nothing like a Buddy quote to stir the pot

A

Anthony Amodeo

Guest
56077229079063102180115.jpg


discuss
 
Buddys views on music were just a bit narrow.The rock drummers that he did like were actually jazz/rock/fusion guys like Seraphine and,Columby .To Buddy there was Jazz......and everything else.

But I still love his playing and contribution to music.He was just in a name and a word.,not to mention a force of nature....Buddy.:)

Steve B
 
Buddy's wasn't very adept at seeing things from someone else's point of view.
It's a pretty pig headed statement, no matter what era he lived in.
 
I actually have that magazine that quote came from! But to further clarify what I think he meant was that in terms of creativity, symphony players (he feels) are given music to interpret. He's not having to create something out of thin air, as a jazz musician would have to when they tell him to solo and only give him the chords he can use to outline what he plays. So I understood where he was coming from. It's like rappers - I admit, I've never seen anyone create rhythmic rhyming until I saw a very good rapper do it on the spot, and love the medium or not, it's pretty gutsy. Or David Bowie walking into a recording studio and starting to sing while the band was playing something new, without knowing what he would be saying beforehand.

Symphony players are very good players, and I know many of them are very good at creating things, so maybe Buddy was being a bit unfair. But when you think about it, it's unlikely you'll ever hear an entire symphony orchestra improvise something, although they probably could do that very well indeed.
 
I'm terribly offended by this quote!
Not really, but at least he was honest about his feelings towards other genres and didn't have to worry about being PC.
I suspect there are number of members who might agree with this sentiment if starting a forum scuffle wasn't a concern?
 
Just more forum hate and discontent. In other words, lets just shake things up a bit, it's just too quiet around here.

Dennis
 
I don't have the interview to set the context, but I remember Miles talking about the difference between jazz and symphonic players in similar terms in his autobiography, how the symphonic players were "robots" who could only play what was put in front of them. I know Buddy didn't think much of rock musicians, but I wonder if he wasn't referring to the divide with orchestral musicians more than anything else.

Or, he was just trying to piss people off :)
 
Symphonic musicians creativity is strictly limited to interpretations of the score that the conductor agrees with.

In a very real sense the symphony orchestra is the "instrument" through which the artist (composer and to a lesser degree the conductor) expresses himself.

It may seem arrogant at first but Buddy's statement is true. He didn't say "only truly creative artist is the jazz musician". He said "The only truly creative musician is the jazz musician".

Classical instrumentalists are not there to be creative as a primary responsibility.
 
He may have been the greatest but he was definitely an asshole.

The Barry Bonds of drumming, perhaps?

My 80 year old mother who never listened to a jazz LP in her life knew who Buddy Rich was very well. The guy was a star in his day. All over the television.
 
Symphonic musicians creativity is strictly limited to interpretations of the score that the conductor agrees with.

In a very real sense the symphony orchestra is the "instrument" through which the artist (composer and to a lesser degree the conductor) expresses himself.

It may seem arrogant at first but Buddy's statement is true. He didn't say "only truly creative artist is the jazz musician". He said "The only truly creative musician is the jazz musician".

Classical instrumentalists are not there to be creative as a primary responsibility.

Buddy suggests he didn't study other forms of music, just a form of music that was a few decades old when Buddy made this statement. People in Asia, Africa, Europe, the Middle East and Indian subcontinent discovered improvisation while Europe and the US were still populated with nomadic tribes. How little he really knew.
 
Buddy actually was quite aware of other forms of music. He recorded this album with Alla Rakha: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_à_la_Rakha

In fairness to Buddy, I think he would have considered improvisational music from pretty much anywhere to be "jazz."

Funny how people take a quote taken completely out of context and try to read yarns into it. Who knows what he meant or if he even meant it at all. Buddy was no stranger to show-biz and he recognized the value of controversy.
 
In essence he is wrong when he says truly creative but I understand what he means.
 
I was lost in translation, once. Almost never found my way home.

How did that end up?

It's all a bit of a moot point to me. Classical music went through a strict composition phase but there was plenty of improv before that and modern classical composers often allow for improv.

Buddy is not the messiah, he's just a very naughty boy!
 
In fairness to Buddy, I think he would have considered improvisational music from pretty much anywhere to be "jazz."

Except that he really looked down on rock musicians, who are by and large highly improvisational. Maybe from a more limited vocabulary borne of mostly being "by ear" musicians. I wonder what he would have thought of rock musicians with modern conservatory educations.
 
Back
Top