This unit highlights the importance of the consideration and choice of numbers/charts/repertoire for your musical ensemble. Andy focuses on the power of collaboration and the importance of group discussion as ways to find new music to play together.
Keeping our musical minds alive and alert is a joy. The thrill of making music, a slight nuance here and there, keeping our ears wide open, the speed of reaction! Wow! It goes on! The incredible skills of communication that music gives us is invaluable in day-to-day life.
A lot of professional musicians that we know devote a certain percentage of their musical life to innovative and creative projects, with the other time containing more practical and financially-focussed elements. The name of the game at this difficult time is survival.
For 20 years Andy Scott has coached saxophone quartets composed of students at the Royal Northern College of Music. They need to study the standard repertoire, and just play together, after which (if they haven’t fallen out!) they can check out many and varied stylistic routes and repertoire. This route, paying your dues in effect, is crucial, as is not tackling repertoire that is too difficult musically and/or too technically-demanding too soon. This is why having a teacher to guide you is important (we’re talking more from a classical/contemporary perspective within this scenario).
If you’re coming at this from a pop, rock, funk, jazz, folk (and many more styles) then there’s a different take on choosing charts/numbers (let’s drop the word ‘repertoire’ in this section :-). Are you exclusively playing your own music? Are you a covers band, or reimagining existing charts by arranging them yourselves? As with all groups, regardless of musical genre/style, the choice of what we play is first of all determined by the purpose and direction of the group (see the previous unit), and may also be influenced by factors such as programming themes and collaboration that is discussed in future units.
In 1995, percussionist/drummer Dave Hassell & Andy started a duo. It has morphed over the years in terms of what they play, initially being a combination of original charts, arrangements and free improvisation. They had to create their own repertoire and some of the key factors that allowed them to do this were and are; listening skills, experience, musical imagination, musical open-mindedness.
So, how can any group effectively choose what they play if they haven’t done some serious listening prior to this moment?
Discussion, personal taste….. ‘have you heard this?’, ‘check this out…’, ‘there’s something about this that connects with me’ … . This is part of the magic that music brings, and our ears, eyes and minds need to be open and ready to appreciate these effects. The deeper that we listen the more we feel a connection with the music. We need to be instinctive, go with our gut feeling….. ‘yes, this connects with me!’
So, the choice of charts/numbers/repertoire may be a little more complex than it looks. But this is great! There’s a lot of discussion to be had and learning from each other during and post discussion is a vital part of our musical journey together.
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