time! Then on the way home I had her drive the last block to our house and park in the driveway. She did very well and was quite thrilled. Next time I’ll have her go in reverse and learn to park with a bit of precision, and maybe even try some neighborhood streets, get up to 15 or 20!
Spring is creeping closer. Days are getting longer and warmer. No flowers yet, but I’m thinking of taking the Mustang out already! Lots of music events happening these days with the kids. Lots of running around.
Lizzy just finished with her school play yesterday. They did a production of Rogers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella. It was very well done. Lizzy was in the chorus and had one line (she did great!). The fact that she’s new at the school notwithstanding I was a bit surprised she didn’t get a bigger part, being and experienced singer and all. But it turns out there’s alot of talent at that school. All the leads were superb, as was the orchestra. I guess it’s a high school after all, and I’m more used to the K-8 or K-12 performances. They did four shows in four days and it was a huge amount of work and she had a great time, and a bonding experience for the kids. But on to the next thing.
This coming weekend is honor band. Both Lizzy and Michelle are in it. Michelle still plays clarinet regularly in her school band, but Lizzy is dusting off her flute for the first time in a while. Still, they’re both very excited as always.
Then the week after that is the musical at Michelle’s school. The eight graders are the big kids in this production, and this year they have some good talent too. I’ll be playing in the orchestra for this one, and so last week I got a couple CD’s and a big packet of sheet music. I’ve listened thru a couple times and read thru it once, so I’m set for joining them in rehearsal next week. I’m doing ukulele on one song, We’re All Made of Stars. Michelle learned the uke part too, so she’s gonna do it on stage while I double her from the pit. So we’re practicing that song together every day.
Hi everyone, okay our next gig is the first weekend of April. Hope to see you there. I don’t think we’ll be adding very many new tunes for this, but mainly tightening up what we got to take it to the next level.
If you google Victors you’ll see the first review says it’s an awful place, like some guy got in an altercation with one of the regulars and blamed it on the establishment. Who knows? I gotta tell you I’ve played gigs there before and it’s just fine. It’s a good size room with a great big bar and good veiws from most everywhere. They have live bands an open mics up there alot.
LEFT HOOK
Music with a punch!
Westchester’s classic rock Funk & soul party band
Saturday April 2, 9 pm
Victors Bar & Grill
500 Commerce St. Hawthorne
Work on the last couple tracks for the third Buzzy Tonic record, Elixr continues apace, with the epic and angular Plague of Frogs, the new and funky Leave the City Behind, and the poignant Ballad of Galadriel in the offing. But meanwhile I’ve taken on another recording project, albeit of a much lighter nature.
My Saturday jazz group, the Haven Street Quintet, is advanced enough that I figure it’s worth trying to do some originals. It’s kind of amazing to me how few musicians actually write, but to me it’s always been part of the deal, even if only aspiratiionally in the days before I figured out how. Alot if my earliest songs were jazz compositions, and in fact I wrote quite a few before I took on the added challenge of writing lyrics and singing.
In a way writing jazz song is much easier than writing a rock or pop song, because all you really need is a sketch: a melody, some chords, a feel, and maybe an overarching concept. Then you leave it to the musicians to fill in the details and bring it to life.
The first couple of songs I brought to the group we already fully composed, first played by my 80’s fusion group Event Horizon – (I Miss My) Baby in Bb and Solstice. And although the sounded pretty good, they weren’t really right for the direction of the group. Baby in Bb in particular is an uptempo funk, and doesn’t translate on an upright bass. Also I wrote it on alto sax, and it lays just terribly on the tenor. So we’d have to change the key as well as the groove to make it work. Solstice doesn’t have any of those problems, but it’s through-composed enough that learning the structure is non-trivial. Might as well move on!
I have about a half-dozen ideas I can use as the basis for songs for the HSQ. The first of these I’ve named Dark Skies. It’s based on a fragment I’ve had in my head for a long time, but always needed something to complete. I was humming it on the way home from jazz last Saturday and came up with a bridge that was perfect. Came home and banged it out on piano.
There’s no point in trying to track a jazz song on the computer, because the performance is where it’s at. So I had the idea to make a quick demo just to get across the sound. It came out quite well, and was a amazingly fast to record. I tracked the piano on MIDI, and then just repeated the head a second time to provide a backing for the first solo. The bass and drums are MIDI also, just an outline of the rhythm and harmony. The drums are little more than a click track with some pauses and accents. But then I put a sax track over it and that really brought the whole thing to life. I nailed it on the first take. The effects are all well-known presets I just dialed in, some reverb on the horn and some compression on the master out. It only took a couple hours from start to finish.
Hopefully we’ll do it at practice next week and it’ll light up with the band. If all goes well I’m gonna try to knock off a jazz demo every week or two while I finish the last couple tracks of my rock album, a sort of side project within a project. Best case scenario we’ll have some fun and unique new material for the group, and it’ll push us toward the next level. Worst case I’ll have a nice little collection of jazz demos.
